The Counterfeit Madam

by Pat McIntosh

  Otterburn glanced at him, and sat back. Gil came forward from his seat by the window and stood looking down at the prisoner. She looked back at him hardily, despite the split lip and the bruises on her face. Her decent worsted gown was stained and filthy from her night in the cells, and scraps of damp straw clung to sleeve and hem.

  ‘Your mistress is dead,’ he said after a moment. She nodded, and waited for him to continue. ‘Do you know how she died?’

  ‘No.’ She paused to consider. ‘I was thinking maybe it was – it was—’ She threw a few words of Ersche at Ealasaidh, who said sulkily,

  ‘She was thinking it was an apoplexy, the same as you were saying, Maister Cunningham.’

  ‘So you did see her after she was dead,’ Gil said. ‘Tell me about the morning. You and Annot got her up, I think, and then called the men in so she could give them orders.’ Forveleth nodded at that. ‘What happened next?’

  She closed her dark eyes to think.

  ‘We washed her,’ she said. ‘Och, no, she would be saying her prayers first. A good hour, that took her. Then she would, she would,’ she hesitated, ‘attend to something private, you understand.’

  ‘I understand,’ said Gil. ‘I also understand that the two of you, Annot and yoursel, were in and out for a space while she was occupied.’

  Forveleth tightened her swollen mouth, winced, but nodded agreement. ‘Until she ordered us away,’ she said. ‘Out of my sight, she said, and called us a pair of worthless trollops. Forever bad-wording us, she was. So we left.’

  ‘What did you do then?’ Gil asked.

  For the first time, Forveleth looked uneasy.

  ‘I’d maybe no mind,’ she said.

  ‘You’ve been clear enough up to now,’ Otterburn said.

  ‘You went to the kitchen eventually, we ken that,’ Gil said. ‘Where were you between the time you were dismissed and the time you reached the kitchen?’

  ‘About. It’s a fair walk out to the kitchen.’

  ‘Annot got there long before you did.’ Gil studied her, thinking about Alys’s comments last night. ‘Did you go back in to your mistress? You were combing her, I think. What did you do with her cap?’

  ‘Her cap?’ the woman repeated.

  ‘A cap?’ said Otterburn, interested. ‘Now there’s one in your bundle, lassie. How did that get there?’

  ‘Is that you stolen your mistress’s linen as well as the rest?’ demanded Livingstone.

  ‘I never!’ she said sharply, as Walter rose and quietly fetched the bundle. ‘Here, that’s mine, those are my things—’

  ‘What, all of it?’ Otterburn untied the heavy woollen stuff and spread it out. ‘Two shifts, a kirtle,’ he glanced at the prisoner still kneeling before him, ‘aye, yours rather than hers to judge by the quality, a comb, some good linen,’ he patted the folded wad, checking that nothing nestled among the layers, ‘two holy pictures and your Sunday beads. This cap,’ he turned it, put both hands inside it to mould it out, and looked at the prisoner again. ‘Yours or hers, woman?’

  Ealasaidh came forward with her hand out. Otterburn gave her the item, raising his eyebrows, and she sniffed at it, then bent to sniff at the kneeling woman, moving her linen veil aside despite Forveleth’s objections.

  ‘Hers,’ she said, in a tone which invited no discussion. Gil and Otterburn exchanged startled glances.

  ‘So where,’ Gil said, recovering first, ’is the cap your mistress was wearing when Annot last saw her? When she went to stool?’

  ‘I’d maybe no mind. And keep her off me!’ said the prisoner indignantly.

  ‘Forveleth,’ Gil said, hunkering down beside her. ‘Look at me.’ She turned the dark eyes on him, wary as a cornered animal. ‘You’re in trouble here, you must see that. You and Annot were the last to see your mistress alive, and Annot has witnesses for where she was till Dame Isabella was found dead. Then you ran off, and you were lifted yestreen fleeing from the Provost’s men, wi a great bag of false coin about you—’

  ‘I never!’ she said hotly. ‘I never did! I never had any such thing—’ She turned to Ealasaidh and burst into impassioned Ersche.

  ‘Be quiet, woman!’ ordered Otterburn. He gestured at his clerk, who moved to open the great kist by the wall. ‘What about this, then? Five hundred merk of false coin, found in your bundle.’ He put his hand on the leather sack as Walter deposited it on the table.

