Highland Sunset

by Joan Wolf

  His back was to her, his head resting on his, arm, his hard, chiseled profile visible in the light from the window. He looked younger as he lay there asleep, but she thought he also looked very tired.

  Frances clasped her arms around her knees and laid her head on them, her long brown hair spilling down over the coverlet in a shining, silken fall. Her hands were gripped so tightly the knuckles showed white.

  He was going into battle today and the two of them were still at odds. There was nothing more she could do; she had made every overture of reconciliation she could think of. He would not be placated.

  She thought it was his own doubts that stood in their way. If he had been truly confident of success, then he would have been able to forgive her her doubt. Then he could have afforded to be magnanimous, generous, forgiving; he would have been right.

  He was worried. Even with the victories they had had, the triumphant entry into Edinburgh, he was worried. And he could not share that worry with her. She had declared herself opposed to his cause and so he had put her outside his trust. She was the enemy for him, a living reminder of all his own most private fears. And he was all she had.

  He stirred. His lashes lifted and he assessed the time from the light at the window. Then he rolled over onto his back and saw her. For a brief moment something flashed in his eyes; then the shutters came down. "What are you doing awake at this hour, Frances?"

  She swallowed. "I don't know. I just woke up."

  "You should have awakened me," he said. "It's getting late." And he swung out of bed and went to the wardrobe.

  Frances watched him in silence as he stripped and dressed. He would be marching at the head of his clan, not riding, and so he put on the kilt. "We have as many men as Cope," he said as he fastened the brooch that held his plaid on his shoulder. "This battle we should win."

  "Where is Niall?" Frances asked.

  "He bedded down with the clan last night. They are encamped with the rest of the army in the King's Park." His teeth showed in a quick, hard smile. "I am too old a dog to sleep on the ground when a bed is available."

  He was fully dressed now and he came over to stand beside the bed. "Do not worry, Frances. I will see you soon enough."

  She raised her arms, not caring if he rejected her, aware only of her own fear and need. "Oh, Alasdair. Take care of yourself. Please take care of yourself."

  His arms came around her, hard and crushing. He kissed her once, fiercely, burningly, then he let her go. Without another word, he turned and left the room.

  If Alasdair felt some doubts on that morning of September 20, Niall felt none. He went among the men of his clan, all air and fire, supremely confident, totally unafraid. He saw before him only the glorious prospect of complete victory; the possible alternative of a soldier's grave scarcely crossed his mind.

  The Highlanders were quartered on the rolling ground that lay behind Holyrood Palace and, as each clan's piper sounded forth, the army gathered into marching order and prepared to set forth. Alasdair had Niall beside him and his foster brother and piper behind him as the MacIans swung out onto the road that took them under the green height of Arthur's Seat and eastward toward the sea.

  The sun was going down when the Highlanders received word they were within a mile of the English army. The prince immediately gave the order for the clans to get off the low coast road they had been following and take the heights that commanded the plain which stretched between the villages of Prestonpans and Cockenzie. As the clansmen formed into battle lines on the hill, the van of Sir John Cope's army appeared from among the trees on the far side of the plain.

  "Cope wants to hold the level ground between us and the sea," Alasdair said to Niall as the two of them watched from their hillside position.

  Niall could see plainly the squadrons of dragoons forming opposite them. There was only about a half-mile between them and the enemy army. Behind him Alan Ruadh was arranging the line in their own battle formation. Similar maneuvers were going on all over the hillside.

  "There is the artillery," Alasdair said quietly.

  Niall watched with burning eyes as the field pieces were brought up, placed before the dragoons, and pointed up against the heights. Then came three or four regiments of infantry marching in open column, their fixed bayonets showing like successive hedges of steel, and their arms flashing like lightning as, at a given signal, they all wheeled up, and were placed in direct opposition to the Highlanders. Then a second train of artillery, with another regiment of horse, formed on the left flank of the infantry, the whole line facing southward.

