Shona MacLEAN - The Redemption of Alexander Seaton

Straloch indicated the map. ‘Tell me about the murdered man. What was a man capable of such work as this doing apprenticed to an apothecary?’

So again, for the laird of Straloch’s benefit, I rehearsed the tale of Patrick Davidson’s childhood, his years of study at home and abroad, his return to Banff under the roof of Edward Arbuthnott and the talk of his relationship with Arbuthnott’s daughter. The laird interjected once or twice in the course of the tale with ‘a good college’, ‘a wonderful city’, ‘a wise choice’, but said little more until I got to the end of it. Laughter and music were reaching us from the dining hall; it was at once comforting and yet incongruous as an accompaniment to our conversation. When I was finished the laird got up and raked at the fire.

‘It does not make sense, Mr Seaton. No, it does not make sense.’ He leant against the mantel in thought and then turned around to look at me. ‘Why did he come back to Banff? Why? When his love of botany had been strong enough to steer him away from the study of the law, and even medicine?’

‘He came to study the apothecary’s craft,’ I said, unsure what it was about this that so bothered the laird. It was plain enough to me that Patrick Davidson had returned to the town of his childhood because his connections of influence – his uncle – were able to secure him a place to train with a good master. But this did not satisfy Straloch.

‘No,’ he said. ‘When one has a passion such as this – or a calling even – it overrides all other considerations. If advancement in the study of botany and the usage of plants was his guiding desire, he would not have come to Banff. He would have stayed on the continent of Europe, war or no, where he would have learnt much. What is there in the flora of our corner of Scotland that could engage the heart and the mind of one who already knew it from childhood? Nothing, I would wager, to what the Alps, the Pyrenees, the warm lands to the South have to offer, to say nothing of the exotic riches of the East or the undisturbed forests and swamps of the New World. No, one with a true passion for the understanding of plants would not cast all aside in order to play out his youth in the town of Banff.’

I conceded that there was some sense in what the laird reasoned, but it seemed to me that he deliberately did not mention the maps; that he was drawing me to his point instead. I held the document up. ‘You think he came to do this?’ I asked.

His voice was low and he spoke slowly, not looking at me. ‘I think he may have done,’ he said, ‘and that if he did, he was killed for it.’ His words hung in the air a moment, and then he changed his tack. ‘But tell me also, Mr Seaton; where was the body found?’

I swallowed and looked at him directly. ‘The body was found in my schoolroom, sprawled across my desk.’

He nodded, and seemed satisfied. It was as I had thought: I had been asked the question as a test of my honesty and trustworthiness. Robert Gordon had known exactly where the body of Patrick Davidson had been found. I wondered what else he knew. The singing and laughter from the dining hall was becoming louder. A voice called out ‘Gray Steel’ and the sounds of clapping and the stamping of feet was followed by the dragging noise of furniture being cleared from the floor for dancing. Straloch crossed the room and shut tight the door, which until then had been left a little ajar. ‘How did he come to be there?’

I swallowed. ‘He was brought there.’

He was watching me closely now. ‘By whom?’

I had no reason that I knew to distrust the laird of Straloch, but neither was I content to tell him all I knew. ‘For their own protection, I cannot tell you.’

‘The killer?’

I shook my head. ‘No, I am certain of that. Those who found him saw the state he was in and sought to help him. They had seen me entering the schoolhouse shortly before, and thought I would not yet have been abed, or at least asleep. They left him there. I knew nothing of it till morning. He was dead then.’

‘Why did they not call for you?’

‘They did not wish to be discovered themselves.’ I had given away too much already. Mary Dawson was out of the country, and safe now, but her sister Janet might not yet have gained a sanctuary. The laird, sensing my reluctance, did not press me further. He changed his line of questioning a little.

‘They tell me he was murdered on the night of the great storm. We were battered here for many hours, and lost some trees in the park there. On such a night there cannot have been many abroad. These Samaritans of yours, they saw no one else?’

Since he would not leave it I would lie. ‘No.’

‘And there is nothing, in your past or his, nothing in these maps, that links you in some way to Patrick Davidson or his fate?’

The sensation of fear began to creep through me, and I could feel a coldness under my skin. ‘I know of nothing.’

Straloch was grave. ‘But he was laid in your schoolroom to die. And yet it is your friend, the music schoolmaster, who lies in the tolbooth of Banff, while you walk free.’ He looked at me in silence for a moment before proceeding. ‘I fear there is some great game of evil afoot in Banff, a game that will not end at the one death. You must take great care, Mr Seaton, great care.’ We had neither of us finished our wine. I sat and sipped the warm red liquid while the laird’s words resonated in my head.

I drained my cup and stood up. ‘I must go to my bed now, I think.’

Straloch came towards me and offered me his hand. ‘I myself have an early start. I ride out tomorrow at seven. I am bound for Edinburgh. I doubt if we will meet again before I leave. As you can see, I am much surrounded by young men and in their company often, but it is not so often that I find one whose conversation is of interest to me. I hope we may meet again some day.’ We shook hands and I gave him the letter from Jamesone that I had almost forgotten, and made for the door. I had my hand on the handle when he suddenly called me. ‘The map!’ How quickly it had been forgotten in the talk of its maker’s murder. ‘I will write a line for you to take back to the provost tomorrow. I can be of little help to allay his fears. It is the finest piece of cartography I have seen, and would serve any army well, if the others you spoke of are of anything like the quality. But I tell you again, I know of no intended invasion, and if there be any, the hand of the Marquis of Huntly is not in it.’

I believed him; whether or not Baillie Buchan, the Reverend Guild and the rest would was another question. Assuring the laird I could find my way myself to my bedchamber, I took the candle he offered me and made my way back along through the west wing to the great central stairway. The sound of a raucous ballad and much laughter filled the whole ground floor of the house. How many times I had been party to such evenings, such gatherings of friends and kin, the storytelling, the music, the catches and rounds, that went on into the small hours of the night. I longed to go in, just to listen, to be one of them again, for a moment. The ballad came to an end as I stood at the foot of the stairs. And then, when the laughter and cheering had died down, a woman’s voice, clear and alone, rose in a lament. All around was silence. Isabella Irvine. I ascended the stairs.

I had reached my small chamber at the very top of the house before I remembered the boots that a servant had taken in the afternoon to dry for me. Wearily I turned and began to make my way down again. I used my knowledge of such houses to guess where the kitchens might be. I turned to the right at the foot of the stairs and knew that something had gone wrong. I looked around the great entrance hall of the house and saw nothing or no one to give cause for alarm, and yet something was not as it should be. I stood still and listened. I heard nothing. And that was it: where before there had been music, and voices singing, and laughter, now no sound came from the dining hall. Yet, I had heard no one come up the stairs after me. I followed the corridor past the dining hall towards the kitchens, and was met by the steward coming the other way. He was carrying my clothing and riding boots. I thanked him and took them from him. As I did so, a bell was rung in the dining hall and he hastened to answer it. As he stood in the open doorway I could see beyond him into the room. Straloch stood with his back to the fireplace, talking in a low but authoritative voice to his older sons and two or three of the young men who had been at table earlier. Of the women I saw nothing. The steward closed the door behind him, and in the darkening silence of the house I climbed the stairway once again and made for my bed.