by Pat McIntosh
Michael, recognising this joke, acknowledged it with a flick of his brows and went on.
‘So they fenced about a bit, neither o them willing to name what they’d to discuss, but at length it cam clear, that the Irishman’s negotiating for Somerville and his marrows to slay somebody, here in Scotland. You can be sure I cockit my lugs at that,’ he said grimly, ‘trying after a name I could report or warn. But all they said was, The boy, the stocach, the gossoon. Never a name used.’ He looked about the table, seeming a little thrown off his stride by the expressionless stares of two of his hearers.
‘Those all mean the same thing,’ Gil observed encouragingly.
‘I ken that,’ said Michael. ‘There was one or two black Irish at the college in my time. So as far’s I could collect, the gossoon they’re after isny in Scotland the now, but he’s expected any time, as a guest o James Stewart. The Gordons were mentioned and all, Lady Katherine in especial, you ken, Huntly’s third lassie. Whether they’re in the plot or they’re a’ to be slain wi the gossoon I couldny make out. I think the Irishman was stepping back and forth fro the window, the way his voice came and went. Somerville was reluctant, to gie him credit, though I suspect it was as much because he doubted being able to do the deed without being recognised. He said a time or two he’d no wish for the attention o the Crown.’
‘Dear, dear,’ said Boyd.
‘The Irishman pressed him a bit,’ Michael continued, ‘mentioned a price though I never caught what it was, said if he wouldny do it he’d find another. Then the steward interrupted them.’ He spread his hands. ‘That’s about all I got.’
‘You got a good deal,’ said Boyd at last. ‘Dates? Places?’
‘No,’ said Michael with regret. ‘Save that he’s no in Scotland yet, as I said. Oh, a Maximilian was mentioned. That’s no a Scots name, nor yet an Irish one.’
‘No,’ said Boyd.
‘I hesitate to ask it,’ said Gil, ‘but did you see any sign of Mistress Madur? Any word from the steward – or Somerville himself, for that?’
‘Oh!’ said Michael, and swallowed another gulp of ale. ‘As well you asked, I near forgot. Attie said he saw one o Bluebell’s get in the stables, about five year old wi a sock and a star. Somerville denied all knowledge o the lassie, but then he’d had a chance to think about it. I heard the steward tell him what I was asking when he finally chapped at the closet door where they were talking. Or at least,’ he said scrupulously, ‘I heard Somerville saying, Michael Douglas? Asking for who? Oh, the deil take him, I’d better ha a word. So he’d time to get his tale straight, saying he’d no notion she was from hame. I never got round to telling Crombie that,’ he added, ‘So I hope the trod’s no all ower the countryside on a false trail, if he did catch up wi them.’
‘You never had a sight of the Irishman?’ Boyd asked casually.
‘No, I never. Somerville cam down to the garden himsel to speak wi me, expressed concern for his niece, said he hoped she was safe.’ He grunted sceptically, and fell silent.
‘You’re right,’ said Gil after a moment. ‘There’s treason afoot, and we need to inform on it. Will you scribe it, or will I? Then we can get it sent to,’ he paused again, considering. ‘I’m inclined to send it to Blacader, making it clear who got the information.’ He met his cousin’s eye across the table, and got a tiny nod in acknowledgement.
‘I can scribe it,’ said Michael reluctantly. ‘I think maybe you’re like to be busy.’
‘Good man,’ said Boyd, and pushed his stool back from the table. ‘Now, shall we go up and greet my aunt? Then you can collect Lady Tib and get away home.’
‘I’ll bide here,’ said Doig hastily. ‘No need for me to disturb her ladyship.’ He reached for the final wedge of the pie, and nodded dismissal.
The three ladies were in the solar, with the last of the sunlight still sloping in at the north windows, warming the white sandstone of the empty fireplace. Tib was drowsing on the daybed, Alys and her mother-in-law were talking softly, and Lady Egidia’s cat was curled on her knee, its kitten sound asleep in the basket. Socrates bounded in ahead of Gil, waving his tail at Alys, and the cat looked up, flattened its ears and glared, but stayed where it was. Lady Egidia stroked the grey fur and smiled at her kinsman.
‘Come in, Maister Boyd,’ she said. ‘I’ve been waiting for you.’
Boyd made her a deep bow, flourishing his felt hat.
