by Pat McIntosh
‘You were expecting me?’
‘Himself is, certain. He woke me to say you would be here, he had seen it. It is a thing he does now and then.’
‘He did not see what came to Bess, I suppose?’
‘If he did he has not told me.’ She took the change the baker’s man offered her and turned towards her lodging. ‘I am troubled about him, maister. His women come and go, though never none like Bess, and I have never seen him shaken like this, not even when the servant lassie at Banff drowned herself. He is still saying he may never play again.’
She strode through the pend, nodding to neighbours as she emerged into the yard.
‘And Eoghan Campbell was here again yesterday before Vespers,’ she said, ‘getting another crack with her in there, and then round our door asking where was Bess’s things. I sent him away,’ she said with some satisfaction.
The harper was seated in the great chair where Gil had seen him before. He was in formal dress again, as if for a great occasion, finished off with the gold chain and velvet cap which he had worn at the Cross on May Day. Gil, distracted, counted hastily and discovered this was still only the fourth of May. The harper had risen and was bowing to him.
‘A blessing on the house,’ he said.
‘And on the guest in the house,’ said the harper. ‘Good morning to you, maister. Woman, bring refreshment for our guest.’
To Gil’s relief, Ealasaidh brought him not usquebae but ale in a wooden beaker and a platter of fresh bannocks. He drank the health of his hosts, and hesitated, wondering where to broach the subject of Sempill’s offer.
The harper, after a moment, gave him help.
‘It is as a man of law you are here, not my son’s tutor,’ he stated. ‘Put your case, maister.’
‘It is hardly a case,’ said Gil. My son’s tutor? What does the old boy mean? he wondered.
‘It is a heavy thing,’ said the harper. ‘The burden of it woke me. Speak, and make the matter clear to us.’
‘It is a word from John Sempill of Muirend,’ said Gil.
Putting matters as fairly as he could, he explained Sempill’s offer. Ealasaidh listened with growing fury, and as soon as Gil stopped speaking she exploded with, ‘The ill-given kithan! The hempie! Does he think we would let a gallows-breid like him raise Bess’s bairn?’
‘Woman,’ said her brother, ‘be silent. He has not offered to raise the bairn.’
‘He has not,’ agreed Gil. ‘The offer is only to recognize the child as his heir. I think he is aware that that would give him some control over it, and hence the promise to see you right.’
‘Does he mean money?’ said Ealasaidh suspiciously.
‘Those were his words,’ said Gil. ‘I offer no interpretation.’
The harper sat silent for a little, his blank stare directed at the empty hearth.
‘What would your advice be?’ he asked at length.
‘Aenghus!’
‘Let Maister Cunningham answer, woman. We must do something for the bairn, for we can hardly be trailing him about Scotland with Nancy, and it is best to consider everything. Maister?’
‘I am acting for Sempill of Muirend in this,’ Gil pointed out, rather uncomfortable. The harper bowed his head with great stateliness. ‘However, if I was advising a friend in such a case, I would suggest at least talking to Sempill, to find out what more he intends. There might be some benefit in it -‘
‘But at what cost!’ exclaimed Ealasaidh.
‘Further, if you were to pursue the matter, I would recommend that a written contract be entered into, and that it be made out with great care, to protect the bairn in the first instance. He is Bess Stewart’s heir, you realize that, with land in his own right so soon as the matter is settled -‘
‘Is that what Sempill is after?’ asked the harper. The boy’s land?’
‘I do not know that,’ said Gil.
‘Aenghus, we cannot trust him! Bess did not trust him! He will smother the bairn as soon as he gets his hands on him, he only wants the property -‘
‘Bess’s family could contest that if the bairn were to die in infancy,’ Gil observed.
‘And he will not love him!’
‘That I think may be true,’ said Gil.
The harper suddenly rose to his feet. ‘Woman, give me the small harp,’ he said. She stared at him, and slowly reached out and lifted the smallest clarsach. Clasping it, he paused for a moment, then pronounced, ‘This is my word to John Sempill of Muirend. I will meet him, upon conditions, to talk more of this, though I promise nothing.’
