The Royal Burgh

by Veerapen, Steven

  The interior of the chapel was a haven of peaceful dimness, its smell the familiar mix of weathered stone and holy water. There was no mass, of course – the clergy were still on strike, with no news of Cardinal Beaton’s freedom. However, still the loyal parishioners came, to thumb their beads in silence. Danforth scanned their faces for those he knew – he spotted McTavish and his sour, silent wife; Furay, surrounded by nosy neighbours feigning sympathy in order to derive news; the baillies and Provost Cochran, who had seats in a privileged position and who must keep up appearances even in the midst of religious turmoil. Only the denizens of the wynd, Mr Sharp and the extraordinary, self-titled Sir Andrew Boyle were not present. Doubtless they would have their own altars at which to worship, the poorer classes being kept apart from the burgh’s great chapel.

  The smell of the place did its work, and although the priest would not celebrate mass for them, he nevertheless mouthed blessings and moved around the groups of parishioners. By doing so, supposed Danforth, he felt to ease the little knot of anxiety that every Catholic now felt. If Protector Arran and his Douglas friends had their way, the altars would be stripped, the walls bare of any paint save stark white, the statues beheaded and cast into the Forth.

  After spending what they approximated to be the time a full mass would have taken, they had time to speak with the elderly, drooping-eyed priest himself.

  ‘And you are young Martin. How well you’ve turned out, to be enlisted in the Lord Cardinal’s great struggle against heresy.’

  ‘Thank you, Father.’

  ‘How fares his Grace?’

  ‘Well, so the report’s go.’ Martin shuffled his feet, unable to meet the priest’s eyes. ‘As he’s imprisoned, he cannot easily write, nor tell us his mind.’

  ‘Ah,’ he said, sensing Martin’s discomfort. ‘Well, the Lord shall have a care over his Grace. The sooner he is free, the sooner the world can again be put to order. The sooner our services can be resumed.’

  ‘Amen,’ said Danforth, crossing himself. ‘You cannot fear, Father, that the new governor and his fellows shall touch the church here with their great troubles?’

  ‘No, my son. Not as long we live under the queen dowager’s special protection, God save her. And that of your master. They are our faith’s great champions and heads now. You are also a Cardinal’s man?’

  ‘His English secretary. Yet,’ Danforth hurried on quickly, ‘Mr Martin and I are even now engaged in another matter. The death of Mistress Madeleine Furay.’

  ‘Aye,’ said the priest, shaking his head sadly. ‘The protection of her soul is in all of our prayers, though we can’t offer her Christian burial. Not until your master is free. You hope to discover the murderer and have him brought to justice?’

  ‘We do.’

  ‘That’s good to hear. There is such vice in this burgh in these dark days, spiritual and temporal, and some whisper that the kingdom is cursed. I think it’s not so.’

  ‘Nor I,’ said Martin, suddenly animated.

  ‘You young fellows are all our hopes. I wish you God’s grace in conducting your business. Only … only have a care how you proceed. I don’t much like the foul reports that might result from the discovery of poor Mistress Furay’s murderer.’ He bowed his head and back away, leaving Martin and Danforth wearing matching, puzzled expressions.

  ‘That was an odd thing to say,’ said Martin as they stepped out of the church porch and into the flat churchyard, a gentle stretch of ground that offered respite before the arduous trek up the castle wynd.

  ‘The old fellow hears confessions, Arnaud,’ said Danforth, his voice light. ‘Who knows what he might know, about every matter that has ever passed in this burgh. It is the true burden of an ordained priest, that he must carry in his heart the manifold sins and foul transgressions of his community. I have never known how any man might bear it without running mad himself, distracted and crazed by the horrors of his fellow man. It is why only stout fellows of pure heart take the oaths.’

  ‘Aye, so it’s said. And yet some men of the Church turn their heads towards reform.’

  ‘Och, but it’s this new-fangled desire for questioning everything, even the mysteries, until nothing is left sacred.’

  ‘Do you not realise that it’s become our trade to ask questions?’ Martin gave Danforth an amused look. Danforth ignored it.

