The Fourth Crow (23 page)

‘Nein!’

‘Is hier
,’ she drew a line away from St Nicholas’, ‘Rottenrow.’ Another nod.
‘Hier kom twee mensen
.’ She held up two fingers, then walked them along the line of Rottenrow.
‘Ja? Twee mensen.’
She mimed fine clothes, patted rich sleeves, adjusted a hat. Berthold nodded hesitantly.

‘My, you’re as good as a play, mem,’ said Jennet, laughing.

‘Twee mensen
,’ Alys said, and walked them down Rottenrow again. By the spot which represented St Nicholas’ she paused. Berthold was watching her fingers; after a moment he stole a glance at her, then looked back at her hand.
‘Wat u zien?’
she asked again. The boy shook his head and looked away again, staring intently at the flagstones under the bench. ‘Berthold,’ she persisted.
‘Wat u zien?’

His chest heaved.

‘Nichts!
’ he burst out.
‘Ich sah nichts!’
He sprang to his feet, bobbed a perfunctory bow, the civility heartbreaking in the circumstances, and fled towards the house.

‘Well!’ said Jennet. ‘Did he tell you anything, mem? I canny make out his babble. It’s right clever the way you can understand him, and Luke can tell what he’s saying and all.’

‘He saw the two brothers,’ Alys said, gazing after the boy. ‘The same two that Meggot was telling you about. I know Luke saw them so that must be right. But he insists that he saw nothing else.’

‘He’s feart for something,’ said Jennet. ‘Or someone, maybe.’

‘So I thought,’ agreed Alys. She drew a deep breath, and got to her feet. ‘Come, I must be civil to my good-mother.’

Ealasaidh nic Iain, very upright on the settle in the hall, her red worsted skirts spreading round her and her dark curling hair hidden by a very new French hood which did not entirely suit her, studied Alys with faint hostility.

‘Was that all you were wanting?’ she asked. Then, perhaps recognising that she sounded ungracious, ‘No that you are not welcome in your faither’s house, lassie. Will you take another cake?’

‘Thank you.’ Alys took another oatcake, then offered the platter to her stepmother, who shook her head curtly. ‘No, I wished a word with you as well, Ealasaidh.’

‘Oh?’

They had dealt with the health and progress of small John, Ealasaidh’s nephew, along with two clever things he had said, and agreed on the management of whatever ailed young Berthold with a harmonious exchange of receipts for afflictions of the spirits. Now Alys bit into the oatcake, which was smeared with some of the apricot preserve she had left in the stillroom. Across the hall, Jennet was seated primly in the window, looking with disapproval at the floor, which was certainly dusty. Trying not to follow her gaze, Alys said,

‘When you were travelling about Scotland,’ she met her stepmother’s eye and quailed at the expression in it, ‘did you ever know, did you ever hear of,’ she corrected herself, ‘a chapman called Cadger Billy? He trades in Lanarkshire, that I know of.’

‘I have heard o him,’ admitted Ealasaidh remotely. ‘We never played for the great houses out in Lanarkshire, you understand, they have no appreciation of the clarsadh there, but I have heard of Cadger Billy.’

‘Do you know where he comes from?’

The other woman shrugged.

‘They know him out by Dumbarton, and by Kirkintilloch. I never met the man.’

‘That is helpful,’ Alys said thoughtfully. ‘His circuit centres on Glasgow, perhaps.’

‘Why do you ask? Is there no enough goods in Glasgow for you?’

‘He called more than once at the home of the lassie that is missing,’ she explained. ‘I wonder if he might have carried some word for her.’

‘Very likely. Who better, indeed? Is that you helping your man again? Have you learned aught to avail him?’

Recognising the real meaning of the question, Alys recounted all that was known of the two deaths and the disappearance. As was her habit, Ealasaidh listened with many exclamations of shock and surprise, even to the portions she must have heard already, laughed heartily at the tale of the quest and the two verdicts, and finally said,

‘And you are thinking our laddie might be involved?’

‘I think he may have seen something. My father has told me you see shadows around the boy.’ Ealasaidh’s mouth tightened, but she nodded. ‘Do you know what they mean?’

‘No.’ She waited, and after a moment the other woman went on, ‘I am seeing a darkness about him, like death. It is not a death close to him, or danger of death, I am thinking, but I do not know what it betokens. And also I am seeing crows.’

‘Crows,’ Alys repeated. ‘That is very strange.’

‘Three of them,’ Ealasaidh said. Her strong mouth twisted wryly. ‘As in the song, you ken it? Three crows on a wall. I am not understanding it.’

