The King's Corrodian

Chapter Eight

‘I’m glad you never disabused Prior Boyd,’ said Alys, shaking the rain off her plaid. ‘About the lady in the drawing,’ she elaborated, as Gil looked blankly at her. ‘Her name is Margaret Rattray, not Keithick. She’s his sister.’

‘You found her!’

‘Led us straight there, so she did,’ said Jennet with pride. ‘And we’ve learned why the poor laddie thought he disappeared the other fellow, and all.’

‘Christ aid her,’ said Tam, his face darkening.

‘Come and tell me.’ Gil patted the bench beside him, and Alys hung her plaid on the finial at its end and came to join him before the fire.

Leaving Prior Boyd, Gil had returned to the guest hall to find it deserted apart from the cat and a resentful Socrates who had demanded out with some urgency. Exercising the dog in the dark courtyard, watching the members of the community come and go from the makeshift infirmary across the way, he had been joined by Alys and her escort, with a borrowed lantern, but there was still no sign of the other ser vants. Since it would soon be suppertime, he was not much concerned.

‘I spoke to the man of law as well,’ Alys was saying now in her accented Scots. ‘Mistress Rattray gave me a token for him, and a signed permission on a set of tablets. He’s acted for the two o them these six or eight months, sending to the Low Countries and dealing wi the property and so on.’

‘That’s well done,’ he said admiringly. ‘Tell me about it.’

She recounted her visit to Mistress Rattray, with comments from Jennet interpolated. Gil heard her out, frowning.

‘There’s still a lot of this goes against the Rule,’ he said at length, ‘even if he was keeping no mistress. Leaving the house by night, keeping property back, transacting business abroad — these are all misdeeds for which Pollock could have threatened to expose him.’

‘Very likely,’ Alys said. ‘And I think by what one of the novices told you — was it the one called Simpson? — that Pollock knew of Mistress Rattray and assumed she was Andrew’s mistress, and believed that Andrew would be afraid of the truth getting about. She’s still hiding from her husband.’

‘And no wonder,’ muttered Tam.

‘Yes. I can see the boy would have wished Pollock dead,’ Gil said, ‘but I don’t like this tale of the priest who died before, and by fire at that.’

‘It could look very like witchcraft, to the wrong hearer,’ Alys said, looking sideways at him. He nodded. ‘Mistress Rattray told me the Sheriff found it to be arson, and the man guilty was found, and confessed at the Assize at Montrose, and hanged.’

‘Nevertheless,’ Gil said, ‘I think we don’t mention that afore the Prior or the Bishop. Tam, Jennet, you hear me? No mention of the boy’s past. Nor of his sister, I think, unless we must.’

‘Are you sure of that?’ Alys asked. Gil looked directly at her.

‘Unless we must,’ he repeated. She bit her lip, then looked away.

‘I wonder how much his fellows kent of this,’ she said. ‘I wish we could talk to them, but I suppose it would hardly be proper to try to question them just now, when the community is in silence.’

‘There are more reasons for talking to them,’ Gil said. He recounted what he had learned in the day, to exclamations from Jennet and cynical nods from Tam.

Alys listened closely, and sat back as he finished, saying, ‘Very strange. I agree, it sounds as if Father Henry protects someone who has confessed to him, but surely if someone confessed murder, his confessor should set a very great penance?’

‘Aye, and in a community like this the penance at least would be known, even if the cause was kept secret. He did say he was waiting for the miscreant to confess of his own accord. But to what? Arson, or murder, or both?’

‘And what about the factor farming on the rents?’ burst out Jennet. ‘That’s a crime and all, even if it’s no murder, cheating honest men o their coin. And I’ll warrant it goes into his own purse, no the Blackfriars’ kist.’

‘If that’s what Pollock knew,’ said Alys, ‘the man Wilson also had reason to wish Pollock dead.’

‘Several people wished the man dead,’ Gil said. ‘Wilson, Rattray, Raitts I know of, and I’ve little doubt there are others. The Prior kens about Wilson now,’ he added to Jennet. ‘We’ll hope he’ll deal wi the matter appropriately.’

