The Spitfire

by Bertrice Small

  “Go home, Donald,” the earl said wearily.

  “Are ye nae coming, man? The fighting is over, though God knows ‘twas no real fight at all. Just a wee bit of butchering.”

  He peered closely at his elder brother. “Yer going to hae a black eye, Tavis,” he said.

  “So are ye,” the earl noted dryly, and then he grinned at Donald. “Are all yer teeth still there, laddie?”

  Donald Fleming gingerly felt about his jawline. He spit once or twice, and then he replied, “Ye’ve loosened two or three of them, man, but I think they’ll hold. Why aren’t ye coming home now? Not that damned English spitfire still?”

  The earl’s grin faded and he glared darkly at his younger sibling. “I want to see my daughter,” he told him, daring him to refute his explanation.

  “Hummmph,” Donald said. “Will ye be wanting me to take all the men wi’ me?”

  “Aye, take them all. I’ll be home in a few days’ time, and there’s none fool enough to attack Tavis Stewart, though he rides alone.”

  Donald Fleming departed with his brother’s clansmen, leaving the Earl of Dunmor to his own pursuits, although Donald didn’t believe for a minute that Tavis’ chief reason for remaining behind at Greyfaire was the little dark-haired lassie who was his niece. The earl remained behind because of that pale-haired English vixen with a temper bigger than she herself was. His brother hadn’t been able to bring Arabella Grey to his bridle before. Donald wondered what had changed that Tavis thought he could bring the wench to heel now.

  The earl watched his forces leaving, and then he turned back into the hall.

  “Father Anselm would say a Mass of thanksgiving before we break our fast,” Arabella told him, and he followed her to the little family chapel which was off the Great Hall. There was no church now, for the little Greyfaire church had been one of the first things Sir Jasper Keane had destroyed when he had turned outlaw. The chapel was crowded with all the remaining Greyfaire folk. Many were elderly, but there were some young men, and a few women with children. Despite the happiness of the occasion, it was, the earl thought, a pitiful gathering. FitzWalter was right, though Arabella had not yet faced it. Greyfaire was dead.

  Afterward in the hall they sat together at the highboard and he was served a hearty breakfast of oat porridge, fresh-baked bread with sweet butter, a honeycomb, and a good brown ale.

  “You have sent your men away,” she said to him.

  “Their job is done, madame, and besides, I realize that ye dinna hae the means at the moment to feed such a great troop,” he answered her.

  “Thatwas kind, Tavis,” she replied, using his name for the first time since he had arrived at Greyfaire. “In another year or two I shall have Greyfaire back to its old self, and my hospitality will not be so niggardly.”

  “Will ye be able to restore your estate, lovey?” he asked her, slipping without even realizing it into his old form of address.

  “Aye! Of course I will!” she insisted.

  “How will ye go about it?” he persisted.

  “There is no hope of a harvest this year,” she began seriously. “It is simply too late in the summer to plant another crop, but we can clear the fields back again so they will be ready for plowing in the spring. I will replant the orchards then too.”

  “How will ye live through the winter? Yer people will need to be fed,” he said.

  “I’ll buy grain and flour in York,” she told him. “We’ll dry the grasses we weed from the fields to feed the livestock we have, and then in the spring I’ll buy another flock of sheep to replace those that were stolen. There’s deer and rabbit in the hills that are mine to hunt. We’ll manage, Tavis.”

  He wanted to tell her that it was all madness. That she should never again be able to rebuild Greyfaire, for she looked at her lands through sentimental eyes. In the best of times it had never been a rich estate, and the times were not particularly good now, but he did not tell her. She would not have accepted his word in the matter, and it would have driven a wedge between them just when he believed there was a chance of his winning her back. Arabella might be proud and stubborn, but she was no fool. Eventually she had to come to her senses. So he listened, and he nodded, and he held his peace, mindful of FitzWalter’s approving eyes upon him, and somehow the captain’s silent compliance in the matter was comforting.

