The Nicholas Feast (Gil Cunningham Murder Mystery)

by Pat McIntosh

  PAT McINTOSH, like Gil Cunningham, is a graduate of Glasgow University. Born and brought up in Lanarkshire, for many years the author lived and worked in Glasgow and is now settled on the West Coast.

  Titles in this series

  (listed in order)

  The Harper’s Quine

  The Nicholas Feast

  The Merchant’s Mark

  St Mungo’s Robin

  Constable & Robinson Ltd

  3 The Lanchesters

  162 Fulham Palace Road

  London W6 9ER

  www.constablerobinson.com

  First published in the UK by Constable, an imprint of Constable & Robinson Ltd, 2005

  This paperback edition published by Robinson, an imprint of Constable & Robinson Ltd, 2007

  First US edition published by Carroll & Graf Publishers 2005, this paperback edition, 2007

  Carroll & Graf Publishers

  An Imprint of Avalon Publishing Group, Inc.

  245 W. 17th Street, 11th Floor

  New York, NY 10011-5300

  www.carrollandgraf.com

  Copyright © Pat McIntosh, 2005, 2007

  The right of Pat McIntosh to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988.

  All rights reserved. This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, re-sold, hired out or otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

  A copy of the British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data is available from the British Library.

  UK ISBN: 978-1-84119-824-8 (hbk)

  UK ISBN: 978-1-84529-500-4 (pbk)

  eISBN: 978-1-84901-861-6

  US ISBN-13: 978-0-78671-997-6

  US ISBN-10: 0-7867-1997-4

  Printed and bound in the EU

  For Gil’s godmother,

  who recognized William’s real crime immediately,

  with gratitude.

  The University of Glasgow

  Nobody could write about the early days of the University of Glasgow without consulting the magisterial The University of Glasgow 1451–1577, by John Durkan and James Kirk (University of Glasgow Press, 1977). I have made copious use of it; everything I have got right is from Durkan & Kirk, and everything I have invented or got wrong is of course my own.

  A list of people around the University might be useful. Those marked with an asterisk are known to history.

  Regents (lecturers) and other members of the staff

  *Maister John Doby, the Principal Regent (head of the Faculty of Arts and of the University)

  *Maister Patrick Elphinstone, Dean of the Faculty of Arts

  *Maister Patrick (Patey) Coventry, the Second Regent

  *Maister Thomas Forsyth, a senior regent

  Maister Nicholas Kennedy, a junior regent

  *Maister David Gray, the Faculty Scribe (a lawyer)

  *Maister Archibald Crawford, Faculty and University Promotor (a lawyer)

  *John Gray, the University Scribe and Beadle (a lawyer)

  *John Shaw, the Faculty Steward

  Fr Bernard Stewart, a Dominican friar with responsibility for the University

  Andro and Tammas, two of the servitors

  Agnes Dickson, the cook

  Tam, Adam, Aikie, kitchen grooms

  Eppie, a kitchen maid

  Jaikie, the University porter

  Students

  Alan Liddell, a Theology student (postgraduate)

  Magistrand (fourth-year student)

  John Hucheson, who makes a speech

  Senior bachelors (third-year students)

  Ninian Boyd (playing Diligence)

  Michael Douglas (playing a daughter of Collegia)

  Lowrie Livingstone

  Nicholas Gray (helping in the kitchen)

  Junior bachelors (second-year students)

  Ralph Gibson (playing Collegia)

  William Irvine

  Robert Montgomery

  Richie (playing the Scholar)

  Henry (playing Frivolity)

  Walter and Andrew (playing two of Collegia’s daughters)

  Bejants (first-year students)

  David Ross

  Billy Ross

  Contents

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter One

  Gil Cunningham said later that if he had known he would find a corpse in the coalhouse of Glasgow University, he would never have gone to the Arts Faculty feast.

  ‘But then,’ said Alys his betrothed, considering this seriously, ‘you would never have met Socrates.’

  The day began well enough. In the bright sunshine after early rain Gil, his academic robes in a bundle under his arm, had strolled down the High Street past the University, where several people in gowns and furred hoods were already exchanging formal bows with a lanky red-haired student before the great wooden door. Further down the street, in the rambling stone-built house called the White Castle, he found Alys and her father the French master mason, just breaking their fast with the rest of their household after hearing the first Mass at Greyfriars.

  ‘Gil!’ said Alys in delight, and sprang up to kiss him in greeting.

  ‘Bonjour, Gilbert,’ said Maistre Pierre cheerfully, his teeth white in his neat black beard. He rose broadshouldered and imposing from his great chair and waved at an empty stool. ‘Have you eaten? What do you this early on a Sunday morning?’

  ‘The Nicholas Feast,’ Gil reminded him. He smiled at Alys, still standing slender and elegant beside him in the brown linen dress that matched her eyes. Like most unmarried girls in Scotland she went bare-headed, and her honey-coloured hair fell over her shoulders. He savoured the sight for a moment, thinking again how fortunate he was, that this clever, competent, beautiful girl was to be his wife, then tipped her face up with a gentle finger and kissed the high narrow bridge of her nose. ‘I hoped Alys would help me robe,’ he continued. ‘The procession will start from the college, and if I must walk there alone in these ridiculous garments I had rather do it from here, four doors away, than from Rottenrow. At least when we ride up to St Thomas’s I’ll be in company with the whole of the Arts Faculty.’

  ‘They are not ridiculous garments!’ Alys said indignantly. ‘They are the insignia of your learning! Come and sit down, Gil.’

