by Pat McIntosh
‘We never had to,’ she pointed out, ‘as you said when we talked of Michael and your sister. We were always acknowledged.’
‘True. What did this Girzie hear?’
‘Ah. It seems on this occasion they were sitting in the corner by the hearth, talking with their heads together, and Girzie passed them with a tray for someone else, just as Murray said something about mortal sin.’
‘It’s hardly a surprise.’
‘So,’ Alys persisted, ‘she took her time going by them on her return to the kitchen, and heard the forester speak of slitting his throat.’
‘Oh,’ said Gil, and turned to meet her eyes again. ‘That could alter matters.’
‘Yes. I coaxed her as far as I could, but I’m not sure how much of their talk she really heard. She heard one of them say, What’s done’s done, and then there was something about Tell the old beldam what I know, but she recalled nothing more that made sense. She thinks they said also that the old woman was away.’
‘Which old woman did they mean?’ Gil contemplated this. ‘Arbella hasn’t left the coaltown this spring, so far as I’ve learned.’
‘They never mentioned a name.’ Her smile flickered. ‘A good worker, this Girzie, I should think, but rather a silly woman. She kept coming back to the idea of the forester slitting his throat. It seems she had a liking for him, and the thought of him doing such a deed has overset her. I had quite a task to persuade her that he’d done no such thing.’
‘But I wonder,’ said Gil slowly, ‘if that means we need look no further – if it was Murray or Syme supplied the poison, whether the other knew it was there or not.’
‘I think not,’ she said after a moment. ‘It would simplify matters, but –’
‘It’s too simple, isn’t it?’ he agreed, drawing his plaid up round his neck against the rain.
‘There’s no hint that they’d been recognized or suspected, no threat to separate them. No pursuit that would be a cause to take poison and be together forever.’ He recognized the influence of the romances which were Alys’s favourite reading in this pronouncement. ‘For all Girzie was so sure the forester had killed himself, she had no notion why he might have done so, and the two men you saw at Blackness gave no hint either, I think?’
‘None. And Syme’s maister was astounded to hear of it.’ Gil’s thoughts had run off at a tangent. ‘Alys, was it poison indeed? Did you test what was dried into the flask?’
‘That was why I rode down to Lanark to find you. We did, and I thought you might need to know.’ Again that serious look. ‘We rinsed both the flask and the bottle with well-water, and gave the water to two of the beasts Henry brought us. Whatever was in the bottle, it was just as it left the brewer, the ratling that drank that portion came to no harm, but the other one . . .’
‘Well?’
Alys pulled a face. ‘It died. It seemed quite normal for a while, and then began to stagger, and turned round as if it was dizzy, and then it fell over and after a time it died.’ She bit her lip, and stared into the distance. ‘I suppose, if the two men died like that, then we know it was quick, and most probably painless.’
‘We do,’ agreed Gil. ‘And we know that whatever it was, there was some in the flask. Have you or my mother any idea what it was?’
She shook her head, scattering raindrops from the brim of her hat.
‘I don’t know,’ she said. ‘Poisons are not something I – and all the ones I’ve heard about would induce purging, or vomiting, before death. And your mother has said she does not know this one either.’
‘I thought you knew everything,’ said Gil, amused and faintly relieved to find a gap in her astonishing medical knowledge. She blushed pink, and shook her head again.
‘I need a book,’ she said, ‘but I don’t know who would have such a one, except . . .’
‘Mistress Lithgo,’ Gil finished for her.
‘Except Mistress Lithgo.’ She reached out her hand, and when he took it her fingers clung to his. ‘And how can I ask her when we – Oh, Gil, how can we do this? The truth must be served, but the accidents it brings about are fearful.’
‘The truth must be served,’ he agreed, keeping a grip of her hand.
They rode up into Carluke town, and along its deep-worn main street between the two rows of cottages facing one another across it. As they passed St Andrew’s kirk at the far end of the town, Sir John Heriot popped out of his house like a figure in a child’s toy, his clerk behind him, and hurried towards them, hand out, exclaiming, ‘Maister Cunningham! In a good hour, indeed! I have great news, sir!’
‘News?’ Gil said blankly, letting go of Alys’s hand to bend down and clasp the priest’s.
‘Indeed, sir. I have a name for our man. I ken who he is.’
