by J. D. Davies
Only one man on earth was entitled to ride ahead of that emblem.
He reined in before us. He was a strange spectacle altogether: clad from head to toe in green hunting garb, his shoulders covered by a fur stole, he possessed great, staring, sad eyes that seemed too big for his head, a beard flecked with grey even though he was years younger than My Lord, and a swarthy foreign appearance, very different to the pale features adorning the faces of the men who rode behind him. The heavily armed men, who could easily kill us in a trice if ordered so to do.
The Earl bowed deeply in the saddle, and I followed suit.
‘Your Grace,’ said My Lord.
‘So ye’re the famous Earl of Ravensden, then. Son to a Stewart mother, though, if I read my genealogies rightly. One of the offshoots of the Aubigny line, eh, My Lord, and thus close kin to my cousin Lennox? Means there’s good blood in ye somewhere, laddie. Aye, good Stewart blood, cousin Matthew.’
James the Sixth, King of Scots, spoke in an accent so strange and rapid that it was difficult to get the gist of what he said. Indeed, it was difficult to accept that this peculiar, shambolic figure could actually be a King at all. Here was no Alexander, no Charlemagne, no Harry the Fifth, that was certain.
The King looked me up and down. There was something unsettling about his gaze.
‘And who’s this braw laddie, My Lord?’
‘Nicholas Musk, Your Grace. He distinguished himself greatly in the Queen’s service at the Battle of Castlehaven.’
‘Is that so? Musk. Nicholas Musk. An unusual name. As rare as your namesake, forsooth, Master Musk. Rosa moschata, eh? A sweet smelling rose. Fragrant, even. What’s yon Sassenach poet say? Some’at about a bank wi’ wild thyme and oxlips, o’er-canopied with musk roses? Shakespeare, that’s the laddie. But you wouldna ken him, I suppose, Master Musk.’
The King’s expression was as innocent as his words were loaded. I bowed my head to acknowledge His Grace’s learning, and as I did so, I chided myself for suspecting that this most unlikely example of divinity upon earth could possibly know who I truly was.
‘I have seen some of Master Shakespeare’s works played upon the stage, Your Grace,’ I said.
‘Mayhap,’ said the King. ‘But tell me, cousin Matthew – ye’ve brought it?’
‘As I promised, Your Grace.’
The Earl reached into his saddlebag and drew out a small pouch. He urged his horse forward a couple of paces, and handed it to the King. James Stuart undid the ties and reached eagerly inside the bag. He took out the paper within, opened it, and read.
‘Aye, weel,’ he said. ‘So this is what you think will save your head, Matthew Quinton. And this is the original?’
‘It is, sire.’
‘Of course it is. Although I ofttimes hear strange blethering to the effect that there might be several originals. But that could not possibly be the case, could it, My Lord, if an Earl of England gives me his word of honour upon it?’
The Earl inclined his head.
‘As you say, Your Grace.’
‘And this Musk, here – he knows the content of this?’
‘He does, sire.’
Once again, the King looked at me rather too intently for my liking.
‘I could have ye both killed, here and now,’ he said. ‘Men who are privy to this secret are dangerous to me. Men who took the cause of the Earl of Gowrie are doubly dangerous to me. Traitors. Would-be regicides. Such men deserve to die.’
I felt myself go rigid in the saddle. Had My Lord miscalculated? I stole a glance at him. His face was pale, paler than I had ever seen it, and I knew then that he was having the same thought. James’s wrath toward all those who had been even slightly involved in the Gowrie plot was a byword, the King’s vengeance utterly implacable. And yet the Earl of Ravensden, who was more involved in that plot than any, had just handed James Stuart the only thing that could possibly save his life.
But the King simply sighed, and nodded toward the paper in his hand.
