Lady Magdalen

by Robin Jenkins

  James would have said that it was impossible for him ever to hate his brother but he came very close to it then as he listened to John disdainfully finding excuses for Mama.

  8

  MAGDALEN WOULD NEVER forget that look on her son’s face. Anger she would have expected, and disappointment, and even contempt, for he had inherited his father’s opinion of women that they were weak creatures with no conception of honour; but not hatred. He had been like a young priest who thought she had defiled his temple and mocked his gods.

  Back in her room, busy again with her needles and threads, her hands trembled. Another woman – Katherine Graham, for example – would have had the resolution to keep the gates closed and let the three men be butchered. In Biblical times, such a woman would have gone out afterwards and dipped her hands in the blood. On her knees, she would have thanked God for the death of her husband’s enemies. And God would have looked down on her with favour, for she had shown fidelity to her husband, whom in His sight she had solemnly sworn to obey.

  That was one way of looking at it. Mr Henderson would have pointed out another. Since all Covenanters were servants of God, by saving three of them she had pleased Him. She might not have her reward on earth but she would certainly have it in heaven.

  They all knew what God wanted. Why not, since it was what they themselves wanted. She did not know what she wanted and, therefore, even if she had been so presumptuous could not instruct Him. Instead, she felt herself withdrawing further and further to a place where there could be communication with no one, not even with God. If it was not stopped before too late she would become like a woman of stone. They would all say, with pity but without much surprise, that she had finally gone mad.

  There was a knock on the door. She did not have to ask who it was. She recognised, in the timid sound, James’s anxiety and love.

  He was carrying a sprig of rowan berries. They were reputed to bring good luck or, at any rate, to keep away bad.

  ‘Are you all right, Mama?’ he asked.

  She smiled and came a great way back into the world. ‘Yes, I’m all right.’

  ‘John’s sorry. For speaking to you the way he did.’

  But not perhaps for looking at her the way he had done.

  James pretended to be interested in her sewing: it happened to be the head of Jesus.

  ‘We couldn’t really have let them be killed, could we, Mama? They weren’t armed. They wanted to surrender. They should have been taken prisoner. That’s how civilised soldiers fight.’

  Civilised soldiers. He must have got the expression from his father. Soldiers killed men who had done them no harm. How could it be done in a civilised fashion?

  ‘John thinks so too now.’

  Poor John, so keen to be a soldier and yet, with his weak constitution, unfit. If a bullet or sword did not kill him, cold and rain would.

  ‘He’s going to talk to you about it. Later. One of them’s got a big gash in his neck. Mrs Witherspoon couldn’t stop the blood. She says he’ll die.’

  Mrs Witherspoon had some skill as a nurse.

  ‘The other two are all right. They said he was married with three children. He was a locksmith. Will you go to Kinnaird now, Mama? John wants to go to Perth to join Father.’

  ‘Will you come to Kinnaird with me?’

  He frowned. ‘I’d like to but I think I’ll have to go with John. You understand, don’t you?’

  ‘Yes, I understand.’

  ‘I’ll come and visit you at Kinnaird as often as I can. They said they ran away because the Irish were so ferocious. They saw them cutting off heads and tossing them to one another like footballs, with the blood dripping. They couldn’t stand it, they said. It was like fighting devils from hell. Do you know how far they ran, Mama? Twelve miles! There were about twenty of them at first. The rest were caught up and killed. It must have been terrible seeing heads cut off and used as footballs. Do you know, Mama, I think I might have run away too. Don’t tell John I said that.’

  ‘I won’t tell him.’

  ‘Or Father. Please never tell him.’

  ‘I won’t.’

  ‘I wonder what’s happened to Mr Blair the dominie, and Cissie. They went to Perth; didn’t they?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘But Father wouldn’t allow the Irish to kill the people in the town, would he?’

  ‘No.’ But what if it had been a condition of the Irish’s allegiance to him that he did not prevent them from killing and plundering?

  A few minutes later, James left to go and see what John was doing.

  He had no idea that he had, for the time being at least, saved his mother from turning to stone.