The other men, Nory and Dandy and Euan, straggled back just as the supper was carried in from the kitchen by the lay servants. The conversation was general over stewed kale and stockfish with a green sauce, but once the dishes were cleared and the broth from the dish of kale poured onto a broken loaf for Socrates, as the deep-voiced processional singing of Compline floated from the cloister, Gil drew his stool to the table again. ‘Time to set what we’ve learned all thegither. There’s still much to discover, but if we know what we’ve got we can direct the search better. Nory, have you got anything new the day?’

His body-servant grimaced.

‘Little enough, maister,’ he said primly. ‘I was working in the great barn, mending nets for the stables along wi Brother Archie, who can talk without drawing breath let me tell you for all he’s still coughing, and heard all about how easy this or that friar is to work wi and how the kitchen men gets a loaf to take home wi them every week, and the like. He’d no a lot to say about the laddie that died, the novices and the lay brothers don’t come across one another that often, but he’d a fair bit to say about yesterday’s stushie, mostly lamenting that Brother Dickon had got the lay brothers out afore it got going. He did say Faither Henry was no for joining in, just stood there in silence wi the battle brewing about him.’

‘So young Mureson said,’ Gil agreed. ‘Did he mention any others by name?’

‘The two that begun it, that accused one another, he named them. Wilson and Raitts. And he said, one o the novices was right distressed by it, he’d thought he was like to swoon away wi horror, which is the reason Brother Dickon rounded them up and got them out wi his own men. So Archie said,’ Nory finished, scepticism in his tone.

‘If it was the boy Mureson,’ said Alys, ‘he was still very shaken when he came to tell us.’

‘And he’d a deal to say about the man Pollock, Archie had. Seems there’s been one or two enquiring for him the week after he vanished away.’

‘I wasny told that,’ said Gil.

‘Aye, well, maybe it never reached the Prior’s ears. If it was someone came to the gate, or spoke to one o the lay brothers working in the yard, they’d maybe turn back when they heard he wasny here. One o them was a fremit kind o fellow, so Archie said.’

‘Fremit? What kind of foreigner?’

Nory shook his head.

‘Just no from here. Archie’s no a travelled man himsel for all he was a soldier — he’d reckon anyone from further than Glasgow or Aberdeen was a foreigner — but I think this one had some kind o accent, spoke funny, and he’d a badge wi a rose on it on his jerkin.’

‘Oh!’ said Gil. ‘And this was after Pollock dis appeared? How long after, did Archie say? Had he seen the man before?’

‘He never said,’ Nory reported with regret.

‘A red rose or a white?’ asked Alys.

‘I never asked him. I could ask him the morn,’ Nory offered.

‘Aye, do that.’ Gil frowned. ‘Odd that the messenger never called on Pullar. He said he’d been expecting one about now.’

‘What messenger’s that, maister?’ Nory asked, and Gil recounted his visit to Andrew Pullar. The man listened, and offered, ‘Likely he went away again, never spoke to the man o law, thinking there’d be no money, when he found Pollock wasny here.’

‘You’d think he might check with the other contact.’

‘Unless Pollock was to give him the direction to Pullar’s place of business,’ Alys suggested. ‘I wonder where the coin is going?’

‘It will be going into Ireland, to the O’Neill,’ said Euan. ‘It will be for the new Duke of York, that is certain.’

‘Of course!’ said Gil, and Alys nodded. ‘This fellow that’s maybe, or maybe no, the Duke o York. Claims to be the son o Edward Fourth, or the like — one o the two boys that were prisoned in the Tower at London,’ he explained to the two grooms, who were looking blank. ‘There’s more than one o the monarchs of Europe friendly to him, if only to annoy Henry Tudor. I’ve heard he’s some friendship wi the O’Neill, but I suspect we’ll see him in Scotland afore too long, if this has been the Treasury sending him money.’

‘Och, no, he is planning to go to England and fight King Henry,’ said Euan confidently.

‘In any case,’ said Gil, ‘it looks as though Pollock was supporting the man’s cause, for whatever reason. Thank you, Nory.’

‘How are your hands?’ Alys asked. ‘I have a cream for your finger-ends, if the rope has chafed them.’

‘Dandy,’ said Gil over Nory’s murmured thanks, ‘did you learn aught to the purpose? What did you do the day?’

