A Plague on Both Your Houses (26 page)

There were more bodies in Bridge Street, although

the area around St John’s Hospital was relatively clean thanks to the Austin Canons. Bartholomew talked to the Canons and they agreed, albeit reluctantly, to pick up bodies they saw on the way to the plague pits when they took their own dead there. He walked on to St Edmund’s Priory and obtained a similar agreement there, along with the promise of a lay-brother to supervise the filling of the plague pits.

Bartholomew’s plans to keep the town free from

plague-ridden bodies were beginning to come together.

He still needed volunteers to drive the carts each day and collect up the piles of dead. He knew the risk of infection was great, but it was a job that had to be done.

He stood looking at the plague pit that he and Colet

had organised almost two weeks before. It was so full that there was scarcely room to add the quicklime over the last layer of corpses, let alone cover it with earth afterwards.

He shivered. It was a desolate spot, even though it lay only a short distance from the town gates. The wind

seemed colder near the pit, and whistled softly through the scrubby trees and bushes that partially shielded it from the road. He went to a nearby tavern and offered

to buy ale for any who would help him dig a new pit. At first, there was no response. Then a man stood, and said he would buy ale for any who could dig faster or deeper than he could. This met with catcalls and hoots, but the man strode out of the tavern rolling up his sleeves, and others followed.

In a short time, a new pit was dug, larger than the

previous one and about twice as deep. Men competed

with each other to show off their strength while, more sedately, women and even small children helped, ferrying stones from the pit to the ever-growing pile of earth to one side. Bartholomew took his turn in digging and heaving great stones out of the way. During a brief

respite, Bartholomew went to speak to the man who

had instigated the competitive spirit.

‘Thank you, Master Blacksmith,’ he said. “I thought

I might have to dig it alone.’

The blacksmith grinned, revealing the yellow-black

teeth that Bartholomew remembered from the night of

the riot. ‘It will cost you in ale,’ he said.

When the new pit had been dug, Bartholomew’s

helpers began to drift away. He handed over all the

money he had to buy the promised ale and was pleasantly surprised to receive half of it back again with mutters that it was too much. He shovelled lime into the pit,

and watched as it bubbled and seethed in the water at

the bottom. The blacksmith helped him bury the first

bodies, a pathetic line of ten crudely-wrapped shapes.

Bartholomew covered them with more lime, and leaned

on the spade wiping the sweat from his eyes.

The blacksmith came to stand beside him. “I am

sorry,’ he said, and pushed something into Bartholomew’s hand. Bartholomew, bewildered, looked at the

greasy black purse in his hand, and then back at the

blacksmith. Abruptly the blacksmith turned away and

began to walk back to the tavern. Bartholomew caught

up with him, and swung him round.

‘What is this?’

The blacksmith refused to meet Bartholomew’s eyes.

“I did not want to do it. I told them it was wrong,’ he mumbled, trying to head for the tavern. Bartholomew held him fast.

‘What was wrong? What are you talking about? I do

not want your money.’

The blacksmith looked up at the low clouds scudding

overhead in the growing dusk. ‘It is the money I got

for the riot,’ he said. “I kept it all this time. I only spent enough to get some of my lads drunk enough to be

brave on the night, and some to bury Mistress Atkin’s

son. It is Judas money and I do not want it.’

Bartholomew shook his head in bewilderment.

‘What are you talking about?’ he said. ‘Did someone

pay you to start the riot?’

The blacksmith looked Bartholomew full in the

face, his eyes round. ‘Yes, they paid me to get some

of the lads excited. You know how it was that day - that pompous bastard throwing his wealth around while us

poor folk stood and watched and waited for scraps like dogs.’ He spat on the ground. ‘They seemed to know

how it would be, and they paid me to make sure there

was a fight. Once the fight was started, I was to find you and warn you off.’

He paused, and searched Bartholomew’s face,

earnestly looking for some reaction to his confession.

Bartholomew thought back to the riot, of his last-minute dash into the College with the enraged mob behind him, and of Abigny telling him that Henry Oliver had ordered Francis Eltham to lock him out. Surely the whole thing had not been staged to get at him? Bartholomew shook

his head in disbelief. What could he have done that

people wanted him dead? He racked his brain for

patients who might have died in his care, wondering

whether his unorthodox treatment might have seemed

to have killed when leeches might have saved, but he

could think of none. Unbidden, Sir John’s benign face

came into his mind. But what had Sir John done, or

Augustus and Aelfrith, to warrant their murders? He

recalled Henry Oliver’s looks of hatred at him since the riot every time they inadvertently met.

The blacksmith, watching Bartholomew’s brows

drawn down in thought, continued. ‘It seemed like

an easy way to earn some decent money at first, and trade had been poor, with the threat of the Death coming. I did a good job, getting people roused up

against Michaelhouse. But it went wrong. It all got out of control before I could do anything, and the two lads died. Then you helped Rachel Atkin, and you set my leg.

I have felt wrong ever since, which is why I have not spent the money. My broken leg was God’s judgement on me

for my actions. The men who gave me the money came

to see me while my leg was mending, and I told them

that I had warned you as they asked, just to get them

out of my house.’

‘Get who out?’ asked Bartholomew, the whole mess

slowly revolving in his mind, a confused jumble.

The blacksmith shook his head. “I wish I knew,

because I would tell you. These are evil men, and

you.

I would wish you to be on your guard against

them.’

‘Where did they approach you?’

The blacksmith nodded over to the tavern. ‘In there.

I was having a quiet drink, and I got a message telling me that if I went outside, I could be a rich man. I went, and there were two men. They told me to cause a bit of a

fight on the day of old fatso’s ceremony, and to get you alone and warn you off.’

‘What exactly did they say?’