  9

  NEXT DAY, LATE in the evening their kinsman Graham of Braco arrived at the castle with a message from Father: the two boys were to join him in Perth, where they would be safer; and Magdalen was to take Robert and little David to Kinnaird for the same reason. Braco would escort them.

  He was a small sulky-looking man with a dour sense of humour that not many appreciated. He was prouder of his prowess as a farmer than of his rank as a gentleman. It was his ambition to breed bigger and fatter cattle.

  The journey would have to be carried out as secretly as possible. James Graham, he reminded them, was at that moment the most hated man in Lowland Scotland. Many people wanted to be revenged on him for relatives killed or wounded at Tippermuir. It wouldn’t matter to them, any more than it had to Herod, that his children were innocent. Hurting them would be a way of hurting him. Ministers would be the first to point that out.

  The boys begged him to give an account of the battle. In a dry flat voice, as if he was describing some mundane matter, like a cow calving, he told of men disembowelled while still alive, heads hacked off with the mouths still open with cries for mercy, and private parts sliced off with claymores swung like golf clubs. Even John began to look green and sick.

  As Magdalen listened, she wondered what part James, lover of honour, merciful soldier, fastidious gentleman, and poet, had played in the butchery. Seeing the question in her eyes, Braco remarked that James had chosen to fight on foot, with a half-pike as his weapon. He had not seen him use it but he had heard him shouting encouragement to the disembowellers and beheaders. His boots had been splashed with blood.

  But it had been a glorious victory, hadn’t it? said John.

  By God it had. It was said two thousand Covenanters had been killed. A man could have walked on corpses all the way to Perth. And yet, said John, the Covenanters had had more men, more cavalry, and more guns. Wasn’t that so? Aye, it was. Didn’t that show that Father was a much better general than Lord Elcho who had commanded the Covenanters?

  It did, but another reason could be that the men from Fife had had no stomach for blood-letting, whereas the Irish had enjoyed it like a feast. Also, since both sides had gone down on their knees before the battle to ask God’s help, it looked as if the God of the Irish, who were Papists, mind, was better at miracles than the Presbyterians’ God.

  No, cried John indignantly. God had given Father victory because his cause was just.

  Aye, that would be right, said Braco drily. Everyone knew that just causes always won.

  To Magdalen, later, when they were alone, Braco gave his opinion that in spite of James’s remarkable victory and other victories that might follow, he could not, in the end, win. He had turned most of Lowland Scotland against him by his use of the Irish. Braco himself had had enough of slaughter. After delivering the boys to their father, he was returning to Braco, to look after his cattle and do some thinking. Other members of the Lowland Scotch gentry would be doing the same. They just could not bring themselves to fight alongside Highlanders and Irish on behalf of a King who, though born in Scotland, had chosen to become an Englishman, and who had a Catholic wife, whose advice he foolishly heeded.

  But if James’s kinsmen and friends would not help him, thought Magdalen, he really was doomed, in spite of his first victory. She felt g
reat pity for him.

  Braco was not much interested in the three soldiers whose lives she had saved. There must be dozens like them, he said, who had managed to escape from their pursuers. James had forbidden such pursuits but the Irish once they had tasted blood, were uncontrollable.

  She did not feel well enough to travel. Besides, if she remained in the castle with her two youngest children, it was less likely to be attacked and destroyed.

  Braco was doubtful. The Covenant troops who came would have been instructed by Argyll to blow up the castle and leave it uninhabitable. There would be ministers with them who would see to it that they did their duty.

  Braco enjoyed talking through his nose, in imitation of fanatical preachers.

  They set off soon after dawn. Magdalen was up to see them off, though it was chilly and still dark and she had had a sleepless night with pain and worry. James was proud that he was to ride a horse and not a small pony, but he could not help his voice trembling as he said goodbye. He promised to come back soon.

