The Prisoner's Dilemma

by Sean Stuart O'Connor

  Dunbeath was rapidly becoming agitated at the memory of L’Arquen. And with Zweig’s logic. His temper began to rise.

  ‘My God, captain, if the English know all this then they’ll know by now that Sophie must have arrived with you …if they have so much as touched her! I dread to think if that monster L’Arquen has questioned her. What are we to do, Zweig? Their spies will be watching out for our arrival. We must continue up the coast and then walk back and hope we can evade their sentries.’

  ‘No, my lord. I have another suggestion,’ replied Zweig. ‘Why do we not go into the castle from the sea without the redcoats seeing us? By great good fortune the tide should be at its lowest in an hour or so and we can then enter under cover of darkness – by a hidden cave that I’m aware of.’

  Zweig briefly told Dunbeath about the long forgotten escape route.

  ‘We can take the boat’s tender down to the rocks before dawn without being seen,’ he continued. ‘I suggest we keep the jacht well away from the coast and then row in while the night is still dark. But where can Makepeace take the boat when we leave it, my lord?’

  Dunbeath thought for a moment and then turned to the coachman.

  ‘Stand well out from the coast, Makepeace. Be sure not to be seen. Then sail the boat around that promontory you can see up there, that’s Dunbeaton Head, and anchor it near a shallow beach you’ll see about three miles further on. You’ll be able to get in close to the shore and it’s a safe anchorage. But if we’re taking the tender you’ll have to stay on the boat until I can have you picked up. I’ll send my housekeeper down to that small village at the end of the beach there and she’ll get one of the fishermen to bring a rowing boat round the headland for you later.’

  They unlashed the dinghy from its housing on the cabin roof and slid it gently into the sea. Dunbeath and Zweig climbed in and Makepeace waved them off as the captain rowed quietly towards the castle in the dark, pulling with long powerful strokes.

  ‘We shall land at low tide, my lord,’ Zweig whispered. ‘That is the only point at which one can enter by this escape route. I shall stay at the castle while we complete our business and then I’ll leave on the next low tide this afternoon and row back to where Makepeace will have anchored the boat. You’re quite sure that I’ll be able to see it when I round the headland?’

  Dunbeath nodded.

  ‘Yes, yes quite sure. It’s a wide, open bay and you’ll see it clearly.’

  Half an hour later Zweig brought the little craft skillfully alongside the largest of the great boulders under the castle wall. He put his arm out to steady Dunbeath as the earl clambered up onto it. Then he jumped out himself, holding the boat’s painter.

  ‘I’ll put a long line on her. The tide will rise before I leave this afternoon and she’ll need some slack. Now, my lord, let me show you how to go here. You see that gap between the rocks? When I touch your arm, you are to jump down and run through that entrance into a cave. Go to the back of it as fast as you can and climb up on the ledge you’ll find there. There will be no time to be wasted between the waves, and take care of your footing, the cave will be wet and dark and we have no light with us.’

  Dunbeath dropped down and Zweig heard his feet slopping on the sodden sand of the cave floor. Then he called out that he was on the ledge and Zweig jumped down himself. It was only a few seconds before he was up and taking the lead on the stone steps. He reached the flagstone and pushed it upwards, holding it open for Dunbeath as they emerged into the storeroom.

  ‘Good God!’ said Dunbeath, ‘I’ve lived in this castle all my life and I had no idea of this. Not even rumours. How did you know about it, Zweig?’

  Zweig smiled in the darkness.

  ‘You know how fishermen do talk,’ he said, and Dunbeath knew very well not to question him further.

  Once they were safely in the castle there was little need for quiet and before long the sound of their voices brought the others from their beds and they gathered in the great salon, still dressed in their night clothes. Adam Smith was introduced to an amazed Dunbeath and, before long, Annie had breakfast on the table, everyone eating in the highest of spirits, hugely elated that the men had got into the castle without L’Arquen’s sentries seeing them.

  ‘The bed sheet was a brilliant conception, my dearest one,’ said Dunbeath, beaming with pride at Sophie, ‘Captain Zweig spotted it immediately for what it was.’

  Sophie laughed and gave an ironic bow towards Zweig.

