The Harper's Quine: A Gil Cunningham Murder Mystery

by Pat McIntosh

  ‘Ah, she is a Muirhead?’

  ‘Of Lauchope. And the present Dean of St Mungo’s is also a kinsman.’ Gil smiled at the black eyes glittering at him, and drained his glass. She replenished it without consulting him.

  ‘And your father, maistre? What land did he hold? I believe he fell at the late battle, just before we came into Scotland.’

  These cards were not so good.

  ‘He did,’ agreed Gil. ‘With my two older brothers. We held lands here in Lanarkshire, near to my mother’s dower lands, but I am heir to nothing, because all was forfeit after the battle, and there were no funds to recover it with.’ And was that Hughie’s doing too? he wondered, for the first time.

  ‘And so you must be a priest,’ said the gruff voice. ‘One must condole with you and your mother. And our master thinks you do not wish to be a priest.’

  ‘I have no choice. I must live on something.’

  ‘Is this a right way to approach Holy Church?’

  ‘I have prayed over it,’ he admitted, ‘but St Giles has not yet shown me another path.’

  `Perhaps you have not prayed enough, or asked in the right way.’ She set her little glass on the tray and rose. ‘Alys has not returned, which makes me think the boy is still awake. Come and see him, but do not start asking him questions.’

  In the tapestry-hung store-room, Alys and one of the maidservants were watching while Brother Andrew, the nearest thing the burgh possessed to a doctor, examined his patient by the light of a branch of candles. The boy was a curious yellowish white, and had lost substance so that all the angles of his bones showed through the skin, but he was answering the little Franciscan’s questions about his physical state coherently enough.

  ‘And what is the last thing you remember?’

  Alarm crossed the thin face.

  ‘I was playing at football. Did I take a tumble? I’ll need to get up! The maister’ll need me to mix the mortar.’

  ‘Do not worry about that, Davie,’ said Alys. ‘You can mix mortar again when you are well.’

  Brother Andrew nodded approvingly at her, and drew the cover over the boy’s chest.

  ‘Your dame is quite right,’ he said comfortably. ‘You are proof of the good effects of strong prayer and careful nursing. You have been ill, laddie, but you will recover if you he quiet and get your strength back. I will come and see you again tomorrow.’

  He turned away from the bed, lifting his uroscope and scrip of medicines, and paused in the doorway to bestow a blessing on all present. Alys, with a quick smile at Gil, followed to see him out.

  Davie lay back against his pillow as if he would dissolve into it, and said weakly to the maidservant, ‘What was it? What’s come to me, Kittock?’

  ‘You hit your head,’ said Gil, moving forward. Davie’s eyes flicked to him and back to Kittock. ‘I found you.’

  ‘I dinna mind that.’

  ‘Don’t fret about it,’ said Gil. ‘It often happens after a bang on the head. It addles one’s wits. You will find it comes back bit by bit.’

  The boy stared blankly at him.

  ‘Don’t fret,’ he said again. ‘And, no, you do not know me. I found you.’

  The yellowish face relaxed, and the eyes closed.

  ‘I think he’s sleeping, maister,’ said Kittock. Alys slipped back into the room and lifted the bowl and spoon from the floor by the bed.

  ‘We are to tell him as little as possible,’ she said. ‘Answer his questions, but don’t add anything. He will be quite childish for a while, Brother Andrew says.’

  ‘He’s away now,’ said Kittock, sitting down with her spindle. ‘Is he still to be watched, mem?’

  ‘Until he is stronger, yes,’ said Alys. She went out, and Gil followed her.

  ‘He remembers nothing,’ he said, drawing the door to behind him.

  ‘And may never remember,’ she -answered. ‘Brother Andrew says we still cannot tell how well he will mend. It is clear he will be able to walk and talk, but his thinking is still to recover.’

  ‘So we must continue to pursue the other girl.’

  ‘And quickly, before she too is knifed. I hope she has really gone to Dumbarton.’

  Gil glanced at the sky.

  ‘I must be gone. I am to meet your father in Blackfriars yard after Terce, to look at where Bridie Miller was lifted up.’

  Alys paused on the fore-stair and turned to him with that direct brown gaze. She was wearing the faded blue gown again, and Gil found himself admiring the way her hair fell across the tight wool sleeve.

