by Pat McIntosh
‘I see,’ said the Official. ‘If it was thought to be stolen, he might not have to repay it, and in any case he would be able to use the King’s jewels to pay the Hospital.’
‘Indeed,’ agreed Gil. ‘Since he could hardly use them as currency anywhere in Scotland. So Wilkie and Carson, and Carson’s brother with the axe, attacked the cooper’s yard after persuading Billy Walker to leave the gate open for them. But their raid went wrong. The coin was to go in a barrel, to be covered by salt herring, and sent onward to Sinclair’s land disguised as part of the quarter’s rent. Half the coin had gone into the barrel, the other half was still on the horse, and Knollys’s men attacked too soon.’
‘How did they know when to attack?’ asked Alys.
‘Knollys’s net was both wide and fine, so I have heard,’ said Canon Cunningham.
‘In this case,’ said Gil, nodding agreement, ‘he likely had intelligence from Sinclair’s own household. They’re looking for a new sub-steward at Roslin, so Pierre tells me.’
‘It seems the previous man fell down a stair,’ expanded Maistre Pierre.
‘So,’ Gil returned to his narrative, ‘though it was no part of their plan, Carson’s brother, who we’ve seen was very ready to use his axe, killed Nelkin Fletcher.’ He hesitated, staring at nothing. Kate wondered what he could see. ‘The boy bolted with the horse and the other saddlebag. Wilkie and the two Carsons put the head in the barrel to conceal Nelkin’s death, in on top of what they thought was the whole of the treasure –’
‘Ah!’ said David Cunningham again.
Gil glanced at him, and nodded. ‘Then they filled it up with the brine from the vat standing ready, and Billy Walker was induced to seal the barrel for them, being a cooper’s son and understanding the craft.’
‘And that was what woke the cooper’s wife,’ said Maistre Pierre. ‘No, ma mie, no more wine for now.’
‘It must have been. Then I think the Axeman simply put the barrel on the wrong cart. His brother has now told us he was left-handed.’
‘I knew it!’ said Alys triumphantly, and Gil smiled at her where she stood with the flask of cowslip wine.
‘Mistress Riddoch looked out just in time to see one of them carrying Nelkin’s headless body out of the yard, and I suppose it’s still somewhere on the hillside, since there’s been no word yet from Linlithgow to say it’s been found.’
‘As simple as that,’ said Canon Cunningham.
‘And that was why they were so sure we had the rest of the money,’ said Kate.
‘They were certainly very persistent,’ said Maistre Pierre, ‘both here in Glasgow, I gather, and also in the Lothians.’
‘Knollys must have been desperate to have the money found,’ agreed Gil.
‘Quite so. It seems,’ David Cunningham reported without expression, accepting more wine from Alys, ‘as if there was maybe a wee bit confusion between his own account rolls and the treasury’s. He’s already posted a string of cases to be heard at Edinburgh about sums owing to him personally, and Robert Blacader thinks there’s like to be at least one brought against him by the new Treasurer.’
‘For there is not so much joy in holding high office as there is grief in falling from a high place. I wonder,’ said Gil thoughtfully, ‘whether the Preceptory will be involved in those?’
‘Probably not,’ said his uncle. Maistre Pierre leaned back against the cushions in his great chair and closed his eyes. ‘There was a bit of legal bickering a few years since, and its connection was mostly straightened out then. And the loan, of course, is a separate matter and now concluded.’
‘And you got your own barrel back,’ said Kate.
Gil grinned. ‘We did. And there was some rare print in it. I told you that. Another Blanchflour and Eglantyne, a very bonny Virgil, the Sons of Aymon, a marvellous book on hunting. And –’ he exchanged a complicit smile with Alys – ‘a betrothal gift.’
‘It will come home from the bookbinder’s next week,’ Alys said. ‘Two volumes in red leather, each with our initials on the cover and he Morte Darthur on the spine.’
