Fate and Fortune (15 page)

‘Then why did you confess to it?’ Hew persisted gently.

‘Phillip said I must.’ The boy wiped his nose on his sleeve.

‘I think that you like Phillip very much.’

‘I admire him, sir. He is teaching me my letters,’ Michael answered desperately, ‘which will help me set good copy. I would wish to be like him, if I can.’

‘And you do not like Christian,’ Hew concluded.

Michael said judiciously, ‘I do not mind her much. She is a woman.’

Hew laughed. ‘Aye, then, there’s the rub. You do not mind her when you should.’

‘How can a woman be master, sir, over a man like Phillip!’ the boy burst out. ‘It is not right!’

‘Is that what Phillip says?’

‘No, sir. Phillip likes her,’ the boy admitted grudgingly.

‘So Phillip told you to confess?’

‘Aye, sir, and he said, if I did own it as a jest, he would makes things right with Christian, and I should keep my place. Which he did, sir.’

Hew did not mistake the pleading in his voice. ‘But surely,’ he said softly, ‘Christian must know you cannot write.’

‘We telt her I made copy of the letters from a book, it was a trick to tease her.’

‘Then you have been punished unjustly,’ Hew pointed out.

The boy shook his head. ‘No, sir, I have kept my place. And had I not confessed, I should have lost my place. Phillip said, I must confess to Christian, or she would dismiss me. He said that it was what she wished to hear.’

Meeting Richard later at the tolbooth, Hew saw something that eclipsed these strange affairs. Marten Voet the card seller, escorted by two bailies, passed him by the entrance to the turnpike stair.

‘What is happening here?’ he inquired of Richard.

‘Burgh council business that does not concern us. Nonetheless,’ said Richard thoughtfully, ‘it does involve your printer, in some sense.’

‘In what sense?’ Hew asked him urgently.

‘In as much as this is one of the unfree printers I was telling you about. He is a maker, not of books, but of playing cards.’

‘Aye, I know,’ Hew exclaimed impatiently. ‘What is he doing here?’

Richard regarded him for a moment, with a look of grave amusement. ‘You are a little forward in your form of question,’ he admonished mildly, ‘If I were you, I’d keep that tone of voice for court.’

Hew muttered, ‘Pardon,’ barely masking his frustration.

‘Granted,’ Richard smiled. ‘It appears he has been brought in for illicit trading. He’s a Frenchmen, if you please! Though it may be hypocritical to judge. My own wife bought a packet of his cards. As I understand, he does a roaring trade. All of which is of no consequence to us; the council will dismiss him with a fine.’

‘I know the man,’ repeated Hew. ‘He is not French.’

Richard, plainly, had grown weary of the argument. ‘French, English, Turk, it’s all the same. If he came here from the Canongate, he still would be a stranger – and, of all the printers, they’re the worse. He came, and made a nuisance, and will presently be gone, as, my friend, will we. There’s work to do tonight.’

Hew ignored him, crying out, ‘Marten, Marten Voet!’

The cardseller did not respond. But as he paid his fine and motioned to depart, Hew blocked his way. ‘You are Marten Voet, from Antwerp. We met in St Andrews, at the senzie fair,’ he asserted bluntly.

Only then did Marten stop to look at him. ‘You are mistaken, sir. My name is Luc Martin, and I am French. I have not been at the fair, nor in the place you mention, but am newly docked at Leith, having come from Rouen.’

‘Let the poor man pass, Hew, and be gone about his way,’ Richard called out sharply, ‘unless you want a pack of playing cards. I cannot have you making such a scene.’

Reluctantly, Hew stepped aside. ‘He is Marten Voet, I’m sure of it,’ he said again to Richard.

‘And what if he is? These dustyfutes have many secret lives. They live by their wits. What matters is that they move on, and do not make a nuisance of themselves. Your friend Martin – that I think we may conclude to be his name, with some degree of certainty – has made his moonlight sales and paid his dues.’

‘No doubt you are right,’ Hew sighed. ‘I bow to your experience.’

‘I’m very glad to hear it, Hew! At last you have begun to learn!’ Richard clapped him on the back. ‘You are the most perverse and wayward pupil I have had. Now here are some very dull writs that will keep you busy for the next few days, and leave you no time free for pursuing mysteries.’

