A Wicked Deed

by Susanna GREGORY

  ‘I knew my mother was employing delaying tactics – trying to make more work for you, to slow the process down,’ said Tuddenham tiredly. ‘For example, last week she produced that huge chest of irrelevant household accounts, knowing you would have to read them, and that to do so would waste your time. I just thought she was trying to wear you down, not that she was biding her time for murder.’

  ‘Really,’ said William, folding his arms, clearly unconvinced.

  ‘Yes, really!’ snapped Tuddenham. ‘But my mother is a cautious woman, and it seems she did not want to chance my having an accident before the birth of Isilia’s child –you may have noticed how solicitous they both were of my health – so, she must have decided that the deed should not be completed at any cost.’

  ‘She almost succeeded,’ said Michael. ‘She tried several times to have Alcote poisoned – once with Eltisley’s digestive tonic, and again with raisins – and she even attempted to stab him before Eltisley took matters in hand.’

  ‘Did any of them escape?’ asked Cynric, gesturing to the burning church. ‘You would not want the likes of those ladies and that Eltisley roaming the country with revenge in their hearts.’

  ‘Indeed not,’ said Tuddenham. He nodded toward Siric, who was guarding three of Eltisley’s surly drinkers, all sitting on the grass and covered in white plaster. Next to them lay a row of unmoving figures, their faces covered with a hastily gathered assortment of garments. From under Tuddenham’s russet cloak poked the hem of Isilia’s velvet dress, while Hamon’s boiled-leather hauberk hid most of Dame Eva from view. Eltisley lay next to her, identifiable by his green-stained apron.

  ‘You will check, when the fire dies down?’ asked Michael. ‘Look in the vault, too, in case one of them managed to crawl to safety.’

  ‘We will,’ said Hamon quietly. He gazed at Eltisley’s body with revulsion. ‘That madman will stay this way, I hope. Do you think he had taken some concoction that will allow him to rise from the grave, and come to haunt us?’

  Bartholomew shook his head. ‘Sir Thomas was right. There was no chance of Eltisley’s potions working to raise the dead. It is against the basic laws of nature.’ He gestured to the black knight, who had come to stand with Tuddenham and Hamon. ‘And is Sir Robert Grosnold also aware of what has happened here?’

  ‘He is a good friend and a loyal ally,’ said Tuddenham, smiling wanly at his neighbour. ‘He slipped back to the village to warn me that my mother and wife were plotting against you the day Unwin died.’

  ‘I overheard Dame Eva and Isilia talking to Eltisley just before the feast started,’ said Grosnold. ‘You see, I rode my destrier too hard across the village green and he damaged a leg. I was forced to stop and attend to it: it was then that I heard the three of them plotting. I walked back to inform Tuddenham, and was about to go home when I saw that poor friar, Unwin, all weak and shaking. I dispatched the physician Stoate to bleed him, but it seems it did him no good.’

  ‘No good at all,’ agreed Bartholomew. ‘But why did you not tell us you were with Unwin just before he died? We thought you had a hand in his death when you denied meeting him.’

  Grosnold did not look pleased. ‘I am a knight. I do not slay priests unless absolutely necessary.’

  ‘Quite so. But why did you say you did not return to Grundisburgh, when you had?’ pressed Michael.

  ‘Because I did not want half the village to know I had returned to warn Tuddenham about treachery in his own household,’ snapped Grosnold. ‘I had no idea whether I could trust you to be discreet, as I could Stoate and Unwin. And regrettable though Unwin’s death was, it was over and done with, while the matter of Dame Eva and Isilia was still very much alive. So, like a good soldier, I considered my priorities. And there were appearances to be taken into account: I did not want the villagers seeing that I had driven my destrier lame in my demonstration of equestrian skills, either.’

  ‘Anyway, he had no reason to suspect Stoate played a part in Unwin’s death,’ said Tuddenham. ‘As far as he was concerned, Stoate had bled Unwin to improve the balance of his humours, and then Unwin had been murdered in the church for his purse.’

  ‘But it was not the first time you had spoken secretly to Unwin,’ said Bartholomew. ‘You met him before we ever arrived in Grundisburgh. I saw you talking to him in your bailey.’

  ‘True,’ said Grosnold. ‘I asked for his blessing because I had been hunting on a feast day, and needed absolution. He gave it to me.’

