“But what will you do?”
“I will raise your standard. The King’s Royal Standard. Against Crichton. If you will let me, Sire.”
The boy stared, biting his lip. He glanced over at Robert Fleming, who sat there quietly listening. “How . . . how shall you do that?”
“I shall need Your Grace’s help. I can raise men. The Douglas power which all talk so much of. But it must not be only Douglas. Others must rally to your cause. Otherwise it will be proclaimed rebellion. Treason! And that will frighten many. The Constable’s authority is not enough, he says. For he is only responsible for Your Grace’s person and safety, he tells me. So we need your authority. Your royal decree. There is only one man who may raise the Royal Standard of Scotland. Other than the King. That is the King’s Lieutenant-General. Lieutenant-General of the Realm!”
“But, but there is none. Is there?”
“Not since my cousin died. The 5th Earl. Archibald, Earl of Douglas and Duke of Touraine. Father of those who were murdered. He was Lieutenant-General. You could make another, Sire. And only you can!”
Even Robert Fleming cleared his throat nervously.
James almost whispered it. “Me? Make you Lieutenant-General? You? Could I do that?”
“Why not? You are the King. And being held here, you need a Lieutenant. I am young, but at least I am loyal. Make me Lieutenant, and all leal men can rally to your standard.”
“They would annul it. Crichton. The Council.”
“They would wish to. But could they? The King’s Deputy? Appointed by himself. They would not confirm it — but could they annul it?” Will looked at Fleming.
“I do not know, my lord. Your Grace. But it would seem a most special office. Not for the Council to appoint to. This would much confuse them I think.”
“So think I. Which gives us time. If I have such decree written, Sire, will you sign it?”
James hesitated, darting uncertain glances, the red strawberry mark on his cheek red indeed. Then he nodded. “Yes, Yes, I will. So be it you win me free out of this castle. Soon. I will sign it.”
Will sighed his relief. “That is our purpose, Sire. Now, this very night, those Douglas men-at-arms out there will turn messenger! To ride to every corner of the realm where there are Douglas lands and Douglas vassals. To muster. To assemble, and ride for Stirling. Pate will see to it. Pate Pringle. He will know how it should be done and where to go — for I do not. This Douglas power — we will see what it amounts to!”
“It will take time, my lord,” Fleming warned. “There has not been an assembly of Douglas might for many years. Men will have grown slack. Forgotten their duty, perhaps. Time it will take . . .”
“And time we have not got, I tell you. There must be no holding back. No delay. You — you will go to Angus. To the Red Douglases. The Earl of Angus, at Tantallon. He can field a thousand, they say. And near to hand, in Lothian. Tomorrow . . .”
CHAPTER FIVE
TO the high shrilling of a trumpet, Will Douglas spurred his heavy charger to a canter, and rode, clanking and clattering, up the serried ranks of armed and mounted men who sat waiting, that sunny morning, on the Burghmuir of Stirling; and the cheer that rose at the bottom end of his quarter-mile ride swelled and deepened as he went, and gradually changed its tempo and quality, as the chant of ‘A Douglas! A Douglas!’ mingled with it, permeated it and finally overbore the rest. Not much more than half of that host wore the Douglas colours, but these, in their troops and companies, formed the entire forward portion of the long and wide column, so that, as the Earl came pounding up the line, that ominous, pregnant slogan, two words that in the past had struck more of dread in Scots ears than any others soever, grew and prevailed. The young man who occasioned it all would have been less than human had he not been affected, excited, enheartened by it — and Will Douglas was very human. It was his nineteenth birthday.
He was, indeed, glad of the heavy, clumsy and restricting armour that he wore — since, within it, his actual trembling eagerness could not be discerned. Armour, of course, should be made for a man, tailored; and Will had had no time for that, amongst other things. What he wore, indeed, had been built up from various pieces, mainly provided by Sir William Hay from the Erroll armoury, some fitting, some not, and all tending to look slightly old-fashioned. But the open, loose linen surcoat over it at least was his own, sewn by a Stirling tailor, with the Red Heart of Douglas embroidered front and back. He rode bareheaded, his black hair streaming in the wind, the great battle helm with its rude crest of a salamander’s head, carried at his esquire’s saddle-bow behind. His mount also was armoured and heraldically caparisoned, a massively-built brute more meet to pull a plough than lead chivalry, but necessary to carry all its weight. Its great hooves spattered turfs from the Burghmuir as it cantered heavily.
