Tam Fairlie sighed at that. ‘Mebbe,’ he suggested, ‘ye think your place is this side o’ the gate, and that side of the gate, and the doctor’s house, and the doctor’s wife. I have to break it to ye, that it is not so.’
The Richan boy looked murder at him. Tam had not kent the laddie had the spirit in him, and he was amused by it. He did not, for a moment, care if he went lowping at the doctor’s wife. In fact, he half approved of it, since it showed the laddie had the makings of a man. But he could not have him do it while he kept the watch. ‘Son, ye are relieved of duty. You will follow me.’
The Richan boy was scared. Not his common wariness, but deep down in his belly, he was feart of Tam. It should have done him proud. But Tam could feel no pleasure in it.
‘I can stay here if you like,’ the boy was pleading now, ‘an’ work another shift.’
‘But ye canna ye see,’ Tam explained, as gentle as though Richan were his little lass, ‘for ye cannot be trusted, in the first line of defence. You maun come wi’ me.’
He put his arm around the soldier, kindly and protective, as a father to a son. ‘How is yon sair shoulder, John?’ He called him by his name.
The Richan laddie swallowed. ‘Soon it will be well.’
‘Aye? Tis to the good. For in the place where ye are going, ye will have to climb a rope.’
Since Meg had no hope of resting now, she retired to the kitchen and began to make broth, hoping to find calm in the dull domestic act. A fine dry-grained dust had settled over all; she had to scrub the board before she could begin. She had barely started chopping, or steadied her quick heart, when another round of knocking called her to the door. This time, it was Hew. He had walked from Kenly Green, calling in to see her on his way to college. He was surprised to see his sister open up the door herself, dabbing at her eyes with a corner of her sleeve.
‘It is the onions,’ she informed him. And perhaps it was. She changed the subject quickly. ‘I am glad to see you here. I thought you might be vexed with us.’
‘And why should you think that?’
‘I thought, because of Clare.’
‘I knew that she was married, Meg. Though I had not imagined she might have a child. Which may tell you how very green I was.’
There was hurt still in his eyes, and Meg was not deceived.
‘I had some strange idea that I might save her from her husband. In truth, I do not know how I meant to go about it. And I took no account,’ Hew admitted wryly, ‘of her lack of will, or interest to be saved. And now I come to see how simple and how foolish were my feelings, I feel in part ashamed, and somewhat more relieved. I felt sorry for her, married to that man. You should have told me, Meg, that what she wanted most was to get with child. I thought that she was coming to you because she wanted an escape from her husband, not because she wanted to become more close to him.’
‘We could not break her trust. And you can never tell – no one ever knows – what secrets and collusions are between a man and wife. Some are happy, that seem not; and some that seem the best of friends . . .’ Here Meg faltered and broke off.
‘What is the matter, Meg? For you are sad and pale.’
‘I think I may have made,’ she said, ‘a terrible mistake.’
‘What mistake is that?’
Meg composed herself, beneath his careful scrutiny. ‘I think I may have put in pepper, where I wanted clove.’ She peered into the broth.
‘Though I do not believe that for a moment, it would scarcely matter if you had. Do you not feel well?’
‘I have a little headache from the hammer. And it will not be long ere it begins again.’ Meg changed the subject quickly. ‘Giles telt me that Sir Andrew Wood had looked for you in college. I hope there is no matter there.’
‘He wrote to me,’ reported Hew. ‘He said he had business that he would take up with me, but that he is now occupied, in conference with the king. And that is like the man. He likes to be mysterious. His method is to leave a man alone to find his fear, examining his conscience for some matter he has done.’
‘Then there is nothing, I suppose, that you should be afeared of?’ wondered Meg.
Her brother smiled at her. ‘My conscience is quite clear.’
Chapter 20
The Castle on the Cliff
Tam Fairlie came to Harry to relieve him of the night watch. Harry was surprised. ‘Should it no’ be John?’
‘He is in his pit. Mebbe ye should fetch him.’
‘What, still asleep?’
The sergeant grinned at him. ‘I did not say that.’ He rattled at his belt, taking off a key. ‘You will want a light.’
Harry said, ‘Sweet Jesus, Tam!’