‘Dod and Jamesie was redding up the plough-harness,’ said Dandy, ‘so I gied them a hand, did a couple wee mends, we got it all greased and laid out ready for the ploughing. So natural enough, working at that, we spoke o where we’d come fro, and then where others were raised and all. Seems Wilson’s a local man, Henry White’s from Lanarkshire though he’s been here for years, and the man Raitts is out of Ayrshire they think, though he’s very close as to his history. As Nory here says, they’d little knowledge o the novices, though they both had a liking for the laddie that’s slain, thought him a decent fellow, like to make a good friar and a good preacher.’

‘Did they say aught at all o the others?’ Gil asked.

‘No a lot. Calder’s ower serious and just as like to report you to Brother Dickon, though to be fair they say Brother Dickon doesny like his men reported to him. He sees to their discipline hissel, says there’s no need for some youngster owerseeing them. Munt and Simpson, is that the names? They’re aye good for a laugh, it seems, and up to all the kind o tricks laddies that age gets up to. It’ll no last, they reckon, they’ll be as solemn as the rest by the time they’re done. The one, Mureson, is ower solemn already, they said.’

‘And Andrew?’ said Gil. ‘The dead laddie? Was he lively and all, or was he serious?’

‘Kinna in atween, by what they said. Certainly up to tricks, they reckoned he’d a lassie in the town, covered for him a time or two when he’d been out and shouldny.’

Gil nodded.

‘Very useful. Thanks, Dandy. Had they any notion how he died? Who might have cut his throat and burned the infirmary to conceal it?’

‘Oh, they reckon Sandy Raitts. They all hold him to be a pirlie, ragglish fellow, liable to all kinds o cantrips. They wouldny put it past him to do an orra thing like that.’

Jennet muttered agreement, but Alys said, ‘No, surely no. He’s a poor creature, I’ll admit, but he’s no destructive.’

Gil looked at her.

‘What, you think he would kill but not set the fire?’

‘I think he would not kill, and certainly not set a fire. That’s a thoughtless action.’

‘Arson always is,’ Gil agreed. ‘Well, perhaps. And you, Euan, have you learned anything of use?’

‘Och, indeed,’ said Euan proudly. ‘I was sitting with the old man again, the one that’s deeing, to ease Brother Euan’s work. He’s a dispensation from the silence, Brother Euan has, seeing he must question his patients, so we was chatting away in the Gaelic whenever it was quiet. He’s been telling me all the history of the folks here, and who gets on wi who, and what their quarrels are. You’d never know the wee things they quarrel over, what wi being shut in and obedient.’

‘So what have you learned?’ Gil prompted.

‘Well, well, the man Raitts has quarrelled with the most of his brothers, saving maybe Henry White, over his books. This one has ill-treated a book, that one has put one back wrong, all those sorts of things. You’d think they was his own books, says Brother Euan. The brother called Thomas Wilson has been farming the rents, though Father Prior doesny ken yet. The second-year novices has been brewing ale in one o the barns, and put all sorts into the mash and gave theirsels some bad dreams. It’s a wonder what the Infirmarer knows about the folk in the place, so it is.’ He paused, closing his eyes to think. ‘The one Raitts is accusing Wilson of talking about him in the town. Seems he told someone he was spreading tales o him, though he never said what sort of tales-’

‘Ochtaway, this is all just well-head clash!’ protested Rob. ‘There’s no purpose in any o’t!’

‘And how is it any different Jamesie telling you tales o the same man?’ demanded Euan, firing up.

‘Be at peace, both of you!’ said Gil. ‘You’ve both done what I asked o you, and it’s a matter o fortune whether simply talking to folk raises useful information or no. Tell me more about the novices, Euan. What did the sub-Infirmarer have to say about them?’

‘Och, they’re good enough laddies, by what he tells me. They’ve called at the infirmary daily to ask after their friend while he was shut away, though that’s had to cease now, and sent him messages and words o comfort each time. That would be the first-year novices, a course. Euan never let them in to see him, so he says.’

‘Did he mention John Blythe?’

‘Him that’s novice-master? Do you know, he did, now — and what was he telling me o him?’ Euan closed his eyes again, the better to recollect. ‘Och, yes, he’s no been sleeping well, the poor man, and has had a sleeping-draught to him the last few weeks or more. Euan was just making up some more the day.’ Despite much racking of his memory, he produced no further useful recollections.

At length, giving up, Gil said, ‘Very well. We’ll brew up a stoup of buttered ale and put all thegether, see if we can work out what’s been happening. Where did that jug of ale go? Should we send into the kitchen for another?’

