‘He was not stabbed,’ replied Bartholomew. Michael looked sharply at him. ‘I know Candelby said he was, but he is mistaken. This wound is too small and the wrong shape to have been made by a blade. It was caused by a crossbow bolt, just like the one in Lynton.’
Michael stared at him. ‘Are you sure?’
‘Of course – and I can prove it.’
The monk averted his eyes when Bartholomew took a pair of pliers from his bag and began to do something to Ocleye’s chest. There was an unpleasant grating sound that made him feel queasy, and when he plucked up the courage to glance back, Bartholomew was inspecting something bloody that lay in the palm of his hand. It was the sharp end of a crossbow bolt, about the length of his little finger.
‘It snapped off inside him,’ explained the physician. ‘I suspect someone tried to retrieve the whole thing, but this part was embedded in bone, and it broke as it was tugged out.’
‘Are you sure it was not that injury which killed him?’ asked Michael, pointing to a gash across Ocleye’s ribs. He took several steps backwards when Bartholomew began to examine it, then squeezed his eyes tightly closed. ‘Please do not put your fingers inside corpses when I am looking! I missed your company when you took that sabbatical leave of absence last year, but I certainly did not miss this kind of thing!’
‘I cannot determine the depth of a wound simply by staring at it. However, probing tells me this one is not serious enough to have caused death. The bolt in the chest was what killed Ocleye. No one could have been shot there and survived.’
‘So, whoever killed Lynton killed Ocleye, too?’ asked Michael. ‘The murderer used the same weapon on both?’
‘It looks that way. Ocleye died later than Lynton, though. I saw him after the accident myself, and he was definitely alive. Also, Candelby said Ocleye was fussing over him when he regained his wits after being thrown from the cart, so he is another witness. And finally, crossbows take time to rewind, so there would have been a delay. The brawl provided the killer with a perfect opportunity to claim his second victim.’
‘So, we were right: Lynton’s death and Ocleye’s are connected. But how did Ocleye come by that other cut? Do you think the Clare student stabbed himself a corpse?’
‘Or the killer scored the wound in an attempt to disguise the real nature of Ocleye’s demise – to make people think he died from a dagger attack.’
‘How could anyone expect to deceive you?’
‘Ocleye was not a scholar, and he did not die on University property. Ergo, your Corpse Examiner has no reason to inspect him – and the body-washer has obviously noticed nothing amiss. Further, Ocleye has no family or close friends – no one to demand detailed answers.’
‘Lord!’ breathed Michael. ‘I do not like this at all – not least because of what we have done.’
‘What is that?’
‘If the killer went to all this trouble with Ocleye, then it stands to reason that he does not want anyone to know what happened to Lynton, either. And what did you do? Steal the crossbow bolt from Lynton’s corpse and later disguise the wound. Meanwhile, I am encouraging his colleagues to believe he died when the horse kicked his head.’
Bartholomew stared at him. ‘We have helped a killer to cover his tracks.’
Bartholomew left St Bene’t’s full of anxious questions. Who had shot Ocleye and Lynton? How could a pot-boy afford to enter a rent agreement with a man who charged princely prices for his houses? Bartholomew’s concerns returned to Falmeresham. What had happened to him? What did Candelby know that he was not telling? Was Michael right, and the man was just pretending to possess information in order to provoke a member of the hated University?
‘I do not like Candelby’s role in all this,’ said Michael, when the physician voiced his concerns aloud. ‘I think he might be the killer.’
‘We know he is not – he was in his cart when Lynton was shot, and we believe the murderer hid in St John Zachary’s churchyard.’
‘You said the weapon was small, so perhaps Candelby concealed it under his cloak. Then he whipped it out and loosed a bolt as Lynton rode towards him.’
‘Without Maud and Ocleye noticing?’
Michael shot him a triumphant look. ‘Perhaps Ocleye did notice, and either threatened to tell, or demanded payment for his silence. And do not forget that Candelby said Maud is refusing to see him. Maybe she is uncomfortable with murder committed under her nose.’
‘Even if all that is true, and Candelby did kill Lynton, he could not have shot Ocleye, too. Arderne had taken him away by the time the brawl started. He was not there.’
‘He must have come back,’ countered Michael. ‘It was a perfect opportunity to blame a violent death on a street disturbance. And, not content with that, he now wants the town to believe Ocleye was killed by a scholar – to make him a martyr, so people will fight over it.’
Bartholomew considered Candelby as the culprit. ‘I suppose he may have hired an accomplice, which would account for him being elsewhere when Ocleye was killed.’
‘This rent agreement makes no sense, though,’ mused Michael. ‘Even if Ocleye did have hidden riches, why elect to do business with Lynton? Why not Candelby, his master? Candelby has vacant lodgings aplenty, because our students are beginning to move out – either he has declined to make repairs so the buildings have become uninhabitable, or he has refused to renew their leases.’
Bartholomew was becoming frustrated by the questions that tumbled unanswered in his mind. ‘Why does Candelby want the streets running with blood? Surely he must know that if the dispute escalates, rioting scholars are likely to target his properties? He might find himself with burned-out shells in place of his handsome mansions.’
‘If our scholars do destroy his houses, we will be forced to pay him compensation. He is bound to claim a higher value than their actual worth; he may even come out ahead.’
‘I am not unsympathetic to his grievances,’ said Bartholomew, earning himself a glare. ‘The University has kept rents artificially low for decades, and it is hard on the town.’
‘If we allowed landlords free rein, they would charge a fortune. Scholars would spend all their money on housing, and would be unable to pay their academic fees. The University would founder and die. But I see we will not agree about this, so we had better discuss something else. What did you make of Arderne’s miraculous cure? Candelby’s arm looked horribly bruised to me.’
‘Bruising is all that is wrong with it – Arderne did not knit shattered bones. I imagine it was numb immediately after the accident, which accounts for why it could be pulled around without pain. The “discolouration” Arderne says will fade in two weeks would have done so anyway.’
Michael grimaced. ‘Even I can tell Arderne is a fraud, and it is clear that he intends to have Cambridge to himself, medically speaking. I only hope people see through his tricks before he does some serious harm – and not only to his hapless patients. He clearly wants to hurt you, too.’
‘He can try. Leeches have invaded the town before, but they make promises they cannot keep, and it is not long before people turn against them.’
‘You are underestimating the risk,’ warned Michael. ‘There is something charismatic about Arderne that makes people more inclined to listen – something to do with his eyes. But I see we will not agree on this, either, so we had better return to the subject of murder.’
Bartholomew was thoughtful. ‘You are right to be suspicious of Candelby. He does have a powerful motive.’