Lord and Master mog-1

by Nigel Tranter

  Marie started as though to hasten after her, but David restrained her with a hand on her shoulder.

  'Let her be,' he counselled. 'Let her be. Better so.'

  'Go you after her, then, Davy. Tell her that I am sorry. I did not mean to hurt her – it is the last thing I would have done! You must tell her so. I did not know that she was thus with her father…'

  'I should have told you, perhaps. He… he did not think highly of me as good-son! He injured Mariota cruelly.'

  'And now – and now my talk has upset her. I am a fool! I should not have come, Davy. I thought twice before coming, but… I pined for the sight of your honest nice…'

  'And word of Patrick,' he added heavily.

  'Yes – that also,' she admitted, quiet-voiced. 'What is it that Patrick does to us all, Davy.'

  'I do not know,' he said, and sighed.

  In their own room later, with Marie returned to Erroll, Mariota, tense and fretful, turned on David as soon as he came in.

  "That woman,' she cried. 'Why did she come here? What does she want of us? What does she want of you?'

  'I think that she but wanted word of Patrick…'

  'Aye, that was easily seen! But she wanted more than that, I think. I saw her – the fine lady with her sly looks and hints! I saw the pair of you, and your quick glances…'

  David jerked a laugh. 'Sly, of all things, I would not call the Lady Marie! She is honest and straight, Mariota – the only one such that I ever found at the Court…'

  "We think alike on many things, Davy!"' the young woman mimicked unkindly. 'Oh, aye – a fine honest loose Court hizzy, with her mocking slow ways and yellow hair! She knows how to twist men round her little finger, yon one – great foolish men, who believe that they turn the world over in their hands!'

  Perplexed, he stared at her. This was not like Mariota the gentle, the mild. What had come over her? Surely the mention of her father's advancement was not sufficient for all this? 'You have it all amiss, my dear,' he told her. 'Far from twisting men around her finger, she it was whom Patrick asked to marry him.

  And she would not. I told you…,

  'Aye – and so twisted him the tighter! He thinks to run away to France to escape her, no doubt, to Spain – into dangers and trials without number! Poor foolish Patrick…!'

  T faith – poor Patrick indeed! Lassie, you do not know what you are saying. Patrick uses women as he uses all else – for his own advantage and amusement, and that only. As once he… he… well, as he always has done. She – the Lady Marie -would not be so used…'

  'There you are – ever traducing him! You can think no good of him – your own brother! A shame on you, David Gray! And she – she must cozen him to his face, and speak ill of him behind his back! Aye, and when she cannot have him, she comes here to lay her soft white hands on you…!'

  'Lord! Are you out of your mind, girl? I think that she is fond of Patrick, yet sees his faults… as only a bemused and gullible ninny would not! And because she knows that I am fond of him likewise, though no more blind than she is, she is drawn to me a little. That is all. We are friends…!

  'Friends?''

  'Aye, friends. Is that so strange? But fear nothing – you will see no more of her! She will not come back, after the tantrums you have shown her, I swear! I do not know what has come over you, and that's a fact!'

  'There is a lot that you do not know, I think…' she began, with the first glistening of tears in her eyes. And seeing that gleam, David Gray, as became a man of some discretion, turned and stamped out of the room, and down the winding stone stairway; better causes than his had been lost in the flood of a woman's tears.

  David was wrong about Marie Stewart not coming back to Castle Huntly. It was almost five weeks later before she did, but then she came in some urgency, in late August, She arrived, again with a single escort, just as Lord Gray was setting out for Dundee, at noontide on the twenty-fourth of the month. My lord greeted her, in the courtyard, with the somewhat ponderous gallantry and comprehensive leering inspection that was standard with him for attractive ladies. He was a little bit put out that it seemed to be David whom she had come to see, not himself. He delayed his departure, however, while that young man was fetched down from his tower school-room, to entertain ' the caller.

  'Here'is the- Lady Marie of Orkney speiring for you, Davy' he announced. 'A right bonny visitor, too, for a damned bookish dominie! A wicked waste, I call it'

  David bowed, unspeaking, and Marie appeared to be in no mood for badinage.

  'In this pass, a dominie at his books may have the best of it!' she said coolly.

