A Wicked Deed (39 page)

‘Time is running on,’ muttered Cynric anxiously, glancing up at the sky. ‘We will miss sunrise if we do not hurry, and then this will be me!’

‘What happened?’ asked Bartholomew of Deblunville’s men. ‘Did any of you see?’

‘He went off alone into the trees,’ said the toothless man. ‘Too much ale at dinner. When he did not come back, we went looking for him, and found him like this.’

‘Did you see anyone else?’ asked Bartholomew, thinking uncomfortably that Hamon and his cronies were probably not far away.

‘No,’ said the toothless man. He gave a grim, gummy smile. ‘Believe me, nothing would give us greater pleasure than to blame Master Deblunville’s death on Hamon, but it is obvious it was an accident: he fell and hit his head. There are the torn weeds where his foot slipped, and you can see that stone is buried in the ground, and has been for years. If someone had killed him, it would be lying on top of the grass, not half hidden in the soil.’

‘It was Padfoot,’ said the archer in a whisper. ‘Why did we not listen? Why did we ever come out here? Maybe Padfoot is the calf’s guardian, and he does not want the thing dug up.’

All the men and Cynric crossed themselves hastily, looking about them as though the white dog might appear at any moment and drag them off to hell. Bartholomew stood up. There was nothing more he could do, and Cynric was becoming increasingly agitated about the time. Everything pointed to the fact that Deblunville’s death was simply a tragic accident, although coming so soon after the others, there was a nagging doubt at the back of Bartholomew’s mind.

‘Take him home,’ he instructed the waiting men. He thought about Janelle and her unborn child. ‘And you will have to inform his wife that she is now a widow. Be sure to do it gently – shocks like this will not be good for her.’

‘She will not be overly distressed,’ said one of the men, a skinny fellow with strangely pale eyes. He shrugged at his friends’ reaction to his indiscretion. ‘Well, it is true! I would say it took them about two nights to realise what a dreadful mistake they had made, and after ten days they are already at the point where they loathe each other.’

‘It was because of that Walter Wauncy,’ said the archer sagely. ‘I said it was not good luck to be married by a walking corpse, but Janelle insisted because of the saving of three pennies.’

‘She said last night that she was afraid she might go the same way as his first wife, Pernel,’ said the pale-eyed man, his expression knowing. The others nodded agreement, and looked expectantly at Bartholomew, who wondered what they wanted him to say.

‘I see,’ he replied noncommittally, aware of Cynric’s impatience to be away.

‘Master Bardolf has gone home now, you see,’ said the pale-eyed man. ‘Without her father to protect her, Mistress Janelle felt her husband was already making plans to dispatch her.’

‘That is why he died like this,’ said the archer, gazing at the corpse as if it explained everything. ‘It is God’s judgement on a black soul.’

‘I thought you said his death was Padfoot’s fault,’ said Bartholomew.

The assembly crossed themselves again, and peered nervously into the trees.

‘He pushed Pernel, you see,’ said the pale-eyed man. ‘He pushed her hard, and she hit her head on the stone windowsill and died. And now he has died in the same way – his brains dashed out on a stone. It is God’s judgement and Padfoot’s revenge.’

So Deblunville
had
killed his first wife, just as the Grundisburgh villagers had speculated, thought Bartholomew, surprised to learn that there was truth in what he had assumed was a piece of nasty gossip put about by Tuddenham. He supposed it was possible that Deblunville had not intended Pernel to die, but by all accounts she was a good deal older than him, and a man in his prime had no right to be pushing old ladies around, no matter what the provocation. He watched the men gather up their dead lord and bear him away through the dark forest. He turned to Cynric, fretting at his side.

‘Now for the prayer at sunrise,’ he said, wishing he was anywhere but at Barchester.

Dawn that morning was just a case of the sky growing steadily lighter, and it was almost impossible to tell at what point the sun rose, since it was concealed behind a thick bank of clouds. In the distance thunder growled, and the air was thick and still, as it always was before a storm. Lightning zigzagged towards a faraway hill, and there was a red blaze as it struck a tree. Bartholomew did not relish the prospect of being caught in a cloudburst but he followed Cynric’s rapid pace through the trees without complaint.

As they drew parallel to it, with the River Lark between them, Bartholomew could see the top of the church tower poking above the trees, and noticed that Cynric had drawn his sword.

‘I am having second thoughts,’ said the book-bearer fearfully. ‘I cannot go through with this.’

‘Cynric,’ said Bartholomew gently. ‘This is unlike the brave warrior from Gwynedd, who has fought more battles than he can remember and is afraid of no man.’

‘Stay here, then,’ said Bartholomew. ‘I will go alone.’

‘No!’ said Cynric, gripping his hand. ‘I will not let you throw away your life. Padfoot has killed once already tonight, and his fangs will be hot for more blood.’

‘Or perhaps he is sated,’ reasoned Bartholomew. ‘Come on, Cynric. It will be sunrise soon, and I am not going through all this beef-stealing again tomorrow because we missed it.’

‘But you do not know where I saw Padfoot,’ said Cynric weakly. ‘You will not be able to stand in the right place.’

‘Of course I will. The thing was sitting on me – I know exactly where it was. So hurry.’

‘I am not going,’ said Cynric, with sudden firmness. ‘And neither are you. There will be a storm soon, and we do not want to get wet.’

‘We have been wet before,’ said Bartholomew. He laid his hand on Cynric’s arm. ‘Stay here with Deynman.’ He pointed to a small, sod-roofed shepherds’ hut that, judging from its unkempt appearance, had long been disused. Its roof was cloaked in ivy, and weeds choked the single window. ‘You can shelter there if it starts to rain.’

