by Pat McIntosh
‘Likely,’ said Robert indifferently. He reached under the counter and brought out another sweetmeat, which he popped into his mouth. He did not offer to share the supply.
‘The lassie was quite overset,’ confided Syme unnecessarily. ‘It’s no wonder if she’s shut herself away. She’s young yet, and still inclined to be foolish, no like my wife.’
‘Hah!’ said Robert explosively, but did not elaborate. Gil eyed Syme speculatively, thinking that the man seemed to hold Eleanor in more regard than she did him.
‘I’d a word with Mistress Eleanor earlier,’ he said. ‘She tells me she and Agnes and your good-sister do a lot of the stillroom work for the business.’
‘That’s true,’ admitted Syme. ‘That’s very true. We’ve been able to expand the range, what’s more, since our good-sister came home. She has a few strange receipts from some learned Saracen she met in the Low Countries. Her rose comfits sell well, they’re not quite like any –’
He was interrupted. The cacophony beyond the house door had been reducing as the good ladies of the High Street made their way out to go home, but suddenly a new, shrill, perfectly sober voice burst on their ears.
‘Do you believe my daughter now, Frankie Renfrew?’
‘Aye, I’ll believe her.’ That was certainly Maister Renfrew. ‘The bairn’s a Renfrew right enough. She’s the image of Agnes and Robert when they were born.’
‘Are you no to apologize, then?’
Syme rose, turning towards the door as if to cover it, stop the exchange somehow. Gil moved to look out of the green window at the wriggling shapes moving in the street.
‘Apologize? What way would I apologize? It’s your daughter should apologize to me, woman, forever leading me to think other.’
‘Just because Sibella Bairdie played you false, man, doesny mean all women’s to be tarred from the same pot. My Meg’s an honest wife, and you’ll treat her that way from now on, or I’ll have your hide for cushions, maister potyngar. And just you mind that.’
‘Oh, aye, I’ll mind it.’ The latch rattled, the door opened, Maister Renfrew stepped through into the shop, saying over his shoulder, ‘And maybe you’ll mind that this is my house, woman, and treat me wi civility.’
‘Aye, when you’re civil to my lassie!’
Renfrew shut the door on this retort, snarling, then caught sight of Gil and stiffened.
‘Oh, you’re back, are you?’ he said. ‘Were you wanting something?’
‘We are come to wish good fortune to the bairn,’ said Maistre Pierre hastily. ‘Are both mother and babe well?’
‘Oh, aye, well enough.’ Renfrew pushed his felt hat forward, scratched the back of his head, and sighed deeply. ‘I was a fool to marry again. I wish I hadny thought of it now.’
‘Me too,’ muttered Robert.
His father looked sharply at him, but Syme broke in, smiling, ‘Admit it, Frankie, there’s advantages to being a married man.’
‘Might we have a word, Maister Renfrew?’ said Gil.
‘What about? If it’s the poison Bothwell used, these two had as well hear it, it’s of as much interest to them as to me.’
‘Not entirely,’ said Gil. ‘In your workroom, maybe?’
Renfrew unlocked the workroom and led them in. Gil looked round again, admiring the long scrubbed bench below the window, light even this late in the day. There must be room for more than one person to work at a time.
‘All the potyngary work happens here?’ he said.
‘Aye, it does. What’s this about, maister? I’ve all to see to, and the bairn’s godparents to choose.’
‘Syme and his wife and your good-daughter,’ said Maistre Pierre. ‘There, it is simple. Frankie, we are concerned for you.’ Renfrew frowned enquiringly at him. ‘We think that the flask that held the poison was one of those which should hold some drops which you take –’
‘What? Havers, man, it was one of Bothwell’s own –’
‘No, sir,’ said Gil patiently, ‘we are quite certain all Bothwell’s are accounted for, and so are those Forrest had. We should check what you’ve given out already,’ he added, with little hope, ‘in case it was one of those, stolen from whoever you sold it to, but we are quite certain it was –’
‘Rubbish!’ exploded Renfrew. ‘How would he get hold of it? I never heard such nonsense. My workroom’s locked, the supply of flasks is still in the barrel there in the corner, all in their straw, and the spare ones Grace makes up for me are here –’ He turned to the shelves beside him, and patted a small, expensive sample of the cabinetmaker’s craft. ‘In this cabinet.’