  ‘Is that the bag?’ said Lowrie. Otterburn flicked him a glance, and went on,

  ‘You touched that, I’d say, and to some purpose.’

  She stared at the object, looked at Otterburn, back at the leather bag.

  ‘I never saw that in my life,’ she said firmly. ‘I have no knowledge of whose it might be, but it is never my mis-tress’s purse. That is blue velvet and gold braid. You may ask at Annot if you are not believing me.’

  ‘Is it, now, maister?’ Otterburn asked Livingstone, who shook his head.

  ‘I’m no her tirewoman. Ask at Annot, like she says, she’ll let you ken.’

  Forveleth looked alarmed, and turned to Ealasaidh again, with more of the Ersche, shaking her head repeatedly. Ealasaidh answered, there was a longer exchange. Gil got to his feet, easing cramped muscles.

  ‘She is telling me a great story,’ said Ealasaidh eventually, and looked from Otterburn to Gil. ‘She says, she waited in the next chamber, the one where she was seeing a laid-out corp, and the old woman was calling her back in after a while, to comb her hair and listen while she abused her for a thieving Erschewoman. Then she says her mistress suddenly ordered that she bring her this purse of blue velvet and leave her, so she put the comb by and went out to the kitchen, and talked with the other women. She says they will be swearing to it if you ask them.’

  ‘Now that’s all foolery!’ exclaimed Otterburn, but Gil nodded, watching Forveleth’s face as Ealasaidh recounted her tale.

  ‘What did you do with the cap?’ he asked. The woman stared at him, then suddenly put a hand to the breast of her gown, delved briefly within its low square neckline, and drew out a crumpled handful of linen.

  ‘I mind now, I was putting it down my busk while I combed her hair,’ she said, ‘and then she was sending me away, so I forgot it.’

  ‘Like I said,’ exclaimed Livingstone, ‘thieving her mis-tress’s linen and all!’

  Ealasaidh took the little bundle from her, sniffed it, inspected it briefly, handed it on.

  ‘This one is not hers,’ she said. Gil, shaking it out, had to agree. This cap was made in a different style, of much better linen, and though it smelled faintly of Forveleth there was a strong, sour undernote of unwashed hair about it. He stood looking down at it, watching the scene Ealasaidh had described play out in his head.

  ‘Why did she send you away the second time?’ he asked.

  ‘She’s making it up,’ said Livingstone. ‘I don’t believe a word o this.’

  ‘No, it makes sense, uncle,’ said Lowrie.

  ‘For modesty, maybe?’ said Ealasaidh. Forveleth snorted.

  ‘Her? She’d not know the word, for all she was flyting at Annot and me for immodest trollops. She never said why I was to leave,’ she added, ‘nor I would not be knowing what her reason was. She was looking out of the window while I stood beside her and combed at her hair, and then in the midst of that she bid me fetch her blue velvet purse and be gone.’ She paused, closing her eyes for a moment. ‘I think it was – it was—’ She groped for the Scots, then said something to Ealasaidh, who nodded slowly and translated:

  ‘She is thinking her mistress acted on a sudden, in haste maybe, for she would not take the time to miscall her the way she was doing in general, only she was bidding her leave her immediate.’ She looked earnestly at Gil. ‘I think that is a wise thing she says.’

  ‘You never looked out of the window yourself?’ Gil asked. The woman shrugged.

  ‘I was looking, but I was not seeing whatever it was caused her to send me away. Nor she was not giving me time to stand and
stare,’ she added, her bruised mouth twisting.

  ‘I swear it’s no! Ask at Annot,’ protested Forveleth. ‘And no more it is not the purse she kept at her belt, that all her household has seen. I never saw this leather one in my life!’

  ‘Ask at the others of her household!’ protested Forveleth. ‘They’ve all seen it, they saw it just that morn when she gave money out to Alan for the potyngary she wanted!’

  ‘No, it’s no the purse the old dame usually had by her,’ agreed Lowrie.

  ‘There would never be room in the kist for a bag that size,’ said Gil.

  Otterburn glanced at him, and grunted.

  ‘So where did it come from?’ he repeated. ‘It was tied in your plaid wi the rest, woman, no sense in denying it—’

  ‘I never put it there!’ The manacles clinked again as Forveleth spread her hands. ‘I was never seeing it afore, I wouldny ken who had it nor who put it in my things, I am not wanting anything to do with it.’

