Lord and Master mog-1

by Nigel Tranter

  Indeed, that was the general attitude, in Stirling. All men waited.

  Then, on the fourth afternoon, Logan of Restalrig himself rode into the town at the gallop, with a score of tough Border mosstroopers at his heels. Only after a considerable clash of wills did Patrick prevail upon Stewart to allow this party, of what he named freebooters, within the castle precincts. Logan, a coarse, foul-mouthed,gorilla of a man, but namely as a fighter, brought the word that he had been racing Morton north from Teviotdale, and reckoned to have beaten the old sinner by half a day at least The cat was out of the bag, at last There would not be much more waiting.

  There was no hiding the tension in the castie of Stirling that night Patrick sent out hurried messages north and south.

  According to Logan, Morton rode with a hundred Douglases, only. He could raise a score of times that number if the occasion seemed to warrant it

  Despite the obvious need for closing the ranks, Stewart of Ochiltree was at his most arrogant and unco-operative. Perhaps he was merely frightened; perhaps he was beginning to doubt the wisdom of his change of sides? Even Patrick allowed himself to be a little put out by this. He came to James, down at the royal stables, where he was spending a" deal of his time, with d'Aubigny, admiring, exclaiming over, even grooming, the six Barbary blacks.

  'Your Grace' he said, seeking to hide the urgency in his voice. 'I fear that it is necessary to make a gesture towards your Captain Jamie. To, h m, bind him closer to your royal side. To indicate to him that your Highness's favour is… important'

  'Eh? Captain Jamie isna that much interested in my favour, Master Patrick.'

  'He should be, He can be, Sire. It is essential… with my lord of Morton on his way here.'

  At mention of that name, the boy seemed to shrink in on himself. 'He… he will send you away? The Lord Morton will no' have you here? He… he will give me knocks, again -hard knocks…'

  'Knocks, Sire?' d'Aubigny raised his brows. 'Surely you cannot mean that Morton could strike you? Your royal person?'

  'Aye, could he! Often he has done it Hard knocks.'

  'By the Mass, then he will do it no more, the ruffian I We shall see to that, Cousin.'

  'And one way of seeing to it, Your Grace, is to ensure that Captain Jamie is your good friend, since he controls your guard. You should give him a present, Sire.'

  'Eh? A present? What have I that Captain Jamie might want…?'

  'Plenty. For instance, Your Highness might give him a couple of these black horses. He has already expressed his admiration for them.'

  The boy's eyes widened, became huge. 'Eh? Give… my blacks! No! No – I'll no' do it!' The thick uncertain voice rose abruptly almost to a scream, as James started forward to the nearest horse. 'I'll no' give them!' he cried. 'They're mine, mine!'

  Blinking, Patrick looked at d'Aubigny. 'Just two, Sire. You will still have four left'

  'No! Never! You'll no' take my bonny beasts! No, no, noP

  D'Aubigny hurried over to slip an arm around the boy's heaving shoulders. 'Never fear, Cousin,' he soothed. 'If they mean so much to you, no one will – no one can – take them from you. Forget it, Sure – it is all right There are plenty of other gifts that you can make, after all.'

  James had pressed his tear-wet face against the gleaming black flank of the horse. Sidelong, now, he peered up and round at his cousin. 'I'll no' give him my horses,' he declared, with tremulous stubbornness. 'But… but I havena anything else, Cousin Esme. I've no other presents that I could give him.'

  D'Aubigny laughed. 'You do not realise what you have to give, Cousin. You have more than anyone else. You are the King. You have lands and houses and castles and titles to give. Offices and privileges and honours. All yours, and yours only.'

  'No' me. Yon the Lord Morton gives.'

  'No more, Sire. He is no longer Regent Nothing can be given without your signature. And anything given with your signature, stands.'

  James turned round to stare at the speaker now, doubts, ideas, hopes chasing themselves across his ugly expressive face. 'Is that… true?' he asked. And he turned to Patrick to confirm it

  'Absolutely, Highness. All that is needed is Your Grace's signature on a paper, and the thing is done. Anything is done.' 'And… and I have lots o'… these things that I can give?' 'You have all Scotland.'

