Beside the river was a path leading out to open country. James urged his courser along it, hope swelling inside him. God had crowned his enterprise with success! He was going to get clean away.
A shout made him look over his shoulder. His hopes turned to ash. Three horsemen had emerged from a side-street, not twenty yards above and to his left, and were cantering after him.
“You, there!” one of them shouted. “Halt, in the name of the King!”
James didn’t need to see their livery badges to know they were Moray’s servants. He clapped in his spurs and put his head down.
His courser surged into a full-blown gallop. The shouts died away behind him, replaced by the rattle of hooves on the stony path. They had given chase.
The path curved around to meet the highway, which eventually led to the coast. A boat was waiting for James at a secluded location, to carry him away to exile and safety in France. There he meant to stay until the news of Moray’s death had lit a new fire of rebellion in Scotland. This time, he prayed, the flame would be hot enough to consume all of Queen Mary’s enemies.
His courser pounded along the rough flat of the road. He occasionally risked a glance back. Moray’s servants were gaining on him. They wore no armour to weigh them down, and their horses were superb. Thoroughbreds, probably, from the Regent’s own stables.
James was no coward, but he couldn’t hope to fight off three men. Others would soon come up to join them. He shuddered at the thought of his fate if they took him alive. A traitor’s death, slowly torn to pieces while still alive in the marketplace at Edinburgh before a baying crowd, his bowels ripped out and burnt before his eyes. James would rather fall on his sword than suffer such agonies.
He drew his knife. Desperation called for desperate measures. His courser was already at a flat gallop, long neck extended, legs pumping, nostrils flared. There was one cruel method of drawing an extra burst of speed from her.
James plunged the knife down into the courser’s rump. She shrieked, and a gout of hot blood spurted over his back.
“On!” he shouted, whacking her with the flat of the blade. “Faster, you hobbled mule!”
Relief surged through him as she gave a great leap and flung herself into an even greater gallop. Anything to get away from the searing pain in her backside. James hung on for dear life, tightly clutching the reins. To his delight, when he looked back it was to see his pursuers dwindling to spots on the horizon.
God had seen him safe.
17.
In the great hall of Naworth Castle, Lord Dacre sat and re-read the letter on his lap.
It was written in a fine clerkly hand on expensive vellum. The red wax seal displayed the arms of Lord Scrope, Warden of the West March. Dacre contemplated tossing it onto the fire.
Even better, he reflected savagely, to cast Scrope onto the fire. Scrope, Hunsdon, Forster, Burghley, Walsingham, the Queen...the whole devilish pack of them. Chained to stakes and burnt, as they deserve.
He drew his fur-lined cloak tighter around him. It was difficult to get truly warm, even next to raging heat. Inside the massive hooded hearth the best part of a tree slowly burnt to ashes. At this time of year a fire was kept burning all night in the hall. A martyr to cold, Dacre spent as much time as possible here.
The nightmarish cold of January seeped through even the thick stones of his castle. Outside the land was buried under layers of freezing snow. Dacre's poorer tenants huddled inside their miserable cottages, striving desperately to keep themselves alive until the warm days of spring. An unnerving silence had fallen across the Border. Heavy snowfall had achieved what even the most able Warden could not, and instilled a measure of peace.
Not for long, if Dacre had his way. He glanced up at his younger brother Edward. “What did you do with Scrope's messenger?” he asked.
“He's in the kitchens,” replied Edward, “swilling as much spiced wine as he can get inside him before the journey back to Carlisle.”
Edward was similar to Dacre in appearance, though slightly taller and without the twist in his spine. A fiercely staunch Catholic, he was also headstrong. His recent hare-brained effort to seize Carlisle for the rebel earls had made Dacre's blood run as cold as the snow. Not for the first time, he thanked God he was born the elder of the two. Left to his sibling, the family fortunes would have long since run to ruin.
“Make sure he stays there,” said Dacre. “On no account must he see me.”
Edward's brow furrowed. “Why not, Leonard? What do you have in mind?”
