“If you wish to investigate something, I will make myself available to you. And once Mr. Gage arrives, there will be two of us to accompany you.”
My breath caught at the reminder of Gage’s impending arrival, and when I felt the carriage turn into the drive for Dryburgh House, I was grateful for the distraction.
? ? ?
Several of Lord Buchan’s servants were already at work in the ruins of the abbey when we arrived. Dodd’s body had been taken away, and Willie was down on hands and knees scrubbing at the bloodstains left behind. My heart clenched at the sight, and I touched a hand gently to his shoulder. He looked up at me, and I could see the stark tracks his tears had left behind on his grimy face. He sniffed and nodded, and then bent back to his task.
I thought it was cruel that Willie should be assigned this distressing job, but then I realized the guilt-ridden young man had probably requested it. An apology for not accompanying the older man to the abbey the previous night. I knew it would do no good to point out that, had he done so, Willie would likely also be dead. Guilt did not often answer to common sense.
Two other men were employed near the eleventh Earl of Buchan’s yawning grave. I had to admit that the sight still made a chill run down my spine, even with the pale winter sun shining peacefully on the ruins, chasing away the night’s lingering shadows. Barren creepers and ivy covered the cold stone walls of the north transept, a bleak backdrop to the scene.
Our footsteps crunched across the frosted grass, alerting the men to our approach. One fellow stood down in the grave while the other kneeled beside it. A pile of the deceased Lord Buchan’s discarded clothes, retrieved from the coffin, lay next to the headstone.
Trevor and I introduced ourselves and quickly learned that both men were employed by the earl as gardeners and had been at the ceilidh the night before.
“Did either of you notice anything strange, either at the bonfire, or before or after?” I asked.
Both men shook their heads.
“An unfamiliar carriage on the road or a group of men on horseback?” Trevor pressed.
“Aye, well, we seen plenty o’ unfamiliar carriages, but they was all headed t’ord Clintmains,” the man kneeling by the grave said as he rose to his feet. “Saw a fair number o’ lads on horseback as well. But they ’tweren’t no strangers.”
“And what of here?” I glanced significantly at the grave. “What have you recovered?”
The man shifted to look at the pile of belongings. “His clothes and shoes, a handkerchief—though I dinna ken what he’d need tha’ for—a watch, and some sort o’ jeweled pin. What ye call it?”
“A stickpin,” the man in the grave replied in his deep, gritty voice.
“Aye.”
“No bones?” I clarified.
“Nay.”
So the robbers had been careful to retrieve all of the bones—even the tiny ones in the hands and feet—but had left behind the valuable items. Such circumstances were very odd. All of the items in that pile were worth a good deal of money, including the gentleman’s handkerchief, and yet none of the robbers had taken them. Not even the stickpin, something small and easily concealed.
Either this group of men had considerable confidence in the amount of money they would be receiving for stealing the bones and nothing else—and the self-discipline not to be tempted to take one of the other objects to make a couple of extra quid—or they weren’t in need of the money. Their motive was something else entirely.
Of course, we still needed to verify with the current Lord Buchan that all of his uncle’s effects were accounted for. Maybe something buried with the body had been taken—a ring, a medal, a jewel-tipped walking stick. At least now we knew what had not been taken and could move forward from there.
“Did either of you see the late earl laid out in his coffin before he was buried?” I asked the men, curious if they would remember anything.
“Aye, m’lady. We all did. Had his coffin restin’ on a table in the parlor so we could all pay our last respects.”
“Can you recall whether anything he was wearing then is missing from this pile?”
The man standing beside the grave glanced down at his companion, and then shook his head. “Sorry.”
I nodded, knowing it had been unlikely they would remember.
“But ye might ask Mrs. Moffat in St. Boswells. She be the one who cleans and lays oot the bodies o’ our dead.”
I had not thought to confer with such a woman, but she might prove an invaluable source of information. I thanked him and took Trevor’s arm to allow him to lead me across the abbey ruins and through the west door, past Willie, who was still scrubbing almost desperately at the stone. I tried to push the image from my mind, but the vicious scraping of his brush against the sandstone dogged our steps as we moved away from the sheltered arbor of the abbey and down one of the paths that led toward Dryburgh House.
CHAPTER FIVE