Free The Counterfeit Madam by Pat McIntosh Page B

had got out to play for a while. The image-maker was not at home, his house shuttered and silent; the man sounded inoffensive, to judge by Sempill’s contemptuous description.
    He moved on down the path, past another long low house with an open barn at its further end.
    ‘Then there’s Noll Campbell,’ Sempill had said, tapping the rent-roll. ‘I’ve had more trouble wi him than the whole – It’s another hallirakit Erscheman, a right sliddery scruff, wi a mouthful o abuse for any that speaks wi him, one that would sell his granny for dog’s meat. Makes enough to keep a prentice, but will he ever ha the rent together for the quarter-day? No him! I wish you well o him.’ There was a vindictive tone in his voice; clearly this Campbell and Sempill had crossed more than once.
    In the barn, the whitesmith straightened up and stared at him under black scowling brows, tongs in hand; behind him in the shadows another man turned to look. That must be the apprentice. Gil nodded at them, and the smith bent to his work again, tap-tapping at what seemed likely to become a lantern.
    Beyond the building was a kaleyard with a drying-green, where the women were still arguing in Ersche over a piece of linen. The children ran back up the path, and the two women paused as he came into sight, gazing open-mouthed at him, two Highland women with brows as dark as the smith’s, one young and slender, the other older and heavier. Both were clad in brown linen aprons tied on over loose checked gowns, whiter linen folded and pinned on their heads.
    ‘Good day to you,’ he said, raising his hat to them. ‘Is that Danny Sproat’s stable down yonder?’
    One of them nodded. The older one said civilly enough, in accented Scots,
    ‘Aye. Aye, it is. But you will not be finding Danny the now. He iss out with the cart and the donkey, just, and not back before tomorrow so he was saying.’
    ‘I’m only wanting a look inside the stable,’ he said reassuringly. They looked at each other, and the one who had spoken gathered up the disputed washing.
    ‘Bethag will show you,’ she said, turning towards the houses. ‘There is a way of opening the door, to be keeping the donkey in, you ken.’ She added something in Ersche; the other woman gave her a sharp look, then smiled awkwardly at Gil and gestured towards the small building at the foot of the toft. He followed her, looking about. The kaleyard seemed to be divided up; none of the households would get a living from it, but it would provide all with some green vegetables for most of the year, assuming the donkey did not get through the woven hazel fence.
    The door was well secured, though he could probably have opened it without difficulty. Bethag dragged one leaf open and nodded at the shadowed interior; he peered in, identifying stall and manger for the donkey and the standing for the little cart it pulled. The woman spoke in Ersche, pointing at the far wall.
    ‘What is it?’ he asked. She gave him that awkward smile again and crossed to open a shutter above the cart standing, and by its light showed him a place where the planking was splintered and gnawed. Something scurried over their heads in the low rafters, and she looked up apprehensively. ‘Aye, you get rats in a stable. You need a dog here. Can Danny Bell not bring his dog down to sort matters?’
    She nodded, and moved to the door, pointing at the feed sack with a sour, unintelligible comment. He looked about again, comparing the small building with the rent he knew Sproat paid and finding it reasonable, and turned to follow her out.
    Pain stabbed savagely at his head, and the world went dark.
     
    The next thing he was fully aware of was of lying facedown on grass, soaking wet and shivering, with an upheaval in his stomach which became a paroxysm of vomiting. As it passed off and he collapsed shuddering on one elbow again, a pair of booted feet came into his field of view, followed by a swirl of dark red broadcloth.
    ‘You see,