Pat McIntosh - The Counterfeit Madam

The clerk left the chamber, and Otterburn sat back.

‘Now, this matter of murder and maybe robbery at Canon Aiken’s house,’ he went on. ‘You’re saying you’re no right convinced by John Anderson’s version?’

‘I’m saying,’ Gil replied carefully, ‘there are more questions to be asked. It might be that the Serjeant’s right, but it might not. I’m not clear about a few things.’ He pinched the bridge of his nose, trying to call some of them to mind. ‘For one, all her people said she wore her cap to give the men orders, but when she lay dead she was bareheaded and there was no cap to be seen. For another, it was a right sharp morning, but she had only her shift on her, nothing round her shoulders. And now this matter of the missing purse of coin.’

‘You think these things matter?’

‘The coin matters, for certain, and I think the others might.’

Otterburn nodded, making small squares with the little stylus in the wax of his tablets. After a moment he said,

‘Well, no harm if Anderson pursues these servants he’s cried at the Cross, for we’ll need to speak to them whatever else we jalouse. And this bag o siller has to be found and all. You’ll make your own enquiries, I take it? Aye. Well, call on me if you need help, man. There’s a whole troop o armed men eating their heads off out there, we need to gie them occupation.’ He threw Gil another look. ‘But no the day, I hope. You look to me as if you’re about done.’

‘I’m for home,’ Gil agreed. ‘I’ve a few things to discuss wi my wife.’

‘I’ll wager you have,’ said Otterburn, grinning.

Alys was not speaking to him.

He could see that she was distressed; her face was pinched and drawn back from the high narrow bridge of her nose, the delicate feature to which Dame Isabella had taken such exception. If he spoke she glanced at him, but did not react. He had seen her apply the same treatment to her father when he had displeased her. What did I say to Lowrie? he thought. I should have kept my mouth shut. Socrates, apparently feeling he was also in disgrace, leaned against his knee shivering.

It did not help that the hall of Maistre Pierre’s house was full of music and people. As well as the mason himself, the harper McIan and his sister Ealasaidh, a fiddler, a drummer, and Catherine improbably tapping a foot to The Battle of Harlaw were gathered round the hearth; in various corners of the big chamber the McIans’ two servants (Two? he thought, they must be doing well just now) and the company of musicians which somehow condensed about them wherever they went, not to mention small John and his nurse Nancy and all their own servants, seemed to be dancing to the infectious rhythms. The dinner would be burning. No, it was long past dinnertime, but the supper would definitely be afflicted, and all he wanted to do was sit down quietly and talk his day through with Alys, who could always help him to think more clearly.

The battle came to an end. Alys began shooing the women back to their work in the kitchen, and McIan set his harp aside, making certain it was standing firmly beside the arm of his host’s great chair.

‘God’s greeting to you, Maister Cunningham,’ he said, turning his white eyes towards Gil.

‘Ah, Gilbert.’ Maistre Pierre beckoned. ‘See who has blown in off the High Street. Come from Stirling the day, they tell me.’

‘How are you, sir?’ Gil came forward with Socrates at his heel. The harper rose to his majestic height and bowed, long silver hair falling over his brow, the white beard settling back on his chest as he straightened up again. ‘And Mistress Ealasaidh?’

‘We are both well, maister, by God’s grace. And so is that bonnie wee skellum yonder, that is growing like a weed.’ The blank gaze swung to small John, who was still dancing though the music had stopped, and the austere mouth softened. ‘You take good care of him in this house. I think he is well loved.’

‘Indeed yes!’ said Maistre Pierre.

‘He brightens the place,’ Gil said simply. The fiddler and drummer had retreated to the other end of the hall and now struck up a court dance, the sharp drumbeats striking pain in his head. Two recorders and a still shawm joined in on the second phrase, and one of the singers began showing John the steps. ‘Have you heard him sing?’

‘He sings like a lintie,’ offered Ealasaidh McIan, seated beside the mason on one of the two long settles. Not much past thirty, nearly as tall as her brother, she was clad for travel in the loose checked gown of an Erschewoman, her dark hair curling down her back. She looked hard at Gil, but went on, ‘His mammy was full of music, Our Lady call her from Purgatory, so small wonder if he has it too. Did I hear the man Sempill has taken another woman?’

‘He has,’ Gil agreed. ‘And she leads him as if she had a ring through his — his nose. I’d say the boy’s mammy is well avenged.’

Her eyes glittered, but her brother said,

‘Leave that the now, woman. Maister Cunningham, I have a word for you from the Archbishop.’

‘Sir?’ Gil removed his hat carefully, as if his master was present. The harper bent his head a moment, then said in a startling imitation of Robert Blacader’s ponderous speech,

‘My greetings and blessing to Maister Cunningham, and let him ken this. The matter of the false coin is in hand, it’s my will he shouldny involve himself. If I need his help I’ll send to him.’ Across the hall Alys looked up sharply, but said nothing. Gil felt himself reddening.

‘ Mon Dieu! ’ said Maistre Pierre. ‘But who else should deal with it in Glasgow? You or Otterburn should take it on, I would think, and he has asked you, so it cannot be him.’

The harper, reverting to his own manner, said, ‘Best to let it lie the now. You will be caught up in it soon enough, maister. There is much unknown, and more hidden.’

Used to this kind of gnomic utterance, Gil did not question the man, but replaced his hat with care, sat down beside Catherine on the other settle, and applied himself to repressing anger. His master the Archbishop had just snubbed him before his ward’s father and the entire household, and he could do nothing about it.

‘The Isles are full of the stuff,’ observed Ealasaidh.

‘We will not speak of that,’ said her brother, sitting down again. She slid him a dark look, but said no more. ‘And you, maister. What have you been at the day? There is death about you, and it links to the boy.’

‘Indirectly,’ Gil agreed, wishing he could leave the conversation, leave the hall, go and sit peacefully in their own apartment. The dog nudged his knee with his long nose, and he stroked the soft ears.

‘Indeed it does,’ agreed Maistre Pierre. ‘What are all these tales I hear, Gilbert? Is that dreadful old woman dead in truth?’

‘It is news of the most distressing,’ observed Catherine in French.

‘Tell it,’ prompted McIan. His sister put a cup of ale into his hand. ‘Who is slain?’

The musicians had all gathered about the plate-cupboard at the far end of the hall, where someone had propped a new piece of music against the larger of the two salts. This one did not involve the drum. Over an argument about where the repeats should fall Gil identified Dame Isabella, with interpolations from Maistre Pierre, explained her connection with small John, described her death. Alys listened, quietly pouring more ale or handing little cakes; he was aware of her attention, though she did not look at him. Ealasaidh sat by her brother and exclaimed at each turn of the tale, but the harper was as silent as Alys.

‘To be rid of the man Sempill!’ Ealasaidh burst out as he finished. ‘Angus, we accept the offer, surely!’