A Pig of Cold Poison

by Pat McIntosh

  ‘No sign,’ Gil said blankly. ‘Are you sure?’

  ‘Sure enough,’ said Eleanor. She peered at him over the candle, then stood back. ‘Is she not at home? You’d best come in out the cold and make certain yoursel.’

  ‘My wife has been here all day,’ said Syme, putting a possessive hand on her shoulder, ‘but maybe Mistress Mason wouldny disturb her if she was resting. I’ve not seen her myself.’

  ‘Have you asked the servants if they saw her?’ Gil demanded abruptly. ‘Or Mistress Baillie? Or Mistress Grace?’ At Grace’s name the sense of Syme’s first remark finally reached him. ‘Grace and Nicol? Did you say they’ve left the house?’

  ‘Taken their gear and gone, and my faither no buried yet,’ Eleanor said, nodding. She looked like someone who had taken one blow too many to the head. ‘It’s like the bairns’ rhyme, first one goes and then another. There’s just me and wee Marion left of the family.’ She giggled faintly, sounding very like her brother, and turned away to light the candles on the pricket-stand. The shadows retreated into the corners of the hall, and Syme said gently:

  ‘And your good-mother, and me, lass. And your own bairn soon.’

  ‘Alys has been here,’ said Gil with certainty. Both Eleanor and her husband turned to look at him. He nodded at the plate-cupboard, where a candle-box and two wooden candlestocks stood waiting for whoever needed them. Next to them was a lantern, a square copper object with real glass windows and a trailing chain. ‘That’s our lantern. I know it well. Pierre has four like that which he brought from France.’

  In the chamber which Nicol and his wife had occupied the hangings were still on the bed, the furnishings still in place, but kist and shelf were empty, no clothes hung on the pegs behind the door, a cavernous space under the bed spoke of items removed.

  ‘You see?’ said Eleanor triumphantly. ‘I was right, they’ve left, and taken all wi them.’ She stepped past him, holding her candle high, and the shadows bobbed as she crossed the room to open a further door. ‘Even her workroom stripped bare, though gie her her due, she’s left Frankie’s glassware.’

  ‘Workroom?’ repeated Gil, following her, the dog’s claws clicking at his heels. Andro had never mentioned a workroom; had he even searched it? ‘This was Mistress Grace’s workroom?’

  ‘Oh, aye,’ said Eleanor. ‘See, Agnes and me lodged here afore I was wedded, and made use of the workroom for making of sweetmeats and the like, so we wereny under Frankie’s feet. Which suited us just fine, I can tell you,’ she added with a flicker of her usual manner. ‘So Agnes being lodged in the main house, in the end chamber under Frankie’s eye ever since I left, Meg put Nicol and Grace in here when they came home.’

  Never say that, Nicol had said. Gil did not comment, but looked round the small closet in the candlelight. Bulbous glass gleamed, jars of glazed pottery caught the light, a microcosm of the workroom behind the shop. The brazier was cold. There was a lingering smell of –

  Yes, of apples.

  ‘Their passage was booked from Dumbarton,’ he said over the sudden thumping of his heart. ‘Do you know what vessel? How would they get there?’

  ‘Surely by boat,’ said Syme from the doorway. ‘They had such a quantity of baggage, it would take two days to reach Dumbarton on a cart at this time of year.’

  ‘They came upriver by boat in May,’ said Eleanor, and giggled again. Socrates emerged from the workroom and cast about the main chamber, pausing at the bench with his long nose jammed against the cushion. He padded back to Gil’s side and nudged his hand, whining faintly.

  Syme, consigning his wife to the care of a weary Mistress Baillie, had accompanied him to the riverbank. They had gained little there; the fisher community, its hours dictated by the tides as much as by the daylight, was awake and stirring but the best information Gil could extract was of a great stushie two or three hours since, when Stockfish Tam’s passengers, bound for Dumbarton, had turned up wi a great load of boxes and barrels on a handcart and an extra –

  ‘An extra passenger?’ he repeated, heart thumping again. ‘Who was it, do you ken?’

  His informant spat inaccurately in the direction of the river. ‘Naw. Just I heard what he was telling them. More boxes than they’d tellt him, an extra chiel to carry, lucky if the boatie reached Partick. Mind, there was only the two of them standing there arguing,’ he added.

  ‘Did they –’ Gil swallowed – ‘did all go in the boat in the end?’