  John had to show that at 14, he was a man, whereas James, at twelve, was still a child. So he did not cling to his mother as James had done or have tears in his eyes. He tried so hard to be manly and looked so like his father that, though she smiled, and, in a calm enough voice gave him sensible advice about looking after his health, she was very close to weeping, for there in the courtyard, under the red sky, with the horses snorting and stamping, and in the distance a curlew calling, she had a premonition that she would never see him again. She did not have the same premonition about James, so it could not be her own death that would prevent their meeting; it must be his own.

  After they were gone, she remained in the courtyard for a while, as the sky grew lighter. Outwardly, she looked composed: so much so that servants watching were divided as to whether to admire her fortitude or condemn her apparent lack of feeling. They themselves would have been lamenting loudly if they had just seen their sons riding off to join their father in a war where they might be killed.

  They did not know that she was feeling so trapped in despair that she would not be able to pray. She would not know what to say to God, just as she had not known what to say to James, her husband. She had tried to write a letter to him but could not find words both loving and truthful.

  When she was a child, her father had warned her never to put God to shame; never to ask God to do for her what would be unfair not only to others but also to God Himself. Surely He was never more shamed than when men killed one another in His name, with both sides praying.

  She shivered, and Mrs Witherspoon hurried forward to place a blanket over her shoulders.

  Mrs Witherspoon, a minister’s widow, had been engaged as nurse companion after Janet’s death. She was a handsome ambitious young woman, with red hair and a fine figure.

  10

  LATER THAT DAY Magdalen went to the room where the three soldiers were being cared for.

  Mrs Witherspoon opened the door but was reluctant to let her in. One of the men was dying, she said: there was a danger of infection. What she really meant was that it was unseemly for a great lady, wife of a marquis, to be seen showing concern for common soldiers. Mrs Witherspoon believed strongly in rank, not only because God had ordained it, as the Kirk taught, but also because she considered herself above all the other servants in the house. Lady Magdalen’s disregard of rank was another consequence of her illness, which weakened her mind as well as her body.

  ‘I promised I would speak to them,’ said Magdalen.

  ‘One’s past speaking, my lady.’

  ‘Then I shall speak to the others.’

  ‘Well, just a minute, my lady.’ Mrs Witherspoon went in and reappeared shortly with a peculiar look of satisfaction. She had been proved right.

  ‘He’s just passed on, my lady. You don’t want to see him, I’m sure.’

  But Magdalen did, though it would be the first time she had seen a dead person.

  He was lying on a low bed, with his face turned towards her. His eyes were still open and he seemed to be smiling. He looked strangely content and purified.

  Mrs Witherspoon went forward and threw a blanket over his face.

  The two other men were on their feet, bowing their heads to Magdalen. One, hardly any older than John, was weeping quietly. He tried to hide his face with his hand, which was bandaged. He was blaming no one, not even the Irish soldier who had dealt the vicious fatal blow. His grief was simple and beautiful.

  His companion was older. He had large hands, which he kept wringing. Was he the baker and did he imagine he was kneading dough? Was it his way of holding on to sanity? Of reminding himself that one day he would be making bread again?

  ‘I’m very sorry,’ said Magdalen.

  He looked up at her in surprise. He had not expected to find her concern sincere but he saw that it was. ‘Whaur will Willie be buried, my lady?’

  ‘In the kirkyard, surely. I would like to write a letter to his wife. Would you take it to her?’

  He nodded, still amazed.

  Mrs Witherspoon frowned but said nothing. Such a letter would be a mistake. Whatever the rights and wrongs of the war that the Marquis had started, it was not proper for his wife to be seen giving comfort to his enemies. The poor young lady did not realise that that was what she would be doing. The letter would end up in the hands of people who would use it against her husband. She was kind-hearted but ignorant as a bairn in so many ways. How could she have avoided it, brought up in the lap of luxury and protected from the harshnesses of life? Mrs Witherspoon herself had had a difficult childhood. By the age of ten she had experienced more hardships than her ladyship ever would even if she were to live till she was 70, which, alas, was most unlikely.

