An Order for Death (25 page)

‘Was it a woman?’ asked Lincolne, more gently. ‘It seems that is the main reason most of you slip away from your duties and
obligations.’ His eyes narrowed in sudden suspicion. ‘It is not that Tysilia, is it? I warned you all about her, after what
happened to Brother Andrew.’

‘Do you mean the Brother Andrew who drowned himself in the King’s Ditch just before Christmas?’ asked Timothy curiously.

‘Yes,’ said Lincolne. ‘Tysilia stole his heart and then refused to see him. We told people his humours had been unbalanced
and that he was ill when he took his own life – which was certainly true after he had encountered that witch.’

‘Faricius was not seeing a woman,’ said Horneby. ‘Not even Tysilia. We all kept our distance from her, just as you ordered,
Father.’ He smiled ingratiatingly.

‘Do not think that obeying him over this one woman
redeems you,’ said Michael, seeing that Lincolne was vaguely mollified by Horneby’s claim. ‘Personally, I do not believe
it should be necessary for a Prior to issue such a warning to men of the cloth.’

‘Do not be so pompous, Brother,’ muttered Bartholomew in Michael’s ear. ‘The chances are that some of your own escapades with
women are known around the town. You will look foolish if they challenge your right to ask such questions.’

Michael ignored him. ‘And do not try to change the subject, Horneby. I want to know why Faricius left the friary.’

‘He was writing an essay,’ said Horneby reluctantly.

‘An essay?’ echoed Michael, surprise taking the anger from his voice.

Horneby shot an apologetic glance at Lincolne. ‘I am sorry, Father, but Faricius’s essay was in defence of nominalism and
supported the controversial theories of the Oxford philosopher William Heytesbury. Faricius was a nominalist.’

‘An essay on nominalism?’ asked Michael, looking around the assembled scholars in wary disbelief. ‘Is that what this great
secret is? Is that why Faricius risked life and limb to go outside when it was obvious he should have remained here?’

Horneby nodded unhappily, while the other students shook their heads in disgust that Horneby had betrayed their dead colleague’s
trust.

‘Faricius was a nominalist?’ whispered Lincolne, aghast. ‘If only I had known! I could have used my powers of reason to show
him that he was wrong, and that nominalism is heresy.’

‘No,’ said Horneby. ‘He was quite certain of his beliefs and he argued them convincingly. You would not have dissuaded him.
We all tried and were unsuccessful.’

Michael scratched his chin, a puzzled frown creasing his fat features. ‘Nominalism is a complex theory. I cannot see
that a mere novice would provide us with any new insights, and so I fail to see why this essay is important.’

‘Faricius could have provided you with new insights,’ argued Horneby. ‘He had a brilliant mind, and spent a good deal of time
honing his debating skills. We were proud of him, but afraid for him at the same time.’

Bartholomew suspected that Horneby was right. Walcote, Timothy and Janius had all claimed to admire Faricius’s thinking, while
the great William Heytesbury had even offered to take him as a student. A man like Heytesbury could choose any scholar he
wanted, and that he was interested in Faricius was revealing. Bartholomew realised that Horneby and his cronies were not the
only ones who had maintained their silence about Faricius’s beliefs: Heytesbury had also declined to enlighten Michael with
what he knew of the Carmelite friar murdered at around the time he had arrived in Cambridge himself.

‘And all of you knew about Faricius’s philosophical leanings?’ asked Michael, looking around at the other students. They nodded
reluctantly, casting guilty glances at each other.

‘Yes,’ said Horneby. ‘But he talked to other scholars in the University known to support nominalism, too, so that he could
learn from them.’

‘Such as whom?’ demanded Michael.

‘I cannot remember precisely,’ said Horneby, a little testily. ‘Half the town believes in nominalism, so he was not exactly
strapped for choice.’

‘Henry de Kyrkeby, the Dominican precentor, is due to give the University Lecture on nominalism,’ suggested another student,
more helpfully. ‘I think Faricius waylaid him and discussed his ideas once. Then there is Father Paul of the Franciscans,
who is a tolerant and kindly man. And I saw Faricius in deep discussion with your Junior Proctor on several occasions.’

‘Brother Timothy?’ asked Michael, regarding doubtfully the Benedictine who stood behind him. ‘You have not mentioned this
before.’

