Candace Robb - A Trust Betrayed

“Holy Mother,” Celia cried as she shook out her skirts, “look at the mud.” A patch of her plaid mantle and the skirt of her russet gown were the same dark gray-brown. She brushed her hands together and muttered a curse.

“Are you injured?” Margaret took Celia’s hands, turning them palms up. A few pebbles were lodged in the sticky mud, but though the skin at the edges looked red there was no blood. “No cuts, that’s a blessing. Let’s get you back to our chamber.”

They continued slowly, Celia pausing several times to brush her hands as the mud dried.

Behind Murdoch’s inn was a garden patch with the brown, slimy remains of the past harvest, and beyond it a low building whence came smoke and enticing smells. The kitchen, Margaret guessed.

“Go up, take off those wet clothes, and warm yourself,” she told Celia. “I shall follow soon.”

Margaret headed for the small building. This was not where she had thought to find her uncle, but there he stood stirring something in a large pot. And watching the door with a black look.

“Where have you been?” he demanded.

“At St. Giles. Celia and I went to Mass.”

“Mass? After such a journey, and without an escort? Did I not tell you the women of Edinburgh cannot safely go about without an escort? Do you not know what soldiers are like? Half of them are felons pardoned by Longshanks to serve in his army.”

“You mentioned the laundresses yesterday. But there were other women at Mass.”

He shrugged his shoulders, shook his head. “The trouble with your being here is I’ll spend all my time worrying.”

“I am a married woman and run my own household. I do not need tending.”

“This place is nothing like your household.” Murdoch grabbed two bowls from a shelf, a ladle from a hook. His motions were not hesitant-he knew where everything was. “Had you the patience I would have brought some of this up to you myself. A soup with winter roots, a bit of coney, and even some beef.”

“God bless you. I am starving.”

“Sit down.” He ladled some soup into a bowl.

“Celia should have some of this,” Margaret said.

“In good time. You are the mistress.”

“She fell in High Street. She’s wet and muddy.”

“Is she injured?”

“Only her gown, I think.”

“Thank the Lord you women are protected by all your skirts and mantles. Now sit. She will still be peeling off the layers.”

Margaret sat down on a bench, put the bowl on the win-dowsill, and wondered at the amount of meat she stirred up with her spoon. The English would have it if they knew it was here.

“Do you cook for the tavern?” she asked after several spoonfuls.

“I cook for myself, no others. I have a cook for the tavern.”

“This is not the tavern kitchen?”

“That is farther in the backland.”

It was a large kitchen for one man. “Might I dry Celia’s wet clothing in here?”

Murdoch’s short eyebrow twitched. “I’ll not have it. There’s a brazier in your chamber.”

“It will be forever drying. A good cook fire’s what’s needed.”

“Ask my tavern cook-Roy’s his name. His kitchen’s behind the next cottage-where the chambermaid bides when we have one.”

Not wanting to outstay her welcome, Margaret took her leave as soon as she was finished and carried a bowl of the fine soup and a chunk of dark bread up to Celia. The maid ate hastily, then gathered her wet clothes and set out for the tavern kitchen, hoping to wash out the mud before the stains set in.

Margaret felt weary to the bone, but when she lay down and closed her eyes, she felt them fluttering behind the lids as if trying to catch passing ghosts, and every creak set her heart racing. She thought it might help to get her bearings, that she might rest more easily once she had seen more of the inn, the back-land, the town, and understood the sounds.

The rain had stopped, though the stiff breeze carried its scent. The backland stretched out behind Murdoch’s kitchen. The chambermaid’s lodging was a shed half the size of his kitchen, wattle and daub with a thatch roof. Margaret pushed at the door. Inside it was dusty and smelled of damp. There was a platform for a bed, a shelf for a candle, and a stool. A shuttered window faced back to Murdoch’s kitchen. Water puddled in a corner of the packed-earth floor. It was a simple room, but with a brazier, a good oil lamp, and a wattle screen by the bed to block the draft from the window it would be as comfortable as many simple homes. With the leak that had caused the puddle fixed it could be the best home a servant had ever had. Margaret must ask her uncle what had happened to the maid.

Stepping out, she shut the door behind her and turned the corner to continue down the backland to the tavern kitchen. She thought she might come to Celia’s aid if necessary.

The tavern kitchen was twice the size of the chambermaid’s lodging, with a tile roof, smoke coming from the smoke hole in the center, benches lining the outside wall either side of the door. Raised voices, Celia’s and a man’s, came from within.

A young man appeared in the doorway, a bowl cradled in one arm. He stirred the contents with the opposite hand. He was the one who had brought the peat for the brazier the previous day. Dark hair, dark eyes, solemn. His clothes were shabby, but clean. The cook’s helper, she guessed.

He withdrew into the kitchen, but the argument did not falter.

“Surely it is Master Murdoch’s kitchen,” Celia was saying quite steadily, in the tone of the righteous.

Margaret stepped across the threshold. The wild-haired man waving floury hands at Celia must be Roy, the cook.

“How can I work with your clothes flapping about?” He matched Celia’s righteous tone.

The room was indeed crowded, with several small tables, a large fire circle, a wall of shelving, several benches, and the two men moving about their work. Murdoch must not have considered that when he suggested Celia do her laundry here.

“I see the problem,” Margaret said from the doorway. “Send a basin of warm water, some soap, and a cloth to our chamber and we’ll manage there. Come, Celia.” And before the imperious pair could continue their argument Margaret grabbed her maid by the elbow.

“Send a basin of warm water?” Roy exclaimed in disbelief.

As Margaret shoved Celia through the door she said, “As soon as the water is warm.”

Celia trembled with rage. Margaret did not let go of her until they gained the stairs. “Now go up and wait, Celia.”

Two spots of color and eyes that seemed to be generating heat dominated Celia’s thin face. “That man.”

“He is the cook, not a servant under you. Do not make me regret bringing you here.”

Celia’s eyes widened, but she said nothing, just turned and gathered her skirts, mounted the stairs.

Margaret peered into the tavern. Murdoch was bent over someone lying on a bench by the cold brazier.

“Murdoch wastes his time,” a woman spoke softly behind her. “There’s no waking Old Will till he’s sober.”

By the speaker’s breath, she was not sober either. Margaret turned in the little space the woman allowed.

A piece of dirty plaid kept most of the woman’s dark hair in check, though a long greasy strand hung down over her left eye. “You don’t look like a Kerr.”

“Do you have business with my uncle?”

The woman lifted dirty, large-knuckled hands. “These make the finest ale in Edinburgh. Ask your uncle about Mary’s ale.” She looked Margaret up and down, grinning. “Roger Sinclair’s wife, eh?”

Margaret felt a shiver down her back. “Do you know my husband?”

“I ken all who come to the tavern.”

“So there you are, Mary,” Murdoch interrupted. “What have you got for me?”