  ‘We question only that which requires answer. The mysteries of the divine order defy answer.’ Martin said nothing. ‘Go on,’ said Danforth. ‘What smart retort do you have in mind?’

  ‘None,’ said Martin. ‘No debate. It’s just … yes, the Father here is a good man. But all kinds of dark-hearted monsters find their way into holy orders. There the Church might protect them, cover their misdeeds up from the world.’

  ‘Perhaps. They pay their price, eventually. And so now we go from the glory of God to that part of the burgh which brings shame upon His temporal world.’

  ‘You turn poet, Mr Danforth?’ Danforth ignored Martin’s jibe, leading the way through the neat churchyard. ‘So we’re off to St Mary’s?’

  ‘You are an impatient fellow. No, Arnaud. I have something else in mind first.’

  They rejoined the Hiegait, the general crowd of parishioners milling ahead of them. They had left Woebegone and Coureur there, not wishing them to trample the churchyard. ‘Arnaud, what is the surest route to the port?’

  ‘Which port?’ Danforth shook his head.

  ‘Not the gate-ports: the harbour.’

  ‘Oh. The road to it leads off near the Back Raw. It is the road to Cambuskenneth Abbey that passes to the shore.’

  ‘Let us go there. It is a bracing enough morning for a ride.’

  ‘You wish to visit the Abbey? I thought,’ he added, a trace of disappointment in his voice, ‘that we were for the wynd.’

  ‘No. I have had enough of Abbeys. And the wynd shall wait.’

  They left the Hiegait, mounted and set off along the Back Raw. Before reaching the little path that would take them home, Martin indicated a wide route on the left, and they followed a rutted trail, worn deep with the tramping of generations of hooves and cartwheels. Bare bushes stood out on either side of it. It was only a short journey to the riverside, and Stirling’s meagre harbour.

  ‘There is hardly anything here deserving the name of a harbour,’ said Danforth. He drew Woebegone to a pause and surveyed the scene. The stretch of the Forth was narrow and winding, its waters a steady slate. After nearly a decade, Danforth still found it difficult not to compare Scottish rivers to London’s mighty Thames. In doing so, this bit of the Forth was like a slight country road in comparison to a great highway. Scotland, it often seemed to him, was built of roads and connected by horses, England by rivers and ships. As if answering his comparison, he spotted some little boats moored and bobbing alongside several wooden jetties. In the past, Danforth had tried in vain to learn the names of various types of sailing vessel, but they refused to moor in his mind. He couldn’t tell what these were, nor what they might be used for. Wherries? Barges?

  ‘Aye, it’s fit for the smallest vessels with the meanest cargoes,’ said Martin, sniffing the air. ‘It supposedly was different back in the day. But the great ships can’t sail so far up and unloose their contents to be taken to the burgh by the highway. Regard – even the birds are poor things.’ Martin pointed to some little birds that were flying low across the water, their wings skating along the surface. When they neared the jetties and boats, they veered upwards into the sky, warbling angrily.

  ‘Yet merchants use the harbour?’

  ‘I suppose so. Yes, they do.’

  Danforth led Woebegone, who seemed reluctant, towards the water. The banks of the river were steep and muddy, little cliffs of rocky brown slanting downwards. He paused at the nearest jetty and put the reins over a post that marked its beginning. Martin did the same on the other side. Out over the water, some men were tending to their boats. Danforth hailed them with a wave. ‘Good day, you fellows,�
�� he called. One man, a broad, hairy, older one, stood and favoured him and Martin with a suspicious look. ‘You men labour for the merchants?’

  ‘We’re fishermen,’ shouted the man. ‘Not labourers. We’ve nothin’ to sell you. You have to buy from the burgh.’ Danforth sighed. But he understood. He and Martin must appear to be on some official business, checking that the fishermen were not selling their catches illegally rather than through the fishermen’s guild to be sold with appropriate revenue for the burgh. All Danforth knew of fishing was that in England, February brought Tuckett Fare, the season of plaice.

  ‘Peace, sir,’ he announced, clattering along the jetty, every inch the landlubber. He cast an eye around the other men. Each wore the same distrustful look. ‘We are not come to buy, but on another matter.’