  ‘May I come too?’ she said. ‘Not to stare at where she died, never that - but you and my father learned such a lot just by looking in St Mungo’s, and I would like to see how it is done.’

  ‘About time, too; said the wiry Dominican in the porter’s lodge. ‘I’ve turned away a many gapers this morning already. It’s down yonder corner, my son, not the College corner but the other one, and watch where you put your feet.’

  He gestured back towards the wall which divided the small public graveyard from the back of the High Street tofts. In the south-western corner, further from the friars’ obstreperous neighbour, was the clump of bushes Maggie had described.

  ‘I suppose you saw nothing?’ Gil asked. Brother Porter shook his head regretfully.

  ‘Nothing I can recall. A good few lassies wandered in, with it being market, casual the way they do, trying to pretend they’re not here, but no fellow with a foreign knife came in when I was looking. I’d have chased him out of that corner; the brother declared. ‘It’s hardly proper, what they’re doing in a kirkyard, but spying on decent lassies is even less right.’

  Thanking him, Gil made his way towards the place, Alys behind him with her skirts held fastidiously up off the grass.

  ‘This does not make sense,’ she said as they reached the bushes. ‘The market is all down by the Tolbooth. Bridie would have passed her own house to get here.’

  Gil turned to stare at her.

  ‘Agnes Hamilton said the same thing. I never paid any attention,’ he admitted. ‘So she must have accompanied her killer here for some other reason, rather than have been followed.’

  ‘And why come here to talk or - or anything else, when there are prettier and more comfortable comers to be private with another person?’

  ‘We asked ourselves the same question in St Mungo’s,’ Gil said, gazing round him. ‘Ah - that trampled space.’

  He picked a careful path between the bushes, inspecting each one and the grass beneath it as he went. His movements stirred up wafts of a scent which made his nostrils flare. It reminded him of a dyer’s tub, which he felt was not surprising, but there were overtones which puzzled him. He found himself thinking, with great clarity, of Euphemia Campbell as he had seen her two nights since, half naked by candlelight, wrestling passionately with her lover.

  ‘What are you looking for?’ asked Alys from where she stood. He dragged his mind back to the task at hand.

  ‘Anything. Sign. Broken branches, trampled grass. There will be very little of use, I suspect, the searchers have been everywhere.’

  ‘Footprints? That kind of thing?’

  ‘Yes. In fact I can see prints of many feet, going in different directions.’

  ‘That’s just like hunting, isn’t it?’

  ,it is very like hunting,’ said Gil. ‘I find myself trying to judge the mind of the quarry in the same way, as well as identifying sign.’

  ‘There are fewmets here, too.’

  ‘I had noticed that.’ Gil was at the centre of the trampled patch. ‘Now, I think this is blood. She must have fallen here.’ He looked round, to see her buckle at the knees. ‘Ah, Alys, I am sorry!’

  Three quick steps took him to her side, but she was already straightening up.

  ‘No. I am sorry. I was interested, watching you, and forgot that that poor girl died here. It took me by surprise.’

  ‘Do you want to go into the church? Perhaps sit down, pray for her?’r />
  I can pray for her here.’ She pressed his hand gratefully, and moved towards the wall, skirts held up again. ‘Ugh, more fewmets. And someone has been sick.’

  “That’s odd.’ Gil followed her, to look down at the unpleasant splatter. ‘Someone had been sick in St Mungo’s, near where Bess lay.’

  ‘Do you think it is important?’

  ‘It might be, or it might be nothing.’ He turned his head. ‘Maister Mason. Come look at this. And I have found where she fell.’

  The mason, after a cursory glance, offered the opinion that some girl was regretting St Mungo’s Fair.

  ‘What, last January?’ said Alys. ‘She would have stopped throwing up by now, father. It’s too soon for it to be the effects of May Day, I suppose it could be from Fastern’s E’en.’ She smiled a little tremulously at Gil, who was gaping at her. ‘One has to know these things when one runs a house, Maister Cunningham.’

  ‘And where did Bridie Miller lie?’ asked her father.

  ‘Here. You may step as you please, the searchers have trampled everything. See, there is blood, though there was none in St Mungo’s, but that may have been due to the way she fell. I wish we had seen her before they took her up.’

