Mystery in the Minster (6 page)

‘Why not?’ asked Bartholomew, loath to admit to a knight – a man with elite equestrian skills – that he had lost it falling off a horse.

‘Because we have narrow streets,’ explained William. ‘And our residents are in the habit of hurling night-soil out of their windows. You will not want that in your hair, because it is difficult to rinse out. But you can buy one here – York is full of fine hats.’

Bartholomew was sure it was, and was equally sure they would be well beyond his meagre means. He had his College stipend and the money he was paid by his wealthier patients, but most of his customers were poor, and could not afford the medicines he prescribed. As there was no point in tending them if they did not have access to the remedies that would make them better, he bought them
himself, a practice that made him popular among Cambridge’s paupers, but which meant that items like new hats were a luxury he would have to do without.

However, he soon saw Sir William’s point about the inadvisability of venturing out
sans
adequate protection, because it was not long before something brown and sticky slapped into his shoulder. He could not be certain, but he thought he glimpsed a hulking figure with a fur-edged hood and pattens ducking out of sight. Vicars did not hurl muck at people in Cambridge, and he wondered whether Cave was completely in control of his wits.

‘Take off your cloak,’ advised Sir William, after attempts to remove the mess had made it worse. ‘And carry it under your arm. We shall keep to the middle of the road from now on, so it will not happen again. Thank God it did not land on your head – the stuff reeks!’

Fortunately, Bartholomew’s wealthy sister had insisted on buying him a new tunic before he had left Cambridge, afraid he would catch his death of cold if he ventured north in the threadbare clothes he usually wore. Its quality was such that, as long as the rain held off, he would not miss the cloak. It was travel stained, but warmer than anything else he had owned in a very long time.

Sir William chatted amiably as they set off again, explaining that the street along which they walked was named Petergate, which continued through the city until it became Fossgate and then Walmgate. He led the way into the minster precinct, where Bartholomew saw his colleagues some distance ahead, talking to a few of the vicars-choral. The discussion appeared to be amiable, and he wondered whether they were trying to make amends for their sub-chanter’s earlier hostility.

But bad-mannered vicars flew from his mind when he turned his attention to the minster, which was even more
magnificent close up than it had been from afar. Delicately arched windows soared skywards, interspersed with buttresses and arcades that were simultaneously imposing and elegant. Above him, the lofty towers seemed to graze the dark clouds that scudded overhead, their stone a deep honey-gold in the sullen grey light.

‘It is grand,’ said William, smiling as the physician gazed in open-mouthed admiration. ‘We are very proud of it.’

Bartholomew was about to tell him he had good cause, when there was a hiss followed by a thump. He had seen enough of war to recognise the sound of an arrow hitting flesh when he heard it, and he whipped around to see Sir William crumple, both hands clasped around the quarrel that protruded from his side.

For a moment, Bartholomew was too stunned to do more than stare at Sir William’s prostrate form, but a scream from a passing woman jolted him back to his senses. He dropped to his knees and fought to stem the bleeding with a piece of clean linen from the bag he always carried over his shoulder. He was dimly aware of a crowd gathering, but his mind was on medicine as he pressed on the wound with one hand, and groped for forceps with the other.

As a physician, he should not have been considering a procedure that was the domain of barber-surgeons, but Cambridge had no competent sawbones of its own, and as he was of the opinion that patients should have access to any treatment that might save their lives, he was more skilled at such techniques than he should have been. Working quickly, he inserted the forceps into the wound, careful to place them around the barb, so it could be neutralised before removal.

‘I told you,’ murmured a familiar voice, and Bartholomew glanced up to see Cynric crouching beside him. ‘I said something terrible would happen. This arrow was intended for you.’

Bartholomew gaped at him. ‘At me? Why? I have no enemies here.’

‘No, but Michaelhouse has,’ whispered Cynric. ‘A distant College, which has laid claim to a
local
church. There will be more than vicars-choral who resent us for it.’

