Garulf was regaining his composure, and making more sense. “Some time later, someone woke me by saying: ‘Wigelm seems to be having a very long piss.’”

“What did you do?”

“I went back to sleep.”

“Did you see him again?”

“Not alive, no.”

“What do you think happened?”

“I think he fell into the canal and drowned.”

There was a murmur of agreement from the crowd. Ragna was pleased. She had led them to the result she wanted while letting them think it had been their own decision.

She looked around the church. “Did anyone see Wigelm after he left the tavern in the middle of the night?”

No one answered.

“To the best of our knowledge, then, the cause of death was accidental drowning.”

To her surprise Bada, the man-at-arms who had helped carry Wigelm from the canal to the church, spoke up in dissent. “I don’t think he drowned,” he said.

Ragna had been afraid of something like this. She hid her anxiety and put on an expression of interest. “What makes you say that, Bada?”

“I’ve taken a drowned man out of the water before. When you lift him, a lot of fluid comes out of his mouth. It’s the water he breathed in, the water that killed him. But when we lifted Wigelm, nothing came out.”

“Now that’s curious, but I’m not sure it gets us anywhere.” Ragna turned to the baker. “Did you see that, Wilmund?”

“I didn’t notice it,” the baker said.

Bada said insistently: “I did, though.”

“What do you think it signifies, Bada?”

“It shows that he was dead before he went in the water.”

Ragna remembered holding Wigelm’s mouth and nose so that he could not breathe. The picture kept returning to her mind no matter how hard she tried. With an effort she thought of the next question. “So how did he die?”

“Maybe someone killed him, then threw the body in the water.” Bada looked defiantly around the church. “Someone who hated him, perhaps. Someone who felt wronged by him.”

Ragna was being accused by implication. Everyone knew she had hated Wigelm. If the charge were made openly, she was confident that the villagers would loyally take her side; but she did not want things to go that far.

She walked slowly and deliberately around the body. With difficulty, she made her voice calm and confident. “Come closer, Bada,” she said. “Look carefully.”

The room went quiet.

Bada did as she said.

“If he didn’t drown, how was he killed?”

Bada said nothing.

“Do you see a wound? Any blood? A bruise, even? Because I don’t.”

She was suddenly scared by a new thought. The strap she had used to pull the corpse along the canal might have left a red mark. Discreetly, she looked hard at the skin of his throat, but to her relief nothing was visible.

“Well, Bada?”

Bada just looked sulky.

“Anybody,” Ragna said to the crowd. “Come as near as you like. Inspect the body. Look for signs of violence.”