J. Tomlin - The Winter Kill

“I suppose that you do. Most men feel it, I am telt, but evil cannae touch me. It was God’s will that I be given a face and shape that draws women to me with their soft touches and sleekit ways. He made me desirable to the daughters of Eve to test me. My father wanted me to marry, and the woman was fair to look upon. She brushed her hands against me, tried to entice me with sweet scents and soft smiles. I spent a week on my knees begging Christ to deliver me from any uncleanness. He told me to withdraw from the world and spurn all such filth.” Again he dropped his preaching tone for a normal one. “I suppose most men know about temptation.”

“And Maister Kennedy is free from temptation as well?”

Brother Hugh scowled at Law. “That you must ask him about. He is a priest and should be above such things, but…” He shook his head. “I wish I kent where he is today. It is odd that he is nae here, so I can make you no promises that you can speak to him.”

Law stood. “Suppose I come back later to see whether he’s here then.”

“I am fasting today and shall be here all the day, so I can finish my work. Would you like me to tell him you were seeking him?”

Law grinned. “You will any road.”

“Aye.” Brother Hugh had a bright-eyed smile. “But I wondered what you would say.”

Law shook his head. “I’m sure you’ll do whatever you think is right.”

The snow had hardened to a thick layer of ice on North Street. Law passed through North Port, its heavy gates open and a guard huddling in the protection of the guardhouse door. Then he followed the track that led by the wide, ice-covered Town Ditch dug to protect the burgh in one of the wars with the English.

It was a typical suburb. A saddler’s yard with harnesses hanging from the eves of sturdy stone house, was cheek to jowl by a dyer where apprentices stirred steaming vats of dye in a neatly shoveled yard. An ice-slick path ran between the two. The path wended its way past a mix of hovels and decent stone houses, shutters closed against the biting wind. Usually there would have been carts lurching past, but the snow was still too deep for traffic. The high walls of Blackfriars Abbey rose in the distance, past a field of deep drifts sculpted into mounds around bushes and trees.

The house Law sought was in the middle of the suburb farther from the port than he had thought, judging by the stench of curing hides. A dog took up barking as he stepped through the gate.

“Maister!” A lad in a tattered tunic stopped shoveling snow to shout and point toward Law.

The yard was busy in spite of the snow, with the lad shoveling and a journeyman stirring a steaming vat that reeked strongly enough to sting Law’s eyes. The master tanner was a short, sturdy, fair-haired man who frowned as he supervised the workers, his hands on his hips. He yelled for the hound to be quiet.

“I need a word with Maister Braidlaw,” Law said.

The maister strode decisively toward him. “A word is it, sir?” The man’s sharp eyes assessed him, taking in his muddy boots but pausing for a moment on Law’s gold spurs. “Is it about the woman Gil found the day before yesterday?” At Law’s nod he continued. “Come inside the counting house and warm yourself, if you will.”

“Were you with Gil when he found her?” Law asked as he followed the man into a little hut at the far end of the yard. There was a table stacked with papers against one wall, a couple of shelves on another, and scraps of leather scattered hither and yon. A small brazier cut some of the chill, and Law held out his hands to warm them.

“Right before, and if you’re thinking he had anything to do with the woman, put it out of your head. He’s my apprentice and sleeps on a pallet in the hut with Davey, my journeyman.” He sat on a stool and gestured to another. He leaned forward, elbows on the table, pushing aside a docket of papers. “With finished hides on the premises, even after a storm I take care about thieves. The dog was raising a fuss like, so I kent there was something amiss. I sent Gil out with it on a lead to find out what had the animal in a lather.” He grimaced with distaste. “He came running back without even the dog, screaming like a lassie. Had to send Davey to find the animal, but the dog was with the…the body. Standing guard, Davey said. I sent Davey for the watch for I could nae send Gil, he was shaking and huddling in his pallet like a wean. Though I cannae say I blame him that much.”

“Did you see the body yourself?”

“Aye, certes. I went to stand guard over it while Davey was away.”

“Had the body been moved? After Gil found it, I mean”

Maister Braidlaw scowled. “I dinnae think so. Gil had brushed away the snow, or tried to. She was all stiff like, as a body would be after a while.”

“I’ll need to talk to him, to find out how she lay when he found her.”

“You have my permission. He’s a good enough lad, a mite lazy at times, but honest withal.”

Leaving Maister Braidlaw shuffling papers, Law paused in the doorway. Gil was speaking intently to the journeyman who still stirred the steaming vat. The stench was even stronger, and Law’s eyes watered. He was eager to be away, so he motioned to the lad.

As Gil approached, a bit timidly, Law said, “Your maister said you could tell me about the morning you found the lady in the snow.” He thrust his chin toward the gate. “Come walk with me whilst we talk.”

Gil wrinkled his brow and looked toward the doorway of the counting house, but Maister Braidlaw stepped into view and nodded to him. The lad said, “Och, there’s nae much to tell.”

Outside the gate after a deep breath of somewhat fresher air, Law continued, “Maister Braidlaw said the dog was raising a fuss.”

“Aye, he had been for a good while. When I took him through the gate, he headed straight for where she lay. Near pulled my arm out, he was lunging so.”

Out on the track that ran toward the Ditch and the city wall beyond, he looked around again. There were six houses which ran down to the Ditch, several with kale yards within their fences. Peat smoke drifted above the roofs of all except one close by. Farther from the Ditch was a dyer’s yard. Breathing in air with less stink, Law kept walking as he asked, “How did she lay? She was covered with snow?”

“I could see a bit of her blue cloak. Angus dug at the snow that was covering her until I shoved him back and brushed her off some…” The boy gulped, paling at the memory. “She was facedown, but I had no thought she was dead. I took her hand thinking…though it sounds daft…to pull her up. But it was…stiff. Her fingers like sticks. And cold as ice.”

So even then she’d been dead long enough to have stiffened when Gil found her. After battles, he’d seen bodies stiffen in as little as three or four hours, though when it was cold, stiffening seemed to take longer. At any rate, she’d been dead a good time.

“Can you pick out exactly where you found her?”

Gil pointed across the track from his master’s yard to a much-trampled spot. The storm had howled like a bean sith. Had Jannet cried for help, no one would have heard-except perhaps the good hound.

“So she was stiff and icy cold. How was her body? You say she lay face down? Mayhap curled up for warmth?”

“No,” he said uncomfortably. “Her legs were stretched out straight, like, with her hands…” He raised his arms even with his head. “Like so. They were shoved deep into the snow as though she tried to push herself up.”

“As though she had fallen?” Law asked in a casual tone.

The lad tilted his head as he stared hard at the spot. “Thinking back on it, her clothes when the dog was at the snow, her skirts were smoothed over her legs. Not hiked about as you’d expect if she’d fallen and struggled to get up.”