1588 A Calendar of Crime

by Shirley McKay

  A voice was heard to murmur somewhere in the crowd. ‘Rich laws for the rich, and that’s a fact.’

  Henry had revived his wits sufficiently to say, ‘I am lodging in the South Street, with Professor Black.’

  ‘Are you now?’ said Hew. ‘Then God help you both.’

  Robert Lachlan helped him to take Henry home. ‘Ye maunna fault a man that cannot haud his drink, when he is but young. He has yet to learn. Yon scholars at the college havna taucht him richt.’ He slapped Henry hard between the shoulder blades, a gesture of collegiate conviviality, which Henry threw straight back, in a spurt of spew. Robert sidestepped swiftly ‘Manners of a whore, for aw that.’

  Robert Black turned ashen when they brought him to the door. ‘How can he be so drunk? Tis not gone eight o’clock! What devil have you done to him?’ he asked.

  ‘Nought but saved his skin,’ said Hew. ‘You will not believe the trouble he is in. He has no idea of it himself. If you value his life, lock him in his room, and do not let him out before I come again.’

  ‘What do you say? His life is in danger?’ The regent wrung his hands. ‘What will I tell his father? What am I do? He is in my charge for the next two months.’

  Robert Lachlan grinned at him. ‘Aye? Good luck wi that.’

  Walter Bone was locked in the tolbooth for the night. He had no more to say. He kept Elspet’s ribbons tightly in his grasp. The crownar made no attempt to wrest them from him. He took no interest in the case. In the morning, early, he went back to the harbour, and established that the incoming tide had recovered no trace of the girl. He spoke to several of the fishermen, who had taken their boats out at night, and concluded that there was no charge to answer. He returned to the tolbooth, and set Walter free. He was not going to hang a man for a scrap of thread.

  AUGUST 2

  I

  Elspet had woken up naked and cold. She looked about for clothes, and finding Michael’s shirt the closest thing to hand, she put it on. It held her in his scent, bloody and deep like the scent of a calf. Michael lay still fast asleep. He was naked too, his hair like crumpled corn rigs, tousled tufts of gold, his bare limbs flung carelessly over the fleece. Their bed was a sheepskin, spread out on the floor. Elspet felt his body on her skin, in every part of her.

  He woke and rose at once, instantly alert. ‘Why would you no wake me?’

  ‘I was sleeping too,’ Elspet said. ‘It is early still.’

  Michael said, ‘Tis late. Gie me back ma sark.’

  He is fearful for his work, Elspet thought. Michael had been hired by Robert Lachlan at the Lammas fair. It was good work, he telt her. Honest and well paid. At Michaelmas, when it was done, there would be a feast. They might kill a pig, and the drink would flow. Elspet could come too. She would be his guest.

  He stood above her, supple and awake; every part of him had woken strong and proud, and Elspet felt inside her a hollow kind of longing, aching to be filled. How could she be empty, still? He opened up a gulf in her. She drew up her knees, and tucked the shirt under her. ‘Take it, then,’ she said.

  Michael laughed fondly. ‘I could. God kens, I would. But I hae to work.’

  He thought if he was late he would lose his place. But it was early yet. Elspet did not like Robert Lachlan. He had gone away with Maude, and come back on his own. Elspet had supposed that meant that Maude was dead. But Robert had not said. He drank, sometimes, at the harbour inn, as though what happened there was of no consequence. She did not like that Michael worked for him.

  ‘Not till eleven, you said.’

  Michael looked out at the sky. ‘It must be after ten. Sliddershanks will miss you at the inn. You will have to think a lie to tell him. That you couldna sleep, and went out for a walk, before the sun was up.’

  She had been supposed to slip out after dark, when the inn was closed, with everyone asleep. But Elspet had not kept to the letter of their tryst. She had slipped away while the show was on.

  She had come to the place that Michael called his own, a ruined shepherd’s hut. For door it had a scrap of cloth. Its roof was open to the skies, where Michael pitched a canvas up, to shelter from the rain. The rain that promised did not fall, and they had lain all night together underneath the stars, his jewels for her, he said. Michael had been drinking in the town, and he had not appeared until it was quite dark, and Elspet was afraid. Then his touch had found her, waking every place she had not known she harboured there, asleep.