Dacre tapped the vellum on his lap. “Lord Scrope has invited me to dine with him at Carlisle. He must think me no end of a fool. Once I set foot inside that castle, I would be arrested and clapped in irons. I am suspected, my brother. Have no doubt.”
He paused to consider. Since the flight of the earls, and the collapse of their ill-starred rebellion, Dacre had been careful to maintain the outward appearance of a loyal subject. Secretly he was in correspondence with the Earl of Westmoreland, who had taken refuge in Scotland since his rescue from Liddesdale.
The Earl of Northumberland, hapless Thomas Percy, was no longer a piece on the board. Moray had handed him over to the English garrison at Berwick. He may live for a while, at the Queen's pleasure, but was as good as dead. Dacre thought little of him. So far as the Crookback was concerned, Percy's head might as well already be impaled on a spike.
“Elizabeth's agents watch me closely,” Dacre went on, folding his slender hands, “just as they did in London. They know what I am about, even though they have not a shred of proof. And I know Lord Scrope. If I ever fell into his custody, he would put me to the rack and wrench the truth out of me.”
His brother winced. “What's to be done, then?” Edward cried. Dacre motioned irritably at him to keep his voice down.
“We must step carefully,” Dacre went on. “First, you will tell Scrope's messenger that I thank his lord for the kind invitation, but cannot accept. Say I am indisposed. Sick. I have a sore leg, hurt while hunting, and suffer from a contagious ague.”
“Scrope won't believe it,” Edward warned. Dacre shrugged.
“My lord Scrope can believe what he likes. If he thinks I am about to walk into his clumsy traps, more fool him.”
He flapped a hand at his brother. “Go. Get rid of the pest in my kitchen.”
Edward went, and left Dacre in peace to contemplate his choices.
Everything had changed in the North since the assassination of Moray. Dacre blessed the hand of his killer, who was said to have escaped abroad. With the Regent gone, the Scottish government was virtually powerless to prevent Catholic dissidents in Scotland brewing fresh conspiracies.
It had already started. Dacre’s agents brought back almost daily reports of fresh trouble along the Border. Raiding parties led by the Earl of Westmoreland and his Scottish allies frequently galloped into England, wreaking as much havoc as possible before withdrawing again. Throughout January they had raided and burned as far as Morpeth. Their lancers had even been spotted near Brancepeth, Westmoreland’s old manor.
Dacre was impressed by Westmoreland’s daring. The earl had led a failed assault on Wark Castle, and then burned the crops and stolen the sheep belonging to the garrison. Other towns such as Kirknewton and Learmouth had also been attacked, though the latter was reckoned the best-fortified and garrisoned in the whole of the East March.
Where did the earl get this fighting spirit? Dacre wondered. Why did he not show it before?
Perhaps Westmoreland was spurred to greater action by his new allies. Some of the most fearsome Scottish reiver lords now rode with him: the Kerrs of Cessford and Ferniehurst, Scott of Buccleuch, Johnston and others. Teviotdale men as well. There was no word – yet – whether the headsmen of Liddesdale had joined his banner. Now Moray, their great enemy, was cold in the ground, the Armstrongs and their ilk were free to break loose.
By nightfall Dacre had made his decision. He wrote a letter in his own hand and sent the best a
nd fastest horseman from his garrison to take it into Scotland.
“Place this in the hand of the Earl of Westmoreland,” he crisply instructed the man, “no other. Understand?”
“Yes, my lord,” the soldier grunted. Dacre gave him the letter and wished him God speed.
Afterwards he took himself off to his private chapel and prayed long into the night. He had just made the most fateful decision of his life. The future would be shaped by it.
In his letter Dacre sent apologies to the rebels in Scotland for not joining them earlier, and explained he was watched by the Queen’s servants. At the end, after much thought, he wrote:
“I will soon show myself openly your friend.”
These few words alone were enough to get him hanged. Lord Scrope, who clearly longed to see Dacre dance on the end of a rope, would have paid a royal ransom to get his hands on the letter. Dacre could only plead with the Almighty to cast sand in the eyes of Scrope’s border guards.