‘And the conditions?’ prompted Gil.
‘That yourself be present to see fairness, and that another man of law be present on the bairn’s account. Myself can speak for myself.’
‘Those are reasonable conditions; said Gil formally. ‘I will bear your word to john Sempill.’
‘And then he began tuning the harp.’
‘It would need it, by now,’ agreed Maistre Pierre. ‘Have another bannock.’
Gil, turning in at the pend of the White Castle, had met Alys hurrying out to help at the Hamiltons’ house. Greeting him with pleasure, she had sent him in to share her father’s noon bite of bannocks and potted herring, and hastened on her way.
‘Oh, it did. The point was that Ealasaidh was fearing that he might not play again. So whatever else Sempill has done, he has got the harper’s hands on the harp again. I won’t tell him that.’
‘What will you tell him?’
‘Exactly what McIan told me. It was a formal statement of intent, given with the harp in his hands - it is binding.’
‘I had not known that.’ The mason chewed thoughtfully. ‘Who will act for the bairn?’
‘My uncle may. Failing him, there are other men of law in the Chanonry. I would be more comfortable acting for John Sempill if I knew his intention regarding the bairn, and particularly if I were not investigating the murder of his wife.’
‘And of that poor girl.’
‘Indeed. Did Alys tell you what we learned from her friend? A very poor witness, but it is reasonably clear what she saw.’
‘It is clear that Bridie had a rich lover, but how much can we rely on the other girl’s description? I thought all servant lassies sighed for a rich lover.’
‘Some are more practical than that. Kat herself is winching with one of Andrew Hamilton’s journeymen. Her description is not very detailed, but listen - there is more. Balthasar of Liege stopped me this morning.’
He summarized the musician’s observation.
‘Aha,’ said Maistre Pierre. ‘And you saw James Campbell in the market yesterday. What time would that be, think you?’
Gil cast his mind back.
‘It feels like last week,’ he complained. ‘It was before I met Euphemia Campbell and her Italian, and when Alys caught up with us at Greyfriars it was just Nones. Say about half-way between Sext and Nones, at the foot of the High Street near the Tolbooth. He was talking to a lassie with a basket.’
‘He was, was he?’
‘We don’t know which lassie it was,’ Gil pointed out. ‘As you said, every woman in the burgh was out at the market. No, I must go back to the Sempill house and speak to James Campbell, to Euan, and to Sempill himself.’
‘Shall you ask your uncle to, act for the harper’s bairn?’
‘Not to say ask. I will tell him the story, and he will likely offer.’
The mason drained his beaker and set it down.
‘I will come up the hill with you,’ he said. ‘To cut short the noontime football and see what Wattie has done. Will you ask your uncle if I may call on him after Vespers?’
The mastiff Doucette was barking. Gil heard her as he parted from the mason at the Wyndhead, baying angrily like a dog confronting a larger enemy. Several other dogs added their comments occasionally, but the deep regular note continued while he walked up Rottenrow past a group of children playing a singing-game. Entering the gateway of the Sempill house, he was surp
rised to see Euphemia, seated on the mounting-block and teasing the dog by throwing it a crust from time to time, watched by her silent Italian. He paused, studying her. She was pretty enough to attract any man, and that trick she had of clinging to Sempill’s arm and smiling up at him was certainly one which would have appealed to Hughie.
Euphemia tore off another crust and threw it to the dog with a graceful movement, the wide green velvet sleeves of her gown falling back from her hands.
The musician’s dark gaze fell on Gil, and he said something to his mistress. She looked round, slid off the mounting-block and came towards the gate, sidestepping quickly as the mastiff rushed at her snarling, and smiled brilliantly at him, pushing back the fall of her French hood with a graceful movement.
‘Maister Cunningham, how nice to see you. Have you found who killed Bridie Miller yet? Will the serjeant take someone up for it?’
