‘I don’t believe it either, but he was found standing above the body,’ said Gil, and she clapped both hands over her open mouth. ‘I tried to act for him, Marion, but the bystanders insisted he touch the dead and the corp bled. He’s in the castle now, and there’s to be a quest on it the morn’s morn.’
She swayed, and Bel jumped forward to support her.
‘There, mistress, hold up!’ she said. ‘Come and sit down yonder.’
Maistre Pierre took her other arm, and they helped her to the foot of the Girth Cross where she sat limply on the steps, staring at Gil.
‘He never,’ she said. ‘He never.’
‘Why did he go to Agnew’s house?’ Gil asked. She shook her head. Socrates sat down beside her, and she patted him mechanically.
‘To ask about the will. Is it Agnew that’s slain? What happened, Gil? Why’s John been taken?’
‘Agnew came back to his house, so he says,’ Gil related precisely, ‘and found his man Hob stabbed and bled to death, and John standing above the corp.’
‘When did your brother leave you?’ Maistre Pierre asked. She rubbed a hand across her brow, pushing her linen cap askew.
‘Kind o late in the morning. After Sext, maybe?’ She shivered, pulling her plaid closer about her, and Bel bent to put an arm round her.
‘Come back to the house, mistress,’ she urged. ‘There’s nothing you can do the now.’
‘No — no, I want to see John. He’ll be — ’
‘They’ll no let you in, mistress. Come back and get warm,’ Bel coaxed.
‘Indeed I think it wiser,’ offered Maistre Pierre. ‘Come, we will walk with you.’
After a little more argument she got to her feet and set off weakly down the Drygate, her maid supporting her protectively. The street was busy, with people returning from the market further down the High Street, but she made her way among the passers-by without apparently seeing them.
‘I’ll no believe it,’ she said again. ‘He’d no call to. He’d not been to the man’s house afore, he’d likely have to ask the way. Why should he kill someone he never saw afore?’
‘Ah!’ said Gil. ‘Now if we can find whoever he asked — ’
‘Would you?’ She turned her blue eyes on him. ‘Would you ask about, Gil?’
‘I will,’ he said, ‘if you’ll answer a few things for me.’
‘Aye,’ she said after a moment. ‘I suppose. Fair’s fair.’
Back at the house she seemed to have recovered a little from the shock of John’s arrest, and dismissed Bel with affectionate thanks, though the girl would have stayed with her. Seated in the hall, upright and formal in the great chair which must have been Naismith’s, her visitors on the tapestry-upholstered stools, she said, ‘Did you find that woman you were asking for?’
‘I did,’ said Gil. ‘I’m sorry to have bothered you at a bad moment yestreen. This is no a lot better.’
‘Oh, I’m no much occupied right now,’ she said, with faint irony. ‘What are these questions you’ve got?’
Gil looked at Maistre Pierre, but found his friend’s attention on the ceiling, beyond which Frankie was talking to someone. Occasional sounds of sweeping suggested it was Eppie.
‘One or two things,’ Gil said, and hesitated. ‘Marion, you said John went to ask about the will. Do you ken what the Deacon’s original will was like?’
‘No,’ she said.
‘He never showed you it?’
‘No,’ she said again. Under the crooked cap her oval face was pale and pinched. Above them the child began singing again, the same tune as last night. Socrates cocked his ears to listen, but did not move from his position at Gil’s feet.
‘I know what the new one was to have been,’ Gil persisted, and checked as he realized that Agnew’s tablets were still in his sleeve. Well, it had been no moment to return them. ‘I wondered how much you were to lose by it,’ he went on.
‘He said he’d see me right,’ she said indifferently. ‘I aye trusted him.’
‘But the trust was misplaced,’ said Maistre Pierre. She flicked a quick glance at him — was she startled? Gil wondered.
‘Yes,’ she said, and shivered.
‘He never settled any property on you?’ Gil asked. She shook her head. ‘Or got you to witness any of his papers?’ Another shake of the head. ‘Did you sign anything for him?’