  But while she may have smiled as she ate, she was incredulous too. The last time she had seen the two men they had been sworn enemies, only brought together by a desperate need to co-operate. And now they were the best of friends! How did Zweig do it? Had he drugged him?

  Dunbeath held his arms out to Sophie and then blew her a kiss. She smiled back at him, astonished at such a show of affection. Yet another mystery, she thought. He was a man transformed. What alchemy did Zweig possess?

  She leant forward as Dunbeath moved to nuzzle her tenderly on the cheek.

  ‘I have thought of little but you,’ he said, quite unconcerned at who should hear him. ‘I began to wish that I was not in London.’

  ‘But you were, my lord,’ Sophie beamed at him, ‘for all our futures. How did your meeting with the Board of Longitude progress? Did they accept our findings? And the Prize?’

  Dunbeath laughed, easily and without any of his old rancour.

  ‘It was a great success,’ he replied, ‘I tried to kill the King of England and Captain Zweig saved my life. Do not look so downcast, my sweet. I am quite decided in my own mind that it was for the best. The Board did not award the Prize and I have lived to fight another day. We shall finish this war now and then I shall win the Prize with another king. I am delayed, that is all.’

  Chapter 28

  James McLeish had slept little since he’d discovered Zweig’s deception with the wooden telescope. Dark thoughts raged constantly in him, pulling him in every direction, all of them bound up in hatred. The muscles in his face seemed to have developed a life of their own. Worst of all, his own mother had taken to asking him a barrage of questions, suspicious that the English soldiers hadn’t returned to interrogate him further.

  ‘I decided not to sell Zweig’s gift to me,’ he’d lied. ‘I shall bluff it out if the redcoats want to speak with me again. I am not going to run away. Not now, not ever.’ She had seemed mollified for a while, even heartened by this sudden show of courage. But her newfound respect was wearing thin as she saw the tension that increasingly showed in everything he did. However, just as she wondered about her son, so he was thinking about her, too and he saw how she was now looking at him, questioning and incredulous.

  If she were ever to discover that he’d been to Craigleven, he thought for the thousandth time, she would give him a harder life than even that colonel was capable of. Still, he was sure he’d done the right thing. Why should he suffer for those bastards, Alexis Zweig and the earl? He was quite clear in his own mind: he’d made his bed, now he must lie in it.

  Unable to sleep yet again, he had left the cottage early and was working on his nets as the first thin strips of dawn began to show in the east and the blackness of the night was losing its fight with the first faint streaks of the coming day. He glanced up towards the horizon. Then he looked again, his eye caught by a faint speck in the distance, a small boat, far out and hardly visible, beating up to pass the headland. His keen fisherman’s eye was rarely misled – and he was quite sure that the boat he’d seen was Dunbeath’s jacht.

  He dropped his net and got quickly to his feet. He had thrown in his lot with the English and they would want to know about this. He climbed the dunes to see where the boat was going and then turned and set off for Craigleven with the glazed expression of a man with the clearest of purposes, a man obsessed with revenge.

  * * *

  Dunbeath cradled the glass of whisky his old housekeeper had handed him.

  ‘I’m going to get some sleep now, bu
t you’re to wake me in a couple of hours, Annie. We arrived here by rowing boat and the London coachman, Makepeace, has taken my father’s jacht around Dunbeaton Head and he’ll have anchored it in the bay beyond it. Go into Dunbeaton to get provisions for our luncheon rather than Wick, will you, and find a fisherman there that can take a boat round the headland to pick him up. Zweig and I took the tender so Makepeace has no way of getting ashore. Quiet and secret now, Annie. We don’t want the English to know anything of this. We cannot have L’Arquen know that we’re back.’

  * * *

  The thin light from the tollhouse for the Meikle Ferry at Portnacoulter shone in the distance.

  The King’s Messenger rode on. Wet and cold, his glorious uniform splattered with mud, he gritted his teeth once more.

  The final miles were always the worst, he knew, trying to cheer himself and rise above the constant pain in his neck. Craigleven was said to be some miles south of Wick, so this had to be the last day. His map was clear that once he’d crossed the Firth of Dornoch here, the rest was easier.