Once they were gathered round the fire, watching Jennet pour the hot spiced brew into wooden beakers, Euan remarked airily, ‘It will not be any surprise that the O’Neill has disposed of the man Pollock.’

‘Why would he do that?’ Tam asked in sceptical tones.

‘Why, if Pollock had learned some secret of his, the way he was finding out things to everyone’s discredit, the O’Neill would certainly have him killed.’

‘What, an old man here in a priory in Perth?’ said Tam, the scepticism even stronger. ‘How would he do that, when he never left the place?’

‘The man was having folk call on him here,’ said Euan, ‘and who is to say what secrets they brought him? And the O’Neill has a long arm, I can tell you that.’

‘That’s speculation,’ said Gil firmly. ‘What do we ken for certain about the man?’

‘We ken how he died,’ said Alys, grimacing. Socrates put his head on her knee, and she stroked his ears. ‘Burned up by fire behind locked and barred doors.’

‘He was given to extortion,’ said Gil. ‘So there are a good few folk who disliked him, possibly enough to kill him.’

‘Was he not writing down the reasons for his extortion?’ asked Euan.

‘No,’ said Gil. ‘Names, initials, but nothing about the original misdeeds. I’ve no doubt he feared it getting into other hands.’

‘Now that’s a pity,’ said Euan. ‘Interesting it would be, to know what misdeeds might be in a house of religion like this.’

‘Who do we ken was on his list, maister?’ asked Tam.

Gil hesitated.

‘I’ll not name the living,’ he said after a moment. ‘Better if that doesny get about.’ Tam grinned, his glance flicking to Euan and back in the firelight. ‘We ken he had a go at Andrew Rattray, thinking the lady in the town was his mistress no his sister, and he had a go at one o the other novices and all, and was denied.’

‘And what was that about?’ asked Euan avidly before he could go on.

‘A book from the college library at St Andrews, all confessed and dealt wi,’ said Gil repressively, and Euan subsided.

‘There are others, then, maister?’ said Tam. Gil nodded. ‘But did you no say the doors was barred? How would anyone get in to set fire to the man, whoever it was?’

‘Down the chimney?’ suggested Dandy.

‘Blocked,’ said Alys. ‘So is the window to the inner chamber, and the inner door was locked and the key in the man’s purse, or so we assume,’ she glanced at Gil, ‘since it was found among his ashes.’

‘It’s impossible,’ said Dandy. ‘He might as well be in a lead coffin, and how would you get at a man in a lead coffin?’

‘No, but a lead coffin’s well sealed,’ said Tam. ‘Naught can get in or out, that’s its purpose. Even wi the doors barred, there’s plenty can get into a wee house like yon.’

‘Like what?’ challenged Dandy. Euan was silent.

‘Rats. Mice. You ken as well’s me they can get anywhere. Fire, a draught o air, rain down the chimney — unless it’s sealed off complete, mistress?’

‘So you’re saying a trained rat ran in wi a wee firebrand in its mouth?’

‘There was fire in the house already,’ Alys said over Tam’s indignant response. They stopped arguing to look at her. ‘He had a brazier to keep him warm, and he must have had a light in that chamber, for he had been looking in his kist.’

‘We never found a candlestock,’ Gil said.

‘Likely it was wooden,’ said Tam. ‘It would burn up wi the rest.’

‘But how did the fire consume the man completely?’ demanded Dandy. ‘I’ve been and looked in the kist where they’re praying ower it, there’s just wee bits o ash and bone. The other laddie wasny consumed, and that fire was hot enough, Our Lady kens. If your clothes catches alight, all you do is, you put it out. You don’t just sit there and burn, do you?’

‘If you’re bout-fou you might,’ argued Tam. ‘You might no notice till it’s well alight. Happened to my auntie’s good-faither. He’d had the most o a jug o Bordeaux-wine he’d won in a wager and fell asleep by the fire, except she noticed and tossed the dishwater ower him. He wouldny ha minded,’ he added thoughtfully, ‘but she never took the crocks out first. The great one caught him a wallop in the cods, had him limping for a week.’

‘Was the man a drinker?’ Alys asked.

‘Brother Dickon said not,’ said Gil. ‘I asked him.’

‘So how did he catch on fire?’ Dandy persisted.