‘The eternal folly of womankind, eh?’ he said. ‘Not only the sin, but feeling compelled to record the sin. Like an adulteress bawling news of her fornication to all and sundry at the Mercat cross.’ The King shook his head. ‘And it was for this that you and Gowrie thought to overthrow me and place my son upon the throne, reckoning that one generation’s remove from a taint in the bloodline was sufficient to cleanse the Augean stable. Ah, don’t bother with false protestations and denials, Lord Ravensden – there were witnesses enough to the mysterious English ship at the mouth of the Tay, and her fight with the Dunkirker off Broughty. For some reason, though, Master Secretary Cecil seems determined to convince me that you could not possibly have been the captain of this ship. He is even more determined to convince me that any action against Gowrie’s English confederates would go down most ill among the English nobility, and with him, too. Assuming Gowrie had English confederates, of course, for the late Earl made sure that all the evidence he left behind claimed he and his brother had acted entirely alone. As Master Secretary Cecil reminds me. And everyone falls over themselves to tell me how indispensable Master Secretary Cecil is, how entirely essential he will be to me when I become England’s King. This being the same Master Secretary Cecil who now beds Gowrie’s sister, who saw this same letter twenty years ago. ‘Tis strange how the world turns, is it not? Mighty strange.’
I could see that My Lord was greatly discomfited by the King’s speech. But it was not only his words that were unsettling: for James Stuart’s broad, almost incomprehensible, Scots accent had ebbed away in the blink of an eye, replaced by merely the gentlest lilt. Now he spoke like a King, and a King of England, too.
‘Your Grace knows the law and history of England, I think, as well as that of your own Scotland,’ said the Earl. ‘So if you will permit it, I shall put to you a legal hypothesis, founded upon historical precedent.’
‘We’re on horses in the midst of a wilderness, and you choose this place and this time to quibble on points of law with the King of Scots? We, James, who have out-foxed archbishops, the finest professors at St Andrews, and countless of Edinburgh’s sharpest attorneys? We, James, who could have you condemned for treason for your dealings with Gowrie, the moment we ascend the throne of England, regardless of what yon hunchback says? We, James, who could order the bonnie lads behind us to stick you with blades here and now and spare the expense of a trial? And you want to put to us a legal hypothesis, founded upon historical precedent? Now there’s a pass. You’re not what I had in my mind as the model of a famous English warrior, My Lord of Ravensden.’
Was My Lord thinking, as I was, And you’re not what I had in my mind as the model of a King? If he was, his expression gave not the slightest hint of it.
‘As you say, Your Grace. But the history of England tells us that many men have come to the throne despite having no blood claim to it – William the Norman, Harry the Fourth, your own ancestor Harry the Seventh, and others besides. Now, many might have disputed their claim before they succeeded, and questioned their right to the throne. Questioned their very bloodline, perhaps. But the moment the crown was placed upon their heads in Westminster, these kings became the undoubted, divinely ordained monarchs of England, entitled to the unswerving loyalty of every man in the land.’
‘As I will be, once I am crowned in Westminster, you mean?’
‘Undoubtedly, Your Grace.’
‘The coronation ceremony overrules all? Even this?’
The King held up the letter.
‘Even that, sire.’
‘And at that moment, I will have your unswerving loyalty, My Lord Ravensden? Even though you know what this letter says?’
‘You will be my lawful, anointed King, and I will fight for you with every breath left in my body, Your Grace. Even though I know what that letter says. Especially because I know what it says.’
The large eyes narrowed slightly, but otherwise, King James was impassive.
‘And you, Master Musk? What of
you?’
Careful, Nicholas – the future location of your head depends upon how you answer now. Time for the best speech you have ever written, and the best you will ever deliver.
‘Your Grace, I know nothing of law, but it seems to me that your crowning at Westminster will surely be proof of God’s will that you are the rightful, divinely ordained sovereign of all England. And in that sacred moment, I will throw my hat in the air and proclaim you with gladness in my heart and tears in my eyes, in the English style – Your Majesty.’
James Stuart smiled.
‘Majesty. Aye, I have a liking for the English notion of Majesty. A very great liking. You speak well, Master Musk. Almost like a poet, in fact. Almost like an actor.’
The King of Scots smiled again, and I was dumbfounded.
The Earl of Ravensden:
‘Sire,’ I said, knowing this might be the best opportunity to raise the matter, ‘you have thought upon my request?’
