Pat McIntosh - The Rough Collier

‘I want to go to Dalserf,’ she said thoughtfully. ‘I could ride round by Lanark to meet you. Is it far?’

‘Dalserf? Oh, to find out more about Joanna?’

‘And her family, yes. I cannot get used to that part of being out here in the country. It’s so much further to go to talk to the neighbours, not at all like being able to put my plaid on and step up the High Street.’ She rubbed her eyes. ‘Gil, it is still the middle of the night, and I am getting cold. Have you recovered a little? Could you sleep now, do you think?’

‘Not yet,’ he said, and kissed the bridge of her nose, ‘but I can think of something else we could do. A swete kos of thy mouth mighte be my leche.’ He moved on to her chin, and then the soft curve of her neck.

‘Ah,’ she said softly, and turned towards him, smiling within his embrace. ‘Perhaps we should put the candles out first.’

‘So it is murder,’ said Lady Egidia.

‘Almost certainly,’ agreed Gil, putting almond butter on his porridge.

‘What happens next?’ asked Alys. ‘I know there is to be a quest. Are the procedures different, this far from Glasgow?’

‘Not in principle,’ said Lady Egidia, and placed her wooden porringer on the plate-cupboard for the grey cat to lick. Socrates looked up at it, his long nose twitching; the cat hissed and he flattened his ears and wagged his tail placatingly

‘Provost Lockhart will likely report all to the Sheriff,’ said Gil. He set the horn spoon down in his bowl in order to count off the points with one hand. ‘That’s Archie Hamilton in Lanark. Lockhart will call the quest soon, I hope, since the deaths must be determined in some way, and take evidence, and if the assize brings it in murder and names anyone he’ll imprison the party or put them to the horn, just as in Glasgow. The difference is the distances involved, as you were saying last night.’ Alys glanced up, and they exchanged a look and a quick, reminiscent smile. ‘At least Bonnington is in the same parish as Lanark town, there’s only that and Carluke involved.’

‘And what will you report to Archie?’ His mother moved over to the hearth, and looked in disapproval at the slender logs on the firedogs. ‘Alan must send the men out for firewood soon, if that’s the best he can produce.’

‘Ah.’ Gil spooned porridge, thinking. ‘What do we know, you mean?’

‘Of the man himself,’ said Alys, ‘we know a certain amount. Thomas Murray, aged six-and-twenty, red-haired, medium height, well-set and missing the last joint of these fingers.’ She held up her left hand, two fingers extended. ‘Wedded to Joanna Brownlie and grieve at the coal-heugh, last seen there on the morrow of St Patrick’s and last seen alive by any we’ve spoken to so far on the twentieth of March, was that right, Gil?’

‘That’s right.’ He helped himself to more porridge from the pot on the plate-cupboard. The cat stared at him indignantly. ‘So far as we can discern, he was honest in his employment, but I suppose we have reason enough to get a look at the accounts now to check that.’ He looked across the room at Alys again. ‘Maybe you could do that for me, sweetheart.’

‘And as to finding the corp,’ said his mother, and crossed herself, ‘you told us more than I wish to know of that last night. A gruesome sight it must have been. You looked as though you’d been through a millwheel when you came home, my dear. And you’ve told Mistress Brownlie?’

‘That was why we went by the coaltown first,’ said Gil. ‘Michael wished to go up there straight and take them the word, as his father’s depute. I’m well impressed by Michael in this, Mother. He knows his duty in the world, and he acts as it demands.’

‘Aye, well.’ Lady Egidia tightened her mouth briefly, contemplating the thought of her godson. Alys put her own bowl on the floor, and Socrates paced over to investigate, his claws clicking on the tiles. The cat seized the opportunity to jump down and make for its mistress’s lap. ‘And you think the man was poisoned,’ Lady Egidia went on, holding her loose gown open for her pet to creep inside. ‘Could it have been anything else? Any other cause? If it was poison, how do you know it was for Murray and not for the other fellow?’

Gil nodded. ‘You’re quite right, we don’t know enough there. I’m hoping the Provost will send someone else out to question the folk at Bonnington, though whether I can rely on the findings from that … Anyway, I’ve my own observations and Michael’s.’ He finished his second helping of porridge, and put the bowl down for the dog. ‘Assuming it was poison, and was meant for Murray, and was added to the flask of cordial, I need to find out what it might have been that would be available here in Lanarkshire and would act so quickly.’

Alys and Lady Egidia exchanged a look.

‘And would not be noticed in a cup of the cordial,’ said Lady Egidia. ‘What does it taste of, the cordial, do you know?’

‘I didn’t taste what we found, believe me. It smells like your cough syrup,’ said Gil, pulling a face.

‘Elderberries,’ said Alys, ‘and honey, and perhaps ginger, if it was the same brew that Joanna gave me.’

‘Enough to disguise most things,’ said Lady Egidia. ‘Particularly with another spoonful of honey in it. How big is this flask?’

‘I can show you it. Bide a moment.’

Going quickly up the stair to their chamber, he lifted his outer clothes from the kist where he had flung them down the previous evening. The big purse he had carried was with them, a commodious object of worn leather with half the trim missing. Reflecting that he could now afford a new one, he went back down to the hall, extracting the flask and the pottery bottle as he went. He handed both to Alys, who took them to her mother-in-law, sniffing at one and then the other as she did so.

‘I think the cordial is the same,’ she said, and looked back at Gil. ‘What have you there, Gil? Apiece of stone? Is it one of the little fishes from the coal?’

‘No,’ he said, turning the flat slab over. ‘It’s Bel’s slate, that she dropped. I put it in my purse to give back to her, but I haven’t seen the lassie on her own. I’d forgotten it was there.’ He put the stone on the plate-cupboard, and nodded at the flask and bottle in his mother’s hand. ‘Do those tell us anything?’

‘The flask is quite dry,’ said Alys, ‘but if we rinsed it out with a very little water, we might learn what was in it.’

‘A good thought.’ Lady Egidia held the silver flask to her nose again, then turned it in her hand, admiring it. ‘It’s a valuable gift. German work, to judge by the pattern. I wonder how Mistress Weir came by it?’

‘And why she gave it to Murray. She demanded it back, yesterday before we left, as being now Mistress Brownlie’s property.’

‘What did you say?’ his mother asked.

‘Oh, I denied all knowledge. The Provost will want it for the quest.’

‘True. I’ll keep it close for you. And given that you think you know how this man died,’ Lady Egidia went on, ‘who might have brought about his death? Do you know enough to name anyone to Provost Lockhart?’

‘No.’ Gil sighed. ‘Any of the women at the coal-heugh, I suppose. Much depends on what was in the flask and who put it there.’ He brightened. ‘I suppose it would be wiser to leave questioning them further till I know more about that.’

Alys caught his eye and nodded agreement.

‘True,’ said his mother, and indicated the two bowls on the floor. ‘You may as well pick those up, if the dog’s finished, and save Nan bending for them. And then you’d best be off to Lanark and talk to the Provost, afore the day gets any older.’

Lanark town was significantly bigger than Carluke, and now before Sext its long, curving market-place was bustling with folk, on foot, on horse, even in a couple of tilt-carts with their passengers peering out from under the oiled canvas hoods at the displays on booths and counters. Leaving the garrulous Patey at the Nicholas Inn and the horses tied up in the yard, Gil made his way up the hill to the handsome stone house belonging to the Provost, and gave his name to the maidservant who answered the door.