‘This is unsatisfactory,’ said Alys. ‘On the one hand,’ she held one hand out, ‘we have a man dead in a locked chamber, locked from the inside, and no way to tell which of his enemies might have had a means of getting into the chamber. On the other,’ she withdrew her other hand from Gil’s clasp and held it out too, ‘the means by which he died is not clear. How did the fire start and why was it so fierce?’

‘Aye,’ began Tam.

‘That sums it up well, sweetheart,’ said Gil, retrieving her hand, ‘but-’

‘But that’s my point!’ she broke in, gesturing again with the free hand. ‘It seems like nothing done by a human agency, nothing started by a mortal hand, given that we saw no mechanical contrivances, no artificial hearth or the like. And no trained rats,’ she added, ‘though I suppose those would hide from Socrates.’

The dog beat his tail on the hearth a couple of times in acknowledgement of this. Gil said, ‘Go on. Where does this lead?’

‘If it’s not a human action,’ she turned to look earnestly at him in the candlelight, ‘it must be either a wholly natural one, some sort of accidental occurrence, or a supernatural one. Are you agreed?’

‘Aye,’ he said, and Tam murmured something. Dandy seemed less convinced.

‘The supernatural happens very rarely,’ she went on. ‘We know there are supernatural events, Holy Church teaches us so, but I never witnessed such a thing as the Devil coming into this world-’

‘There was what that woman saw, mem,’ objected Jennet. ‘Wi his great wings rising up, and his red een.’

‘I think she saw the smoke from the great fire,’ said Alys. ‘No, it seems to me so much more likely that Pollock died by some natural occurrence that I have been trying to make it happen again, in a small way. I hope we know more the morn.’

‘Oh, is that …’ said Tam, then fell silent. Gil considered this proposition cautiously.

‘I’d need something solid enough to convince Blacader,’ he said at length. ‘No to mention Brown and the Prior.’

‘That should be possible,’ said Alys, with equal caution. ‘If I can make it work once, I can do so again with witnesses.’

‘Aye,’ he said, unwilling to question her further in front of the servants. ‘Well, we’ll look at this again when we’ve a bit more to go on. Now, what about the young man Rattray? What do we ken about him?’

‘He was well liked,’ offered Tam.

‘Someone didny like him,’ said Dandy.

‘Aye, but he’d no enemies that anyone’ll name,’ argued Tam.

‘He thought he had killed the man Pollock by hating him,’ said Alys.

‘Aye, but what’s that to say to his death, mem?’ Jennet said. ‘I’d ha said they were all glad to be rid o that man.’

‘It’s something we know of him,’ Alys said. ‘Until we have solved the matter, every detail may be important.’

‘He was asleep in the little chamber where he was confined, at the end of the building,’ said Gil slowly, ‘and Father James was also asleep in another chamber nearer the door. Someone crept in without waking the old man, which seems to have been no sort of a problem, but also without waking Rattray, I suppose, and cut the lad’s throat, then set a fire and left.’

‘I suppose he could hardly waken the old fellow,’ said Tam. ‘Here, wake up, brother, I’ve set your infirmary alight.’

‘Quite so,’ said Gil. ‘Then we have the Chapter of Faults which descended into a battle, and the community was silenced, and the first I’ve been able to question any of them was the day.’ Quickly he outlined what he had learned from Wilson and Raitts. ‘I tried to question White, but he gainstood me. I suspect he’s protecting someone, but the question is who? We’ve not been able to find that the lad had any enemies, nobody wi a grudge against him. Why kill him?’

‘Maybe he kent something?’ Dandy suggested.

‘Maybe the old man, the Infirmarer, had an apoplexy and cut the boy’s throat and then forgot he’d done it,’ Tam said.

‘There’s no chance he cut his own throat?’ asked Nory, breaking a long silence.

‘Unlikely, I’d say,’ said Gil. ‘He was laid in his bed, and for all the changes to the body from the fire, it seemed as if he’d been lying quietly afore it — afore it happened. There was no sign o a razor or knife or the like anywhere near him, either.’

‘Brother Augustine’s knife has still not been seen,’ Alys said.

‘If it’s like killing a pig,’ said Nory thoughtfully, ‘there’d be a deal o blood. They’re all in they bonnie white habits, a wheelamageerie colour for a muddy country like Scotland, and none o them that I’ve seen’s ower blood.’