  'Pass? What pass is this?

  'You have not heard, then? It is the King. He has been taken.'

  Taken..?' What do you mean-taken?'

  Taken. Captured. Held, my lord,' she answered, though it was at David that she looked. 'Laid violent hands on, and abducted. Whilst hunting, from Falkland. Taken to Ruthven Castle.'

  'Fiend sieze me – captured! The King! And taken to Ruthven, you say…?'

  'Aye. By your good brother, sir – my lord of Gowrie, the Treasurer. And others.' 'Christ God!'

  'When was this?' David demanded. 'Is the King harmed?'

  'I think not, Though he will be frightened. He must be, for, for…' She paused. 'But two days ago, it was. Word reached the Constable at Erroll last night I came as soon as I might'

  'Gowrie did this,' my lord burst out 'Is the man mad? Here is high treason!'

  'No doubt. But successful treason, may be. And carefully planned, it seems. There are many more to it than Gowrie. All of the Protestant faction. The Earl of Atholl, Arran's own good-brother; the Earls of Angus and Mar and Glencairn. And March, too. My lords Home and Lindsay and Boyd, and the Master of Glamis…'

  That black rogue!'

  'What of Lennox? And Arran? Where are they?' David asked.

  'It was carefully planned, as I say. My lord Duke had gone to his palace of Dalkeith but the day before, to meet the new French ambassador, when he comes to Leith. And Arran was conducting justice-eyres in his new sheriffdom of Linlithgow. He – Arran – has been arrested and held, by Gowrie's command. My lather likewise! And…the Bishop of St Boswellsl'

  'Waesucks – here's a pickle!' Gray declared agitatedly, tugging at his greying beard. All this, indeed, touched him much too closely for personal comfort; not only was Gowrie his

  brother-in-law, but most of the other bras mentioned in the plot were close associates of his own in the Kirk party.

  'I am sorry about your father,' David said 'You have no word of him? His welfare…

  'No. But I do not fear for him greatly. Most of his life has been spent in custody of a sort, and he has survived well enough.' She smiled faintly. 'He said that this present prosperity was too good to last! He survived Morton's spleen -I do not think that Gowrie's will be so harsh.'

  'M'mmm. So Greysteil has become Greysteil again! I wonder…? David looked at her thoughtfully. 'You said that the King must be frightened He must be indeed, for he is easily affrighted. But you meant more than that, I think…?'

  'Yes. For the Ruthven lords have extorted a royal warrant from him, ordering the Duke of Lennox to leave the country within two days, on pain of death!'

  'Lord! He signed that? He was more than frightened, then. Such means terror, no less! His dear Esme! The apple of his eye! Och, the poor laddie!'

  'God be thanked, at the least, that Patrick was safe away in yon Spain,' Lord Gray asserted 'Or it would have been himself, as well'

  David slowly looked up – to find Marie's eyes on his. Their glances locked Neither spoke.

  'You are sure of the truth of all this?' the older man went on. 'It is no mere talk? Hearsay…?'

  'No. The Lord Home himself was sent from Ruthven Castle last night, to Erroll. To order the Constable to keep his house. Under threat. Being a Catholic. He it was who told us. He said much – gave many reasons for the deed He said that they had proof that the Duke meant to turn Scotland
to Catholic again. That he planned to have James sent abroad to be married to a Catholic princess, and meantime he would rule Scotland alone. Lord Home had it that James would never return to Scotland -that he would be assassinated Then a secret paper would come forth, with the King's signature, naming Lennox as heir to the throne. Then we should have King Esme"!'

  'Soul of God!' Gray swore.

  'Oh, there was much else. That Lennox had applied for foreign soldiers, Papal or Spanish, to land in Scotland The Duke of Guise was to land in Sussex, and Elizabeth was to see her nightmare come true, and have to fight north and south. Home said that Bowes, the English ambassador, had told them that Lamox planned to have all the Protestant lords arrested on a charge of treason…'

  'That does not ring true, at any rate!' David said. 'He could not have dared that. Wild charges.'

  'May be. But they are the excuse, whether they believe them or no.'