‘And that will be the pair of you,’ said Kate, keeping the acid from her voice with difficulty, ‘jugged in your books like James the Gentle till you have to emerge for the wedding.’
‘Aye, you’re well suited,’ said Canon Cunningham. ‘But we are tiring our friend.’
‘No, no,’ said the mason, opening his eyes again. ‘Far from it. What were we saying? Are we about to set a date for the marriage?’
‘Ah!’ said the Official, and Catherine’s attention sharpened. Kate hid her hands in her skirts and clenched them tightly, pinning a smile on her face.
‘Next week?’ said Gil hopefully.
‘I thought late November,’ said Alys, setting down the flask of wine.
‘November?’
‘It’s barely three months hence,’ she pointed out, her smile flickering. ‘It will take me near that long to order up the dry stores we’ll need. We’ll want to hold the feast before Advent begins, and by then the Martinmas killing will be past, and there will be fresh meat in plenty. And your sisters will be able to attend.’
‘Hmm.’
‘Indeed,’ said Catherine in her elegant French. ‘I understand your next sister is about to become a mother again.’
‘Aye,’ said Babb, catching the drift of this. ‘Margaret, out at Bothwell. She’s due in a few weeks, so the word is, and it’s her third, it’s no likely to be late.’
‘So she should be able to travel by then,’ Alys said hopefully. ‘And if we give Dorothea plenty of notice, she should be able to find an errand for the convent to bring her over on this side of Scotland about the right time.’
And Kate and Tibby will be able to attend any time, thought Kate. No ties, no responsibilities, nobody else to consult.
Gil was laughing. ‘You have it all thought out, haven’t you? Well, if it can’t be next week, it might as well be November.’ He reached out and drew Alys close, and she looked down at him. The expression on her face dug to Kate’s heart. ‘But how I’ll last till then, sweetheart, I don’t know.’
‘There is a deal to be done before then,’ said Maistre Pierre. ‘If you are to live in the lodgings we picked out over the courtyard yonder, there will be decisions to make, and work to be commissioned. We have the rooms panelled for you, I think.’
‘Well, well,’ said the Official. ‘So you’ll be leaving my house in late November, then, Gilbert?’
‘He’s near left it already,’ said Kate, and managed to keep the tart tone out of her voice. ‘He’s barely been home all the time I’ve been staying with you, sir.’
‘You must tell me as soon as you’ve the dates settled,’ went on David Cunningham, acknowledging this with a quirk of his mouth, ‘and I’ll bid Fleming keep them clear of cases. I’d not wish to be tied up in the Consistory tower while the dancing went on down here.’
‘And we must write to your mother with all the news,’ said Alys.
‘I shall be glad to renew my acquaintance with madame mere,’ said Catherine.
‘Which reminds me,’ said Canon Cunningham. He fished in his sleeve for his spectacles. ‘I wrote to my good-sister a few days since, to tell her about the appointment Robert our Archbishop had offered you, Gilbert, and she has replied.’ He produced a folded sheet from the other sleeve. ‘She’s well pleased, sends good wishes now the marriage can go forward, says she’ll write direct to you, Peter. But here’s a thing.’ He peered at the tightly written page. ‘She sends that she’s heard from her kinswoman Elizabeth Boyd at Kilmarnock. Angus’s countess,’ he elucidated. ‘It seems the King is still at Kilmarnock too, and like to be so for some while, for he spends his time with Elizabeth’s niece Marion. Which one’s Marion, Gilbert?’
‘Archie’s older daughter,’ Kate supplied. ‘I mind her. A wee plump thing, a bit younger than me. I suppose she’s nineteen by now.’
‘She would be,’ muttered Gil. What did he mean by that? Kate wo
ndered.
‘Aye. Seems the King’s much taken wi her, spends night and day in her company. Night and day,’ he repeated with relish, ‘and can think of naught else.’
‘Well, he is a young man,’ said Maistre Pierre tolerantly.