  ‘Why is it called the Nicholas Feast?’ asked Maistre Pierre, ladling more porridge into his wooden porringer. ‘St Nicholas’ day is in December. This is May.’

  ‘The Feast of the Translation of St Nicholas was last Tuesday,’ Gil said. He bowed to Alys’s aged, aristocratic nurse, and nodded to the rest of the household, who were ignoring the French talk at the head of the table. Setting the bundle of his robes on the floor he sat down and accepted a bannock from the platter Alys passed him. ‘When he was translated to Bari, I suppose, though where from I don’t recall. And this is the first Sunday after. The man who founded our feast left exact directions. We’re to ride in procession to hear Mass at eight of the clock in St Thomas Martyr’s, out beyond the Stablegreen Port, and come back down through the town with green branches, and then
we have a meeting, and then we have the feast.’

  ‘He left money for the feast, too, I hope?’ said Maistre Pierre.

  Gil nodded, spreading honey on his bannock.

  ‘There is some, but we are all expected to pay up as well. Eighteen pence it has cost me.’ The mason pulled a face. ‘It would be double that if I had a benefice.’

  ‘I had hoped,’ said Alys with diffidence, ‘we could write to your mother today. Her letter needs an answer, you must agree.’

  ‘Oh, aye, I agree,’ Gil said ruefully. ‘But not today. I am committed to the feast. Perhaps tomorrow.’

  When grace had been said, the dishes had been carried out and the great board lifted from its trestles, Alys’s nurse Catherine rose stiffly and said to the mason, ‘I leave your daughter in your charge, maistre.’

  ‘Yes, yes,’ said Maistre Pierre. ‘And the baby is with Nancy. Go and see to the boy, if you will, madame.’

  She curtsied with arthritic elegance, said, ‘Bonjour, maistre le notaire,’ to Gil as she passed him, and stumped out of the hall among the hurrying maidservants. Alys unfolded Gil’s robes.

  ‘Your mother’s letter,’ she said again, shaking out the cassock. ‘Is it – is that really what she thinks?’

  ‘She’ll come round to it,’ Gil said. ‘Remember, my uncle is in favour.’

  ‘But if your nearest kin can’t agree about your marriage –’

  ‘Perhaps when my uncle can spare me, I should go out to Carluke,’ he suggested.

  ‘Yes!’ She smiled up at him. ‘If you can discuss it with her, I’m sure you will coax her round.’

  ‘Tell her how Alys will be dowered,’ said Alys’s father robustly. ‘That will persuade her.’

  ‘It’s possible,’ said Gil, concealing his doubts. He pulled off his short gown and began to unlace his doublet. ‘Meantime I need help with these ridiculous garments.’

  ‘They are not ridiculous!’ she said again. ‘Which way round does this go?’

  Maistre Pierre watched in mounting astonishment as Gil was arrayed in the black cassock and cope (‘At least this one has two slits for my hands. Some only have one.’), the furred shoulder-cape, the blue fur-lined hood, proper to a Master of Arts of the University of Glasgow.

  ‘All of these garments are wool,’ he observed. ‘You will be warm. And what is that scarf thing? At least that is silk, though it is furred as well.’

  ‘Oh, father,’ said Alys. ‘You remember the men of law wearing those in Paris, surely? It goes on his shoulder. It’s a pity it’s red when your hood is blue,’ she added. ‘Does it need a pin, perhaps?’

  ‘This is the first time I have worn it all complete,’ said Gil, craning over his shoulder at the hood. ‘I must look like a Yule papingo,’ he added in Scots.

  ‘A parrot?’ said Maistre Pierre, grinning.

  ‘No, no, it looks magnificent,’ Alys declared.

  ‘At least I won’t be alone. The entire procession will be in formal dress.’

  ‘And you are to ride in those long skirts?’ continued the mason, as Alys shook the moth-herbs out of the white rabbit-skin lining and stood on tiptoe to pin the red chaperon on to the layer of fur already on Gil’s shoulder. ‘Where is your horse?’

  ‘My uncle sent down to the college earlier with half a dozen beasts loaned from the Chanonry I’ll have the use of one of those.’ Gil settled his felt hat on his head, then took Alys’s hands in his and kissed them. ‘I must go. Tomorrow we’ll write to my mother, sweetheart,’ he promised her.

  ‘Which reminds me indirectly,’ said Maistre Pierre. He got to his feet. ‘I see you to the street. Our neighbour is expected in town.’

  ‘What, Hugh Montgomery?’ Gil turned to stare. ‘What brings him to Glasgow? The King’s at Stirling, by what my uncle says, and the rest of the Court with him.’

  ‘Catherine thought it might be to do with the college,’ said Alys.

  ‘How does Catherine learn these things?’ Gil wondered. ‘She speaks no Scots.’

  ‘Your pardon, maisters, mistress,’ said an anxious voice from the kitchen stairway.

  They all three turned. In the door at the head of the stairs stood a stout, comely woman dressed in respectable homespun. As they looked she bobbed a nervous curtsy and came forward.

  ‘Your pardon for interrupting,’ she said again, ‘but they’re saying in the kitchen you’re for the college the day, maister? Is that right?’

  ‘This is Mistress Irvine, Gil,’ said Alys. ‘A kinswoman of Kittock’s –’

  ‘Aye,’ agreed Mistress Irvine, nodding and beaming. ‘My good-sister’s good-sister, that’s who Kittock is, and a good friend to me and all.’

  ‘– 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 wond
ered 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.’