‘Tell him to mak haste, or else he will be late. And he wouldna want to miss the early shift.’
Harry cleared the bile that was rising in his gorge and spat out in disgust. ‘You are the devil, Tam. I have stood by you, but this . . . I will not keep quiet on this. I will tell the world, what primping kind of brute you are.’
‘Is that a fact?’ the sergeant grinned. ‘Then they will laugh at ye, son. For you are as barnelike as he. I have been toughening him up. When he is a man, the lidder loun will thank me for it. I had thocht that you, at least, were made of stronger stuff. Let the laddie out, if it grieves you so much. What are you waiting for?’
‘You are a consummate shit.’
Though Tam Fairlie laughed at this, his face turned dark as stone.
The Richan boy was in the pit. At first, his friend saw nothing but a pile of sacks, and dared to hope that Tam was simply making sport with him. Harry let the lantern swing from the bottom of a rope. Whatever he discovered, he would not go down, for he was well aware that there was no way up, without a lot of effort on the part of a good friend. He heard a scuffle from the sacking, probably a rat. The pit was sometimes used for storing salt and grain. Though on the other hand, the rat had no way in, through flanks of solid rock.
‘John Richan? Are you down there?’ he called out. The hollow chamber answered, throwing back the sound. Deep down in the darkness, something stirred.
‘I will throw down the rope. You maun try to catch it. Tie it round your waist.’ With the help of the pulley, he could haul John Richan out, but it would take all of his strength. John Richan would be flayed from his oxsters to his wrists, and the skin would be stripped from both of Harry’s hands.
The pile of sacks uncurled, and Harry saw John’s face, blinking at the light. He dangled down the rope. ‘Ye hae to catch it, John.’
John Richan, staring up at him, seemed not to understand. Harry thought mebbe his wits had fled.
‘Haud on to the rope, John, else I will leave ye there.’
John’s answer was to crouch back in the heap of sacks, and to close his eyes against the lantern’s glare.
Harry Petrie swore. ‘I will not ask ye again John. There can be nae helping you, if you will not help yourself.’
The rope swung and bumped, and banged against the wall. John Richan’s whisper carried, faintly, to the air. ‘I want to stay down here.’
‘The devil you do, John. Ye will wish that you were down there when I put my hands on you.’ Harry coaxed and swore at him, threatened and cajoled, until at last John caught the rope and did as he was told. It took another quarter hour before he reached the top. As Harry pulled him clear, exhaustion and relief were melded into rage. He grasped him by the throat. ‘Why can you no dae it, John? Why can you not say aye and nay and be like all the rest of us? Why maun you gowk back at him, with thae great gawping eyes? Drop your gaze, and hark to him. Is it so very hard?’
John Richan stared back, blankly. Harry dropped his fist. ‘I cannot always help you, John. You have to help yourself.’
He put his arm around John’s neck and helped him to the door. The Richan boy woke slowly to the morning light, stepping out unsteadily. Tam Fairlie stood outside, where he had been waiting for them, watching all the while. ‘There ye are, son. Did you sleep wel
l? Ye are late for your watch. But we will excuse it, only this once.’
‘For pity’s sake, man,’ Harry said wearily, ‘let the puir bluiter go in to his bed.’
‘Has he not had the hale night to sleep? And he is well now,’ the sergeant objected. ‘What say ye, John?’
The boy dropped his eyes. ‘Ah’m well eno, aye.’
‘Good lad,’ approved Tam. ‘Though we have not cured ye yet of your outlandish speech. The fresh air will cheer ye, up in the tower.’
Harry left them both, returning to his bunk. He would gladly tumble into it, worn out with the night shift and the dead weight of the pit, for his arms were racked and aching and his back was stiff and sore. But there was something he must do before he went to sleep, and before the day was up. The baxters in the bakehouse had already baked their bread and Harry would find breakfast there. The bishop and his household would sleep on for several hours.
Harry reached beneath his bed, and with the corner of his dagger he pulled up a hollow plank, to remove a wooden box. Inside were sheets of paper, drawing pens and ink, and a leather pocket where he kept his sketch, folded into four. He took the pocket out, and tied it to his belt. He chose a piece of charcoal, sharpened to a point, and tucked it for safekeeping in the cuff of his left boot. Then he replaced the floorboard, and went back outside.