  ‘He kens,’ Elspet said.

  Michael was already pulling up his breeks, tying round the leather cord that served him for a belt, taming, tying down, the rising of his love. He stopped to stare at her. ‘What?’

  ‘He saw us at the fair. He telt me at the pier. When you won the race and gied the ribbons to me. Sliddershanks was there.’

  Elspet had not cared. When he had accused her, she had plucked the ribbons from her breast and taunted, ‘Take them, then. Have them for yersel’! What kind o creature are ye, peeping, spying on us?’ Now she felt a pang, to think how hurt he looked.

  Michael cursed, a long stream of profanities, spilling out like seed. Elspet shrank from it. ‘Why does it matter now? Now that we are handfast, and will soon be wed.’

  ‘Elspet.’ Michael sighed. He squatted down beside her, and cupped his hand around her face, turning it to his, so she could see his seriousness. She shivered at his touch.

  ‘It is Lammastide. And you ken full well that that is coupling time. You are the bonniest thing. The loveliest lass that I ever went with. Ripe and yielding. Sweet.’

  ‘You said that last night.’

  ‘I meant it. But, Elspet, tis harvest time. The harvest will be done. And when the corn is gone, then I will be too.’

  ‘Where will you go?’ Elspet said.

  ‘Far away. Over the hills. Ach, dinna be sad. It will not be a while yet. And you can come again. Now you must go awa and mak your peace wi Sliddershanks. He will take you back. He likes you.’

  ‘But am I not your wife?’

  ‘Whisht, no more of wives. It was Lammas play, and no more meant than that. Wipe your face. I cannot abide to see a lass greet.’

  She did not think that she was greeting. It could not be tears, but dew on her cheeks. She could not be crying, for she felt nothing inside her but coldness and dark, as though a door opened had let in a draught, and filled up the chasm with nothing but ash.

  ‘You can come again, if you will not cry, on another night. I will stay till Michaelmas. You liked it, did you no? You will not tell me no. For I ken you did.’

  He kissed her on the lips before he let her go, standing up again. ‘I have to go and piss. While I am gone, you should get dressed.’

  Michael went outside, to the back of the hut, and presently she heard a sound that streaming on and on chilled and emptied her. She hugged her knees close, wondered how they felt so solid, when she was a husk, with nothing inside.

  A shadow crossed the door, and someone spoke her name, in a voice so filled with sorrow and with tenderness she knew it was not his. Elspet looked up, and was not surprised to see that it was Sliddershanks. She thought she could not bear the sadness in his eyes. She wanted to tell him not to look at her. For I am nothing now. She spoke to him instead as she might have done on any other day. ‘How are your sair banes?’

  He thanked her. ‘No sae bad, the day.’

  ‘I am glad of that. For you have come some way to see us,’ Elspet said. ‘How did you find the place?’

  Careful and polite, as if she might get up, and offer him a cup of something cool to drink, a bannock on a plate, to thank him for his pains. But there was nothing here that lent to hospitality.

  ‘Jonet telt me. Jonet has a wean, with hair like crumpled corn, the image of its da, and she got him here. You did not think,’ said Sliddershanks, ‘that you were the first?’

  She knew that she was not. ‘Why did you let me?’ she said.

  ‘They thought I had hurt you. They kept me away.’

>   ‘Who could think that? You never would. You should have telt them.’

  ‘And shamed you?’ he said. ‘I would never dae that.’

  She let slip a sigh. ‘I am shamed now.’

  ‘No. You will not be. I will make certain of that.’

  ‘Well, if it isnae Widdershins.’ Michael was behind them at the door.

  Elspet said, ‘His name is Walter Bone.’ She wished she had not said to Michael that she called him Sliddershanks. Now Sliddershanks would think she had been mocking him. That was not it, at all.

  Michael grinned at him. ‘Your timing is braw, if you seek your lass. She is ready to come home.’

  To Elspet he said, ‘Are you no dressed, yet? Tak off the shirt.’

  Elspet blinked at him. Would he have her bare, in front of Sliddershanks? She shivered, and hugged herself close.

