The Devil's Recruit (Alexander Seaton 4)

by S. G. MacLean

  Her lips scarcely moved. The words were only just audible. ‘Matthew,’ she said, bleakly. ‘I gave it to Matthew Lumsden.’

  The shock went through my whole body. Matthew whom I had permitted every indulgence for the sake of my memories. And in his stead I had accused Archie. Archie had told me, had shown me, how the war had changed him; I had never once stopped to consider that it might also have changed Matthew. Matthew, who had never been near the Garde Eccosaise, but who these last two weeks had hidden in his uncle’s house and, overheard by poor Christiane Rolland, had intrigued with Ormiston in a treason that if known would have cost them both their necks – and the discovery of which had cost Christiane Rolland hers.

  I remembered our last embrace and knew Matthew had played me for a fool. ‘He has gone with the priest, hasn’t he?’

  Isabella nodded.

  Gone with my blessing and my twelve hours’ grace, to be absolved by Guillaume Charpentier who without Matthew would be lost in our country. I thought of the times we had shared, Matthew and I, over the years, all the allowances I had made for the love of him, and I felt the wreckage of my memories tumble through my fingers.

  I looked at the woman opposite me. ‘And you support their cause? How can you stomach it?’

  ‘No, no,’ she said desperately, ‘you are wrong.’

  I could not believe what she was saying. ‘Dear God, Isabella, you truly think me a fool: I saw you at the Mass in Baillie Lumsden’s chapel. I know you for a Papist.’

  ‘I am faithful to the Church of Rome, but I could never countenance murder in its name. And Christiane … But as for wars and causes, I do not care for them one way or another. There is enough death, here, daily, over nothings and wrongs that will never be righted. But if Archie and William are found out to be conspiring against the king, they will hang.’

  ‘And you have come here to ask me to let them slip away, with those boys on board, to their unwilling deaths?’

  She smiled at me. ‘I have known of you for more years than you have of me, Mr Seaton. Katharine forced me to listen to tales of your many virtues long before she ever even took your eye. I know that nothing I could say could persuade you to bend from your purpose. It was Archie I came to plead with.’

  ‘Would your lieutenant not listen to you? Is he so enamoured of the Habsburg cause?’

  ‘You make light of it, and of him – for his clothing, his manner – but he has suffered much in these wars. As much as Archie.’

  ‘How can you say that? There is but one thin scar on Ormiston’s face.’

  ‘And you think all scars can be seen? That all scars are of the body?’ Her eyes travelled to my forehead, and then my neck. ‘Are those the only wounds you carry? I think there are others. I watched you tonight, in the dining hall, when you saw Katharine. Do not try to tell me you do not still love her.’

  ‘I – that has nothing to do with Lieutenant Ormiston.’

  ‘Does it not? Perhaps you should not condemn what you do not know. William lost a brother at Stralsund seven years ago. They had travelled to the wars together, fought together, he says they should have died together. He carries his loss every day, his scarred heart.’

  ‘I know of his loss, and believe me, I’m sorry for it.’

  She shook her head. ‘You only think you know. You think he was killed in battle, don’t you?’

  ‘I …’ I shrugged. ‘Wasn’t he?’

  Her voice was low. ‘He was hanged by his own comrades, on the orders of his commander.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘He and two Danish soldiers. Hanged, at Stralsund, in punishment and expiation of their crimes.’

  I thought of Jean St Clair, Johnny Sinclair, his final challenge to Ormiston: ‘Will I tell you of your brother?’

  ‘Was he a deserter?’

  She shook her head. ‘He had had the boldness, after four days of sleeping in the street of the town they were daily risking their lives to defend, to go with some other young soldiers to the home of the burgermeister and demand that they be given suitable billets. For this “mutiny”, the Danish military governor, whose blame the lack of proper quartering was, had them court-martialled. They were found guilty, and Governor Holck decided that three of the men should be hanged as an example to their comrades. They were forced to draw lots, pieces of paper out of a hat. All but three of the papers had a blanket drawn out on them. A grim joke: those with the blankets on their paper would sleep sound and warm that night.’

  ‘And the others?’ I asked, my mouth dry.

