He leaned forward, so that his lips were closer, his breath tickling the hair in Hal’s ear.
‘That bell did not ring itself and it was clear that was what wee by-blow Lamprecht came for, not any Rood or rubies. He rang it out and set us in the path o’ the English garrison for revenge and now he has the power to do the Bruce a bad turn, for the Earl has revealed himself in his desire for the Rood, as plain as if he had nailed his claim to the crown to the door of St Giles. And if the Bruce suffers, we suffer.’
‘Jop is beyond us. Lamprecht is a creishy wee fox,’ Hal replied, ‘who has contrived to get us killed and failed. He is running and will want to take his ill-gotten goods away. We should let him.’
Kirkpatrick made a head gesture to say perhaps, perhaps not. There was merit in the Herdmanston lord’s appreciation of matters – the wee pardoner was certainly headed south, from monastery to abbey, priory to chapel, all places where he was sure of a free meal and a safe bed for the night. But the wee bastard had the Rood and Bruce, for all that pursuing it was a danger to him – and so all those round him – could not see it pass him by and do nothing.
Returning to London was certainly not safe for Lamprecht, Kirkpatrick thought, so it may be that Hal has it right and Lamprecht was planning to carry on to the coast and a ship to France. Back to the eastern Middle Sea, where his riches could be sold with no questions asked and where his way of speaking would not mark him.
‘He was daft to try what he did,’ Hal muttered. ‘He must hold a hard hate for what we did to him that night in the leper house of Berwick.’
Kirkpatrick flapped a hand, keeping his voice low as he hissed a reply.
‘We did nothing much – showed him a blade and slapped him once or twice. He was fortunate – for his partnering of that moudiwart bastard Malise Bellejambe he should have been throat-cut there and then.’
‘Your answer to all,’ Hal replied tersely and Kirkpatrick looked back at him from under lowered brows.
‘That way we would not now be dealing with a nursed flame that will not be put out as easily as spit on a spark,’ he said. ‘Our saving grace is that the wee pardoner is stupid enough to try and play intrigue with the nobiles, whose lives entire are spent in makin’ and breakin’ plots and plans more cunning than any Lamprecht may devise.’
‘Like Buchan?’
Kirkpatrick nodded grimly.
‘Throw a Comyn in the air and ye discover a wee man thumbin’ his neb at a Bruce when he lands. Buchan has sent yon Malise in pursuit of Lamprecht, to find out what he has that the Bruce chases.’
‘Death for the wee pardoner, then,’ Hal growled sullenly, ‘no matter who reaches him first.’
Kirkpatrick, swaddling himself in cloak, surged with irritation.
‘Christ, man, ye are a pot o’ cold gruel,’ he spat in a sibilant hiss. ‘Make your mind to it – the wee pardoner is a killed man and ye had better buckle to the bit if it is yourself has to do it. Else it will be us killed. As well that Jop is cold – as yon wee Riccarton priest should be betimes.’
‘Yon priest kens nothin’,’ Hal muttered bitterly, ‘though Jop might have explained what Lamprecht intended, had he been allowed to live a wee while longer.’
‘Aye weel,’ Kirkpatrick growled, aware that he had been hasty with the knife – but Christ’s Bones, the man was coming at him. The wee priest, on the other hand, was neither here nor there. For certes, Kirkpatrick said to himself with grim humour, he will, by now, wish he is no longer here – and explained to Hal, patient as a mother, why it would have been better if he had died.
‘The wee priest kens folk were spyin’ Jop out. He kens the name Lamprecht, which was spoke out for all to hear,’ he whispered, flat and cold. ‘That name has already reached Comyn ears, which is why Malise is sent out. It will, for certes, be whispered in Longshanks’ own by now.’
Hal said nothing, for the truth of it was a cold burn, like the wound along his ribs. Jop was better dead, if only for his own sake; the King’s questioners would not have stinted on their store of agony – for all Edward Longshanks proudly pontificated about there being no torture in his realm – and the priest would be telling all he knew to anyone who would listen.
The more Hal thought on it, the more he wondered about what might have been inadvertently revealed that night. His dreams were cold-sweated with what the priest might be saying, but Hal knew he would have been hard put to kill the man for it. Nor was he sure he could kill Lamprecht as coldly.