‘Not yet,’ said Gil, crossing the yard to meet her, staying carefully outside the mastiff’s range. ‘Good day to you, madam. I have a -‘
‘Oh, but he must! Have you never a word of advice for him? Was it the same ill-doer who killed Bess? Is Glasgow full of people killing young women?’ She shuddered, biting a knuckle. ‘None of us is safe. What if something came to that little poppet who summoned you yesterday? Such a well-mannered child, a pity she’s so plain.’ Gil recognized Alys with difficulty. ‘Or to Mally here, or those bairns out at the Cross?’
‘Calma, calma, donna mia,’ said the Italian beside her. She threw him a glance, and smiled again at Gil, a little tremulously.
‘Forgive me,’ she said. ‘What brings you here, Maister Cunningham?’
‘I have a word for Maister Sempill,’ said Gil, ‘and I wanted to speak to your brother. Are they at home?’
‘I think John’s in the stables.’ She lifted the bread from the mounting-block, looked down at it, and threw another lump, rewarded by further round of barking. ‘Ask them at the house.’
Gil left her breaking a new loaf, and climbed the forestair to the house door, aware of the lutenist’s dark gaze on his back. Hughie, he reflected, if confronted by that lovely smile, those taking ways, would not have troubled to resist Euphemia. And how did he feel, he wondered, when he realized what she had cost him? Not guilty, most like. Few things were ever Hughie’s fault.
The door stood open, but the hall within was deserted. After some calling, he raised Euphemia’s companion, who emerged from a door at the far end of the hall exclaiming, ‘Your pardon, maister! I never heard you, the dog’s that loud. Oh, it’s Maister Cunningham, is it, the man of law? And what are you after today?’
Gil explained his errand, and she sniffed.
‘Maister James is in the tower room with his books, I think Sempill’s out the back docking pups’ tails. Here, you go down this stair.’
She turned towards another doorway, picking up her dark wool skirts.
‘No need to trouble you,’ Gil said. ‘I can find my own way.’
‘Oh, it’s no trouble,’ she said a trifle grimly, as if she was protecting the house from unauthorized invasion. She stumped down the stair, the rosary and hussif at her belt clacking together at each step, and said over her shoulder, in unconscious echo of her mistress, ‘And have you found who’s running about knifing women? We’ll none of us be able to sleep till someone’s taken up for it. Euphemia’s quite ill with the worry, the wee sowl, and it’s not good for her.’
‘I’m still searching,’ said Gil, emerging after her into the reeking stable yard. John Sempill was just going into the cart-shed opposite, but seeing Gil he turned and waited for him to cross the yard.
‘Well, Gil?’
‘Well, John. Finished with the pups?’
‘Oh, that was an hour since. I’d ha been quicker with it, but Euphemia helped me.’
‘Oh, she never!’ exclaimed Mistress Murray. ‘In her green velvet, too! It’ll be all over blood.’ She turned and hastened back across the yard.
Gil, suppressing an image of Euphemia Campbell being stripped of the green velvet gown, said, ‘I’ve had a word with the harper, john.’
‘Aye?’
He recited the statement the harper had delivered. Sempill glared at him.
‘Better than nothing,’ he said grudgingly. ‘Aye, I’ll meet him, and his conditions. Do you want to name someone yourself to stand for the brat, or will I find a man?’
‘I thought to ask my uncle.’
Sempill shot him another look, scowling.
‘Aye,’ he said at length. ‘That makes it clear I’m dealing straight with him.’
‘It does that, John,’ agreed Gil.
Sempill opened his mouth to speak, closed it, and finally said in exasperation, ‘So when can we meet? I need to get this over with.’
‘I have still to speak to my uncle, but if he was free this evening—’
‘Not this evening. I’m promised to Clem Walkinshaw.’
‘Then it needs be a few days hence. I’ve an errand that takes me out of town.’
‘What errand? I thought you were hunting down Bess’s killer?’
‘I am. This is to that end. What can you tell me about Bess’s property in Bute?’
‘In Bute? There’s the two farms from her father, and the burgage plot from Edward Stewart, with the house on it. Then there’s the two joint feus, which will be mine now, I suppose, little use though they are. One’s a stretch of Kingarth covered in stones, and the other’s between the castle and the sea. Gets burned every time the burgh’s raided, it seems. God, I’ll get back at him for that. Little benefit she’ll have got from the rents, mind you,’ he added thoughtfully.
