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Whatever else he was, Jock was not stupid. “The man didna know of a better place or couldna reach it in the time,” he said. “He’s a stranger to this country.”

“And Daniel Swanders saw someone when he stole Caspar,” said Carey. “He saw a man in a rich doublet, cleaning a jack, and what’s more, the man didn’t chase after him either so Caspar wasn’t the reason for the…”

“A rich doublet,” repeated Jock.

“So,” said Carey, counting off on his fingers in a way he had picked up wholesale from Walsingham, “we have signs and portents of the murderer. He was well-known to Sweetmilk so he could get up close behind him with a loaded dag, he was rich, he was a stranger to these parts…”

“Good God Almighty,” said Jock, putting his head back against the wooden post, “I’ve been sitting down to eat with my son’s killer for this past week.”

“It has to be, doesn’t it?” said Carey. “It has to be the Earl or one of his men.”

“But why…?”

“I don’t know,” said Carey, but he couldn’t hide the expression on his face well enough for Jock.

“Ye do know.”

“I don’t.”

“Ay, ye do,” said Jock, “and ye’ll tell it me, if you’ve gone this far.” He laughed mirthlessly. “Who knows, it could even get you out of this alive.”

“Don’t lie to me, Jock.”

“Well, it could get you a quicker death, any road. Come on.”

“Whoever killed Sweetmilk is the father of your daughter Mary’s bairn.”

“Her what” Jock’s eyes were glaring with fury and he struggled against the ropes holding him. “WHAT did you say?”

“Your daughter Mary is expecting a babe around Christmas time. Bothwell, or one of his men, is the father.” Jock’s face was swollen, he seemed to be choking. Carey, who knew perfectly well he was talking for his life, but was a natural gambler, carried on remorselessly. “My thinking is that Sweetmilk found out what had happened to his sister, and challenged the man to a duel. They went off away from Carlisle to fight it out, so Mary wouldn’t be shamed by it, and while they were on their way, the man came up behind Sweetmilk when he wasn’t expecting it, and shot him. Then he abandoned him at the only place he could think of and came back.”

There were tears flowing down Jock’s crusty face. “God damn him, God damn him to hell, poor Sweetmilk, I’ll skelp the little bitch, I’ll…”

“You’ll marry her off quickly is what you’ll do. I think she might have been forced.”

“What do you know about it?”

“I’ve talked to her and I don’t think she was willing,” Carey, knowing what he did of the Queen’s maids of honour, thought she’d probably been perfectly willing at the time, but felt sorry for her. “At best, he persuaded her against her better judgment. At worst he raped her.”

“God, so that’s what’s been ailing her. Why didn’t she tell me when Sweetmilk was killed?”

“Afraid of you. Afraid of the man, perhaps he threatened her. Perhaps she still had a liking for him. Who knows?”

Jock shook his head, snortled violently against his running nose. “How can I find the man?”

“Well, I’ve done a lot of the work,” said Carey reasonably, “I’ve narrowed it down from most of the population of the March to Bothwell or one of his men. And I hate to admit it, but I don’t think it was Bothwell either.”

“Why not?”

“Mary said she wouldn’t marry the father if he was the Earl himself, so I think he wasn’t. It’s not that Bothwell wouldn’t do it, but I don’t think he did on this occasion. So you’ve got three or four possible murderers to choose from.”

“I suppose it would be wasteful to shoot all of them and be done with it,” said Jock thoughtfully. “And it might be a little tickle to do at that. So, how do I find out which one to kill?”

“Who was at Netherby on the Saturday? Who did Sweetmilk ride out with? Who came back?”

“Ah,” said Jock, wriggling his shoulders against the wood. “Let me think.” If his arms were cramping him, he didn’t say anything about it, and Carey wouldn’t have risked untying him anyway. He was a grizzled old bastard and tough as doornails, he could suffer.

Carey’s belly started rumbling again. It was dinner time and nothing to eat but raw pigeon squabs from the little dovecote on the south western corner. Well, he wasn’t that hungry yet. Or perhaps he could light a little fire with the materials for the beacon and roast them.

There was a stealthy clatter on the other side of the roof. Jock didn’t seem to have heard, but Carey knew if he’d been a horse, his ears would have swivelled.

He picked up one of the long hardwood poles used for poking the beacon and crept round to the opposite parapet. When he peered over, he saw that the ladder they were trying to use was too short, but that the man climbing it had a caliver under his arm, with the slowmatch lit.

“Halfwits,” said Carey again, under his breath, “haven’t any of you heard of Pythagoras?”

Very carefully, while the man was still halfway up, he reached with his pole over the wall, hooked it into the top rung of the ladder and pushed. There was a scream, a bang from the caliver, a loud crash and clatter. Carey went back to where Jock was and offered him some water, which Jock drank. Neither of them commented on the ladder.

“Ye canna win,” said Jock, “ye canna hold out indefinitely. Sooner or later ye must sleep.”

“Oh, it’ll be quicker than that,” said Carey, “sooner or later they’ll work out how to do it.”

“And how’s that?” demanded Jock.

Carey shook his head. “Besieging’s a science, and I’m not going to give you lessons.”

“You mean they’ll burn ye out.”

“Us. They’ll burn us out. It’s probably only Wattie’s objections that’s stopping them now.”

Jock turned his face away. “What’s making ye so cheerful? It’s only a matter of time before you die.”

Carey couldn’t really explain it. He knew perfectly well he’d got himself into a ridiculous situation; that his scheme for finding out what was going on in Netherby had perhaps not been one of his best, and that while Elizabeth might be wondering where he’d got to, there was very little she could do for him. Somehow, with the sun shining down on him and the sight he had of Liddesdale valley glowering to the north, sitting talking to a trussed-up Jock of the Peartree was almost pleasant.

“Well,” he said after he’d wandered round the parapet looking for activity down below and seeing nothing, which would have worried him if he’d been a worrying man, “maybe we can narrow it down even more. Tell me what happened here on Saturday.”

“Now then. A couple of the women went down to Carlisle to buy oatmeal, but they were back by noon. That was when Mary fell and hurt her hand. And I’d sent Sweetmilk, and Bothwell sent two of his men, Jock Hepburn and Geordie Irwin of Bonshaw, to Carlisle to see if they could scout out who had horses and where they were, and buy a few if they saw some cheap. Sweetmilk was in a taking with something that morning, but he wouldna tell me what it was, so I thought it was some girl or other-it usually is, was,” Jock swallowed. “I said he should take Caspar, which the Earl of Bothwell had brought to me as a fee, in case Scrope was interested in buying him and also to…er…so people could admire him, ye know. So they’d send me their mares.”

Carey nodded, twanging his thumb gently on the bowstring. Something was niggling his mind, but he couldn’t think what it was.

Jock wriggled again. “That’s the last time I saw him alive.”

“So it’s Geordie Irwin of Bonshaw, or Jock Hepburn. Or the Earl.”

“Unless he met somebody at Carlisle, of course. I mind that the Affleck boy, not Robert, he’s dead, but his younger brother, Ian, he didn’t come here until early Sunday.”

“Well it couldn’t be him, could it, if I’m right about Mary.”

“Oh ay. So it’s Geordie Irwin or Jock Hepburn.”

“Well?”

“Well what?”

“Which do you think it is?”

“Och, lad, it could be any of them, they’re a’ bastards. And I’m not convinced it wasna the Earl; he’s allus had an eye for women that one, and Mary’s a bonny little girl. He wasnae in Netherby on the Saturday either, and I dinna ken where he was.”