Close behind, two others rode, both armoured likewise. Robert Fleming carried, as well as the helmet, Will’s lance and great blazoned shield, hastily painted with the quartered arms of Douglas and Moray, while Pate Pringle bore aloft the fluttering banner of the Bloody Heart. Some way further behind, the trumpeter trotted.
The trio came to the head of the array, where the Constable awaited them, under his own red and white banner, amongst a group of knightly supporters. They made a glittering and impressive-seeming leadership to a noteable cohort. But none there was deceived, least of all Will Douglas, however momentarily uplifted.
He raised steel-gauntleted hand to Hay. “No more come,” he said, a little breathlessly “No sign of any parties from north or west. From the topmost tower Hamilton has failed us.”
“Aye. I expected it,” the Constable said curtly. “And Livingstone?”
“He has not shown face. Keeps his room. But interfered nothing. His two sons never leave the King’s side.”
Hay nodded. “We have been fortunate with Livingstone, at least. He can know nothing, or he would never have let us go, like this. Without railing on us. We ride now, then? Forward?”
‘We ride, yes.” Will signed to the trumpeter, who sounded his clamant ululant advance. Like a great monster laboriously stretching and shaking itself, the long array stirred into movement, southwards.
“God go with us and cherish us!” Master Adam, the somewhat smug Cambuskenneth sub-Abbot said piously — the only churchman present.
“Amen!” the Constable grunted feelingly. “Else we were wise to turn back now. While still we can!”
Hay was no optimist, of course, but the situation was indeed less heartening than it might seem. There were fifteen hundred men in that goodly company, eight hundred of them Douglases — but that was nothing like the numbers that they had looked for. From most of the Douglas baronies and lairdships, the response had been disappointing and tardy; from some, not at all. Admittedly the time had been short, but even so, enthusiasm for the new earl’s summons had been markedly absent. No single great Douglas baron had come in person, and most had sent only token forces. Notably, the Earl of Angus, after a cool reception of Robert Fleming at Tantallon, had sent not one man; so that, significantly, the Red branch of the house was totally unrepresented. Apparently James the Gross’s inertia had been infectious, and here too, men waited to see which way the cat would jump. As for others than Douglas, it was the same story, only more so. Basically, only the Constable’s friends and neighbours from the Carse of Gowrie and south Perthshire were represented. And apart from the local Cambuskenneth contingent, Holy Church looked otherwhere. Even Hamilton evidently had had second thoughts.
Had they been able to wait longer, months instead of a week or two, it might possibly have been different, for the assembling, arming and despatching of large numbers of men was a slow business — or so the excuses went. On the other hand, delay could have aided the other side equally. Moreover, Will had come to the reluctant conclusion that men, if they sought excuse to hold back, would continue to find it.
What had forced their hand, however, was the information from Dumfriesshire that the Ch
ancellor was urgently assembling men from Crichton lands of Sanquhar and Upper Nithsdale, and was strengthening the defences of Edinburgh Castle. So he was preparing for hostilities — and still having the nation’s purse to pay for it, he could gather support. The only blessing in the situation had been their evident success in keeping from Livingstone and his sons the offer of the Treasurership. Three of Crichton’s couriers lay languishing in the cellars of Cambuskenneth Abbey, their messages undelivered. Sir Alexander had been informed only of the proposed bribe of the Border Wardenship for Will, and the Chancellor’s belief that Livingstone dared not move against him. So the old man, who seldom emerged from the castle, was lying low, waiting. But he had other sons, elsewhere, and sooner or later Crichton would approach them.