‘Forgive me, madam!’ he said, pressing the other hand to his heart. ‘Though I may never forgive mysel for keeping sic a one waiting, more decore than of before And swetar be sic sevyne.’
Her eyebrows went up.
‘You suggest I am indeflore?’ she asked.
‘I need to get Tib home,’ said Michael, crossing the chamber to take his wife’s hand. ‘It’s high time she was back in her own place.’
In the bustle of rousing Tib, ordering horses and a suitable saddle, bidding farewell, Gil managed to draw Alys aside and exchange a summary of what they had both discovered after they parted in the afternoon, though hers differed only in the greater detail from Michael’s earlier report.
‘That poor girl,’ she said, ‘in such a plight. I hope they are keeping her safe. Gil, do you really think she is at The Cleuch?’
‘I think she’s been taken there,’ he said cautiously. ‘I don’t know if she’s still there. If they work out that Michael could have overheard them, they’ll move her. They might move her anyway, merely because he asked after her.’
The travellers finally waved off from the gate, Tib’s plaintive tones dwindling into the warm evening, the remaining party retreated to the solar again.
‘Now,’ said Lady Egidia, sitting down and lifting her cat, ‘what are you after, Alexander? How is your sister, by the way? And her bairn? The new marriage goes well?’
‘It does,’ admitted Boyd with a grimace. ‘He’s no at all to my taste, nor I’d think to yours, madam, but Maidie has John Sempill well in hand, and the boy is shaping better than I feared. He’s more a Boyd than a Sempill.’
‘Our Lady be praised for that,’ said Lady Egidia. ‘And what is it you want wi my son?’
‘Guidance,’ he said promptly. ‘I need to find my way to The Cleuch this night.’
‘The night?’ she said, raising her eyebrows. ‘It’s no that far, a course, but need it be the night?’
‘It must,’ he said. ‘I need to be in Lanark by daylight. Besides, if Mistress Madur’s there, as we think she might be, the sooner we fetch her away the better.’
‘You’d need men for that,’ she said briskly, ‘and Henry’s taken the most of our fellows for a trod. How certain are you she’s there? I’d ha thought they’d move her again after Michael was there. After all, they seem to be waiting for Vary to do something for them, so they’ll no want her rescued yet awhile. Will you and Gil be enough on your own?’
‘Mother,’ said Gil, aware of fighting a losing battle, ‘last time I went out after dark wi Sandy Boyd I was near being arrested for housebreaking.’
‘Surely no, dear,’ she said. Alys caught Gil’s eye, looking anxious. ‘Sandy, you’d never lead your cousin into anything like that, would you?’
‘Oh, wouldn’t he?’ said Gil, before Boyd could answer. ‘What are you planning at The Cleuch, anyway, Sandy? Tell us. The truth, mind. Audrey Madur’s nothing to do wi’t, is she? She’s no more than a pretext.’
‘Oh, the truth?’ said his kinsman, waving one large white hand so that for those who knew her Madame Olympe was suddenly in the chamber. ‘What’s truth but a naked lassie at a well? She aye needs covered up in some way. I want to be at The Cleuch,’ he said, reverting to Sandy Boyd, ‘for a word wi Robert Somerville, who I think kens more than a wee bit about something I’m concerned wi. I’d be right glad o a word wi his guest and all, if he’s still about, but I’m less hopeful o that. And as I say, if this lassie’s there we can bring her away. Maybe.’
‘Michael kens the house better than I,’ said Gil. ‘You’d be be
tter waiting till the morn.’
‘And your word won’t wait?’ said his mother, ignoring this. ‘Come, Gil, don’t be so misobliging. I’m sure Sandy willny lead you into more housebreaking the night, will you, dear? Or anything else of the sort?’
Alys was biting her lip, but Boyd gave her a gleaming smile, then turned the same on Lady Egidia.
‘He’ll be as safe as if he rode in my purse,’ he assured her, patting the item.
‘I wouldny fit,’ said Gil. Boyd flicked his eyebrows at him, but the smile did not waver.
‘I think you should find your father’s helm, Gil,’ said Lady Egidia. ‘It’s in the great kist in my chamber, along wi his good jack.’
‘Madame—’ began Alys. Lady Egidia turned; they exchanged a long look. Then Alys dropped her eyes. ‘I suppose,’ she said quietly. Gil looked from one to the other, frowning. What were they about?