  "Then… then, Cousin Esme -I could give you a present!' That came out in a rush. 'Master Patrick, too. And Davy Gray, of course. What would you like, Cousin? Eh, man – what would you like?'

  The two conspirators could not forebear to exchange glances. David, standing in a cobwebby corner by the hayforks, did not tail to read momentary naked triumph therein. But when d'Aubigny spoke, he shook his handsome head.

  'No, no, James – nothing for me.' That was the first time that he had called the King merely James. 'Nor for Patrick either, I think. We are your true friends – we do not need gifts. Just for Stewart, the Captain. Give him something that will hold him fast'

  'I'd liefer give you something.'

  'Another time, then. Later, perhaps… and thank you, James. Now – what for Stewart?

  Patrick spoke. The Master of Glamis' he said, smiling brilliantly. 'The Treasurer. He has been amassing overmuch treasure of late, I hear. They tell me that he had Morton appoint him Commendator of the Priory of Prenmay, a year back, with all its fat lands and revenues. I suggest that you transfer the Commendatorship to Captain Stewart of Ochiltree, Your Grace.'

  'C-can I do that?'

  'Most certainly. It is all in your royal gift' 'You wouldna like it for yoursel', Master Patrick?' 'I would much prefer, Sire, that Stewart had it If I write you out a paper, will you sign it?' 'Aye.'

  'Excellent, Your Highness. I think that we may rely upon Captain Jamie, hereafter i'

  Late that night the uneasy fortress awoke to the clatter of horses and armed men, and shouts for admittance at the gatehouse. Patrick, fully dressed and unsleeping, was quickly down at the portcullis chamber – but only a few moments before the new Prior of Prenmay. They exchanged quick glances, in the gloom.

  'Is that the Lord Morton?' Stewart demanded, of the guard. A large body of horsemen could be made out, beyond.

  'No, sir. It is the High Constable, my lord of Erroll, demanding admittance to protect the person of the King's Highness. He says that it is his duty.'

  'As so it is!' Patrick ejaculated, with rather more vehemence than was necessary. 'That is… welL' He sought to hide the relief in his voice.

  Stewart turned to consider him, narrow-eyed. 'I had not known of this, Master of Gray,' he said slowly. 'I congratulate you. It seems that you have not idled.'

  'Idleness has its delights – in due season, Master Prior. Time for that will come… for all of us,' the other answered lightly. 'Can I request you to have the drawbridge lowered?

  Stewart gave the order.

  The Earl of Erroll, a grave middle-aged man of impressive appearance but few words, had brought with him seventy men and a dozen Hay lairds. It was his hereditary privilege to keep the peace around the King's person, and so was the only man who might legitimately bring armed men into the near presence of the monarch – however many did so otherwise. His clinging to the old religion had cost him dear.

  Patrick and Stewart, with David in attendance, had barely seen this contingent settled in quarters, when a further hullabaloo from the castle approaches brought them hurrying back to the gatehouse, wondering whether Erroll had arrived only just in time. It was not Morton yet, however, but the Lord Seton, with forty retainers, who had ridden hard from East Lothian on receipt of a message from Patrick. Seton was no Catholic, but he had fairly recently been ousted from the enjoyment of the revenues of the rich church lands of Pluscarden in favour of James Douglas, one of Morton's illegitimate sons. He was therefore in a mood for reprisals. He had been, of course, one of Mary the Queen's most staunch supporters, suffering banishment for her failing cause, and of late years living quietly at Seton Palace, taking no part in state affai
rs.

  Stewart fingered his pointed beard as this company rode in under the portcullis. 'You cast a wide net, my friend,' he said to Patrick. 'I wonder at the diversity of your friends. Think you that they will make good bedfellows?'

  'All unfriends of Morton are friends of mine, this night,' Patrick told him. 'And I would suggest that you consider not their diversity but that they come at all! Men who have not moved for years. Think you that they would be here if they believed that the tide ebbed against them?5

  The Captain did not argue that 'Are more to come?' he

  asked.

  'One only, I think. There are others, but they lie too far off to reach here in time.'

  'Your noble father?'

  Patrick laughed. 'Where is my Lord Ochiltree?' he wondered. 'Fathers are safer kept in the background – do you not agree?' He did not require to amplify that, to point out that it was a short-sighted house which committed both chief and heir to the one side, 'what I wonder is… where is the Master of Glamis?'