Bartholomew thought it a ludicrous assertion and dismissed
it from his mind. He started to ease the arrow out, but William began to writhe, and the book-bearer was unequal to keeping him still. He was on the verge of commandeering help from the spectators, when someone knelt next to him and expertly pinioned the knight’s arms. It was still not enough, but within moments more help arrived in the form of the woman who had shrieked. She was extremely attractive, with olive skin, dark eyes and silky black hair. She was past the first flush of youth, and her figure was mature but shapely. Bartholomew was slightly ashamed when Cynric was obliged to elbow him in order to bring his attention back to medicine.

‘It is all right, William,’ the lady was whispering encouragingly. ‘I am here, and so is Fournays. We will look after you.’

Once the patient was immobile, removing the arrow was easy. The wound bled copiously, but Bartholomew hoped this would serve to wash out any dirt. Unfortunately, it also meant the patient would bleed to death if he was carried home before it was sutured, so Bartholomew decided to complete the task in the street. He enlarged the hole slightly so that he could see what he was doing, found needle and thread, and began the laborious process of repairing damaged blood vessels and layers of muscle. William fainted, leaving Bartholomew’s assistants free to talk.

‘Did anyone see what happened?’ asked Fournays. He glanced at the woman. ‘Lady Helen?’

‘Yes, but I cannot credit it,’ replied Helen, in a voice that was unsteady with shock. ‘William and this surgeon were admiring the minster, when an arrow just thudded into him.’

‘Who could have done such a terrible thing?’ asked one of the crowd, before Bartholomew could inform her that he was nothing of the kind. The speaker was Prior
Chozaico. Anketil was at his side, and both had evidently hurried back when they had heard the commotion, because they were breathing hard. ‘I thought everyone liked Sir William.’

‘Even if we knew, we would not tell
you
,’ came an unpleasant response. Bartholomew glanced up to see that the speaker was Ellis, surrounded by vicars-choral, none of whom displayed any surprise or embarrassment at the remark. ‘You are French spies!’

When virtually every onlooker growled agreement, the two monks made themselves scarce. Bartholomew did not blame them: crowds turned quickly into mobs when there was a scapegoat to hand, and he could tell by the response Ellis’s words had provoked that the reports describing the city’s hostility towards a foundation thought to be working for the enemy had not been exaggerated.

He finished suturing a vein, and clipped off the ends of the twine with tiny but very sharp scissors. He started to reach for more thread, only to find Fournays ready with it. At this point, the spectators craned forward so eagerly that they blocked his light. Fournays ordered them back, and while he waited for them to oblige, Bartholomew noticed that the lawyer Dalfeld and the two nuns from the Abbot’s solar were among them, along with his Michaelhouse colleagues.

Michael’s face was a mask of dismay; clearly he was anticipating the trouble that would ensue when it became known that a physician, not a surgeon, was publicly conducting grisly procedures on the minster’s
advocatus ecclesiae
. Radeford was more interested in gazing at Isabella, while Langelee was pale, shocked by the assault on his old friend. He bent to whisper in Bartholomew’s ear.

‘Will he survive?’

Bartholomew raised his hands in a shrug. ‘I hope so, but it is too soon to say for certain.’

Langelee gripped his shoulder hard. ‘Do your best for him. He is a good man.’

As Sir William was still insensible and did not need to be held, Lady Helen stood on wobbly legs. A number of men immediately rushed to steady her, but she declined their hands and aimed for Isabella instead, who received her with a comforting hug. Bartholomew recalled that Langelee had mentioned a cousin of Isabella’s named Helen.

‘Helen’s distress is understandable,’ Fournays whispered to the physician. ‘She and Sir William were close until recently. We all thought they would marry, which would have been good for the city – they belong to opposing factions, you see, so it would have brought a measure of peace – but they changed their minds. They remain fond of each other, though.’

Bartholomew wondered how the knight could have let such a woman slip through his fingers, quite forgetting that he had done much the same with Matilde. He said nothing as he continued to stitch, listening with half an ear to the discussion taking place above his head.