  Niall's hand tightened convulsively on the Lochaber ax that hung at his belt. His lips drew back over his teeth. He whirled to look at the hundreds of MacIans massed behind him.

  "Buaich no Bas!" (Victory or Death) he cried out to their ranks.

  "Buaich no Bas!" they roared back.

  The English below heard them and shouted defiance toward the hill. A cannon went off. Alasdair laid a hand on his son's arm.

  "Be quiet!" he ordered. His straight black brows were almost meeting over his arrogant, high-bridged nose. "I do not like the ground."

  "What do you mean, Father?" Niall asked. "We are almost on top of them."

  "The ground is marshy," Alasdair said shortly. "And look at that ditch, Niall. It will slow our charge fatally. The artillery would get us before we could ever reach them." He turned and shot an order to Alan Ruadh before he turned back to Niall. "Never mistake the ability of the saighdearan dearg, my son."

  Niall looked down at the row upon row of English "red soldiers" with a somber face.

  "I am going to see the prince and Lord George," Alasdair said. "You may come with me if you wish."

  The result of Alasdair's interview with the prince and the commander-in-chief was that some men were sent out to scour the neighborhood for a man to guide them across the marsh. The Highlanders withheld their attack and darkness fell. One of the prince's scouts returned with a local man, Robert Anderson of Whitburgh, who said he knew a secret path through the marsh. At midnight Alasdair and Niall wrapped themselves in their plaids and lay down on the cold hard ground to sleep.

  They were wakened after scarcely three hours had passed. The night was heavy and dark with mist. In eerie silence the clans formed into line and crossed the marsh behind their leaders and Robert Anderson. It was still dark as they moved into battle formation, ready at the first light of dawn to fall upon the unsuspecting English.

  But even the rising sun did not dissipate the thick white fog the Scots call a haar that shrouded the plain that morning. The English soldiers awakened to its dreariness with annoyed resignation. It was just the sort of weather one could expect in this uncivilized country, where men went unbreeched and spoke a barbaric language and fought with axes. The veterans of Fontenoy, secure in their artillery and their cavalry, did not anticipate much trouble in dealing with the primitive clansmen on the hill.

  The mist was just lifting when there came the sound of shots, then a shout of alarm, and then, terrifyingly, the war cries of the clans as they rose from more than two thousand throats. Before the English veterans knew what had happened, like hunters in quest of their prey, the Highlanders were on them. There was no chance to use the artillery. The cavalry horses ran mad with fear. As the English lines broke and tried to flee to their rear, they ran into the long stone wall about twelve feet high that was immediately behind them. The despised broadswords and Lochaber axes did murderous damage. In less than fifteen minutes the English army was routed, and in some cases, cut to pieces. General Cope with a remnant of men fled to Berwick-on-Tweed.

  The English left five hundred dead on the field at Prestonpans and nine hundred wounded. The Highlanders' total casualties amounted to one hundred. On Sunday, September 21, 1745, Prince Charles Edward Stuart was the undisputed master of all Scotland.

  Van and Frances waited tensely in Edinburgh for news of the battle. As the morning dragged on, Van felt herself becoming more and
more uncertain. No one could be braver than their men, certainly, but they were not professionals. The English army had fought wars before, had fought in Europe in the wars against France. She thought of her father, of Niall. Of Alan.

  Only once during the long course of that morning did the picture of a blue-eyed man intrude on her thoughts. And her feelings toward him were not kindly. Edward was risking nothing in this fight, she thought. He was not out there on the battlefield. He was back in London, riding his horses. On the Sunday morning that the battle of Prestonpans was fought, London and Staplehurst and Edward Romney seemed very far away from her, seemed another world, a world that had nothing to do with her or with Frances or with the men they loved who were risking their lives that day for their beloved cause.

