The second fatality occured in the early hours of the next morning. Ernulf gave Bascot the news as he and Gianni were going to the castle chapel to attend Mass.

“I was just coming to get you,” the serjeant called out from the steps of the forebuilding that led up to the keep. “There’s been another death, from the same sickness as the clerk.”

“Another?” Bascot echoed in disbelief. “Who?”

“Sir Simon,” Ernulf replied. “Breathed his last not two hours since, just after Matins.”

Simon of Haukwell was the knight whose duty it had been to train the squires of the Camville retinue. A dour and taciturn man, he nonetheless had the respect of the boys who wielded lance and sword under his direction, for while he had little patience with careless mistakes, he was also unstinting in the time he spent in ensuring his charges did not make them.

“Then Haukwell must have eaten the same tainted food that the clerk did,” Bascot concluded, “despite the fact that Blund said the clerk didn’t take his meals at the castle board.”

Ernulf nodded. “Seems likely, but if so, we don’t know what it was.” The serjeant rubbed a hand over his face, which was grey with tiredness. “Lady Nicolaa has been up since before Prime with the disturbance, and she’s already worn out from that rheum that’s ailing her.” Concern for his mistress’s well-being, Bascot suspected, was adding to the serjeant’s fatigue. He had been devoted to her since she was a young girl and was ever-conscious of her welfare.

“What is Martin’s opinion?” Bascot asked.

“He’s insisting that both the clerk and Haukwell ate some victual that was rotten, but there’s one or two of the servants as saying it’s a pestilence that’s come amongst us.”