The Hanging of Margaret Dickson (9 page)

When she returns to the cottage, he's gone.

***

On New Year's Day, Maggie spends another day alone. And on that day it happens the fire is low and so she ventures outside to fetch the last of the peat. As she descends the steps of the cottage she takes care not to slip on the icy floor, when suddenly a familiar voice calls out to her.

‘What are you doing out here in the freezing cold, Mangy Maggie?'

‘Johnny. Is that you?' She peers down from the steps to the ground below.

‘Who do you think it is? Get that door open, I'm frozen to the bone.' In two strides he's half-way up the steps holding out his arms.

He looks at her with a puzzled expression and places a hand on her protruding stomach. ‘I thought you'd have dropped that by now?'

‘You feckless fool, this is a new baby. My baby girl's fast asleep inside; you must come inside and see her.' She stretches out one arm to the door.

Johnny ruffles her hair, exactly the way he did when she was a child.
‘
You have a wee baby girl? What did you call her?' He asks and follows Maggie through the front door.

‘We named her Anna after my…' she beams.

Johnny's bottom lip trembles. ‘Of course…' he replies in a broken voice, a tear rolls from the corner of his eye, and he wipes it away with his dirty sleeve.

For a while Johnny shuffles near the door and then he raises a hand to his face and laughs. ‘I knew I'd forgotten something. Can I ask you a favour, lass? My friend's waiting outside by the harbour. Can he come in by the fire? It's a cold night.'

‘Aye, bring him inside. I won't be a moment, I need to fetch some peat.'

When Maggie returns with the peat, a strange looking man enters the cottage. A cloak of sea mist swirls around his body as though he's wearing a magical cape. Maggie stares at him in awe, mouth wide open.

Johnny claps his hands together and walks over to the odd man. ‘This is a good friend of mine, Maggie. This is Kenneth Laing.'

Kenneth wastes no time in getting close to the blistering hearth.
A quantity of steam rises from his trews as he warms his rump by the fire. And as he does so an expression of extreme relief crosses his face.

‘Kenneth's a taibsear.'

Maggie's eyebrows lower. ‘A what?'

‘A taibsear. Oh, you lowlanders are an ignorant lot. A taibsear – a seventh child of a seventh child. Kenneth has a gift; he can see into the future and has premonitions.'

Maggie's not one for such nonsense and narrows her eyes. ‘And how did he get these powers?'

‘How do you think? Through the power of the fairies, Maggie, how else? Don't you ever leave gifts out for the little people – milk or…'

Maggie interrupts him and says under her breath. ‘Isn't that a load of old nonsense, Johnny?' she replies, ignoring the dagger-like look she receives from the strange little man.

For a while, there is silence, except for the crackling fire. When the taibsear opens his mouth, he directs his speech to Maggie, his tone smooth and rich like warm honey. ‘The gift of prophecy is not nonsense; you should learn to curb your tongue, woman. The gift is not something to be taken lightly and comes with a price.'

‘I meant no offence. So if there was a price, sir – what was yours?'

‘I paid with my eyes.'

‘He's blind in one eye,' explains Johnny.

The taibsear clears his throat. ‘The sight comes to me in visions and dreams. Do you dream, Maggie?'

A feeling of unease comes over Maggie. Her hands reach for her neck, nervous fingers scratching at her throat. ‘Aye, I do. It's very strange. I have the same dream, over and over again.'

Kenneth nods. ‘To dream the same dream again and again is commoner than you think. What's in this dream, Maggie?'

Maggie swallows, unsure of whether to reveal the nightmare that plagues her sleeps. She looks to Johnny for reassurance and when he nods his head she utters. ‘I am stretched out on a dirty floor and rats crawl all over me. And there's this banging noise in the dream, as though a hammer is banging in the distance and the noise drives me insane, so that I scream at the top of my lungs, and that's how the dream is – every single time until I wake up.'

The taibsear's face appears troubled. He turns to Johnny and then to Maggie as though unsure of who to address. ‘My premonitions are spontaneous and come of their own accord. I see nothing of your future, but I do feel uneasy in your company. I sense a dark…'

Johnny Notions interrupts here. ‘You'll be giving the lassie nightmares, Kenneth.'