  Early in the afternoon, as Van and Frances were sitting in the small parlor of their house, the sound of bagpipes came swirling up the High Street. They looked at each other and both ran for the door at the same time. Down on the street they followed the crowd that was moving quickly toward the Netherbow Port, the gate in the city wall that had been erected in 1513 after the defeat by England at Flodden. On the other side of the Netherbow Port was the Canongate and the sloping road to Holyrood Palace.

  Van recognized the badge in the Highlanders' bonnets as soon as the first man came through the gate. She clutched her mother's arm. "It's the Camerons, Mother!"

  It was indeed the Camerons, and above them flew the colors they had captured only hours earlier from General Cope's dragoons. The air the pipers played was an old and favorite Jacobite song: "The King Shall Enjoy His Own Again."

  "We won, Mother!" Van's face blazed with exultation. "I can scarcely believe it! We did it! We beat the English! We won!"

  Frances' face reflected none of her daughter's joy. In fact it was rather pale. "I wonder what the casualties were," she said.

  "I'm sure Father and Niall are fine," Van responded bracingly. Her mother looked very white and she put an arm about Frances' shoulders. The pipes were skirling as more and more Camerons poured in through the city gates. "We'll ask one of the officers for news of them," she said to Frances, and began to scan the ranks for a familiar face. She was not at all afraid. She was certain her men were safe. The jubilant faces of the Camerons told her it was a solid victory. We won! We won! We won! she thought as, arm around her mother, she guided her toward Hector Cameron, who would certainly have news of the MacIans.

  They did not see Alasdair that day but they got the news of his safety from Niall, who arrived at his mother's doorstep some hours after the Camerons' entry half-carrying a wounded Alan MacDonald.

  "The musket shot passed right through his arm, Mother," Niall said after he had got Alan into bed. "One of the doctors cleaned and bandaged it. You'll take care of him, won't you? Lady Lochaber is not in Edinburgh."

  Frances smiled down into Alan's pain-filled face and spoke reassuringly. "Of course we'll take care of you, Alan." She put a cool hand on his forehead. "But you should not have tried to come back to Edinburgh so soon."

  "I told him that," Niall said beside her. "The prince is staying at Pinkie House for the night. But he insisted."

  Van had gone to her mother's room for some laudanum and now she came back into the bedroom with a bottle and a spoon in her hand. "Insisted or not, you should not have let him," she said to Niall as she handed the medicine to Frances. Then she looked at Alan. Poor boy, she thought. His eyes were heavy with pain. She put her hand against his cheek. "You're a fool, Alan MacDonald." Her voice was gentle.

  Behind her back, Niall smiled with satisfaction.

  Alan tried to speak lightly. "I did not want to die without seeing you again."

  Van frowned fiercely. "You are not going to die." She looked at her brother, and his face grew instantly grave. "I just might kill Niall, however."

  "He seemed perfectly fine at Prestonpans," Niall said defensively. "And we came on horseback." He grinned. "There were plenty of fine English horses to be had after the battle."

  "Out of here, everyone," Frances said firmly. "I am going to give Alan something to make him sleep."

  "I knew you'd know what to do, Mother," Niall said gratefully as she herded them out the door.

  He wanted to go seek out Jean Cameron, but his mother and sister would not let him go until he had told them all about the battle.

  "The dawn attack was Father's idea," he said proudly. "They did not know we were coming until we were on them."

  Van stared at him in awe. "Did you kill a lot of them?" she asked. "Hundreds. And many were wounded. The field looked like a slaughterhouse." Niall looked pleased. "The axes did their work well."

  Frances looked at her son with a mixture of horror and resignation. She could not blame him for being so bloodthirsty, she thought. Killing was what he had been brought up to do, what his training and his tradition had geared him for. He had been weaned on songs of battle and slaughter, had got his first gun when he was five, shot his first stag when he was nine. Killing was the activity for which he had been most intensively trained; she supposed she could not blame him if he enjoyed it.

  Van's regard had changed from awe to faint amusement. "You sound as if you liked it," she said.

  He grinned, a boy's grin. "I did," he replied simply. "Now, if you don't mind, I'm off to see Jeannie Cameron."