  Lord Gray took a turn or two up and down the flagstones of his courtyard, spurs jingling. This needs a deal of considering,' he muttered. 'You say that Angus and Atholl and Mar are in the. conspiracy? Powerful men. And what of the Catholic lords – other than Erroll? Huntly, Herries arid the others?'

  'No doubt they are being attended to, likewise.'

  'Aye.!… I must see Crawford. And Oliphant. I…'

  'The Master of Oliphant was another of those whom Lord Home mentioned as in the endeavour.'

  'Say you so! God's death – Oliphant too! I faith -I must be hence. I must talk with, with… You must excuse me, ma'am. Davy, see that the Lady Marie receives all attention. That my house does not lack in anything for her comfort. I must be away. I was in fact on my way when you came…'

  'I understand, my lord. Go you.'

  As they watched him ride clattering out under the gatehouse, solid phalanx of men-at-arms at heel, the young woman shook her head. "There goes a man with much on his mind, I think.'

  'Less than his son and heir, I would say!' David amended.

  She turned to him. 'Davy – you think the same, do you?'

  'I do not know what to think. Save that it all falls into place damnably neat!'

  'Yes. I see it thus also. He said… that the Court, Scotland, would be a good place to be furth of, this summer.'

  .'Aye. And that you would be wise to take your father with you!'

  'He could not wait. We must be furth of Scotland within the month, he said. He must go to France, then. For what reason he never told us – or me, at any rate.'

  'All he said was that, it was on account Of Scotland's affairs. But not on the King's business, I gathered.'

  'No.'

  'And he has been wearying of Lennox for months.'

  'You, you think, then, that he could have arranged all this beforehand? Plotted this conspiracy, left his instructions – and then sailed from Scotland in good time, so that none could hold him in anything responsible? All to bring down Lennox? Without seeming to have a hand in it?'

  David drew a hand across his brow. 'I do not know. I do not say that he did it. All I say is that it looks as though he knew that it was to happen – and when. Not to a day, perhaps – but when-abouts. Knew – and did nothing to stop it!'

  'Remember – when we asked whether the Duke of Lennox would be returning with him to France, he said – how was it? My lord Duke will be… will be otherwise occupied! That was it. That was three months ago.' She shook her head. 'And Patrick is not one to know of plots and intrigues and take no part.'

  'No. And William Ruthven – Greysteil – my lord of Gowrie-is not the man to have plotted this. Always he has been a fighter, and not a plotter. Patrick thought but little of his wits – his Uncle Steilpate, he called him! Though they have been mighty thick together, since Morton fell'

  Man and woman looked at each other blankly. What more was there to say?,

  'Your Mariota would berate us sorely for so thinking of Patrick!' Marie said at length.

  'Aye, she would.' Involuntarily, David glanced up at the main keep windows. Nobody seemed to be looking down there from. The young faces of scholars peered out from the corner-tower, however. 'Come – you must need food. Rest. Or will you be staying here, with us? You will not wish to go back to Erroll? A Catholic house

  'No. I thank you – but no. I have a sister, natural but dear to me. Married to an Ogilvie laird deep in one of the Angus glens. I will go there until this trouble is past I can be there in but a few hours.'

  Much as he liked her, David hoped that his relief at this announcement did not show too plainly.

  'If you have word of Patrick, you will send to me, in Glen Prosen, Davy?'

  'Aye. You still… would wish to hear of him? After this?'

  'Yes,' she said simply.

  'Very well. I am sorry… for it all' He said that with difficulty.

  'Yes,' she repeated, and looked away and away. 'I wish… I wish…' Shaking her yellow head, she left that unsaid.

  Esme Stuart, the Sieur d'Aubiny, Duke of Lennox, was dead. The news reached Castle Huntly quite casually, at the tail-end of a letter to Davy, sent from Rome. Patrick mentioned a dozen other matters first – the interests off oreign travel, kind enquiries for friends, and his amusement over reported events in Scotland. In this connection, he added, he had just had sure word that poor Esme had died of a broken heart within a few weeks of his return to France. Personally, he was apt to be suspicious of fatalities from this disease – but since Esme's lady-wife had refused to see him on his somewhat hurried and informal arrival from Scotland, it might be true… though they had got on well enough apart for three years. Heigho – women were the devil, were they not? All of them – even the mature Queen of France herself, Catherine de Medici, who pettishly so seldom forgot old scores! How thrice-blest was his good old Davy, with his so reliable and amiable Mariota, whom the gods preserve…

  For long David conned and considered that letter, and sought to fathom what lay behind it, before sending the gist of it off to the Lady Marie in her Angus glen.