‘The apprentices practise in the butts on a Monday,’ one of the vicars was saying. ‘So there are weapons everywhere. It would be easy for anyone to lay hold of one.’

‘Is there anything special about the arrow?’ Dalfeld shrugged when everyone regarded him in bemusement. ‘They are often distinctive, and may allow us to identify the man who shot it.’

Cynric handed it to him. Haughtily, the lawyer took it between thumb and forefinger, and made a show of examining it. The crowd waited in tense expectation for his verdict, although Bartholomew noticed several nudging each other and smirking at the sorry state of his clothes.

‘The barb is unique,’ Dalfeld announced eventually. ‘See how the tips are flattened?’

‘They were crushed when the arrow was removed from Sir William,’ said Cynric dismissively. ‘By the forceps. Obviously, they were not that shape when they struck.’

‘You mean you destroyed evidence that may allow us to catch a murderer?’ demanded Dalfeld. It was a remark made purely to repay Cynric for making him look foolish, but a murmur of suspicion rippled through the onlookers, and Bartholomew felt decidedly uneasy.

‘Of course not,’ said Fournays firmly, cutting it off. ‘Obviously, it was better to damage the arrow than to further damage the patient.’

Meanwhile, Langelee was scanning the area with the eye of a professional. ‘The bowman could have loosed the weapon from anywhere, but the most likely place is there.’

He pointed to a church that sat curiously close to the eastern end of the minster. It had probably once been handsome, but was now derelict: its window shutters were rotting, ivy grew over its roof, and pigeons roosted in the cracks that yawned in its crumbling tower.

‘St Mary ad Valvas?’ asked Lady Helen in surprise. ‘I sincerely doubt it! That place is cursed, and no one goes in it for any reason.’

‘It does have a reputation,’ agreed Isabella. She glanced at Langelee. ‘It is odd that you should single it out, because it has a slight connection to Michaelhouse. As you know, John Cotyngham is the current vicar of Huntington, but before that, he was priest at St Mary ad Valvas.’

‘A strange dedication,’ mused Michael. ‘Do I understand from the Latin that it has a sliding door? Perhaps a similar contrivance to the rollable stone that sealed Jesus’s tomb?’

‘Yes, it did,’ replied Isabella. ‘But it fell into disrepair years ago.’

‘Regardless, it is the perfect place for an ambush,’ said Langelee, still staring at it. ‘An archer could stand in there and no one would see him.’

‘But who would want to kill Sir William Longton?’ asked Fournays. ‘He is one of the most popular men in York.’

‘Yes, but his brother is not,’ said Dalfeld slyly. ‘
John
Longton has enemies galore.’

When the last stitch was in place, Fournays helped Bartholomew dress the wound, and they finished just as William opened pain-filled eyes. Helen crouched next to him, muttering re assurances; the knight smiled gratefully and squeezed her fingers.

Knowing the patient was going to be in for an uncomfortable time as he was carried home, no matter how careful the bearers, Bartholomew helped him sip a powerful soporific. It was not long before the knight’s eyes closed a second time, although he struggled to open them when someone began shoving through the crowd in a manner that was rudely aggressive.

‘Is it true?’ the newcomer demanded. ‘Someone has attacked my brother?’

There was a resemblance between him and the casualty, but the older man’s brusque manner could not have been more different from William’s amiable dignity. Moreover, his face was florid from high living, and he was unsteady on his feet, despite the fact that it was not yet noon. He was accompanied by companions who were also far from sober, all of whom wore clothes that said they were wealthy.

‘Sir William has been shot, Mayor Longton,’ supplied Dalfeld, when no one else spoke. ‘I imagine the wound will prove fatal. They usually are, where innards are concerned.’

‘Not necessarily,’ countered Fournays sharply, while Bartholomew gaped at the lawyer in dismay: the patient
was listening, and hearing such a grim prognosis would do nothing to aid his recovery. ‘Sir William is strong.’

‘Yes, and I am not ready to die just yet,’ whispered William with a wan smile. He tried to fight the effects of the medicine, but could not do it, and his head lolled to one side.