‘If anything else disrupts our fishing,’ he said, ‘I wouldn’t like to say what might happen to other people’s looms, or their stock.’
‘Is that a threat, Hugh Farquhar?’ said Geordie Kinkell, in a shocked tone.
‘Ach, he could never carry a threat through from here to the end of the road,’ said Sandy Kinkell, and pushed his way to the front. ‘Sure his sister’s a better man than he is.’
‘Well it’s sure you’ve changed her from the good young lass she was, Sandy Kinkell,’ snapped Hugh, ‘but I didn’t know you’d turned her into a man.’ His fists were already up in front of his thin chest.
‘Let her come back to me and I’ll show you how much she’s a man, and how much a woman and my wife!’ cried Sandy.
‘Now, lads, enough,’ said Joe Baillie, not wishing to bring up the subject of returning the inconveniently kidnapped Alison. He barred Hugh’s way with an authoritative hand outstretched. ‘I’m sure Alison will be in her rightful home as soon as possible.’ Whichever end of town that might be, he added to himself. ‘We’ll let you get on your way, then, Geordie. I wouldn’t want you to be keeping Lord Scoggie’s supper waiting.’
‘Aye, I hate to inconvenience my host,’ Geordie agreed, with a hard nudge in his brother Sandy’s ribs. ‘We should be going on. We’ll be seeing you, gentlemen.’
He stood by with the lantern held high while his companions went past, in case the fishermen tried anything in the dark. The two parties passed in silence, until Richie Shaw, glancing back at Geordie Kinkell, remarked,
‘By the way, have you seen the gentleman at Aberardour Lodge here, Geordie? A Mr. Bootham, they say.’
‘Why should I have seen him?’
‘No reason. It’s only – it struck me when I saw him yesterday.’ He scratched at the woollen cap covering his bald pate. ‘He’s awful like your son.’
‘Oh, aye?’ Joe Baillie overheard this. ‘Is he indeed? Is this his first time in the parish, do you know?’
‘Less of that, Joe Baillie,’ snapped Geordie Kinkell. ‘I won’t have a word said against my wife.’
‘Aye, well,’ said Richie Shaw. ‘But take a look when you next have the chance, Geordie - just a word to the wise.’
His tone was not unfriendly, and as he vanished into the darkness Geordie Kinkell, mouth open for a forgotten retort, stared after him, holding the lantern dangling loose by his side.
Lord Scoggie was already established on his high chair in the library when Murray was summoned to take the minutes of his meeting with the next delegation.
‘This will be the other side of the argument,’ he sighed as Murray came in, pen and paper at the ready. ‘The time these people take up with ridiculous quarrels that should never happen in the first place. I don’t mind sorting out real problems – it’s my duty, of course – but petty squabbles like this – ah, yes, Naismyth, show them in, I suppose.’ He remained seated, while Murray arranged chairs for the five men at the raised table. They bowed to Lord Scoggie and settled themselves.
‘I’ll just make sure my secretary knows all your names,’ said Lord Scoggie. ‘Mr. Murray, this is Geordie Kinkell with the red hair, and his son Peter, and this is his brother Sandy. You caused all the trouble in the first place, didn’t you, Sandy? Why could you not do your courting up the hill instead of down it?’
Sandy, also red-headed, looked defiant, but his brother Geordie seemed inclined to agree.
‘Mixed marriages are always fraught with difficulties,’ Lord Scoggie went on. ‘Now, you I know,’ he nodded to a lean, strong looking man with thin hair. ‘You’re Don Downie, aren’t you? You helped fix Lady Scoggie’s pony trap last year when the spring went.’
‘That’s right, your lordship,’ said the man, gratified. ‘I have a wright’s workshop up from the kirk.’
‘Yes, indeed. But you are new, I think.’
The fourth man nodded.
‘Well, speak up, man, who are you?’
‘He’s a weaver like me, your lordship, but from Crail,’ explained Geordie Kinkell. ‘He has a stut, so he doesn’t like to speak much.’
Lord Scoggie waved his hand, permitting such an eccentricity for the moment.
‘Now, what do you have to say?’ he said. ‘I’ll have you know that I have already heard the fishermen’s side of the matter, but I shall listen to you, too. I have already advised them on some action, and I’ll tell you that I don’t approve of some of their actions. Speak, then, and let me hear how you see things.’
