The Harper's Quine (25 page)

The bright eyes rolled sideways at her.

‘I won’t tell, and nor will Maister Cunningham.’

‘Unless it becomes necessary in the course of justice,’
said Gil scrupulously.

Kat rubbed the toe of her shoe along the line of the
floorboards.

‘Well ,’ she said. ‘I just happened to be looking out of the
window of the maister’s closet, see, when she came back
on May Day. There was no harm, really, seeing that the
maister was out at supper at the Walkinshaws and no in
his closet. And if the marchpane suckets got dislodged
when I was there, that the mistress put to dry and never
told us, well, it wasn’t -‘

‘I’m sure it was completely accidental,’ said Alys. ‘And
certainly nothing to do with Maister Cunningham.’

‘Oh, quite!’ Gil agreed hastily.

‘And the closet overlooks the street?’ said Alys. ‘So you
got a sight of them from above.’

‘Yes.’ The cracked leather of the shoe went back and
forth. ‘So I didn’t really see him very well. But I did see
one thing,’ said Kat, sitting up straighter. ‘It wasn’t any of
the laddies in the town. And he was gey fine dressed, to go
with the hat. I thought he was a gentleman.’

Gil, leaving Alys at the White Castle to oversee the dinner,
went on down the High Street, taking more care over
where he was going this time. Round the Tolbooth, into the
Thenawgait, he passed a baker’s shop where hot loaves
steamed on the boards, the apothecary’s where the scent of
spices tickled his nose, the burgh’s one armourer with two
sullen apprentices rottenstoning a breastplate at the door.
He reached the Fishergait without straying from the route,
and there encountered Ealasaidh buying bread.

‘Good day to you,’ she said, unsurprised. ‘Himself is
waiting on you.’

‘You were expecting me?’

‘Himself is, certain. He woke me to say you would be
here, he had seen it. It is a thing he does now and then.’

‘He did not see what came to Bess, I suppose?’

‘If he did he has not told me.’ She took the change the
baker’s man offered her and turned towards her lodging.
‘I am troubled about him, maister. His women come and
go, though never none like Bess, and I have never seen him
shaken like this, not even when the servant lassie at Banff
drowned herself. He is still saying he may never play
again.’

She strode through the pend, nodding to neighbours as
she emerged into the yard.

‘And Eoghan Campbell was here again yesterday before
Vespers,’ she said, ‘getting another crack with her in there,
and then round our door asking where was Bess’s things.
I sent him away,’ she said with some satisfaction.

The harper was seated in the great chair where Gil had
seen him before. He was in formal dress again, as if for a
great occasion, finished off with the gold chain and velvet
cap which he had worn at the Cross on May Day. Gil,
distracted, counted hastily and discovered this was still
only the fourth of May. The harper had risen and was
bowing to him.

‘A blessing on the house,’ he said.

‘And on the guest in the house,’ said the harper. ‘Good morning to you, maister. Woman, bring refreshment for
our guest.’

To Gil’s relief, Ealasaidh brought him not usquebae but
ale in a wooden beaker and a platter of fresh bannocks. He
drank the health of his hosts, and hesitated, wondering
where to broach the subject of Sempill’s offer.

The harper, after a moment, gave him help.

‘It is as a man of law you are here, not my son’s tutor,’
he stated. ‘Put your case, maister.’

‘It is hardly a case,’ said Gil. My son’s tutor? What does
the old boy mean? he wondered.

‘It is a heavy thing,’ said the harper. ‘The burden of it
woke me. Speak, and make the matter clear to us.’

‘It is a word from John Sempill of Muirend,’ said Gil.

Putting matters as fairly as he could, he explained
Sempill’s offer. Ealasaidh listened with growing fury, and
as soon as Gil stopped speaking she exploded with, ‘The
ill-given kithan! The hempie! Does he think we would let
a gallows-breid like him raise Bess’s bairn?’

‘Woman,’ said her brother, ‘be silent. He has not offered
to raise the bairn.’

‘He has not,’ agreed Gil. ‘The offer is only to recognize
the child as his heir. I think he is aware that that would
give him some control over it, and hence the promise to
see you right.’

‘Does he mean money?’ said Ealasaidh suspiciously.

‘Those were his words,’ said Gil. ‘I offer no interpretation.’

The harper sat silent for a little, his blank stare directed
at the empty hearth.