‘The trick is to strip yoursel first,’ said Euan. ‘Likely he would be leaving his habit by the door, and putting it back on when he was done.’

‘And therefore,’ said Alys, leaning forward, ‘he barred the infirmary door, not wishing to be interrupted in his body-linen.’

‘That would fit,’ Gil agreed. ‘Boyd said he had never known Father James bar the door. That would fit well.’

‘That’s the how,’ said Dandy. ‘But who was it?’

‘Whoever Father Henry was talking to?’ said Alys, and answered herself, ‘No.’

‘No,’ Gil agreed. ‘Thys may ryme well but it acorde nought. If Wilson had just found the infirmary barred, and then saw White talking to someone, and some time later the infirmary went up in flames, there must ha been at least two people. Other than White,’ he added scrupulously. Euan frowned over this, but after a moment Dandy nodded.

‘But if it’s a matter of confession,’ said Alys, ‘if he’s protecting someone who had confessed to him, I mean, I suppose we have to guess who it might have been and confront that one direct. I wonder what they really discussed?’

‘Anything other than what either Wilson or Raitts claims to have heard, I suspect,’ Gil said. ‘I’d not trust either man’s account. Well, we can do nothing until Prior Boyd releases the community from its silence. I wish he had weighed up the drawbacks afore he imposed it. There must ha been another penance would have done as well.’

‘We could make them all strip to their linen,’ said Nory, still thinking deeply. ‘There’s likely bloodstains in the inside o his habit, no to mention his shirt.’

‘They wear shirts?’ said Jennet. ‘Och, I suppose they must, they’d freeze to death otherwise, never mind the wool chafing at their skins.’

‘That’s for the morn,’ said Gil. ‘Nory, you find out what happens about their wash and see if there’s been any bloody sarks sent down. I wish we’d thought o that sooner, there’s no knowing when the laundrywomen will come. Dandy, you did well the day, see if you can get any more the same way. Euan.’ He looked at the Erscheman, who gazed innocently back at him. ‘I’ll maybe want you to attend me, but if no, you can talk some more wi Brother Euan. See if you can find out where more o the brothers are from, what kind o family, are they country folk or townsmen.’

‘Och, yes indeed, I can be doing that,’ said Euan cheerfully.

‘Maister Gil,’ said Tam, craning to see past Dandy, ‘is that someone in the yard? There’s lights out there.’

Gil turned to look at the narrow windows. The lower portions were firmly shuttered, but the glazed upper sections showed dim lights moving, and now there were voices calling. Away through the high hall someone hammered on the outer door with a sound like thunder.

‘What’s amiss?’ he wondered, getting to his feet and lifting one of the candles. Tam followed him out into the hall, where they met a liveried manservant stumbling in out of the night, another behind him. Horses trampled, lanterns bobbed, and a harsh familiar voice sounded from the yard.

‘And don’t take no for an answer, Thomas! Go on, ask them!’

‘Oh, it’s you, maister,’ said the man in front, and swung his bonnet in a servant’s bow. ‘It’s my mistress outside, looking for the Prior.’

‘You’ve found the guest hall,’ Gil said. ‘Come in out the cold a moment. You’d need to knock at the gate to the slype, and whether any will hear you’s a good question. Did the porter no-’

‘My mistress wouldny wait for the porter to come back,’ said Thomas without expression.

‘Thomas!’

‘I’ll come out,’ said Gil. ‘Wait till I get my plaid.’

The rain had stopped, but a bitter wind blew between the buildings. Mistress Trabboch sat on her horse in the midst of the yard, glaring about her by the light of two lanterns. Gil approached her stirrup, and she scowled at him and said, ‘You’re no the Prior. Where is he? He’s got my man here, I want to talk to him.’

‘This is the guest hall, mistress,’ said Gil. ‘Will you step in and wait in the warm till the porter comes back?’

‘No,’ she said curtly. ‘I’ll wait here. He’ll no slip past me and out the gates afore I set my hand on him.’ It was not clear whether she meant the Prior or her husband.

‘The friars have sung Compline,’ Gil observed, ‘and are likely all abed by now. It may be a while.’

‘I’ll wait.’ She drew her furred cloak closer against the biting wind. The other horses in the yard fidgeted. ‘Thomas, can you no hold they beasts quiet?’

‘Have you come far?’ Gil asked politely. ‘It’s bitter season for travelling.’