  ‘I think we should have come here sooner,’ admitted the mason. ‘And have we found the beets yet?’

  ‘I can see them,’ said Alys, from where she stood by the wall . ‘Under that bush to your left.’

  Gil and her father both looked round without success.

  ‘No, that one there. The elder-bush with the low branches.’

  Gil pulled back the branches, to find a basket lying on its side, a bunch of beets beside it.

  ‘Curious,’ he said. ‘It was never dropped here, under the branch like that.’

  ‘It is more as if it was set down and then overturned,’ the mason agreed. He bent to lift basket and greenstuff.

  ‘Those little new ones are dear on the market just now,’ observed Alys. ‘Agnes will be glad to get them.’

  ‘I hope she washes them well,’ said Gil. ‘Do you suppose Brother Porter has water at the lodge? I must get the smell of this place off my hands.’

  They turned, after a final look round, and began to walk towards the buildings.

  ‘Now what must we do?’ said Maistre Pierre.

  ‘I need to get a word with the harper, and I must speak to the other girls at the Hamiltons’,’ said Gil. ‘To ask if Bridie had a new sweetheart.’

  ‘I could help you do that,’ said Alys hopefully.

  ‘If you can spare the time from your duties,’ said Gil, ‘I would be grateful.’

  ‘Talking of St Mungo’s,’ said the mason, ‘we found a plaid.’

  ‘A plaid? Where?’

  ,is it hers?’ demanded Alys.

  ‘I do not know. It is black and green, quite vivid, and it was folded up neatly in the lodge, up out of the way under the roof.’

  ‘In the lodge?’ repeated Gil incredulously.

  ‘In the lodge. It seems Luke found it spread out on the ground the morning all this began, Tuesday or whenever it was, and folded it up and put it away all tidy.’ He looked from one to the other, well pleased with his effect. ‘He never thought it might be important.’

  ‘In the lodge,’ said Gil again, thoughtfully. ‘On the other side of the wall from where Bess died.’ He followed the mason towards the gatehouse, abstracted. ‘Bess was in the trees. Suppose she left her plaid there when she went into the building site -‘

  ‘Why?’ asked Alys.

  ‘So John Sempill would know she was not far away? But Davie and his new girl found it, and took it into the lodge to make the ground more comfortable, and overheard - part of the conversation? Bess’s death?’

  ‘And ran away in fear and were pursued? But I thought we agreed it was someone else who struck the boy down.’

  ‘Oh, it was,’ said Gil. ‘We have been very slow. It was someone else, and he is still there, with his weapon.’

  ‘Still there?’ Maistre Pierre turned to stare at him.

  ‘I know,’ said Alys, pulling her plaid tight round her. ‘The tree.’

  The tree?’ repeated her father, but Gil nodded.

  ‘The boy was running bent over, with his head down.’ He demonstrated. “That’s why the mark on the branch is so low.’

  ‘He ran into the tree,’ said Alys. ‘And the girl ran on and never looked back, thinking they were still pursued. Maister Gil, you must find her. It becomes more urgent every hour.’

  Chapter Nine

  ‘Oh, aye, she had a new sweetheart,’ said Kat Paton. She looked speculatively from Alys to Gil, and giggled.

  Agnes Hamilton, when asked for the name of the girl closest to the dead Bridie, had become flustered, counted off her entire household one by one, and finally selected this one. She was a small, lively, chattering creature, who had eyed Alys warily at first but seeing no signs of pepper had accompanied her willingly. She was not at all overwhelmed by sitting with her in the best bedchamber talking to a man of law, and Gil was having difficulty getting a word in.

  ‘She told us all about it when she quarrelled with the mason’s laddie,’ she assured them, ‘and she wept for him a day or two, so she did, and then she cheered up. So I asked her, and of course she said not, but I kept at her about it, and finally she said she’d a new leman, and not to tell anyone. So I didn’t. Well, not hardly, only Sibby and Jess next door.’

  Alys, with fewer qualms than Gil, cut briskly across this.

  ‘Did she tell you anything about him, Kat?’

  ‘Oh, no. Well, she wouldn’t, would she? But I think maybe he had money. He gave her a great bunch of ribbons for May Day. Only he wasn’t in Glasgow on May Eve for the dancing, so she said she’d mind the kitchen if she could get away on May Day after dinner, and we all went off and left her happy enough.’