  ‘There’s the handcart yonder, standing empty. Once they’d agreed the extra groat,’ said the man, grinning in the light of Gil’s lantern, ‘it all packed in right enough. They’ll be past Renfrew by now, wi this wind, seeing they left just afore the top o the tide.’

  ‘You never saw the extra passenger?’

  ‘Naw.’ The man turned away towards his own boat, leaving Gil staring after him.

  ‘If Mistress Mason was unwilling to go along wi them,’ said Syme diffidently at his elbow, ‘they might dose her wi Nicol’s drops till she couldny stand upright.’ He put a sympathetic hand on Gil’s arm. ‘If they’ve taken her wi them, she’s no harmed, maister.’

  That was true, he recognized, standing there in the midnight with Glasgow whirling round him. They would scarcely take so much trouble if they had – if she was –

  ‘I must ha been right,’ continued Syme, ‘though it’s no pleasure to think it. Frankie’s death was never natural, if Nicol’s up and run like this, and taken Mistress Mason for a hostage.’

  ‘Land or water?’ Gil said aloud, hardly hearing him. ‘I must catch them.’

  ‘Ye’ll be faster by land,’ said the man he had spoken to, looking up from whatever he was doing. ‘There’s no a boatie on the Clyde can out-sail Stockfish Tam’s Cuthbert, even wi a burthen like yon. You’ll be at Dumbarton afore them, on a good horse, and you’ll ha what’s left of the moon in a few hours and all.’

  ‘I’ll ride wi you,’ said Syme.

  Now, with Syme and the mason’s youngest man Luke, he pressed on through the night, plaid wound firmly against the wind, dimly grateful for the absence of rain, his mind churning with hideous visions of Alys bound, injured, terrified. And why had she ventured out to the Renfrew house alone? What had taken her –

  She must have thought matters through, and come to some conclusion. And then what? Had she gone to ask for some final scrap of information, and alerted Grace or Nicol to her suspicions? That could surely have waited till the morning, and in any case she had more sense than risk an encounter with someone they thought guilty, after the time out in Lanarkshire.

  He pulled his plaid tighter and settled down in the saddle, following Luke’s piebald horse through the dark, the lantern held down at the lad’s stirrup showing them the next few steps of the road. What had altered since suppertime? What new information had reached them, to prompt Alys to action? The letter from the apothecary in Edinburgh, of course, with the information about the poison. Apple pips. The fragments Adam Forrest showed him must have been apple pips, not almonds, and the workroom had smelled of apples.

  But an apple pip was a small thing. What quantity must one need to make up a flask of poison such as came into Bothwell’s hand on Hallowe’en? There were five or ten at most in one apple, so how many apples must one slice open to get a cupful? Enough to make one very ill, or to make a very large dish of applemoy, or perhaps some sweetmeat or other. It kept coming back to sweetmeats, he thought, and suddenly recalled Frankie Renfrew complaining about apple-cheese. Robert had said, We’ve apple-cheese in plenty, and later his father had remarked sourly that Grace was a great one for making the stuff. Grace, who had stripped the room where her father-in-law died. Who had expressed what seemed like genuine regret at Robert’s death. As well she might, thought Gil, if she had brewed the poison that slew him.

  Grace, he recalled with a chill down his back, who had saved John’s life. We owe her a debt for life, Alys had said. A debt which was more than enough to prompt Alys to warn her that she must be
suspected. That must be why she had gone to the Renfrew house. He wondered why he was not angry at the idea, and found he was more angry with Nicol and with Grace, for repaying her in this way. He knew some of his wife’s ideas on justice, and felt they were probably nearer to God’s justice than to canon law. The question of explaining things to his master the Archbishop or even to the Provost could be dealt with later, after he had Alys safe, after –

  ‘Maister?’ Ahead of him, Luke checked. ‘There’s a fellow on the track, maister.’

  ‘Who’s there?’ A voice from the darkness in front of them, a moving shadow which made Luke’s horse stamp uneasily. ‘Who’s there at this hour?’

  ‘Who’s abroad i the night like this?’ said Syme nervously behind Gil. ‘Is it thieves?’

  ‘I’d ask you the same. Who are you?’ Gil reined in beside Luke. ‘We’re bound for Dumbarton. Are you afoot? Alone?’

  ‘Aye.’ The man came closer, his footsteps squelching. ‘Could I beg yez for a lift to Dumbarton? Would any of yir beasts take a second man aboard?’