  ‘Nae mair o your piddling,’ Michael said, ‘I am late for work.’ He would have stripped it from her there and then, had Walter not been standing in his way.

  Walter accused him, ‘You have defiled her.’

  ‘Defilit is she? Do you hear that?’ Michael said. ‘Widdershins thinks ye are foul.’

  ‘She never was foul, nor is she now. You have deflowered her,’ Sliddershanks said.

  ‘Deflowered her? There is a word. Ah, but she was ripe for it! Tell the cripple, Elspet, how much you were longing for it, thirsty as the blossom drooping for the rain. What kind of man are you, that kept her locked away, too feeble and too dry to pluck her for yourself? I brought her to the light. It was what she craved.’

  Sliddershanks did not reply. Instead he looked at Elspet. ‘Is this what you want?’

  She could not look at him. ‘I do not know,’ she said. ‘I wanted to be loved.’

  ‘You did not ken you were?’ He shook his head, heavy with the sorrow of it. ‘Well, the thing is done. And you must marry now.’

  ‘Marry? I will marry her, at latter Lammas time,’ Michael said. That was a time that never came. ‘Elspet understands. Ask her, she will tell you. Oh, but she was ready for it! Luscious, sweet and ripe. You should hae had her, Widdershins, while you had the chance. But you can hae her now. I opened her for you.’

  Walter took the knife he carried from his belt. ‘Marry her, or die,’ he suggested simply.

  ‘Dinnae,’ Elspet cried.

  Michael laughed at them. ‘Threaten me, auld man? Ah dinna think you could.’ As Walter came at him, he struck out with his foot, to topple him as easily as he might trip a child. Walter’s crooked bones were racked and twisted under him. He crumpled with a whimper. Michael squatted over him, grappling for the blade. He wrenched the knife from Sliddershanks, and waved it, dark with blood. ‘Oh, Jesus Christ!’ He pleaded to Elspet. ‘I didnae dae that. He did it to hi’self. You saw that, did ye no?’

  Sliddershanks was clutching at his thigh. And blood was showering Michael, splattering his face.

  Elspet ran to Sliddershanks, pushing her hands in the place he had cut. The wound was too deep or her hands were too small, for the blood pumped out still, drowning her fingers. ‘Tie your belt round him,’ she cried.

  But Michael stood gawping. ‘He came at me, Elspet, you saw.’

  Walter’s eyes were closed. And Elspet felt his spirit pumping out. Her shirt was drenched with blood. Then the bleeding stopped, abrupt as it began. His eyes fluttered open. Elspet held him close.

  ‘Look at you,’ she said, ‘you silly, futless cripple. See now what you’ve done.’

  He telt her, ‘Dinna girn. I will not hae you greet. Your face is foul enough.’

  ‘Is that a fact?’ she said. ‘Well, ye wad ken. For ye are such a foulsum wreck yersel.’

  His eyes had closed again. And Elspet felt her heart so heavy and so sore that she could not speak. When she found the words, she turned them on Michael. ‘We have killt him,’ she said.

  And Michael did not stay to see that he was dead, but fled across the fields, cowering from her grief.

  II

  The sturdy men who gathered to survey the barley rigs, Robert Lachlan’s band, were astonished at the sight of a man, naked to the waist, and showering flakes of blood, rising from the corn. It did not take them long to trap and bring him down, writhing like a fish. They traced back the trail to the bloody hut where Elspet cradled Sliddershanks. Hew was called, and came, bringing Bella Frew, to see what could be done. It was Bella who helped Elspet out of Michael’s shirt and into her own clothes, and showed to her a rough and understanding kindness Elspet had not come across since Maude, while Walter’s body, prised from her, was carried to the town. Then they made a slow procession following the corpse.

  The crownar Andrew Wood was returning home when his horse was caught and halted by the messenger, who telt him that his gallows might be wanted after all. Reluctantly, he turned. A grim show was set out to greet him at the tolbooth: the corpse of Walter Bone, straddled on a board, bathed in its own blood. Michael stood shivering, cowed, naked and ashamed as Adam at the Fall. Elspet stood apart, in a solemn sadness. Nothing that was said or done appeared to reach her there.

