no for letting her in.’
‘What have I tellt ye about gossip, lad?’ said Dickon.
‘She said she wanted to see the library,’ said Gil with misgivings, and Brother Jamesie went red and ducked his head in apology.
‘She was being right civil to him,’ he assured them. ‘He’ll maybe no say anything that bad to her. Just he doesny like ladies ower much.’
‘Jamesie!’ said his superior sharply. ‘Get back to work, and less o your prating.’
‘Aye, but he doesny,’ argued Jamesie. ‘That’s why he’s been minding the library these two year and no out on the road, ken, so he doesny have to speak to ony ladies. How he managed afore he was tonsured— a’richt, I’m going, I’m going!’
‘And so I should think! Gossip’s a sin,’ Brother Dickon reminded him. ‘You’ll ha to confess that.’
‘Aye,’ said Jamesie, bitterly. ‘And if those better’n me ever confessed their faults likewise, I’d ha less objection.’
‘Jamesie.’
At the warning in his superior’s voice, Jamesie offered no more argument, but swung away to the section where he had been working. Brother Dickon glared at his back, but returned to his own task in silence.
‘Did Pollock have other friends?’ Gil asked after a moment. ‘I think you mentioned folk who visited him from the town.’
‘Aye, a few. They’d come and go freely enough in the outer yard, never tried to get inside the cloister that I noticed. I can let you have their names, likely.’
‘Had he money of his own? Apart from what was paid for his keep, I mean.’
‘Now that I couldny say.’ Brother Dickon hoisted his first basket of sherds and made for the tarpaulin. ‘But,’ he paused before tipping the blackened mass out, ‘he never wore the clothes that were provided him. Nor the shoes. Aye well clad he was, warmer than us this weather, and plenty coal and kindling to his wee house, more than my lads ever fetched to him.’
‘Did you ever run into him afore?’ Gil asked. ‘When you were still sergeant-at-arms, I mean. Given you were both members o James Third’s household.’
‘I did,’ replied Brother Dickon baldly. ‘I couldny say if he minded me,’ he added. ‘I’m a wee thing changed since then. The beard makes a difference.’
‘He’d hardly have enemies in a house of Religious like this,’ Gil went on delicately, slinging broken tiles as he spoke. His companion produced a sardonic grunt. ‘But did he have any particular unfriends about the place?’
‘Oh, I couldny say,’ said Brother Dickon. He shifted another handful of tiles, and paused, staring through the charred timbers below them. Gil paused too, watching him, as Dickon turned, very deliberately, threw the tiles into the waiting basket, and turned back to look closer. Then he crossed himself.
‘Is that—?’ Gil began.
‘Aye, it is, maister. We’ve found our missing laddie.’
Gil picked his way to join the lay brother. At the far end of the building, the other men gradually stopped, straightened up, watched them. When Gil bent his head and removed his hat the two grooms did likewise, and one by one the whole group left their task, drifted out of the tangle of ash and timber, drew closer. The little group of novices stood shoulder to shoulder, staring in awful fascination.
‘It’s him, then,’ said one. ‘I hoped he’d— I hoped …’
‘He’d ha turned up by now if he’d escaped the fire, Sandy,’ said another. ‘It was aye more likely.’ He crossed himself, tears in his eyes.
His neighbour, a tow-headed muscular young man, said quietly, ‘I wonder how he didny get out? Or was he maybe right at the heart o the fire? Could it ha started wi him?’
‘Don’t be daft, Adam,’ said someone else roundly.
‘He’s deid, then,’ said one of the lay brothers, possibly Brother Dod.
Brother Dickon gave him a look which should have shrivelled him, crossed himself again and began, ‘
Subvenite, sancti Dei, occurrite, angeli Domini
.’ By