“Lord,” he murmured as he knelt on the cold stones before the altar, “you know how busy I must be in the coming days. If I forget you, please, I beg, do not you forget me.”
The next morning, deprived of sleep and with a terrible ache in his knees, Dacre summoned his brother and chief officers and wardens. After breakfast they gathered in the hall. Dacre stood on the dais to receive them.
To show intent, he had belted on his sword and breastplate. His morion and a pair of pistols rested on the table beside him.
“Is it war, Leonard?” Edward asked eagerly. Dacre smiled thinly at his brother’s enthusiasm.
“War to the knife,” he replied. “Gentlemen, I have sent a message into Scotland. By now, I hope, it will be in the hands of the Earl of Westmoreland. The message assures him of our friendship and support.”
He drew himself up. “I intend to place myself at the head of this new rebellion. There will be no mistakes this time. You will ride out and summon my tenants to arms. All of them. The call to arms shall go out to the Names in both England and Scotland. All those loyal to Queen Mary will muster under the Red Bull.”
One of his officers, a burly veteran whose face was criss-crossed with old scars, gave a cough. “The families on our side of the Border but recently rose in support of the earls,” he said. “How can we be sure the riders of Redesdale and Tynedale, to say nothing of the Scotsmen, will be ready to take the risk again?”
“Especially since the last venture failed so dismally,” remarked another.
Dacre signalled at a servant, who came forward with a tray bearing six silver goblets. Each was full to the brim with wine, the best Madeira from Naworth’s cellar. The servant gave Dacre the first goblet, then handed out the rest.
“The Names will rise,” Dacre said confidently, “you have my promise on that. I have been in correspondence with their chiefs. They itch to have another crack at the Tudor and her lackeys. There was no proper fighting last time. I have promised them their fill of blood and plunder.”
His officers looked slightly more hopeful. Dacre seized the moment and raised his goblet high.
“My friends,” he cried, “to the success of our enterprise, and the health and good fortune of Mary Stewart, rightful Queen of England and Scotland!”
“To the Red Bull!” cried Edward. Every man present responded to the old war-cry. Their united voices, raised in a great shout, echoed in the dusty rafters of Naworth hall.
“The Red Bull!”
18.
After the Liddesdale raid, Richie expected his broken men to fall away from him. The Kerrs had gathered them for one purpose only: the rescue of Westmoreland and the Countess. Now the thing was done, they had no reason to stick with him.
One, a grizzled brute named Clemmie the Clash, who boasted of eight murders to his name, thought differently. “I’ve spoken with the rest of the lads,” he said, “and I speak for them. We are of one mind. We stay with you.”
The outlaws were back in the Moss. It was a cold, drizzly night, and there was not room for all of them inside the bastle, so they took their supper together in the largest of the old timber lodges.
Richie wanted to celebrate the success of their raid. To that end Davy had lit a fire, and one of Adam’s three remaining beasts was slaughtered. A great haunch of beef roasted slowly on a makeshift spit over the flames, turned occasionally by Adam. The fire held the chill and discomfort at bay, and the outlaws had enough meat drink to cheer them.
“I’m grateful,” Richie answered, “but to stay with me is to invite death. I have too much blood on my head.”
Clemmie snorted, spraying bits of half-chewed beef from his mouth. The men next to him also laughed.
“Too much blood!” he crowed. “D’you think you’re the only man to have a feud declared against him? Why, the Pringles have been after me for nigh sixteen years, ever since I slew Jock Pringle in a row over cards. The cheating little bastard had an ace tucked up his sleeve. I spied the ace, and split him from scalp to chops with my good sword. As he deserved.”
“Aye,” he added reflectively, fingering the hilt of his dirk, “and I’ve had good cause to lay a few more in the ground since. It was me or them.”
Another man spoke up. This was a Scot from Branxholm, a few miles north of Liddesdale, no less weathered and hard-bitten than Clemmie.
