Authors: Pat McIntosh
‘The family uses it as a town lodging,’ said Gil, hanging the keys on a nail on the back of the door as he had been asked and surveying the sparsely furnished outer chamber.
‘It saves having to pay the burgh taxes on a townhouse, after all.’
‘Yes,’ said Maistre Pierre. ‘That had occurred to me. What is that dog looking for?’
Socrates looked up, waved his tail, and continued on his patrol. Gil followed him, lifted the seat of the box-bench to peer into the storage space within, checked the fireside aumbry, felt
carefully at the sack of meal on the over-mantel, looked at the fire-irons where they stood in a box by the hearth. The dog threw him a withering glance and took his more acute senses into the
inner chamber.
When, after a quarter-hour or so, Gil came down the precipitous stair with Socrates sliding behind him, Maistre Pierre was seated on the bench, his cloak thrown back and his tablets in his
hand.
‘The accounts are revealing,’ he said, looking up. ‘This is what I came out to tell you. Have you found anything?’
‘Nothing of interest to us, though I had to drag the dog away from the bed in the inner chamber there,’ Gil reported, smiling wryly. ‘I hope the boy provided sheets for his
leman. There are none there now, though there’s the scraps of a love-feast.’
‘Hah!’ said Maistre Pierre in disapproval. ‘Nothing else?’
‘There’s little above-stairs to see, let alone to search. I suppose Sir James will bring cushions and hangings with him to make the place habitable. Tell me about these
accounts.’
‘Here are the figures.’ Maistre Pierre tilted the tablets so that Gil could read the columns inscribed on the green wax. ‘You see, this is what comes in quarterly from one
endowment and another, lands in Lanarkshire and some northwards by Kilsyth as well. That was donated ten years since by the grateful kin of one particular bedesman, it seems. The total is quite a
significant sum.’
‘And yet he has been making economies,’ said Gil. ‘Where was the money going?’
‘Here,’ said Maistre Pierre, turning a leaf of the tablets with a triumphant flourish. ‘You see? Property by the Caichpele. Properties in Rottenrow. Properties in the
Gallowgait. The records are all there, in the locked kist by his bed.’
‘In whose name is this property?’ enquired Gil levelly
‘In the name of Robert Naismith. And the conveyancing,’ said Maistre Pierre, turning another leaf, ‘was done by one Thomas Agnew.’
‘Oh, indeed,’ agreed Maister Millar. The community had said Nones and eaten its dinner, and the bedesmen were seated round the hall fire again, but Gil and Maistre
Pierre had cornered the sub-Deacon in his own lodging. It was a single chamber, with a bed built into the panelling of one wall and a neat desk for a scholar opposite the hearth, five books on a
shelf above it. There was no sign of a black cloak other than Millar’s own, and no velvet hat visible. ‘He’s done the bedehouse’s legal work ever since I’ve been here
at any rate, I’ve no doubt he’s – he was Deacon Naismith’s man of law and all.’
‘So Naismith was diverting the bedehouse’s incomings to his own use,’ said Gil.
Millar gave him a shocked look. ‘Oh, I’m certain that canny be right. He’d no do such a thing. Would he?’ he added dubiously, lowering his eyes to the figures on Maistre
Pierre’s tablets. ‘I find this unbelievable, Maister Cunningham.’
‘The figures do not lie,’ said Maistre Pierre.
‘You said something about a property out to the north,’ Gil said.
‘This one.’ Maistre Pierre pointed with his thumb. A rich one, as you see.’
‘Where is it? Who gave it?’ Gil asked.
His friend shrugged. ‘I was looking only at the figures. I think the donor’s name was not in the papers I looked at, indeed. Do you know, Maister Millar?’
‘I wouldny ken,’ said Millar helplessly. ‘It would be afore my time. I’ve never paid much mind to the bedehouse money, you understand. I take my part in the duties
towards the brothers, and the Deacon’s part as well half the time, and look to my studies between whiles, and he deals – dealt wi the money. Would Maister Agnew ken who was the donor,
maybe?’
‘I’ll not ask him just yet.’ Gil stared thoughtfully at the column of figures. ‘Do we have the bedehouse outgoings there?’
‘We do.’ Maistre Pierre turned to another leaf. ‘They seem to have been kept up daily, in great detail, which did not conceal that the outlays were very small for such a
community. Perhaps only one-third of mine.’
‘He oversaw the accounts daily,’ agreed Millar. ‘I tellt you that.’
Maistre Pierre nodded. ‘The charitable receipts are noted and included, but even so Mistress Mudie must have worked wonders, to be feeding and physicking six bedesmen and a household of
six people from such an amount.’