Returning home for supper later in the day, Richard and Hew were startled by the rumble of a deep, familiar voice. It seemed to fill the hall, booming from the windows in the upper gallery. Sitting in a gossip chair, in Richard’s favourite spot above the street, was Doctor Giles Locke. Hew’s first thoughts were for Meg, while Richard asked alarmed, ‘Is someone sick?’

‘Not at all,’ beamed Giles. ‘I was explaining to your son why it is not well-advised to eat green plums. He has the makings of a fine anatomist.’

‘That does not surprise me,’ Richard answered dryly. ‘Roger is the sort of boy who likes to tear the wings from flies.’

Roger scowled, and the doctor looked taken aback. ‘A little harsh, I think,’ he commented.

‘But Giles,’ protested Hew, ‘whatever are you doing here? Has something happened to Meg?’

‘Your sister is quite well, though exhausted by the journey. I left her in the lodging house, with Paul. She is under strict instruction to lie down and rest. She does not take too kindly to instruction,’ Giles admitted.

‘Like another from her family,’ Richard laughed. ‘Good doctor, you are welcome in my house.’

‘Aye, tis good to see you. But what are you doing here?’ persisted Hew.

‘Doctor Locke has been explaining to us how our use of fruits impacts upon the humours,’ Eleanor said weakly. Her usual calm
politeness
seemed a little strained. ‘And why we should not eat green pippins. I sent Grace upstairs, when the narrative became a little too
direct
.’

‘The consequence of poor digestion,’ Giles asserted, ‘cannot be too forcefully impressed upon the young. I have seen a bairn bloat like a hog’s bladder, after a surfeit of pears.’

‘We apprehend the risk, and will remember it,’ Richard said politely, ‘when the apple trees are once again in fruit.’

‘Now that you are come home, I will take Roger upstairs. Will you stay to supper, Doctor Locke?’ Eleanor offered. ‘We have nothing green.’

‘Cowcumbers,’
Giles remonstrated sternly, ‘are by far the worst, to a windy constitution, being cold and wet. Indeed, I thank you, madam, but we are lodged without the city walls, and my wife will be expecting me. I must be gone before they close the gates.’

‘A pity, then, another time,’ Eleanor said, evidently relieved.

Giles bowed to her. ‘I shall look forward to it. I pray you, take no trouble, for a little leg of mutton will suffice. With perhaps an egg or two,’ he added wistfully.

‘I will send up some wine,’ Eleanor answered, somewhat at a loss. ‘Come, Roger, let’s go and find Grace.’

Roger resisted. ‘I should like to stay. Doctor Locke was telling us of hard fruits in the belly. They are very cold and windy, and corrupt the blood. I especially liked the part,’ he said to Giles, ‘about the stinking vomits and the flux.’

Giles gave a little cough, ‘Ah yes, good boy, go to,’ he murmured awkwardly.

‘Aye, Roger, go, this is men’s talk,’ Richard said impatiently. Roger glowered at him as he allowed his mother to escort him from the room.

‘Giles, for the last time, what’s your business here?’ demanded Hew. ‘And why have you brought Meg?’

‘That is no kind of welcome. I have brought you letters from your man of law.’

‘But surely,’ Hew exclaimed, ‘you did not have to bring them here yourself.’

‘That’s true enough,’ conceded Giles. ‘But I have had no peace from Meg since she read your letter. And since I have some business here in town, we thought to make a journey of it. I am here on a matter which, as Richard well inferred, is not fit for mention before wives and bairns. You will recall, before you left, I found myself much
exercised
in trying to control the verol – what the vulgar call,’ he said to Richard, confidentially, ‘the Spanish fleas or pox.’

Richard blanched. ‘I am well glad,’ he muttered, ‘that you concealed your purpose from my wife and children.’

‘For which purpose,’ Giles went on to Hew, ‘I have come for
conference
with my good friend Doctor Dow, who has a practice here on the Cowgate. Doctor Dow is an expert in the
morbus gallicus
, and our council desired that I should consult with him. So I have taken leave of absence for a while. Your sister has been most vexatious, and would not be left behind. As I understand,’ he turned to Richard, ‘the disease is as rife in Edinburgh as it is across the water.’

‘So I am told,’ Richard answered seriously, ‘and the worst is in the Canongate, where the gudemen cannot keep their tails within their breeks.’

‘Quite so,’ murmured Giles.

‘How long do you mean to stay here?’ Hew inquired.