“I killed a Warden’s man,” he said in his gravelly voice, “a trooper that came raging after me in the waste, after I had lifted three kyne from Wat o’Stobs. I slit the fool from ear to ear. Turned out he was the Land Sergeant’s own brother. The Sergeant swore on the Holy Book to string me up before Christmas.”
He gripped his throat and winked at Richie. “That was eight years gone. Yon Sergeant has yet to see me swing.”
Richie knew the others had similar tales to tell. A few might claim they had only robbed and slaughtered (among other crimes) out of self-defence. They might even be telling the truth, or a version of it. Men had to shift as best they could on the Border.
“All right,” he said, “you’re all hard men. You have no fear of Armstrongs or any other. But why stay with me? I have little to offer. I’m just another outlaw, of no great name or reputation.”
Clemmie belched. “After what we did in Liddesdale, your name will be on the lips of every minstrel on the March. They already sing songs of you.”
“I would follow such a man,” added Jock, “even if he is but a lad, with barely a fuzz of decent beard on his chin.”
There was growl of agreement from the others. Richie felt strangely helpless. Trapped by a growing heroic reputation he neither sought nor deserved. He looked to Ruth for comfort, and was alarmed to see the admiration in her hazel eyes.
Has she, too, fallen for this deceit?
Still, he reflected, it was a fine thing to have the support of such men. Thieves and killers they might be, walking gallows-bait, but his enemies might think twice before attacking Hope's End with them at his back. Perhaps it wouldn't be necessary to abandon the Moss after all. Twenty men could defend the marshes just as well as a hundred.
“Richie's Bairns,” said Ruth. “It has a fine ring, don't you think?”
He smiled and raised his cup in toast to her. “Aye,” he replied after a hefty gulp of October, “Richie's Bairns it is!”
Richie set about turning the Moss into a fortress. Hope's End was too small to lodge all his followers, so he had them build new lodges at choke-points in the mere, guarding fords and pathways. For this to be done quickly, most of the outbuildings behind the bastle were demolished, and the timber carried to the new sites.
His Bairns worked with a will. Some were good craftsmen and turned the lodges into little fortresses: stout wooden cabins built on high ground or hidden among the moss. The doorways were covered by layers of gorse and branches cut from the woods, the windows mere round spy-holes, large enough for a musket. Each cabin was big enough for two, maybe three men. Next to each was a heap of brushwood, to be fired as a beacon if the Moss was invaded.<
br />
Richie noticed Davy spent much time in the company of one man in particular. His name was Stephen of Hawick, coarsely nicknamed Buggerback. Borderers were open about such things, and it was no secret or shame among them to know Davy and Stephen had become lovers.
“I'm glad,” Richie remarked to Ruth one night as they lay together before the fire inside Hope's End. “The death of our cousin weighed heavy on Davy's mind. Perhaps this will lighten the burden.”
Ruth's fingers gently traced the contour of his stomach. “Davy blamed himself for deserting Cleave-Crown. He told me we should have stayed and fought, even if it meant we all died together. Rather that, than live with shame.”
“Shame can be wiped out,” said Richie. He thought of Nebless Will's last moments. The old reiver sneering up at him, even as he placed cold metal between the man's eyes. The pistol's sudden jerk as he squeezed the trigger. Will's head blown all to pieces, his brains scattered over the grass.
Perhaps it was evil to kill a man in such a way. Without a shred of mercy, as he knelt defenceless before you. Bernard Gilpin would certainly say as much, and often did so in his furious sermons. Gilpin had never grasped the spirit of deadly feud, in which morality counted for little. Only revenge mattered, however it was gained.
Revenge. It will be my death.
Richie was caught up in the endless cycle of feud. If an Armstrong didn't put a bullet or a blade in him, a Nixon or Crosier would. Maybe a Potts. He made fresh enemies almost by the day.
God help us, he thought desperately, there must be a better way.
“What will you do,” asked Ruth, “now your great enemy is dead? Does my future husband have any plans for the future?”
Reiver Page 15