Pat McIntosh - The Merchant's Mark

The mason turned to look up at Linlithgow Palace in the morning sunshine, with St Michael’s Kirk wrapped in scaffolding beyond it, and added approvingly, ‘And that is a well-run chantier . I have spoken with the master. He tells me the church has been many years rebuilding.’

Gil threw another pebble into the loch, and nodded. Socrates, loping back along the water’s edge, saw the splash and leaped in.

‘Where are your men?’ the mason asked.

Gil pulled himself together. ‘I gave them some drink-silver and sent them into the inn by the West Port.’

‘The Black Bitch, I think.’

‘Aye.’ Gil threw another pebble for the dog, who plunged joyfully after it, biting at the ripples. ‘I told them to find the whereabouts of the cooper’s yard for me.’

‘The tonnellerie ? I have asked the master builder. It is the other way — along towards the East Port beside the tower, which he tells me belongs to the Knights of St John. I did not realize they were here.’

‘Oh, yes,’ said Gil. ‘Their headquarters is a few miles away over the hill.’ He waved a hand vaguely south-west.

‘Is it, indeed? I had thought it much further south. That would account for the number of their servants one sees in the town,’ said Maistre Pierre. ‘Likely your men find my lad Luke in the Black Bitch too. Well, I got nothing of use at the dyer’s yard in Kilsyth. There had been no disturbance, and no orphaned barrels left lying about. And what have you learned in Stirling?’

Gil shook his head. ‘I think our dead man is not the musician, since I’ve a sighting of him here on Tuesday morning, but I’ll be happier about that if I can get another trace of him.’ The mason grunted agreement. ‘And I had no useful word concerning the other matter. Nobody would admit to knowing where it might have been hid, or to knowing who would know. .’ The mason grunted again. ‘Except,’ Gil added thoughtfully, ‘that William Knollys was very keen to send me into Ayrshire to talk to my father’s friends there.’

‘Into Ayrshire,’ Maistre Pierre repeated, raising his eyebrows.

‘Cumnock and thereabouts. So what we have to do here,’ said Gil, ‘is speak to the cooper, and ask after the musician.’

‘Do we also go out to the shore at Blackness?’ asked Maistre Pierre. ‘I understand it is not far.’

‘It could be worth the trip,’ Gil agreed, ‘but we may learn all we need here in the town.’

‘I have been thinking,’ said Maistre Pierre. He looked about, selected another disregarded block of stone, and seated himself. ‘Why put a severed head into a barrel? How many reasons can there be?’

‘Concealment,’ offered Gil. Socrates bounded out of the water, shook himself copiously, and sat down at Gil’s feet, staring intently at the remaining handful of pebbles. ‘We dule for nae evil deed, sae it be derne haldin.’

‘Yes, but where is the body? The rest of the man?’

‘Hidden somewhere else, I assume,’ Gil said.

‘Where?’

‘Somewhere in Scotland.’

‘Yes.’ His friend pulled a face. ‘And what is being concealed? The murder, or the fact that this man in particular is dead, or the place of his death? Or something else?’

‘And why should these need to be concealed?’ Gil wondered. ‘Both of the bodies we dealt with in May had been left openly where they were killed. Well, fairly openly,’ he qualified. ‘What was this man doing, that he had to be made to disappear?’

‘Presumably that is connected with the treasure.’

Gil stared unseeing at a journeyman mixing mortar in the distance.

‘Yes,’ he said slowly. ‘So the head was hidden in the barrel to conceal an unlawful killing, or the death of this man in particular, or his death in a particular place,’ he ticked the points off on his fingers, ‘or perhaps to get it past a watcher.’

‘Or to preserve it to accuse someone later,’ suggested Maistre Pierre. ‘It was put up in brine, after all.’

‘Mm.’ Gil thought about that. ‘If that was so, it may have been put in the barrel by someone other than the killer. We must keep it in mind, but it adds a complication and the question is already sufficiently complicated.’

‘Mon Dieu, oui! ’ agreed the mason. ‘And the treasure? Why did the killer not simply take it with him, since he has apparently made his escape?’

‘Yes. That puzzles me. It surely means whoever put both in the barrel intended to keep track of it — of the barrel. I wish we had some idea of where the hoard has been.’

‘So does that mean the head was hidden for some longer purpose, not simply to conceal an unlawful killing?’

‘Perhaps.’ Gil got to his feet, and Socrates scrambled up looking hopefully at his face. ‘We need to find a name for the dead man. Once we have that, we will have something to work on, and perhaps we can discover where he was killed.’ He gestured towards the little town in the sunshine. ‘Shall we go find the men? They’ll be a stoup or two ahead of us by now.’

As they reached the foot of the Kirkgait, Maistre Pierre paused and stared eastward past the Mercat Cross along Linlithgow’s other, busier street. There was a cavalcade approaching among the bustle of women with baskets and journeymen with boards or bales of merchandise. Helmets glinted in the sunlight, bright badges and well-waxed boots collected the dust of the dry road.

‘Who is this with such a retinue?’ he wondered. ‘Do you know the blazon?’

‘Yes, and I know the leader,’ said Gil a little grimly. ‘Sinclair. I saw him in Stirling.’ He raised his hat as Oliver Sinclair reined in his horse, the ornaments on its bridle clinking. ‘Good day, sir.’

‘Good day again, young Cunningham.’ Sinclair grinned at him. ‘So Will Knollys never persuaded you into Ayrshire, then?’ Gil shook his head. ‘Probably wise, man. And what brings you this way?’

‘My good-father and I are tracking a murder,’ said Gil.

‘Oh, the man in the barrel?’ Sinclair nodded to the mason, and checked his horse, which was touching noses with Socrates. ‘This is you in hot pursuit, is it?’

‘Say rather, in cold pursuit,’ said Gil wryly. ‘The trail’s near a week old, and may be crossed. That’s what I want to find out.’

‘Good hunting, then,’ said Sinclair carelessly. He nodded again and nudged his horse on, summoning his men after him with a wide gesture of one arm. They clattered away east along the curve of the High Street, scattering chickens, pigs and burgesses as they went.

‘He never mentioned leaving Stirling when I spoke to him last night,’ said Gil, staring after them. ‘Not that I had much conversation with him,’ he added, after considering the point.

‘Perhaps it slipped his mind,’ said Maistre Pierre. ‘Come and let us drink.’

The taproom of the Black Bitch, which had probably been the hall when the sprawling building had been somebody’s house, was large and smoky from an ill-drawn fire, but clearly the ale was good, for even in mid-morning the room was busy and loud with gossip. Gil’s men and the mason’s Luke were there; Luke and Tam were sitting at one of the long tables, and Rob was in colloquy with the man in charge of the great barrel of ale on its trestle. Seeing them enter, he broke off his conversation and returned to his seat with a jug and two more beakers.

‘Talk the man in the Moon to death, that one,’ he said, grinning, as Luke moved along the bench to allow his master to sit down. ‘William Riddoch the cooper has his yard along near the East Port, Maister Gil, at the back of the first Cross tavern, and there’s been no musicians in the place since the court moved to Stirling.’

‘In the town,’ Gil questioned, ‘or here in the Black Bitch?’