Pat McIntosh - The Merchant's Mark

‘Christ and Our Lady have compassion on him,’ said Kate, and crossed herself. ‘It is still extraordinary,’ she added, ‘that none of us heard anything. Surely he had time to cry out?’

‘Perhaps he was t-too busy trying to get out of reach,’ said Alys, her hand still tight over Kate’s.

‘Seen enough?’ said Andy, and shut the door without waiting for an answer. ‘What now, my leddy?’

‘I want to look at the back gate,’ said Kate, ‘where he likely got in, and then the men must have their noon bite, and someone must take those books to Maister Morison, and then …’

She looked at Alys.

‘What are you planning, Lady Kate?’ asked Andy suspiciously.

‘That’s just it,’ she said. ‘I think now it might not be so clever.’

Alys nodded ruefully.

‘What’s no so clever?’ Andy looked from one to the other of them. ‘Oh, no. No back to the Hog. I’ll take your mule up to Rottenrow my ain sel’ first, to keep you from going out.’

‘No need,’ said Kate, setting off towards the back of the yard. ‘I can see for myself that sitting in the tavern asking openly about this man that slips into places to kill by night is no the best way to carry on the enquiry.’

‘Just the same,’ said Alys. Kate paused, and looked at her again. ‘What if …’ she began. ‘What if someone went down to the Hog — don’t worry, Andy, we could send one of the men — to offer Mattha the chance to purchase these coals.’ She paused. ‘Perhaps he could take money,’ she continued, thinking aloud, ‘to buy Billy’s friends a drink.’

‘The whole of the Hog would turn out to be his drinking-fellows,’ objected Andy.

‘So they would. Then how can we learn more?’

‘What are ye after?’

‘Anyone who overheard him yesterday,’ said Kate. ‘Anything we can learn about the man with the axe and what he and Billy said to one another.’

‘But without the man with the axe learning we are seeking for him,’ supplied Alys.

Andy gnawed at his lip. ‘A tall order,’ he commented. ‘Jamesie and William might manage it. If we gied them some drinksilver after their dinner, and the message for Mattha right enough, they could sit a while and see what they might hear.’ He glanced over his shoulder at the industrious men, and grinned suddenly. ‘I’ve a notion they’d like it better than shifting broken crocks. I’ll have to let them all have the evening off.’

The back of the yard, beyond the barn and the cart-shed, was defined by a tall fence of split palings, well maintained, though the whitewash had worn off it. Kate commented on this, and Andy grunted.

‘I’ve kept the palings tied on,’ he said, ‘for it keeps the hens out the yard mostly, but we’ve no had the time for whiting things for a while. See, while we were at Linlithgow last week,’ he explained, dragging the gate open, ‘William and our John stayed here to mind the yard, but the other two fellows had the other cart to Irvine wi three great pipes for Ireland, laden wi crocks and St Mungo kens all-what gear. They brought back a couple of tuns of wine and some small stuff for Clem Walkinshaw and a few others, and they’d ha been out again the morn with another load if this hadny happened. He’s been driving us and himself, ever since — well, for the last couple of years.’

Beyond the gate the rest of the property sloped down towards the mill-burn, ending in another, lower fence with a gate in it, and the stable where Mall had waited for her sweetheart. Kate stood at the top of the slope, looking about her. The kale-yard nearest the fence, where the chickens were pecking, was obviously being worked, and was well tended, but beyond it to one side was a small pleasance whose formal shapes were outlined by untrimmed box hedges and full of weeds. There was a bench, disappearing under a rampant honeysuckle, and two strips of standing hay which were probably intended to be grassy paths, Kate thought.

‘The mistress sat there often,’ said Andy, seeing the direction of her glance.

Kate nodded. She remembered Agnes Cowan, a round-faced girl with brown curls, a ready laugh and a significant tocher. What, she wondered, had brought her down so far that she drowned herself, leaving her two little girls motherless?

Alys bent to look at the neat plots of vegetables.

‘I would like some seed off these turnips,’ she said. ‘They are different from mine. Who minds the garden?’

‘Our John,’ said Andy.

‘He would make a gardener,’ said Alys. ‘Kate, have you seen all you want?’

‘Aye. Not hard to get in by the fence down yonder,’ she said, ‘and this gate can be opened from either side. He’d have had no trouble getting into the yard.’

As they turned to go in, one of the men threaded his way between the buildings with a word for Andy, glancing sideways at Kate and Alys as he delivered it. Andy nodded, and sent him back.

‘That’s one of the constables at the yett, Jamesie says,’ he reported. ‘We’re all summoned to the quest on Billy. They want it for the morn, after Terce, to get it out the way afore the King gets here.’

‘I have never seen such a quest,’ remarked Alys.

‘I’ve seen one too many,’ said Andy sourly. ‘You can come along if you will, mistress. I’ve no doubt Lady Kate’d be glad o yir company.’

They were clearing the table away after the midday bite when the gate thumped. Andy, gathering his workforce together as the women carried out the empty dishes, turned to peer out of the hall window.

‘St Mungo’s banes,’ he said, staring. ‘Is this no your uncle, my leddy?’

‘My uncle?’ Kate swung herself towards the window. Out in the yard, severe in his long black gown and acorn-shaped hat, Canon Cunningham was gazing about him with the air of one surveying a battlefield. Beside him Matt was looking hopefully at the house. ‘Indeed it is. What’s brought him down here?’

‘I hope nothing is wrong!’ Alys joined her with an armful of folded linen. ‘No, he does not look as if he brings bad news.’

‘That’s good lassies,’ said Nan, handing a wooden platter to each of the little girls. ‘Take those down to Ursel, now, just like Jennet did, and then we’ll go out in the yard.’

‘Likely he’s come to see what you’re about, the two of you,’ surmised Babb from across the room. ‘Let him in and bid him sit down, my doo, since we’ve made oursels at home.’

‘Yes, indeed.’ Alys moved to stow the linen in the great press, and paused. ‘I wonder, has he eaten? Do you suppose Ursel …’

‘No, no,’ said Canon Cunningham when she asked him the same question. ‘I’ve eaten well, my lassie. You ken the kitchen Maggie keeps. Thank you for asking,’ he added. Seating himself on one of Maister Morison’s backstools he looked closely at his niece. ‘Well, Kate.’

‘Well, sir,’ she responded, seated opposite him and wondering why she felt as if she had been caught in mischief.

‘Tell me, what are you at here? What about all these tales reaching the Chanonry?’

‘What tales are those, sir?’

‘You had a thief in the house last night, did you no? And a murder this morning.’ The Official looked round him at the gloomy hall. ‘Was it just the one murder, or was it half the household as Maggie swears that Agnes Dow tellt her?’

‘Just the one, sir,’ Kate assured him, her mouth quirking in spite of herself.

‘So it’s true, then?’ Her uncle raised one eyebrow. ‘Who?’

‘The thief, Christ assoil him. Babb and I took him redhand at his master’s kist, and we shut him in the coalhouse till morning. Then when Andy Paterson went to fetch him out, he was dead, slain by another inbreaker.’