  Meanwhile Scotland seethed, but did not boil over. The King remained a prisoner in Ruthven Castle – though, officially of course, he had merely elected to set up his Court there – and many were the rumours as to his treatment that circulated through the land. Arran, too, was held fast, in various strengths, though his wife, who was free to come and go, did so to some tune, working mightily on his affairs, or at least on affairs of some sort, so that she was as much at Ruthven Castle as she was with her husband. A consortium, with Gowrie as its nominal head, ruled Scotland in the King's name. No major effort was made to release the unfortunate James. Relations with Elizabeth, however, were better than almost ever before, and her Mr Bowes' voice spoke loud in the land. The Kirk gave its approval to the godly lords' doings.

  So the winter passed. The Earl of Orkney was released, apparently none the worse for his immurement and very ready to co-operate with all concerned. The Bishop of St. Boswells likewise. Marie Stewart stayed on in Glen Prosen.

  Patrick's next message, months later when the snows were all but gone from the high blue mountains to the north, did not reach Castle Huntly in the usual fashion, via a Dysart shipmaster, but by the hands of Robert Logan of Restalrig. Patrick's – and for that matter, David's – roystering, fierce, but cheerful cousin arrived in the Carse in person one late Spring day almost a year after Patrick's departure, and after a drinking session with my lord his uncle, slipped a sealed letter quietly into David's hand It read thus:

  'My fine D.,

  I think that it is time that our poor J. had a change of company. Do you not agree? It could be arranged with no great difficulty. J's present companions think not highly of his spirit, and overlook him but scantily, I am assured – no doubt with excuse. The lad pines, and would well do with a change. Moreover, his habits are in need of reform, for he still hunts unseasonable deer. I charge you to see to his improvement Cousin Robert is in a good situation to assist you, because of his mother. But dear Robert is rash and lacks your sober wi
ts. If you see to it, with his aid, all will be well, I have no doubt

  They tell me that Saints Boswell and Andrew are now again in heavenly embrace. Were J. to join them, at the time of the justice-eyres, it would be justice indeed.

  Salutations, my good and upright D!

  P.'

  If David had perused the previous letter long and carefully, this curious epistle set him frowning more fiercely still. Not that its contents and wording mystified him; he perceived the allusions readily enough. Patrick wanted King James rescued from Ruthven Castle, considered that the time was ripe for the attempt, and proposed that it should be done during a hunt -and at the justice-eyres period in late June when so many of the lords, because of their hereditary jurisdictions, must be holding courts in their own baronies and sheriffdoms, just as Arran had been doing a year before when the Ruthven raiders had struck. Apt justice indeed. Cousin Robert's usefulness, because of his mother, must refer to the fact that the Lady Agnes Logan, formerly Gray and my lord's sister, had as a widow married the Lord Home, now so prominent at Ruthven. Through his stepfather, no doubt, Logan could learn much that would be necessary for the success of any rescue attempt Lastly, the picture of Saints Boswell and Andrew in heavenly embrace could only mean that Master Davidson, Bishop of St Boswells, was back in St Andrews town, and this, for some reason, would be the place to take the released King. Obviously, however far away, Patrick was kept very well informed.

  But none of that was what wrinkled David's brow.

  The question was – what was he to do about it? Could he accept this task, lend himself to this new plot? Patrick, hi his lordly way, just assumed that he would do it. But why should he dance to Patrick's tune always? He was no plotter, no schemer. Indeed, he hated it all. Yet Logan assuredly would be in favour of it, whether he himself took part or no – and headstrong as he was, might well end it all in failure; And that could bear hardly on the King. Indeed, he had to consider James in all this – his own loyalty to his King. Was it his plain duty to help to free him, if he could? The boy had been a captive for nine long months. Was it no one's duty to rescue him?