  ‘You’re wet, man,’ said Luke, holding the lantern higher to see the stranger’s face.

  ‘Aye, I’m wet,’ the man agreed, through chattering teeth. ‘Piracy on the river, freens, my boatie stole from me and sailed on out my sight, and me left to make my way ashore as best’s I can. But I’ve freens at Dumbarton will sort him for me, him and his extra passenger!’

  ‘Ah,’ said Gil. ‘Stockfish Tam, is it?’

  With the boatman perched behind Luke and wrapped in Syme’s great cloak, which he gave up with creditable willingness, they put a fresh candle in Luke’s lantern and pressed on through the dark towards Dumbarton, accompanied by a monologue on the subject of piracy and a debt of two groats. Questions about the extra passenger established that she had been alive, conscious and talking to the pirate’s wife, though Tam had not heard their conversation, and after that Gil shut his ears to the man’s grumbles and thought about Grace Gordon and a poison brewed from apple pips, and about what they would find at Dumbarton. The Sankt Nikolaas, if she was big enough to traverse the Irish Sea, the English Channel, the German Sea, was likely to be moored out in the roads off the port, rather than run up on to the shore. Could Nicol sail Tam’s boat well enough to find her? Could he sail a boat at all? What if they failed to meet up with the Dutchman and drifted on down the river with the tide?

  Most of Dumbarton was still asleep, though as they rounded the town heading for the shore a few lights showed and the smell of rising bread floated on the wind. Stockfish Tam directed them to where the Leven rippled quietly down to join the bigger river, and along the shore where Gil and Pierre had once found a fisherman willing to sail them to Rothesay in a boat of willow and skins. There were a couple of fires showing, with dark shapes squatting round them, waiting for the dawn, waiting for returning fishing-boats.

  ‘Bide here,’ said Tam, and slid down from Luke’s horse. The animal sighed in relief, and he crunched off along the shore, hailing the nearest fire.

  ‘The custumar,’ said Gil, looking about him. Dumbarton Rock loomed over them against the stars, the narrow moon slid in and out of clouds, and one or two windows in the town showed lights. Here on the shore, apart from the two fires, there was little to see. It was still some hours to dawn, he reckoned, and by far too dark for customs work or for loading or unloading goods unless the matter was urgent. As it was now. The custumar would be virtuously asleep in his bed.

  ‘I ken him,’ said Syme unexpectedly. ‘James Renton. He’s a cousin of my oldest brother’s wife.’

  ‘Where does he stay?’

  ‘One of those, I would think, convenient for the shore.’

  Peering where Syme pointed, Gil made out several taller houses. He was debating asking at the fireside which was the custumar’s when Stockfish Tam tramped back to them, followed by four or five of the dark shapes from the firesides.

  ‘I’ve tellt these fellows what’s abroad,’ he said, ‘and there’s one of them willing to take you out to the Dutchman, rouse her skipper, and we’ll pass the word along the shore and a hantle more o us lie out and wait for Cuthbert when she comes down the channel. That’s supposing he hasny sunk her off of Bowling,’ he added bitterly. ‘Right?’

  ‘Right,’ said Gil slowly, putting the image that comment generated firmly from his mind. He would by far rather take the first opportunity to get Alys to safety, but he had to admit he would be less use in a brawl in a small boat, if it came to that, than he would be on board the Sankt Nikolaas persuading her skipper to help them.

  ‘I could wake the custumar,’ said Syme diffidently. ‘He’ll want to inspect the baggage Nicol has wi him, I’ve no doubt. If he sends a boat out, it might hold things up.’

  ‘Aye, do that,’ said Gil. ‘A good notion.’

  Crouched in the stern of a small boat, a stout son of Dumbarton hauling on the oars in the darkness, Luke shuddering beside him, he watched the approaching riding-lights swaying high up near the stars.

  ‘How can you tell which is which?’ he asked.

  ‘I can mind where yer boatie was by day,’ said their oarsman. ‘Unless Gerrit moved her after sunset, she’ll be in the same place.’ It seemed to be a joke; he laughed shortly, leaned on his oars for a moment, then rowed on.

  ‘Maister Gil,’ said Luke tremulously. The boy was obviously terrified of being on the water, Gil recognized. He should never have accepted his help. ‘Maister Gil, do you speak Dutch? Will you can talk to this skipper?’

  ‘A little,’ he said. ‘I’m hoping he’ll speak Scots.’

  ‘Gerrit?’ said the oarsman. ‘No a lot. He gets by, the most of them does.’

