‘I put it under Master Alcote’s corpse,’ said Cynric. ‘In his coffin.’
Bartholomew and Michael stared at him.
‘What are you suggesting?’ asked Michael uneasily. ‘That Runham hid the treasure in St Michael’s parish coffin?’
‘Not in the parish coffin,’ said Cynric. ‘In Master Wilson’s coffin – inside his tomb.’
‘But he would not dare!’ exclaimed Bartholomew, revolted. ‘Wilson died of the plague. Even a greedy man like Runham would not open the grave of a man taken by the pestilence.’
‘Are you sure about that?’ asked Cynric.
Michael scratched his face, fingernails rasping on his bristles. ‘You may be right. Runham was certainly prepared to use the space in the altar to hide his ill-gotten gains. What was to stop him from storing the rest inside the tomb itself? It would certainly explain his unhealthy fascination with it.’
‘And the strong-smelling soap served not only to smuggle riches out of the College and into the church, but to disguise the stench from the open tomb,’ said Bartholomew.
‘That is an unpleasant suggestion, Matt,’ said Michael, wrinkling his nose in disgust. ‘But you are probably correct. And when Runham was kneeling at that grave, pretending to pray for his cousin, he was hiding his treasure for Caumpes to collect.’
‘When any of us saw him at the tomb, our immediate reaction was to avoid him,’ said Bartholomew. ‘None of us wanted to be invited to join him at his prayers, and I think we were all made uncomfortable by the devotion with which he revered Wilson’s memory.’
He recalled Runham kneeling at the tomb the morning after his election, when he had fined the physician for being late. Bartholomew’s assumption that Runham had arrived early to catch him was wrong: Runham had arrived early to place some of the treasure in the church for Caumpes. He had not been cleaning when Bartholomew had arrived, but hiding his loot.
‘And Wilson and Runham did not even like each other,’ said Cynric. ‘Father Paul said that they had always been rivals, and that he was surprised Runham should be so determined to build a tomb for a man he hated.’
‘He was not building a tomb,’ said Michael. ‘He was building a strongbox for the treasures he anticipated would fill it when he finally became Master.’
‘We should go,’ said Cynric. ‘The lane is clear at the moment. We should be able to sneak out without being seen by the rioters.’
‘But what happens if the mob attacks Michaelhouse while we are gone?’ asked Michael. ‘I do not like the notion of being outside its walls when the trouble comes.’
‘Then we will have to be quick,’ said Bartholomew. ‘The whole point of the exercise is to prevent the riot from starting. Those archers on the walls will not hesitate to shoot, and I do not want to see men like Blaston and Newenham hurt.’
‘Or my choir,’ added Michael. ‘Isnard the bargeman, and the rivermen Dunstan and Aethelbald, are good people whom Michaelhouse has wronged. Come on, then, Cynric. Lead the way.’
With a grin of pleasure, delighted to be back in his role of assistant to the Senior Proctor, Cynric slipped the bar on the wicket gate and led the way up the lane towards the church.
The High Street was still deserted, although Bartholomew could hear the ominous rumble of voices emanating from the Market Square. He heard individual voices, too – that of Sheriff Tulyet, ordering people back to their homes, and of Mayor Horwoode making an appeal for peace. He and the others jumped to one side as a group of mounted soldiers thundered past, swords already drawn in anticipation of violence. Bartholomew and Michael exchanged a horrified glance and hurried on.
Bartholomew wrenched open the door to the church, swearing loudly when the sticky latch played its usual tricks. The building was silent and shadowy. Runham still lay under his silken sheet in his coffin, and the altar that Bartholomew and Michael had prised from its moorings remained on its side. As far away from Runham as possible was the fake Suttone, covered hastily with a sheet and lying on two planks. Below him was a bowl, strategically placed to catch the blood that still dripped from the body.
Wilson’s grave had once been a boxlike affair of grey stone, topped by a simple and attractive piece of black marble. Since Runham had arrived, the box had been encased in some elaborate wooden carvings, while the life-sized gilded effigy of Wilson, sneering at the world as it rested on one elbow and gazed across the chancel, had been grafted over the marble slab.
‘I do not like this, Brother,’ said Bartholomew, pausing with a metal lever poised over the tomb. ‘Supposing opening this grave releases the contagion again, and the plague returns?’
‘Runham probably had it open, and the Death did not strike him,’ Cynric pointed out. Bartholomew could not help but notice that the book-bearer was nevertheless keeping a respectful distance from the tomb and its contents.
‘But what if you are wrong?’ he asked, hesitating. ‘What if Runham hid the treasure elsewhere – with a friend, for example?’
‘Runham did not have any friends,’ said Michael, exasperated. ‘And people will die unless we are able to produce this damned treasure soon. I cannot think of anywhere else Runham might have stored the stuff, and we do not have time to hold a disputation over it. All we need to do is lift that slab and have a quick look underneath.’
‘All right, all right,’ said Bartholomew. ‘Stand back, then.’
He began to poke around with his lever, seeing that the mortar had been loosened all along the back. Cynric was right: someone had been inside the tomb. Bartholomew began to heave. The slab lifted slightly, and then dropped back. He tried again, but it was too heavy with the brazen effigy reclining on top of it.
‘We need to lift this thing off first,’ he said. ‘We will never get the lid open with this revolting carving weighting it down.’
Cynric and Michael watched him chip away the mortar that held the effigy in its place, but made no move to assist when he staggered under its weight.
‘It is curious how loath I am to touch it,’ said Michael, reluctantly stepping forward and wrapping his hands in his sleeves before he handled the statue. ‘It reminds me so much of Wilson himself, that I want nothing to do with it.’
‘If you are not squeamish about opening the man’s grave, I hardly think you can be fastidious about touching his graven image,’ said Bartholomew. ‘Put it on the floor, over there. We do not want to damage it and then have more of Wilson’s cousins coming to rectify matters.’
‘We do not,’ said Cynric with a shudder.
Once the effigy had been removed, prising open the slab was easy. The silence in the church was broken by the noise of clattering hooves. More soldiers were hurrying to the escalating confrontation between Sheriff and mob in the Market Square.
‘Quickly,’ urged Michael, white-faced. ‘If Cynric thinks these rioters mean business, then Tulyet will not be able to control them for much longer.’
‘I will hold it up, while you slip your hand inside the tomb and see what you can feel,’ said Bartholomew. Michael and Cynric exchanged a nervous glance.
‘We will feel bones, boy,’ said Cynric with a shudder. ‘We will not do it, will we, Brother?’
‘We will not,’ said Michael with firm conviction. ‘Just lever the whole thing off, and then we can look inside with no need for poking about with our hands.’
‘It is too heavy,’ said Bartholomew. ‘And if we take it off, we will never get it back on again. We cannot leave an open grave – of a plague victim, remember – in the church where our friends come to pray.’
‘Then we will lever and you can feel,’ said Michael, snatching the metal rod from him. ‘You are more used to that sort of thing than us.’