  ‘Gallows.’ Her eyes became hard. ‘Lots, Alexander, to see whether they should live or die. William had to watch as his brother pulled out his ticket. He had to watch as his brother, whom he loved, was hanged in the square of that foreign town. All for asking for a roof over his head from the people who had called them there in the first place.’

  I felt sickened. ‘But could the Scottish commanders do nothing?’

  She looked into what remained of the fire. ‘The Danish officer had superiority. Had Lord MacKay been there, he would not have allowed it, but he arrived from Scotland too late. Duncan Ormiston was eighteen years old, and William has never got over it.’

  ‘He told you all this?’

  ‘Not him, Archie. He was trying to warn me, I think, that I should not set my hopes on William ever settling and coming home until this war is over, for it is a thing very personal to him, and his wounds will not heal until he has avenged his brother’s death.’

  I could see a sadness in her that, for all the antagonism between us, I would not have had her subject to. ‘And yet the lieutenant has courted you, and his feelings for you are real – I have seen it myself. On the night of his ship-board dinner, his disappointment at your absence was very genuine.’

  ‘I know it,’ she said. ‘And I think I might, in time, pull him back from this course of life that is bent only on vengeance and destruction. I think I might persuade him to make his future with me. But that future will never be if he is hanged on the Heading Hill of Aberdeen for treason.’

  ‘No, I see that.’ Her honesty had brought me to a decision. ‘If they let the recruits go, I will tell no one what I know, Isabella.’

  She got up. ‘Thank you. And I will keep your secrets also, Mr Seaton.’

  After she had gone, I sat a while in the chair and thought about what she had told me. Ormiston’s shooting of Jean St Clair at the mention of his brother’s name made some sense to me now, but I did not think that would be enough to give him peace. The clock on the mantelpiece sounded three o’clock, and I could not think that Archie and his father could still be up talking in the Great Hall. I wanted to talk to him before taking a few more hours sleep, and so I left his room and went to look for him.

  All was silent in the castle, and only a few candles remained lit, to lend their dim light to stairways and corridors. I made my way quietly back to the Great Hall, but the guards were gone from the doors, and on pushing them open I found the place empty and in darkness, save for the last red glow of the coals in the hearth. I was about to go out again when I heard a slight stirring from beneath the south window. I moved closer, and saw that a figure slept there on a couch. It was Katharine, wrapped in a rug. Her breathing was soft and regular, and I knew that if I made my way quietly from the hall and back to Archie’s room, she would never know I had been there.

  That is what I should have done. Perhaps, in the light of day, with a clear head after a good night’s sleep, it is what I would have done. But it wanted four hours or more until the break of day, and I had slept but very little. In sleep, she looked almost like a child again. She was the girl I had known all my life, the girl I had fallen in love with, without any hope of release, at the age of seventeen. I walked to the doors of the Great Hall and closed them. A basket of coals had been set by the fire and I carefully placed a few on the glowing embers, raking them gently to stir them back to life. I went over to Katharine’s couch and knelt down by it. I lifted my hand to t
ouch her cheek, stopped myself, withdrew it. I cursed my weakness, told myself to get up, to walk away, but then she moved a little in her sleep and the rug began to slip from her shoulders. I bent again to shift it, and felt the warmth of her breath on my cheek. She was so close, and in that moment, my everything.

  ‘Katharine,’ I said. ‘Katharine, wake up.’

  She moved a little again, opened her eyes, squinting, confused, in the candlelight. ‘Alexander?’

  ‘Katharine. Listen to me.’

  She sat up now, pulling the rug round her for warmth.

  ‘What’s wrong, Alexander?’

  ‘I need you to listen to me. I need you to know that I love you. That every day since that day on the road to Sandend I have regretted walking away from you. I love you and I have never stopped loving you.’

  ‘Nor I you,’ she said. She tilted her face towards me and I bent and kissed her lips, gently, softly, before drawing back in some sort of shock at myself.

  ‘And does this end it?’ she said.

  My breathing came hard and my hands were shaking. ‘I cannot, Katharine. Do not ask me to end it again.’ I bent my face to hers again, and this time I did not draw away.

  23

  Tempest

  ‘Wake up, Alexander. For God’s sake, wake up.’