Johnny pokes Maggie in the arm and twitches his head in Kenneth's direction, swirling a finger in a circular motion around his head. ‘Pay him no heed, he's been at the fire water again and is not making much sense. I think we should be on our way now, Maggie, we've a long journey ahead of us.'

Maggie's shoulders sag. ‘But you've had nothing to eat. Sit down and warm yourself by the fire.'

Maggie pulls a stool out for Johnny and another for Kenneth, gesturing for them to sit down. ‘I've some broth and a couple of bannocks.'

Johnny shakes his head. ‘Nae, lassie. You need the food for yourself and the coming bairn; you've not enough for everyone.'

‘No, I insist Johnny. Let me give you a bite to eat and then you can be on your way.'

Reluctantly, Johnny nods his head. The two men sit by the fire and make conversation. Maggie sets about bringing the broth to the boil, all the while watching Johnny's kind face glowing in the firelight. Taking her time, she places the food on the table and then pours out two cups of small ale.

‘Eat up,' she says.

‘Where's yours?'

‘I ate earlier,' she lies.

But Johnny's no fool. His brow furrows into a frown as he picks up a wooden spoon. ‘Are you sure?'

‘Aye,' Maggie replies as a look passes between them. ‘Honest to God.'

She watches them eat and fusses all over them, fetching more ale and even some of Patrick's baccy. When they finish she places the last of the peat on the fire and signals for them to come near the hearth.

‘Oh no, Maggie, we must go now.'

Maggie's eyebrows droop and the corners of her lips pull down. ‘But I've just put more peat on the fire…'

Johnny crosses the room to embrace her, pulling her face to his chest. He smells of heather and tobacco and his coarse hair tickles her chin. Maggie sniffs up in her nose and swallows back the pain in her throat. He'll forever be the father she wishes she had.

‘Your man will return soon lassie and when he does pass on my good wishes.' He kisses the top of her head and pulls away. ‘Now kiss the bairn for me and keep a place for me near the fire.'

Maggie nods and places a shaky hand across the front of her mouth. ‘Don't leave it long now coming back, Johnny,' she tries to smile but it somehow turns into a sob.

‘I won't.'

‘Goodbye, Kenneth. It was a pleasure to meet you. Look after Johnny, he's like a father to me you know,' she says and closes the door.

***

With her belly full of baby, Maggie follows the other fishwives downhill to the Westbow. Her throat's dry and raw. She catches sight of a water fountain and is so distracted she pays little attention to the familiar cry of ‘gardy loo.' Suddenly a dirty rascal throws raw sewage from a tenement above. At the last moment, Maggie manages to avoid the offensive shower and hurries away, but in the process loses the other fishwives.

‘No matter, I will catch up with them later,' she says under her breath.

At the water fountain she drinks her fill, wincing at an incessant snapping sound. All the while she wonders what is causing the noise, a carter's whip or something more sinister.

Near the market square, the snapping noise grows louder. A small crowd congregates near the Grassmarket. Maggie pushes her way through them until she comes to a break in the crowd, suddenly she freezes. The whip has nine lengths of plaited cord, attached to a leather baton and lashes the back of a half-naked woman. A length of hempen rope dangles from her neck as the bailie reads out her crime. And all the while, as her crime is being proclaimed to the crowd, they drag her around the market square before hacking off her hair.

‘Name the father, and we will be merciful!' The bailie shouts.

The woman shakes her head and retches, her vomit spewing onto the floor. The bailie nods to the hangman to continue the flogging, Maggie turns her head away in disgust, wishing she was far away.
A couple of linkboys scurry past her to the market square. Homeless and desperate for food, they beg all day till they have enough money to buy a torch to light a fine gentleman's way, come nightfall, for the price of a few coins. Maggie's face softens at the sight of one of them. He's fair haired and barely four summers old.

