Pat McIntosh - The Fourth Crow

‘I’d say she was tied to the Cross first, and then throttled,’ said Gil. ‘The hair at the back of her neck was caught under the cord, but the rest hung free. And at some point the sacking gown Annie Gibb was wearing was put on her.’

‘Is it the same one?’

‘I need to check wi St Mungo’s.’

‘So is Mistress Gibb running about Glasgow in her shift? She’ll be easy enough recognised if that’s so. How mad is she? Is she a danger?’

‘Her friends say not. She seems to be melancholy rather than wood-wild. And she may well be in her shift, I got her maidservant to check and her clothes are all in the pilgrim lodging where the lassie put them last night, naught missing.’

Otterburn grunted again.

‘Give Walter her description and all. We’ll get the two o them cried through the town and see what that turns up, and you can ask at Andro for any help you need. The men should enjoy searching for a stinking lady in her shift. Have you any more to tell me?’

‘Not yet,’ admitted Gil, ‘but I’ve another question.’ He drew from his purse the coil of cord, and laid it on the Provost’s desk. ‘This is what was used to throttle the dead woman. The Shaw servants never saw it afore, so far as they can tell. Can we learn aught from it, do you think?’

‘Cord’s just cord, surely,’ said Otterburn, lifting a honey-pale loop. ‘This doesny look anything out of the ordinar.’

‘A barrel’s just a barrel,’ countered Gil, ‘but I once learned a lot about one barrel by speaking to its maker. Most craftsmen can make their own cordage if they’re put to it, but this looks like a specialist’s work. Do we have any spinners of twine and cord in the burgh?’

‘Walter?’

‘You might ask at Matt Dickson the rope-drawer, maister,’ suggested the clerk. ‘It’s mostly heavier stuff he turns out, so I believe, but he’d likely ken where that came from.’ He assessed Gil’s blank expression. ‘Away out the Thenewgate, almost at Partick. A great long shed o a place, been burned down two-three times. You canny miss it.’

Like most major offices around a great cathedral church, that of Almoner to St Mungo’s was a sinecure, a post whose holder was not expected to take more than a perfunctory interest in its duties. These were carried out by the Sub-Almoner, a depressed individual who inhabited a cramped, sour-smelling chamber up a stair in the northwest tower, surrounded by piles of neatly folded clothing and blankets. When Gil found him there, Sir Alan Jamieson was just dismissing the last of his morning’s supplicants, a surprisingly well-nourished boy of eight or nine.

‘No, no, wee Leckie’s fit enough,’ he said when Gil commented. ‘He’s the laddie that’s paid of the burgh to lead old Jeanie Thomson, that’s been blind these ten year. He was fetching another head-rail to her, to keep her decent, seeing her last one blew away when her neighbour laid it out to dry.’ He pulled a face. ‘That’s their tale, any road. I just hope they got its worth at the rag market. What can I do for you, Gil? I take it this isny a call on my duties?’

‘Maybe no directly,’ admitted Gil. He set the bundle he carried on the table beside the almoner’s great ledger. ‘You’ll have heard what happened at St Mungo’s Cross, then, Alan?’

Sir Alan crossed himself.

‘Aye, poor lady, her servant came up to the vestry just as we were about to sing Matins. She’s free o her troubles now, right enough, but no in the way she-’ He paused as Gil shook his head. ‘What d’you mean, no?’

‘There’s more happened than that,’ Gil said. ‘The lass that was found dead at the Cross this morning wasny the same one that was bound there last night.’ Jamieson gaped at him. ‘She was wearing this,’ he nodded at the bundle, ‘and I’d like to hear if you reckon it’s the same gown you gave out yesterday, or another. It was me cut the inkles,’ he added hastily as the almoner reached for the folds of sacking. ‘I’ll pay for the repairs.’

‘Aye, you did,’ said Sir Alan, inspecting the ragged ends of the tapes. ‘Made a thorough job of it, and all.’ He shook out the light brown folds. ‘Let me see now, where’s the-Aye, this is the gown I lent out to Mistress Gibb’s kinsfolk yesterday afternoon. There’s the mark.’ He pointed to a row of neat red stitches just inside the neckline. ‘Six red lines for gown number six. There’s a dozen,’ he enlarged, ‘but we’ve never needed that many, even when thon band of penitents cam here two summers ago, hoping to flagellate theirsels the length o the High Street. Canon Henderson soon put a stop to that, I can tell you.’

‘He did that,’ agreed Gil, recalling the occasion with faint amusement. It had provided his uncle with food for shocked discussion for days. The parade of the High Street had been reduced, in short order, to a procession round the Upper Town and a vigil by the patron saint’s tomb in the crypt; the weather had been unkind, and the fiddler the group had brought with them had refused to risk his instrument in the pouring rain, so the singing had been doleful indeed. When last heard of the group of penitent pilgrims had been riding out of Glasgow, back to wherever they came from (Arbroath, was it?) quarrelling bitterly about whose idea it had been in the first place. ‘So you’d swear to this being the same gown?’

‘Let me mak certain.’ Jamieson clipped his spectacles onto his nose and drew the great ledger towards him. ‘A plaid to Hoastin Harry, a woad-dyed gown to Maggie Bent, aye, aye, here we are. Penitential gown number six, to the kin o Annie Gibb.’ He turned the great book about so that Gil could read the entry. ‘Clear enough, I’d say, and I’ll just mark it returned.’ Drawing the book towards him, he reached for his pen.

‘Clear enough,’ Gil agreed. ‘Thanks for this, Alan.’ He dug in his purse for a couple of coins. ‘Will that cover the repairs? Is it just clothing and blankets you give out here? I’d thought you’d some provisions to supply the poor and all.’

‘Oh, I do, I do.’ Jamieson shook sand on the new entry and wiped his pen on the blotched rag at his elbow. ‘Such as there is the now.’

‘What, are donations running low? I’ll tell my wife.’

‘No, no, donations is no bad, though we can aye do wi more. The poor we ha aye wi us, after all. No,’ Jamieson straightened up on his stool, shaking his head, ‘it’s hard to keep hold o the stuff the now. It’s all stored next the dry goods for the Vicars’ hall, round the north side o the kirk, and there’s as much vanishing from both dry stores, the last six month or so, it’s a right worry.’

‘Theft, you mean? How secure is the store?’

‘Secure enough, I’d ha said, till now. Aye, it’s theft. There’s aye the odd cup o dried pease or handful o meal goes astray, but this is a half-sack at a time just walking off when naeb’dy’s watching.’ The Sub-Almoner pulled a long face. ‘You don’t see folk at their best in this post, Gil, you’ll believe me, but to my mind that takes the bell, thieving from the poor. I’ve got the vergers warned to look out for it, but it wouldny surprise me if they were in the game and all.’

‘I’d not heard of that,’ Gil confessed. ‘You’ve changed the locks, I take it.’

‘Oh, aye, and a new padlock at my own expense. That walked off and all, I’d to get a second.’

Thinking it was little wonder that the Sub-Almoner was usually afflicted with melancholy, Gil took his leave of the man and returned to St Catherine’s, where the nameless corpse was now laid out in the little chapel under Annie Gibb’s own shroud, with Sir Simon murmuring in the shadowed chancel. Drawing back the linen he studied the dead woman with care, counting the scars and bruises on her thin body, considering the rough skin of her hands and feet and the broken nails. Meggot had washed these as thoroughly as the rest, and had cleaned under the nails with the point of a knife, extracting dirt and blood and fragments of skin.