The Mark Of A Murderer

PROLOGUE

Oxford, 10 February 1355 (St Scholastica’s Day)

The Swindlestock Tavern had been painted a delicate pale gold the previous summer, so it stood handsome and resplendent among its more shabby neighbours. The inn was noted for the quality of its brewing, its fine spit roasts and the genial hospitality of its landlord Master Croidon, a squat, cheery-faced man who possessed the kind of belly that indicated he had no small liking for ale himself. His kind brown eyes invited confidences, and this made him popular among those for whom drinking also required a ready listener.

The tavern was peaceful when the scholars entered, but the low murmur of amiable conversation and the busy clatter of pots from the kitchen were not to last. Walter Spryngheuse and his friends walked to a table near the fire, and set about divesting themselves of their ice-clotted cloaks and hats. The wind rattled the window shutters and sent a frigid blast down the chimney, scattering ashes and sparks across the flagstone floor as Croidon came to tend the new arrivals, wiping his hands on his apron and exchanging pleasantries with other patrons as he went.

‘What can I fetch you, sirs?’ he asked, smiling an affable welcome. Drinking in the town’s hostelries was forbidden to members of the University, and the ones who flouted the rules nearly always caused trouble. But Croidon knew Spryngheuse and his colleagues to be sober, decent men, who often used his inn as a venue for their lively discussions on philosophy and natural science, and he did not fear bad behaviour from them. He glanced around as pellets of snow pattered against the window shutters, and did not blame the scholars for choosing his cosy tavern over the cold, draughty halls they called home.

‘Ale,’ replied Spryngheuse, edging closer to the fire. ‘Warmed, if you please. And what are you cooking today?’

‘Mutton,’ replied Croidon. ‘The poor animal froze to death inside her byre two nights ago. It has been a long and bitter winter, and I shall be glad to see it end.’

The clerks nodded heartfelt agreement. It had been one of the worst winters anyone could remember, with roads choked by snow since Christmas, and the river frozen hard, like stone. Life in many University foundations could be dismal even in good weather, and the atrocious weather had rendered some unbearable. Spryngheuse longed to abandon his studies and escape to the relative comfort of his family’s manor in the diocese of Hereford, but the roads west were all but impassable, and only a fool undertook long journeys while violent storms raged.

The scholars finished ordering their meal, then huddled around the table to discuss the latest theories emanating from Merton College on speed and motion. Spryngheuse was a Merton man himself, and used his association with the foundation’s great philosophers to impress the others. His good friend Roger de Chesterfelde was a member of Balliol, which also had its share of clever thinkers, and they began a bantering, light-hearted argument, while the others listened and laughed at the quick-witted insults that were tossed this way and that.

One did not smile, however. He was a slight, serious-faced man who wore the dark habit of a Benedictine. Croidon had not seen him before, and was under the impression that he had attached himself to Spryngheuse’s party without an invitation – the taverner doubted the monk’s tense, dour demeanour would have encouraged the others to befriend him. As soon as Croidon had gone to fetch the ale, the Benedictine made his first move.

‘Heytesbury of Merton is an ass,’ he declared, so harshly and unexpectedly that even the Balliol scholars were taken aback by his vehemence. ‘His theories about uniformly accelerated motion are flawed and illogical.’

Spryngheuse stared at him in astonishment. ‘You are mistaken, Brother: Heytesbury is widely acclaimed as the best natural philosopher Oxford has ever known.’

‘Nonsense,’ retorted the monk aggressively. ‘That honour belongs to Wyclif of Balliol. Is that not true, Chesterfelde?’

‘Of course,’ agreed Chesterfelde, although the tone of his voice was uneasy: it was one thing to assert supremacy with good-natured raillery, but another altogether to be downright rude about it. He jabbed the bemused Spryngheuse in the ribs in an attempt to revert to their former levity. ‘Wyclif is still young, but he is already the superior of your bumbling Mertonians. Just imagine what he will be like when he is the same age as Heytesbury!’

‘Here is your ale, gentlemen,’ boomed Croidon jovially, bearing a tray loaded with jugs. ‘Warmed against the chill of winter.’

‘But you have not heated it as much as you would a townsman’s,’ said the monk, sipping it with distaste. ‘And I asked for wine, anyway.’

‘You did not!’ declared Croidon indignantly. ‘You all ordered ale, and if it is not as hot as you would like, then you can blame the weather. I assure you, I treat all my patrons the same.’

‘Bring me wine,’ ordered the monk, thrusting the ale back at the landlord, so hard that some spilled on the man’s apron. ‘I cannot drink this vile brew.’

Croidon knew better than to argue with bellicose customers. Wordlessly, he took the jug and went to fetch a different drink. The monk’s companions regarded him uncomfortably.