  So that was it, thought Bartholomew, recalling the student emerging from Grosnold’s bailey that night. And because Grosnold had made a confession, Unwin could not break his silence to tell Bartholomew what had transpired. It was all purely innocent after all.

  ‘I know you suspected me of ambushing you here after you did my astrological consultation,’ Grosnold continued. ‘You thought I wanted to ensure your silence regarding the deed you found about who gave me my manor …’

  ‘What deed is this?’ asked Hamon, interested.

  ‘A deed that is none of your affair,’ said Tuddenham softly. He exchanged a look with Grosnold that told Bartholomew that it was a secret that he had known for many years, and that it would be a secret kept.

  ‘… or that I had something to hide regarding Unwin’s death,’ Grosnold finished.

  ‘Well, you did,’ said Bartholomew. ‘You denied meeting him, and confused us with lies.’

  ‘But not with malicious intent,’ said Tuddenham defensively. ‘Grosnold sought only to protect me.’ He smiled at his neighbour. ‘And if Alcote had possessed a friend half as loyal he might be here now, not lying in his coffin in the church.’

  ‘Just a moment,’ began Michael indignantly. ‘We have—’

  Tuddenham held up a hand. ‘You did not like him, Brother. None of you did. You did not grieve for him, as that nice young Horsey did for Unwin. You were angry and indignant at his murder, but none of you will miss him much.’

  ‘Do you really think he is dead?’ asked Bartholomew, remembering the fussy little scholar. ‘I keep expecting him to walk up to us, and announce that there has been some dreadful mistake.’

  ‘Yes, it would not surprise me to learn that he had persuaded some other unfortunate to take his place in Eltisley’s inferno,’ said Michael. ‘It would be the kind of thing he would do.’

  ‘Or perhaps he did die, but his angry spirit will not let his body rest,’ whispered Hamon, looking at the forlorn hovels of the deserted village. ‘Perhaps he will join the plague-dead here, in Barchester, and wander through the houses wailing and gnashing his teeth.’

  It was not a pleasant image, and Bartholomew found himself glancing behind him, in the direction in which Hamon was gazing so fearfully. He pulled himself together irritably, refusing to be drawn into yet more superstitious tales and pagan beliefs. Padfoot, which had held the village in such terror, was nothing but a toothless performing bear, and the happenings at Barchester were sinister enough, but there was nothing supernatural about them.

  ‘Alcote’s time had come, and he was called,’ said William in the tone of voice he usually reserved for preaching to people he considered heretics. ‘Although called by whom, I should not like to guess.’

  ‘It is the will of God that he is gone,’ said Wauncy. His eyes, glittering in his skull-like face, took on a predatory gleam. ‘But if you are genuinely concerned for the state of his soul, you might consider making a donation for a few masses to reduce his time in Purgatory. Unfortunately, owing to the sudden increase in demand for my services, I have been forced to raise my prices: sixpence a mass.’

  ‘God’s blood!’ spat Michael, outraged. ‘Your taverner murders our colleagues, and you charge us extra for requiem masses?’

  ‘Master Wauncy will say a mass free of charge every day for a month, for Master Alcote and for Unwin,’ said Tuddenham, ignoring the gasp of fiscal indignation from his cadaverous priest. ‘I am sorry for all the wrong that has been perpetrated against Michaelhouse on my manor, an
d will make amends. I not only propose to give the living of the church to your College, but will build the new vicar –the replacement sent for Unwin – a fine new house. If you are still willing to accept the advowson, that is.’

  ‘We are,’ said Michael, before anyone could decline. ‘It is what Alcote would have wanted.’

  Bartholomew looked at the forlorn row of corpses that lay in the long grass, his gaze lingering on Eltisley’s green apron. ‘Well, at least now poor Alcote is avenged.’

  Michael shivered suddenly as a chill breeze hissed through the dead village and made the flames on the burning church dance and flicker. ‘Then let us hope he is also at rest,’ he whispered.

  Epilogue

  Cambridge, June 1353

  THE SUN SLANTED GOLDEN AND SOFT THROUGH THE branches of the fruit trees in the orchard at the back of Michaelhouse where Bartholomew and Michael sat side by side on the trunk of an old apple tree that had fallen many years before. The air was still and warm, and was full of the familiar aromas of the town: the sweet scent of flowers, the rich smell of cut grass and the sulphurous stench of the river and its myriad of ditches that crisscrossed the countryside.