The King’s face changed in a trice. From the jovial fellow flattering Nicholas Iles, James Stuart turned in an instant into a suspicious, petulant cynic.
‘Your payment, you mean? The payment for returning to me what was always rightfully mine? The payment for my not ordering your death, either now or when I come to England’s throne? Is your life not payment enough, My Lord Ravensden?’
‘The other matter was but a humble request, Your Grace, nothing more.’
The King nodded.
‘Aye, humble indeed. As is right and proper, when mere men seek to approach God’s divinely appointed. But, perchance, it suits me to accede to your request, My Lord of Ravensden. Suits me for my own purposes. For I am told that England’s monarch needs good admirals, and I have it upon good authority that the victor of Castlehaven, Sesimbra Bay and the fight in the Narrow Seas is not only a man worth keeping alive, whatever treasons he might have committed, but a man worth accommodating. I have that upon the very highest authority, if you catch my meaning.’
Oh, I caught his meaning well enough, although I struggled to believe it. Elizabeth, Queen of England, who had spent the last fifteen years denying me command after command – now, at the very end of her life, the dying old crone was recommending me to the man who was bound to be her successor.
The King raised a hand. Moments later, two riders appeared on the crest of the ridge to the north; but the rearmost of them was facing backwards upon his horse, and had his hands tied behind his back. Even so, I recognised him in short order.
‘A strange fellow,’ said the King. ‘Throughout the time he’s been kept in the Edinburgh tolbooth, he’s done nothing but petition and petition again for an audience. I ask you, an audience! Despite his having killed the Macrae, who was a loyal friend to me. It seems he can think and talk of nothing but his ambition, so much so that it has become a kind of madness, I think. His ambition to be you, My Lord. To be the Earl of Ravensden.’
The prisoner and his guard were close now, and Horvath even turned his head to sneer at Iles. But he would not look me in the face.
‘I could say that it is good to see you again, cousin Balthasar,’ I said, ‘but we both know that would be a lie. And I am one Quinton who does not lie before Kings.’
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
The Dowager Countess:
I pummelled my husband’s chest. I screamed. I wept. I pummelled again.
‘It is madness!’ I cried. ‘Kill him! Go down to the dungeon now, this very minute, and slit his throat! You are the Earl of Ravensden, and no man will gainsay you!’
He grasped my shoulders and held me far enough away that I was pummelling only air.
‘No,’ he said. ‘If I killed him in such a way, I would answer before the law. That is our English way, and no man stands above it.’
‘But single combat, husband? With all the risks in that?’
‘You have seen him fight, My Lord,’ said Iles, coming to my aid. ‘You know – that is, you must be aware—’
‘Of what, poet? That on dry land, he’s a better fighter than I? Do you think I do this without knowing that?’
We three were in the principal room of Alnburgh Castle: a cold, bare space warmed by an inadequate fire and hung with mouldy tapestries. Rain lashed the window shutters, and I could hear mighty storm-waves breaking upon the rocks below. Three floors beneath us, the son of Earl Henry festered in chains.
I went limp, and he enfolded me with his arms.
‘Then why, Matthew? In the name of God and all the saints, why?’
He stroked my hair, and Iles looked away.
‘It is so that I can answer to God – and to the saints and the Virgin, too, if your church is right and mine is wrong. But God alone should judge which Quinton, Matthew or Balthasar, has the right to be the Earl of Ravensden.’
‘But you are the rightful Earl – your uncle’s marriage to Horvath’s – to Balthasar’s mother was bigamous!’
‘A marriage of which there is no record, my love. A marriage of which the date is uncertain.’
‘Then you think he might have a true case, My Lord?’ said Iles. ‘That Earl Henry’s first wife died before he married in Hungary?’
‘That, my friend, is what God must decide. In the old way – the way that our common ancestors, all the way back to the Quinton who came over with the Conqueror, would approve of. Single combat.’
‘And what of your common grandmother?’ I demanded. ‘What would the Countess Katherine say, if she knew that one of her grandsons was set fair to kill the other?’
‘Oh, she has already said it, my love. She said it the night she told me who Laszlo Horvath really was. Destroy him, Matthew, she said. Destroy him, as I destroyed his father.’
