The King's Corrodian Read Free

there was a strange smell, kinna sweet, like nothing he had smelled before.’
    ‘Pleasant?’ asked the Bishop doubtfully. His little dog growled at Socrates, and Maister Gregor bleated faintly in protest at one or the other. The Bishop delved in the fur-lined sleeve of his great velvet gown and produced a titbit which he fed to the spaniel. Socrates ignored all this with dignity.
    ‘Neither pleasant nor unpleasant, so he says,’ said the Prior.
    ‘And what did you find in the chamber?’ Gil prompted.
    The Prior shook his head again. ‘There wasny that much furniture. A bed, a kist, a great chair, two stools. The bed was as it was made up by one o the lay servants the previous morn, hadny been slept in. The kist stood open as if he’d been looking in it; one of the stools had fallen over. But the chair—’ He crossed himself, and went on resolutely, ‘The chair was burned almost to ashes. It was a wee while afore we saw it was there; indeed, it was only when Brother Dickon recognised one o the arms we realised what the ashes were.’
    ‘And the man Pollock was vanished away,’ said Bishop Brown.
    ‘Although the outer door was barred,’ said Alys.
    ‘I think there’s a chimney,’ said Gil. ‘A fireplace, a hearth? Is the roof harmed at all? Thatch scorched, slates cracked?’
    ‘The roof’s tiled, and it’s taken no hurt, though the tiles are blackened,’ said the Prior. ‘There’s a wee hearth, but the chimney was blocked at the same time as the window, on the same docket.’ He looked at Gil, and reverted to Latin. ‘The community is much disturbed by these events. I should be very glad to know the truth of the matter, in order to negate the rumours which abound in the neighbourhood.’
    ‘And these are?’ Gil enquired. ‘Is it more than simply the tale of the Devil carrying the man away? Do other matters trouble you?’
    The Prior bent his head, examining his fingertips.
    ‘Folk must be looking for reasons why it might happen,’ Alys said in Scots, ‘what might draw the Devil to the house, and if they find none they’ll make them up.’
    He looked up at her, relief in his face for a moment at her understanding.
    ‘Indeed,’ he said. ‘And little to the credit of the community.’
    Gil was silent, considering this.
    ‘I wish,’ reiterated Father David, ‘to know the truth of the matter. However unpalatable it may be, the truth is more nourishing than the poison of rumour or the sweets of wishful thinking, and
Truth
is, after all, the watchword of our Order. Moreover, if it was indeed the work of the Devil, exorcism will be required.’
    ‘It should ha been done long since,’ said Bishop Brown again.
    ‘I’ll want to see the lodging where this happened,’ Gil said, with resignation. Across the small chamber Alys gathered her skirts together as if to rise. ‘Though I suppose there’s little enough to be seen now after, what, ten days?’
    The two senior churchmen looked at one another.
    ‘It has been sealed,’ said the Prior. There was a pause, and then he continued delicately, ‘As soon as it was perceived that something strange had occurred, and that it would be better investigated by someone from outside our house, we determined that all should be left as it had been found. Brother Dickon became quite emphatic on the matter, in fact, so Chapter ordered him to nail up the house. It is easily unsealed.’
    ‘That will be a help,’ said Gil. He remembered Brother Dickon, the senior lay brother of the house, who had been sergeant-at-arms to the late King James Third, and could well imagine him becoming emphatic. But why should it be
someone from outside the house
who investigated, he wondered. ‘And I’ll want to question everyone who witnessed the place being opened, and probably the rest of the community forbye.’
    ‘I will give orders at Chapter tomorrow that all should cooperate with you,’ said Boyd.
    ‘And the man and woman in the house outside the walls and all, I