‘Clerks!’ muttered Sir William.
‘And I found the injury that killed the boy Iain. His skull is broke.’
‘Aye, I heard about that. The bairn’s mother came raging to Patrick while we drank to the memory of the dead.’
‘I’ve no doubt of it,’ said Gil drily. He summarized what he had learned, at Dalriach and from Alys. When he had finished there was another long silence, broken by the occasional clink of a chain and ruffle of feathers.
‘Bad,’ said Sir William at last, sucking his teeth. ‘I’ve no stomach to execute a woman.’
‘And it’s not right clear yet,’ said Gil, ‘which of them it might be.’
Sir William nodded, and set Eleanor back on her perch. Having fastened her leash and tugged it to check it was secure, he led the way out into the yard, where Socrates rose and padded over to thrust his nose into Gil’s hand. ‘How much d’you need to do about secretary Stirling? How close to his killer are you?’
‘Not close enough,’ said Gil, grimacing. ‘I should return to Perth tomorrow, as I said.’
‘Hmf,’ said Sir William again. Behind him his falconer slipped into the mews to continue his work. ‘Cunningham, I’m told that information about the English treaty got where it should never ha been, and a bit more besides. Even if you think he’s been dead these two weeks, it might still have been Stirling’s doing.’
‘It could,’ agreed Gil cautiously.
‘And I’ll need to act in the other business the morn’s morn, speak to David and send up Glenbuckie for more answers. The laddie can hardly stay prisoned in the kirk while we bury the folk he’s accused of slaying, even if Andrew will conduct the burials.’
Why not? Gil wondered. ‘Sir Duncan has no more than a day or two to live,’ he said. ‘Robert and his — assistant have their hands full, but while the other fellow’s there Robert can leave Sir Duncan long enough that he could at least commit the dead, even if he’s not able to say a Mass for them.’
‘That’s true,’ said Sir William, making for the house. ‘I aye forget the boy’s clerked. My lord Montgomery plans Holy Kirk for him, when all’s over and paid for.’
Sweet St Giles, you’d as well cage the lad, thought Gil, aware yet again of the strange feeling of sympathy for a Montgomery. Does that explain his bitterness today?
Andrew Drummond’s man remembered Gil clearly.
‘And I’ve called a many blessings down on you these last days, maister,’ he said earnestly.
‘Have you, indeed?’ said Gil, closing the garden gate behind them, and opening it again to allow Socrates through.
‘Aye, many and many. See, it was after you called on him that my maister rose up out of his melancholy. I’d no notion what to do for him, the way he’d sat and stared at nothing ever since — ’ He paused, staring out across the loch in the early evening sun. ‘Ever since the second letter came from his mother,’ he reckoned finally. ‘Two weeks since, that would be, a day or two after we got back from Perth.’
‘After you got back from Perth,’ Gil repeated. ‘What state was he in before that? Just after you got back?’
‘Oh, he was eased in his mind,’ asserted Benet. ‘That was why it was sic a painful thing to see him so cast down again, for we’d ridden back from Perth much easier than we’d been on the road there. Calmer, if you take my meaning, and more able for making decisions.’
‘His stay in Perth had helped him, then,’ Gil suggested.
‘Aye.’ Benet nodded firmly, and looked about him at the low hedges and plots of bright flowers. ‘It’s a bonnie garden, this. What was it my maister said I should tell you about?’
‘About Perth.’ Gil strolled along the path towards the seat at the far end. Socrates set off to patrol the maze of box hedges, his nose to the ground. ‘Do you mind, the last day you were there, Canon Drummond spent a while talking wi someone.’
Benet nodded again.
‘I wondered at it,’ he admitted, ‘for he’d not been seeking out company, and he and this fellow never seemed like friends when they met, but they must ha spent a couple of hours walking on the meadows by the town Ditch, talking of all sorts.’
‘Who was the other man?’ Gil asked. ‘Did you learn that? Do you mind anything about him?’
‘Oh, aye. Well, his man tellt me who he was. At least, he wasny his man, he was another of the household. Fellow cried Mitchel, good company he was and all, the two of us sat down by the Ditch and had a right good crack while our maisters were talking.’
‘Mitchel,’ repeated Gil. ‘And his maister?’
‘Well, his maister was the Bishop o Dunkeld,’ explained Benet scrupulously, ‘but he was waiting on this man my own maister was talking wi, that was the Bishop’s secretary so he tellt me. Name o Stirling, he said. Tall fellow, well set up, wi his hat all ower badges.’
‘Benet, have you heard that Stirling was murdered that evening?’
He had judged his audience right. Benet’s eyes opened wide, with a gleam of pleasurable amazement.
‘You don’t say! Murdered! And my maister walking and talking wi him just that day!’
Gil nodded corroboration to this, and went on, ‘I’m charged wi finding out who killed him. So anything you can mind about the afternoon might be a help to me.’
‘The afternoon,’ repeated Benet doubtfully. ‘Murdered! But I never spoke wi him.’
‘No reason you should,’ agreed Gil. ‘But you’re a good servant, and take note of aught that affects your own maister, I’ve no doubt.’ The man made no comment, but looked gratified at this. ‘Start when the two of them met. How did that chance?’
‘Oh, we went to the dog-breeder’s yard and there he was, and they was talking over the dog-pens a wee while.’ Benet grinned. ‘I was thinking the dog-breeder wasny best pleased at that, for they were right in her way, but it seems the man Mitchel was some kind o kin, and he talked her out of her strunt and gave her a bit hand wi the tasks she had.’
‘What did you go there for?’
Benet shook his head.
‘My maister never said. I wondered at it mysel,’ he admitted, ‘for he’s no one for dogs in the house.’
‘So you never got a word with Mitchel while you were in the yard?’ Benet agreed to this. ‘What was Stirling talking to the Canon about?’
‘Dogs, mostly,’ said the man, ‘seeing they were all about them I suppose. How they get on wi one another, and the like. Training them. The fellow Stirling said how it’s amazing what a dog’ll fetch and carry if you reward it well. And that’s a true word,’ he added, ‘my uncle’s got a sheepdog, it’ll fetch him anything he names in the house and set it in his hand.’
‘And then they left.’
‘Aye, and went out on to the meadow land. I did wonder,’ said Benet, ‘if all would be well, for they marched along the track wi never a word, till they got out on to the open ground, and then they directed Mitchel and me to wait under a hazel-bush, and went off into the midst of the meadow. But they were quite civil wi one another after that.’
‘So you never heard what they spoke of,’ said Gil. Socrates, his tour of inspection completed, came and sat down by his feet. ‘It’s a good way to be private, to go out where you can see anyone else approaching.’
‘Aye, but I think they forgot about being private,’ said Benet, grinning. ‘Once they got well into their talk, they were walking back and forth and came often within earshot. No that we listened, a course,’ he said virtuously.
‘No, of course not,’ agreed Gil. ‘So what did you and Mitchel talk of? Were you there a while?’
‘Oh, aye, the best part o two hour. Beats me what they had to talk over that took as long. We’d tellt one another our lifes and run out o riddles by the time they called us.’
‘And then you went your separate ways,’ Gil prompted.
‘Aye, all in different directions, too,’ Benet said, laughing. ‘My maister sent me back to the Blackfriars, saying he’d dine in Perth, but he’d an errand that side the Ditch first. The other fellow sent Mitchel in to Perth, bade him say he’d be in to his supper but he’d stroll a while on the meadow first. So none o us went the same way.’ He held his hand out for Socrates to sniff.