Free Last Writes by Catherine Aird Page B

south. Gunpowder, those had been. This, he decided after a long look, was a hefty round stone. Steeling himself and not seeing anything in the nature of a lighted fuse, he presently set out to examine it. It was indeed a round stone, and it was covered in skiver.
    He brought it back inside the house and carefully unwound the piece of split sheepskin leather from the stone, full of hope that it might have a message written on it.
    It had.
    Calling for Dougal, his clerk, he started to read out the letters roughly scribbled on the skiver.
    ‘Wait you, while I read it out,’ he instructed him. Holding the skiver to the failing light he called out the words. ‘It begins “ MUCH, FRIENDS ”… That’s not very helpful. I doubt if it’s any of our “friends” on the way.’
    ‘So do I,’ muttered Dougal under his breath, struggling with his quill.
    ‘Then it has “ BOOK, TOWNSHIP ” … What does that mean, I wonder?’
    ‘I canna’ begin to say, my lord,’ said Dougal, scratching the words down. ‘All it does mean is that someone has his letters.’
    ‘That’s a good point,’ said the sheriff fairly. Most of the insurgents wouldn’t be able to read or write, although that didn’t make them less good at the sword, but there would be one or two educated men among them. ‘It goes on “ HARE, TREE ” … Dougal, is there a somewhere near here with a special tree where hares meet?’
    ‘Not to my knowledge, my lord,’ said Dougal, literate but no countryman. ‘Not until March, anyway.’
    ‘Ah,’ said the sheriff, ‘this is better. The word “ SECRET ” comes next.’
    ‘Secret,’ echoed Dougal, obediently writing this down.
    ‘And then there’s “ SHIP ”,’ said the sheriff pensively. ‘That’s all. Now, read it back to me.’
    The clerk said, ‘Much, friends, book, township, hare, tree, secret, ship.’
    ‘It disna mean a thing,’ said Rhuaraidh Macmillan, dismissing his clerk and settling down to think. It still meant nothing after he’d called for candles to be brought,the better to see the written words, and that meant that if anyone else saw the message it wouldn’t mean anything to them either, which might be important.
    Searching for the place name he needed so badly – if, indeed, the message had been from a friend – he took the first letter of all the words but could make nothing of them however much he jumbled them about.
    Even after he’d had the peat of the fire cast aside and logs brought in the better to warm his body on a cold night – and he hoped his brain, too – he couldn’t fathom anything in the message. Together the words were meaningless no matter which way he looked at them. Separately they meant very little more.
    Idly, he considered them one by one, pausing at ‘township’ since that was a word that did have connotations with all sheriffs. It had been the only English word which in French had also meant something to him. ‘
Banlieue
’ that had been – and
banlieue
in French meant the extent within which the sheriffs could exercise their manorial rights and send out their proclamations –
banlieue
literally meant the place of a sheriff’s jurisdiction. And this word he could understand – and remember.
    He didn’t need that clever young fellow from Castle Pitcalnie to remind him of the French for ‘ship’ either. It was ‘
bâtiment
’ or … what was it for a small sailing ship? Dammit, he’d had the word on the tip of his tongue already today. He kicked a log on the fire back into the centre of the flames while he gave himself time to think. ‘
Radier
’, that was it.
    Pleased that he’d called two or three French words to mind he looked at the others on the list. If he couldn’tdo anything else, he’d see if he could translate them into French. The word for ‘book’ he knew was ‘
livre
’ because that had been the first one the dominie had made him learn and the second was for ‘hare’ which he had to know because he hadn’t