  ‘Oh aye, and what’s that, sir?’ There was emphasis on the ‘sir’. The fisherman looked Danforth up and down, hunting for some trace of officialdom.

  ‘We are seeking after a man called Furay. Do you know of him?’

  ‘No, sir.’

  ‘Yet,’ said Martin, ‘this man says he’s a merchant, and does business here. Some of you,’ he added, looking around at the other, ‘must do other than fish? You must know the men of trade and merchants?’

  ‘Aye,’ piped up a younger fisherman, his beard sparse. ‘We know the men of trade. There’s no Furay amongst ‘em.’

  ‘Is that so?’ asked Danforth. ‘Then it is our mistake. This fellow must do his business with others. Elsewhere.’

  ‘What trade’s he in, sir?’ asked the older fisherman.

  ‘Spices, as he claims.’

  ‘Well, spices come through here and from Alloa, to furnish the Abbey’s table and the castle’s.’

  ‘As I said, sir, this man must do his trade elsewhere.’ Danforth looked around at them all again. ‘These are goodly vessels,’ he said.

  ‘Says a man who doesn’t know boats. They’re small vessels,’ said the lead fisherman. ‘This harbour isn’t what it once was.’ Danforth smiled, unsure what else to say. Some more water-birds squawked somewhere along the riverbank.

  ‘Thank you,’ said Martin, bowing. ‘We’ll look forward to tasting your catch when we buy it in the town. Properly, all above board.’

  ‘You’ll find no better,’ said the young man.

  Danforth and Martin returned along the jetty, regaining the horses. They took the road back towards the burgh at a slow trot, careful of the poor road. They rode close by one another, so that they didn’t need to shout. ‘And so Furay’s a liar,’ said Martin. ‘I told you so.’

  ‘Yes. He seemed so, by his manner.’

  ‘And what manner of man lies when the truth might clear his name?’

  ‘I do not know, Arnaud. One who has something to hide. A prideful one, perhaps. Yet I return again to his possible guilt.’

  ‘He’s guilty of lying.’

  ‘Lying and murder are not the same.’

  ‘Yet lying to protect a murderer may seem him suffer.’

  Danforth nodded, thinking. They returned all the way to the Hiegait, each thinking that the trip had been a waste. They had suspected that Furay was hiding something; confirmation of it did not take them much further. Once again, they dismounted, and made to tie up the horses.

  ‘Oh, sweet suffering Christ!’

  ‘Sir, you are but lately come from church. Mind your tongue,’ said Danforth. After his admonition, he looked to see the source of Martin’s dismay.

  Coureur, it seemed, had lost a horseshoe to the sucking pull of the wet, snow-powdered ground. Woebegone was fine, entirely unfazed by his fellow’s struggles. He waited placidly whilst the masters found a hard-faced old smithy, who promised to get to work re-shoeing Martin’s mount immediately.

  ‘Well, we need no horses to ride to St Mary’s Wynd,’ said Martin. Danforth tutted. He had half-hoped that Martin’s desire would have faded, and tentatively begun to believe that the loss of the shoe was a little intervention from God, guiding them elsewhere. Indeed, it had crossed his mind that the death of Mistress Furay might have forced from Martin’s mind entirely from any notion of vengeance against the incompetent physician.

  Yet his friend had not given up. Danforth could think of nothing else to say to dissuade and, besides, he had had to grudgingly admit that Martin’s suggestion was sound. If Walter Furay, as McTavish claimed, spent only occasional nights in the inn across from his home, he might well have had other regular lodgings. They had seen no other place that a man might rest his head save the stew next to Sharp’s tavern, the place of laughter and carved hearts where John McKenzie slept off his drinking. At the least they might disprove that Furay stayed there, and thereby assume instead that he did sleep occasionally in his own home.

  ‘Shall you leave Woebegone tied on the Hiegait?’ asked Martin. ‘We might ask news of Mr Sharp.’ You do not, thought Danforth, give up easily.