‘They stole my wife!’ Sandy burst out. ‘They have her locked away!’
‘Steady, now, brother,’ said Geordie. ‘It’s true, your lordship. They came in the night and took her from her hearth, leaving her bairn behind like a fish they didn’t fancy, and carried her away down the hill. Now, we could have been impetuous men and gone to snatch her back, but instead we come to you to plead our case.’
‘You’re very virtuous, Geordie,’ Lord Scoggie allowed. ‘I’m impressed. You’ll be anxious to get her back, no doubt, Sandy, and your bairn will be missing his mother terribly. When did this happen? Last night? The night before?’
‘A week ago!’ cried Sandy. ‘They’ve had her a whole week!’
‘A whole week, eh?’ Lord Scoggie tutted through his enormous front teeth. ‘That’s a dreadful state of affairs. A week, and you haven’t tried to rescue her yet?’
‘Yes! No,’ added Sandy hurriedly.
‘You don’t seem very sure,’ said Lord Scoggie.
‘Well, of course we had to go down there straight away, your Lordship,’ said Geordie, trying to make his sudden inspiration sound reasoned. ‘We had to make sure that they were treating her well, though of course we could not just burst in and snatch her back. We might have hurt someone.’ It was quite clear to both Lord Scoggie and Murray that they had in fact tried to burst in and snatch her back, but that something had gone wrong. Perhaps the someone hurt had been one of them, rather than the fishermen.
‘And were they treating her well?’ asked Lord Scoggie, mildly.
‘They had her locked in,’ said Sandy, ‘and her hands were tied.’
‘I heard,’ said Lord Scoggie, without quite meeting Sandy’s eye, ‘that she tried to scratch Ritchie Shaw’s eyes out. Would that be some reason for tying her hands?’
A complicated look passed over Sandy’s face, in which Murray thought he could read, swiftly, alarm, pride, and possibly even sympathy – for Ritchie, not for his independent wife.
‘Aye, maybe,’ he conceded thoughtfully.
‘So, having decided – wisely, I agree –’ Lord Scoggie went on, ‘not to attempt a violent rescue, how did you spend the rest of the week? For I must say, that for a man anxious to get his wife back and not entirely assured of her fair treatment by her captors, and for a man seeking my help in the matter, you have left it a long time to come up here.’
‘Of course we don’t ask for your help lightly, your lordship,’ Geordie said hastily, glaring at his brother. ‘It takes us time to sort out our arguments so that we waste none of your valuable time when you are good enough to see us.’ He looked forthright and in all respects the honourable and thoughtful tenant. It was quite a good act, Murray thought. In the mean time, Geordie’s son, Peter, leaned back in his chair, gazing up at the chandeliers high above him, mouth open and dazzled, quite oblivious to the proceedings. Murray remembered seeing him warming himself on the bench outside Geordie Kinkell’s cottage, staring up at the sun in much the same way, or waving happily at any passer by. It would have been difficult not to like him.
‘And while you were sorting out your arguments so considerately,’ said Lord Scoggie, ‘what else were you doing? I cannot imagine that relations between the upper village and the lower village have been good for the past week.’
‘They k-killed my pig,’ said the weaver from Crail suddenly. Geordie’s face fell.
‘You were supposed to be saying nothing,’ he hissed at him.
‘But they k-
killed my pig,’ protested the man, eyes wet. ‘They did, your l-lordship. They k-killed my pig.’
‘That’s a terrible thing,’ agreed Lord Scoggie. ‘A dead pig is not as useful as a live one, I suppose. Was it a sow or a boar?’
‘A sow,’ moaned the man, almost sobbing. ‘I had hoped to b-breed of her next year.’
Lord Scoggie tutted again. Geordie looked up at him warily.
‘A sow,’ repeated Lord Scoggie. ‘I should be very upset if any of my sows was killed, I must say. On the other hand, it must be said that I do not put my sows to any great hazard. I keep them, or my pigman does, in their sty, or perhaps let them root in the orchard. I don’t often take them for walks. Perhaps they would fancy the notion, but even if they did, I think I would probably not take them out at night. Not at night, not down a steep muddy hill, and not to a harbour. And even if I did, even if I paid as little regard to the welfare of my sows as to do all this with them, I would not abandon them on the harbour to the mercies of the local fishermen who, let it be acknowledged, do not appreciate pigs, sows or boars, as we do.’