The muster on the Burghmuir had gone on. Livingstone had done nothing to try to stop it, but neither had he acknowledged its existence. He would claim credit if they were successful; if not, he would repudiate them entirely.
Will fretted, now, at the slowness of the pace the great lumbering horses imposed upon them. It was thirty five miles to Edinburgh. All Scotland would know that they were on their way, before they got there.
Nevertheless, at Bannockburn, a mere couple of miles on their road, he had the trumpeter sound the halt. There, on that ground sacred in Scotland’s history, he ordered the troops and companies to break ranks and gather round. He handed the precious parchment to Hay to read aloud — which in stiff embarrassment that man did.
“To all lords, spiritual and temporal, barons and landed men, burgesses, lieges and leal men of this my realm of Scotland — greeting!” he jerked forth in a flat monotone. “I hereby decree and declare that I have this day, in my castle of Stirling, for the better governance and weal of this my realm, appointed and established my right trusty and well-beloved cousin and servant, William, Earl of Douglas and Avondale, to be my Lieutenant-General of the said Realm, as was the Earl Archibald and others before him, to wield in my royal name and stead the sword of state, and to require of all lords and lieges soever that they offer the said William all support, strength and service as they would my royal self.
Signed by my hand, this twenty-ninth day of April, of our Lord’s year the fourteenth hundred and forty-third, at my castle of Stirling,
JAMES.”
If Will had expected a great wave of excitement and enthusiasm for this announcement, he was disappointed. Surprise there was to some extent, but by and large its significance passed over the heads of the vast majority of its hearers. The few of the lairdly and knightly class who led the host, of course, perceived something of its vital importance, but by and large the thing was accepted as some sort of clerkly formality irrelevant to fighting men. Even the ceremonious unfurling of the splendid red Lion Rampant on gold, the Royal Standard of Scotland, to take pride of place between the banners of Douglas and the Constable, raised not so much as a cheer. It was six grim years since James the First’s assassination when that standard had meant anything in the land.
It was Will Douglas’s firmest intention, however, that it should mean something hereafter. Under its once-proud folds, he led on southwards. It might all seem like mummery, play-acting, as Hay himself tended to think, for someone still lacking two years to being of age, but he at least was determined to prove it otherwise.
There were no crowds present at Linlithgow, that late afternoon as they rode into the grey burgh by the loch. They paused there only long enough to dismiss the acting Constable of the palace and sheriffdom, in the King’s name, and to install in his place Douglas of Mains, an elderly man and one of the few substantial lairds of the name who had rallied to his lord’s banner in person. Then Will self-consciously read a brief proclamation, his first official act as nominal Lieutenant-General of the Realm, declaring that he had taken over Linlithgow, the King’s personal house, in His Grace’s name, and commanding all loyal men to rally here to the Royal Standard. The said Standard was run up from the palace’s topmost tower, and leaving a scratch garrison of about one hundred of the least active men to hold the place, they moved on eastward. It was all only a gesture, a token, but with its own significance and probably worth the hundred men. There was a certain satisfaction for Will, at least, in thus making good the humiliation of their previous departure from Linlithgow.
Six miles more brought the weary host to Abercorn, where monastery, village and castle all huddled together round a small tidal estuary of the Firth of Forth, about ten miles from Edinburgh. Will had never been here before, to his father’s chosen domicile, and saw it at once, in the sunset light, to be a place of ease and comfort rather than strength, a soft and rich establishment of scattered undefended buildings, orchards, pleasances and gardens, strange seat for the head of the warlike house of Douglas. The castle itself was hardly to be distinguished from the monastery occupying a low green promontory of the firth. Here was no base, as he had hoped.
But at least there was ample provision for the tired and hungry warriors to camp for the night, Pate Pringle and the Prior taking charge. The Countess was at home, with Will’s sister Beatrix, and gave them fair enough welcome — even though she seemed less than enthusiastic over her son’s present venture. Undoubtedly, in her ambitions for Douglas advancement, she preferred less warlike and straightforward methods. Some indication of this was evidenced when, later that night, after he had come back from the encampment, she came to Will’s room.
