Pat McIntosh - The Counterfeit Madam

They had told the man on the stall that the coin was false, but he had been angry, and accused Nan of trying to pass false coin back to him out of her own purse. Ysonde had been certain the coin was one the man had given her sister, but Nan was less sure.

‘So we just left it,’ she said, ‘and I wish now I’d argued the matter.’

‘What stall was this?’ Gil asked. Kate, at the other side of the wide window space, looked elaborately out at the men stacking huge yellow-glazed crocks in the yard.

‘A sweetmeat seller,’ Nan mouthed. He nodded understanding.

‘And then we went to St Mungo’s,’ Wynliane continued.

‘That’s Little St Mungo’s out the Gallowgate,’ Nan amended. ‘I’ve a fondness for the wee place, seeing I grew up next it.’ Gil knew the little chapel, a crumbling structure outside the eastward yett of the burgh in which his uncle took an interest; small as it was it contained three or four altars to different saints, screened off with hangings of mouse-nibbled brocade. ‘We went to say our prayers, did we no, my lass?’

Wynliane nodded.

‘And the man was there,’ said Ysonde from where she stood beside Lowrie. ‘Him and the other man was fighting.’

‘They were arguing,’ Nan corrected. ‘We were saying our prayers to Our Lady, all quiet in her wee chapel, and these two came in, and that busy arguing they never heard us.’

‘They were shouting,’ agreed Wynliane, burrowing against Nan’s apron.

‘The sweetie man said it was a cheat,’ said Ysonde, ‘and trying to get him in trouble, and then they fighted, and fell down battling each other. And then the priest came and stopped them,’ she said regretfully.

‘There was all blood,’ said Wynliane.

‘You never told me that, lass,’ said Kate.

‘Naught but a bloody nose, mem,’ said Nan reassuringly.

‘So one of them blamed the other for passing him false coin,’ Gil interpreted, ‘and there was a fight. Did you learn any more? Who were they?’

Nan shook her head.

‘I’d say they were maybe neighbours,’ she said. ‘They wereny kin, they wereny alike at all, but they seemed to ken one another right well. The one we’d spoke to, I never heard his name, but the other one,’ she paused, frowning. ‘Sir Tammas cried him, was it Miller?’

‘Miller?’ Gil repeated. ‘You’re sure of that?’

‘No.’ She shook her head again. ‘I was a wee bit taigled, you’ll understand,’ she glanced significantly at Wynliane, ‘and no paying that much mind. Miller or a name like it, Wright or Carter or the like.’

‘And I said,’ said Ysonde importantly, ‘we had to tell you, cos Mammy Kate said you was asking all about the false coins in Glasgow.’

‘Very right,’ said Lowrie. She gave him one of her rare smiles, accepting the praise as her due.

‘Then what?’ asked Gil. ‘Did they hear you? Did they go on talking?’

‘The dusty man said,’ Ysonde recalled with a sudden attack of accuracy, ‘the priest was an interfering auld ruddoch, and the sweetie man was a greetin-faced wantwit, and then he stamped out-’

‘Ysonde!’ said Kate.

‘You swored,’ said Wynliane, equally shocked.

‘Did not!’ retorted her sister, going red.

‘Did so!’

‘You’d never use words like that yoursel, would you?’ said Lowrie encouragingly. ‘You were just telling us what the man said.’

‘Well, it was what he said,’ she iterated, lower lip stuck out ‘And the sweetie man told the priest the dusty man was getting him in trouble, and then he went away too.’

‘That’s about it, Maister Gil,’ agreed Nan. ‘I’m hoping it was worth dragging you down here for, but it doesny seem like much to me.’

‘What did they look like?’ Gil asked. ‘What were they wearing?’

‘The sweetie man had a belt,’ said Wynliane. ‘With a namel buckle.’

‘Aye, that’s right, lassie,’ agreed Nan. ‘A pretty thing, it was, save the enamel was chipped. Otherwise,’ she thought briefly, and shrugged. ‘He was clad like any working man in Glasgow, I’d say, a leather doublet, a blue jerkin under it. I never noticed his hose, they were maybe hodden grey or the like, but he’d a blue bonnet on his head. He was a young fellow, maybe five-and-twenty, no so much as thirty. I never took much of a look at the other, but,’ she paused to think again. ‘I’d ha thought him a wee bittie younger by the way he spoke.’

‘Why did you call one of them the dusty man?’ Lowrie asked Ysonde. She looked up at him, scowling, from where she stood within his arm. ‘Was he dusty?’

‘Don’t know. That’s what the sweetie man called him.’

‘I think I’ll take a walk down to St Mungo’s,’ Gil said. ‘Can you come wi me, Lowrie?’

The young man nodded, and removed his arm from about Ysonde, saying,

‘I have to go now.’

There was a brief argument, but Ysonde was eventually persuaded that the two men could find the chapel by themselves. Wynliane put up her face to be kissed, saying,

‘Will you come back and tell us?’

‘Maister Gil will tell you, I expect,’ said Lowrie.

‘No, you’re to come,’ ordered Ysonde. ‘Say you’ll come.’

‘If I’m permitted,’ Lowrie said. Gil exchanged startled glances with Kate, but Ysonde accepted this reluctantly, and they took their leave.

Out in the street, glancing at the sky, Gil said, ‘We’ve likely time to go by Little St Mungo’s now. Then I could do wi a word wi your man Attie.’

‘So could I,’ said Lowrie absently. ‘That’s a lively wee lassie of your sister’s. How old is she? The two o them are her stepdaughters, you said?’

‘Ysonde? She’s five or six, I think. She’s a wildcat,’ Gil said, ‘and about as ready to gentle.’

‘But sharp as a,’ Lowrie paused, swallowed, and visibly changed what came next, ‘sharp as a new pin. Quoting from Floris and Blanchflour at six!’

‘It’s one of their father’s favourites. He’s likely read it to them a few times.’

‘Oh, is that it?’ Lowrie stepped aside to avoid a marauding pig. ‘If she grows up aught like madam your sister she’ll be a rare gem.’

Sir Tammas Dubbs, priest of Little St Mungo’s, was a worn elderly man in worn elderly garments, with a long knitted scarf wound round his neck. He was about to say Nones with the clerk who was shuffling about in the chancel waiting for him, and was unwilling at first to listen to Gil’s questions.

‘There’s a many fights atween folk in this parish,’ he said brusquely. ‘I pay no mind, other than try to stop them killing one another.’

‘These two wereny killing one another,’ Gil said. ‘They were arguing because one said the other had got him into some trouble over some coin.’

There was a resonant thump on the end wall of the little building. The clerk, to Gil’s astonishment, erupted from the chancel and hurried to the door, trailing a muttering stream of curses. Sir Tammas turned to watch him go, and said over his shoulder,

‘Aye, well. And half my parish wi him, I’ve no doubt.’

‘One of them might be called Miller.’ Sir Tammas turned abruptly and stared at Gil, then looked away again. ‘And the other sells sweetmeats along the Gallowgate, and has an enamel buckle to his belt.’

Outside the clerk was shouting indignantly. Impudent young voices answered him, and a taunting chant began. The priest clicked his tongue in annoyance, and shook his head.

‘I’ve no idea who it might ha been,’ he said. ‘Like I tell ye, there’s fights all the time.’

‘What, in here and all?’ Lowrie asked. Sir Tammas glanced at him, but did not answer.

‘Have you had any trouble wi false coin?’ Gil moved casually so that light fell on the priest’s face.