‘On a cold and a frosty morning
. Has he mentioned crows?’

‘He has said nothing. He is frightened, that is very clear. Maybe I will make himself question him again.’

‘I think that might not work,’ Alys protested, ‘for he has already lied to my father. No, leave him, we might get something from him once he has thought for longer. If Gil learns more about what he might have seen, we may be able to question him more closely.’

Ealasaidh grunted, but said after a moment, ‘A shocking thing it is, all this that has happened, and all around St Mungo’s too. You would be thinking the saint would be protecting his own better than that. No doubt he is revenged on the man Barnabas now. Himself was telling me of that last night.’

‘He likes to talk over the day,’ said Alys cautiously. Her stepmother gave her a suspicious look. She smiled, the same smile as she had shown her father, maintaining it with the same slight effort. ‘He has missed my mother sorely these seven years. I am glad he has you to talk to.’

Ealasaidh’s expression softened slightly.

‘It is good of you to be saying that, lassie,’ she said.

‘Oh, yes,’ Alys assured her. ‘My duty is with Gil’s household, after all, now he has his own roof-tree, and my father would be alone, since he has no other child.’

There was a silence, which extended beyond comfort and into an appalled chill. She felt her face solidify, and the shadows in the hall darkened and danced before her eyes.
Christ aid me,
she thought,
surely not? Not already?
Out of the darkness Ealasaidh’s voice said,

‘I would not have told you yet, lassie. Himself does not know, I have only now begun to sicken.’

‘I wish you,’ she said from a dry mouth, ‘I wish you well. I wish you very well.’

A hard hand closed over hers, just as she had clasped Johan’s.

‘Alys.’ Was that the first time the woman had used her name? ‘I take that very kindly, lassie. Are you,’ the strong-featured face emerged from the dancing shadows close to hers, ‘are you well? Will I call for a cordial?’

‘No, I,’ she rose unsteadily, ‘I must go. I must call on, call on,’ she swallowed, ‘I must make other calls.’

Jennet was exclaiming at her elbow, concern in her tone, and her stepmother spoke again, low and intense, though she could not catch the words. Jennet said,

‘What are you telling her, mistress? Get away from her, leave her alone!’

‘She needs to know this.’

‘Leave her, mistress, can you no see she’s no well? She can hear it later. Come away, mem, can you manage the stair?’

By the time they had traversed the courtyard and the pend which led out into the street she was shivering so her teeth chattered, and clinging to Jennet’s hand.

‘What is it, my dearie?’ her maid demanded, pulling her plaid about her shoulders for her. ‘What’s come to you? What will I do for you, lassie?’ The girl looked about her, as if for help. ‘Are you ill right enough? Oh, how will I get you home from here? Can you walk?’

‘Kate,’ she managed.
What shall I do, what shall I do?
went the thoughts in her head.

‘Leddy Kate! A course, that’s the answer. Come on, my lassie, just a few steps. Our Lady send she’s home, or some of them at least.’

One foot in front of the other. Her legs like hanks of yarn, Jennet’s arm strong about her waist. Voices round her, familiar and friendly.

‘Mercy on us, girl, what’s come to your mistress? Babb, fetch me the angelica cordial and a glass.’

‘I dinna ken, mem, we called on her good-mother, then she went like this when we cam to leave. I canny get her home this way.’

‘Alys? Alys, what ails you?’

‘It was something the auld wife said to her.’ Jennet’s voice was dark with suspicion. ‘My mistress wished her well, but it turned her right dwaibly, it did, for all that.’

‘What did she say? Bring her here.’ The familiar thumping of her sister-in-law’s crutches. She was led forward, pushed onto something soft, made to lie back. ‘Cover her wi this, she’s cold as charity. Alys? Can you hear me?’

She nodded, and a warm hand gripped hers.

‘I’ve no a notion what she said, mem, but my mistress was wishing her well,’ Jennet repeated. There was a pause, as if the two exchanged a glance, and Kate’s voice said,

‘I see. Aye, Babb, bring that here. Alys? A wee drop cordial?’

‘I feel a right fool,’ she said.

‘Rubbish,’ said Kate briskly. Seated in the window-space, the cradle at her feet and her son at her breast, she peered at Alys across the hall chamber. ‘I’ll not ask what your good-mother told you, but if it’s what I think it is, it would owerset anybody. Are you feeling better after that wee sleep?’

‘I should get up the road and see to the dinner.’

‘Kittock can make the dinner by herself, she’s done it a few times,’ Kate retorted. ‘You’ll leave here when I say you’re fit to go. What took you to that house, anyway? I thought you wereny on calling terms?’