  ‘Will we get the mistress back, by doing this?’

  ‘We’d better,’ said Gil.

  Five, six more strokes, and the oarsman backed one oar, swung the little boat round, bumped against the side of a much larger vessel.

  ‘There ye are,’ he said. ‘Will I hail them for ye, or are ye wanting to take them by surprise?’ It was too late for that: a hoarse voice spoke from the darkness above them. ‘Aye Nikolaas,’ said the boatman. ‘Here’s an archbishop’s questioner for you, wanting a word wi Dutch Gerrit.’

  Gil found a ladder of rope and wood at his shoulder; he tugged it cautiously, and scrambled up, aware of the familiar scents of tar and salted wood, hemp and damp wool, and climbed over the side on to the deck. Luke tumbled after him, almost sobbing with relief at being on a bigger boat. The deck swung under his feet, a barefoot man beside him held a dagger which gleamed in the light of the lantern slung beside the crucifix on the stern-castle railing, and across the waist someone moved towards him, very large in the shadows.

  Deliberately he drew off his hat, saluted the cross, turned to the approaching man. No, men, there were two more, their bearing hostile. Mustering his few words of Low Dutch, he took a breath and said hopefully, ‘Skipper Gerrit?’

  By the time Syme and the custumar joined them, Gil had contrived to set aside his anxieties, concentrate on his ability with words, and explain matters to the skipper.

  He had observed before that the men of the Low Countries seemed to come in two sizes, small and fine-boned or very large. Gerrit van ’t Haag was definitely one of the latter, filling the after-cabin, nodding and wrinkling his large nose, his fair head bent to listen to the mixture of Low Dutch, French and Scots they were using.

  ‘Klaas – Nicol t’ief your vrouw,’ he said disapprovingly. ‘Is niet goed. I help. Help you,’ he clarified, grinning and stabbing a sausage-like finger at Gil.

  ‘And we’ll have his baggage sealed afore you sail, captain,’ said Maister Renton. The custumar, woken by his kinsman, had apparently reacted strongly to the idea of uncustomed goods leaving his port, and turned out in person, his doublet fastened awry and his clerk rubbing bleary eyes and lugging the canvas bag with the great custom-book in it. ‘The idea, slipping past me in the night like this!’

  The skipper gave him an innocent loo
k. ‘Niet goed,’ he agreed, shaking his head.

  ‘The boatmen are out waiting,’ said Syme to Gil. ‘They told Maister Renton where they would lie afore we came on board.’

  The custumar appeared to be passing the information to the skipper, to judge by his gestures. The big man reached past him, without rising, to open the cabin door.

  ‘Allons-y,’ he said. But Gil had already slipped out on to the deck, impelled by a sudden surge of fear. Luke followed as if glued to his elbow. Out in the dark there was bustle and movement, several men with cudgels, the mate issuing curt, guttural orders. He stepped to the side, peering into the night past the pre-dawn lights of Dumbarton and the black bulk of the Rock.

  Away across the water, a voice suddenly spoke, a woman’s voice, high-pitched and frightened. Heart thumping, he stared tensely towards the sound. Alys? He thought not, but – Another voice rose in a loud shout that lifted a flock of flapping seabirds, which whirred over their heads, making Luke cross himself, exclaiming a blessing. Several of the sailors did likewise.

  ‘Ah!’ said the skipper behind him. ‘Kommt Klaas. Waar sint other schouten?’

  Out in the dark there was an exchange with one of the other rocking vessels, and another loud halloo! and a shout of Gerrit! Then over towards the Rock an outbreak of more shouting, of struggles and splashing, a scream.

  ‘To the boat!’ proclaimed the skipper in thick Scots, and seized Gil’s elbow. ‘Ve save your vrouw!’

  Six men at the oars shifted the ship’s boat across the flat water, across the wind, at a brisk pace. Gerrit in the stern steered towards the noise, Gil beside him. He had persuaded Luke quite readily to stay with Syme and the custumar. Lights showed on another of the merchant vessels, someone shouted a question. Gerrit answered, and shortly another boat followed them. It seemed to take for ever to cross the dark water to where shouting and splashing, a high quivering lantern, the white glimmer of spray identified the battle, and when they reached it and Gerrit’s men tumbled over the side into the shallows it was hard to work out who was on which side. Scots voices challenged and answered. The men of Dumbarton seemed to be fighting with one another as much as with Nicol.