Pat McIntosh - St Mungo's Robin

‘A heron?’ said Gil involuntarily. ‘Why ever a heron?’

Humphrey gave him his blank smile.

‘Oh, it’s quite clear to me. A heron that goes stepping about in all the mud,’ he demonstrated the deliberate gait with his hands, ‘watching his feet, and then stabs! wi his beak.’ Gil felt Alys flinch beside him as Humphrey stabbed with his beakless head. ‘And this is your make, maister. A heron like yoursel, she is.’

‘This is Mistress Mason,’ said Gil formally. A heron? he thought. In her blue woollen gown, the grey plaid over her shoulders, her plumage was the right colour, but that was all.

‘- no a very nice thing to call a bonnie lassie — ’ agreed Mistress Mudie.

‘Maister Humphrey,’ said Gil, on a venture. Humphrey turned his blank smile on him again. ‘You mind you told me that Deacon Naismith is a robin, now that he’s dead?’

‘Aye, that’s right, he’s a robin,’ agreed Humphrey.

‘So who’s the sparrow?’ Gil asked hopefully.

Humphrey shook his head. ‘No, no. There’s no sparrow here. Frankie’s a kestrel, see, and Anselm’s a coal-tit, and Cubby’s a yaffle,’ he counted on his fingers, ‘and Barty’s a barn-owl, and Duncan’s a jay, you can tell, but there’s no sparrow in the place.’

‘And Maister Millar?’

‘Andro’s another owl,’ Humphrey said confidently.

‘Now that’s enough, my poppet, you and your games, calling folk all sorts — ’ said Mistress Mudie reprovingly.

Humphrey ignored her, and looked from Gil to Alys again. ‘And you’re to be wed soon, wi kirk and Mass, Sissie tells us.’

‘That’s right.’

With unnerving suddenness, Humphrey’s eyes focused, and his expression changed to one of professional pastoral concern. He raised his right hand with its bleeding nails, and pronounced a blessing on their coming marriage in rolling Latin phrases. Gil found his throat stopped, but Alys’s tongue was loosed. Bending her head she crossed herself and said gently, ‘Thank you indeed, Maister Humphrey. I hope you’ll pray for us.’

‘And you for me, my lassie, if you will, for Our Lord kens I need it,’ said Humphrey. Then, abandoning sense, ‘Sissie, have you a bit fish for these two herons?’

‘They’ll eat in their own place, my poppet,’ said Mistress Mudie, wiping her eyes on her sleeve. ‘And maybe you’d best go now, for he’s no been good the day, it was all too much for us yesterday what wi one thing and then another — ’

‘The poor man,’ said Alys as they stepped into the yard.

‘ Much sorwe I walke with For beste of boon and blood ,’ Gil quoted. ‘It seems he is mad for grief and guilt.’

She nodded, then looked around, and drew Gil to the chapel. The little building was full of shadows leaping from the two candles on the altar; nothing else moved, although it felt almost as if someone had left as they entered. Through the roof? Gil wondered, amused at himself. There’s only the one door.

‘The two women sleep out,’ Alys was saying quietly, ‘as I suspected when you said they were talking about witchcraft. No wonder the laddie was frightened. And he sleeps under the table or on the hearth, and saw and heard nothing moving, not even the Devil.’

‘Alys, that’s marvellous,’ he said, drawing her into his arms.

‘I do wonder,’ she went on, ‘now I have seen the boy, whether he would think to mention it if Mistress Mudie had left her chamber later. He must be used to her going in and out at all hours if she’s needed.’

‘Difficult to find out.’ Gil tightened his clasp. ‘What did you learn from the painter’s man?’

‘Oh, yes.’ She paused, ordering her thoughts. ‘He spoke to his cousin last night, indeed she must have told the half of Glasgow about it all. The only new thing I learned is that Naismith may have known the little girl was not his. You said the dates didn’t add up, didn’t you?’

‘Mm,’ he said, and kissed the top of her ear.

‘I wondered if her brother thought it was Naismith’s.’

‘What would that do?’ he said.

‘I don’t know. It gives him the more reason to dislike the man, if Naismith was repudiating his mistress and his child as well.’

‘Did Daidie know who is the child’s father?’

‘He said not.’

‘If this was a verse romance, it would turn out to be the mysterious watcher.’

‘Oh, Daidie mentioned him too. By today he’d become a giant with a black beard and a bloody sword.’ She looked up at him, her quick smile flickering. ‘The Watch won’t venture along the Drygate this night, I imagine.’

‘I wonder what Bel really saw? I’m not inclined to believe in her watcher, giant or not.’

She nodded, and laid her head briefly on his shoulder, then drew away slightly. Reluctantly, he let her go, and she bent the knee to the altar and crossed herself.

‘What is my father doing with the accounts?’ she speculated. Heart heavy, he followed her out across the yard and up the sounding stair.

Maistre Pierre had all the bundles of paper arranged on the polished surface of the table, and was peering at one sheet held at a distance, his tablets in his other hand.

‘The man wrote appalling small,’ he complained as they entered. ‘This is that very profitable estate, you recall, Gil, out by Kilsyth. The total is considerable.’

‘May I see?’ Alys took the paper he held, and ran a finger down the returns. ‘Where was it all going? This alone would keep the bedehouse in comfort, I should have thought. Whose gift was it?’

‘Now that’s interesting,’ said Gil, scrutinizing the opened packet on the table. ‘It was gifted by the parents of Humphrey Agnew, specifically for his keep.’

‘Surely that isn’t the original?’ asked Alys, looking round his shoulder.

‘No, an extract only.’ He was still studying the abbreviated phrases. ‘The parchment must be filed safe elsewhere. See, here it merely says, ad domusdei S Servi, de Thomasi Agnew et Anna Paterson ux suis, pro bono Umfridi fil eis.’

‘I would have expected better Latin,’ she said critically.

‘Not necessarily.’ He turned the leaf and skimmed over the other side. ‘This lists the boundaries of the land, and the buildings and tenants. It seems to include an entire ferm-toun. Nothing here about the terms of the gift. The parchment will have the detail — what prayers are expected, and how much care Humphrey gets in return for the income.’

‘He must need a deal of care, poor man,’ said Alys. ‘Gil, what is all this about birds?’

‘He seems to see the folk around him as birds,’ Gil agreed. ‘Maister Cubby as a woodpecker, Millar as an owl. And the Deacon was a shrike and then a robin.’

‘Why a robin?’

‘ Because he’s dead ,’ Gil quoted. ‘Whether he means the one in the bairns’ rhyme — I said the sparrow with my bow and arrow — or the one St Mungo brought back to life, I’ve no notion.’

‘St Mungo’s robin? But the saint will not bring the Deacon back to life.’

‘It seems unlikely.’

‘Naismith was making a good profit from the situation,’ said Maistre Pierre. He had gone on to another sheaf of paper. ‘Now this is a Douglas gift. If the family uses the place as a townhouse, I imagine the Deacon would have less freedom to divert these funds.’

‘And you said the man’s own papers are in his kist,’ Alys prompted.

‘It is locked,’ said her father without looking up. ‘The keys are yonder.’

Following her after a short time, Gil found her on her knees before the painted kist, its lid open. She was going methodically through the packets of paper and parchment from one of the inner compartments, but as he knelt beside her she inspected the last one and gathered them up to put them back in the kist, their dangling seals clicking together.