  Giles Locke was in attendance. He bore witness that Michael’s account of events was not contradicted by the facts. Nor did the facts confirm it. Facts were simply facts. And the facts, as he saw them, were that the knife had entered Walter’s thigh, and severed both the vein and the artery. It could have been by accident. It could have been intent. A sure, but unlikely, way to kill a man.

  He believed, in the event of accident, there was very little that could have been done to save the victim’s life. If Michael had remained, then the pressure of his hands, with Elspet’s, could have staunched the flow. But that was not a thing a common man might ken, and Michael was not culpable if he had in mind to run off for the surgeon, as he said he did. That was yet a hopeless cause; no surgeon could have come in time. By his estimation, it took Walter Bone a little over four and a little under five minutes to bleed out, until his life was drained.

  Elspet spoke at that, wondering aloud. ‘Four minutes! And no more!’ It felt to her a lifetime she had held him in her hands, while his life slipped out, and no time at all.

  Sir Andrew made a note of it and dismissed the doctor. He looked upon the others with disdain. He had no interest in the life or death of Walter Bone, who had few fine friends to press the crownar to avenge him. Nor was he concerned with Michael or with Elspet, whose squalid love affair might trouble the kirk’s courts, but did not trouble his. What caught his interest more, in all of this, was Hew. Hew stood by, white-faced. And the crownar was intent on finding out his part, to hold him to account.

  ‘You telt me,’ he said, ‘to keep this man locked up, or evil would be done. Now he is a corpse. Perhaps you can explain to me how such things jump together as to be coincident, in this place and time.’

  ‘He would not be a corpse,’ Hew said, ‘if you had kept your word, and kept him under lock until the girl was found.’

  Sir Andrew said, ‘My word? No word of mine, but yours. This is strange work, sir. What was it? Did you have a premonition that he would be killed? Speak, or I will take your silence for a darker kind of magic. What was in your mind?’

  Hew was forced to say, for Michael’s sake if not his own, that Walter had confessed to him he meant to take a life. Therefore he corroborated Michael’s self-defence, that Walter had attacked him.

  ‘He slipped and fell on his ain blade. That is all I ken,’ Michael said. He looked at Hew. ‘I had no reason to expect it.’

  Hew said, ‘I did not ken the life he meant was yours. I see now that it was. But I did not know it at the time.’

  The crownar stared at him. ‘You heard this yesterday. And yet you did not think it worthy of report?’

  ‘No. I will not report a man’s intent as truth, when it is telt in confidence. Besides, if I had told you, you might have hanged him then, taking as confirmed what Marie said.’

  The crownar said, ‘I should have done. But that does not excuse
you, nor should it clear your conscience. If you had but spoken, these sad events would not have come about.’

  ‘What? If you had hanged him, he would not now be dead?’ Hew asked. ‘Strange reason, that.’

  ‘Chop logic as you will, I see your hand in this. You set yourself above the law, and fortune too. This fortune has caught up with you and Walter Bone. The law can watch and wait, and bide the time when it will catch you too. When it does, understand, I will come for you. No one hangs today. You three are free to go.’

  Sir Andrew turned his back on them and left. These small lives, this death, disgusted him. His pledge to serve his king and to keep the peace had exhausted him, draining his estates, and he had grown indifferent to the part. There would come a time, he hoped not far away, when he would put the rope around his last man’s neck. If that man was Hew Cullan he would rest content. It would bring his service to a satisfying end.

  Michael knelt to Hew. ‘Master, you have saved my life.’

  ‘I am not your master,’ answered Hew. He looked across at Elspet. ‘Do you want this man?’

  Elspet answered clearly, ‘Not ever in my life. Whatever is the law, I ken it in my heart that he killed Sliddershanks. I will not have him die for it. But I can never bear to look on him again.’

  Michael swore to Hew, ‘Your man, Robert Lachlan, hired me for the harvest. Wherefore I am yours, and will serve you gladly. I am strong and true.’

  Hew told him, ‘Did you not hear? You are set free. You are no man of Elspet’s, and no man of mine. Give thanks for your good fortune, that though your life was sought you did not die today. Fortune smiles on you. Go freely where you will. But let it not be here, nor ever on my land. I have no place for you.’