‘So he says, but we only have his word that he visited his father in Norfolk when he went missing in February. He may have gone to Oxford and lied about it.’
‘So, after Hamecotes kindly helped Clippesby to conceal Okehamptone’s murder, Clippesby killed him, too?’ asked Bartholomew. ‘That does not make sense.’
Michael sighed. ‘Clippesby is mad, so of course he will not act in a way we can understand. But perhaps I was wrong about this Oxford association. Hamecotes must have been taking orders from a Cambridge accomplice when he summoned you to Weasenham, because no Oxford stranger would know you are a diligent Corpse Examiner.’
Bartholomew scratched his head, uncertain. ‘Yes and no. Rougham knows I am careful, and may have mentioned the fact to Okehamptone, probably as an example of the kind of colleague he is obliged to endure. Then his friend Okehamptone may have told others – Polmorva and the merchants.’
‘Rougham,’ mused Michael. ‘That would explain why he was attacked, too. Rougham is fat, with plenty of flesh to be gnawed through before a throat can be reached, whereas Okehamptone was thin. It is possible that Clippesby’s fangs were thwarted by Rougham’s lard.’
Bartholomew glanced at the monk askance, thinking he would present no mean challenge to a set of teeth himself. ‘I do not understand why Clippesby should want to attack these people.’
‘We will not agree about Clippesby, so let us leave him for now and look at the other links between our town and Oxford.’
‘Polmorva,’ said Bartholomew immediately. ‘He declined to let Rougham see Okehamptone, so it is clear he is involved in some sinister way.’
‘Perhaps,’ agreed Michael. ‘But there is also you. You attended Merton College, and you have a previous acquaintance with Duraunt and Polmorva. Indeed, you know Polmorva well enough to have made an enemy of him. He hates you, and you would like to see him indicted for murder.’
‘Only if he is guilty. I would not conspire to convict an innocent man.’
Michael shook his head despairingly. ‘I have failed miserably in my training of you, if you decline to use the opportunities that come your way to strike blows at ancient adversaries.’
‘Shall we confront Polmorva with our conclusions?’ asked Bartholomew, ignoring the monk’s levity – if levity it was. ‘We may be able to gauge whether we are close to a solution.’
‘We have not been able to gauge anything so far, and I think we should wait until we have more than a bag of unfounded speculations. Besides, we may just frighten our culprit – be he Polmorva or someone else – and cause him to flee, or even to kill again.’ Michael sighed, and turned his mind to other matters. ‘You should visit Stourbridge today and tell Clippesby he is going on a journey. He will certainly object, and I do not want a scene when my beadles arrive to escort him away on Monday.’
‘Me?’ asked Bartholomew in distaste. ‘It was not my idea. You do it.’
‘You are his physician. You must make him understand that this is the only way we can resolve the matter without harming him or compromising the College. The alternative is for him to throw himself on the mercy of the judicial system, and I do not think he should do that.’
‘No, he should not,’ agreed Bartholomew bitterly. ‘He will be found guilty just because he is different. Our society is intolerant of those who do not conform, no matter how inane the rules.’ He was thinking not only of Clippesby, but of Joan Wormynghalle.
‘We are talking about murder here, Matt,’ said Michael sternly. ‘And they are not just simple murders, either, but ones that show a violent hatred towards the victims. You saw those corpses, and witnessed the savagery with which they had been defiled. I am sorry for Clippesby, but if he did these terrible things, then I do not want him in my town. Supposing he was to take against Matilde for losing that silver dog? How would you feel if she was his next victim?’
Bartholomew could think of nothing to say.
Bartholomew was deeply unhappy with the whole affair regarding Clippesby, and postponed his visit for as long as possible. It was with a heavy heart that he set out for Stourbridge the following day, immediately after the Trinity Sunday mass. It was a glorious morning, with birds singing shrill and sweet, the sun warm on his face, and a pleasant breeze wafting the scent of flowers and clean earth towards him. He returned the greetings of people he knew, many of whom were out enjoying the new glories of their freshly cleaned town. Folk were delighted by the changes, superficial though they were, and talk of the impending Visitation was on everyone’s lips.
Bartholomew heard little of their excited babble, and felt burdened by the knowledge of what he was about to do. He walked slowly, although he knew it would only prolong the agony. He tried to tell himself that the Dominican would be well cared for in Rougham’s remote retreat, and that they were lucky the Gonville man was prepared to spend his own money looking after an ailing colleague. But this did not blunt the knowledge that imprisonment was a very cruel thing to do to a free spirit like Clippesby.
Eventually he arrived at the hospital, where he spent longer than necessary talking to Brother Paul and examining two other inmates. When he could defer his unpleasant duty no longer, he walked to the house where Clippesby was installed, and climbed the stairs to the upper floor. The friar’s cell was at the end of a corridor, and comprised a small room with a single window. The window had stone mullions that were less than the length of a man’s hand apart, so it was impossible to squeeze between them and escape; the door was secured by a hefty bar placed between two iron wall loops, and a substantial lock. The key to the lock was on a hook outside the door, unreachable by the inmate, but conveniently accessible to anyone bringing food.
Bartholomew was shocked by the change two days had wrought on Michaelhouse’s Master of Music and Astronomy. Clippesby’s face was grey, and his hair was greasy and unkempt. He did not turn when Bartholomew opened the door, and did not react at all when told the news that he was soon to be moved to a distant place, where he would never see friends or family again. Bartholomew shook his arm, to try to gain his attention, but Clippesby simply continued to gaze through the window at the green fields beyond, and would not speak. Finally, Bartholomew secured the door behind him, and walked back to Cambridge feeling even more miserable than he had on the way out.
He spent the afternoon trying to concentrate on his treatise on fevers, a text that had already reached prodigious dimensions. Writing it usually relaxed him and, although College rules forbade any kind of work other than religious on the Sabbath, he felt the treatise was more pleasure than labour; he often spent his leisure hours scribbling down his ideas, ranging from fevers’ symptoms and manifestations, to their treatment and how to avoid them. But even agues could not exorcise Clippesby from his mind, and he was grateful for even the smallest interruption that day.
He spent an hour helping Deynman with ‘difficult’ spellings, giving the student his entire attention on a matter he normally would have delegated to one of his teaching assistants. Then he joined in a lively debate among William’s Franciscans, which focused on the work of the great Dominican known simply as Perscrutator. William was predictably frenzied in his claims that the Dominican Order never produced good scholars, although he was unable to refute any of Perscrutator’s arguments pertaining to the definition of the elements. A large number of Fellows, students and commoners turned out to listen to the debate, although most were far more interested in William’s rabid antics than in understanding Perscrutator’s complex expositions.
At the evening meal, Bartholomew was pleased to note that Michael was as good as his word and ate only a modest portion of meat and a mere three pieces of bread. All vegetables, green or otherwise, were politely declined. That evening, when the sun was setting, sending rays of gold and red to play over the honey-coloured stone of Michaelhouse, Bartholomew wandered into the orchard, where there was a fallen apple tree that provided a comfortable seat for those wanting peace and silence.