‘He kept all his business separate,’ she said at last. ‘I kent nothing about the bedehouse, nor his transactions in the burgh. Thomas Agnew tells me they’re considerable, but I never heard of any of them.’
‘Agnew’s spoken to you?’ said Gil, startled. ‘What was that about?’
‘Oh, aye. This morning.’
‘This morning?’ repeated Gil. ‘Before or after John went to see him?’
‘Oh, long afore. That’s why he went, see,’ she explained. ‘The man was here and spoke to me about the Deacon’s business, explained that all he left uncompleted would be void now, but he never said aught about the will. So John gaed to ask him when he came back fro the bedehouse.’
Gil waited, but no more was forthcoming. After a moment he changed the subject.
‘Marion, when did your brother come to Glasgow?’
Another quick glance.
‘Two days since,’ she said. ‘No, it’s the day afore that now, isn’t it? The day Naismith dined here and then — ’ She stopped, apparently unwilling to finish the sentence, her expression quite blank. ‘John turned up at my door afore noon that day,’ she resumed, ‘and I was fair glad to see him, for he’d been away almost four year. He’d never set een on my wee girl.’
‘He was on his own?’
‘On his own.’
‘Was it a good venture?’ asked Maistre Pierre with professional interest. ‘Where had he been?’
‘He’s pleased enough,’ she said. ‘I don’t know all where he’s been. Spain and the Middle Sea and Araby maybe.’
‘As far as cercled is the mappemounde,’ offered Gil.
Marion glanced briefly at him, but merely went on, ‘He’s come home a wealthy man.’ She put up a hand to cover her mouth. ‘And what good it’ll do him — ’
‘Has he been to Portingal?’ suggested Maistre Pierre. The smile vanished.
‘No, that was — ’ She bit off the words. ‘That was one place he never said,’ she finished carefully. Maistre Pierre looked at her oddly, but did not comment.
Gil felt in his sleeve and drew out the stained scarf.
‘Do you ken this piece of linen, Marion?’ he asked, unfolding it. She looked at it, and her gaze sharpened.
‘No,’ she said. ‘What is it? Where did you get it?’
‘It has an initial on it,’ he said, turning the end of the strip towards her. She made no attempt to reach for it. ‘Or perhaps two. It might be N, it might be I V.’
‘It might be a number,’ she suggested. ‘What’s the stains on it? Where did you get it?’ she asked again.
‘I think it was dropped by whoever put Deacon Naismith into the bedehouse garden,’ said Gil, watching her carefully. Her eyes widened slightly.
‘You mean it was in the garden?’ she said, still staring at the thing.
‘Not in the garden,’ said Maistre Pierre. ‘Maister Cunningham’s dog found it.’
Again the quick glance at him. Then her eyes went back to the scarf, studying the fine white stitchery on the end Gil was holding up.
‘I’ve never seen it afore,’ she said.
‘What is it?’ Gil asked. ‘We thought it might be a towel, or else a neck-scarf, but women ken more about such things.’
She shook her head. ‘It could be either.’ Gil held it out to her, and she shrank away from it. ‘Where did you say you found it?’
‘Where would you think such a thing might be found?’ asked Maistre Pierre.
‘How would I ken?’ she asked, her voice rising slightly. ‘I–I don’t — I’ve never seen it afore,’ she reiterated.
The house door opened. She looked up, and something like relief crossed her face. Socrates scrambled to his feet and Gil turned, as a man’s voice demanded, ‘Marion, have you seen John this day?’
A big voice, not shouting but pitched to carry in a gale. Maistre Pierre looked at Gil, his eyebrows rising, and round the open door appeared a man to match the voice, big and broad, booted feet planted firmly on the wide boards, his short dark curls level with the carved lintel. Rankin Elder, drinking companion of John Veitch, who had told them the tales of flying fishes in a tavern on the High Street.