He went first, as he always did, to the far west corner of the southern range, adding several charcoal smudges to the early draft. Later, he would rub them out, replacing them with ink. The chapel was already drawn, and coloured, on the map. He entered through the colonnade and up the chapel stair. A door led from the chapel to the central tower, and from there to the bishop’s quarters on the other side, which, at this early hour, would certainly be locked. He spent a while in the chapel, simply looking out, down toward the hill and the ditch below, passing through the trance to the bishop’s tower, where he heard a flutter somewhere at his back, as though a little bird had flown up through the tower. Tam Fairlie’s little daughter peeped out from the stairwell.
‘What are you doin’?’ she asked him. ‘Lookin’ for jewels?’
‘To be sure. Have you found some? You are like the lark, rising with the day.’
The small girl laughed at that, and ran out to the sunlight. It was for the best. Tam Fairlie did not care for soldiers talking to his child, even Harry Petrie, who had been a friend. Harry stood a moment for the lass to disappear again before he left the tower. She never lingered long, and it was rarely that they came upon her playing face to face. She flitted through the gardens, and high up on the parapets, through the vaults and cellars and up on the cliff. By God’s own grace and wonder she did not fall down. She had liked to play, for a while, in the high long gallery above the bishop’s hall, before Patrick put a stop to it, driven to distraction by her running feet, as he lay wan and wammilling in his bed below. While Tam was at his work, she went about at will. No matter in that, now, for Harry had no cause to climb up to the gallery. He had no interest there.
He went through the cloister to the vaulted chambers underneath the chapel, where he spent some time examining the walls. He took a measure with his thumb, and stepped out to the light with the paper in his hand, to find that someone else was walking in the morning air. He folded up the sheet again and slipped it in its pouch.
‘Good morrow to you, sir,’ he greeted Ninian Scrymgeour, the bishop’s privy secretary. ‘You are unco early up to say your prayers.’
The secretary squinted, for he had not brought his spectacles, and for a moment seemed uncertain who it was had spoken, and perhaps a little fearful that it might be Tam, though Harry was distinctive, because of his red hair. ‘Good morning to you, soldier,’ he agreed at last. ‘I like to spend an hour or two in quiet and reflection, before the sun is up.’
‘Aye, and the archbishop,’ Harry sympathised.
‘Ah, yes, indeed.’ Ninian had embarked upon a rapid course of blinking, which signalled some embarrassment that Harry read his mind. ‘It will be some time before his lordship stirs. And I do confess, I find a certain solace in this private hour.’ Ninian came closer, peering up at Harry without benefit of glass. ‘I think I saw you, did I not, coming from the fore tower?’
‘Aye, no doubt ye did.’
‘Perhaps you were on duty there?’
‘I have just come off the watch,’ Harry answered, truthfully.
‘So I had supposed. Yet that does not explain what you were doing in the chamber underneath the chapel. Indeed, it does not explain it. I can see no reason for a soldier to be there. Indeed, he ought not be, you know. The chapel vaults are sacred.’
‘Your pardon,’ Harry murmured, ‘if I have offended ye, for I meant no offence.’ It surprised him that the timid clerk had ventured to attack, but his answer was prepared. ‘I chose this hour, that I not disturb or trouble the archbishop. The truth is, I was looking for something.’
Ninian pressed him, ‘Aye?’
‘Do you remember that lawyer I showed round here some while back? With the doctor from the college?’
‘Master Cullan? Aye, indeed.’
Well, he has lost a ring. And he is minded to believe he dropped it somewhere here.
‘I will tell to you the truth. I do not think it likely. I doubt he left it at the bedside of some other fellow’s wife,’ Harry’s wink at Ninian was rewarded with a blush. ‘But that is no’ the answer that he wants to hear. Well, you are my witness. I have come to look for it. And more than that, the ribald dare not ask.’
‘You have not found it then?’ Ninian asked, perplexed. ‘Then that was not the ring I saw you tuck into your pouch?’