‘Oh,’ said Geordie Kinkell after a moment.
‘Indeed, oh. You left that poor sow down there by the harbour, in the middle of the night. What did you expect them to do with her? Give her an apple and send her home?’
‘I told you,’ muttered the weaver from Crail. Peter Kinkell straightened up and looked at Lord Scoggie.
‘Poor sow,’ he repeated. ‘Poor sow.’
‘They sent her back in joints,’ said the weaver, now openly crying. ‘Mally the flesher b-b-butchered her. Joints!’ He wiped his nose on his sleeve. Peter Kinkell stared at him.
‘Poor sow,’ he said, and began to cry, too. Geordie, his father, looked desperate.
‘It was only a joke,’ he said. ‘It was just a joke,’ he turned to Lord Scoggie. ‘It just went wrong.’
‘They’re savages,’ added Sandy, not in the least likely to cry. ‘If they butcher my Alison I’ll slaughter every one of them with my bare hands.’
‘I’m sure you would,’ said Lord Scoggie drily, ‘but you’ll acknowledge there’s a fair difference between a wife and a sow.’
‘Poor sow!’ sobbed Peter.
‘She was as dear to me as a wife!’ the weaver wept. Geordie caught Lord Scoggie’s eye, his mouth twisting.
‘You canna cut a wife up and expect good bacon, for example,’ he said.
‘I’ll mention it to the fishermen at their next visit,’ said Lord Scoggie, now beginning to look cross. ‘Now, listen. I have told Joe Baillie and Hugh Farquhar to return your wife, Sandy, and mind you look after her better this time. And have more sense than to anger her family by serving ham the next time you’re lucky enough to be celebrating the birth of a bairn. If Alison does not reappear in the next few days, come and tell me. As for the sow, I’m sorry for your loss, but you were extremely foolish, the lot of you. You know they can’t fish if there’s a pig about the harbour, and it’s the herring season. Do you want them all claiming poor relief off the parish? You should consider yourselves lucky they sent you back the meat, and didn’t burn it. Smoke it and salt it and enjoy it over the winter, reckon up the feed you’ve saved yourself, and save up for a new pig in the spring, and take better care of it this time. All right?’
There was a moment of shuffling and sounds that did not quite constitute speech. Murray waited, pen poised, for a response. Peter and the weaver sobbed on.
‘Aye, well, I suppose,’ said Geordie eventually.
‘And you’ve told them to send Alison back, your lordship?’
‘I have. She may even be waiting for you when you get home.’
‘Thank you, your lordship.’
The two brothers, ruffling their red hair in a gesture that emphasised their family resemblance, stood up and bowed again to Lord Scoggie. Geordie urged the weaver and the wright to follow them, while Sandy took his nephew Peter by the arm and led him towards the door, wiping his face as they went. Geordie nodded at them, and looked up at Lord Scoggie.
‘I’m sorry I had to bring the lad, your lordship,’ he said. ‘My wife’s no well, and I didn’t want her bothered around the house while I was out.’
‘That’s all right, Geordie. I’m sorry to hear about your wife. Nothing too serious, I hope?’
‘I’m feart it might be, your lordship,’ said Geordie, blushing at such an admission. ‘She’s very frail.’
‘That’s very bad. I shall ask Lady Scoggie to – to take her some soup, perhaps. Has the doctor called?’
‘Ach, no, your lordship, we can get on well enough without that.’ He turned away.
‘I know how you feel,’ said Lord Scoggie. He rose from his seat and returned to ground level, and went round the table to Geordie. ‘Doctors can be very intrusive, can’t they? But I know a man would go along and see her just as a favour, and she can send him away if he bothers her.’
‘Do you, your lordship?’ Geordie looked torn, moving from one foot to the other, unsure whether to abandon this hope. ‘Do you know, would he be prescribing all kinds of fancy medicines?’
‘Well, now, I don’t know. But you can always say no, come the time.’ He paused, giving Geordie space to break away. ‘Shall I send him round?’