  As Van watched her brother leave the room, the image of Edward once again crossed her mind. He and Niall—there could not be two more different men. Niall would never understand Edward, she thought. Niall thought with his heart. And it was thinking with the heart that had brought them this far. Looking at their cause with Edward's eyes, intelligently, dispassionately, one would have said they hadn't a chance of success, yet here they were in Edinburgh, and the clans had just soundly defeated the greatest army in the world. It was Niall who was right, she thought fiercely. Niall and Alan and her father—those who held to their loyalty and their honor, not those who followed the path of prudence.

  She was vaguely aware that she was being unfair to Edward, that his actions were as firmly based on principle as were those of her father and Niall, but she did not want to see that just now. She wanted to rejoice in this victory and feel pride in her cause and not think of Edward at all. It confused her to think of him. And it hurt. Better by far to live in the present and not think too much of anything else.

  "I'll give you a list of things to get from the apothecary, darling," Frances was saying. "Alan's arm will have to be dressed again."

  Van raised her chin and stiffened her spine. "Yes, Mother. I'll go right away." And she followed Frances into the parlor.

  CHAPTER 15

  Prince Charles returned to Edinburgh and sent another message to old General Guest, the commander of Edinburgh Castle, demanding its surrender. General Guest replied as previously that the prince could take his terms of surrender and go to hell. And so, as the prince and his chiefs and generals continued to reside at Holyrood and fight over what their next course of action should be, the English presence remained intact in the form of the bulk of Edinburgh Castle towering over the town.

  In London there was also discussion as to the road the prince would take next. "Will he invade England?" Lord Pelham asked the Earl of Linton as they sat together in the prime minister's office early on the morning of October 6.

  "He will be a fool if he does so," Edward replied equably. "His only chance of success is to make this a national war, denounce the union, and pit Scotland against England in the cause of Scottish independence. A national Scottish war would almost certainly gain aid from France."

  "Great God." Lord Pelham visibly shuddered at the thought. "Do you think that is what the pretender will do, Linton?"

  Edward's blue eyes glinted. "It is what / should do if I were in his place, but I doubt if the pretender will show such restraint. If he is like all the Stuarts, he will overreach himself." Edward raised a golden eyebrow. "I think he will invade."

  Very slowly Lord Pelham nodded. "Yes. I th
ink you are right." The prime minister closed his fist upon the table. "I shall send Marshal Wade to Newcastle."

  "That would block any invasion by way of Edinburgh," Edward agreed.

  "Very well." Lord Pelham stretched his shoulders. "I shall get a messenger off to General Guest with that information. It is essential Guest hold Edinburgh Castle."

  "You don't need a messenger," Edward said. "I'll go to Edinburgh for you."

  The prime minister stared. "You?"

  "I have some business to attend to in the city," the earl replied blandly.

  Lord Pelham had an idea just what that business was, but didn't dare to ask further. "Very well," he agreed after a moment. "You will stay at the castle, of course. There is not exactly a welcome sign hanging out for Whigs in Edinburgh these days."

  Edward laughed ruefully and went home to make preparations for a journey to Scotland.

  At the very moment that Edward was speaking to Lord Pelham, Van was having a similar conversation with her father. "What will we do now, Father?" she asked Alasdair as she caught him leaving the house after coming home to change his clothes. They saw very little of her father these days; he was almost always at Holyrood Palace.

  "That matter is under almost constant discussion, my daughter," he replied a little grimly.

  "What do you think we should do?" Van asked.

  He looked at her consideringly, then evidently decided to answer, for he sat down on the stiff, uncomfortable parlor sofa and gestured her to a chair opposite him. "The prince is for invading England," he said, "and the chiefs are for staying in Scotland and consolidating our position here. The more successful we are in the north, the more support we will attract. Glen-bucket has come in, and Mackinnon of Mackinnon. And Cluny MacPherson. There will be more if we continue to hold Edinburgh."