  He remained at Greyfaire for several days, avoiding any serious confrontations with Arabella, remaking his daughter’s acquaintance and pretending to himself that they were once again a family. He stood as witness with Arabella at the wedding of his clansman, Fergus MacMichael, and Lona, assuring the young couple that there would be a place for them at Dunmor whenever they decided to return. Finally, however, he could no longer deny that Dunmor and his own obligations as its earl existed. He departed Greyfaire, promising to return as soon as he could.

  He came as often as he dared during the autumn months, always arriving with some gift to help her. Several stags, dressed and ready for hanging. A few casks of wine. Bushels of apples and pears, enough to last until the spring. He knew that she shared her bounty with all of her people, and they did not starve, although their rations were certainly not generous. In February the storms came and he could not go to Greyfaire at all. Penned within his own castle, he lashed out in his frustration at anyone who dared to approach him, for he feared for Arabella’s safety, as well as that of their daughter.

  “Will it nae stop snowing?” he demanded of no one in particular one winter’s evening.

  His mother, who had been caught at Dunmor by this most recent storm, replied calmly, “It will cease snowing when God wills it, Tavis, and nae a moment before. Do sit down. Yer behaving like a spoilt lad.”

  “There was barely enough firewood the last time I was there, Mam,” he told her. “What if they could nae get it cut in time? They’ll freeze to death!”

  “Then they will, Tavis, and yer fretting about it will nae change a thing, laddie,” came the calm reply. Lady Margery had finally given up any hope of marrying her eldest son off to some good Scots lass. He would rewed Arabella Grey, and no one else, she realized.

  When the weather broke, he rode pell-mell across the border to find that they had, indeed, survived the serious weather quite comfortably.

  In the early spring sickness struck Greyfaire. Several children and half a dozen elderly souls died of the White Throat. Arabella lived in terror that Margaret would catch the disease, but she did not. The Spotting Sickness followed, however, and here Lady Margaret Stewart did not escape. She fell seriously ill, to the great fright of her mother, who, though she nursed her daughter lovingly and with all of her skill, could not seem to make the child well. In terror Arabella Grey sent for the Earl of Dunmor, who arrived posthaste, looking haggard, and closely followed several hours later by Lady Margery Fleming, bringing her own remedies for her granddaughter, convinced that her greater experience in these matters would prove successful.

  Margaret’s little body was covered in a great red rash. She burned with fever and complained that her eyes hurt her. They cut her dark curls so that her hair would not sap her waning strength, but it was all to no avail. Lady Margaret Stewart died in her weeping mother’s arms just two weeks after her fourth birthday.

  In her immediate grief Arabella tried to throw herself from Greyfaire’s battlements, but was prevented from doing so by Tavis Stewart. She then fell into a stupor from which she could not be roused for several days, by which time her child was buried next to her maternal grandmother in Greyfaire’s churchyard.

  The earl mourned, although to a slightly lesser degree, the death of his only legitimate child. It was not that he had not loved wee Maggie, for he had, but in truth he had hardly known her as Arabella had taken her away from Dunmor before her second birthday. He would always remember the dark-haired and winning little girl he had come to know these past few months; but he and Arabella would have other children. Other sons and daughters. In the meantime his chief fears were f
or the woman he loved.

  “We must take her back to Dunmor,” Lady Margery insisted. “This wee keep of hers is a damned pesthole, Tavis. Why, I wouldn’t be surprised at all to see the plague breaking out here before long. I can nurse her better at Dunmor.”

  “Nay,” the earl replied. “She will never forgive me if I take her from Greyfaire now. She must want to come wi’ me of her own free will, Mam.”

  “She’s grief-stricken, Tavis,” Lady Margery replied impatiently. “She dinna know what she wants, poor lassie. Ye canna know the pain a woman feels when she loses her bairn.”

  “Ye must trust me in this matter, Mam,” he told his mother. “I hae nae known Arabella all these years nae to understand her. I want her back, but I’ll nae get her back if I take her away from Greyfaire against her will again. She must gie up this dream of hers, nae because she hae failed, or because a woman canna make such a dream come true, but because she can honestly face the fact that Greyfaire is gone. It hae nae been an easy burden she hae been shouldering—being the last of the Greys—and she has nae to be ashamed of, Mam. No man could have done better. If I am patient, she will come to accept of her own free will that the battle is lost. And when she can face that loss, she will come home. I dinna care how long it takes. I will be here for Arabella because I love her. Together we will mourn our daughter’s loss, and together we will rebuild our lives.”