  ‘That’s fortunate,’ said Otterburn, ‘for you’ll no see it again, save when it’s produced as evidence.’ He hefted the thing in his hand, and nodded to Livingstone. ‘Walter, where’s the counting-cloth? If you’d take the lot over to the window, maister, I’d be glad of anything you can tell me about it.’

  ‘Whose house were you sheltering in on Clerk’s Land?’ Gil asked Forveleth. He trawled through his memory for the names, and listed them. ‘Is someone there kin to you? Saunders the pewterer wi the screaming weans, Danny Bell the lorimer, Campbell the ill-tempered whitesmith, Dod Muir, Danny Sproat.’ He watched her carefully, but her expression did not alter. ‘I’d guess it was Campbell’s house. A kinsman, is he?’

  ‘He is not!’ she said quickly. ‘And nor his wife neither. There is no Campbells kin to me!’

  ‘That makes a change,’ said Gil. ‘So is that where you were sheltering? What took you there?’

  ‘I was not sheltering, I was just passing through the toft,’ she retorted, ‘when all on a sudden it was full of soldiers. Any decent woman would run from men of that kind.’ She spat in Gaelic again and glared at the two men who had escorted her in, who still stood on either side of her. One of them kneed her shoulder.

  ‘Less of that, you,’ he said sharply.

  ‘Marion,’ said Lowrie. Recovering her balance, she glanced up at him. ‘Why did you run? And the three men? Why did you all go off? You never thought we’d blame you for the old dame’s death, did you?’

  ‘Three men?’ she said, and bent her head.

  ‘Where are the men?’ Gil asked. She shrugged her shoulders, not looking up.

  ‘I’ve not saw them. I’m no their keeper.’

  ‘I’ve had enough of this,’ said Otterburn impatiently. ‘Maister Cunningham, she’s to be turned over to the Serjeant, so if you want to ask her any more, ask at him.’ Gil nodded. ‘He might get some more out of her wi the pilliwinks, but I’d say we’d enough to charge her wi a good few things already.’ He watched as the prisoner was hauled to her feet, protesting. ‘Theft, possession of false coin, fleeing a murder scene, and probably murder as well. Take her away, lads. Right, Maister Livingstone, have you anything to tell us off these coins?’

  Lowrie met Gil’s eye across the chamber, but did not speak. His uncle, who had spread the contents of the leather sack out across the squared counting-cloth on a stool by the window, and was sliding the thin coins about into different groups, did not reply at first; when Otterburn repeated the question he looked up and said,

  ‘Aye, aye, they’ve plenty to tell me. Bide a bittie till I – ah!’ He turned a coin over and back again, tilted it to the light, and put it carefully between two others. ‘That’s it, I’d say.’ He was still turning coins over, adding them to one pile or another. ‘These are struck wi two different sets of dies, Provost.’

  ‘Different coiners?’ asked Otterburn. ‘Are we looking for two workshops?’

  ‘No, no, I’d say not, for some of them—’ he turned another coin. ‘These threepenny pieces, some of them have one pattern on the reverse and some another, but the same head on them.’

  ‘One die has worn out?’ Gil suggested.

  ‘Aye, more like.’ The man’s fingers danced over the little heaps of coin. ‘See, here we’ve this head, a good copy of the second portrait of James Third, and on the reverse a cross and four mullets, where it should be a cross wi two mullets and two pellets. Now these ones are the same, and these, save that the die’s wearing away, you can scarce see one o the mullets and the head could be Queen Margaret for all you can discern.’

  ‘Is it no just the coin that’s worn?’ Otterburn asked.

  ‘It’s no worn. It’s as thick as the others.’ Livingstone tapped the offending coin with his fingernail. ‘I’d say the die wasny steel. Maybe brass or the like, something softer any road. Now here,’ he lifted four or five coins, which slithered in his hand like fish-scales. ‘Here we’ve a fresh head, wi ringlets, which the other never had, and the worn mullet on the reverse, and here we’ve the new head and a new reverse wi all showing clear.’

  ‘So what does that let me know?’ Otterburn asked, peering at the late king on one of the coins. Livingstone looked blankly at him for a moment, then assembled his thoughts.

  ‘Well. They’ve cut a set o dies, and used them to make all these,’ he waved a hand above the greater part of the heaped coins, ‘and then when they wore out they’ve cut a new set, first the head and then the cross. I’m no sure it—’

  ‘Cut?’ said Gil. ‘Not cast?’