‘So it worked,’ said Gil, but did not explain.
‘That’s the Boyds back in favour,’ said Kate. Her voice came out harshly. ‘If they’ve supplied his first mistress, the King’ll no forget them.’ And even Marion Boyd, plump and giggling, from a family which had seriously offended James Third and suffered for it, would achieve something Kate would not. Whatever else she provided for the King, she had already given him enough to ensure herself a handsome tocher, a good marriage.
‘No wonder Robert our Archbishop’s fixed at Stirling the now,’ mused the Official. ‘The Lords in Council can get on with running the country, with no interference from the King’s grace.’
‘Aye,’ said Gil, very drily. He sounds just like the old man, thought Kate.
There was a knocking at the house door. Maistre Pierre turned his head, frowning.
‘Who might that be?’
‘Are we expecting anyone else?’ Alys looked towards the door as one of the maidservants made her way up from the kitchen. ‘Who is it, Kittock?’
‘I don’t just know, mem,’ said Kittock, but Kate could hear a laugh in her voice. ‘Seeing it’s no the season for guizers. Will I let them in?’
Hardly waiting for Alys’s consent, she swung the great door open, exclaiming, ‘Oh, my, who can this be come visiting?’
Children, then, thought Kate, and unaccountably her heart leapt under her ribs.
Small bare feet pattered on the polished floorboards of the hall. Socrates tensed at Gil’s side, growling faintly, and was hushed. Two little winged figures came round the end of the settle into the circle, and paused, gazing in confusion at the number of people present. They wore smocks of white linen, embellished with white ribbons and little knots of daisies; crowns of ribbons and daisies were fastened among their short curls, and each one carried a posy of flowers. The smaller one’s wings were on crooked. The dog stared intently at them, the hackles standing up along his narrow back.
Our Lady preserve us, thought Kate, trying her best not to laugh, are they angels or cupids?
‘Who is this?’ asked Alys.
The smaller figure scowled at her. ‘That’s not what you say. You’ve to say, it struck a pose of amazement, ‘Who-are-these-finged-wigures?’
The men laughed, but Kate covered her mouth, straightened her face, and said, ‘Who are these winged figures?’
The children looked at each other, visibly counted to three, and recited together, beating time with their posies, ‘Nobles, gentles, tender friends, we are here to make amends.’
‘I am Liking,’ said the older one in the thread of a voice, while her sister mouthed the words with her.
‘I am Love.’
‘We are sent by heaven above,’ the two little voices went on, ‘to bring you thanks for all you’ve done, and promise heaven’s blessing.’
‘And to hope that the sun,’ continued the younger one uncertainly, ‘will shine on your wedding.’
‘Maybe not in November,’ muttered Gil.
They seemed to have come to the end of their verse. Canon Cunningham began to applaud, but Love stamped her bare foot at him.
‘Not yet. There’s more.’
‘Do we have to say anything else?’ Kate asked. He must have spent days teaching them that, she thought. He’s had this planned for a while.
‘She has to say Thank you for the blessing,’ said Love emphatically. ‘And then you get a poetry.’
Alys complied, and Gil echoed her, receiving another scowl for his pains. The two winged figures turned to Kate, counted to three again, and announced:
‘Flowers for the bonniest may, wi een of brown and hair of grey –’ Behind them Gil snorted with suppressed laughter, and Alys shook her head sternly at him. ‘Take these flowers we here presentis, and the heart of him that sent us.’
They stopped in triumph, and simultaneously held their knots of daisies out to Kate. Canon Cunningham applauded, more confidently, and the mason joined in. Before Kate could take the posies, Love pushed her sister aside.
‘No! You can give the other one flowers. I’m giving flowers to our one!’
‘No!’ said Liking indignantly, showing more spirit than Kate had yet seen in her. ‘I’m giving them!’