  “Yer a damned romantic fool,” his mother said tenderly. “A foolish, romantic Stewart! I only hope that Arabella Grey, when she comes to this great understanding, will also appreciate what a good man she hae in ye.” Lady Margery gave her son a hard hug and a motherly kiss. “I’m going home, Tavis. There is nothing more here that I can do for either ye or for poor, wee Arabella. God bless ye both, and for heaven’s sakes, man, remember Dunmor! Ye canna linger here forever!”

  When he had seen her safely off, he returned to Arabella’s chamber to find her awake at long last. She was very pale and there were huge, dark circles beneath her light green eyes. Sitting upon the edge of her bed, he took her little hand in his, kissed it and said, “How do ye feel, lovey?”

  “Is Margaret really dead, Tavis? Or was it simply a bad dream?” she asked him anxiously, and she shivered, though the day was warm.

  “Our wee bairn is dead, lovey,” he told her as gently as he might, and worried to himself that her hand was so icy cold. “There was nae help for it, ye know. Mam said we did everything that we could. Many bairns survive the Spotting Sickness wi’ little discomfort, and others, like Maggie, are struck down so badly that there is simply nothing that can be done for them.”

  She nodded sadly and a single tear rolled down her cheek. “She was such a little girl,” Arabella said helplessly. “Did you see how much she looked like you, Tavis? But for her eyes. Maggie had my mother’s lovely blue eyes.”

  “We buried her next to yer mother, lovey. I thought ye would like it,” he told her gently, and climbing into bed next to her, he took her into the warm comfort of his arms.

  Arabella closed her eyes wearily and tears streamed from beneath her lashes down her face. “I missed a whole year of her life, Tavis,” she whispered tragically. “A whole year! King Henry would not let me have her with me in France.”

  “He was right, lovey,” the earl told the grieving mother. “‘Twas too dangerous.”

  “I did it all for her, Tavis. So she might have Greyfaire. So she might be an heiress in her own right and beholden to none.”

  “I know,” he said.

  “Now there is nothing left,” Arabella said sadly. “Greyfaire is gone and our daughter is gone.” She laughed suddenly. A harsh and terrible sound. “It was all for nothing, Tavis. I destroyed our life together, and I sold my body that I might regain Greyfaire for Margaret. Now I have neither. It is surely God’s judgment upon me for my overweening pride and my many other sins.” She sighed deeply. “Perhaps Father Anselm was right when he told me so long ago that women should be meek and humble, and trust themselves to their men.”

  Tavis Stewart burst out laughing at this last. He simply couldn’t help it. “Arabella Grey,” he said finally. “Yer tired, and yer badly worn wi’ yer grief; but I dinna believe for one moment that ye think ye should be either meek or humble. God’s teeth, lassie! Ye dinna know the meaning of either word, but I would nae be displeased if ye would entrust yerself to me again.”

  “What?” She shook off his arms and, turning her head, looked directly at him. She was not sure that she shouldn’t be very angry at him for laughing at her, and she was certainly not sure that she fully understood him. “What do you mean,” she demanded suspiciously, “‘entrust myself to you’?”

  “Arabella Grey,” he said tenderly, “will ye be my wife again? I love ye, and I always hae loved ye. I think that ye hae always loved me too.”

  “Aye,” she said simply. The time for dissemblance between them was long past. She did love him, and whatever anger she may have felt toward him was long gone. That he would want to renew their life together was most tempting.

  “Then will ye marry me, lassie? Will ye be my wee English wife once more?”

  “I was the Duc de Lambour’s mistress,” she told him honestly. There must be no secrets between them. Nothing that might ever separate them again.

  “I know,” he said quietly.

  “And it matters not at all to you, Tavis?” she probed skillfully.