“This adventure, Will,” she said. “Were it not for the Constable, I would think it ill-advised. And he, I fear, is less than sanguine.”
“You have been talking to Hay? I’ll thank you to leave him to me. As Constable, he is necessary to give me something of the authority I need. I have been at pains to keep him at my side. I do not want him made the more doubtful.” Will was always at his most gruff and uncomfortable with his imperturbably beautiful mother.
“I do not seek to weaken your hand, Will — only to strengthen it,” the Countess assured. “You are young, and like to run where you might better walk, I think. I would but counsel care. Using your head rather than your right arm. As for Sir William, I would bind him closer to you, not turn him away.”
“How that?”
“He is a good man. Honest. And a widower. With broad acres. I had thought to wed Beatrix to Robert Fleming. To ensure that he makes no trouble over the Wigtown earldom. But I think Sir William would serve her better. He is stronger, older. And Beatrix needs mastering . . .”
“Older! I’ faith — he is old enough to be her father!”
“No harm in that. I was twenty years younger than your father. He will make her a good husband. Safe. And it would bind him surely to Douglas. Robert can wait . . .”
“And Beatrix? What of her? It this all you think your daughters are for?”
“They have their part to play, in the restoration of our house. And suitable husbands must be found for them. That is my concern, Will. Leave it to me.”
“Gladly! Myself, I would restore our house on the field rather than in the bedchamber!”
“So says nineteen summers! And where is your first field to be fought, Will? And when? Crichton shuts himself in Edinburgh Castle, they say. You will not take that. Any more than he could take Stirling.”
“No. But we can strike at Crichton other than in Edinburgh Castle . . .”
They were on the move early next morning, following the coast eastwards, by Queen Margaret’s Ferry and Dundas. Little more than an hour’s riding brought them to the mouth of the River Almond in its leafy valley. And breasting the green slopes of Cramond beyond, they saw ahead of them only a few miles further, the smoking ridge of Edinburgh, rising above lesser hills and culminating in the soaring, proud castle-crowned rock, so like Stirling’s, that shook its fist in the face of the morning. Silently the leaders at least stared at it.
Robert Fleming, at Will’s back, leaned forward to touch the younger man’s steel-gauntleted elbow, and pointed, half-left. Much nearer at hand, from gentle, rol
ling, cattle-dotted braes, a tall and handsome grey stone towerhouse rose amongst the grasslands, a fine sight in the early sunshine, against the sparkling blue of the isle-dotted firth.
“Barnton Castle,” he said.
Switching his gaze between the great frowning fortress on the far ridge, and the goodly fortalice a bare half-mile away, Will nodded. “So that is Crichton’s house. Aye. It will serve very well, I think. How say you, Sir William?”
“A notable bait,” Hay acceded. “But . . . can we spring the trap? With this?” He jerked his head back towards their following host.
“We have come to try. To put it to the test, at least. Come.”
They rode directly towards the fine house. Soon they could see signs of activity about it, hurrying men coming and going, some cattle being hastily driven away. Presently a couple of horsemen were seen to ride out from its enclosing courtyard, and spur off eastwards in the direction of Edinburgh.
“Let them go,” Will said, when Pate Pringle wanted to order pursuit.
By the time that the column reached the home parks and infields of Barnton Castle, the place was shut up against them. Though no great stronghold, it was a fortified building, as was every lord’s and laird’s house, rising from a mound around which was a wide and deep dry ditch, which was commanded from the high encircling curtain-walls, of the courtyard. The drawbridge across this had been raised, at the gatehouse. Within this enclosure, the towerhouse itself rose five storeys to a parapet and walk surrounding the gabled attic storey. The thick stone walls were pierced by small iron-grilled windows, and provided with many splayed apertures for shooting from.
Ordering the men to be drawn up just beyond bow-shot range of the walls, Will and Hay, with a few supporters, rode forward to near the bridge-end, under the Royal Standard. People could be seen watching them from windows and the parapet-walk. The trumpeter sounded a flourish.
Black Douglas (Coronet Books) Page 12
