‘Would you mind if I asked you an impertinent question?’ asked Michael, in the tone of voice that suggested he would ask it whether she minded or not. He gave her a smile that was more flirtatious than monastic. ‘It concerns last Friday evening.’
‘I was working,’ she said immediately. ‘I always work Fridays, if I can.’
‘Why Fridays?’ asked Bartholomew curiously.
‘It is a fish day,’ she explained. ‘If men cannot have their meat at dinner, they like to have it another way after dark. Trade is always good on Fridays.’
Leaving Bartholomew speculating with interest on whether there was an anatomical explanation for her discovery, Michael continued to question the prostitute about her customers the night Runham had been killed.
‘You may consider my question indelicate, but did you see Ralph de Langelee then? He claims he was with you at that time.’
‘No,’ she said sharply. ‘He was not. Ralph who?’
‘It is all right, Yolande,’ said Michael gently. ‘I am not asking to make trouble for him, but I need to know the truth.’
She sighed and then grinned, reaching out to chuck the monk under the chin. Bartholomew looked both ways in alarm, lest anyone should have seen the intimate gesture, while Michael favoured the prostitute with a wicked leer.
‘Since it is you, Brother, I will tell the truth. Ralph de Langelee often pays me a visit on a Friday night – it is he who claims fish makes him more desirous of a woman.’ The fact that it was a theory of Langelee’s that had prompted Yolande’s intriguing claim meant that Bartholomew’s medical speculations ceased abruptly. ‘He came about an hour after sunset. Rob!’
Her husband tore his gaze from the Bene’t scaffolding and came towards them. ‘What?’ he asked, a little irritably. ‘I am busy.’
‘Busy doing what?’ asked Michael suspiciously.
‘Busy looking to see how the remaining scaffolding is holding up,’ replied Blaston. ‘We will have to work on that at some point, and I want to ensure it is not falling to pieces.’
‘Not until you have finished your work at Michaelhouse,’ said Michael.
‘Right,’ said Blaston vaguely. ‘A word of warning, though. We plan to ask for a week’s wages tomorrow. Runham said he would pay the whole amount after we had finished everything, but now that he is dead we would like a bit up front, just so that we all know where we stand.’
They know, thought Bartholomew, trying not to cast an anxious glance at Michael. They have heard rumours that Runham’s chest was robbed, and they are worried that they will not be paid.
‘Fair enough,’ said Michael airily. ‘Bring Newenham with you to see me tomorrow and we will see what we can do. But I was discussing another matter with your lady wife.’
‘My wife,’ corrected Blaston. ‘Yes?’
‘What time did Ralph de Langelee arrive, Rob?’ asked Yolande. ‘It was some time after sunset, but I cannot recall exactly when.’
Blaston rubbed his bristly chin. ‘Now, let me think. It was still just light, because little Yolande lost a shoe in the garden, and I had to go out and look for it. I was just able to see without a candle – which was a blessing, because we do not have any.’
‘That is right,’ said Yolande, remembering. ‘So, Ralph and I went upstairs, while you saw to the children. Did you find that shoe, by the way? We cannot afford to buy her another.’
‘Under the cabbages,’ replied Blaston. ‘Ralph de Langelee stayed an unusually long time that night, I recall. In fact, he stayed with you right through until dawn. I remember, because he and I walked to Michaelhouse together – me to work and him to go to mass in the church.’
It seemed a curious arrangement for a married couple, but Bartholomew was not in the habit of judging the lives of his fellow men, particularly after the plague when times were hard and people would do anything to put food on the table and a roof over their heads. Blaston should have been earning a decent wage as a carpenter, but with nine children to support, his income would not go far. The fact that he was willing to work under the dangerous conditions imposed by Runham told its own story, although if he ever had an accident, the Blaston family would be in serious trouble.
Thanking them for their help, Michael steered Bartholomew towards Bene’t College’s front gate. The physician wondered how the family would manage when Yolande was unable to work on Friday nights. He glanced back at them. They were good people – hard-working and honest – and he hoped they would not find life too difficult.
‘They are telling the truth, Matt,’ said Michael. ‘Langelee is lucky: he believed he was out on the wharves thinking a lot longer than he really was – which just goes to show that a lengthy thinking session means something very different to Langelee than it does to us! He was probably out for no more than an hour, and he arrived at the Blaston house at twilight. That means he arrived some time between five and six, and that at eight o’clock, when Runham was being cushioned to death, Langelee was merrily bouncing between the sheets with the mother of nine children.’
‘That means there are only two Michaelhouse Fellows unaccounted for that night,’ said Bartholomew. ‘Clippesby and me.’
‘So, assuming that none of the students or servants killed Runham, we are left with Clippesby,’ said Michael thoughtfully.
Bartholomew smiled. ‘You have no doubts about my innocence at all?’
‘None,’ said Michael firmly. ‘You strike me as more of a poisons man than a smotherer. But let us see what these Bene’t Fellows have to say for themselves. Let me do the talking, Matt. From what they told me yesterday, you did a poor job of interviewing them the last time you were there.’
Their knock at the gate was answered immediately by Osmun, the ill-tempered porter. His brother Ulfo lounged near a crackling fire in the lodge, picking his teeth with a knife that looked sharp enough to sever his tongue if he made a false move. Sitting apart in a corner, sporting a blackened eye and looking very sorry for himself, was Walter, lately night porter at Michaelhouse. Osmun followed Bartholomew’s startled gaze.
‘Caught him sleeping on duty,’ said Osmun with a sour smile. ‘We do not pay people to sleep, do we, Walter?’
Walter shook his head, looking more miserable than Bartholomew had ever seen him, which was a considerable feat. Despite the fact that Bartholomew considered Walter a lazy good-for-nothing, he felt sorry for the man in his blood-splattered shirt and bruised face. Walter saw his sympathetic expression and tried to stand. Ulfo kicked out viciously, and Walter sank back to the floor and hid his face in his hands, a picture of despair.
The Bene’t Fellows were in their conclave, a chamber off the hall that was larger than the one at Michaelhouse, but not nearly so pleasant. The rushes that covered the floor were stale and needed changing, while the tapestries on the walls were of an inferior quality and the dyes in the wools had faded in the sun. It was quite a contrast to the carved oak panelling and rich rugs that adorned the hall, and Bartholomew supposed that the conclave had not been deemed worthy of similar attention, because meetings with important benefactors – like the Duke of Lancaster and the guildsmen of St Mary and Corpus Christi – took place in the hall.
The hall itself housed the students, who sat in attitudes of boredom as they listened to the droning tones of their Bible Scholar reading some dense tract from Leviticus. A fire roared in the hearth, burning logs at a rate that even the absent-minded Kenyngham would have balked at. It was hot to the point of being uncomfortable, and Bartholomew was not surprised that several of the scholars had fallen asleep, lulled by the heat and the dry tones of the reader.