‘Well, if that’s settled,’ said Boyd. ‘Away and find your helm, Gil, and we’ll be off. Ten mile, did you say, and the light going?’
‘There’s a moon,’ said Alys, apparently accepting the situation.
‘In the house o the Ram,’ said Boyd, ‘so it rises at midnight.’
‘Aye, but it’s the third quarter,’ said Gil gloomily. ‘It’ll no be much help.’ He got to his feet, and laughed suddenly, without humour. ‘I recall Pierre complaining that Scotland is by far too full of strong-minded women. He was right there.’
‘Well, I canny think of any here,’ said his mother. ‘I’ve no notion who you’d mean.’
Lying on a dark hillside, peering down at the policies of The Cleuch, the groom Steenie said, ‘You see, maisters, I was right to come round this way.’
‘Agreed,’ said Gil. ‘I shouldny ha doubted you.’
The man had been a last-minute addition to the party, when Lady Egidia had accompanied them all down to the stableyard and found him the only stablehand still about, having been home at his supper when the trod set out.
‘Ah, Steenie,’ she had said, and even in the failing light Gil had seen on Steenie’s scarred face the expression most men wore when addressed by Lady Egidia in that tone. ‘You ken Forth and the lands about it, I think.’
‘Aye, mistress,’ he acknowledged, looking at the rest of the group rather than meet her eye, a flicker of recognition in his face as he saw Doig.
‘Fine,’ she said. ‘Saddle up for yoursel and Maister Gil, as well as my cousin and his man here. They’re wanting to be at The Cleuch by moonrise.’
Alys’s hand slid into Gil’s; he looked down at her, grimacing, and she tightened her clasp, and stroked the moth-eaten velvet of his father’s good jack with her other hand.
‘You’ll be careful,’ she said.
‘If I can.’ He raised the hand in his and kissed it. ‘Don’t wake for me, sweetheart.’
‘What, you think I can sleep?’
‘Gil, are you coming or no?’ demanded his cousin.
‘And Sandy,’ said Lady Egidia, as Boyd swung himself into the saddle. He gave her another gleaming smile and she switched to French. ‘When you come into Lanark, if you should encounter this Madame Olympe of whom I hear so much.’
‘Aye?’ he said, the gleam fading a trifle.
‘Give her my good greetings and tell her how greatly I long to meet her. She must be a personage of the most remarkable.’
‘I’ll do that, madam,’ said Boyd, maintaining the smile resolutely, then bent to assist Doig to scramble up behind him, his mount flattening its ears at the unexpected movements. Gil grinned at his horse’s flanks as he checked the girth, then took his reins from Steenie and mounted up.
‘Let’s away, then,’ he said, ‘afore the night’s wasted.’
Now, studying the scene before them in the light summer night, he reckoned it was no more than an hour past midnight. The moon was up, but still low in a clear sky, silvering the hills about them; the cottages of Forth were shadows against the white ribbon of the road half a mile away, and an owl crossed soundlessly before them, silencing the tiny squeaks and rustles of the night. All was peaceful, except around the house itself.
‘What are they at?’ Steenie wondered. ‘The place is beelin!’
‘That could be in our favour,’ said Boyd thoughtfully. Below them the torches hurried to and fro in the yards, lights moved from one window of the house to another, alarmed shouting rose up to them clearly on the warm night air. ‘What are they saying?’
‘Someone’s deid,’ said Gil, catching the word. Doig swore.
‘So what is it ye’re wanting?’ Steenie asked. ‘Was it just a look at the house, or are ye for calling on them, or what? Will we go down and chap the door?’
‘I’m wanting a word wi Robert Somerville,’ growled Doig, ‘whether he’s deid or no.’
‘You’re seeking the lassie Madur, Gil, are you no?’ said Boyd without looking round. ‘House or outhouses, or the tower-house?’
‘No saying,’ said Gil. ‘If we get closer, I might make it out. And you?’
He felt rather than saw his cousin’s shrug beside him.
‘I’m here to speak wi Rab Somerville, like Billy,’ he said. ‘And I’m planning to kill his house-guest, forbye.’
‘Right,’ said Steenie. ‘So you’ll be wanting to get closer, then?’
The house, a generous edifice much as Michael had described it, of two timber-framed wings on either end of a high-windowed stone hall, was perched on the edge of a steep-sided river valley, one short wing facing the thickly tree-clad slope. Gil realised with slight surprise that it was the Mouse Water which ran there.