‘As long as it will take for me to conclude my inquiries, and for Meg to recover from the ride. Though, I should say, we made a good journey. We came from Pettycur to Newhaven, and found a smooth crossing, that passed without incident. Now I have taken rooms in a tavern on the outskirts of the city, for the town itself is noisome and foul, and not at all convenient for Meg. I fear though,’ he continued fretfully, that once she is rested there will be no staying her, for she will want to see you, and to go to shops and such, and all such silly vanities.’

‘More likely she will want to help you in your conference,’ Hew pointed out.

‘That is what I fear,’ Giles admitted gloomily. ‘It really would be preferable, that she had stayed at home.’

‘Eleanor will be pleased to take her,’ offered Richard, ‘while you are engaged with Doctor Dow.’

‘And she shall come to the print shop and meet Christian,’ suggested Hew.

Giles looked a little doubtful. ‘The printer? Is that a likely place for her?’

‘Aye, for certain. Christian is most gentle and refined. Meg will like her very much.’

‘Then your printer is a woman!’ Giles exclaimed, amused. ‘Ah, we should have guessed it! Christian is a woman’s name, for sure. Though you and I, who lived abroad, might be excused for not remembering it.’

‘I confess, that it never occurred to me,’ admitted Hew. ‘Christian is a widow, and has qualities that will endear her to Meg.’

‘Then
Christian
is your little bird. A match for Doctor Dow, I doubt.’

‘What do you mean?’ Hew frowned.

‘The corbie and the doo – the raven and the dove,’ Giles explained.

‘Whisht, no, he won’t like
that
!’ Richard put in, laughing, ‘for he wants the little printer to himself.’

‘Then I begin to understand,’ the doctor winked at Richard, ‘why he has not come home.’

‘There is no way of warning him, and no way of restraining him. Trust me, I have tried,’ Richard grimaced.

‘This is most utter piffle!’ Hew protested.

‘I think I know your Doctor Dow,’ Richard turned to Giles. ‘Is he not our visitor?’

‘He is indeed,’ Giles agreed, ‘A most accomplished man.’

‘What do you mean, your
visitor
?’ asked Hew.

‘The visitor is appointed by the burgh council to investigate
suspicious
deaths,’ Richard elucidated, ‘due to infectious sickness or foul play. Doctor Dow has given evidence, once or twice, in cases of suspected slaughter, poison, and the like. He was called to Elspet Barr, when she was found dead on the turnpike. It was fortunate for us, perhaps, he was not called in court. He is a fair practitioner,
remarkably
good at his task.’

‘We could do with the position in St Andrews,’ Giles reflected.

Hew looked up, startled. ‘The girl on the beach!’ he exclaimed. ‘What happened to her, Giles? But how could I have forgotten her?’

‘That is not so very strange,’ Giles assuredly him kindly, ‘given all that has happened to you since. To come so close to drowning has a purgative effect upon the wits. Not to mention – for we will not deign to mention – the time that you spent stinking in the gaol. There is nothing like a little degradation to refine one’s point of view.’

‘You are saying that I thought too much about myself?’

‘I’m saying it is natural you forgot the girl.’

‘You will excuse me,’ interrupted Richard, ‘for I do not follow this. Who is the girl on the beach?’

Hew replied bleakly, ‘A dead lass was found on the shore at St Andrews, two or three days before I rode south. Giles and I were made to see her by the coroner. She had been smothered and raped. I found out her name,’ he added, to Giles, ‘she was Jess Reekie of Largo.’

Giles nodded. ‘Her mother came, too late. The poor lass was already in the ground.’

Hew fell silent, staring at the fire. Richard placed a hand upon his young friend’s shoulder, saying with compassion, ‘This
mattered
to you, Hew. And yet you never said. You keep your secrets close.’

‘It mattered that she had a name. I could not give her justice,’ Hew said quietly. ‘For Jess, and for people like her, the law does not serve.’

‘The way things are, that may be so,’ Richard confirmed. ‘Yet we have a young king, and the world is changing. So the law will change. Pursue the law, and you may find your justice after all. How else will you discover it? An eye for an eye? In revenge?’ He turned away abruptly. He was clearly moved. ‘Gentlemen, you must excuse me. I have left some papers in my chamber, that I wished to read tonight. I shall wish you goodnight, Doctor Locke. If there is any assistance you require while you are here, pray don’t hesitate to ask. I should be glad to show you the town.’