  It was Isabella Irvine who was shaking me by the shoulders and shouting urgently in my face. I turned slightly but there was no sign of Katharine on the couch behind me. Isabella was thrusting my boots and clothing towards me.

  ‘Katharine?’

  ‘Katharine is not here. She is gone. They are all gone.’

  I sat up, mindless of my bare chest and shoulders.

  ‘What? What are you talking about? Who is gone?’

  ‘Lady Rothiemay, Katharine and Archie.’

  I shook my head, as if some sense would be let loose in it. ‘Her Ladyship has gone to Rothiemay – she does not want you to share in her troubles, Isabella. You are to go to your aunt’s at Straloch.’

  ‘But …’

  ‘She knew you would be full of “buts”. Allow her this autonomy at least, and do some good to yourself. But Katharine?’ I looked behind me uselessly again, looked around the large, cold room. ‘She will be in her chamber, surely. She will have gone to her son.’

  ‘No,’ said Isabella, beseeching, frustrated. ‘She’s taken him with her. She has gone with Archie.’

  ‘But where to?’

  ‘Oh God, Alexander. How much of a fool are you? She rides home to her husband’s tower house, and Archie to Aberdeen. He’s going for the ship. They’re leaving.’

  ‘With the recruits?’

  ‘Yes, with the recruits. Why do you think he has taken a two-hour start on you? They told me at the stables – they were gone by five this morning.’

  I could not believe it. She must have left very soon after I had fallen asleep. I pulled off the rug and Isabella hastily turned away as I began to throw on my clothes. ‘I may still catch them. The child will surely slow them down, and it may take him some time to get out to the ship from the quayside.’

  I noticed that Isabella was weeping, the first time I had ever seen her do so. She must have realised now that Ormiston was lost to her. I reached out a hand and gently lifted her chin. ‘I may be in time. I may stop them before they do anything that cannot be undone.’

  A husky voice came from the doorway. ‘You will not stop them.’ It was old Lord Hay, ashen-faced, broken, all the light of last night gone from him. ‘Archie told me he would take precautions – a surety for your silence. I am sorry, Alexander. I am truly sorry.’

  *

  Lord Hay’s own old horse was too aged now for the ride that I had to undertake, but he gave me the next best mount in the stables. ‘I love my son, but it were better that he had never come here. The boy I bade farewell to fourteen years ago would never have countenanced what Archie plans to do today. Make haste, Alexander – I would not have him bereave other fathers for a lie.’

  The stable master had the horse ready for me in minutes, and I rode from Delgatie without once looking back. I rode like the Devil. My oldest friend had played me for a fool and I did not know what he had told me in the last week had been truth and what a lie. I knew there was one truth in all that he had spoken, the one he had told me at the first that I had refused, utterly, to believe: the Archie Hay I had known and loved all my life had died twelve years ago on the field of Stadtlohn, and the one who walked in his place was hardly worthy to bear his name. Of Katharine, I could not bear to think.

  The morning was grey and windy, but clear of fog, thank God, and the ground firm underfoot. By Fyvie they were telling me that Katharine Hay and her son had ridden past twenty minutes after a lone horseman who had driven his mount on as if his life depended on it. By Oldmeldrum the gap was nearer an hour, and I came upon her myself outside Newmachar. I reined in my horse, only for a moment.

  ‘You knew.’

  It was clear that she had not expected me to follow so soon. ‘I did not seek you out, Alexander.’

  ‘He put you up to it.’

  ‘No.’ She looked anxiously at her son and back to me, lowering her voice. ‘It was you who came to me.’

  ‘But he told you what he planned and you did not warn me.’

  Her face paled then became defiant. ‘They will send him back, once they have got clear. Why would I have told you? What difference would it make?’

  I dug my spurs into Lord Hay’s horse, calling over my shoulder to her as I did so. ‘All the difference. All the difference in the world, Katharine.’

  ‘But why?’ she cried after me. ‘The boy is not yours. Everyone knows he is not yours.’

  I did not look at her, did not turn to see her face or hear what other words she might have to say. At that moment, I knew I never wanted to set eyes on Katharine Hay again.