‘That was part of it.’ Alys lay back against the pillows of her sister-in-law’s best bed, still feeling disorientated. ‘I—We should be better friends. I thought it falls to me to make— And then she—’ She swallowed, and started again. ‘My father said something about Berthold, I wished to ask her more about it. And to speak to Berthold.’

‘You’re making little sense.’ Kate objected. ‘What about Berthold? He’s coming on, or so John Paterson says, his Scots is no bad at all and he was out at the prentice battle the other night, it seems. A numnum!’ she said to the noisily suckling baby, who ignored her.

Alys tried to gather her thoughts.

‘My father said,’ she recounted slowly, ‘that my good-mother had seen shadows round the boy. He has been unwell for a day or two, ever since the prentice battle. We suspect he saw something that night which has frightened him, and what my father said confirms it to me. I wished to speak to him myself, but it was no good, he would not tell me either.’

‘Shadows.’

‘And also crows. She thought, not his death, but something around him.’

Kate eyed her doubtfully, but did not comment. After a moment she said,

‘Where is Gil at with this matter, anyway? We heard about the man dead at St Mungo’s. Is it connected to the other death? Is someone going about the High Kirk killing folk? That’ll do the pilgrim trade no good.’

‘I don’t know what Gil might have learned today,’ she said. ‘There is no trace of the missing lassie, which is strange, you would think if she has been taken to be wed by force, or for her money, her kin would have heard of it by now. I wanted to ask my good-mother something about that, too,’ she added, ‘but she has never met Cadger Billy, though she has heard of him.’

‘Cadger Billy?’ Kate repeated. ‘The chapman wi the cart?’

‘You know him?’ Of course, she realised, Kate had grown up out in Lanarkshire. Likely Gil knew the man too, and she had had no need to ask, to get into conversation with—

‘Known him all my life. He’d come by every two or three months, first at Darngaber, then after we went to Carluke, he’d turn up wi his wee cart and a great load of knick-knacks and useful things, on his way out into Lanarkshire. Pins and needles, braids and threads, belt buckles, laces, you name it, he carries it all round the West, Ayrshire and Renfrewshire as well as north of the river.’

‘Where does he come from, do you know? Where is his home?’

‘Oh, he’s a Glasgow man.’ Alys sat up with an exclamation, and Kate looked surprised. ‘Why are you asking? What’s he to do wi’t?’

‘The Shaw girls, the missing lady’s good-sisters, mentioned him. I think he may have carried messages for Annie.’

‘He’s out on his round the now,’ Kate said. ‘I had a word from Tib just yesterday, and she mentioned him, said he’d been by Carluke and went on towards Lesmahagow the day she wrote. So even if he carried word, it’s none so likely he carried Annie herself off.’

‘Does he have kin here in Glasgow, do you know?’

‘Never a notion.’ Kate disengaged the drowsy baby from her breast, leaned forward to put him in his cradle, and began to fasten her gown. ‘No, wait, I think he once mentioned having taken a wife out of Renfrewshire, which disappointed my sister Margaret at the time, she’d a fancy for him. Tib and I used to tease her about it. Good-looking fellow, wi fair hair, though he doesny have as many teeth as he used to have.’ She reached for her crutches, and levered herself to her feet to clump across to the bed. ‘How are you feeling now? Aye, I think you’re more like yourself. Were you wanting to track down Cadger Billy? Will we ask the men if they ken where he might dwell?’

Making her way home an hour or so later with Jennet watchful at her elbow, Alys picked her way along the path by the mill-burn, past the gardens of the houses on the High Street, past the tumbledown wall at the foot of the College lands, turning over what she had learned in the afternoon, though her thoughts flinched away from the one fact, the unthinkable thing, which she must not share yet with anyone, not even with Gil. Andy Paterson, steward to Kate’s husband Augie Morison, had promised to ask about for Cadger Billy’s lodging, though he could not see what Alys wanted with such a man, and said so.

‘He’s honest enough,’ he admitted grudgingly, ‘but you’ve all the warehouses o Glasgow about you, mistress, what business would you have wi him?’

Andy’s nephew John had been more helpful. Aye, he minded Berthold fine at the prentice boys’ battle; he had been near the Cross, and then he had slipped away, maybe no liking the tussle. John had seen him by St Nicholas’ chapel, hiding in the shadows. Seeing Luke was in the thick of things, John had kept half an eye on the German laddie, and saw the two fine fellows come down Rottenrow, past Berthold, and turn up the Stablegreen, and then again later coming by the Cross, making for the High Street. They had called encouragement to the defenders of the Cross.