‘Oh, she does, she does. Which makes it the more vexing –’ Millar stopped.
Gil eyed him for a moment, and then said, ‘Talking of six bedesmen, Maister Millar, there’s an odd thing. The boy Livingstone thought he saw a seventh this morning. Did you see
anything?’
‘When was this?’ asked Maistre Pierre. Gil relayed Lowrie’s account of the extra figure in the chapel, and found Millar shaking his head, an embarrassed grin on his face.
‘No. No. We ken that one,’ he said. ‘We don’t let on about it much, which I suppose is why the boy made the mistake. It’s – well, to say truth, we believe
it’s one of the past brothers. I’ve seen him now and then myself, but he doesny attend every day, or even every week,’ he added thoughtfully, ‘whatever Anselm says.’
He stopped, looking from one to the other of them. ‘We get used to it,’ he said.
‘You are saying it is a spirit?’ said Maistre Pierre with incredulity. ‘A ghost?’
‘Call it what you like, maister,’ said Millar a little defiantly. ‘I’m saying it’s one of our past bedesmen, still coming to Mass where he worshipped for years, and
no anything harmful.’
‘But have you not called for someone to banish him?’
‘Why? It’s one thing the brethren and I were all agreed on. Whoever he is, he’s another of our brothers, why would we do a thing like that to him? Besides, it would distress
Anselm, who can see him, beyond bearing. We’ve prayed for his rest, maister, but it seems he still likes to hear the Mass, and there’s no wrong in it, after all. Even the blessed angels
rejoice at the Elevation, we’re told.’
‘
Ah, mon Dieu!
’ said Maistre Pierre, staring at him.
‘So it’s possible Lowrie saw nobody,’ said Gil.
‘It’s most likely,’ said Millar earnestly. ‘Nobody in this world.’
‘And has anyone spoken to Agnew yet?’ asked David Cunningham. ‘Or indeed tellt the man’s mistress, poor soul? I mind her father well, a decent man,
it’s a sore sicht to find the family brought down so far that she’s to keep house for a clerk in this way.’
‘Agnew was there this morning,’ Gil reported. ‘He was quite anxious for his brother. And I think one of the bedesmen had gone to tell Mistress Veitch, so we can likely assume
she knows by now.’
‘Maister Millar also said he would call on her,’ said Maistre Pierre. He stretched his steaming legs closer to the hearth and took another swallow of spiced ale. Maggie approved of
Alys, and by extension of her family, so the ale and the hearty plate of bannocks and cheese with it had appeared with only a passing reference to the time of the household meals.
‘So it seems,’ said the Official, clipping his spectacles on to his nose, ‘as if the man Naismith has been farming the income of the bedehouse to his own benefit?’
‘And considerable benefit at that,’ agreed Gil. ‘Enough to purchase several properties in the burgh. When would St Serf’s last suffer an Archbishop’s Visit,
sir?’
‘Who knows?’ said his uncle, considering briefly. He rested his elbows on the arms of his great chair and steepled his fingers in front of his chin. ‘No in my time,
that’s for certain. Robert Blacader has other matters on his mind than Visitations.’
‘So the accounts have never been audited, and nobody but the old men could say him nay,’ said Gil. ‘Of the five I have met, only two are clear in their heads, and one of those
is stone-deaf.’
‘Do you think that was why he was killed?’ asked the Official.
‘I don’t know yet,’ said Gil.
‘What have you found, then?’
Gil looked at Maistre Pierre, who raised his eyebrows but said nothing and reached for another bannock.
‘Naismith left the almshouse last night, just before they said Vespers, which would be about half an hour after five by what Millar tells us. He went out wearing the same clothes he was
found dead in, and the cloak and hat of his office over them. The almshouse people think he was going to see his mistress.’
‘Who lives by the Caichpele,’ supplied Maistre Pierre through a mouthful of bannock.
‘Thomas Agnew says he was wi him later in his chamber in the tower, but left after an hour or so. He was heard in his lodging, well after nine o’clock,’ Gil continued, nodding
at the interruption. ‘His bed had been slept in and the dole Sissie Mudie left had been eaten. This morning he may or may not have been seen at Mass, though if he was there he wasn’t in
his own seat. And then, not ten minutes after the Mass, he was found knifed in the bedehouse garden, between a locked gate and a locked door, stiff and cold as if he’d been dead near twelve
hours.’
‘Well!’ said David Cunningham, but it was drowned by an urgent exclamation.
‘Who? Who are you talking about?’ Tib stood at the door to the kitchen stairs, white as the flour on the apron which covered her old grey gown. Socrates rose from his place at
Gil’s feet and padded forward to greet her. ‘Is it someone dead at the bedehouse?’