‘My discussions with him were of a more general nature,’ said Timothy, surprised by the student’s assertion. ‘We did not talk
about nominalism.’

‘Not Timothy, the other one. Will Walcote,’ said the student.

‘Unfortunately, Will Walcote is dead,’ said Michael. ‘I
do
recall him saying that he had met Faricius, however, and so I know you are telling the truth on that score. Who else?’

‘I cannot remember,’ said Horneby again. ‘It was not something he discussed with us. He knew we did not agree with his ideas,
and so he tended not to tell us about them.’

‘Where is this essay now?’ demanded Lincolne, still angry. ‘And what do you think it had to do with his death?’

‘Quite,’ said Michael. ‘I am no nominalist myself, and I appreciate why many people find its tenets heretical. But I cannot
see why writing about it should result in anyone’s demise.’

‘I disagree,’ said Lincolne. ‘Nominalism poses one of the greatest threats to our Church and our society since the pestilence.
It causes people to question basic truths like the manner of the creation and the nature of God. It is dangerous, and I will
have none of it in my friary.’

‘Because we all know you feel that way, Faricius could not keep his essay here,’ explained Horneby to his Prior. ‘He always
left it in a crevice in the wall that surrounds the Church of St John Zachary. When he heard that the Dominicans were coming,
he went to fetch it.’

‘Did you see this essay when you found him?’ asked Michael of Bartholomew.

The physician shook his head, but thought about Faricius’s desperation when he had learned that his scrip was missing. Bartholomew
had been wrong. Faricius had not been delirious or confused about which of his scrips he had carried, and it had not been
the ruby ring that he had been thinking about: his scrip must have contained his precious essay.

‘I suppose this means he was killed on his way to fetch the thing,’ surmised Michael.

Bartholomew shook his head. ‘Given his frantic desperation when he learned his scrip was missing, I think it more likely that
he had collected the essay and was on his way home with it.’

‘You had better show me this hiding place in the churchyard of St John Zachary, Horneby,’ said Michael tiredly. ‘It is possible
that the essay – or a copy – is still there.’

‘Lynne and I have already looked,’ said Horneby, exchanging a glance with his friends. ‘We went on Monday night – we did use
the tunnel, before you ask – but it had gone. The stone had been replaced in the wall, and the branches of the nearby bush
arranged to hide evidence of chipped mortar. Faricius always did that. I suppose he intended to use it again once the riot
was over.’

Michael sighed. ‘What a mess! I wish you had told me all this before. It might have saved a good deal of time.’

The students hung their heads, and none would meet the eyes of their Prior, who glowered at them in silent fury. Bartholomew
could not decide whether Lincolne’s anger was directed at them for keeping secrets and delaying Michael’s investigation, or
whether he was merely indignant that they had helped to harbour a heretic in their midst.

So, had Faricius’s controversial essay brought about his death? Recalling his horror when he learned that his scrip had been
stolen, Bartholomew was certain it had played some role. Faricius had been so concerned about its loss that he had even failed
to reveal the identity of the person or people who had stabbed him. Bartholomew supposed it was possible that the killers
were men Faricius had not known, although if the essay were at the heart of the matter, that seemed unlikely.

As far as the physician could see, there were two possible explanations for why Faricius had died. First, he might have been
murdered by a realist, who was afraid that a clever thinker like Faricius would promote the cause of nominalism to the detriment
of realism. If this were true, then it was
likely that Faricius’s killer was a Carmelite. Had one of his colleagues killed him, to protect the theory that the Carmelite
Order had chosen to champion? Bartholomew gazed at Horneby and his friends, and wondered whether one of them still knew more
than he had told. But Horneby suggested that Faricius had talked to lots of people, including the missing Dominican Precentor,
about his affinity with nominalism. Was Kyrkeby’s absence related to Faricius’s murder? Had Kyrkeby committed the crime, then
fled the town? But Kyrkeby was Bartholomew’s patient, and the physician knew Kyrkeby’s weak heart would not have permitted
him to engage in a violent struggle with a young and healthy man. Yet how fit did one need to be to slide a sharp knife into
someone’s stomach?

The second possibility was that the killer knew an essay was in the making, but had made the assumption that it was in support
of realism: because Faricius was a Carmelite, it was not unreasonable to assume that he had followed his Order’s teaching.
Therefore, the suspects were the nominalists, who would not want a brilliant essay in defence of realism circulating the town.
Faricius’s killer could therefore be a Dominican or someone who was a professed nominalist – like Walcote, for example.