The whipping noise halts. They untie the girl from the market cross. She lies face down on the cold dirt floor. The blood speckled face of the hangman gleams with sweat as he delivers his final lash. Be it fascination or horror, Maggie's compelled to stare, her eyes drawn to his coarse hands running along the length of the whip, squeezing and wringing out the blood to form a large scarlet puddle on the dusty floor. The flogged woman is motionless in the dirt. All around her are long ribbons of skin, and her torso resembles a hunk of meat on a fleshers chopping board. The bailie kneels beside her to turn her over; places one ear to her breast and shakes his head. With a pale face, Maggie turns to leave and then stops in her stride, her chest feeling as though it's about to cave inwards. It's the lockman, calling out to her in his loud voice.

‘You, fishwife. Come here.'

‘Me?' Maggie points a finger to her chest.

He nods. ‘Aye, you, fisherwoman. Don't be shy.'

Maggie walks towards him, with each step the smell of sweat and blood gets stronger. Almost immediately she has to resist the urge to retch. As she pauses to adjust the creel on her back, Maggie's swollen stomach protrudes in front of her.

‘Come on, fishwife, I haven't all day. You know the rules, wench. I'm entitled to one fish from every creel on market day.' He stretches out one bloody hand and takes a fish from her creel.

Maggie recoils as he scrutinises her. For a short while his eyes move along the length of her body before finally settling on her face.

‘Till we meet again, fisher lassie,' he utters in a menacing tone.

‘Over my dead body,' she cries and races down the West Bow, running until there's no breath left in her. But the swelling in her stomach makes it hard for her to run and so she has to stop and lean against a door, bending over her knees and gulping like a fish.

After a while she feels well enough to go on, and in no time at all Maggie's at the fish market selling her fish, but alas the other fisher lassies have already gone. With her creel near empty she hurries home, stopping at Joppa to sell the last of her fish. But she can't get the image of the hangman and the woman out of her mind. At the coastal path, the sea soothes her nerves, but as Watts Close comes to sight she breaks into a trot.

‘What's the matter with you, lassie? You are awful pale,' Jean says with a look of concern.

‘A poor woman flogged to death at the Market Cross.'

‘How awful. No wonder you look queasy, sit yourself by the fire. I'll get you a drop of the strong stuff. Where do you keep it?'

‘It's all right, Jean. I'll be fine. How's Anna?'

‘She's no trouble. And her teeth are much better I see. Now I best be off, you never know when a new baby's coming, Mrs McCoist is due any day.

Maggie thanks her and follows her to the door. ‘Oh, before you go. The last time you came to visit me you mentioned Sarah Clerk and the changeling.'

Jean grimaces. ‘It's not good news. The baby died, lass. So it was definitely a changeling. The fairies have her real bairn now.'

Maggie bites her lip. ‘Oh, that's a shame; but I expect she can have another.'

‘Aye, but you know how it is. Folk have started pointing the finger. They're saying it's her fault the baby's a changeling and that she's being punished for her sins.'

‘What sins? She's a good woman. And does her husband blame her too?'

‘Aye, he does. He's beaten her, gave her a black eye and a thick ear,' Jean shakes her head, unable to contain her anger.

Maggie looks at Jean and puffs out her cheeks. ‘For goodness sake, as if the poor woman hasn't been through enough!'

***

When Patrick returns, he thinks he's entered the wrong cottage. Everything is neat and tidy, and not a thing out of place. Maggie's even took care not to tamper with his fishing gear and covered it with an old sack. And for once, his young wife appears to be in a merry mood.

‘Come sit with me, wife.' He pats a stool beside him.

Maggie removes her kertch and joins him near the fire.

‘What the devil have you done? Where is your hair?'

‘I had no money, so I made do.'

‘You sold your hair?'

‘Aye, to the wigmaker on the mile.'

‘But, Maggie, your beautiful hair. I can't believe it. It was down to your waist, and now it barely reaches your shoulders.'

‘It'll grow back,' she stares into the fire.

A feeling of dread fills Patrick's bones and he shivers as he stares at his wife's pale face. There's a sorrow in those eyes he's not noticed before.

‘Will you be here for this one?' she asks, patting her swollen belly.

‘Oh, lass.' He pulls her into his arms and kisses the top of her head. ‘I will. I swear I will.'

***

At the harbour, Maggie has a burst of energy, and the fisherwomen tell her that it's a sure sign that the child is about to be born. She labours all day until her back aches and her hands are red raw from sorting fish on the rocks.