‘None o your mind,’ she retorted. ‘But you can tell me, if you’ve been here any length o time, is there a friar here by the name o Alexander Stair?’

‘None that I’ve met, mistress,’ said Gil. She grunted in what might not have been disbelief. ‘Your husband?’

‘Aye.’

‘When did he leave you?’

‘I’ll talk wi the Prior,’ she said curtly. Gil took a step backwards out of the light, and a dark form emerged from the slype and appeared as a lay brother, hurrying towards them across the courtyard.

‘Mistress?’ he said. ‘The Prior’s retired for the night, but he’s just rising. He’ll be wi you in a short time. Maister!’ He had caught sight of Gil. ‘I’m to ask if you’d be present.’

‘You will not,’ said Mistress Trabboch. ‘The idea! This is a private matter, no for discussing afore the marketplace.’

‘Prior Boyd may wish me present as his man of law,’ said Gil.

This was indeed the case. Boyd, blinking in the light of a branch of candles held by young Brother Martin, was polite but very firm.

‘I’ve no idea what you want, mistress,’ he said, ‘or why it canny wait till the morn, but I will have Maister Cunningham present while we discuss it.’

‘Hah!’ she said, and after a moment, ‘I suppose a witness. Eppie, get down.’ She swung her leg over the pommel, paused to disengage the wide skirts of her riding-dress, and slid to the ground, ignoring Gil’s hand. Her maidservant materialised out of the shadows and straightened the heavy folds of cloth. ‘Where do we meet?’

‘The guest hall is warm and light.’ The Prior nodded to Brother Martin to light the way. Mistress Trabboch, ignoring his arm as she had Gil’s, stalked into the hall behind the young man. In the light she was as tall as Gil, probably broader in the shoulder, with a jaw like a nutcracker. She sat down on the nearest bench.

‘Put those lights there,’ she directed, ‘and you sit there where I can see your face. As for you, I’ve no use for men o law. If you’re staying you can keep out my sight.’

Gil, ignoring this, set a stool for the Prior with all the courtesy of which he was capable, nodded to Tam, who had appeared again out of the shadows, saw Brother Martin and Mistress Trabboch’s maid suitably disposed, and sat down himself at the Prior’s elbow.

‘Thank you, Gilbert,’ said the Prior quietly. ‘Now, madam, what is this about? What brings you to our door at this unseasonable hour?’

‘You’ve a man here by name o Alexander Stair,’ she said, without preamble. ‘Which is my husband, that deserted me five year since, leaving me the speak o Ayrshire and my whole lands to manage mysel. A man o medium height, wi grey een and dark brown hair, legs like windlestraes, sees a boggart ahint every bush. I want him back.’

‘We have no man by that name here,’ said Boyd, ‘whether as friar or lay brother, nor have we ever had that I ken.’

‘Don’t tell me that,’ she said. ‘He was seen here in Perth, in a monk’s habit, no three month since, and I’ve spoke to every one o the houses o religion round the burgh, and they’ve denied me. This is the last, so here’s where he must be.’

‘I assure you, mistress,’ began Boyd.

‘I want him back,’ she repeated.

‘Why?’ Gil asked. She paused, staring at him with her mouth open. Beyond her he saw the maidservant put up a hand to cover her eyes. ‘If he’s deserted you, and left you wi your own lands, why do you want him back?’

‘Because he’s my husband. You’re no wedded yoursel, I take it,’ she said scathingly. ‘I wedded him for consolation and companionship in life and I’ve had none o that in five year. He’ll come back and supply it, or I’ll see him hang for it.’

‘Desertion’s no a hanging offence yet, mistress,’ Gil said. ‘Can I ask, how much consolation and companionship had you o him in the years afore he left?’

Her mouth fell open again. Behind her, the maidservant’s hand slid down as if to conceal a grin. Tam was also grinning, and gesturing graphically; Gil ignored him.

‘That’s no to the point,’ said Mistress Trabboch, recovering. ‘The point is, you’re concealing my man here, that’s a married man and no to take religion without my consent, which I will never gie him, let me tell you, and I want him back.’

‘And I tell you, madam, we are concealing no such person,’ said the Prior.

‘Why did he leave you?’ Gil asked. Though I can guess, he thought.