I looked up at my husband in astonishment. Iles was open-mouthed.
‘She killed her own son?’
‘She arranged his destruction. So yes, she killed him.’
‘What sort of a mother can do such a thing?’
‘Do not judge her too harshly, wife. It was a different time. A different age altogether. Remember, Henry was never meant to be Earl – that was the destiny of his elder brother Matthew, my namesake. Brilliant beyond measure, loved beyond reason, as my mother said many times in the days before her madness. But when Matthew died in his youth, Henry inherited. A strange, unsettled creature, from his very beginning, as my father told me. My grandmother feared that he would sell all the Quinton lands to fund his quests for the Holy Grail, the Philosopher’s Stone, and all the other secrets of the ancients, leaving nothing for my father and I. She will not say who carried out the deed, or how it was done, somewhere here within the walls of Alnburgh. But as I say, it was a different age.’
For a moment, my fear of what my husband was about to do was driven out by another emotion, just as powerful, namely the kindred spirit of motherhood. And I wondered what I would do if I were ever in the Countess Katherine’s position: if, say, little Beth turned out to be a monstrous she-wolf, a new Lucrezia Borgia, or if the son we would surely have one day proved to be a second Balthasar Quinton.
As I thought those thoughts, a new understanding came to me. I saw it now, as clear as day. Yes, my husband had to fight the Hungarian in single combat. He had to kill him, or be killed. It was the only way to expiate the guilt of the ages and the sins of the Quintons.
Nicholas Iles:
A cold dawn upon a Northumberland beach, beneath the walls of Alnburgh Castle. The two men were similarly attired, in long white smock-shirts and buff breeches, and for the first time, I noticed the faint family resemblance between them: between the cousins, Balthasar and Matthew Quinton, one of whom was about to kill the other. I looked away, to the castle ramparts, and saw a very small figure standing there, so still she seemed like a part of the stonework. The Countess was determined to watch, even to the very end.
There were other witnesses, too, so that no man could say this deed, regardless of its outcome, was done in a dark corner. Two of the Earl’s Northumbrian neighbours, a knight and
a gentleman of good acreage, were in attendance, as was an Archdeacon. Avent of the Constant Esperance was there, as was the boy Ielden, who, if necessary, would carry to Ravensden Abbey the news that it had a new lord. Sinkgraven, the Dutch surgeon of the Merhonour (newly paid off and dry docked at Chatham, every man believing that the war with Spain was as good as over), was present, to attend to any wounds short of the fatal kind. Christian Bell stood upon the sands in chains, guarded by men of the Constant Esperance. If his Earl triumphed, he would be a free man that day; but if mine was victorious, Bell was bound for the gallows. So there was quite an audience upon the sands of Alnburgh.
My Lord’s sense of honour extended to affording the Hungarian the choice of weapons, for he was essentially the challenger.
‘I take it you have no scimitars hereabouts,’ said Horvath. ‘In which case I choose the rapier.’
‘The rapier alone? Not with a dagger? Very well, then,’ said the Earl, ‘but he who suffers the first blooding may change weapon if he wishes.’
‘A curious rule. But you are judge and jury here, cousin Matthew, so you may make whatever rules you wish.’
The two men walked a few yards away from each other, and fell to their knees in prayer: Horvath in the language of his own country, My Lord offering up the thirty-fifth psalm.
Finally, they both took guard.
The Earl of Ravensden:
He came at me with anger, but also with control. Such control. Always favouring terza and quarto guards, the rapier held low. He had the fastest sword arm of any man I ever fought, and the best balance, even when lunging. I knew this from our mock-fights, in the first weeks and months that I knew the man who called then himself Laszlo Horvath. But it was clear that he had concealed or held back many of his skills during those bouts. Anticipation is the key to swordplay, and he must have anticipated that one day he and I would fight each other for real, and to the death. He anticipated the need not to reveal all of his techniques to me; and I knew now that if he had a botta segreta, an unstoppable secret thrust not taught by the masters or the manuals, he must have kept it back from me.