‘That was unmannerly, Brother,’ said Chesterfelde. His face, usually bright with laughter, was flushed, and Spryngheuse was reminded that his friend had an unfortunate tendency to lose his temper rather more quickly than most men. ‘Croidon is right: how can he warm his ales when the weather is so bitter? He is only mortal, and cannot magic hot ale from cold casks.’

‘We are breaking University rules by coming here, but Croidon turns a blind eye as long as we are well behaved,’ said Spryngheuse, resting a hand on Chesterfelde’s arm to calm him. ‘So keep a civil tongue in your head, if you please, Brother. I do not want to be reduced to drinking my ale at Balliol, for God’s sake!’

The others laughed, easing the tension that had arisen at the prospect of an unpleasant altercation between Chesterfelde and the Benedictine. Chesterfelde smiled, too, his flare of temper subsiding. He was always ready to enjoy a joke, and was about to retort with a teasing insult aimed at Merton, when Croidon arrived.

‘Here is your wine,’ the landlord said, placing a goblet in front of his awkward patron, along with several coins that were the change from Spryngheuse’s groat. ‘It is the best we have, and I warmed it myself with the poker from the fire.’

‘It is filth,’ declared the Benedictine, spitting it on the floor. Croidon gaped in disbelief as the monk turned to his companions. ‘Will you allow this scoundrel to sell poor quality brews to scholars, while he saves the best for the secular scum who infest the city?’

‘Hey!’ shouted a listening mason indignantly. ‘Watch your mouth! It is scholars who are scum around here, with their uncouth manners and slovenly ways.’

‘Well?’ demanded the monk, ignoring the mason and fixing Chesterfelde with a challenging glare. ‘Will you sit there and let this vagabond insult your University?’

‘No harm has been done,’ said Spryngheuse hastily, aware that Chesterfelde was beginning to rise to the bait. ‘I think-’

‘And we have been cheated, too!’ interrupted the monk, pointing at the money Croidon had left on the table. ‘Look how much we have been charged. He has one price for students and another for the rest of his patrons.’

‘I must have made a mistake,’ said Croidon, bewildered. He was certain the number of coins had been correct.

‘That is not good enough,’ snapped the monk. ‘Frozen ale, filthy wine and now you try to swindle us.’ He appealed to his companions. ‘Will you let this thief treat us like ignorant peasants?’

‘Not I!’ declared Chesterfelde, incensed by the very notion. He snatched up the monk’s goblet and brought it down hard on Croidon’s head. The landlord dropped to his knees with a howl of pain, and blood dribbled between the fingers he lifted to his scalp.

Men were rising to their feet all over the tavern. The mason’s friends began to advance menacingly, while a group of hitherto silent, unobtrusive Franciscans from Exeter College set their sights on an apprentice who had recently jibed them about their celibacy.

‘He tried to deceive us!’ shouted the Benedictine, jabbing an accusing finger at the bleeding landlord. ‘And in so doing he insults Balliol – and Exeter and Merton, too! Will you allow this to happen? Or are you soldiers of God, ready to fight for what is right?’

‘Balliol!’ yelled Chesterfelde, bloated with fury as he struck the hapless landlord a second time.

The mason leapt at him, and they rolled to the floor in an undignified mêlée of arms and legs. The craftsman’s companions surged forward to join in, while the apprentice threw a punch at one of the Franciscans, whose head jerked back and struck the wall with a soggy crunch. Skirmishes broke out all across the room.

‘Come outside!’ the monk urged Spryngheuse, grabbing his arm. ‘I have bows and arrows. You must protect yourself against these murderous townsmen, or they will kill you.’

He dragged the reluctant Spryngheuse through the door and out into the street. Their friends followed, leaving Chesterfelde and the mason embroiled in a scuffle that was becoming deadly: the mason had drawn his dagger, and there was blood on Chesterfelde’s arm.

‘Murder!’ Chesterfelde screeched, his outraged wail audible in the street as he tried to wriggle away from his furious opponent. ‘He has stabbed me!’

‘The town has slain a scholar!’ bawled the Benedictine to several passers-by, as he thrust bows and arrows into his bemused companions’ hands. They were too startled by the sudden escalation in violence to ask why he had thought to store such objects so conveniently close to hand. The situation was spiralling out of control, and there was no time to stop and think logically.

Chesterfelde staggered out of the inn, shrieking from the agony in his wounded arm. The mason followed, and the expression on his face as he wielded his dagger made it plain that he was intending to finish what he had started. Spryngheuse shot him dead.

Then the bells in St Mary’s Church started to ring in an urgent, discordant clamour, warning scholars that their University was under attack. Within moments, the streets were full of students. Word spread that several of their own had been brutally slain in the Swindlestock Tavern, and it was not long before they had armed themselves with staves, clubs and swords, inflamed by the jangle of bells and the calls for vengeance. They flocked to the inn like wasps to honey, and within moments several neighbouring houses were ablaze.