‘Aye, I suppose you could do worse, your lordship. Thank you, now,’ he said, and followed the rest of his party from the room. Murray, who had been trying to pretend he was absent during this tactful conversation, looked up at his employer.
‘I don’t suppose he can afford the doctor,’ he said.
‘I don’t suppose he can,’ Lord Scoggie agreed. ‘But he won’t have to.’ He went to the table and opened a book that lay there, and removed some coins from inside it. ‘Here,’ he said to Murray. ‘Take these to that weaver fellow. He doesn’t deserve it, but I hate to see a man deprived of his pig.’ Murray, with a grin, took the coins and hurried out.
In the hall, the men were being shown across to the servants’ corridor by Naismyth, to take the ale that was always on offer to visitors from the village. At the same moment, Lady Scoggie, small and shabby, was ascending the stairs, accompanied by Mr. Tibo who seemed extraordinarily well turned out beside her. The weaver, the wright and Sandy Kinkell looked up at the couple, but Geordie, concentrating on the servants’ door and possibly the ale beyond, kept his gaze down and chivvied his flock through. Murray followed, noticing that Tibo had turned at the noise, and was gazing down at the party with some intensity. For a second, they paused on the stairs, Lady Scoggie with her eyes still on her feet, as if she expected to miss her footing. Beyond them, Murray suddenly caught sight of Andrew, the new manservant, who had almost run them over in his hurry down the stairs. He paused, also staring at the party from up the hill, then unexpectedly turned and ran back up the way he had come.
Murray managed to complete his duty with the coins discreetly in the servants’ corridor before they reached the kitchen, and turned back to the hall. It was almost supper time, so presumably Tibo was to stay for supper. He often did, for want of other company in the parish of the level he thought he belonged to, though as always Murray was almost convinced that Tibo despised them all, except, of course, for Miss Deborah. Perhaps now that the Boothams were nearby he would spend more time with them – or perhaps the hero Major Keyes would prove the bigger draw. Tibo did not seem like the kind of man who appreciated heroes: poets were probably more to his taste. Oh, well, time would tell.
He glanced at the long case clock in the hall, and went upstairs to look for the boys: he had set them some sentences to render into something approximating Latin before their morning class. Climbing the stairs to the second floor, he could hear Tibo and Lady Scoggie talking, with the girls, too, he thought, in the drawing room on the first floor. At the top of the narrower flight of stairs, he turned left, past the rounded wall of the east tower room, and down the dog-legged corridor to the passage that served the school room, the boys’ bedchambers, and Murray’s own room. It was silen
t.
With a feeling of resignation he opened the school room door, and found it empty. On the two desks were the Latin exercises he had set, mostly, he conceded, complete. He decided not to give himself indigestion by looking at them now. He returned to the passage and glanced into first Henry’s room, then Robert’s, then quickly into the other rooms in the wing, including his own, just in case. Then he went searching further afield.
The usual indoor place to find the boys, after the kitchens, was the tower room that topped the west tower. While the east tower housed the bedchambers of Lady Scoggie, Deborah and Beatrix, the west tower, above the two storey library, held only Lord Scoggie’s bedchamber, and the top room was a sort of box room into which things were placed which might require attention more urgently than the things placed in the rambling attics. To get to it, Murray wriggled past the east tower again, past the stairs, and out into the Long Gallery.
It was a slightly eerie place at night. During the day, with its line of windows giving views over the drive and park, and lighting the solemnly hideous portraits of earlier Scoggies, it provided a respectable exercise ground on wet days. The floor was long enough for bowls, the ceiling high enough, so Deborah told him, for skipping games, the portraits loathed enough for racquet games to be permitted. Off to the side opposite the windows were the doors of spare rooms, usually given over to female guests when there were any, but as Major Keyes was the only guest at present, he was the only resident. As Murray passed along the gallery, with its shadows at the uncurtained windows and the scanty candles, the sound of Keyes mumbling fondly to his dog was quite reassuring. The dog itself was quiet.
At the far end of the gallery, the door to Lord Scoggie’s room stood closed beside the tiny winding stair that encircled it and led up to the tower room. Murray paused at the bottom, listening. For a moment, he thought he heard a slight noise, a quickly released breath, or someone brushing softly against a wall. Then there was nothing. He trod on the first step.
Knowledge of Sins Past (Murray of Letho Book 2) Page 13