  The ferryman asked about his insignia and they spoke for a time about his ride.

  ‘From London! How much further do you have?’

  ‘It is dawn now. Tomorrow’s will see me there.’ He was practically speaking to himself. ‘I shall sleep this evening and cover the rest at night. Many thanks for the crossing.’

  ‘God speed!’

  He rode on.

  * * *

  The trooper found Major Sharrocks in Craigleven’s library, writing up yet another report for L’Arquen on the latest futile search for rebels. Sharrocks glanced up as the man knocked on the door.

  ‘That fisherman wants to see you again, sir. He’s outside. Shall I send him in?’

  Sharrocks breathed a sigh of relief. This had to be action.

  ‘Yes, good. You’ve done well, trooper.’

  A few seconds later Sharrocks summed James up with a glance as he came into the room. Hell’s teeth but he looked ready for death, he thought. He knew this type well – nervous as a weasel. The kind that would do anything to save his skin and could never be trusted in a fight – bluster and show before it but no bottom when the banging started. He looked at him again and saw the stress that was plain in every twitch of his features. He understood the reasons for it – Sharrocks wouldn’t have wagered on the boy’s chances of staying alive if the Jacobites ever discovered that he was helping them.

  But the major showed none of this as he stood to welcome him.

  ‘Good morning to you, Mr McLeish,’ he called out brightly, ‘you must have set out early this morning. What do your sharp eyes show you now? The men I have at the castle have told me nothing.’

  ‘Lord Dunbeath’s boat. I saw it just as dawn was rising. Far out – trying to get up the coast without being seen. It’s here now. I walked up the headland and she’s anchored about three miles north of Dunbeaton.’

  Major Sharrocks leapt immediately to his feet, calling for the trooper.

  ‘Find McLeish here a horse. Rouse out two of the men. Quickly now. I want to leave at once.’

  A horse was found and half an hour later James was leading the little group up a path, high on the dunes, well out of sight of the village. In a further five minutes they were looking down on Dunbeath’s boat, her sails dropped, as it rocked gently at anchor about fifty yards from the shore.

  ‘How do we get out to it, McLeish?’ Sharrocks was now frantic for action.

  ‘There’s a rowing boat at the end of the bay. The lightkeeper uses it to get to the beacon. I’ll go for that.’

  James brought the boat close to the shore and Sharrocks could hardly contain his aggression and he ran out to it through the shallow water and hurled himself in.

  ‘Row! Come on man. Pull!’ James McLeish stretched his arms out at the oars and the little craft shot forward towards Dunbeath’s jacht. Sharrocks looked ahead and his eyes narrowed as he saw Makepeace come on deck and give them a friendly wave. Then his lips tightened and he reached for the pistol at his belt. As the tender came closer, he stood up in the boat, pointing it at the coachman’s head.

  ‘Don’t move. Stay where you are,’ he shouted.

  James climbed on board, tying the dinghy to the rail.

  Sharrocks clambered up after him.

  ‘Right, you, where’s Zweig?’ he screamed. ‘Where’s the earl?’

  ‘Just myself here, soldier,’ replied Makepeace with a shrug.

  Sharrocks handed James the pistol.

  ‘Shoot him if he moves,’ he bellowed, and went below to the tiny cabin. As he reached the bottom of the short steps he immediately saw the court finery and wigs on the bunks and he flung them on the floor, roaring with rage. Then he searched the minute space for any sign of Dunbeath or Zweig and found a tool chest. He manically rummaged through it, snatching up an axe. Almost beside himself with fury, he came back on deck and advanced on Makepeace.

  ‘Where are they?’ he screamed at the coachman’s blank expression. Makepeace shrugged once more and Sharrocks seemed to lose control. With a maddened roar he brought the axe down, narrowly missing the coachman but destroying the tiller. Makepeace at last made to stop him but Sharrocks lifted the axe once more, murder written on his face, and he took a step backwards. By now the major was almost deranged with anger, motivated no doubt by the thought that L’Arquen would blame him for letting Dunbeath and Zweig escape. He continued with his berserk swinging, rampaging through the boat, bringing the axe down on the compass, the cleats and winches, slicing sheets and slashing through halyards.