The clerk nodded agreement, grinning, and crossed himself energetically. Gil looked from one to the other. Beside him, Alys’s horse laid back its ears at a scavenging pig, and she tightened her reins. Steenie dismounted hastily and went to the grey’s head.
‘A name for . . .’ Gil repeated.
‘For the man out of the peat-digging. The corp in your feed-store, sir. And we must have him out of there as soon as may be, it’s no right now that I’ve discerned who he could only be.’ Above the worn and dusty black gown Sir John’s face glowed with pride and triumph. His clerk beamed and nodded again. ‘I went through the kirk records, sir, and read over all our documents, and only just now between Sext and Nones I found it! It’s clear to me that he can be no other than the parish’s own saint, the man that first brought the gospel of Christ and Our Lady in this place. Why would Carluke town’s other name be Ecclesmalesoch but to signify the kirk of the holy Malessock?’
‘What, that dusty old corp out the peat-cutting?’ said Steenie.
Gil stared at the priest in disbelief. ‘Sweet St Giles,’ he said after a moment. ‘But Sir John, you’ve no proof –’
Sir John braced himself with a complex movement of his elbows, and settled down to expound on his case, oblivious of the rain beating on his shoulders. ‘No, only consider, maister. He’s clearly been martyred for his faith, you canny deny that, by the injuries you showed to me, and one of the old tales in a roll out of the Parish Kist tells us how Malessock preached the gospel in the wilderness among the thorns.’
‘I never heard that,’ said Patey.
And if it doesn’t tell it now, thought Gil, it will by the time Sir John gets to his bed tonight. Who koude ryme in Englysshe proprely His martirdom? for sothe it am nat I, is clearly not a permissible standpoint here.
‘Thorn, you see, Thorn, maister,’ persisted the priest. ‘It can be none other!’ He clapped his hands together like a child, smiling radiantly. ‘Oh, Maister Cunningham, I’m so joyful I could dance like King David, here in the Worn Way. Indeed! And we’ll get him out of madam your mother’s feed-store as soon as maybe and brought down here to the kirk, and lay him up properly. What a great thing for my parish, sir! To have our own founder, our own evangelist, to dwell here as patron of our kirk!’
‘They’ve nothing like it in Lanark,’ agreed the clerk, nodding again. ‘Them and their wee bit of the True Cross!’
‘Are you saying that’s your saint that Rab Simson found, Sir John?’ asked Patey. ‘Never! It’s no but a stinking bundle of rotted leather, and so Henry tellt all the folk standing in line in our stable-yard this morning.’
‘No, surely, sir,’ objected Alys, ‘he has no tonsure, no trappings of a priest –’
‘There’s no sign on him at all,’ agreed Gil.
‘Did St Roch have the trappings of a priest, madam?’ demanded Sir John eloquently, waving his hand towards the church. ‘Did Our Lady wear a nun’s garments? Besides,’ he added in a more practical tone, ‘you said yourself, maister, they’d have rotted down in the peat. We’ll get him clad as befits him soon enough. Indeed.’
‘Who’s this coming, Maister Gil?’ said Steenie, peering past the buff-coloured folds of Alys’s skirts. Gil turned in the
saddle, to see a rider in Cauldhope livery approaching fast, leading a spare horse.
‘I must send to your lady mother to get all arranged,’ warbled the priest. ‘We’ll have a great procession, wi’ music and green branches, and –’
‘Sir John!’ said the newcomer urgently, reining in beside the group. Gil’s horse shied restlessly, and Socrates hurried back from his inspection of the kirkyard gate, hackles up. ‘Thanks be to Our Lady I’ve found you, maister. I’m sent for you to Davy Fleming.’
‘Oh!’ said Alys, and caught Gil’s eye.
‘To Davy?’ repeated Sir John in amazement. ‘What’s to do, Simmie? Is he in a bad way? I heard he was on his feet again.’
‘He was,’ said Gil. ‘He was up at the Pow Burn yesterday.’
‘Aye, but he sickened again yestreen after his supper,’ said Simmie. ‘And I’m seeking yourself and all, Maister Cunningham. Maister Michael said to ride on to Belstane for you, but since you’re here I’ve no need. He’s wanting a word wi’ you, and it seems to be eating at him.’
‘I will come too,’ said Alys.
‘Maister Michael wants a word?’ asked Gil.