‘You should block this tunnel as soon as possible,’ Michael advised Lincolne, as he moved away from the graveyard and began
to head towards the front gate. His voice brought Bartholomew out of his reverie, who realised he was cold, wet, tired and
ready for his dinner. ‘It is too dangerous to leave as it is, given that you have this silly feud with the Dominicans.’

One of the students had lit a lamp, and Lincolne took it from him to inspect the dark entrance to the tunnel, shaking his
head in disapproval and casting angry glances at his charges. He leaned forward and put his hand inside it, poking at the
damp earth and announcing that the structure was unstable and that his students were lucky it had not collapsed on them. Suddenly,
Horneby released a
piercing cry of horror that made everyone jump. Bartholomew spun around to look back at him.

‘What is wrong with the boy?’ Michael whispered testily, his hand on his heart. ‘Has he seen a dead worm? Or worse, has he
found Faricius’s “heretical” essay?’

‘Brother! Come quickly!’ cried Lincolne in a wavering, unsteady voice, as his students clustered around him to see what had
so distressed Horneby.

Michael elbowed them out of the way and craned forward to where the lamp illuminated the inside of the tunnel. Meanwhile,
Horneby held a black leather shoe in his hand. Bartholomew peered over Michael’s shoulder, and saw that the shoe had been
pulled from a foot that lay white and bare just beyond the entrance of the tunnel. He reached in and touched it, trying to
determine whether it belonged to someone he could help, but it was unnaturally cold and still.

‘Well?’ asked Michael in a low voice. ‘Is he alive?’

‘I think you have another death to investigate, Brother,’ said Bartholomew softly, so that only Michael could hear. ‘I suspect
Horneby has just located the missing Henry de Kyrkeby.’

‘What in God’s name is it?’ wailed Prior Lincolne, as Bartholomew reached down inside the tunnel and tried to secure a grip
on the white-soled foot. ‘It looks like a corpse!’

‘It
is
a corpse,’ snapped Michael impatiently. ‘And judging from the bit of black habit that I can see, and the fact that the shoe
you are holding is made of the black-dyed leather favoured by the Dominicans, I would guess that this is one of them.’

‘A Dominican?’ squeaked Lincolne in alarm. ‘Who? One of the louts who murdered Faricius, and who then decided he had a taste
for Carmelite blood and was on his way to claim more of it?’

‘I sincerely doubt it,’ said Michael. ‘The body is wet, and looks to me to have been here for some time. Given that
we have only one missing Dominican, I imagine this is Henry de Kyrkeby.’

‘Kyrkeby?’ shrieked Lincolne in agitation. ‘But what is he doing in our tunnel? Was he trying to leave? Or was he trying to
come in?’

Bartholomew began to pull on Kyrkeby’s foot, and succeeded in freeing one leg. But the body was stuck fast, as if something
was pinning it inside its gloomy resting place.

‘Or has someone just used the tunnel as a convenient place to hide his corpse?’ mused Michael, looking away from the body
and studying the faces of the Carmelite students who stood in an uncertain circle around him. The dull grey light made their
expressions difficult to read.

‘But why would anyone do that?’ cried Lincolne. ‘We Carmelites are not in the business of hiding the corpses of members of
rival Orders in dirty holes in the ground!’

‘Neither are most people,’ said Michael. ‘But you have not taken into account the possibility that whoever hid Kyrkeby’s body
might also have killed him.’

He gazed at the student-friars a second time, but could gauge nothing from their reactions. The younger lads seemed frightened
by the sudden appearance of death in their midst, while the faces of the older students, like Horneby, were virtually expressionless,
and the monk could not tell what they thought about the fact that the Dominican Precentor was dead in their graveyard.

‘I cannot get him out,’ muttered Bartholomew, as he knelt next to the tunnel. ‘He is stuck.’

‘No one killed him,’ said Lincolne uncertainly, ignoring Bartholomew as, like Michael, he began looking around at his assembled
scholars, as if not absolutely certain that he could make such a claim.

‘Is that true?’ demanded Michael of Bartholomew. ‘Has Kyrkeby been murdered, or did he die in the tunnel by accident or from
natural causes?’