  “The Duc de Lambour’s English mistress was nae my wife,” he replied. “Nor was the bold English wench who spent three days wi’ my nephew, Jamie,” the earl told her calmly.

  She was thunderstruck. “You…you knew?” she gasped, and her pale skin grew pink with her blush.

  “Aye, I knew,” he said. “Nae at first, mind ye, but Donald, in a nasty mood, suggested it, and though I denied it, it set me to thinking. Why did Jamie help ye? Oh, he’s a good lad, but nae known for his charity. Ye made some damned unholy bargain wi’ the laddie. It was then that I understood, lovey. I understood why ye hae divorced me. That ye nae bring shame upon my name. Was that nae the reason, Arabella? And I knew then that ye truly loved me, lassie. Loved me even as I love ye.”

  “I could not have told you, Tavis,” she admitted frankly. “Not that I feared what you might say, for I did not, but I could not drive a wedge between you and your king. Poor Jamie has few souls he can really trust, and you, my darling, have ever been loyal. ‘Tis one of the things I love you for, Tavis Stewart. Your sense of honor.”

  He smiled at her. “I understood that as well, lovey. Are ye nae fortunate to hae so perceptive a man who loves ye?” he teased her.

  “Aye, Tavis Stewart, I am,” she said with complete sincerity. Then her brow furrowed. “My lord! I cannot leave the few souls who have remained here at Greyfaire to fend for themselves. What can I do? They have been loyal to the Greys to the bitter end. I cannot desert them!”

  “Nay,” he agreed with her. “Ye canna, but I think I know what ye might do, lovey, to help them. The border is safe for now, wi’ Sir Jasper Keane having taken up his residence in Hell. Though I expect there’ll be plenty of border clashes between England and Scotland in times to come, for ‘tis our nature, I fear, to go roving, it will nae ever again be like it was. Let us divide your lands in several portions. We will set upon these lands good tenants to farm them. We will have built stout stone cottages to house them, and the revenues from their rents and kind will be set aside for our next daughter as her dowry. When she marries, the income from the estate will be passed on to her.”

  “Aye,” she agreed, “‘tis a good plan, and the stones for the cottages, Tavis, will come from the keep itself,” she told him.

  “You would destroy Greyfaire Keep, lovey?” He was astounded.

  “The keep was built by the Greys, my lord. Only Greys have resided here all these centuries, but for Sir Jasper’s unfortunate and brief tenure. I am the last of the Greys. It is only fitting that I determine the keep’s fate. It has outlived its strategic usefulne
ss now, I fear. If I leave it standing, it will become a haven for every outlaw roaming the border. What an ignominious end to a house whose honor has always been paramount. That must not be, Tavis. Is it not better that I dismantle the keep in order to put it to better use? Besides, it is half destroyed as it is, thanks to Sir Jasper.”

  Arabella Grey did not leave her lands until the keep had begun to be dismantled. She had, as the earl suggested, divided her estate into portions. She awarded those portions to the few young men who had so loyally remained by her side, giving them the first year rent-free. FitzWalter had been awarded the largest portion rent-free for his lifetime, to be passed on to his male descendants thereafter at a nominal rental.

  The first stones removed from the keep were used to rebuild Greyfaire church, much to the delight of old Father Anselm. And while the clansmen called from Dunmor worked to tear the small castle down, the new tenant farmers and their families tilled their fields, planted their orchards, and cared for the sheep and cattle, as well as the geese and the laying hens that their lady had so generously supplied.

  One condition of tenancy, however, had been that all the men take wives. Those without them had chosen to marry the widows amongst them, thus providing homes for the women, their children, and the few remaining elders. When the keep was finally dismantled, the clansmen would remain on to help the Greyfaire folk build their houses before the winter returned. There might have been some who thought the alliance between the Greyfaire folk and the clansmen from Dunmor odd, but the two groups quickly found that they had much in common.

  Content that her people were now safe, Arabella Grey, the heiress of Greyfaire, remarried Tavis Stewart, the Earl of Dunmor, on the tenth of June, in the year of our Lord, 1491.

  “Would you not prefer that we be wed at Dunmor?” she asked him when she had decided that she might at last leave Greyfaire.