‘No reason at all,’ she averred. ‘I’ve been a good and faithful wife to him all the years we’ve been wed, put up wi all his nonsense and his dreaming and studying and that, never said a word about all his papers, and what’s my reward for it? He runs off, only for cause that I sellt a few o his books, and never a trace o him till Isabella Newton seen him in the town here, and it would ha been more help if she’d kent what habit he was wearing.’

‘How can I convince you?’ said the Prior rather helplessly. ‘I’ll not rouse my brothers at this time o night. We have to say Matins in a few hours and-’ He stopped. ‘If I show you a list o the men present at the moment, will that convince you?’

‘No,’ she said, ‘for I canny read. There could be the King himsel on a paper and I wouldny ken.’

‘What if I read the list out to you?’ Gil suggested. ‘You can look over my shoulder to make sure I don’t skip any o the names.’

‘Aye, I suppose,’ she said grudgingly after a moment’s thought.

Brother Martin was sent to fetch the great book out of the press in the Prior’s chamber. While he was absent Mistress Trabboch stared about the hall, looking at the high carved windows which disappeared into the shadowed roof, the elaborate chimneypiece, the fine proportions of the place.

‘You do yourselves well,’ she remarked sourly. ‘Take a deal o alms and legacies to pay for this lot.’

‘This is the royal lodgings,’ said Prior Boyd repressively. ‘It was built for the first Jameses, so it’s little wonder it’s a fine building.’

‘Hah!’ she said in that tone of disbelief. Gil felt it was fortunate that Brother Martin appeared at this point, clutching a lantern and a substantial leather-bound book.

‘Find me the list we made for the Provincial Chapter,’ said the Prior. The young man sat down and picked his way through the heavy pages, tilting them towards the light, until he came on a list of names, written slantwise down the page in a shaky, elderly hand. Prior Boyd glanced at it, and closed his eyes briefly.

‘I’d forgot, it was Brother James writ it for me,’ he said. ‘There, Gilbert. Take and read that page for the lady. It’s a true copy o the record we took to Edinburgh last autumn, madam, wi all the lay brethren and the servants and all.’

‘We’ll hear all o’t,’ she said in that sour tone. ‘You’ll no conceal him from me disguised as a kitchen-man.’

Gil took the book, tilted it to the light as Brother Martin had done, and began at the top of the page in Scots.

Yhe talye o yhe freres dominican att Perht, 7 day octobre 1494. Dauvit boyd, priorus. robt Park, subpriorus, jhon blyhte lector principalis, henricus whyt, the samyn.

He worked his way down the page, pointing at each name as he read it so that the angry presence at his shoulder could see that none was omitted, down to the list of the lay servants and associate tradesmen.

‘Hah!’ she said in disgust as he finished. ‘I’ll find him yet. Thomas, where are you, you dolt? Get the horses. Eppie!’

She swept out, without a further word, her servants hastening after her, leaving Gil and his kinsman to look in amazement at one another.

‘Well! Whanne she was gone the kynge was glad for she made suche a noyse,’ Gil quoted after a moment.

‘You may well say it,’ said Boyd. ‘I’ll admit, if I had her man here I’d be tempted to conceal him. What a targin scauld! May Our Lady lesson her in humility,’ he added dutifully, and crossed himself.

‘I encountered her in the town earlier,’ Gil said. ‘That’s an Ayrshire name, and so’s her husband’s. I wonder if that’s where she’s from?’

‘Well, she’s no from hereabout,’ said Boyd, ‘nor I never encountered her when I was in Ayrshire, Our Lady be thankit for both.’ He rose, stretching his back, and pulled his black cloak closer about him. ‘Martin, wake up. You’ll get a couple hours afore Matins if you get back to your bed the now.’

Outside the windows, lights, horses and people were moving about uneasily, Mistress Trabboch’s harsh voice resounding over all with contradictory riders to her men. Through this came hurrying feet, another light, a voice calling, ‘Faither? Faither Prior!’

Gil strode to the hall door and jerked it open just as one of the lay brothers raised a fist to hammer on it. Startled, the man reared back, saying, ‘Is our Prior here? He’s called for. Faither!’ he exclaimed, seeing Boyd behind Gil. ‘You need to come. It’s our librarian.’

‘Sandy?’ Boyd said. ‘What’s wrong, Archie? What’s he at?’

‘I think he’s killt Faither Henry!’