  After the funeral, which Magdalen attended, she wrote the letter, signed it, and handed it personally to Mr Simmers, the baker, who promised again to deliver it. She never suspected, that behind her back, Mrs Witherspoon would go to him and demand it back: her mistress had changed her mind. He handed it over without saying anything, though he looked confused and disappointed.

  As soon as he and his companion had set off on foot for Fife, well supplied with provisions, Mrs Witherspoon hurried to her own room, where there was a fire burning. She intended to burn the letter without even unsealing it but she found herself hesitating. She was still convinced she would be doing her mistress a service but, with the letter in her hand, she began to feel guilty. That feeling increased when she gave in to curiosity and read it. It was short and simple but full of genuine feeling: so much so that Mrs Witherspoon, as dry-eyed as any woman in Scotland, was almost in tears. The woman in Pittenweem would have treasured this letter all her life. She would have passed it on to her children and they to theirs. For Lady Magdalen had written, not as a great lady condescending to an underling, but as one wife to another, as one mother to another.

  In the end Mrs Witherspoon hid it at the bottom of the kist where she kept her Sunday clothes.

  11

  ONE WET OCTOBER afternoon, Covenant troops arrived at the castle: a strong contingent of horsemen and infantry, with, as was soon demonstrated, a piece of artillery. As she lay ill in bed, Magdalen heard the neighing of horses, the rattle of military equipment, and the shouting of orders. Then she, and everyone else in the castle, was startled by the roar of the cannon. Mrs Witherspoon came, white-faced and panting, to report that the cannon ball had knocked down some tall trees nearby.

  ‘Have they come to destroy the castle, for spite? Surely they will allow everyone to leave first. What will you do, my lady, that canna walk?’

  Magdalen did not reply. She was thinking that, in spite of pain and weakness, she would refuse to be driven out of her home. She would defy them, not so much for her husband’s sake as for the sake of all women victimised by war.

  Mrs Witherspoon was not reassured by her mistress’s calmness; on the contrary, it alarmed her still more. For some time now, Lady Magdalen had been withdrawn; even her children could
not reach her. She was deranged, some thought; and no wonder, now that her husband was the most hated man in the kingdom.

  That evening, in the gloaming, there came a hammering on the gate, as if with the hilts of swords.

  ‘Go and tell Mr Galloway to let them in,’ said Magdalen.

  Mrs Witherspoon was fearful. ‘What if they’ve come to cut our throats?’

  ‘I hardly think so.’

  Mrs Witherspoon hurried away, wringing her hands.

  Magdalen did not feel calm. She felt frightened and near to despair. She tried to pray but could not. So many prayers were being sent up to God, how could He choose which ones to answer? Those who had come to destroy the castle had no doubt prayed for the success of their mission.

  But if I lose faith in God, she thought, how can I live? And if I die, shall I go straight to hell and never, through eternity, meet my mother?

  Mrs Witherspoon, in much excitement, brought their message. ‘Four of them, my lady: three officers and a minister. They want to speak to you. I told them you were sick in bed but he said, the one in charge, Sir Archibald Hutcheon; he said his name was, said that, if you didna go to them, they wad go to you. That big red-faced man that was here before, he’s one of them.’

  ‘Major Strang?’

  ‘Aye, that’s him. There’s a minister too. He’s the fiercest of them all.’

  ‘Please help me up, Mrs Witherspoon. I shall receive them here.’

  ‘But you’re not fit, my lady.’

  ‘Just help me, please.’

  ‘It’ll be the daith of you.’

  Protesting all the time, Mrs Witherspoon helped her young mistress out of bed, noticing again how thin her legs were, mere spurtles: it was just as well her body was so light. How much pain she felt Mrs Witherspoon could never be sure. She gave little sign; only a sudden gasp now and then. Your man, thought the harassed housekeeper, as she helped to put on the black dress, ought to be here, or your father, or one of your brothers. You shouldn’t be left by yourself in this cold dreary house. The Marquis, wherever he was, should think shame, leaving his young wife to waste away, with no one to talk to but servants, for recently there had been very few visitors. Little wonder there was so much grey in her hair and so much sadness in her eyes, though she was barely 30.