Mathew's Tale

by Quintin Jardine

Genres: Mystery

Synopsis

1818, Carluke, Lancashire. Mathew Fleming returns home to Scotland following heroic service at the Battle of Waterloo. After seven years away, he is a ghostly presence to those he left behind. But Mathew is ambitious and soon becomes a man of influence in his country and beyond. Yet through all his success, he still hides the loss of his one true love. When a terrible act of murder occurs, Mathew must choose between the rule of blood and the rule of law. And as a man of honour with a warrior’s instincts, he embarks on a journey of vengeance that will test every sinew of his faith in mankind…

Release date: October 1, 2014

Publisher: Headline

Print pages: 384

Sample

Chapter One

IF MATHEW FLEMING HAD ever been truly afraid of anyone, that man was already dead.

When he fell asleep, it was with a feeling of dread for the things he might see on his journey to the next dawn, and for those people he might meet.

Old actions, skirmishes and battles that he had fought and had thought were over.

Young comrades he had comforted, even as their blood sprayed upon him from mortal wounds; they might have let go of life, but their horror held him with an unbreakable, unyielding grip.

Relentless enemies, whom no sword cut, no musket shot could down forever, who came at him and his line in his dreams, over and over again, until finally that one, that fateful little Voltigeur bastard, broke through in the last great battle against the Emperor’s armies, his musket discarded but thrusting home his short blade even as he impaled himself on Mathew’s bayonet.

That nightmare was the worst, the one that ended with sudden wakefulness, and a scream that was not always stifled.

The others, while vivid, were not so fearful, not even the recollection of the sabre cut that had cost him his left eye when his company had been ambushed by a pack of outlaw French irregulars.

For that little Voltigeur, that wee, agile, leaping bauchle, was the only man that Mathew had ever killed at close quarters, the only enemy whose light he had seen extinguished, even though his own had been fading in the same moment. It was the Frenchman’s ghost whose forgiveness he craved yet whose curse awaited him, he was sure, in his sleep.

As he stood on the hilltop, where a great copper beech tree marked a crossroads, and looked down upon and across Carluke, bathed in May mid-morning sunshine, he was still troubled, from his victim’s latest visitation the night before, but even more by his uncertainty over what he would find there.

He had spent that night in a proper bedroom, under a roof, albeit an attic in a tavern in a place called Crossford. It had been a luxury, one of the very few he allowed himself, for one who had slept in the open air or under canvas for much of his adult life. He had made that last stop, not very many miles from his destination, because he had wanted to arrive at his native village in the fullness of the day, rather than creep in after dark.

Also it fitted his plan. He had no idea what awaited him there, whether he would be coming home to good news or bad, and so his first call would be paid on the minister. The Reverend John Barclay was the only authority figure within the small community, other than the dominie, the teacher in the parish school, but Porteous’s writ ran only among those aged under twelve. Mr Barclay knew everything that happened in Carluke, and if there was bad news to be borne, he was the man Mathew would prefer to break it.

But would the minister be there himself? It had been a full three years since one of Mathew’s letters home had been answered. Had some disaster struck? All too often, rumours of cholera and other deadly epidemics had reached the continent. They had been unsettling for the men, even though very few of them had been verified.

Mathew’s journey home had been a long one. It had been nine months since his discharge in France, after the regiment had decided that a one-eyed soldier might be much more of a liability than an asset, but six years since he had enlisted, a raw-boned nineteen-year-old, as an infantryman in the King’s Own Cameron Highlanders.

He had been not only raw-boned, but also headstrong, rejecting John Barclay’s advice that he should move no further than Lanark, to complete the apprenticeship as a saddler that had been cut short by the sudden death of his father.

Robert Fleming’s business had died with him, and it was also true that the profits of the village inn were much less certain because of his passing. He had left no money behind him and when the sly, cajoling recruiters had told his son of the signing bounty of five pounds sterling, it had been too much for him to refuse.

They had been less pleased when Mathew gave all of the money to his mother, since the customary practice was for new soldiers to take their windfall with them into service, there to see it disappear rapidly down the throats of the cynical, predatory old lags in their platoon.

The young man had shrugged off his initial unpopularity, winning his new mates over by becoming a first-class infantryman, the sort that they were all pleased to have alongside them in the heat of battle. The Seventy-ninth Regiment of Foot, formed in the previous century, was renowned as one of the army’s finest and its First Battalion saw action against Bonaparte in Spain and in Holland, before the battle that had put an end to the Emperor.

Times had been hard, and the pay much poorer than the young man had been promised. He had signed on in the belief that he would be able to send money home to his mother, but soon found that all of his wages went on food and clothing. There had been plunder during the Peninsular campaign, but his Presbyterian upbringing had prevented him from taking any part in it, endearing him still further to his less scrupulous colleagues. Long before his grievous wound at Waterloo, Mathew’s plan to support his mother through his soldier’s pay had come to nothing. All that he could do was write home, to his sweetheart, Elizabeth, the Marshall girl he had grown up beside, and try to survive.

Those letters were always cheerful, hiding the reality of combat from his loved ones. Occasionally a reply would find him, usually months after it had been written. Lizzie was as positive as he was and her news of his mother . . . reading and writing had never been part of Hannah Fleming’s life . . . was always good, but three years ago her responses had dried up completely.

He had done his best to convince himself that the postal service in France had broken down, but he had been beset by anxiety from then on, impatient for the end of his seven-year enlistment. Thus, when the Breton guerrilla’s sabre cut had taken his eye the year before, he had seen it as a gift from God, and had felt a little sympathy for the man when he and his captured cronies were shot by a firing squad of Highlander musketeers. For a time afterwards he had worn an eyepatch, but it had been uncomfortable, and besides, the great scar across his face had been uncovered. After only a few months he had abandoned it; if his appearance scared some folk at first glance, they were soon won over by his smile and gentle demeanour.

Apart from the small bonus that his colonel had insisted he be paid on his discharge, the army had been good for him in another way. It had recognised his skill as a leather worker and had enabled him to complete his training.

Since leaving the line he had earned his way home, across France in the autumn, and then all the length of England, in the harshness of its winter. He had stopped in Rouen for a month, making light moccasins . . . a style taught him by a veteran of Canadian warfare . . . and selling them on the street. He had paid for his Channel crossing by repairing the ferry officers’ sea boots. He had found well-paid employment for three months on an earl’s estate near Newbury, making and renewing saddles and harnesses. When there was no more to be done there, he had moved on, avoiding the turnpike roads to save money but never going far without finding a new taker for his skills.

He had stopped off for another month in Newcastle, working as a cobbler on the dockside, then moved on to Hexham where more saddles needed repair, until finally he had crossed the border near Gretna, at the beginning of April.

By that time, Mathew Fleming was, by his standards, a well-off man. His handmade leather purse, which he wore next to his skin, was full of notes and coins, far more than the five pounds for which he had sold himself in 1812 to give his mother some reassurance. He was ready to return to look after her properly, and to fulfil the promise he had made to Lizzie before he had gone to the soldiering.

He might have made it home a month sooner had he not come upon a stage coach station in Lockerbie that was in desperate need of a saddler, and prepared to make his purse even fatter. He smiled at the memory of his last employer’s gratitude and of his willingness to help him set up in business if only he would stay in town.

That proposition was still very much on his mind as he paused on the hilltop, in the shade of the copper beech, drawing breath before the last, nervous few miles of his long journey, and allowing Gracie, the pony he had brought all the way from Orleans, to graze.

He wondered who, if anyone, was meeting the needs of his father’s old customers. By far the best of those had been Sir George Cleland, the amiable baronet who owned all the countryside around Carluke. The Laird’s patronage had always kept Robert Fleming’s feet in the sawdust, as his father had put it . . . in other words, in the village inn.

Did he still have the man that his factor had hired, full time, to replace his father? If not . . .

His musing was interrupted by the sound of hooves on the hard track, coming from behind him. He turned, to see two young men, well-dressed, on large sleek horses, bearing down upon him. They could have been no more than fifteen years old, but they carried themselves with assurance, and were comfortable on their mounts.

‘What have we got here, Greg?’ one of them called.

As Mathew’s one eye focused on them he could see that they were no ordinary pair, but twins, alike as green peas in a pod. And from that, he knew who they were. He had seen them on a few occasions as children; noisy little brats, Sir George’s sons, Gregor and Gavin, their indulgent father’s pride.

‘He looks like a vagrant to me,’ the other replied. ‘Shall we tie him across his nag and take him to the Sheriff in Lanark?’

‘Or shall we tie him to a tree and empty his pockets?’ Gavin suggested.

‘Empty them of what?’ Gregor laughed, as he looked down at Mathew. ‘Identify yourself, man.’

‘No, boy,’ he murmured. ‘I will not.’

‘Here’s an impertinent one!’ the youth chuckled. ‘Then we’ll identify you. We’ll call you One-lamp. Now what are you doing here, One-lamp? This is Cleland land.’

‘With respect, young man,’ Mathew contradicted, ‘it’s a public highway across Cleland land. It leads to Carluke, and that’s where I’m going.’

‘You’ll find nothing there to steal,’ he retorted. ‘We don’t want the likes of you here. Yes, let’s strip him and tie him to a tree, Gav. Let him cook in the sun for a bit, while he waits for the militia.’

‘No, boys,’ the traveller said, with a hard edge to his voice that had not been there before, ‘ye’ll not be doing that.’

‘And why not?’ Gavin challenged.

‘Because you’re only a couple of cheeky laddies, in want of a good arse-kicking. Because I am a soldier of the King, honourably discharged from his service, and with paper to prove it. And because,’ he chuckled, ‘you don’t have any rope, you daft little buggers! Now go on your way and learn yourselves some manners, or I might have to teach you. You wouldna’ like that, I assure you.’

The Cleland twins tried to stare him down, their four eyes to his one, before summoning enough common sense to realise that they were facing a man of his word.

‘We will see you later,’ Gavin murmured, then turned his horse, in a tactical withdrawal.

‘I do not doubt that,’ Mathew murmured as he watched the pair ride off, ‘not for one second.’



Chapter Two

BAPTISMS, MARRIAGES AND FUNERALS were all in a week’s work for John Barclay, but it was a rare occasion for the affairs of his rural congregation to fit all three into a single day, even rarer for that day to be a Friday.

He had just buried old Sarah Mackay, gone to her long home after seventy-two years of constant complaints about her lot, yet unwilling to leave it when the time came. In an hour he would baptise baby Jane Fisher, three days old, but unlikely to live for a week, the doctor said. Later that afternoon, he would join together in holy matrimony James Stuart and Elma McGruther, before the result of their conjoining a few months earlier became too obvious.

The simple arithmetic of his day underlined a concern that had been with him for a few years. His community was in decline; slow, but undoubted. The wars had taken some, yes, but they had gone on throughout history, and still places like his had survived and even thrived. But the new era was different: the young men were leaving the village, many drawn east to Edinburgh or west to the upstart Glasgow whose docks were sucking labour to offload imports of cotton, sugar and most of all tobacco. Others were moving within the county, to work in the filthy, dangerous hellholes they called coal mines that were booming since the opening of those damned canals, and in the new factories that were part of what people were calling the Industrial Revolution.

Yes, the place needed new blood, but it was hard to see how it would come, or from where.

The minister was fretting over the future as he climbed up into the steeple tower. Carluke’s parish kirk was in want of a beadle since old Jimmy Peebles had gone to live with his son in Monklands, in the same county but as distant as the moon to most of his former neighbours, and so the church officer’s essential workload had fallen upon him. These included ensuring that the clock, a gift to the church by Sir George Cleland’s grandfather, also George, was always wound, oiled and keeping time.

He reached the platform and inserted the long heavy winding lever into its slot, then turned it, laboriously, straining with the effort.

‘Never force it,’ old Jimmy had instructed him before he left. ‘Otherwise ye’ll bugger the works. Then ye’ll hae tae get the clockmaker frae Hamilton and he will no’ be cheap.’

Barclay was in his middle years and had never been a strong man, so forcing it was not an issue. As soon as he felt that the resistance was reaching his limit he stopped and withdrew the winder, pausing for breath before reaching for the oil can.

He had barely finished the lubrication when the loud click of a turning cog sounded in the tower, as the clock reached the top of the hour, the top of the morning. It had its own bell, separate from the one that sounded twice on Sunday to summon the faithful . . . and those who were not, but kept up appearances . . . and when it rang, it was best to be some distance away.

The minister had no time to escape. All he could do was press his hands over his ears to muffle the twelve chimes and to lean as far as he could out of the slatted stone light vents that were set on either side of the face.

As he looked out, grimacing occasionally, he saw a figure, a man in a blue three-quarter coat of uncommon design, a grey shift and breeches. He could not see his face, not properly, but even at that distance he was struck by the quality of his black boots, so well polished that they seemed to shine in the sun.

The newcomer might have drawn a greater audience, for he was exceptionally tall, at least six feet high, but Carluke was at work and there was nobody else to be seen. He was leading a pony as he crossed the green space in front of the kirk. Its brown saddle gleamed as brightly as its master’s footwear, and it was laden with two leather bags, one on either side, and two cloth-wrapped bundles. The pair paused to take water, the man cranking the village pump handle and drinking straight from the spout, his horse from the trough beside it.

Refreshed, they approached the church. The bell had finished its tolling, but Barclay realised that he still had his hands over his ears. He withdrew them, self-conscious even though he could not have been observed, and continued to watch as the stranger tied his companion to the post beside the gate, then gave it an apple taken from one of his pockets.

He glanced behind him, in a slightly furtive way that alarmed the minister, then stepped on to consecrated ground, heading up the pathway.

‘Who can he be?’ John Barclay muttered as he made his way down the stone steps. The newcomer bore himself with confidence and authority yet his dress, while odd by village standards, was not that of a person of importance.

The kirk was always open when the minister was there. Just as he emerged from the steeple tower, so his visitor stepped inside.

Even though the place was lit only from the outside, Barclay’s gaze fell at once upon the scar. It ran from the centre of his forehead, downward, diagonally across his left eye, which its opacity showed to be sightless beyond doubt, and then his cheek, not quite reaching his ear. He was transfixed and might have looked at nothing else had the other eye not been so vivid and compelling as it fixed on him.

‘So you’re still here, Minister,’ the man said, and then he smiled.

‘Aye, that I am, by God’s will,’ Barclay agreed. ‘And so are you, by the same divine agency from the look of you. Let’s go over by the window so I can see you better, then you can tell me how I can help you. Not that I’ve got much time, mind; I’ve a bairn to christen at one.’

He moved into an elongated diamond of multi-coloured light cast by the stained glass.

‘Whose bairn would that be?’ the stranger asked.

‘The father’s name is Joel,’ he replied, wondering why he should be asked. ‘They’re calling her Jane, after his mother.’

‘That’s a recipe for confusion, is it not . . . no’ that big Joel was ever too clear-headed.’

‘That’s not likely,’ the clergyman replied. ‘The child is weak, and shilpit, no’ likely to live. She’s one of twins; the other was stillborn, poor wee mite.’

‘Ah, what a shame. Big Joel the smith deserves better. He’s a good soul. Still, miracles do happen, and I’m sure you’ll be praying for one as you christen her, Mr Barclay.’

An eyebrow rose as he peered at the visitor; for all the light, he had his back to it and it was still difficult to discern his features beyond that great blemish.

‘You would seem to know Carluke,’ he murmured. ‘How would that be and how would you know my name?’

‘As for the latter, I can read. It’s printed on the sign outside, in letters of gold. But apart from that I’ve known you for almost twenty years, Mr Barclay, since you came here to follow that grim old fellow Howitt, who put the fear o’ God into all us weans. Am I that badly marked, sir, that you do not recognise me, after standing beside me as we buried my faither?’

As he spoke, a cold hand seemed to grab the minister’s innards, and he began to fear a strange irrational fear. ‘Turn around,’ he said sharply, ‘turn to the side, to your left so your face gets all the light and I can see it better, and no’ just that scar.’

‘I will,’ the man laughed, ‘but let me make it easy for you. I’m Mathew, Mathew Fleming. Has it taken you only six years to forget me?’

John Barclay felt his legs go weak; indeed he might have fallen had he not been able to lean on the christening font. ‘Mathew?’ he repeated. ‘Mathew my boy, I’ll never forget you . . . but son, you’re dead.’

He saw that face, finally familiar, turn sombre in an instant and saw that one compelling eye turn cold. ‘If that’s the case, John,’ Mathew replied, quietly, ‘did I not just tell you that miracles happen?’

The minister pondered the question for many seconds before he countered. ‘They may indeed,’ he said, solemnly, ‘but the raising of the dead is much more likely to be down to human error than the hand of the Almighty.’