‘If I dwelt there, I’d ha cleared the glen,’ he said critically. ‘Too much cover.’
‘They’ve a stout wall,’ said Steenie. ‘And clear ground atween that and the house. It’s no a strong place, but Somerville’s no daft. And they’ve the tower-house yet, if they’d the time to retreat to it. I’s wager the lassie’s in there, maister.’
‘I see that,’ said Gil. ‘I’d say you were right.’
The tower-house, an old-fashioned solid structure, lay south-east of the main house, at the other side of a complex of outhouses and stables. It would have been invisible, Gil saw, from the north side of the house where Michael had been put to wait.
‘The trees are still too far away to be any help,’ said Sandy Boyd. ‘Maybe we should just throw you ower the wall, Billy.’
Doig growled at him.
‘I’m inclined to try the main yett, here at the south side,’ said Gil. ‘D’ye see, it’s ajar. I can see torchlight in the gap by times. That gets us into the yard where all the stir’s happening, and we can plan from there.’
‘Well seen,’ said Boyd. ‘Right, who’s wi us? Billy, you’re wi me, I take it.’
‘I’m wi Maister Gil,’ said Steenie firmly.
‘Signals,’ said Gil.
‘Oh, if you hear me scream, run like lightning,’ said Boyd cheerfully.
‘I can do a peesweep,’ said Doig improbably. ‘If I’m leaving, I’ll cry like a peesweep, three times, and make for where we left the horses.’
Gil settled his father’s helm more firmly on his head, wishing yet again that the brim was narrower like that of his own helm, and tightened the chinstrap.
‘Let’s go,’ he said.
Whatever had happened within the high wall, it had overset the household completely. There seemed to be no watch being kept; they approached the main gate of the place with caution but were not challenged, and the shouting they could hear made it plain that someone was dead, that another man who might have had authority had left the house in the afternoon, and someone they only called him was nowhere to be found. Gil paused by the gates and held up a hand, listening.
After a moment he braced himself, pushed the gate wider and stepped inside, aware of the other men following him.
‘What’s afoot here?’ he demanded in carrying tones. ‘What way’s this for a baron’s household to be behaving at this hour?’
&nb
sp; Behind him, his cousin stifled a laugh. Two, then three, then half a dozen men in the yard stopped their running about, stared at him for a moment and then approached slowly, the torches illuminating a dawning hope in their expressions.
‘Maister? Somerville’s deid,’ said the one nearest him bluntly. ‘Somerville’s deid, knifed in his closet, and we dinna ken what to do!’
Doig snarled. Sandy Boyd said, expressionless, ‘Oh, my. What a pity.’
Chapter Seven
‘Who’s your steward?’ Gil asked. ‘Who’s in charge?’
‘Naeb’dy,’ said the same man. ‘We’ve no— he sent the maist o them out an errand afore suppertime, and the steward wi them; they’s just us here. We’ve no instructions.’
Clearly, the more reliable men had gone with the errand, Gil thought.
‘Right,’ he said decisively. ‘I want the whole of you that’s left here to stop running about like hens wi the fox in the yard, and get assembled here in yon corner. Steenie, you can owersee that. And I want a look at Somerville first. You,’ he pointed to the spokesman, ‘take us up to where he lies.’
‘Me?’ said the man in alarm. ‘I’m an outside man, I’m no used wi the house.’
‘I’ll tak ye, maister,’ said another man, stepping forward. ‘I’ll no look at him, mind, he’s all ower blood, I seen him already, but I’ll tak ye up the stair.’
‘Here,’ said the man who said he was an outdoor man, ‘is he to go in and all? The duarch?’ He was making signs against evil with his free hand. Doig grinned his humourless grin at him, showing white teeth, and stropped his knife on his hard palm.
‘He is,’ said Gil curtly.
Finding the usual collection of lanterns set on a kist just inside the great door of the house, he made their guide wait while he lit one for himself, and watched Boyd and Doig do likewise. After a little thought the man lifted a fourth and put fire to the candle inside.
‘It’s this way,’ he said, looking warily about him at the shadowed hall. ‘And he’s— we dinna ken where the man that did it’s gone. If he’s in the house yet or no. He could be anywhere, maister, just waiting to slit all our throats!’