A Bone Of Contention Part 25

Edred's eyes became frightened again and he seemed to lose some of the colour from his face. 'Because I took the ring to Master Lydgate and he told me if I ever mentioned to anyone what I had done, he would kill me,' he said.

'So, why are you telling us now?' asked Michael, unmoved by the friar's fear.

'Because he made a similar threat to Werbergh.

Werbergh spoke to you,' said Edred, looking at Bartholomew with large eyes, 'and now he is dead.'

'But if you think Werbergh died because he spoke to me,' said Bartholomew reasonably, 'why are you now doing the same?'

'Because I do not know what else to do,' said Edred.

Bartholomew had expected him to break down into tears and wail at him, but Edred was made of sterner stuff. He swallowed hard and met Bartholomew's gaze evenly. 'I thought if I told you what I know, you might be able to sort out this mess and offer me some kind of protection.'

Michael sighed. 'It all sounds most mysterious,' he said cynically. 'But let us start at the beginning. We will consider your protection when we better know what we must protect you against.' He leaned back into his chair again, ignoring the creaking wood. 'Proceed.'

Edred looked from one to the other, his face expression-i less. 'Master Lydgate killed Dominica and a servant from Valence Marie that she was with the night of the riot. He also killed Werbergh and James Kenzie. And if he knows where I am he will kill me too.'

CHAPTER 9.

In the silence that followed Edred's announcement, Bartholomew was aware of small sounds in the kitchen: Michael's heavy breathing, a student laughing in one of the rooms, the purring of the College cat as it rubbed around his legs.

'How do you know all this?' asked Michael, the first to regain his tongue.

Edred studied an oatcake, then began to crumble it in his fingers. 'On the night of the riot, I was out with some of the other students. I was only there to administer to those that might need me, and to try to stop needless fighting,' he said, looking at Michael.

'Of course you were,' said Michael flatly. 'Pray continue.'

'Then I saw Dominica Lydgate in the company of two men. I knew she was thought to be safe in Chesterton, and so I ran back to G.o.dwinsson to tell Master Lydgate that she was in Cambridge.'

Bartholomew nodded. That accorded with what Cecily had told him. He thought of Joanna and the uncertain light. 'Are you certain it was Dominica? Could you have been mistaken?'

Edred looked surprised. 'Yes, I am certain,' he said. 'It was Dominica I saw.'

'Did you recognise the men she was with?' asked Michael, looking at the small pile of crumbs on the table from Edred's oatcake.

Edred hung his head and swallowed noisily.

'Come now, Brother Edred,' said Michael firmly. 'You are safe here. Tonight you can sleep in Michaelhouse and tomorrow we will see about getting you away from Cambridge altogether. But only if you are honest with us now.'

Edred nodded miserably. 'I thought I recognised who she was with,1 he said, 'although I am still uncertain. I think one of the men was called Will - he is a grubby little man who works at Valence Marie and who has been trawling the King's Ditch for relics recently. The other was his brother, Ned, who died in the riot.'

Bartholomew thought back to the bodies lying in the castle outbuilding. One may well have been Will's brother.

He looked up to find Edred staring at him intently.

'Master Lydgate has killed four people already. My conscience will not allow him to kill again.'

'But what evidence do you have that he has killed these four people?' asked Bartholomew, denying himself the satisfaction of asking the arrogant friar why his conscience only started to p.r.i.c.k after four deaths.

Edred began to push the oatcake crumbs into a heap with his index fingers. 'When I told Master Lydgate I had seen Dominica the night of the riot, he left to find her.

He was in a rage such as I have never seen before.' He looked up briefly. 'And, believe me, I have witnessed a fair few of his rages during my time at G.o.dwinsson.

Anyway, after he had gone Mistress Lydgate said she was going, too. I did the only thing an honest friar could do and accompanied her.'

Michael and Bartholomew exchanged a wry look in response to the friar's claimed motive. Edred, his attention fixed on his pyramid of crumbs, did not notice.