‘I will protect you from demons and devils, Cynric,’ said Deynman earnestly. ‘We have almost done all the charm, and we cannot give up now.’

Tucking his bag under one arm, Bartholomew began to trot down the slope toward the stream, splashing across where it was shallowest, and up the other side. Cynric’s fear seemed to have rubbed off on him, and he could not help but notice that it was very quiet as he neared Barchester. The birds that had been singing as dawn approached had suddenly stopped, and even the breeze had died in the trees. All he could hear was his own laboured breathing, and the clink of phials in his bag.

As he drew closer to the village, he slowed, pausing to look and to listen, as he had seen Cynric do so many times. It seemed that the rain had been waiting for him to reach Barchester, because as he inched toward it, drops began to fall, becoming steadily harder as he neared the hamlet, almost as if it were warning him to stay away, Impatiently he forced such fanciful thoughts from his mind, and concentrated on what he was doing.

Carefully, he picked his way through the tangle of elm and birch, and emerged in the main street. It was as still and unwelcoming as the grave. The spot where he had been attacked was easy to find. It was puddled and pitted with hoof marks, and one of Cynric’s arrows still protruded from the ground nearby. Bartholomew stood in the pool of muddy water and, assuming the sun was rising somewhere behind the glowering grey clouds, he began to chant.

‘Pater noster, qui es in coelis, sanctificetur Nomen tuum.’

Recalling that he was supposed to say it as fast as he could, he started again, glancing around uneasily, partly concerned that some tatty and vicious dog would attack him, but more worried that he would be caught in the act of doing something very odd by some perfectly sane traveller.

‘Adveniat regnum tuum. Fiat voluntas tua, sicut in coelo, et in terra.’

As he spoke, the heavens finally opened. The rain hissed and pattered, increasing in volume until it was a steady drone against the roofs of the hovels.

‘Panem nostrum quotidianum da nobis hodie, et dimitte nobis debita nostra …’

It fell in a solid sheet, obscuring the distant trees completely, and veiling the closer ones with a sheet of downward-moving haze. Raindrops hammered into the mud, making the puddles dance and shudder, while leaves shivered and long blades of grass twisted this way and that.

‘Sicut et nos dimittimus debitoribus nostris.’

Just when Bartholomew thought it could grow no heavier, a floodgate opened and the drone became a roar. He began to shout, the words barely audible over the thunder.

‘Et ne nos inducas in tentationem. Sed libera nos a malo.’

He found it was not difficult to gabble, since all his instincts told him to run for cover in one of the huts.

‘Per omnia saecula saeculorum. Amen.’

With relief he finished and looked around him, blinking water out of his eyes. The rain began to ease, not that it made much difference to him now that he was completely sodden.

Since he was there, and since there were no disapproving colleagues looking over his shoulder, he decided to conduct a quick search, wondering if he might find Norys hiding, or some clue as to the nature of the white dog that held the entire area in terror. Or even the golden calf, unearthed by one of the diggers and secreted there until it could be spirited away and sold without Tuddenham’s knowledge. Cautiously, he slunk along the side of the first house, and looked in through a window that had shutters dangling uselessly on broken hinges.

There was nothing to see. The roof had collapsed, and any furniture or belongings that had been left were buried under a heap of rotting reeds. The second house was little different, although the roof was not quite so decayed. The third had only two walls standing, while the fourth cottage had been badly damaged by fire. A sudden gust of wind made dried leaves rustle across the charred floor, and a precarious timber groaned ominously. Outside there was a skeleton of what seemed to be a dog, still wearing a leather collar and tethered to the doorpost, stark white bones gleaming in the litter of dead leaves.

Curiously, he pushed aside the strip of leather that had served as a door, and looked inside. The wizened carrots that had been on the table were still there, along with a turnip that he did not recall seeing before. He dropped the leather back into place and looked up the street. There was only one more place left to search: the church.

For some reason, the church seemed to exude the feeling that it did not want its secrets disturbed, far more than did any of the houses. He almost gave up, reasoning that there was nothing to be gained from forcing himself to look inside it when he did not want to, but the thought of Unwin spurred him on.

The church’s graveyard was the domain of the forest, and tombs were rendered invisible under long grass and nettles. The building itself was a low, long structure with a squat tower at the west end, both larger than he would have expected for such a small village, suggesting that at some point in the past a lord of the manor had considered the village worth spending money on.

The main entrance had been through a porch in the south wall, but this was thick with ivy, and Bartholomew could see it would not easily be breached. He walked around the church, looking up at its wet, forbidding walls as he wiped the rain from his eyes with his sleeve. There was not a window that did not have something growing from it, while the tiled roof was sadly decayed: it would not be very much longer before the entire thing collapsed.

A priest’s door led into the chancel, and Bartholomew saw that it hung askew, one of its leather hinges having decayed away. His hand was reaching out to push it inward, when a flicker of movement caught his eye.

He spun around, stomach churning, but there was nothing to see but drops falling silver from the trees and a faint stirring of the undergrowth in the wind. Taking a deep breath to control himself, he turned and lifted his hand to the door once more. It was just swinging open when a blood-curdling screech froze his blood, and made his heart pound in panic.

He swung around just in time to see something hurtling out of the undergrowth to throw itself at him. Raising his arms to protect himself, he was knocked backward against the wall, losing his footing in the slippery grass. Glancing up, he saw the glint of a weapon, and dodged to one side as it flashed toward him. He heard it screech against the stone, and then saw it rise for a second strike. He twisted away again, feeling it thump into his medicine bag, and struggled to his feet. There was another unearthly howl, and clawed hands raked at his face. He grabbed at one of them and caught it, flinching back as the other flailed wildly, aiming for his eyes.