‘And the other property? Whose is that now?’
‘What the devil’s it to do with you?’
‘It may have some bearing on her death.’
Sempill stared at Gil. ‘Are you still harping on that one? It was some broken man, skulking in the kirkyard, that’s obvious.’
‘Not to me. Do you know whose the other property is now?’
‘I suppose,’ said Sempill, chewing his lip, ‘it depends on how it was left. Alexander Stewart would know, he likely drew up both wills. Is that where you’re going? To poke about Rothesay asking questions that don’t concern you?’
‘They concern your wife’s death, which I am investigating,’ Gil said. ‘Another thing, John. Did you know that that pair of gallowglasses knew your wife before?’
Sempill stared at him.
‘Of course I did, gomerel. Where do you think I got them from? She hired them, after Stirling field when the country was unsettled and I was away. John of the Isles was raging up and down the west coast, and who knew what he’d do next. So of course I sent Neil down with the message for her on May Day. I knew he’d deliver it to the right woman.’
‘Can I speak to them?’
‘You can not. They’re away an errand. Both of them.’
‘When will they return?’
‘When they’ve completed it, I hope. I’ll send them over to you when they get back, but it’ll likely be Sunday or Monday.’
‘Thank you. Then can I speak to Maister Campbell of Glenstriven?’
James Campbell was in the chamber at the top of the wheel stair, where Gil had first spoken to the household. He was seated by the window, one expensively booted leg crossed over the other, with a book of Latin poetry in his hands, but he closed this politely enough, keeping a finger in his place, and allowed Gil to take him back over the events of May Day without revealing anything new.
‘Where is this leading?’ he asked at length. ‘I have answered these questions before.’
‘Some new detail might emerge,’ said Gil inventively. ‘Now - do you have a green velvet hat? What shape is it?’
‘This one, you mean?’ Campbell nodded at the gown on the floor beside him, and lifted it to untangle a hat from the folds of material. ‘See for yourself.’
Gil turned the hat in his hand. It was a floppy bag-like object, with
a couple of seagull feathers secured to one side by a brooch with a green stone. It smelled of musk and unwashed hair.
‘And were you wearing this,’ he said carefully, ‘when you were in Glasgow last market day? Not yesterday, but a week ago?’
‘I likely was,’ said Campbell easily. ‘I stayed here, and left that here with my other gear.’
‘How long were you in Glasgow?’
‘A few days - from the Wednesday to the Saturday. Then I went out to Muirend where Sempill was, to persuade my sister home. I’m still trying, without much success.’
‘And that was when you met Bridie Miller?’
There was a silence.
‘It was,’ said Campbell finally.
‘When did you last see her?’
The green eyes flickered. Gil could almost hear the other man recognizing that it was useless to deny it. With a barely perceptible hesitation, Campbell admitted, ‘On May Day. Before Compline.’
‘That was why you were late to the service?’
‘It was. But Neil came in just ahead of me, and Bess was live when he left her. That’s certain enough. And before you ask, yes, I did see the two of them in the kirkyard. They were just going into the trees as I came through the gate, and Neil crossed to the south door and went into the church before me.’
‘I am looking at what happened to Bridie,’ Gil said. ‘It is likely but not necessary that the two deaths are connected.’
‘Is that what it seems to you?’ said Campbell, his tone challenging. ‘An exercise in logic?’
‘No,’ said Gil a little defensively, ‘but it helps. Now, I saw you in the market yesterday,’ he continued, going on the attack, ‘talking to another servant lass. What was in her basket?’
‘Her basket?’ repeated Campbell. Gil waited. ‘Green stuff. Let me think. A pair of smoked fish, a package of laces and a great bundle of something green. Long narrow leaves.’ His fingers described them. ‘I know - leeks.’
‘You seem very sure of that,’ Gil commented. Campbell grinned without humour, showing his teeth in the same way his sister did.
‘I offer you the advice for nothing, brother: there’s always a good line to be spun from a lassie’s marketing. Believe me, they love it if you take an interest in what they have bought.’
