Candace Robb - A Trust Betrayed

“When did you last see Roger?” Margaret asked.

Murdoch frowned down at the floor. “I don’t recall. Jack came here asking about him, too. Why did you think Roger would be here?”

Margaret told him about the letter sent from Edinburgh.

“He sent only the one message?”

Margaret cursed herself for blushing as she nodded.

Murdoch grunted. “You think to bide here while you look for a man who has no reason to be here and hasn’t seen fit to send word to you since before Christmas?”

Margaret had expected resistance, but not unkindness. She tried to keep her voice steady, confident. “I hoped my maid and I might be welcome.”

“And why should I welcome you? You’ll be naught but trouble.”

Don’t drop your head, she thought. Don’t let him know how you doubt yourself. “Kin are always welcome in the house of a Kerr.”

“In a house, mayhap. This is an inn. I depend on paying customers here. You two cannot bed with men-you need a chamber to yourselves. Two paying customers you lose me, or more.”

“I shall pay you,” Margaret said. She had thought he would not have much custom at present and could therefore spare the room. She felt very naive.

Murdoch growled. “I cannot take your siller, Maggie.”

For that she was grateful, for she had little, but it was not the time to inform her uncle of her penury.

Murdoch’s voice softened. “You should not be in Edinburgh. What would your father say if he sailed into Perth and heard you were down here among the English soldiers? They will come sniffing about. They can think of only one reason women might come to the town-to service them. Oh, Maggie, you must be gone. Back to Perth with you. And your fancy maid.”

Had her father cared he would not have left Perth. As for the soldiers, she had not thought of them as a danger to her unless she threatened them. She must have a care. But it did not sway her. “I’ve sat at home since Martinmas, worrying. Imagining all the worst. That Roger is injured and has no one caring for him. Taken prisoner. That he has left me and begun another life.”

“He will come home, I am sure of it,” Murdoch said absently, turning his attention to Andrew. “Could you not find Maggie fit lodgings in Canongate?”

Andrew threw up his hands. “I did not know she meant to come until last night. I have not had time to make arrangements for her, but I shall do so.”

Risking irritating her uncle, but recalling how he had encouraged decisiveness in her, Margaret said, “I will bide here, Uncle.”

She watched for Murdoch’s reaction to her determination as Sim shuffled in with a flagon of wine and four cups. “I’ll bring a pie by and by,” the man muttered as he withdrew. A lad carried in some peat, began to fuss with the brazier. Celia told him she could manage and quickly set to it.

Murdoch did not outwardly react to her comment. When the servants departed, he nodded toward the wine. “Drink up, Father Andrew. You will have little good wine at the abbey. Your abbot has no doubt sent it to King Edward’s captains at Soutra Hospital, and what is left will be rationed among their wounded troops.” Edward had taken over the great Hospital of the Trinity on Soutra Hill, which straddled the highest point on the King’s Highway between the border and Edinburgh.

“There is precious little good wine left this side of the Forth,” said Andrew. “Where do you find yours-on Edward Longshanks’s ships?”

Murdoch growled.

Margaret had had enough of their contention. “What say you, Uncle? Will you turn us out, Celia and me?”

Murdoch dropped his eyes to hers, touched her chin with his rough hand. “I have not convinced you to go home, lass? What do you need to hear?”

“News of my husband.”

A shadow flickered across Murdoch’s face. “We shall talk in the morn. You are a woman in need of bed.”

“Do you have clean linen?” Celia demanded.

The woman did not seem aware of how precarious their situation was. Margaret told her to be still.

Murdoch snorted. “Find me a laundress and I will. Women are fearful to go down to the water with all the soldiers about.”

“Dry clothes, that is what I need,” Margaret said. “And to warm myself down in the tavern for a while.”

The men withdrew so she might change. But when the hide fell in place over the doorway behind them, Margaret did not move. She had expected to fall back on the bed, exhausted. Instead she just sat there, benumbed by the horrible turn life had taken since she had last seen her uncle. Her husband was missing, Jack was dead, she had traveled a long way, with a difficult crossing, with little plan but to resolve Roger’s disappearance, the town was so changed, so broken and subdued, and her uncle, whom she had not seen since her wedding, plainly wished her anywhere but here. She could not remember a worse time in her life.

“Mistress, you wished to change?” Celia said.

Margaret shook herself. She unhooked her scrip from her girdle, drew out the few coins she carried and the weight she had found in Jack’s shroud. The coins she poured back in-she would keep the scrip hidden beneath her kirtle at all times, or beneath her pillow at night. Every penny was precious to her.

“Pay my uncle no heed, Celia. He will come round to understanding why I came.” She studied the weight. It might be a fishnet weight, though it was small and far too clean, unless it was new. It was also too small for a thatching weight. She was almost certain it was a loom weight. A weaver would tie the end of the warp to this to keep it close to the floor, the thread taut. It was not something she would expect Jack to clutch as he died, nor was it something he was likely to have clasped in a fight.

“Your hands are so cold,” Celia said, rubbing them, knocking the stone to the floor.

Slowly, stiff from the saddle, Margaret stooped to retrieve the weight. The movement made her dizzy.

“You have not eaten in hours.” Celia helped her to her feet, untied the laces at Margaret’s back and wrists, let the gown slip to the floor. “Step out of it,” she said softly.

Margaret moved because she was told. “You have not eaten either.”

“I am not eager to taste the food down below.” Celia straightened with a wince.

Of course. It had been a long ride for anyone, let alone one who had apparently never sat astride a horse before. “I’ll send up ale and food-you won’t wish to climb stairs tonight,” said Margaret.

“I have a salve for saddle sores.”

Margaret shook her head at the proud woman. “The sores are the least of it.”

The tavern was welcomingly warm and busier, now it was early evening, cheering Margaret despite the ripe odors. A rowdy dice game attracted a crowd round the table by the door. Margaret was glad to see two other women in the room. At one table an elderly woman wrapped in a much mended plaid quietly reasoned with a bald man who pounded the table to emphasize his argument. Another woman sat nodding by the brazier, leaning against a man who was listening intently to the other men sitting there. At the third table a man sat hunched over an ale, listening to the diatribe of the man across from him. Both were dressed well, and both occasionally stole glances at Andrew.

Her brother was the only solitary figure in the tavern, sitting at the table nearest the back door, through which Margaret had just come.

Nodding in greeting, he poured her a cup of wine from a flagon.

“I must be off to the abbey as soon as Murdoch returns,” he said brusquely. “He is fetching food for you and Celia.”

“If you must be off, be off.” Though grateful to him for escorting her, Margaret wearied of his stern manner. “There are other women here, I can”-a hush fell over the room as the street door opened-“manage.” A few heads turned as her last word rang out in the sudden silence.