‘What would your advice be?’ he asked at length.

‘Aenghus!’

‘Let Maister Cunningham answer, woman. We must do
something for the bairn, for we can hardly be trailing him
about Scotland with Nancy, and it is best to consider
everything. Maister?’

‘I am acting for Sempill of Muirend in this,’ Gil pointed
out, rather uncomfortable. The harper bowed his head with great stateliness. ‘However, if I was advising a friend
in such a case, I would suggest at least talking to Sempill,
to find out what more he intends. There might be some
benefit in it -‘

‘But at what cost!’ exclaimed Ealasaidh.

‘Further, if you were to pursue the matter, I would
recommend that a written contract be entered into, and
that it be made out with great care, to protect the bairn
in the first instance. He is Bess Stewart’s heir, you realize
that, with land in his own right so soon as the matter is
settled -‘

‘Is that what Sempill is after?’ asked the harper. The
boy’s land?’

‘I do not know that,’ said Gil.

‘Aenghus, we cannot trust him! Bess did not trust him!
He will smother the bairn as soon as he gets his hands on
him, he only wants the property
-‘

‘Bess’s family could contest that if the bairn were to die
in infancy,’ Gil observed.

‘And he will not love him!’

‘That I think may be true,’ said Gil.

The harper suddenly rose to his feet. ‘Woman, give me
the small harp,’ he said. She stared at him, and slowly
reached out and lifted the smallest clarsach. Clasping it, he
paused for a moment, then pronounced, ‘This is my word
to John Sempill of Muirend. I will meet him, upon conditions, to talk more of this, though I promise nothing.’

‘And the conditions?’ prompted Gil.

‘That yourself be present to see fairness, and that
another man of law be present on the bairn’s account.
Myself can speak for myself.’

‘Those are reasonable conditions; said Gil formally.
‘I will bear your word to john Sempill.’

‘And then he began tuning the harp.’

‘It would need it, by now,’ agreed Maistre Pierre. ‘Have
another bannock.’

Gil, turning in at the pend of the White Castle, had met
Alys hurrying out to help at the Hamiltons’ house. Greeting him with pleasure, she had sent him in to share her
father’s noon bite of bannocks and potted herring, and
hastened on her way.

‘Oh, it did. The point was that Ealasaidh was fearing
that he might not play again. So whatever else Sempill has
done, he has got the harper’s hands on the harp again.
I won’t tell him that.’

‘What will you tell him?’

‘Exactly what McIan told me. It was a formal statement
of intent, given with the harp in his hands - it is
binding.’

‘I had not known that.’ The mason chewed thoughtfully.
‘Who will act for the bairn?’

‘My uncle may. Failing him, there are other men of law
in the Chanonry. I would be more comfortable acting for
John Sempill if I knew his intention regarding the bairn,
and particularly if I were not investigating the murder of
his wife.’

‘And of that poor girl.’

‘Indeed. Did Alys tell you what we learned from her
friend? A very poor witness, but it is reasonably clear what
she saw.’

‘It is clear that Bridie had a rich lover, but how much can
we rely on the other girl’s description? I thought all servant lassies sighed for a rich lover.’

‘Some are more practical than that. Kat herself is winching with one of Andrew Hamilton’s journeymen. Her
description is not very detailed, but listen - there is more.
Balthasar of Liege stopped me this morning.’

He summarized the musician’s observation.

‘Aha,’ said Maistre Pierre. ‘And you saw James Campbell in the market yesterday. What time would that be,
think you?’

Gil cast his mind back.

‘It feels like last week,’ he complained. ‘It was before
I met Euphemia Campbell and her Italian, and when Alys caught up with us at Greyfriars it was just Nones. Say
about half-way between Sext and Nones, at the foot of the
High Street near the Tolbooth. He was talking to a lassie
with a basket.’

‘He was, was he?’

‘We don’t know which lassie it was,’ Gil pointed out. ‘As
you said, every woman in the burgh was out at the market.
No, I must go back to the Sempill house and speak to
James Campbell, to Euan, and to Sempill himself.’

‘Shall you ask your uncle to, act for the harper’s
bairn?’

‘Not to say ask. I will tell him the story, and he will
likely offer.’

The mason drained his beaker and set it down.

‘I will come up the hill with you,’ he said. ‘To cut short
the noontime football and see what Wattie has done. Will
you ask your uncle if I may call on him after Vespers?’