  ‘No, that’s likely why they’re using brass,’ Livingstone said. ‘You can engrave it, see. It’s an easier process for your counterfeiter, you just need to draw the image on the end o the die and engrave it, no need to play about wi casting in iron and impressing on steel. If you’ve a man wi a good ee and a steady hand, it’s no great trouble.’

  ‘How easy is it to find sic a one?’ asked Otterburn. Livingstone shrugged.

  ‘Easy enough. When I’d charge o the Mint for the late king I could ha laid my hand on five or six in Edinburgh, within easy walk o the Mint, and likely the same again further about the town.’

  ‘Gets us nowhere much,’ said Otterburn. He tossed the coin in the air, caught it on the back of his hand. ‘Heads or crosses, maister?’

  ‘Heads,’ said Lowrie promptly. The Provost looked at him, half-smiling, and uncovered the coin. The cross with its four mullets greeted their gaze.

  ‘It was never her,’ said Ealasaidh, striding down the High Street beside Gil.

  ‘I’m agreed,’ said Lowrie, on her other side, ‘but what makes you say that?’

  Gil dragged his mind from an unsatisfactory interview with the Serjeant. The man had been at pains to tell him that the carpenters at work in Canon Aiken’s house had left no mell or other such implement lying about, something Gil should have thought to check for himself, and had made clear his expectation of getting a confession out of Forveleth before noon. Torture was a valuable method of interrogation, Gil knew, but he disliked the thought of it applied to a woman.

  ‘She thought it was an apoplexy. Nor she never robbed the old woman of the blue velvet purse.’

  ‘She could be lying,’ Gil offered.

  ‘She could.’ Her tone made it clear she thought it unlikely.

  ‘Why did she say she had seen you before?’ Lowrie asked.

  ‘Och, that.’ She reddened again. ‘Foolishness. There is those that see things, and it means little. What will you do now, Maister Cunningham? Who will you question next?’

  ‘Sempill,’ said Gil, his heart sinking at the thought. Ealasaidh snorted. ‘And I should speak to your uncle’s household again, Lowrie.’

  ‘That should be easy enough arranged,’ said the young man. He drew a breath and went on, rather hesitantly, ‘Maister Gil, did Dame Isabella – when she spoke wi you – did she, did she say aught about me?’

  ‘About you?’ Gil paused, staring at him and trying to recall the conversation he had had with
the deceased. ‘No, I’d say not. Should she have?’

  ‘No,’ said Lowrie hastily, reddening. Gil turned to move on, but Ealasaidh took hold of his arm.

  ‘Is that no Maister Mason’s boy?’ she asked, craning her neck to see through the groups of people in the busy street. ‘A good laddie, that. He is seeking someone.’

  ‘Maister Gil!’ said Luke, dodging round a group of women with baskets, their plaids bright in a sudden blink of sunshine. ‘Mistress.’ He doffed his cap to Ealasaidh and then to Gil, acknowledged Lowrie politely and stood in front of them, catching his breath. ‘The maister said I should tell you, Maister Gil.’

  ‘Tell me what?’ Gil gestured down the street, and they moved on.

  ‘About yestreen,’ Luke said earnestly. ‘See when the mistress sent me to the ’pothecary shop, and I got a great list o things, and she bade me ask for a sweetie myself, and I had one of the marchpane cherries—’ Gil repressed a shudder. He would never feel the same about marchpane cherries since last autumn. ‘Oh, and Jennet and me took the basket to the house wi the mermaiden on the door afore I started work the day, and they were right pleased wi the gift, said how it was awfy generous o the mistress. I never saw any lassies in their stays, but,’ he added with regret.

  ‘Is that what you were to tell me?’ Gil prompted.

  ‘No, no, it was this. When I told the maister of it he said you should hear it. I was talking wi Maister Syme, see, and I mentioned how strange it was that two o that old carline’s men should ha been in his shop right at the time she was killed—’ How did the boy know that? Gil wondered. Information seemed to travel round the burgh on the wind. ‘And Maister Syme said No, no, it was just the one. And the maister said I was to let you hear it. And another thing,’ Luke went on. ‘Lady Kate sent to say she’d be glad of your company a wee while the day, one of the wee lassies has something she wants to tell you.’ He judged Gil’s expression correctly, and added, ‘The mistress bade me say she thought it was something to the point.’

  Chapter Six

  ‘Just the one,’ confirmed James Syme.