Pat McIntosh - The Rough Collier

‘So you think,’ said Lady Egidia, ‘that the man Murray has a mistress in or near Lanark, and visits her once a quarter while these two brothers collect the money for him.’

‘It looks very like it,’ Gil said. Socrates nudged his hand, and he scratched behind the dog’s ears again. A waft of the animal’s fishy breath reached him.

‘It’s odd, mind you,’ persisted his mother, ‘if that’s so, that word’s never got round. It’s a small enough neighbourhood, after all. Carluke folk go down to the market at Lanark, and a juicy bit of gossip like that would travel, you’d think.’

‘He might visit her under another name,’ said Alys.

‘He’d be recognized by someone as he came or went, I’m sure of that.’

‘He goes in disguise,’ said Gil. ‘A turban and a false beard from the Corpus Christi costume kist.’

‘ Corpus Christi costume kist. Now yon’s a tongue-trap!’ said his mother, half laughing.

‘Perhaps she lives secluded,’ suggested Alys. ‘In a green desert, with one faithful hound for company.’ She reached across Gil to stroke their own faithful hound’s head, and the dog licked her wrist with a long tongue.

‘The yew tree wouldn’t fit with that,’ said Gil. ‘They mostly grow in a kirkyard or at least by a chapel.’

‘She is the guardian of the chapel, of course.’

‘What, and a man’s mistress these two years as well?’

‘Temptation can strike anyone,’ Alys responded seriously.

‘The yew tree might be on the road to her home,’ said Lady Egidia.

‘Can you think of anywhere that might fit, Mother? You know this side the river better than I do.’

‘If it’s so much out of the way,’ said Alys, ‘surely nobody can know of it.’

‘You get the odd dwelling down by the Clyde itself,’ said Lady Egidia, nodding in acknowledgement of this point, ‘even in the gorge below Lanark. But I’ve a notion I’ve seen something elsewhere. A solitary place in the cut of one of the rivers, on the way to nowhere. Now where was it and why was I going that way?’

‘Exercising the horses?’ suggested Alys.

‘Maybe Michael will have learned something of use,’ said Gil doubtfully. ‘I’d like to find Murray, and get this whole matter dealt with. And what about the corp we do have? Has anyone claimed to know him yet?’

‘No, and it seems there has been a great stream of folk to inspect him,’ Alys said. ‘Henry was kept too busy to wash the dog on his own yesterday. I suppose the whole parish must have heard how he was found, no doubt they want to tell their grandchildren they saw him. Most of those who looked have prayed for him, Henry says, so at least he benefits by that.’

Gil nodded. ‘I’ve been wondering,’ he said, ‘if his death could be much older than we first thought. Maybe as far back as Wallace’s time, or even beyond it. Old Forrest the huntsman had no knowledge of him, and his recollection goes back over a hundred years.’

‘Could he be from even longer ago, from before the Flood?’ asked Alys. ‘The men who were cutting the peat talked of tree-roots and elf-bolts that they found under it, from Noah’s time, so why not this man as well? He’s well enough preserved, I would have thought, he could have lasted so long.’

‘He wasn’t under the peat,’ Gil objected, ‘he was in its midst.’

‘Then he must be from halfway back to the Flood,’ offered Alys. ‘Gil!’ She sat up straight, turning to stare at him, brown eyes round. ‘Gil, do you suppose he could be from the time when Our Lord was born? That he might have seen the star that led the kings?’

‘I suppose he could. There’s no way of telling,’ Gil said cautiously, reluctant to contradict such a notion. Socrates raised his head from his master’s knee to stare at the door. ‘But surely he wouldn’t have seen the star even so. It led the kings out of the east, not the west.’

‘But he might have heard the angels in the sky,’ Alys’s eyes were shining. ‘Perhaps he went to Bethlehem. I would have done.’

‘So would we all. That’s a bonnie thought,’ said Lady Cunningham, abandoning her reflections. ‘What is it, Alan?’

In the doorway of the chamber, the steward ducked in an apologetic bow.

‘Right apposite to what ye were just saying, mistress,’ he said. ‘It’s Jackie Heriot walked out from Carluke asking for a word about the man out of the peat-digging. Will ye see him, or no?’

‘Sir John?’ Lady Cunningham raised her brows, and rose to her feet. ‘Aye, send him in, Alan. Good day to you, Sir John. What can we do for you the day?’

Sir John Heriot, bowing low over his round black hat, had to ask after his parishioner’s health, exclaim over encountering Alys again, congratulate Gil on his marriage, admire the wolfhound, who beat his tail on the floor a couple of times in acknowledgement. Eventually the priest was persuaded to sit down, saying, ‘It’s in a good hour I meet Mistress Mason again. Indeed. I think I have a message for you. You mind you were asking for a Marion Lockhart of this parish, madam?’

‘Who’s that?’ Gil asked. ‘The place is full of Lockharts.’

‘Joanna’s mother,’ Alys supplied. ‘Go on, sir.’

‘Well, after you left St Andrew’s kirk yesterday, Isobel Douglas — Isa — ’

‘Oh, yes.’ Alys nodded, smiling. ‘A good woman, I think.’

A faint grimace crossed Sir John’s broad fair-skinned face. ‘Oh, aye, indeed. A valued member of my flock, Isa is. Aye busy about the kirk or my house. Indeed. And yestreen afore Vespers Isa came to me to say she feared she’d sent you on a fool’s errand. I think she tellt you Mistress Lockhart’s sons were across the river in Lesmahagow?’ Alys nodded again. ‘Indeed. It seems now she’s recalled different. One of them went away into Ayrshire some years ago, and the other moved to Glasgow last Lammas-tide.’

‘To Glasgow?’ repeated Alys.

‘Why ever would he do that?’ Gil asked. ‘If he’d land to farm in Lesmahagow, what’s to take him to Glasgow?’

‘He gave up the farm,’ said Sir John. ‘Isa gave me no sensible idea why, though she said something about birds. Maybe they ate the seed-corn and his crop failed. Indeed. Nor she never said which of the two it was, nor how he would support himself in Glasgow.’

‘There’s ways enough,’ said Gil, ‘but he’d need some skill or other.’

‘You’ve contacts in plenty in Glasgow,’ said his mother, ‘and the burgh’s no that big. You should be able to find the man. What was his surname? Brownlie? Do you know his own name?’

‘Either Hob or Tammas,’ Alys said. ‘If I send to my father, he can put that in motion, I suppose. Sir John, I’m grateful for this. I hope you’ll pass my thanks to Dame Isa too. Did you come all the way out here just for that? It was most kind of you.’

Sir John blushed like a youth, but admitted, ‘No, no, I canny claim it. Indeed. I wished to hear more of this man in the peat-digging, and maybe to get a keek at him if he’s yet above ground.’

‘Oh, he’s above ground,’ said Lady Cunningham sardonically. ‘Lying coffined in my feed-store wi’ half the parish waiting in line to inspect him. You’re welcome to a look at him, Sir John.’

The corpse in the feed-store had deteriorated further, though it still smelled only of peat. Preserved far beyond corruption, Gil thought. He could see cracks in the shrunken flesh now, and the skin was beginning to dry out and peel away in places.

‘Did you get his finger back, Alan?’ he asked. ‘And I hope he’s lost no more oddments.’

‘Aye, it’s there.’ Alan, standing by with the keys, nodded to a small object folded in linen by the corpse’s elbow as if it was a saint’s relic. ‘I wrapped it up decent.’