‘That is most kind,’ Giles enthused. ‘I have a whim to play a game of caich. Perhaps you could direct me to a court?’

‘But certainly. I should be delighted to play with you myself.’

‘Giles does not play,’ Hew qualified quickly. Richard looked perplexed.

‘I am in the early stages, of beginning to begin to play the game,’ Giles contradicted, ‘and am keen to learn. Perhaps we might play doubles, with your bright boy Roger making up the four?’

Richard laughed sardonically. ‘That is not a good idea. Though Roger is a quick and subtle boy, at any kind of sport he is curiously inept. In truth, were his mother not above suspicion, there are times I should wonder that he is my son.’

Giles looked a little thoughtful. Later, he remarked to Hew, ‘That was a cruel thing that Richard said about his son. If I were a father, then I cannot think I would express myself so pointedly.’

‘They have a strange relationship,’ reflected Hew. ‘Though Roger’s mother tells me they are close, I confess, I see no sign of it. Richard goads his son, who seems to spark the worst in him. But Roger is a difficult boy.’

Early the next morning, Hew called upon the goldsmith, George Urquhart, with the letters Giles had brought. Unlocking Urquhart’s secrets, Richard had explained, called for subtle questioning. ‘He is as close as any man I’ve met,’ he confided, ‘and if he came as witness to the court I would not care to see him on the other side.’ He insisted on accompanying Hew, as curator of his interests and affairs. And Hew, as it turned out, was well advised to have brought along a friend. Urquhart kept his shop in the heart of the luckenbooths, adjacent to the kirk or stinking stile. In appearance, it was little different from the other shops, apart from the windows, which were fitted with iron bars. Inside, there was a vaulted chamber, stifling in the close heat of the forge, where Urquhart welcomed customers. The young King James himself, so Richard claimed, was sometimes to be found there, perched upon a stool, drinking sack with George Urquhart on some private business of his own. Beyond this entrance cell, that held the
goldsmith’s
tools of trade, it was supposed he kept enough in gold to make secure the commonwealth. But this was supposition, for no stranger ever passed there; James himself had never glimpsed what lay within those vaults. Whatever streams of fortune Urquhart dammed and banked there, he released, by strict appointment, in disappointing drips.

Urquhart himself was equally impenetrable. Each evening on the stroke of eight, he closed his shop and made his way along the stinking stile, sidestepping the muck that lined the street. The crowds would part to let him pass. And though he let his shop keys jangle from his belt, no one dared to cross him as he sauntered to the Cowgate where he kept his house. The crames ran with thieves, like a garden full of weeds, and once a dead body had been found slumped in the stile, doubled in a puddle of its own congealing blood. Yet Urquhart walked untroubled, without a second glance, or the slightest qualm or
quickening
of his step.

This goldsmith now subjected Hew to careful scrutiny before he would admit him to the shop. ‘Matthew Cullan’s heir, you say? And yet I do not know you,’ he remarked.

‘You know
me
,’ said Richard firmly.

‘Aye, for certain,’ Urquhart said at last. ‘You had best come in.’

‘I know you, Master Cunningham,’ he said cunningly to Richard, ‘as a connoisseur of rings. I have a pair of diamonds you may care to look at while you’re here.’

‘When our business is concluded,’ Richard winked at Hew. ‘For the present, I am here with Master Cullan.’

Urquhart motioned them to sit upon the stools, in the fierce heat of his fire, while he looked upon the letters, leaving them to sweat. He examined Hew’s documents though a diamond cutter’s eyeglass, for any mark of swindle, forgery or theft.

Hew grew impatient, and was about to speak, when Richard hushed him with a smile. ‘George will not be rushed.’

‘Quite right.’ Urquhart looked at them astutely. ‘Master
Cunningham
here knows, as well as most, the danger of false letters.’

‘It is a risk I meet,’ the advocate observed, ‘from time to time, in my profession. Yet it is less common, than you may suppose.’

‘In my profession, I assure you,’ Urquhart answered smoothly, ‘false letters are more common, than you may suppose. Never, ever,
underestimate
the threat of forgery.’ He folded up the letters, returning them to Hew. ‘I know your lawman in St Andrews, and I am convinced that this is his hand. I will accept that you are Matthew Cullan’s heir. A gentle and an honest man, I have not seen him for some years. I am sorry to hear of his death.’