‘He’s in no pain,’ said Robert after a moment. ‘That’s a grace. My grandsire — Aye, well.’ Davie moved; Alys thought he put a hand over Robert’s. ‘And he’s been confessed, your — your uncle saw to that, and shrived him and all. But it’s taking him so long!’
‘It’s a long road,’ said Davie. ‘A long road, and a hard one.’
‘Tell me about Gheel,’ said Alys softly.
After a moment Davie began to describe the town, so vividly she could almost see it, its narrow streets and squares, the tall white kirk growing in its midst with the striped tower beside it, and the poor creatures with their injured minds walking about where they were treated with love and respect rather than being taunted and tormented.
‘It’s all some of them need,’ he said, ‘to be treated like ordinary folk, but a lot of them need physicking as well, and there are aye some that are too wild to live out at first, they’re tended in the hospital. They go home cured, or they die, or they stay wi us for ever. As St Dymphna chooses.’
‘I’d like to do that,’ said Robert after a thoughtful silence.
‘What, cure the mad?’
‘Look after the mad,’ Robert corrected. ‘It’s a service. I could do it.’
‘You could,’ said Davie, considering it in a way that told Alys he knew why Robert was here. ‘It would be a — yes, you could!’ he exclaimed.
Would Robert’s uncle permit it, Alys wondered.
‘No ropes round the neck?’ he was asking. ‘No chains?’
The two voices murmured on in the shadows. Alys leaned back against the house wall, listening carefully, but she was still very weary and after a time she lost the thread of their conversation.
A sharp movement woke her. She sat up straight, closing her mouth, and discovered that it was full dark, they sat under a field of stars, and her companions were silent, though the hum of prayers still surrounded the house, like bees in clover. Then she became aware of tension beside her, of someone — Davie? — taut as a bowstring and breathing fast, of Robert suddenly sitting at the further end of the bench. What had happened?
‘I’m sorry,’ whispered someone, almost inaudible. Had there been a sound before the movement? A tiny sound, like a kiss?
The house door opened, shedding lamplight which gleamed on weary faces and prayerful hands in front of it, but cast the three of them into shadow here at the gable. A tall figure strode round the corner, broad shoulders black against the stars, stick in hand.
‘It is near ended, my son,’ said a voice. The same voice that had spoken to Alys in the preaching-field, the red-haired man’s voice. ‘Go within now, it is your turn. You have earned the right.’
Robert stood up, hesitated as if he looked back at Davie, or Alys, or the red-haired man; then he moved obediently towards the house door. Beside Alys Davie rose, and she — heard him trying to calm his breathing.
‘Will I go too?’
‘No. Your duty together is not yet.’ The dark shape moved, as if to set a hand on his forehead. ‘The calumny is avenged, for the woman was swearing falsely, but there is things you must be setting right and all, Davie Drummond.’
‘I ken that,’ said Davie.
‘The blessing of Angus be upon you,’ said the man. ‘And upon you, my daughter.’
‘Amen,’ Alys said. Something touched her bent head, lightly. When she looked up the tall figure had gone, though it was too dark to move swiftly.
There was a sudden outbreak of wailing at the house door, and within Robert’s voice rose in Latin. The prayer for the dead.
‘They’ll regret waiting this long,’ observed Sir William.
‘It’s no more than three days,’ said his lady.
‘Aye, but in this heat?’
Alys kept silent. She was not entirely sure whether she should be present at Mistress Drummond’s burying, but she had been determined to attend.
She had already taken a liking to her hostess, but the heroism with which Lady Stewart had refrained from questioning her until she was ready to talk had won her deep respect. They had spent the whole of yesterday afternoon in the solar discussing the events in Glenbuckie and in the Kirkton. The Bailie’s wife had taken a pragmatic attitude to the death of the child Iain.
‘He was an innocent. He’d likely go straight into Our Lady’s arms, for I ken he was baptised, so he’s in a better place and his people are better without him and all.’
‘But surely — ’ Alys had protested. The older woman looked pityingly at her across her needlework.
‘Out here, the way they work the land, they’re never more than one bad summer away from famine. It’s a thought to feed a bairn that willny work for you in its turn.’
She heard her own voice, talking to Gil. I may not know about country life, but I have lived in towns all my days. Quite so, she thought.
‘So it was the Good Neighbours,’ she said aloud.
‘It was. And Dalriach might as well blame the fire on them and all, if it stops Caterin making trouble for young David. What do you think of that matter now? Sìne tells me he has spent the day in the loft in the kirk and won’t come down.’
‘I think the Good Neighbours may take Davie back soon as well.’
‘Do you now?’ Lady Stewart’s needle was arrested again. ‘Even though Patrick has accepted him?’
‘Maybe because Patrick has accepted him.’
So now she stood near the edge of the circular kirkyard, too hot in her best black velvet headdress with the gold wire braid and a great black cloak borrowed from her hostess, and watched while Andrew Drummond, in the vestments out of the kist in the priest’s house, committed his mother and his nephew to the earth. He was dry-eyed, his harsh voice giving nothing away; round him the men of the family in their best clothes watched solemnly, Jamie Beag and Patrick, Davie with Murdo Dubh beside him. The other men of Dalriach were present, a stranger in plaid and feathered bonnet who must be the son-in-law, and a few men of the Kirkton still in their working shirts, but none of the folk from the glen, and no women at all apart from herself and Lady Stewart, not even the boy’s mother.
‘They’ll bury Sir Duncan tomorrow,’ said Lady Stewart. Alys nodded; that much she could understand. St Angus’ fair had been postponed till after the priest’s burial; the entire parish would wish to see Sir Duncan to his grave and be at the fair as well, and three days in a row away from the harvest was too much.
Robert was present in the kirkyard too. He had acted as Andrew’s clerk for the Mass. Watching him now, Alys recognized that he had placed himself where he need not see Davie Drummond, though every so often he could not help looking for him. Davie, on the other hand, was conspicuously not looking at Robert.
‘I’m glad to see Robert about,’ said Lady Stewart. ‘Sìne says he never crossed the threshold of Sir Duncan’s house yesterday, either, I feared he was going to fall into melancholy. He’s done well by the old man, poor laddie. It’s been a hard road for him.’
Alys nodded again, thinking of the moments before Sir Duncan died, and then of Lady Stewart’s reply when she had asked about the red-haired man.
‘Red hair?’ she had said. ‘No, I don’t think so. Most of our people are dark, except the MacGregors, and he doesn’t sound like any MacGregor I can think of. And if Sìne’s right he was up at Dalriach and all,’ she added thoughtfully.
‘He was going bald. His hair was back behind his ears.’ Alys demonstrated the retracted hairline.
‘What was his accent? Ersche or Scots?’
‘I don’t know,’ Alys said in dawning disbelief. ‘He just spoke to me. That’s strange, I can usually tell the difference.’
The mourners were tossing clods of earth into the grave. Sir William stirred, and muttered a prayer, then strode forward to say something appropriate and accept the invitation to ride back to Dalriach. Lady Stewart crossed herself and said: