by H A CULLEY
‘I see but why does the boy speak whilst the master stays silent.’
‘My master, Fulk of Winchester, has an affliction of the throat, my lord, and has quite lost his voice.’
‘That’s so,’ croaked William quietly in Norman French, hoping that the short phrase sounded vaguely the same as the speech of the Norman knights that they had captured at Bannockburn.
Lord Henry Percy was plainly bored with the exchange and airily waved his hand as permission to continue before putting his spurs to the palfrey and cantering away, followed by his retinue.
‘Phew, well done Edgar,’ William whispered.
‘He left as if he couldn’t stand our stench up his aristocratic nostrils a moment longer.’
‘Well, he might have a point, we do smell a bit strong; and less of the aristocratic nostrils, if you don’t mind. My nose is just as aristocratic as his. By the way, where did Fulk of Winchester come from?’
‘He was a travelling troubadour who entertained the court at Christmas, don’t you remember.’
‘Oh yes. That’s a good one; I couldn’t sing to save my life.’
‘Well, then let’s hope you never have to, Sir William,’ Edgar said with a grin.
‘Cheeky scamp,’ William retorted but with a grin in return. He knew he shouldn’t let the boy be as familiar with him as he was but he was fond of him and, in any case, he was in his debt for saving the mission entrusted to him by Lord Douglas. If it hadn’t been for the boy’s quick thinking they would have been in real trouble.
~#~
Simon and Edgar sat companionably beside each other on their horses as they watched the two papal legates and their entourage approach up the hill from Redesdale towards where Lord Douglas awaited them at the col called Carter Bar, which marked the border. After their release upon the payment of two hundred marks by the Dean of Durham, Sir Gilbert Middleton had restored their rich robes to them but he had kept their bejewelled rings and crucifixes. Before release, the cardinals and the bishop had been escorted by the robbers to near the gates of Durham sitting on three donkeys. They had also been given back the two leather document pouches.
The proud cardinals were furious at the insult to their dignity but they had little option but to ride through the streets on the lowly steeds instead of on their expensive palfreys. The bishop didn’t enjoy the experience either; it was not the way he had expected to arrive in his new diocese but he did find the discomfiture of the pompous cardinals secretly amusing. The people found the sight of two princes of the church and their new bishop riding animals normally reserved for poor monks and friars humorous and their laughter and a few ribald comments added to the churchmen’s humiliation.
Once they were reunited with their entourage and their escort, the papal legates set off two days later for Scotland, having been told that Robert Bruce was at Jedburgh, some ten miles north of Carter Bar. They left the bishop trying to decide how best to overcome the damage to his prestige occasioned by his unfortunate arrival in Durham.
James Douglas urged his palfrey forward at a slow walk, accompanied by Sir William Keith on one side and Simon on the other carrying the Douglas white banner with its blue bar in chief and three white stars. Edgar followed Sir William carrying his banner, also white but with alternate red and yellow vertical stripes in chief.
This low key party to greet the papal legates and escort them to Jedburgh was deliberate. Robert’s strategy was to keep the pair off balance to give him the edge in any negotiations. By subtly insulting them he was provoking their anger in the knowledge that angry men don’t think clearly.
Robert had chosen to meet the legates in the nave of the church of Jedburgh Abbey. Not only could he cram over a hundred of his earls, bishops, abbots, barons, highland chieftains and knights in the magnificent space to indicate the strength of his support but it made the point that he was endorsed by the Church in Scotland.
Simon, Edgar, Ian Ross and a few of their friends were determined to watch the encounter. They were too junior to be included and there wasn’t space for those who were invited to be accompanied by attendants, so they climbed up the narrow staircase to the small gallery over the west door from where the sub-prior would normally watch the monks at their devotions to ensure that no-one was misbehaving.
King Robert sat on an ornately carved chair on a raised dais in the middle of the nave with Queen Elizabeth sitting beside him on a slightly smaller chair. His nobles and senior clergy were arrayed around and behind them. Thomas Randolph was still in Ireland with Edward Bruce but most of the other senior nobles were present. The Earls of Ross, Fife, Atholl and Dunbar stood close enough to whisper to him, along with Lord James Douglas, the Bishop of St. Andrews and the High Steward. All were richly attired in their best robes and both the king and queen wore their crowns. As Edward Longshanks had stolen the original crown jewels after deposing John Balliol as king, Robert had been forced to have new crowns made for himself and his queen. Both were similar, being plain gold circlets with eight fleur de lys attached along the top of the rim of the circular band. The only difference was that Elizabeth’s was smaller.
When the two cardinals arrived at the foot of the dais one went to ascend the three steps to hand King Robert a letter. Neither had bowed to the king. He didn’t get beyond he first step.
‘It is customary for anyone approaching the throne to stop, bow and then wait for an invitation to approach the king,’ Walter Stewart told them, managing to sound rather offended.
‘We are princes of the church and the representatives of His Holiness, the Pope, so the normal rules don’t apply to us,’ the shorter of the two cardinals replied haughtily.
‘Oh but they do,’ Robert told them. ‘When I was much younger I was at the court of King Edward, the present king’s father, at Winchester. A new papal nuncio arrived and he went down on one knee to the king, extending his hand so that the king could kiss his ring. He remained kneeling until Edward Longshanks told him to rise. Why don’t we try that here? Let’s start again. You go back outside and attempt and get it right this time.’
‘Lord Robert, we have not come here to play games. This letter is for you from His Holiness.’
He waved the document in front of Robert Bruce, evidently expecting him to get up, descend the dais and take the letter. Instead Bruce nodded to Walter Steward, who stepped forward and took the letter before the cardinal could withdraw it. Walter broke the seal and scanned the contents before handing it to Robert. The two cardinals looked scandalised but said nothing.
Robert pretended to study the letter, though of course he already knew contents.
‘I echo the Pope’s sentiments about a lasting peace between England and Scotland, your Eminences. It is something I have been striving for but, regrettably, Edward of England does not seem to share our desires. Perhaps you should be trying to persuade him of the error of his ways instead?’
‘But it is you who in rebellion against him.’ The taller of the two cardinals spoke for the first time.
‘No, you have been misinformed, your Eminence. I am merely defending my country against an aggressor, which I have every right to do.’
‘But you raid northern England at will and have now invaded King Edward’s province of Ireland.’
‘True but we are at war, otherwise we wouldn’t need a truce. Once Edward recognises Scotland as an independent sovereign nation and me as its king, peace will follow.’
The two cardinals eyed each other uncomfortably before the taller one stepped forward proffering another letter.
‘Then your intransigence gives us no choice. We are instructed to deliver this second letter addressed specifically to you.’
Robert glanced at it when handed it to him by Walter Stewart, then handed it back to Walter who, in turn gave it back to the surprised cardinal.
‘But it isn’t addressed to me, your Eminence. It is addressed to some other Robert Bruce who, it seems, is Governor of some province called Scotland. A remarkable
co-incidence, I grant you but I am King of Scots and Scotland is a country, not a province. As the letter isn’t properly addressed I can’t possible accept it.’
The two legates were nonplussed.
‘But you must, my lord. It is for you from the Pope and it contains…’
Before the man could say what it contained Robert Bruce lost his temper and thundered at him.
‘I am not ‘my lord’. You will address me as Sire or Highness or Lord King, is that clear? I have paid you the courtesy of addressing you as Eminence and you will do me the courtesy of using the proper form of address to me. You wouldn’t dream of calling Philip of France or Edward of England ‘my lord’ would you?’
The two men looked at each other and seemed to reach agreement with their eyes.
‘We beg permission to withdraw and consider what you have said.’
Robert waved his hand in dismissal and, without bowing, the two cardinals turned their back on the king and stalked from the nave, their bodies conveying the resentment that they felt at the way that they had been treated.
‘Well, that went rather well, I thought,’ Robert remarked to Walter and James Douglas and the three men grinned at each other.
In the gallery the squires looked at one another and wondered what this all meant for the future. They weren’t particularly religious but they all had a healthy respect for the Church and believed that excommunication would mean that your soul would be damned for all eternity. Both Simon and Edgar worried that the confrontation that they had just witnessed would mean that the Pope would now take action against King Robert, and perhaps the whole of Scotland.
Chapter Four – The Taking of Berwick
April 1318
The papal envoys had made a further attempt to get King Robert to accept the second letter, apologising that they were unable to address him as king as the Pope hadn’t yet decided whether to recognise him as such, implying that there was a chance that he would do so. They implored him to cease hostilities in the meantime. Robert replied that, even if he was minded to agree, his barons would never concur. They had suffered much at the hands of the rapacious English, he said, and only a fair and just peace which recognised Scotland and its king would persuade them to lay down their arms. The frustrated cardinals returned to York to wait for further advice from the Pope.
In the meantime Robert started to plan to recapture the last Scottish town and castle in English hands – Berwick upon Tweed. His agents had been watching the town and the castle at its western end for some time and, from what they had reported, the sentries were too many and too alert for Simon and Edgar to climb up the wall to fix the scaling ladders in place at night.
However, thinking about the two youths reminded Robert that the brothers had been trapped in the town before and therefore presumably knew their way around. After thinking about the idea which had just occurred to him, he sent for them.
Simon was now nineteen and had turned into a tall, well-built youth with broad shoulders so different from the gangly, skinny boy he had been when he first saw him. Edgar was seventeen and, although not as broad in the shoulders as his brother, he was as tall and his gangly frame had started to fill out recently. They had also lost the Northumbrian accent and sounded more Scottish than Geordie.
‘Can you both remember your Northumbrian dialect?’
The two looked at each other, puzzled, then Simon replied in broad Geordie and his brother echoed him.
‘Excellent. I have a little information gathering mission for you.’
Three days later the two squires joined the throng of merchants, farmers, pedlars and entertainers entering Berwick for the weekly market. After hanging around the market square for a while, Simon and Edgar ducked down a side street and, stepping over the piles of filth and the odd animal carcase, they made their way to the inside of the town walls. Occasionally they ducked into an alleyway to check that they weren’t being followed but no-one seemed to be taking undue interest in them.
King Robert had thought that, having escaped from Berwick once, they would know their way around but they soon realised that they had only seen a small part of the town in the dark on the last occasion, and that had been over five years ago. They reached the town walls and sauntered around looking for the gates. There were only three. One to the south which led out onto the quayside, one to the north near the castle and one to the east through which they had entered the town. There was also the postern gate into the castle itself, through which they had exited the castle the last time.
The king had hoped that there was a postern gate into the town which, if he could secure it, might allow his men to steal in to Berwick but it looked as if the English had kept the ingress points to the minimum. Simon and Edgar had just decided that they had better join the crowd leaving after the market before they were stuck in Berwick after curfew again. They had just set off in the direction of the gate when they heard a shout behind them. Four members of the town watch stood about fifty yards behind them with a small urchin who was pointing at them.
‘They kept walking round the walls, they must be Scotchmen come to spy on us,’ the boy shrilled. ‘Can I have my penny reward now?’ he asked hopefully.
‘Bugger it, I hadn’t thought to watch out for little vermin like him. Very clever.’ Simon muttered to Edgar before yelling ‘run for it.’
Just as they started to sprint down the narrow lane in the general direction of the north gate four more men of the town watch appeared, blocking the other exit from the lane. Simon and Edgar skidded to a halt. They could either try and fight their way free armed only with their daggers against men with swords and spears, or they could stop and try and brazen it out. They decided on the latter and half an hour later, bound hand and foot and looking a little the worse for wear from the beating that they had been given, they were thrust into the presence of Peter Spalding, the Captain of the Berwick Town Watch.
‘Oh good! The governor does so like a nice dawn hanging or two to start his day off.’ Spalding smirked nastily at the two youths. ‘Well, what have you two got to say for yourselves?’
~#~
When the two squires failed to re-join Robert Bruce at Kelso within three days of setting out he came to the conclusion that they must have been captured or killed. He decided to wait for one more day and sent scouts out along the Tweed towards Berwick to see if there was any sign of them. At dusk on the fourth day he gave them up for dead and called a war council to consider his other options for taking the town.
‘The quay might be our best option, Sire,’ the Marishal, Sir Richard Keith, suggested. If we can get ashore there with enough men at night we can get into the warehouses that the merchants have built right up against the walls. We can then mine under the walls, protected by the buildings and set a fire under them to collapse the walls.’
‘It’s an idea, certainly. Any thoughts?’
‘The quays are always clogged with shipping and our men would be exposed clambering over the decks of the ships between them and the quay, the English could sally out and slaughter us before we even reach the warehouses and they could set fire to the warehouses with us inside if and when we do get there. Other than that, I think it’s a great plan.’ James Douglas sniffed loudly just to emphasise what he thought of Keith’s idea.
Keith was furious and his hand gripped his sword.
‘There is no need to be snide, Jamie. You have made some good points but you could have done so in a less confrontational manner.’
‘I apologise, Sire, and to you Richard, if I have caused offence.’
Richard Keith nodded curtly and let his hand fall from his sword. ‘Accepted.’
‘Anyone else have any suggestions?’ The king’s eyes travelled around the room until they met those of the newly knighted Sir Iain Ross, who was there on behalf of his father.
‘Yes, Sir Iain, what does the representative of the Earl of Ross have to suggest?’
‘In all the time I have served you, Sire,
the one thing your army lacked, apart from enough knights, was siege engines.’
A few nodded their agreement but the king was disappointed. What young Ross had said was common knowledge.
‘So I suggest we start to build some.’ Iain said quickly before the king could cut him off and move on.
‘But we don’t have the engineers to help us build them.’
‘But the French do, and so do the Flemings.’
Robert sat and thought about what Iain Ross had said.
‘Very well, let’s send a delegation to both and see if they will lend us some, or better still, teach us how to build and use our own. Iain, as it was your idea, you can accompany the Marischal to see the Count of Flanders and you, Jamie, can take Richard’s brother, William, to Paris and approach King Philip.’
William was worried about Edgar but hadn’t yet given up hope that his squire would turn up alive. Instead of appointing another squire he took one of his mother’s pages, a twelve year old boy called Rollo of Dirleton, to be his body servant. Of course, the boy was puffed up with importance, boasting to his fellow pages that he was really a squire now, until William brought him down to earth with a bump.
‘You are not my squire and never will be, you jumped up little turd. Edgar de Powburn is my squire and will remain so until I see his dead body. You could never fill his shoes, do you hear.’
He left the boy in tears and the butt of his friends’ teasing. He felt bad about his outburst; it wasn’t like him to lose his temper so easily, especially with a young boy. However, he was worried about Edgar and took his anxiety out on Rollo.
It was a very subdued Rollo who came to collect William’s weapons and armour for polishing that evening. William was tempted to apologise for his outburst but he was astute enough to realise that this would be a mistake. The boy was naturally cocky and he would become insufferable if he was allowed to think for one moment that he had bested his master.