The little clerk was sharper than he looked. But Harry was a match for him. ‘I tucked my knife into my belt. I used the blade to dig about a little in the dust. But to no avail. Then that was what you saw.’
‘No doubt it was,’ Ninian accepted. ‘For I do not see very well. Soldier . . . sin ye are here, I wonder, could I trouble ye? There is something I would ask. The truth is, it is a matter I was meant to take up with your sergeant . . . the archbishop had mentioned it, and I had clean forgot . . . He spoke of it last night . . . By rights, you see, it ought to be the chamberlain that dealt with it, but the chamberlain will have nought to do wi’ Tam Fairlie, sin the cook caught the sergeant’s daughter dipping in the honey pot and he telt the little lassie he would clip her tail and Tam came to the kitchens and caught him by the throat, and telt him he wad wake one morn to find his ain tail clipped and stuffed into his mouth, and frighted him so fearfully he does not sleep at night. Wherefore it is left to me . . . and I confess that I . . .’
‘Tam can be a fearsome loun to thae that do not ken him, and he is in a black mood now. What was it that you wanted from him?’ This answer drove the little clerk to further frightened fumbling.
‘Twas only that . . . There is a boat expected in today, to replenish the stores that were emptied by the king. And Patrick wants a soldier to open up the sea yett, afore that boat comes in.’
‘Aye, then fret no more,’ Harry promised, cheerfully. ‘I can look to that. I will go precipitate, and see to it myself.’
‘Then I am obliged to ye, for, as I will confess, I have no will to converse or dispute with that man. Good morrow to you, then.’
‘Good morrow it may be,’ Harry stretched and yawned. ‘Sin I have done my watch, and am ready for my bed now, I will say goodnight.’
‘Goodnight to you, soldier. God speed you well.’
Harry watched the little clerk climb up to the chapel, where, without his spectacles, he knelt to say his prayers, between the sergeant and the bishop, wrung out like a cloth. He did not envy Ninian, put upon and weak. It was not much of a life.
It was early, still, as Harry crossed the courtyard. No one was about. He waved to John Richan, at watch on the sea tower. John did not wave back. The man on the kitchen tower was looking to the harbour, waking to the light. The sea gate was stiff, and always hard to shift. Harry had
to pull at it with both of his hands. His arms were weak as water, from the effort he had wasted pulling John up from the pit.
John Richan on the sea tower saw Harry Petrie fall. He fell without a sound, and landed on the rocks. The dull thud of his landing was drowned out by the sea. For a moment, John stood still. Then he left his post, and climbed down to the shore. He pulled his friend up from the tide line, back upon the rocks, and saw that he was dead. He stood stricken for a moment, before he turned and fled, creeping like a limpet round the edges of the cliff. He had reached the harbour wall before the sentry saw him, and the sentry did not fathom what it was he saw. By the time he picked out Harry, in the grey mass of the rocks, the tide was coming in, and John far gone from sight.
The body was not brought up until early afternoon. A crowd began to gather ar the castle cliff, to witness the recovery. Harry Petrie’s carcass had been taken to the haven, to the harbourmaster’s house. The harbourmaster sent for Doctor Locke, whose job it was to make report on all unnatural deaths. Giles was at the college, and came down at once, with Hew. Harry’s battered body was carried up Kirk Heugh and through the castle gates. It came to rest at last in the upper gallery, a cool and quiet, open-ended place, where Giles could view the corpse in privacy and dignity.
Patrick was dismayed. ‘The port is open to the cliff, when this man lost his step and fell. He expected a boat,’ he gesticulated, helplessly. ‘Still, we expect a boat, for the court has drained us dry of all of our supplies, and all of us have worn our fingers to the bone. Ah, dear me. We all of us are tired, and all of us are exercised, and it is not remarkable that the poor man fell. Tis clear enough he slipped as he opened up the gate. He had just come off the night watch. The truth is, we have all been trauchled, with the coming of his majestie, and all the other company. The wonder is that all of us have not yet fallen to our deaths.’ He gave thanks to God that Harry had the decency to wait till James had gone, before he lost his footing and went tumbling down the cliff. ‘If ye could dae your work here, speedily, and quietly,’ he requested Giles.
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