‘Oh, I couldny say to that,’ said the man confusingly, ‘but it’s for certain Davy Fleming wants you, for I heard him say as much to the maister. Mind you,’ he added, ‘I’m no so sure myself he’s near death, for the way he shouted at Maister Michael this morning out of his bed, you never heard the like.’
‘Just let me pack up what’s needed,’ said Sir John briskly, all professional concern. ‘I’ll need to bear an intinctured wafer wi’ me, Jock, and I must borrow a horse –’
‘You’ll no need, I brought this beast in for you,’ said Simmie.
‘You’ll be wanting the new box, then,’ said the clerk to his master, with a significant look.
‘Aye, indeed!’ agreed Sir John. He grinned, and clapped his hands together. ‘A good thought, Jock! Just wait here, Simmie, and I’ll be right with you.’
Gil was shocked by the change in David Fleming, and recognized from the sudden stiffening of her back that Alys was equally dismayed. The man was huddled in the steward’s chair in the little chamber off the hall, bundled in rugs and racked by spells of shivering. The truth was self-evident of Alys’s statement that he had his death on him; overnight his plump cheeks seemed to have fallen in, his eyes were sunken, dark-ringed and feverishly bright, and there was a sheen of sweat across his brow, darkening the limp, mousy hair which clung to it.
Alys went forward and began to feel her patient’s forehead and neck with gentle fingers. He looked blankly at her, and then at Gil, then said to Michael where he stood in the doorway, ‘I want a word wi’ Maister Cunningham. It’s right urgent, sir.’
‘I’m here,’ said Gil, wondering if the man could see clearly.
‘There, now, my poor friend,’ said Sir John in sympathy. He set his leather case down on a handy stool and began unbuckling the straps which secured it. ‘We’ll ha’ a bowl and a jug of fresh well-water, maybe, Maister Michael? And I’ll need a towel and basin and all. Indeed.’
Michael nodded and turned to the door of the steward’s room. Over his directions to Simmie out in the screens passage Fleming said hoarsely, ‘This first. I’ve something I must tell you, sir.’
‘Now, now, man,’ chided Sir John. ‘What could be more urgent than your own confession and healing?’
‘You should rest,’ said Alys, ‘and gather your strength.’
‘Aye, well, I’m done for, mistress,’ said Fleming, and licked dry lips, ‘but this is important. I’ll last long enough to set this in your hands, Maister Cunningham. You’ll need to peruse this afore the quest on Thomas Murray, so you can tell the Provost all that’s needful, all the evidence against the witch. One of them or the other – or maybe they’re both in it,’ he added. ‘Aye, I wish I could ha’ seen them taken up for witchcraft and put to the test, but if that’s no God’s will for me, I must go without.’
‘Tuts, man,’ said Sir John, ‘we’ll no give up hope for you yet. We’ll see to your spiritual needs, but then I’ve a remedy to try that I’ll swear’s sovereign against all wasting diseases, and who more deserving of it than yourself?’
‘Set what in my hands?’ asked Gil. ‘Let me take it and get away, Sir David, and leave you to your spiritual duties.’
‘The rent rolls,’ said Fleming, catching at Alys’s wrist. ‘There they are on the desk waiting for your man, mistress, the rent rolls for the coal-heugh, the old one and the new one. You’ll need to read it wi’ care, maister, but it’s all in there, all you need to know, you mind I told you of it last time you were in this chamber.’
‘I hardly think Sir James would be pleased if I went off with his rent rolls,’ objected Gil.
‘Maister Michael will permit it,’ suggested Fleming. Michael, reappearing in the doorway, nodded agreement. His face was thinned by anxiety, exaggerating the curved jaw and pointed chin.
‘I could go through them too,’ said Alys.
‘No, no,’ said Fleming, condescending even in his weakness, ‘maybe you can read, lassie, but you’ve no the experience. It takes a man of law to discern these things –’
‘Here’s your basin, clerk,’ announced Simmie, charging in past his master, ‘and your water and all. Is it to be a wee Mass of healing? Or is it this new saint you’ve got? He should be a good help, seeing that Davy himself found him buried.’
‘Ah, thank you, Simmie,’ Sir John turned from the leather case, ‘and you can stay, indeed, and give me a hand wi’ the censer.’
‘New saint?’ said Fleming, distracted from his preoccupation. ‘What’s this?’