  Eventually, he came to a stop, exhausted. The boat was smashed beyond repair. ‘McLeish,’ he panted, ‘get the anchor up.’

  Makepeace was bundled at pistol point into the rowing boat and as James rowed the three of them back to the shore, Dunbeath’s wrecked boat began a new journey, drifting helplessly out to sea.

  Chapter 29

  ‘And then the fat prince stood there, shouting his head off to his toy soldiers. Charge! Kilt them! Kilt them! Goodness, how he was wobbling, Sophie,’ laughed Dunbeath, ‘he looked as if he’d just left the jelly mould. By the way, Zweig, what regiment had those two ever been near?’

  Zweig grinned in reply and the stories ran on. Breakfast had been over some time before and now the two men had their friends in thrall as Dunbeath reeled off a catalogue of their adventures. Hume and Sophie gazed on, amazed at the change that had taken place in the earl. Amused, energetic and generous with his praise for Zweig, the catastrophic trip had invigorated him in a way they would never have thought possible – even if he’d won a dozen prizes. Yet again, Sophie stole a look at the miracle worker. She’d heard their stories but she still didn’t understand how Zweig had done it, how Dunbeath’s trust had been won. But won it most certainly was.

  Eventually, a lull came in the conversation and Dunbeath called Zweig to his side.

  ‘Perhaps we might have a quiet word together?’ he murmured and then turned to the others. ‘Would you excuse me if I took the captain away for a minute?’

  The two men walked over to the window alcove and began to speak in low voices.

  ‘How do you see your next steps, captain?’

  ‘Your jacht should have me back in Königsberg in two or three weeks,’ said Zweig, urgent and serious now. ‘It will take me a further two to find the arms and gunpowder and arrange a ship and crew to bring them back. All being well, I believe I shall see you and your men at Lord Macdougall’s landing place in two months time. I shall get word to you through his contacts.’

  ‘Excellent,’ replied Dunbeath. ‘Our friends here must know nothing of this – we have to protect them should anything go amiss. We’ll keep them amused for now and they’ll be unlikely to suspect anything. You will be setting sail after we’ve dined and I intend to leave here myself by the escape route at dawn tomorrow. I’ll have no trouble in getting to Inverness, I know of many that will see that I get there safely. I’ll be able to rendezvous with
some of the clan chiefs once I’m in the city and then I’ll get word out to my own people. Now, are you ready to set off later ? I think the tide should be at its lowest at around four o’clock this afternoon and you can leave by the cave then. I have your money ready in gold.’

  Zweig nodded.

  ‘Good. All is well,’ he said.

  ‘Before you go, captain, there is one last service that you could do for me.’

  ‘Of course, just name it.’

  ‘I would be greatly in your debt if you would speak to Sophie about what she wishes you to tell her father.’

  ‘Yes, willingly, my lord. Let me call her over now.’

  Zweig wandered over to where Sophie was standing with Hume and Smith by the fire.

  ‘Sophie, might we speak? Gentlemen, with your leave.’ She looked up in surprise as he gestured towards the bow window. They strolled over to the alcove and Zweig looked calmly out towards the open sea.

  ‘Lord Dunbeath tells me you are to be married,’ he said quietly in German. Like a great fisherman, he would do nothing to spook his prey. ‘I wish you joy,’ he continued, smiling. ‘I shall see your father when I get to Königsberg and tell him that the debt has been repaid and that you will be staying here in Scotland.’

  ‘Yes,’ replied Sophie, in a completely neutral tone, ‘please tell him that. And send my love to my mother. Tell them I am content here and that I look forward to seeing them again when his lordship’s war is over.’

  Zweig smiled again but chose to say nothing. There was an odd silence. Then Sophie put her head closer to his. She spoke quietly.

  ‘Did you really save Lord Dunbeath’s life?’

  ‘I don’t think he intended to die,’ replied Zweig with a crooked grin. He looked over to where Dunbeath stood talking to David Hume by the fire. ‘He becomes hot, does he not? But, yes, I saved the life of the man you would choose to marry rather than me.’