‘How many flasks do you use?’ Gil asked.
‘I keep three for the drops. Grace fills the three at a time, and puts them by here for me, and when I empty one, as I did this morn, I pass it to her. Then when I get to the third one she makes up a fresh batch.’
Gil frowned, working this out. Something did not tally.
‘You leave it all to your good-daughter?’ asked Maistre Pierre curiously.
Renfrew shrugged. ‘I can trust her well enough wi that. The receipt’s clear, she’s capable of following it right, and it makes her feel useful forbye. I maybe need to bid her strengthen it,’ he added thoughtfully. ‘I feel as if the humours are unbalanced again the day.’
‘Much has happened in the day,’ observed Maistre Pierre.
‘I’d have thought she was useful for more than that,’ said Gil. ‘She seems both skilled and competent.’
‘You’d be surprised,’ said Renfrew, with a sudden bark of laughter. ‘You’d be surprised. Aye, she’s a useful lassie, particular at making apple-cheese. I canny interest you in a box? Anyway, maister, the spare flasks,’ he picked open one of the many little doors in the cabinet, ‘would be with Grace, lying empty and waiting to be filled, or else here for my use. So it canny have been one of mine that Bothwell had, and when I think of the help I’ve given that lad, the advice and the stores I’ve put in his way, it fair makes my blood boil that he should misuse the craft that way.’
The doors of the cabinet bore labels with writing on them. Gil bent and looked closely, but found the words much abbreviated. Absint., Tanac., Alc. mol., he read. The open cavity was unlabelled and empty; there were stains on the light wood which smelled vaguely herbal, though the cabinet and the whole chamber smelled so strongly of spices and drugs it was hard to identify one odour. Maister Renfrew, appealed to, agreed that it was the same way as his drops smelled.
‘The last two or three you finished,’ said Gil, ‘did you give them to Mistress Grace yourself?’
‘Oh, likely. Or I’d gie them to Frankie or to Robert to pass on to her. So it gets to her, it’s no great matter.’
‘But none has been missed?’
‘And the one in your purse now, Frankie?’ asked Maistre Pierre across the denial.
‘It’s the right stuff,’ Renfrew said irritably. ‘I lifted it this morning and I’ve had two or three doses in the day. I ken my own receipt. What are you trying to show, Peter? Are you suspicioning Bothwell intended to leave it here for me?’
‘Not Bothwell necessarily,’ said Maistre Pierre, ‘but we have wondered if it was intended for you.’
Renfrew stared at him, then laughed again.
‘No,’ he said. ‘No, I’ll not entertain it. That’s a daft idea. Besides, there’s nothing goes on in my workroom that I’m not in control of.’ He closed the little door, and looked at them curiously. ‘You’re serious in this, aren’t you, Peter?’
‘We are,’ said Gil. ‘Is there anyone in the house capable of brewing up such a poison?’
Renfrew shrugged. ‘Robert and James and me, we’re all busy at sic things from time to time. Nicol likely could and all, daftheid though he is, I trained him well. So aye, any of us, maister. But as I said, there’s naught occurs in my workroom but I’m in charge of it, whoever’s handling the bellows. No, I canny see that it could ha been aimed at me. Whatever sort of an ill-doer he is, Bothwell would neve
r ha had the chance to set it in here, and nobody under my roof could do sic a thing, for reason that I take care of all the potyngary stuffs that would pyson a man.’
‘The workroom was locked yesterday, you say?’ asked Maistre Pierre.
‘It was. You saw me unlock it the now. It’s aye locked when I’m out of the house or when the shop’s empty.’
‘Is there another key?’ Gil asked.
‘Aye, Jimmy has a key, being a partner in the business, but he keeps it close as I do.’
‘And do you have any more idea what yesterday’s poison might be?’
‘None.’ Renfrew opened the workroom door, a little too quickly for his son who was revealed within a yard or so of the other side. ‘Robert, have you no work to occupy you?’
‘Aye, Faither,’ returned the young man, ‘but it’s all in the workroom where you were just now.’
‘Get on with it, then, afore I take a stick across your back,’ said his father sharply. ‘Jimmy, I think Peter and his good-son are just leaving.’
‘No,’ said Gil apologetically. ‘I need a word with your daughter Agnes.’