  ‘So, it is done,’ said Michael in satisfaction, stretching his legs out in front of him, and folding his hands across his stomach. ‘Today, in Cambridge, the deed granting Michaelhouse the living of the Church of Our Lady in Grundisburgh was formally signed by Walter Wauncy on behalf of Thomas Tuddenham, in front of the Chancellor of the University and the Master and Fellows of the College.’

  ‘But at what cost?’ asked Bartholomew. ‘It brought about terrible suffering, and led to so much evil being done.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Michael. He gave a sudden grin. ‘I suppose it was what you might call a wicked deed. But Michaelhouse gained from it. It has all been worthwhile.’

  ‘Roger Alcote would not agree,’ said Bartholomew. ‘Nor would Unwin. Not to mention Will Norys, the Freemans, Alice Quy, Roland Deblunville, Dame Eva, Isilia, Tobias Eltisley and Eltisley’s men.’

  ‘But some good has come of this,’ protested Michael mildly. ‘Horsey is now parish priest of Grundisburgh, and we will never need to concern ourselves about his welfare again. And he will make a much better parish priest than Unwin ever would have done.’

  ‘Why did he volunteer to do that, do you think?’ asked Bartholomew. ‘The rest of us were only too keen to leave Suffolk and return to Cambridge.’

  ‘I think his few days in the leper hospital with Deynman may have swayed him. There is always the possibility in the Franciscan Order that he might be sent to work in one, and I think he thought a job as a priest in a pretty rural village like Grundisburgh was far preferable. He will be well paid – especially with all those masses for the dead to say – and relatively safe from diseases.’

  Bartholomew did not reply. He had been concerned when there had been no sign of Deynman and Horsey at Brother Peter’s leper hospital, and had spent some days traipsing across the county with Cynric searching for them. They were finally unearthed at a leper hospital in Ipswich. Somehow –although Bartholomew could not imagine how, given that the Old Road was almost completely straight – Deynman had managed to lose his way. Unconcerned, he had merely made the decision that one leper hospital was very much like another, selected a suitable institution in Ipswich, and settled in comfortably to wait for Bartholomew to collect him.

  Unlike Horsey, who had apparently had doubts about the venture from the very beginning, Deynman had not been in the least surprised when Bartholomew eventually tracked them down, although his teacher’s exasperation had clearly puzzled him. But it had been one of the few times when Deynman’s inability to complete even the most basic of tasks had worked to his advantage.

  Michael was still talking about Horsey. ‘Or perhaps it was some kind of calling. Some priests do have a vocation to make the lives of others better, you know, despite what you think of us monks and friars. I once knew a Benedictine who was prepared to work three months of every year among the poor.’

  ‘Really?’ asked Bartholomew dryly. ‘That must have caused some consternation about his mental health.’

  Michael glanced at him quizzically, but then went on to other matters. ‘William tells me you settled Mad Megin with Brother Peter in the leper hospital.’

  Bartholomew nodded, ‘He will look after her, and she can help him in the laundry. No one else would take her – Eltisley took too long to revive her when she tried to drown herself, and her mind was impaired. She was grief-stricken over the death of the performing bear and distress is making her act more oddly than ever.’

  ‘And you healed her sore eyes?’

  Bartholomew nodded again. ‘Eltisley had been experimenting on her with his potions. What kind of man takes a sick old woman and uses her like some kind of animal to test wild theories?’

  ‘A man like Eltisley,’ said Michael with a shrug. He leaned back, and a slow, comfortable smile spread across his flabby face. ‘I have the answers to two outstanding questions about this mess. Guess what they are.’

  ‘I have learned more than I ever wanted to know about this miserable affair,’ said Bartholomew, refusing to take the monk’s bait. ‘The best thing we can do now is put the whole thing behind us, and concentrate on our teaching.’

  ‘You will want to know this,’ said Michael, gloating.

  ‘Well, come on then,’ said Bartholomew irritably. ‘All that fuss over the formal signing of the advowson today has left me exhausted. I am going to bed soon.’