'We searched for some time and then we found Dominica. But Master Lydgate had arrived before us and Dominica already lay dead. He had also killed Ned. He was standing over the bodies with his dagger dripping. Of Will there was no sign. He must have managed to escape, for I have seen him alive since.'

'But did you actually see Lydgate kill them?' persisted Bartholomew. Although Edred's story corroborated Cecily's, there remained a small thread of doubt in his mind.

Edred gave a short bark of laughter. 'No, I did not. But a man hovering over two corpses with his dagger dripping blood? What else would you imagine had happened?

Mistress Cecily was all for rushing forward to Dominica, but I prevented her. Master Lydgate stood over his victims for a while, looked around him as though he expected the Devil to s.n.a.t.c.h him away, and then slunk off. We had seen enough. Mistress Lydgate asked me to escort her to Maud's and I left her there. By the time I returned to the scene of the murder, Dominica's and Ned's bodies had been removed by the Sheriffs men.'

Michael looked at Bartholomew as he asked his next question. 'Do you know where Cecily Lydgate is now?'

Bartholomew avoided his eyes while Edred continued.

'I cannot say what happened after I left her at Maud's. She did not return to G.o.dwinsson, but apparently someone had made a terrible mess of her room - perhaps when it was searched.'

'Searched for what?' asked Michael.

'Her jewellery, I suppose. It is widely known that she possesses a great deal of priceless jewellery.'

'Was this jewellery missing after her room was searched?'

Michael asked.

Edred's mouth lifted at one corner in a disdainful sneer. 'Of course not. She does not keep it on display.

It is all hidden away in places known only to her and Master Lydgate.'

'Not Dominica?' asked Bartholomew.

Again the sneer. 'One or two places, perhaps, but not all. The Lydgates are not a trusting couple where their wealth is concerned.'

Around Edred's neck was a delicate golden crucifix that Bartholomew had not seen him wear before. Since Edred seemed to know about Cecily's hidden treasure, Bartholomew supposed it was not too much of a leap in logic to suppose that Edred had taken the opportunity to ransack her room himself. It would certainly explain why he had taken so long to return to the scene of Dominica's murder-long enough so that the Sheriff had removed the body - after he had seen Cecily safely to Maud's Hostel.

'The day after all this, you went to the Castle to identify the body of the G.o.dwinsson friar who died during the riot, did you not?' asked Bartholomew. 'In the company of Master Lydgate?'

Edred nodded. 'Several students were missing after the riot and Master Lydgate wanted to see whether any of the dead were ours. Two were: the friar and the French student. The friar's head was crushed but we saw the scar on his knee where he was injured at the Battle of Crcy. Or so he always claimed. Master Lydgate insisted on viewing all the dead, although I only looked at ours.'

Bartholomew caught Michael's eye, wondering if he would consider this evidence that Lydgate had been looking for Dominica among the dead. Except that now, Bartholomew was no longer certain whom Lydgate had been seeking - or even which of the women had lain dead in the makeshift Castle mortuary. Edred went back to his pile of crumbs.

'Now, tell us why you also think Lydgate killed Werbergh?' asked Michael, leaning back in his chair and folding his arms across his considerable girth. 'His death was an accident, was it not? The shed fell on him when he went to find timber to build a writing desk. Why do you think Werbergh was murdered?'

Edred looked pained. 'Because Master Lydgate told us that if we talked to you, he would kill us. Werbergh was seen talking to you and he disappeared, only to reappear dead under the shed.'

'And you think this suspicious?' asked Michael.

Edred gave another of his short, explosive laughs. 'I most certainly do! Oh, it looked convincing enough, and our servants, Saul Potter and Huw, both claimed that Werbergh had told them he was going out to look for wood to build a desk, but it seemed too convenient.

A man disappears and suddenly returns only to die in a fluky accident? No! That is too coincidental.'

'But you did not actually see Lydgate kill Werbergh,' pressed Bartholomew. It was a statement and not a question.

'It is not necessary to have seen him plunge the dagger into his victims in order to make sense of the evidence,' retorted Edred, his temper ruffled. He suddenly put his head in his hands, scattering the crumbs. 'I should have known it was a mistake to come to you. Why should you believe me?'

