Pat McIntosh - The Counterfeit Madam

‘Here — no, no, I didny mean it like that!’

‘You’ve just said you did,’ said Gil.

‘Aye, but I wouldny — I didny-’

‘John.’

He stopped, looked at the pale hand on his arm, and covered it with his own, met his wife’s gaze. She said earnestly,

‘John, tell me you didny kill my godmother.’

‘I didny kill her,’ he said obediently. ‘I swear it on-µ’ Her hand twitched, and he bit his lip. ‘I mean, my word on it, Maidie.’

She put her other hand on top of his.

‘That’s enough for me. But we need to find out who did, so he gets time to repent. You’ll tell Maister Gil all he needs to hear, won’t you, John?’

‘Aye,’ he said reluctantly.

Lady Magdalen smiled at him, nodded at Gil, and sat back, one hand still on Sempill’s arm. Gil, wondering whether he would know if Alys managed him in such an obvious way, said,

‘So what did you do?’

‘Do?’ Sempill stared at him. ‘Nothing. Went home to my bed.’

‘About the silver,’ Gil said. ‘The next morning, the Thursday, you were from home when I came looking for you. You came in about Terce, I’d say. Where had you been?’

‘Out looking for you,’ said Sempill boldly. ‘I tellt you that, I mind.’

‘And I’d said I’d meet you at the house. No, by what I hear you were down at Clerk’s Land, John.’

‘If you ken that, why’d you ask me? You hear a curst sight too much,’ Sempill added. ‘I was looking for you there, thought you might be spying round the place.’

‘You were speaking to Campbell and Saunders,’ Gil corrected him. ‘Letting them know there would be no more silver, no more of the old dame’s scheme. What was the scheme, John?’

‘Scheme?’ Lady Magdalen asked. ‘What was happening to the silver? Do you know, John?’

He threw her a hunted look.

‘No,’ he said. ‘No, I–I wasny in it, once she’d paid me for the silver. I’ve no idea what she was at.’

‘You knew enough to tell the Clerk’s Land folk,’ said Gil.

‘Aye, well, I kent that was where Neil took the stuff. Seemed only civil to let them hear it was all at an end.’

Gil, setting aside the combination of John Sempill and the word ‘civil’ for later contemplation, looked at Otter-burn and said,

‘Then we come to the Clerk’s Land folk.’

‘Aye.’ Otterburn grunted. ‘All in it thegither, save for the lorimer. And maybe Danny Sproat’s donkey,’ he considered. ‘Two hammermen and an image-maker, and their friend Miller the knife man from the Gallowgate.’

Sempill sat motionless.

‘After you left the toft,’ Gil resumed, ‘Campbell sent one of the Saunders children down to summon Miller up there, and passed the word to him. The pair of them decided to go and have it out wi Dame Isabella, and went off down the Drygate. Dame Isabella looked out from her window and saw them approaching, and she ordered her woman to give her the purse of blue velvet and leave her.’ Lady Magdalen’s pale eyes were fixed on his face, her lips parted. She must have been fond of the old woman, he thought, or is she feart I’ll prove John killed her after all? ‘The woman got no sight of the two men, she only saw a stranger leaving by the gate a few minutes later. Nobody else was seen about the place. But when they next went in to Dame Isabella she was dead.’

Lady Magdalen bent her head, and her lips moved silently. After a moment she said,

‘So is it one of these men, Campbell or Miller, that killed her? Where is the blue purse, sir? Is it found?’

Straight to the point, he thought.

‘We found it in Miller’s possession,’ said Alys. ‘It seems likely she gave him it. One of them must have kept her talking while the other went round into the house and into her chamber.’ She leaned forward to touch Lady Magdalen’s free hand. The dog raised his head, then went back to sleep. ‘I’m sorry. It’s a great loss to you, I understand that.’

‘My thanks,’ said the other woman with a tremulous smile. ‘But has neither o them confessed?’

Sempill glared at Alys, patted his wife’s shoulder awkwardly, and said,

‘Aye, you need to put them to the question, they’ll confess soon enough if you go about it right.’

‘They will the morn,’ said Otterburn confidently. ‘Either or both. Now, can one o you set light on a subject that’s troubling me? Why in the name o Christ and all His saints would a woman in her position be sending false coin out to the Isles?’

‘What?’ Sempill jerked upright. ‘To the Isles? Why in the Deil’s name?’

‘John.’

‘Aye, but what’s the point o that? You tellt me she was daft for John o the Isles,’ he recalled, scowling at her, ‘more sense surely to send it to him and let him pay for his escape if he wants to. No that he’s worth it,’ he added, ‘a burnt stock that one if ever I seen one.’

Of course, thought Gil, John of the Isles is pensioned at Paisley Abbey, not so far from Muirend.

‘It’s changing the balance of the region,’ he said. ‘It’s altering matters like who has more men, more ships, more importance. There’s been enough arguing since Earl John was dispossessed, if it comes to war out there, no knowing who’ll come out victorious.’

‘She knew him,’ said Lady Magdalen suddenly, in a faint voice. ‘Forgive me, maisters, this has been a great shock to me.’

‘You should lie down,’ said Sempill. ‘You should be home in your bed, no sitting here till all hours answering daft questions. We’ll be away, Otterburn-’

‘No yet,’ said Otterburn, quite mildly, but Sempill sat down again. ‘She knew him, you say, madam?’

‘She once tellt me.’ She put a hand to her brow. ‘I canny mind right. She must ha known Thomas Livingstone, that’s her last husband, sir, when they were all young, for she spoke o his sister, that was wedded to John of the Isles. They’d been good friends, I think.’

‘Dame Isabella and the Livingstone lady were friends?’ Gil interpreted, untangling this. She nodded.

‘And ever since, she’d had a great regard for him, by the way she spoke. So maybe, maybe,’ she bit her lip, ‘it doesny maybe make sense, but I wonder.’

‘You wonder if she wished to destabilize the Isles,’ Alys supplied. ‘Perhaps even hoping that John might get back to his possessions.’

‘Aye,’ she said gratefully. ‘It sounds right daft, when you put it like that, but she was, she was, she was aye one wi her own-’

‘She was a steering auld ettercap,’ said Sempill forcefully, ‘and I’ll no forgive her for putting you through all this.’

Gil met Alys’s glance, but kept his face straight.

‘Well,’ said Otterburn. ‘I can see we’ve a lot to think on, all o us present. I think I’ll ask you to take Lady Magdalen home to her bed, Sempill, but first,’ he went on, ignoring Sempill’s expostulations, ‘I’ll have you swear, and I’ll have your word, madam, no to depart fro Glasgow till I give you leave.’

‘I’ll come and go as I please!’ exploded Sempill, ‘and no Archbishop’s placeman’s going to-’

‘John.’ Lady Magdalen turned her weary face to Otter-burn. ‘Sir, you may have my word on that, and gladly, but why?’

Could she possibly be as obtuse as she appeared, Gil wondered. Otterburn appeared to think the same, for he looked hard at her, and then said,

‘I need your man where I can put my hand on him. There’s been silver mining without informing the Crown, there’s been shipping the metal about the realm, there’s been supplying counterfeit coiners, there’s been offering comfort to the King’s enemies-’

‘I never!’ burst out Sempill. ‘I never did any o that, all I did was let the old dame have the stuff, it’s none o my blame what she did wi it!’