‘Whatever,’ the resurrected exclaimed, ‘why did you write me off as dead in the first place? Are you telling me that my mother thinks I’m gone?’

‘Aye, and it near broke her heart.’

‘Near but not entirely? She’s still alive?’

‘Of course. I think sometimes that whenever Armageddon comes, Hannah Fleming will be there, daring it to do its worst. Mathew, there was a letter, three years ago, from the Highlanders. It came to your mother; she brought it to me to read for her, and I have it still, in the parish records.’

‘Where is it? Can I see it?’

‘I think ye’d better. Come across to the manse with me . . . and bring your cuddy as well,’ Barclay added. ‘I asked Jessie to have a meal ready before the christening. It will stretch to two, and I always have some oats for travellers’ animals.’

The minister’s residence was set on the right of the church, built of the same hard grey stone and accessible from within its grounds, but Mathew led the untethered Gracie the long way round rather than take her across the graves that filled them.

There was a post and a trough at the side of the manse. He tied her there, then followed his host in through the kitchen entrance.

Jessie was the minister’s housekeeper, not his wife. She was ancient and had come to the parish with him. There were rumours, generated by a stranger in the inn several years before, that Barclay had been born on the wrong side of the blanket and that she was, in fact, his mother, but he was too respected in the community for that tale ever to be put to him.

The old woman eyed Mathew silently as he came in. No introduction was offered, and if she recognised him she kept it to herself. Jessie had two facial expressions, severe and less severe. There were people in Carluke who claimed to have seen her smile slightly, once, at a hanging in Lanark.

The two men ate at a table in a small room next to the kitchen; it faced south, across the green and down into the village and thus it was sunlit. The minister was in a rush to be ready for the baptism, and so there was no conversation for they both knew that Mathew’s tale would be long in the telling. The stovies that had been their main course were followed by steamed pudding, and then, astonishingly to the newcomer, coffee, something he had never seen in his home village. He remarked upon the fact.

‘Glasgow,’ Barclay replied. ‘There’s all sorts of stuff coming in through that city that we’ve never seen before. Half the tobacco in the United Kingdoms is imported through there, so they say. Scotland is being split in two; there’s the aristocracy and the lawyers in the east and the merchants in the west. Edinburgh might be our capital, but I doubt that it’s our largest city, no’ any longer. Our country’s changing, young man, and places like this are under siege. If it wasna’ for Sir George Cleland, Carluke would be full of nothing but the old and the useless.’

‘I had a conversation with his sons just outside the village,’ Mathew remarked, quietly.

Mention of the twins made the minister frown. ‘I know those brats,’ he said. ‘I should; I baptised them. And I look down at them every Sunday beside their father in the Cleland pew, whispering through the sermon. Hopefully Sir George will correct the pair of them out before they’re grown men.’ He glanced across the table and smiled. ‘Your tone suggests they enjoyed the conversation rather less than you did.’

‘That might have been the case; had it been a year or so ago, in another country, they wouldn’t have enjoyed it at all. Indeed their father might tell them to be careful who they cheek at the roadside. There’ll be a few of Wellington’s veterans making their way. If they cross the wrong one, at the wrong time and place, they could wind up in a hole in the ground and their fine horses gone for sale in some town along the way.’

‘I’ll pass that message on, Mathew, tho’ I doubt it’ll do much good. Those boys are Sir George’s only weakness. Another laird might have sent them off to school, in England maybe, but he won’t be parted from them, not since Lady Cleland died seven years ago. Instead he has tutors for them who teach them a’thing but manners.’

He rose from the table, suddenly. ‘Excuse me,’ he said then strode from the room. Mathew waited, growing impatient. Now that his fear for his mother had been lifted he was anxious to see her, and not just her either. He could almost see her house, just round the bend beyond the tavern, with Lizzie Marshall’s family home a little further down the same street.

Lizzie. How would she take to the man who was returning to her, much different from the impulsive boy who had left to serve King George, for money rather than patriotism? What would she think of the scar? Would it repel her, as it repelled him every time he had to look at himself in a glass?

Barclay’s return broke into his thoughts. He held in his hand a letter, in its envelope, which he laid on the table before his guest. Mathew recognised the regimental crest on the outside, above the words, ‘Mrs Hannah Fleming, Carluke, Lanarkshire, Scotland’.

‘I’m going to christe. . .