Pat McIntosh: The Nicholas Feast

‘- and Davie’s aunt,’ continued Alys. ‘She has come from Paisley to see him.’

‘How is the boy today?’ Gil asked, with sympathy.

‘He’s still sleeping the maist o’ the time,’ said Mistress Irvine, looking troubled. ‘And he minds nothing even when he’s awake. I think it was you that found him, maister? Blessings on ye for that, sir, and his mother’s and all.’

‘He improves slowly,’ said the mason.

‘It’s only two weeks, father,’ said Alys. ‘It takes longer than that for a broken skull to mend. Mistress Irvine was very distressed to see her nephew in such a state, Gil, the more so as her foster-son at the college is strong and healthy.’

‘The contrast must be painful,’ Gil commented wryly. The mason’s injured mortar-laddie was a reminder of an episode which he would have wished to forget, had it not resulted in his betrothal to Alys. ‘Has the other boy visited Davie? The company would be good for him.’

‘Och, no. William’s ower busy at his studies,’ explained Mistress Irvine, and bobbed another curtsy. ‘I wonder if I might trouble ye, sir? It’s just to leave this paper for him with the man at the yett. It’s for William Irvine.’ She produced a folded and sealed package.

‘That’s no trouble.’ Gil put his hand out. A line of verse popped into his head: Little Sir William, are you within? Which of the ballads was that?

‘Only he said he’d be busy today, he can’t come to see me, and I don’t like to go back, the porter was as awkward yesterday about sending to fetch him to the yett, and if they’re all taigled with this feast I’d only be in the way. It’s a shame I never took it with me when I went out to Vespers.’

So the guardian of the college’s great wooden door must be the same fellow Gil remembered from his own time. ‘It’s no trouble,’ he said again.

She put the little package into his hand and curtsied again. ‘Blessings on ye, sir. Oh, here, you’ve lost your wee scarf.’ She stooped to lift the swatch of silk and fur. ‘You’ll not need that round your neck the day, maister, it’ll be warm enough when it’s no raining. And I’ll away back down to the kitchen, mistress, and see to that remedy I promised Nancy for the bairn. We’ll see if we can’t get him taking more than milk with honey and usquebae, won’t we no?’

‘We will be aye grateful if you do, mistress,’ said Alys. ‘I believe he has eaten only by accident since his mother died.’ She watched Mistress Irvine puffing her way down the kitchen stair, then turned to fasten the scarf back on Gil’s shoulder. ‘There, I have used two pins this time. Take care,’ she said earnestly. ‘Of the Montgomerys, I mean.’

‘Yes indeed.’ The mason made for the door. ‘Maybe you do not go about alone for a while. Bah! It is raining again.’

‘The Montgomerys have killed no Cunninghams for at least six months,’ Gil said. ‘That I know of,’ he added.

He hugged Alys, and bent to kiss her. For a long moment she returned his embrace, with the eager innocence which he found so enchanting; then she drew away, suddenly shy, and he dropped another quick kiss on the bridge of her nose, and followed Maistre Pierre down the fore-stair and across the courtyard in the rain.

Pacing up the High Street with the dignity imposed by the heavy garments, Gil glanced at the tall stone house belonging to Hugh, Lord Montgomery and wondered again what that turbulent baron wanted in Glasgow. Montgomery had no Lanarkshire holdings and no need to keep on the good side of the Archbishop, unlike Gil’s own kindred, and the holdings and privileges in Ayrshire which were the cause of Montgomery’s bloody dispute with the Cunninghams were all administered from Irvine. Perhaps, Gil speculated, Alys’s governess was right and the family wished to make its mark on the college in some way.

The High Street was now completely blocked outside the college gateway by the mounts waiting for the procession. John Shaw the Steward was welcoming another arrival. Gil avoided the heels of a restless mule and picked his way to the door. Here he was met by the same student he had seen earlier, a gangling youth with a faded gown and a fashionable haircut, who bowed deeply, flourishing his hat so that raindrops flew from it.

‘Salve, Magister. The college greets you. May I know your name?’

‘Maister Gilbert Cunningham,’ said Gil, ‘determined in ’84.’

The student straightened abruptly, clapping the hat back on his head.

‘Gang within, maister, if ye will,’ he said, cutting across Gil’s greeting to the college. ‘The Faculty’s in the Fore Hall.’ He waved a long arm towards the great wooden yett and the vaulted passage beyond it, and turned away.

A little startled by this incivility, Gil made his way into the passage, pausing at the porter’s door. As he had surmised, the occupant of the rancid, cluttered little room was the same man he remembered from his own days at the college, a surly individual with a bald head and a flabby paunch.

‘Good morning, Jaikie,’ he said politely. ‘I see you’re still in charge here.’

‘Oh, it’s you, Gil Cunningham,’ said Jaikie, looking him up and down. ‘I thought ye’d be here earlier, but maybe since ye’re to be married, ye’re done with early rising.’ He produced an unpleasantly suggestive leer. ‘And I hear there’s a bairn already?’

‘There is,’ agreed Gil, ever more politely. ‘A motherless bairn being fostered by the household.’

‘Aye, right. And what do you want?’ demanded Jaikie. ‘I’ve enough to see to, dealing with this feast, without idle conversation round my door.’

‘I have a package here for William Irvine.’

The man’s expression flickered.

‘Ye have, have ye? Let’s see. From Billy Dog, is it?’

Gil handed over the folded paper. Jaikie turned it in his hands, flicked at the seal with a dirty thumbnail, and grunted.

‘It’s no from Billy Dog. Well, ye can deliver it yirsel. That’s William Irvine out there at the yett, capering like a May hobby, welcoming the maisters.’

‘The boy with the red hair?’

‘Aye, the same.’ Jaikie cast a glance out of his window at the crowd in the street. ‘Ye’ll need to be quick. They’ll mount up soon.’

Gil went back out to the doorway and waited while the rain stopped, the sun came out, and the red-haired boy greeted another pair of graduates with flowery compliments about the college’s sons. One of them produced a stock phrase in reply, about the fountain of wisdom; the other grunted, ‘Aye, thanks,’ and pushed past Gil into the tunnel.

‘William,’ said Gil. The boy turned, and recognizing Gil raised his hat briefly and attempted to look down his nose at him. Tall though he was, Gil topped him by several inches, so he was unsuccessful in this, but he assumed an expression of vague contempt.

‘I have a package for you from Mistress Irvine, William,’ said Gil politely, holding it out. Little Sir William, are you within? he thought again.

‘From — ? Oh,’ said William, taking it. He turned the little bundle over, reading the clumsy writing on the cover. ‘Thank you,’ he added, as if the words tasted unpleasant, and then, almost warily, ‘Did she say anything about it?’

‘Not a thing,’ said Gil. ‘You’ll need to open it to find out.’

‘Well, it’s what one usually does with a letter,’ said William, with casual impertinence. Gil raised one eyebrow, and the boy looked down and turned away. ‘Thank you, maister,’ he said again, ostentatiously studying the writing on the package.

Gil made his way through the tunnel into the Outer Close where he paused, savouring the scene. The place had scarcely changed in the eight years since he had left; the thatch was sagging, the shutters were crooked, even the weeds between the flagstones seemed the same. Now, where had that ill-schooled boy said? Yes, in the Fore Hall.