  Stewart frowned at that name – as he was meant to do.

  It was a crisp autumn sunrise, however, before the red-eyed weary guardians of Stirling Castle saw the final company come climbing up the hill through the morning mists. No great cohort this, a mere score of riders perhaps – but the banner at their head widened Stewart's heavy eyes.

  'So-o-o!' he declared. 'You fly yon carrion-crow, Gray! Beware that it does not peck your Frenchie's pretty eyes out!

  It and its foul brood. They are nearer the blood, mind, than is your Monsieur'

  'My Frenchie is protected by a fine paper from such as these,' Patrick pointed out The pen is mightier, as someone has said, than… h'm… than the implement that banner represents! What a blessed thing is holy matrimony, duly witnessed! Man, the Kirk and the Crown are united in love of it I'

  The flag that they saw bore indeed the royal arms of Scotland – only with a black bar sinister slashing diagonally across it Under it rode the Lord Robert Stewart, illegitimate son of King James Fifth, half-brother of Mary, uncle of the boy in the castle behind them. Rapacious, untrustworthy, fickle, he represented trouble. He was not long out of Morton's gaol, where he had been held by the Regency on a charge of treason, for years. He could bring no long tail of fighting men, since he had not the wherewithal to pay them, but he did his best with sons innumerable. Of the seventeen with him this morning, none were born in wedlock, and it was their father's boast that none claimed the same mother.They all required properties, lands, inheritances.

  . 'A hungry ragged crew!' the other Stewart observed scornfully.

  'Aye – but there is the witness to Elizabeth of England's doles, see you' Patrick said. 'So the Guises assured me – and they are knowledgeable. He it was who brought them, at the first, they say. Heigho!' That was laugh and yawn mixed together. 'Now I am ready for the Douglas!'

  They had plenty of warning – Logan's scouts saw to that Morton had spent the night at Linlithgow Palace. The long presence-chamber, so much fuller of people than it had been for years, heard the distant echoes of the ominous cry, that had terrorised Scotland for so long, come drifting up from the town, and few there could repress a shiver at the sound. 'A Douglas! A Douglas!' the fell slogan rang out, and behind it the thunder of furious hooves throbbed on the warm air of noontide. In the long apartment hardly a man spoke.

  Stiff, still, they waited as the noise grew and drew closer. Ears straining, they followed its progress, up out of the climbing streets, over the wide forecourt, drumming over the lowered drawbridge. Stewart the soldier had said keep the drawbridge up and the portcullis down – keep the man out; but the Master of Gray said rather let the man in, or he will turn at the closed gates, go and collect his thousands, and come back to batter them down. Doors open, therefore, they waited.

  They heard the great clattering on the cobbles of the quadrangle outside, the shouts of men and the clash of steel. Patrick pressed a hand on the trembling shoulder of the boy on the Chair of State. No sound came from the entire room.

  A hawking and a spitting came first Then an angry bearlike growling, and heavy deliberate footsteps with the ring of spurs.

  'Way for Douglas!' someone shouted outside, and from beyond scores of hoarse voices took up the refrain. 'A Douglas! A Douglas!'

  Morton strode into the presence-chamber, scene of so many of his triumphs, took a few paces forward, and stopped dead, to stare around him. At his back came half-a-dozen Douglas lairds, and the Master of Glamis. No Lord Ruthven.

  Quietly David and Stewart closed the double doors at their backs.

  Morton had grown stouter, even more gross, since last David and Patrick had seen him, but lost nothing of his appearance of bull-like vigour. Clad carelessly in tarnished half-armour and dusty broadcloth he stood wide-legged, straddling, stertorously panting. If there was silver amongst the red of his flaming bushy beard, it did not show, nor in the untidy hair that stuck out from under his tall black hat He glared about him, head and chin forward.

  'Davy, request my lord of Morton to uncover, in the presence of the King's Grace.' Patrick's voice rang out clearly, pleasantly – the first words spoken in that room for some time.

  David, needless to say, did not take that seriously, but as a gesture. He stood where he was, being a man of common sense. Morton emitted a sort of choking roar, and reaching up both hands, wrenched down the hat more firmly.