‘Aye, indeed,’ said her uncle, turning his head. ‘Seems the Deacon has been stabbed.’
‘Stabbed?’ she repeated blankly. ‘The Deacon? Who’s that? Who by?’
‘That’s what your brother has to find out.’
‘But when did it happen?’ Tib demanded. Socrates thrust his nose against her apron, tail waving, and she pushed him away.
‘Last night sometime,’ said Gil. ‘Who do you know at the bedehouse?’
She gave a little gasp, and shook her head. Socrates sat down and grinned up at her face, then turned to look over his shoulder at Gil.
‘No one,’ Tib said earnestly, ignoring the dog. ‘But it’s so close. Just over the way and down the vennel.’
‘Never fear, Lady Tib,’ said Maistre Pierre in bracing tones. ‘Your brother and uncle will keep you safe.’
‘Yes,’ she said, with a contrived smile. Her eyes slid away from Gil’s, and she wound her fingers in the folds of her apron. He was about to speak when there was a knocking at
the main door of the house.
‘Tell Maggie I’ll get that,’ he said, rising.
‘If it’s another death, say you’re from home,’ recommended the mason.
What’s worrying Tib? Gil wondered, making his way down the stair to the door, the dog at his heels. She seemed frightened for someone, rather than by something. It has certainly changed
her tune from this morning, if she accepts that I might be of some use, he thought, lifting the latch and swinging the heavy door back.
‘Well, Gil,’ said the foremost of the three Cistercians on the doorstep. ‘Let us in out the rain, and then I’ll wish you happy.’
‘Dorothea!’ he said in delight.
By the time Sister Dorothea and her retinue of plump lay sister and small elderly confessor-cum-secretary had been drawn in, welcomed, and dried off, Maggie had appeared with
more spiced ale and a large jug of wine, followed by Tib bearing a platter of new girdlecakes.
‘And I sent Tam to tell them at the court you’d be held up, maister,’ Maggie added to the Official, and set down the tray to seize hold of Dorothea. ‘Oh, my, Lady Dawtie,
you’re looking well. You’ve no changed a bit. Cellarer, is it, now, and keeping the accounts? You that used to hide from your lady mother when it was time to learn your
numbers?’
‘Sub-Cellarer,’ Dorothea corrected her, emerging from the embrace with aplomb.
‘We’ll pray for your promotion,’ said Maggie, and pushed her down on to a stool. ‘Sit there, Lady Dawtie, my dearie, and hae a glass of wine. It’s the good
stuff.’
‘I’d rather a wee cake,’ said Dorothea. ‘Herbert, Agnes, I commend Maggie’s girdle-cakes. That’s what I’ve come to Glasgow for, Maggie, no my
brother’s marriage.’
Tib, the apron discarded, helped to serve out the wine and cakes very properly, eyeing Dorothea under her lashes. Gil watched this with some amusement but could not blame her; he hardly
recognized their sister himself. Had Dorothea really been this confident, this calm, at sixteen? It seemed unlikely, despite Maggie’s assertion. He remembered a thin, hungry girl, impatient
of the distractions of the world, always at her prayers. As he should have been himself at the time, given the plans their parents had nurtured for him, but at fourteen there were more exciting
things to be doing.
‘And I hear from Mother,’ said Dorothea, passing her confessor the platter of cakes, ‘that you’ve a benefice and a title now, Gil. Is that your doing, sir?’
‘No, it’s all your brother’s own doing,’ said Canon Cunningham. ‘I reminded Robert Blacader of his existence, and so I believe did your mother, a number of
times,’ he added remotely, ‘but it was Gil’s own work made Robert that pleased wi him.’
‘You put him to the blush,’ said Maistre Pierre.
‘But what work is that? Not this business of hunting down murderers, surely. Does Blacader think that worth a benefice?’
‘He seems to,’ said Gil.
‘Oh, is that why they wanted you at St Serf’s the day?’ said Tib in tones of innocence. ‘I thought it was just because you were at the college with that man
Kennedy.’
‘St Serf’s?’ said Dorothea. ‘Is that the bedehouse? Is something wrong there?’
‘Robert Naismith the Deacon was found stabbed this morning,’ said Gil baldly. She bowed her head and crossed herself, her lips moving.
‘And has anyone tellt the lassie Veitch yet, that’s what I’d like to know,’ said Maggie from her position by the small cupboard. ‘You mind Marion Veitch,
don’t you no, Lady Dawtie?’
‘Marion? What’s she – oh!’ said Dorothea. Her face, narrowly visible within the folds of white coif and black veil, took on an expression of dismay. ‘Oh, poor
Marion. Where’s she staying? I must visit her.’