‘Wi Agnes?’ Renfrew stared at him. ‘Why?’
‘As you said yourself, sir,’ Gil pointed out, ‘one of her sweethearts has slain the other. I’d say Sir Thomas will want a word wi her and all, and it’s plain she can help me. I’ve given her most of the day, since she’s not left her chamber, but I must speak wi her now.’
‘You’ve no need to speak to Agnes,’ said Renfrew crisply. ‘An empty-heidit lassie like her can add nothing to what the rest of us saw.’
‘I’ll fetch her,’ offered Robert, still in the workroom doorway. Gil looked at the young man, and saw the smirk just vanishing from his face.
‘I come with you,’ said Maistre Pierre.
‘I’d sooner speak to the lassie in her own chamber,’ said Gil, ‘with maybe one of the other women at her side.’
‘She’s nothing to hide from her faither,’ pronounced her father in menacing tones.
‘Then you’ll not need to be present, sir,’ suggested Gil.
Renfrew grunted sourly at that and turned to the house door. ‘You’d best come up, then,’ he said.
‘I’ll come and all,’ said Robert. ‘I want to hear what she has to say.’
With a faintly gleeful air he preceded them through into the house, up the newel stair into the hall, up a further flight.
‘What is a hurcheon?’ asked Maistre Pierre absently as they passed through a succession of ostentatious rooms, their wooden furnishings pale and new, and the hangings bright and fresh even in the dwindling daylight.
‘Hérisson,’ translated Gil. ‘Hedgehog.’
Finally Robert kicked at a shut door and flung it open, saying, ‘Agnes? Here’s the Provost’s men come to take you up for poisoning Danny Gibson.’
‘Robert!’ said Gil sharply, but it was drowned in Agnes’s shriek of terror. She had been lying on the handsome tester-bed which occupied most of the chamber, and she sprang up and off the bed on the far side, all in one movement, white-faced, petticoats flying, stammering:
‘No! No, I didny – I never –!’
‘Robert, you’re a fool!’ said his father.
‘Come, come, Agnes,’ said Maistre Pierre reassuringly. ‘You know enough not to pay attention to what your brother says, no?’
‘I never –’ repeated Agnes, and then the sense of these words penetrated. ‘You mean it’s not – he was –’ She swallowed, and turned a savage face on her brother, showing little even teeth. ‘Our Lady’s nails, I’ll pay you for that one, Robert, I swear it, if it’s the last thing I ever do.’
‘There was joye to sen hem mete, With layking and with kissing swete. Thank you, Robert,’ said Gil, without sincerity. ‘I’m sure your father can spare you now. Likely Maister Syme would like your help to close up the shop.’
‘Aye, get away, Robert,’ said Renfrew. ‘That was a daft trick. And we’ll ha none o your sarcasm, maister,’ he added. Robert gave Gil an ugly look and slunk out, and Renfrew entered the chamber, saying to his daughter, ‘Here’s Maister Cunningham wants to ask you about yesterday, Agnes. Speak up and answer him the truth, lassie.’
His face cracked in a half-smile, and the girl relaxed slightly, and came round the end of the bed. Her cheeks were wet, as if she had been weeping, and Gil saw that she was still trembling from the fright her brother had given her.
‘Shall we have some light, and then sit down?’ he suggested.
Seated by the opened shutters, he studied Agnes again in the light of the yellow sunset. She did not look as if she had slept; the blue eyes were dark-ringed, the gold curls uncombed, and she clasped and unclasped her hands, apparently unaware that she did so. Maistre Pierre was watching her with some sympathy.
‘You know your good-mother has a wee lassie,’ Renfrew said.
‘I could hardly miss it,’ said Agnes. Not so distressed as she seems, then, Gil registered.
‘Where did you find the flask, Agnes?’ he said abruptly. She reared back like a horse sharply reined in, and stared at him, mouth open, eyes very wide.
‘Find it?’ she said after a moment. ‘Me?’
‘You gave it to Nanty Bothwell on the stair,’ Gil said. Renfrew looked from his daughter to Gil, open-mouthed in indignation.
‘Why would I do that?’ she countered boldly. Definitely not so distressed as she seems, thought Gil. ‘What would I – does he say I gave him it?’
‘Never mind what he says,’ said Gil. ‘I’m interested in what you say. Where did you find it?’