Children and women screamed, horses whinnied in terror, and scholars and townsmen alike howled in savage delight at the prospect of a serious brawl. The University’s Chancellor hurried from his sumptuous lodgings and tried to appeal for calm, but a gang of apprentices recognised his gorgeous robes and began to pelt him with mud. Some struck his face. The mob surged towards him, and would have torn him apart, had his clerks not dragged him back inside and barred the door.

Meanwhile, the Mayor, seeing what happened to the Chancellor, decided the only way to resolve the situation was to make sure the town won the fracas, so he exhorted his people to rise up against the scholars. A group of unarmed friars from University Hall went down amid a flailing fury of sticks and spades; all six were killed within moments. News of the slaughter spread like wildfire, and more scholars ran on to the streets with weapons. Croidon watched the unfolding massacre with open-mouthed horror, while the monk who had started it all hid in a doorway, a smile of satisfaction stamped across his dour features. Then he slipped away to complete his own business while chaos reigned.

Cambridge, May 1355

Only the merest sliver of moon was visible on the eve of the festival to celebrate Ascension Day. John Clippesby, the Dominican Master of Music and Astronomy at the College of Michaelhouse, liked this soft, velvety darkness, because it meant he was less likely to be seen, and he could sit quietly and listen to the sounds of the night without being disturbed.

He was glad to be away from the College, to escape from fat Brother Michael and his tediously fussy preparations for the following day. Clippesby would not have minded if some of the arrangements had focused on the religious ceremonies, but the gluttonous monk made no bones about the fact that his chief interest lay in the feast that was to follow the mass. Clippesby was tired of hearing about the vast quantities of meat and wine that were to be consumed, and the number of Lombard slices that had already been baked.

The Dominican often left his College at night. He disliked being obliged to spend too much time with his quarrelsome, earthly minded colleagues, and preferred the more peaceful, honest company of animals. Like Clippesby himself, they were soft-footed and silent, and together they witnessed all manner of happenings when people did not know the shadows held observant eyes. Clippesby had already watched Father William sneak into the cellars to raid Michael’s wine, and he had seen a pair of Doctor Bartholomew’s medical students climb over the College walls to enjoy an illicit assignation with some of the town’s prostitutes.

He walked along the High Street, stopping briefly to greet the University stationer’s mule, and then spent some time near King’s Hall, admiring the bats. When his neck became stiff from craning to see their intricate aerial ballet, he made his way towards All-Saints-in-the-Jewry. A cat regularly prowled in the church’s graveyard, and Clippesby enjoyed talking to her. Sometimes, she talked back, and told him what she had seen as she hunted mice and rats. Clippesby knew his colleagues thought he was insane because he conversed with animals, but he did not care – his furred and feathered friends invariably made a lot more sense to him than the diatribes of his human companions.

He passed a row of houses that had been rebuilt after their collapse the previous winter. The largest was occupied by a yellow dog called Edwardus Rex, named for the King; he graciously shared his home with Yolande de Blaston, her husband Robert and their ten children. The Blastons were so desperate for money to feed their ever-growing brood that Robert was only too pleased his wife was able to provide extra by selling her body to other men, and saw nothing odd in her using the family home for such purposes. Clippesby did not hire her: he was a friar, and he took his vows of chastity seriously. He edged behind the trees opposite the house, thinking it had been some time since he had seen Edwardus and that he should enquire after his health. Edwardus barked, and Clippesby smiled.

But it was not Clippesby that Edwardus was acknowledging: it was someone else. Intrigued as always by the steady procession of men who made their way to Yolande’s door during the secret hours of darkness, Clippesby waited to see who had an appointment with her that night. He grimaced when he recognised a scholar he did not like, who regularly visited Yolande and who was a hypocrite, because he condemned others for sins he committed himself. However, he knew there was no point in exposing the man: Clippesby’s penchant for animals meant that most people considered him a lunatic, and few believed anything he said.

The scholar carried a package under his arm, which Clippesby knew from past observations contained marchpanes for Yolande’s children; he supposed the gift eased the man’s conscience about cavorting with their mother while they and their father slept upstairs. When Yolande opened the door to her suitor’s soft taps, Edwardus eased past her and began sniffing the parcel. The scholar tried to kick him, but Edwardus had been hurt by the man before, and was ready to dodge out of the way. Then the dog stiffened and started to growl.

Clippesby raced forward as fast as he could. He heard Edwardus’s furious yaps and the scholar’s exclamation of annoyance that he should be disturbed as he was about to enjoy himself. Then Yolande screamed, and blood spurted from a gaping wound in the scholar’s shoulder.

‘The wolf!’ Clippesby yelled. ‘It is the wolf!’