  'A stink for the King's Grace!' he said, and spat on the stone flags.

  Round all the great chamber he glowered – as well he might Never before had he seen it thus. Armed men lined every inch of its lower walling, so that no space for another remained there, right round the throne-half of the chamber as well as the fire end. Some were in the royal livery of the guard – well spaced out, these, for Patrick did not altogether trust them -some in the red and white colours of the High Constable, the red and gold of Seton, others in the nondescript rusty morions and bucklers of Logan's mosstroopers, two hundred men at least Silent, tense, armed to the teeth, they stood, their hostility like a palisade.

  Morton's little pig's eyes darted on, ignoring the people at the lower end of the chamber, over those nearer to the throne – Erroll, Seton, Oliphant, Logan. At sight of the Lord Robert Stewart, they paused, and then passed on to where James, cloaked specially in the royal purple and wearing a chaplet of gold for crown, sat on the Chair of State and quaked. With an open sneer, he jerked his red head, to bring his lowering stare finally to the two brilliantly clad gallants who stood one on either side of the throne. Dressed in the lavish height of the French mode, d'Aubigny in golden satin, Patrick in white velvet with black, they looked like a couple of birds of paradise in a rookery.

  Morton hooted, belched coarsely, deliberately, and then turned right round to look at Stewart, near the door. 'Clear me this rabble! he snapped.

  Stewart gazed straight ahead of him, motionless, wordless.

  It was Patrick who spoke. 'Lord of Morton,' he said clearly. 'You have come unbidden into the King's presence – and remained covered deliberately. As a former Viceroy of the Realm you know the penalty for such. The Lord Constable is here to enforce His Grace's royal commands…'

  'I do not talk with pap-suckers, nor yet prancing clothes-horses!' the other interrupted harshly. 'Erroll, you Pope's bottom-licker – this is rebellion!'

  The Constable stared through and past him, and said never a word.

  'Seton, you crawling louse – I ha' better things than you in my body hair! Is it banishment again for you – or the clasp o' my fair Maiden at the Tolbooth o' Edinburgh? Eh, creature?'

  Silence.

  'Robbie Stewart – whoreson! Fool's get! Beggar at my table! Was my last cell no' deep enough for you? Is it below ground you'd be?'

  There was no answer.

  'Precious soul o' God!' the Earl roared, and the entire room vibrated to the volume and the fury of it 'Think you that you may remain dumb when Douglas bespeaks you? A fiend – I've plenty steel outby there to loosen
the tongues o' you! Aye, a plenty. Will I have my lads in – eh?'

  'Earl Morton, is that a threat of force in the presence of the King's Grace? Force and fear?' Patrick enquired, even-voiced.

  If so, you must know that it carries the punishment of immediate death, without formality of trial. And here is ample power and authority to enforce sentence – at once. Twice as many as your Douglas bulfyrooks without!'

  Morton drew a long quivering breath – but muttered only into his beard.

  'Do we take it, then, that no threat was intended?' Patrick pressed, silkily.

  'Not to Jamie, damn you – not to the Kingl' the older man spluttered.

  'Ah! Good! Excellent, my lord. Nevertheless, I would counsel you to be more careful in your speech, in the royal presence, lest an unfortunate mistake is made – too late to be rectified!'

  'Misbegotten whelp…!' the Earl began, when Patrick held up his hand.

  'Silence, in the King's name!' he cried authoritatively, 'His Highness has something other against the Lord Morton than mere threats.' He drew a folded paper out of his doublet 'Sire, is it your royal wish that I read this indictment?'

  Dumbly James nodded.

  'Hear you, then – by the command of the gracious and high prince James, King of Scots, King of Man, High Steward of Scotland, Lord of the Isles, Protector of Christ's Kirk – this! It has come to our royal knowledge that James Douglas, Earl of Morton, formerly our Viceroy and regent of our Realm of Scotland, has on occasions many received from our excellent sister, the well-beloved princess Elizabeth, Queen of England, certain moneys and treasure intended for the comfort and well-being of our royal self and person, it being inconceivable that the said princess should treat with and constantly enrich a subject not her own. And that the said James Douglas has wrongfully and treasonably retained the said moneys and treasure unto his own use and keeping…'