  I must have covered the miles to Old Aberdeen more quickly than I had ever done before, but it seemed to me that the road would go on for ever, and that I would never come within sight of the Cathedral of St Machar, rising high above the old town. At last though, when it seemed that the poor beast under me could have little left in him, the twin spires of the church came within my view, and I was crossing the Brig o’ Balgownie.

  The watchmen on the Bishop’s gate told me that yes, a horseman calling himself Sergeant Nimmo, from the recruiting ship moored off Torry, had come by nearly two hours ago, riding hard. At each port on my way down to the new town I was told the same thing, and my heart sank further with every telling of it.

  Once through the Calsey Port into the New Town, I headed down the Gallowgate, but instead of continuing on to the harbour, I urged my beast towards my own house. There was little traffic on Upperkirkgate, at this time on a winter’s day, and I was soon dismounting in Flourmill Lane. I ran to the door of my house, and although I found it locked, I banged hard for a moment all the same, cursing myself for losing time I did not have. The sky was darkening and the shutters above me rattled in the rising wind. I left the exhausted horse where it stood and ran on foot to William’s house. I met my friend on the path on the way back to his chambers after taking his dinner at home.

  ‘Alexander … you were not expected back yet. Had you any luck finding Seoras?’

  ‘Seoras?’ I had forgotten the pretext for my absence from the town and had no idea what he was talking about. I did not slacken my pace but ran past him. ‘Where is Sarah? Is she here?’

  ‘Yes, of course, but …’

  I could not stop to hear him and barged through the door of the kitchen, with William now in my wake.

  Sarah was there, with William’s wife Elizabeth. They looked up from their work, surprised by my sudden entrance. ‘Alexander …’

  ‘Where are the children?’

  ‘Deirdre is in the henhouse, looking for eggs. Davy is sleeping.’ Sarah indicated my youngest child curled up in a corner with William’s dog. ‘Alexander, what is it?’

  ‘And what about
the boys?’ I said to Elizabeth.

  ‘James is back at the school – they finished their dinner an hour ago …’ Her voice trailed off and she glanced, a little frightened, at Sarah.

  My heart went cold. ‘Sarah, where is Zander? Is he at the school?’

  Her face paled and she shook her head slowly. ‘No. No he is not.’

  I gripped her by the shoulders, so hard it must have hurt her. ‘Where is he?’

  ‘Arch …’ She glanced at Elizabeth and back to me. ‘Sergeant Nimmo. He sent word just when they came home for their dinner, for Zander to meet him and go out and see the ship. I thought there could be no harm.’ Her eyes were filling with panic now. ‘Alexander, what is it? Alexander, tell me. Where has he taken him? Where has Archie taken him?’

  I ran out of the house with William close behind me. The kitchen door banged shut behind us – the wind was working itself up to a gale. William was shouting at me, but I had not the time to turn round, until I felt his hand heavy on my shoulder, bringing me to a halt.

  ‘I have no time …’

  ‘What is going on, Alexander? Why would Sarah let Zander on to the recruiting ship, and what did she mean about Archie?’

  ‘He is back, William.’

  ‘Archie? He cannot be. Alex—’

  ‘He is back. He is Sergeant Nimmo, and he has my son.’

  I tore myself from William’s grip and began to run once more. There was no time now to go to the Castlegate and summon up the magistrates. Every moment would be a moment lost. I ran down Ragg’s Lane to the Broadgate, pushing cursing and bemused townsfolk out of my way. Two of Lord Reay’s men, engaged in buying supplies of some sort at the market on the Castlegate, gave off what they were doing and joined, fleet-footed, in the chase.

  It cannot have taken much more than five minutes to get from William’s backland to Shiprow and the top of Shore Brae, from where I could get a good view of the harbour and the troop ship anchored further out in the river mouth beyond. Relief flooded through me at the sight of it there. The waves were choppy enough off Torry already and the sky was turning from a deep grey to almost black. A storm was coming from the north, as if all Lord Reay’s grief and rage had taken hold of the skies and were hurling the worst that they had against the town of Aberdeen. I knew that no ship’s captain, supposing a dozen lieutenants should hold their pistols to his head, would take his vessel out into the open sea in such weather.