  ‘The father of Isilia’s child,’ said Michael. ‘I know who he is.’

  ‘How?’ asked Bartholomew suspiciously. ‘Tuddenham would not tell us, and no one else seemed to know.’

  ‘Mother Goodman knew,’ said Michael, infuriatingly smug. ‘She said she would tell me if I gave her your Suffolk cramp ring.’

  ‘So that is what happened to it,’ said Bartholomew. ‘I have been looking for that. Cynric wanted it to present to Rachel Atkin as a betrothal gift.’

  ‘It is the kind of thing that would appeal to Cynric and his superstitious mind,’ said Michael. ‘Speaking of whom, has he told you where he hid the copy of that deed yet?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Bartholomew, smiling. ‘And I also know he has wagered you a shilling that you will not guess where he put it. So, do not think I will tell you where it is, so you can claim his money.’

  ‘This is a matter of honour, Matt, not money,’ said Michael reproachfully. ‘You cannot allow a servant to outwit one of us scholars.’

  ‘Then you had better do some serious thinking,’ said Bartholomew.

  ‘I have,’ said Michael. ‘But he has me completely confounded. I would hate that man to be on the wrong side of the University, and become an adversary rather than an ally.’

  ‘Give him his shilling, then,’ said Bartholomew, laughing. ‘And do not try to cheat him by trying to worm the answer out of me.’

  ‘Give me a clue. Is it somewhere logical? Is it somewhere I will be angry at myself for not guessing?’

  ‘No, Brother,’ said Bartholomew. ‘You will never guess – just as Cynric said.’

  ‘We will see about that,’ said Michael, stiffly. ‘But to go back to what we were discussing: the father of Isilia’s child was Walter Wauncy.’

  ‘I do not believe you,’ said Bartholomew, too amused to be surprised. ‘The man looks like a corpse, and is as old as her husband. Mother Goodman was spinning you improbable yarns to entertain the villagers with later.’

  ‘That is what I thought,’ said Michael. ‘But apparently he has fathered a number of children in the village – strange for a man who is supposed to be celibate. He is said to be something of a devil for pretty girls.’

  Bartholomew laughed out loud. ‘So he might regard himself, but I doubt any of the village women would agree. There is no earthly way a man like Wauncy could inveigle himself an invitation to the room of a beautiful woman like Isilia.’

  ‘He has distinctive ears – l
arge and transparent,’ said Michael. ‘When I looked at some of the village children, I counted at least five with the same feature. None of their fathers seemed to have ears like that. Anyway, Isilia told Mother Goodman about Wauncy herself. It happened one day when Tuddenham was out, and Isilia was becoming rather desperate for manly attentions.’

  ‘Desperate is the word,’ said Bartholomew, still laughing. ‘But I suppose Tuddenham’s condition might have made it difficult for him to provide his wife with these “manly attentions”, as you put it.’ He frowned, recalling something else. ‘I went to see Mother Goodman before we left, to write down some of her remedies for teething. She told me that Wauncy was the father of Janelle’s child, despite the commonly held rumour that it is Deblunville’s.’

  ‘And that was why Wauncy was willing to marry her for three pennies less than the Burgh priest charged,’ said Michael, nodding. ‘He would not want her revealing that little indiscretion. And now he has married her to Hamon. She was more than willing to wed Hamon now that he, and not Isilia’s brat, will inherit Tuddenham’s estates.’

  ‘The course of true love,’ said Bartholomew.

  ‘Love is all very well, but riches are better for a successful marriage,’ said Michael knowledgeably. ‘And Janelle and Hamon will have plenty of those with Tuddenham’s estates as well as the manors of Burgh and Clopton. If they ever find that golden calf, they will be wealthy beyond their wildest dreams.’

  ‘They will never find that, Brother. It is a legend, like Padfoot. It does not really exist.’

  ‘Do not be so sure,’ said Michael. ‘Anyway, Hamon intends to continue to look – on all his manors.’

  Bartholomew shook his head, thinking about Isilia’s and Janelle’s choice of lover. ‘It is ironic that Tuddenham went to all this trouble to prevent Isilia’s illegitimate child from inheriting his estates, but now Janelle’s child will – and it will have the same father.’ He shrugged. ‘Perhaps it is true, Brother. Perhaps Wauncy is a rogue among the ladies.’