The mastiff Doucette was barking. Gil heard her as he
parted from the mason at the Wyndhead, baying angrily
like a dog confronting a larger enemy. Several other dogs
added their comments occasionally, but the deep regular
note continued while he walked up Rottenrow past a
group of children playing a singing-game. Entering the
gateway of the Sempill house, he was surprised to see
Euphemia, seated on the mounting-block and teasing the
dog by throwing it a crust from time to time, watched by
her silent Italian. He paused, studying her. She was pretty
enough to attract any man, and that trick she had of
clinging to Sempill’s arm and smiling up at him was
certainly one which would have appealed to Hughie.

Euphemia tore off another crust and threw it to the dog
with a graceful movement, the wide green velvet sleeves of
her gown falling back from her hands.

The musician’s dark gaze fell on Gil, and he said something to his mistress. She looked round, slid off the
mounting-block and came towards the gate, sidestepping quickly as the mastiff rushed at her snarling, and smiled
brilliantly at him, pushing back the fall of her French hood
with a graceful movement.

‘Maister Cunningham, how nice to see you. Have you
found who killed Bridie Miller yet? Will the serjeant take
someone up for it?’

‘Not yet,’ said Gil, crossing the yard to meet her, staying
carefully outside the mastiff’s range. ‘Good day to you,
madam. I have a -‘

‘Oh, but he must! Have you never a word of advice for
him? Was it the same ill-doer who killed Bess? Is Glasgow
full of people killing young women?’ She shuddered, biting a knuckle. ‘None of us is safe. What if something came
to that little poppet who summoned you yesterday? Such
a well-mannered child, a pity she’s so plain.’ Gil recognized Alys with difficulty. ‘Or to Mally here, or those
bairns out at the Cross?’

‘Calma, calma, donna mia,’ said the Italian beside her. She
threw him a glance, and smiled again at Gil, a little
tremulously.

‘Forgive me,’ she said. ‘What brings you here, Maister
Cunningham?’

‘I have a word for Maister Sempill,’ said Gil, ‘and
I wanted to speak to your brother. Are they at home?’

‘I think John’s in the stables.’ She lifted the bread from
the mounting-block, looked down at it, and threw another
lump, rewarded by further round of barking. ‘Ask them at
the house.’

Gil left her breaking a new loaf, and climbed the forestair to the house door, aware of the lutenist’s dark gaze on
his back. Hughie, he reflected, if confronted by that lovely
smile, those taking ways, would not have troubled to resist
Euphemia. And how did he feel, he wondered, when he
realized what she had cost him? Not guilty, most like. Few
things were ever Hughie’s fault.

The door stood open, but the hall within was deserted.
After some calling, he raised Euphemia’s companion, who
emerged from a door at the far end of the hall exclaiming, ‘Your pardon, maister! I never heard you, the dog’s that
loud. Oh, it’s Maister Cunningham, is it, the man of law?
And what are you after today?’

Gil explained his errand, and she sniffed.

‘Maister James is in the tower room with his books,
I think Sempill’s out the back docking pups’ tails. Here,
you go down this stair.’

She turned towards another doorway, picking up her
dark wool skirts.

‘No need to trouble you,’ Gil said. ‘I can find my own
way.’

‘Oh, it’s no trouble,’ she said a trifle grimly, as if she was
protecting the house from unauthorized invasion. She
stumped down the stair, the rosary and hussif at her belt
clacking together at each step, and said over her shoulder,
in unconscious echo of her mistress, ‘And have you found
who’s running about knifing women? We’ll none of us be
able to sleep till someone’s taken up for it. Euphemia’s
quite ill with the worry, the wee sowl, and it’s not good for
her.’

‘I’m still searching,’ said Gil, emerging after her into the
reeking stable yard. John Sempill was just going into the
cart-shed opposite, but seeing Gil he turned and waited for
him to cross the yard.

‘Well, Gil?’

‘Well, John. Finished with the pups?’

‘Oh, that was an hour since. I’d ha been quicker with it,
but Euphemia helped me.’

‘Oh, she never!’ exclaimed Mistress Murray. ‘In her
green velvet, too! It’ll be all over blood.’ She turned and
hastened back across the yard.

Gil, suppressing an image of Euphemia Campbell being
stripped of the green velvet gown, said, ‘I’ve had a word
with the harper, john.’