‘It’s revealed to me,’ said Sir John importantly, and kissed his stole before he set it over his shoulders, ‘the corp from the peat-digging can be none other than St Malessock who first brought the gospel to this parish.’ He bent to the leather case again, and produced a small linen bundle which he unfolded to reveal a leathery stick-like object. ‘And here I have one of the holy man’s fingers –’
‘Oh, so Alan was right,’ said Gil. Sir John gave him a look of blank innocence.
‘You’ll no dip that in the water, will you?’ said Simmie, recoiling. ‘I’d sooner the Lee Penny, myself. At least that’s clean, considering how often it gets dipped.’
‘Lockhart and his folk at the Lee won’t be pleased if there’s another source of healing in the district,’ observed Michael. Sir John’s jaw dropped. Clearly he had not thought of that.
‘Who’s Malessock?’ demanded Fleming. ‘It canny be any Malessock that came out the peat-digging, it’s Thomas Murray.’
‘No, it’s no Murray,’ said Simmie, ‘for we found him by Bonnington yesterday, Davy, you mind Wat and I tellt you all.’
‘I’ll get away,’ said Gil cravenly. Alys looked up and nodded, but Fleming’s grip on her wrist tightened.
‘The rolls, mistress. Yonder on the desk. Take the rolls, or you take them, sir.’
‘Bring them out into the hall,’ suggested Michael. Gil, in some relief, gathered up the two yellowing scrolls and stepped to the door. Alys disengaged her wrist from Fleming’s grasp, and crossed herself.
‘We’ll leave you with Sir John,’ she said. ‘God speed the business.’
‘Amen,’ agreed Sir John.
‘Read them wi’ care, now,’ admonished Fleming.
‘He seemed well enough when I came home,’ said Michael, ‘though he was chastened once I’d done wi’ him. Maister Gil would tell you about him being up at the Pow Burn . . .?’
Alys nodded. Across the hall where he had been ordered to wait, Socrates emitted a single indignant falsetto yip. Gil snapped his fingers, and the dog paced over to join them.
‘You could sit here in the window, and get the light for the task,’ Michael went on. ‘No, he wasn’t so good after supper last night, and this morning he took a wee sup of porridge, with honey in it after what you said about honey the other day, mistress, but it never helped,
and then he called for Maister Gil and I thought we’d best get a priest to him and all, and set Simmie on to look for you.’
‘Indeed, yes,’ said Alys. ‘You take that one, Gil, I take this, and then we can tell poor Fleming we’ve been through both. Has he been at the pear comfits again, Michael? I could smell them on his breath.’
‘So did I,’ Michael was striding up and down, ‘but I’ve no notion where he’s hid them.’
‘He should fast now, with well-water to drink and not even bread to eat, till noon tomorrow, if you can manage it, and certainly none of the comfits.’
‘I’ll try, though the other men aye bring him food when he shouts for it.’ Michael looked round as Sir John’s voice rose in the familiar, comforting words from beyond the screens passage. ‘Jackie Heriot’s a powerful singer, isn’t he? What’s he about, anyway? What’s that nasty thing he’s brought wi’ him?’
‘He reckons our corp from the peat-digging is this Malessock he claims is in the parish records.’ Gil had untied the tape on the older roll, and now spread out the end on his knee. Socrates sniffed at the edge of the parchment, then lay down with an ostentatious sigh, his head on Gil’s foot.
‘Could it be?’ asked Michael uncertainly, pausing in his traverse. Gil grunted, but Alys looked up.
‘I would not have said so either,’ she said with regret. ‘One thing to surmise that the corp might be someone from the days of the saints, or even from the time Our Lord was born, but another entirely to give him a name as if we had proof.’
Gil, aware of relief, nodded agreement.
‘He came up out of the peat with nothing,’ he said. ‘All we know of him is the violent way he died. If Sir John wishes to give him a name and honour him, there’s no harm, I suppose, but I’ll believe he’s a saint working miracles of healing when I witness one.’
‘The Lee Penny works,’ Michael argued.
‘What is that?’ Alys asked, finger on her place. ‘Simmie mentioned it too.’
Gil immersed himself in the roll he held, only half-hearing Michael’s account of how a Lockhart, of the house by Carluke called the Lee, had brought back a mysterious coin from the Crusades, widely known to cure the pestilence and other serious illness if you drank water it had been dipped in. He was less convinced than Michael of its efficacy, though one heard tales.