‘What’s this about?’ demanded Renfrew. ‘My lassie never had aught to do wi the flask. I told you all that below stairs the now!’
‘I never had it,’ she said resolutely, shaking her head. ‘It was nothing to do with me.’
‘I’ve heard a different tale,’ said Gil. ‘You saved the play, you claimed. Where did you find the flask?’
‘Why would I have the flask?’ she said. ‘It’s nothing to do wi me, is it, Daddy? You keep all those things in your care, locked in the workroom, we never get a sight of them, what would I be doing passing one to Nanty Bothwell?’
‘That’s what I’d like to know,’ said Gil. ‘Nanty forgot to lift the one he should have had with him, so he asked you to find him something that would do, when you slipped back here to fetch your good-mother a cushion.’
‘Why are you accusing her like this?’ demanded Renfrew. ‘What’s the proof you have?’
‘I never did anything of the sort,’ said Agnes, sounding alarmed. ‘You canny show I did, either!’
‘Aye, what proof?’ demanded Renfrew again.
‘She was seen talking to Nanty, out in the yard, when she left Morison’s house,’ said Gil. ‘And seen afterwards, talking to him on the kitchen stair. That was when she said she’d saved the play. You brought Nanty that flask, Agnes, and it killed Danny Gibson. Was that your intention?’
She turned her face away from the light, putting one hand up to cover her eyes.
‘Do you think I’ll ever forget how he died?’ she whispered. ‘You canny torment me like this, maister. Daddy, stop him! I never –’
‘That’s nothing to say to the matter!’ said Renfrew angrily. ‘It’s all hearsay! How could she get the flask, let alone whatever was in it, when the key to the workroom was in my purse all the time?’
‘Did you know what you’d lifted?’ Gil asked. ‘Did you know it was poison? Did you plan to have one lad kill the other and be hanged for it?’
‘No, I never. Where would I get something like that?’ she asked, without looking round. ‘Tell me that, maister! My faither keeps control over all that moves in this house, and certainly over all that’s to do wi the craft. How would I find sic a flask, let alone poison to put in it to–’ Her face crumpled, and she covered it with her hands again. ‘Oh, the poor laddie!’
‘Danny died. Nanty will hang,’ said Gil deliberately, ‘unless we can show it was a m
istake, that he’d no knowledge of what was in the flask. One of your sweethearts has died, but you could save the other one by telling me the truth, Agnes.’
‘That’s more than enough!’ exploded Renfrew.
He got to his feet and patted his daughter’s shoulder, and she turned to bury her face in the waist of his woollen gown, wailing, ‘Send them away, Daddy!’
‘Aye, never fret, my lammie. That’s all you get, Maister Cunningham. I’ll not hear any more of this nonsense, and I’ll answer no more questions myself. Away and tell the Provost it was Nanty Bothwell done it.’
‘How long will you stay in your chamber, Agnes?’ asked Maistre Pierre suddenly. ‘You are needed out in the house. Your good-mother is abed, there is the house to run –’
‘I’ll see to what needs decided under my own roof, Peter Mason,’ said Renfrew angrily. ‘There now, my pet, they’re just away.’
‘If you change your mind, Agnes,’ said Gil, ‘you can send word to my wife.’
Chapter Seven
‘I’m no that keen on your story,’ said Sir Thomas Stewart, Provost and Sheriff of Glasgow. He pushed aside his notes on Danny Gibson’s death, and blew his nose resonantly into a large linen handkerchief. ‘Confound this rheum, a man canny think straight wi his head full of ill humours. Tell me it all again, till I see how it will sit wi the assize.’
He huddled into his huge furred gown, tucking his hands up the sleeves. Gil obediently began again at the beginning, and recounted what he had learned so far. Sir Thomas listened attentively, blowing his nose from time to time, and shaking his head.
‘I’m still no convinced,’ he said at last, ‘and what’s more I think the assize will never understand it. You’re saying you think this lassie fetched a flask from her father’s house, that turned out to hold poison, and it was all an accident. But the lassie denies it, so does her father, and you’ve given me no reason why Frankie Renfrew should have strong poison lying about his place and not recognize it.’
‘I’ve been unable to speak to the lassie alone,’ Gil corrected, ‘and her father won’t hear of what I say, and laughed at my suspicions.’