The blacksmith closed his eyes and screwed up his

face as he sought to recall the exact words. ‘They said that I should just say to you “stay away”. Those were their very words!’ he said triumphantly, pleased at his feat of memory.

‘What were these people like?’

“I could not say. Only one spoke, but I do not recall

his voice. He was quite big, about your size, I would say.

The other was smaller, but both of them wore thick

cloaks with hoods, and I could not see their faces.’

Bartholomew and the blacksmith stood side by

side in the darkness for several moments before the

blacksmith spoke again. ‘If I knew who they were, I

would tell you. The only thing I can think of, and it is not much, is that the purse they gave me is nice. See?’

Bartholomew took a few steps to where he could

see the purse in the faint light from the tavern windows.

The purse had been fine in its time, but weeks in the

blacksmith’s grubby hands had begrimed its soft leather and all but worn away the insignia sewn in gold on the side. Bartholomew examined it more closely, turning it this way and that to try to make the gold thread catch the light. As he did so, the insignia suddenly stood out clearly. ‘BH’ - the initials of Bene’t Hostel! He had seen Hugh Stapleton with a purse almost identical when he

had been out with Abigny once.

He tipped the money out of the purse into his

hand. About five marks, an enormous sum of money

for a blacksmith. He turned round again. ‘You keep

this,’ he said, pushing the money towards the blacksmith and slipping the empty purse into his belt. ‘What is done is done. Thank you for telling me all this. I had no idea that I had such powerful enemies.’

The blacksmith gave a short laugh devoid of humour.

‘Oh, they are powerful right enough. I could tell that just by the way they spoke to me. They are people used to ordering others about.’ He put a mud-stained hand

on Bartholomew’s shoulder. “I wish I had told you this before, but you seemed to be doing well enough. I do

not want the money, though. I might go to hell if I

take it knowing what it was for - and these days, a man cannot be sure of getting the chance to confess before he is taken.’ He looked in distaste at the silver coins in his rough hand.

Before Bartholomew could stop him, he flung them

all in the direction of the pit. Bartholomew saw some of them glitter as they plunged into its steaming depths.

The blacksmith smiled. ‘It is all right now,’ he said

quietly. ‘The blood money is where it belongs.’

Bartholomew offered his thanks again, and made

for home. He hoped that all the coins had disappeared

into the quicklime. He did not want to think of people climbing into the pit to fetch them out.

He walked slowly, breathing in the cold night air

in an attempt to clear his reeling mind. He was wholly confused. Someone had tried to warn him to stay away

the same night that Augustus, Paul, and Montfitchet

were murdered. But stay away from what? Had it been

Hugh Stapleton who had issued the warning? Were there

others with Bene’t Hostel purses? Was it Abigny who had hired the blacksmith, since he was so often at Bene’t

Hostel and was apparently involved in something that

had led him to pretend to be Philippa? But Michael had witnessed that it had been Abigny who had kept Francis Eltham from closing the gates until Bartholomew was

safely inside. Gray had been at Bene’t’s too. Was he

involved? It did not make sense. He wished Sir John or Aelfrith were alive so that he could tell them the whole insane muddle and they could help him to sort it out.

He had already decided not to confide in his family, but who else could he trust? Michael? Bartholomew did not

understand the monk’s role in the death of Augustus,

nor his position in the wretched Oxford plot. Abigny was clearly involved and, anyway, he had fled. The loathing he felt for Wilson was mutual, and how could he trust a man who skulked in his room and left the College to its own devices when it needed a strong Master? He considered

the Chancellor and the Bishop, but what did he have

to tell them? There was only his word that Aelfrith had been poisoned, and that Augustus had been dead when

he disappeared. And the Chancellor and Bishop were

unlikely to be impressed with him for producing the

blacksmith as a witness, a self-confessed rabble-rouser and a man notorious for his drunkenness. With a heavy

sigh, Bartholomew arrived at the same conclusion he

had reached at Stanmore’s house: that there was no

one with whom he could speak, and he would have to

reason through the muddle of facts alone.

Having reached St Michael’s Church, he walked

across the churchyard and stood looking down at the

pile of earth that marked Aelfrith’s grave.

‘Why?’ he whispered into the night. “I do not

understand.’

He rethought the blacksmith’swords as he crouched

down in the long grass that grew over Aelfrith’s mound.

He had no reason to believe the man was lying. Were the mysterious men at the tavern ordering Bartholomew to

stay away from Augustus? The blacksmith suggested that one of the men was educated and used to giving orders.

Could it have been Wilson, suspecting that something

might happen to Augustus and wishing to conceal the

entire matter before it had occurred? He had certainly tried to hide the truth later.

Bartholomew stood, and stretched his aching limbs.

It had been a long day, and the more he thought about

it, the more loose ends there were and the murkier the matter became. He was tired and wanted to concentrate

on finding Philippa. She might be in danger, and his

feeble attempts at trying to unravel University business would not help her. Wearily he walked down the lane to Michaelhouse, intending to ask Gray to help him search the taverns for news of Abigny.

When he reached his room, there was no sign of

Gray, and Bartholomew was uncertain how to begin

questioning people in taverns. He knew that the wrong

questions would not bring him the information he

needed, and might even be dangerous. He heard a

creak of floorboards in the room above, and an idea

began forming in his mind. Philippa’s disappearance

was no secret, and it was only natural that he would

want to find her. Why should he not enlist Michael’s

help for that? He would not need to reveal that he knew anything of the alleged Oxford plot, only that he wished to find Philippa.

Grateful that he had something positive to do, he

slipped out of his room and up the stairs to Michael’s chamber. He pushed open the door and saw that

Michael’s bed was empty. The two Benedictines who

shared his room were sleeping, one of them twitching

as if disturbed by some nightmare. Disappointed, he

turned to leave.