Why indeed? thought Bartholomew. Edred had really given them very little new information, and most was in the form of supposition and conjecture. But Bartholomew's compa.s.sion was aroused when he saw the young man's shoulders shaken by a sob. Edred obviously believed what he was telling them was the truth and was frightened by it.

'And what about James Kenzie?' he asked in a gentler tone. Edred shook his head, unable or unwilling to answer, so Bartholomew answered for him. 'You stole the ring from him during the street brawl and took it to Lydgate to claim your reward. Lydgate was simultaneously pleased to have such a clue regarding the ident.i.ty of his daughter's lover, but angry when you told him it was a Scot. He is a man who bl.u.s.ters and threatens. He vowed to kill Kenzie, and hurled the ring from the window in his anger. Then he threatened to kill you if you confessed that you had stolen the ring.'

Edred looked at him with a tear-stained face. 'No. It did not happen quite like that. I gave the ring to Master Lydgate and he became furious. But not with the Scot, with me. He said the ring was a fake, a cheap imitation of the original. He accused me of having it made so that I could claim the reward from him. He hurled it to the floor and stamped on it. Then he said that if I ever told anyone what I had done, he would kill me. He said having a friar who was a confessed thief and liar would bring G.o.dwinsson Hostel into disrepute. After he had gone I picked up the ring and I could see that he was right.

What I had thought was silver was cheap metal. I flung it through the window in disgust.'

'So the ring you took from Kenzie was a fake?' said Bartholomew thoughtfully. He reached into his sleeve and brought it out. Ts this it?'

Edred took the broken ring and examined it briefly.

'Yes. That's the wretched thing that brought me so much trouble. I don't know how the Scot came to have it, rather than the original. He came later that night to ask if I had taken it, but since it was already broken, and it had landed me in so much trouble, I told him I had not.'

But what was Kenzie doing with a ring that was a fake? wondered Bartholomew. Dominica had definitely given one of the original pair to Kenzie - Robert had identified it quite clearly as the one at Valence Marie - while the other, the one Dominica had kept, had remained with Cecily. But Kenzie had not worn the real ring in the street brawl, he had worn a cheap imitation. Meanwhile, the real ring was on the finger of the relic at Valence Marie. It made no sense. How did the real ring get from Kenzie to the hand found at Valence Marie? 'So, if Lydgate knew that the ring you had taken from Kenzie was a false one, why do you think Lydgate killed him?' Michael was asking.

'That evening, after I had shown the false ring to Master Lydgate, Dominica was sent away to relatives in Chesterton to keep her from seeing her lover,' said Edred. 'I was restless after the scene with the Scot, and knew I would be unable to sleep, so I stayed out. As I was returning, much later, I saw someone throwing pebbles at Dominica's window. He threw perhaps three or four before he realised he was not going to be answered, and then he stole away.'

'And did you recognise this person?' asked Michael.

'Oh yes, I recognised him by the yellow hose under his tabard, which was obvious, even by moonlight. It was the Scot-James Kenzie you say his name was. A few moments after, I saw Master Lydgate leave the house and follow him up the lane. I went to bed, and the next day, you came to say that Kenzie was murdered. I made the reasonable a.s.sumption that Lydgate had also seen Kenzie throwing stones at Dominica's window, guessed him to be her lover, followed him and killed him.'

'Why did you not tell us this before?' asked Michael.

'And why did you lie to us when we asked where you were that night?'

Edred looked frightened again, but also indignant.

'How could I do otherwise? By telling you, I would have admitted to theft and lying, two virtues not highly praised by my Order. I would have been thrown out of the University. And anyway, how could I accuse the Princ.i.p.al of murder? Who would you have believed: the poor, lying thief of a friar who had been seen by the Proctor arguing with the murdered man the day before his death, or the rich and influential Lydgate?'

Michael inclined his head, accepting the young man's reasoning. 'But by hiding your own lesser sins, you have protected the ident.i.ty of a murderer. And you now say that this murderer has struck thrice more and will do so again.'