  ‘No, let us take him. I confess I like less of your mother’s burgh, Arnaud. We are now investigating a murder, and I fear of a sudden that this killer might use the crowd at the market to hurt my animal, and thereby attempt to frighten us from the chase.’ Coureur’s accident, though it was only common mischance, had reminded him suddenly that the horses were vulnerable beasts.

  From outside the smithy, he looked around the market cross. It was like any one of a hundred in Scotland, but Danforth suddenly felt ill-disposed to the gossiping, bartering townspeople. Every old man leaning on a cane was a prospective enemy. Each servant boy following a mistress or a master with a basket might have borne down on Mistress Furay. He spotted Baillie Morris, he of the fawn whiskers sprouting in every direction like a great lion, strutting around with a bag of coins in the palm of his band, bouncing it in the air. Spotting them, Morris nodded without expression and then turned away. Danforth shook his head, clearing it.

  ‘I should prefer to take Woebegone with us, to be stabled with your friend, the boy ostler.’

  ‘How the world turns,’ smiled Martin. ‘It was but the night before last that you found the Hiegait to be Stirling’s place of security, and now you look to the poor wynd.’

  ‘As I told you yesterday,’ said Danforth, ‘I have no use for Eiron.’

  9

  The young ostler did not materialise when Danforth called for him, and so with misgivings he forced open the stable door and tied Woebegone up himself. ‘Breath gently, old Moor,’ he whispered. He stepped back out quickly, the sour tang of the ancient faeces unbearable. As he left, he cast a glance upwards and to the left. The brothel was shuttered, the door at the top of the flight of steps closed.

  The place might once have been a home itself, sharing as it did that building fetish common to Stirling houses, the entrance raised up above the ground. It almost seemed as if the town’s homes sought to elevate themselves, attempting to raise their heads high as they competed with the great castle above. If John McKenzie could find comfort there, it was possible Walter Furay might also – especially if he was not on good terms with his wife. At any rate, thought Danforth, it was a good thing that that was one flight of stairs he need not take. Already his calves were aching from all the toing and froing. Though he had long lost the hollow-cheeked look he had once sported, and with it the constant weakness and exhaustion, he still disliked exertion.

  Such things happened as men quarrelling with their wives and turning to other women, even to whores, though Danforth did not pretend to understand them. He had married young, after getting his wife pregnant. The plague had carried them both off, almost a decade before, leaving him with nothing in England but his faith, and that soon threatened by King Henry’s break with Rome. He knew what it was to have a wife and he knew what it was to lose a wife. He could not fathom any man who could quarrel with the woman he had chosen to share his life with, nor any man who could sin against her, as King Henry did with his, and as it was reported even King James had against the elegant Queen Marie.

  Before they went into Sharp’s tavern
, Danforth turned to Martin. ‘Arnaud, let us not pretend that we are here for the sake of Mistress Furay alone.’

  ‘What do … look, I … I own that I had other reasons. Yet no fighting. I promise. I only want to know the true condition of the fellow.’

  ‘You wish to revel in his misery.’

  ‘Well I’m not ashamed to say that he deserves his fate, and any man he’s wronged may take pleasure of his misfortune. If that’s what you mean.’

  ‘It is vengeance. Rejoice not when your enemy falls, Arnaud, and let not your heart be glad when he stumbles. The Lord shall see your gladdened heart, and it will displease Him, turning His wrath from the wicked man.’ Martin’s eyes rolled upwards. ‘This doctor, McKenzie, did he have a wife?’

  ‘I think not. He was a lecherous bastard, always seeking to handle women. But he was the burgh’s only mediciner, save the royal physicians and apothecaries who served in the castle when the Court was up there. They’d be proper, learned men of the trade, of course, not the type to have bought their way in.’

  ‘I see,’ said Danforth, keen to the conversation. ‘Let us go in.’

  From behind his chipped, battle-scarred bar, the gregarious Mr Sharp welcomed them. ‘You fellows didn’t taste Sharp’s ale when you were here last. I find that a great offence, one which seeks remedy.’ Though it was early, some seasoned drinkers were already ranged around the scattered boxes. Here there were no strewn rushes to trouble the boots, nor to freshen the air with perfume. The place smelled the like the underside of a boat. ‘You still after news of your man, Doctor McKenzie?’