  ‘Did she go out on May Day?’ Alys broke in ruthlessly.

  ‘Indeed she did, with her new ribbons in her hair, and came back late. She wouldn’t tell me where she’d been, but it had been good, you could tell.’ Kat giggled merrily, then suddenly sobered and crossed herself. ‘She’s dead, poor soul, and no in her grave yet, I shouldn’t be talking about her this way.’

  ‘When did she first meet him, do you think?’ Gil asked, seizing his chance.

  Kat looked up and made a face, shrugging her shoulders.

  ‘Last week sometime,’ she said vaguely.

  ‘Can you be more certain than that? Had she met him on Easter Monday?’

  ‘No,’ she said, and then more confidently, ‘no, for her brother that’s a ploughman out at Partick came to see her. And it wasn’t the next day, for that was the day we burned the dinner. Nor the next, because …’ Kat giggled again, but would explain no further. ‘I know!’ she said suddenly. ‘It was at the market last week. She came back looking happier than she had since Good Friday, and she slipped out again after her dinner and when she came back she had the ribbons. And she saw him again on the Friday,’ she went on fluently, ‘but after that he wasn’t in Glasgow. Not till May Day.’

  ‘What about yesterday morning?’ Gil asked. ‘Did you all go out to the market together?’

  ‘Oh, yes. Well, not together, exactly, the mistress called Bridie back to tell her where to ask for the beets she wanted, so she was behind me a bit.’

  ‘And did you see her in the market?’

  ‘No,’ she said regretfully. ‘I was looking, for I wanted a sight of her new man. I thought I saw her a couple of times, but I was wrong.’

  ‘So you haven’t seen the new sweetheart?’ said Alys.

  ‘No. Well, just the once.’

  ‘And can you tell us what he looks like?’ asked Gil.

  ‘Just ordinary, really,’ she said dismissively. ‘Not as goodlooking as my Geordie,’ she added, and giggled again.

  ‘How tall is he? What colour is his hair?’ Gil persisted.

  ‘I never got a right look at him,’ said Kat evasively. ‘Jus
t a quick glance. I never saw his hair, for he’d a hat on.’

  ‘A hat? Not a blue bonnet?’

  ‘A big sort of green velvet hat with a feather in it,’ she said, ‘all falling over his eyes. Daft-looking, I thought it was.’

  ‘What else did he have on?’ Alys asked.

  Kat looked shifty. ‘I never saw him very well,’ she admitted.

  Alys studied her for a moment, and then said shrewdly, ‘Were you somewhere you shouldn’t have been?’

  The bright eyes rolled sideways at her.

  ‘I won’t tell, and nor will Maister Cunningham.’

  ‘Unless it becomes necessary in the course of justice,’ said Gil scrupulously.

  Kat rubbed the toe of her shoe along the line of the floorboards.

  ‘Well ,’ she said. ‘I just happened to be looking out of the window of the maister’s closet, see, when she came back on May Day. There was no harm, really, seeing that the maister was out at supper at the Walkinshaws and no in his closet. And if the marchpane suckets got dislodged when I was there, that the mistress put to dry and never told us, well, it wasn’t -‘

  ‘I’m sure it was completely accidental,’ said Alys. ‘And certainly nothing to do with Maister Cunningham.’

  ‘Oh, quite!’ Gil agreed hastily.

  ‘And the closet overlooks the street?’ said Alys. ‘So you got a sight of them from above.’

  ‘Yes.’ The cracked leather of the shoe went back and forth. ‘So I didn’t really see him very well. But I did see one thing,’ said Kat, sitting up straighter. ‘It wasn’t any of the laddies in the town. And he was gey fine dressed, to go with the hat. I thought he was a gentleman.’

  Gil, leaving Alys at the White Castle to oversee the dinner, went on down the High Street, taking more care over where he was going this time. Round the Tolbooth, into the Thenawgait, he passed a baker’s shop where hot loaves steamed on the boards, the apothecary’s where the scent of spices tickled his nose, the burgh’s one armourer with two sullen apprentices rottenstoning a breastplate at the door. He reached the Fishergait without straying from the route, and there encountered Ealasaidh buying bread.

  ‘Good day to you,’ she said, unsurprised. ‘Himself is waiting on you.’