Edred looked away. 'I did not know what to do.' I did not think you would believe me, because I had already lied to you. But I was afraid, too. The Lydgates know I was absent from the hostel the night of Kenzie's death, and Mistress Lydgate could have accused me of lying when I used Werbergh as my alibi that night. But she did not, and I think she guessed I saw her husband leaving to follow Kenzie. Perhaps she saw me returning through her window. Anyway, the message was clear: if I maintained my silence about what I had seen, so would they.'

It made sense logically, thought Bartholomew, casting his mind back to the information they had been given the day of Kenzie's murder. Edred's story and Werbergh's had not tallied and Bartholomew had wondered whether Edred was lying about the theft of the ring to mask a far more serious incident. The incident had been that he believed his Princ.i.p.al had committed murder. It tallied with Cecily's story, too. She had been told not to contradict anything said to protect G.o.dwinsson from the unwelcome inquiries of Brother Michael. But were Edred's suspicions to be believed? It was all so simple: Lydgate killed Kenzie, then his daughter and Ned from Valence Marie, then Werbergh, whom he thought might be pa.s.sing information to Bartholomew and Michael. Was Lydgate a man who could kill four people with such ease?

Cecily certainly feared her husband sufficiently to flee from him, so perhaps he was.

'Two more questions,' said Bartholomew, seeing the student's shoulders begin to sag with tiredness, 'and then you should sleep. First, do you know who attacked Brother Michael and me in the High Street?'

Edred shook his head. 'I heard about that from Master Lydgate. He was delighted that you had received your just deserts, but he did not know who would attack you, and neither do I.'

Bartholomew nodded, satisfied with the answer, especially given the very plausible response reported from Lydgate.

But that did not mean that G.o.dwinsson was uninvolved.

Bartholomew remained convinced that it had been Saul Potter and Huw's voices he had heard that night, despite his hazy memory.

'And second,' he continued, 'where are G.o.dwinsson's French students?'

Edred looked frightened again. 'One was killed in the riot. But when Master Lydgate had the truth from the other two that they had been involved in a brawl with you - and not with ten heavily armed townspeople as they initially claimed - he grew angry. They left to return to France. Huw and Saul Potter helped them escape.'

Escape from their Princ.i.p.al, thought Bartholomew.

What a terrible indictment of his violent and aggressive character. No wonder Cecily had left him.

As if reading his thoughts, Edred added. 'He hates you. That is one of the reasons I came. Any man who has earned such hatred from Master Lydgate must surely be the man whom I can trust with my life, and who will protect me from him.'

Bartholomew nodded absently, and indicated for Cynric to show Edred where he might sleep. The Welshman fetched a spare blanket from the laundry and led the weary scholar out of the kitchen towards Bartholomew's room. When they had gone, Bartholomew and Michael sat in silence.

'Do you believe him?' asked Bartholomew after a while.

Michael nodded. 'I am certain he thinks he is telling the truth. But that is not to say I agree with his interpretation of it.'

Bartholomew concurred. 'All his evidence - such as it is - suggests that Lydgate killed Dominica, Kenzie, Ned and Werbergh. But there is something not right about it all, something missing.'

'But what? The motives are there in each case, and the opportunity.'

'I know, but there is something I cannot define that does not fit,' said Bartholomew insistently.

'I would have thought you would have been pleased with Edred's evidence. It adds weight to your theory that Joanna was really Dominica.'

'Oh, that,' said Bartholomew dismissively.

Michael leaned forward in his chair, while Bartholomew repeated the conversation he had had with the old rivermen. Michael listened gravely.

'And there is something more, is there not?' he asked when Bartholomew had finished. 'About Mistress Lydgate's disappearance? I know you have another ring like the one on the relic in your sleeve. I found it while you were asleep a couple of nights ago. So, you may as well tell me what else you have learned.'

'Did you search my room?' asked Bartholomew, remembering the moved candle and jug.

'Of course not!' said Michael indignantly. 'And I did not really search for the rings. I just knew where you would hide them.' He paused. 'Are you certain your room was searched?'