Between laughing and weeping, Kate covered her eyes with her hand. And the heart of him that sent us. Oh, my dear man, she thought. In front of friends and family like this –
‘She’s greeting,’ said Ysonde. Her posy fell to the polished floorboards, and she fled round the end of the settle. ‘Da! Da, it’s not working. She’s greeting!’
Wynliane’s flowers joined her sister’s, and Wynliane herself leaned against Kate’s knee. Her small hand reached urgently to draw Kate’s down, and as Morison’s heavier tread came forward to join the group she said, almost inaudible, ‘Do you no want the flowers? They’re bonny.’
‘Yes,’ said Kate, and smiled into the blue eyes looking up at her. ‘I’ll take the flowers.’
‘I want to give her the flowers!’ said Ysonde, hurling herself forward from her father’s side.
‘No, I will!’ Wynliane bent to snatch at the nearest posy. Her sister pushed her aside, shrieking inarticulately. Morison stooped to separate them, making chiding noises.
‘I’ve a better idea,’ said Kate over Wynliane’s response. They stopped squabbling to look at her. She looked from one to the other, and then up at their father, watching her anxiously over their heads. He was wearing the King’s chain. ‘Both of you can give one posy to Mistress Mason, because you said her blessing very nicely, and then both of you can give the other posy to me, because I liked the poem you said for me.’
‘Did you?’ said Morison, as the children picked up one of the posies and advanced on Alys. ‘It’s no very good poetry.’
She looked down, and used her fingers to ease the tears from her eyes.
‘It’s the best I ever heard,’ she said.
Behind her, Babb blew her nose resoundingly on her sleeve.
‘I thought that too,’ she said. ‘The heart of him that sent us, it’s fair lovely. Will you take him, my doo?’
‘Babb!’ said Kate indignantly. ‘I don’t need your help to accept him!’
‘I just want to make sure,’ said Babb. ‘It’s the only chance you’re like to get, I don’t want you to waste it.’
‘Are you sure you want me?’ said Kate, her head on Morison’s shoulder.
It was much later. Love and Liking had been fed little cakes and milk and eventually removed screaming by Nan and Babb. Maistre Pierre, just as weary, had been persuaded to retire after dinner, and Canon Cunningham had gone reluctantly back to his duties at St Mungo’s after arranging to meet Morison and his nephew in the morning to discuss Kate’s marriage contract. But Catherine still sat upright on the cushioned settle nearest the bowl of flowers in the hearth, her handwork trailing across her black skirts, while on one side of the hall Alys and Gil said almost nothing with their heads together and on the other, now, Augie Morison looked fondly at Kate within the circle of his arm and said, ‘I’m very sure.’
‘I’ve a sharp tongue,’ she warned him, ‘and no tocher but the King’s purse.’
‘The King’s purse is yours, my lass. I’ll advise you if you want to venture it, but I’ll not lay a finger on it.’
‘Oh, I see,’ she said. ‘You don’t want me at all, it’s the thought of venturing the King’s hundred merks you’re taken wi.’
He laughed at that. He’s getting the idea of my jokes, she thought.
‘Kate, my bonnie Kate, I tell you, ye ben of my lyf and deth the quene. It’s your sharp tongue and your sharp mind and your sharp courage I want. Wi those for your tocher, I’d take you barefoot in your shift.’
She tilte
d her head back to look at him, with a sudden recollection of the dream which had seemed like the end of all her hopes. Barefoot in her shift, she had stepped forward when the saint led her. Forward to an unseen, unknown bridegroom. I should have had more trust in him, she thought. He has sent me a miracle.
‘You nearly had to,’ she said. Morison’s mouth quivered, and he turned on the bench beside her and put both arms about her.
‘Stop talking,’ he said, and bent his head to kiss her. She held him off a moment.
‘Don’t let me forget, Augie,’ she said. ‘I owe St Mungo a pound of wax.’
His grip tightened.
‘We’ll make it five pounds,’ he said. ‘It’s no every day you get a wife wi a King’s purse to her tocher.’
