A Poisonous Plot

‘You are not supposed to sleep in here,’ said Deynman accusingly. ‘It is a library. What will benefactors think? We shall be banished to the Fens for certain.’

Bartholomew sat up, hand to his stiff neck. ‘Is it time for church?’

‘Not yet, but I was restless, so I thought I would come here to think. It is a good place during the hours of darkness, when there is no one clamouring at me to borrow my treasures. Sometimes, I wish you would all go away and let me do my work in peace.’

‘But we are your work,’ Bartholomew pointed out. ‘You are supposed to lend us books.’

‘Not the way I see it,’ retorted Deynman archly. ‘And there is a nasty tendency in this University to take me for granted — to use me for menial tasks. Well, I am not a messenger-boy — I am a librarian.’ He spoke the word grandly, still delighted by the way it sounded.

Bartholomew regarded him in alarm. ‘Please do not say a patient asked you to tell me something and you refused. Or forgot.’

‘Not a patient. I would make an exception for those. It was Irby from Zachary — before he died, obviously. He shoved a note in my hand and ordered me to give it to you. I told him I was Michaelhouse’s inlitteratus, and thus above running errands, but he only laughed.’

Bartholomew regarded him wonderingly. ‘Inlitteratus?’

‘It is Latin for librarian,’ explained Deynman. ‘Thelnetham told me so.’

‘It means illiterate,’ said Bartholomew, wondering how Deynman’s grasp of the language could remain so dismal when he spent his whole life among books written in it. ‘Thelnetham was being unkind, and Irby must have thought you were making a joke.’

Deynman’s face crumpled in dismay. ‘You mean I have been going around telling all and sundry that I am unlettered? No wonder people have looked at me so oddly! How could he?’

‘How indeed?’ murmured Bartholomew. ‘Do you still have Irby’s letter?’

Deynman went to rummage in a pile of parchments, his expression sullen. ‘Thelnetham will not get away with this,’ he vowed. ‘I shall send him an anonymous gift of that apple wine he likes so much — in the hope that it will make him sick again.’

‘Apple wine? You mean the stuff Shirwynk makes?’

‘Thelnetham is a glutton for it, and is sure to drink it all without sharing with his brethren. He told me that the last barrel he purchased brought on a bout of the debilitas — it turned him silly and he had to spend a whole week in bed.’

‘Then why would he drink a second one?’ asked Bartholomew, thinking the Librarian’s plans for sly revenge needed some serious revision.

‘Because he is a pig and will be unable to resist it,’ replied Deynman. ‘And I hope my gift makes him ill for a lot longer than a week. Hah! Here is Irby’s note.’

Bartholomew groaned when he read what was written. ‘Similia similibus curantur.’

‘Currants are similar to each other,’ translated Deynman liberally. ‘But why-’

‘No! It means like things are cured by like things.’ Bartholomew waved the letter at him. ‘And here he explains that it is his suggestion for the disceptatio. He and I were on the committee appointed to choose the topic, but he was ill for the final meeting. Morys took his place.’

‘And promptly picked a boring discussion about giving away property that one doesn’t own,’ recalled Deynman. He nodded to the letter. ‘Irby’s idea would have been much more entertaining.’

‘When did he give you this message?’

Deynman thought carefully. ‘Saturday — the day before his death. Why?’

‘Because when he received no reply, he started to write another — the one I found under a jug in his room. It is not a clue revealing the identity of the man who took his life: it is a piece of routine correspondence.’

Deynman regarded him uneasily. ‘Are you saying it was important?’

Bartholomew nodded unhappily. ‘We wasted valuable time trying to work out its significance. And worse yet, Michael arrested Nigellus on the strength of it.’

Deynman’s expression was scornful. ‘I am surprised he has lasted so long as Senior Proctor, because everyone knows that Nigellus never cures anything. He calculates horoscopes that prevent people from becoming ill, but once they have a disease, he does nothing at all.’

‘How do you know?’ asked Bartholomew absently, his mind on Nigellus’s probable reaction when told his arrest had been a mistake. It would not be pleasant.

‘Because my brother got the debilitas, and Nigellus told him to abstain from food and drink for a day, but refused to prescribe a remedy. He also declined to give anything to Trinity Hall when they got the debilitas — twice — and the Gilbertine Priory.’

Bartholomew scrubbed hard at his face, wishing Deynman had acted like a responsible, rational being, and passed the letter on. He left the hall, and when he saw a lamp burning in Michael’s room, he climbed the stairs to tell him what had happened. The monk was horrified.

‘But that was our best piece of evidence against Nigellus!’