‘Please, sir,’ Clementina said softly, ‘there has been enough brandy tonight.’
‘Enough brandy? My little spy would limit my drinking now.’ He flung her violently away and with a trembling hand reached for the decanter. He struck it incautiously, and it clattered over, rolling, and spilling the bright liquid on table and floor. He cursed and shouted for more, and Clementina scurried off. ‘No,’ he said calmly. ‘She is not a spy, for all her having a sister at the Usurper’s court. Do you wish to know how I prove her loyalty?’
Marsali cringed, not knowing what would follow. ‘It is simple,’ he said. ‘Women all the world over wish to lie with me because I am a prince. When I was younger,’ he wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, ‘I did not always take advantage of that. I am wiser now. But that one there does not care a whit for that. The truth is she would lie with me if I were a peasant like himself.’ He waved at Murdoch glowering by the hearth. ‘It is me she loves, poor benighted fool, and our good God knows why. But she loves me, to distraction, so she takes my despicable tempers and my drinking, which, I know, is a heavy burden.’ He had attained the drunkard’s maudlin honesty, now, and went on, ‘She is no spy, I know, because she regards me not worth the trouble of spying, no threat to anyone. I am no prince to her.’
He drank again and said suddenly to Marsali alone, ‘Can you fathom, pretty lady, what it is like to be something and have no one believe that thing exists? To half of Europe, I do not exist. They will not even grant me my name. I am “the Pretender’s son”, the “rash adventurer”, “the Chevalier Douglas”, a fanciful Scotsman who is but happy in the tongue of Rome or France. What can I do with myself,’ his voice dropped, ‘when all but wait for me to … vanish.’ He said the last in a whisper.
‘If you will but let us,’ Marsali cried out, ‘we will show them the prince you are. Look here,’ she took from the bodice of her dress the rough parchment she had thrust there. ‘Look, twenty names, and every name a chief. And for every chief are two hundred fighting men. And in the hills of my home, where my house of Glentarvie is but ashes, is gold enough to feed an army for months. All is waiting. In Scotland now, Doctor Cameron is drawing tight the threads. We need only yourself, only your feet on Scottish land again, and all will be won.’ His eyes were on her, the while, and suddenly she laughed, at her self, Marsali the mocker, raising the clans for the Stuart Prince. Antoine’s winds of time had circled her at last.
‘Christ; but I hear my father,’ said Murdoch with an eerie shudder. But Tearlach rose, unsteady from the brandy, but composed once more, and grasped the paper and studied it intently. He had a magnificent bearing, Marsali thought, watching him standing there, with the haughty chin set so firmly and the eyes so dark beneath the fiery hair. That was the man her father had followed, a man worth following, worth fighting for, and failing for, and losing a country for. James MacKinnon had not begrudged him a square inch of Glentarvie. How could she hold him less dear?
‘I did not believe,’ he said. ‘Cameron had told me in letters, and a good friend, but lately with me. All had sworn that the gold was there, but I did not believe. Nor did I trust the armies they promised me with the word of the mouth. But look,’ he cried to Clementina, showing the parchment, ‘look now. I know those signed names. I see those gentlemen yet, as I saw them at Culloden.’ He looked then from the paper to themselves, his eyes lingering on each, almost lovingly. ‘Now I can see them. Now I can see.’
He paused and lowered the parchment, and then a slow grin spread across his face, and he began to laugh, soft at first, and then more loudly, and he stepped solemnly then to Rory and Murdoch and laid a hand on each shoulder.
‘With such as these we make an army,’ cried Tearlach. ‘To hell with the cowards and worriers and priests.’
Rory grinned and cheered, ‘Huzzah.’
‘To hell with my soft-hearted father, and to hell with the Usurper as well.’ Rory gave another cheer, and Marsali saw for the first time that he too was more than a little drunk.
‘With such as these we can make an army,’ cried Tearlach.
‘Aye, yet we shall,’ Rory replied.
‘And with such as these, what prince can lose?’ Then Tearlach flung his arms about both their necks, and hung there, laughing with joy.
Rory clasped his drunken prince about the waist, with delight, and shouted, ‘God save King James,’ and they swung about, like two dancing a laughing reel, and even Murdoch was beguiled and joined, and Marsali stared, amazed and knowing that the king they drank to had no link at all with the sad gentleman of Rome. He was but a myth, a figurehead, leading their dreams as the unicorn led Antoine’s bonnie ship, a thing to be followed before a bright wind.
Tearlach called again for brandy, and the night was yet young.
When they left two days later, with Tearlach’s gold in their pockets, and Tearlach’s guide, O’Niall, at their side, for the port of Dunkirk, it was for Tearlach alone that they rode.
‘I will never know how he did it to us,’ Murdoch said rubbing his head, bemused. ‘I thought him a boor when we met, and a drunk after that, but, aye, when I left him, I thought him a king.’
Rory said, ‘You were that bit drunk yourself,’ but added softly, ‘When a man lays his faith on your shoulders, he is stronger than if he lays a yoke. But I am wondering now, what course he will drive us. O’Niall, what say you of all this?’
O’Niall shrugged wisely. ‘I couldn’t be saying, sir, and of course, I would be following into battle with yourselves, as quick as lightning, only the prince’s household must yet be tended, and surely am I not the man for that?’
‘Who else?’ said Murdoch with a grim smile.
‘Indeed,’ O’Niall said blithely. ‘But I assure ye, you will be in most capable hands.’
It was night when they reached the port, and they made their way uncertainly to the dim shore and harbour. But a moon rose, lighting the forest of ship masts, and gleaming off the cobbles of the quays. The ponies stumbled awkwardly down a steep wynd, and at its foot they rounded the corner of a thatched-roofed inn. A ship lay before them, with her sails furled like the wings of sleeping birds. The brilliant moonlight picked a sharp gleam off the spider webbing of rigging, and lit the tops of the three tall masts.
‘Yon’s a big bark,’ said Rory. ‘Will it be her?’
‘Wait now while I see the figurehead, I will know,’ said O’Niall. But Marsali had seen the figurehead. It was the unicorn, white and gleaming with its beautiful bowed head, and curled hooves, and the moon shining bright on the grim uncanny horn.
Then a clear voice shouted down to them, hailing them from somewhere above, and they twisted in their saddles to see. There was a figure sitting lightly on the railing, a man, slender and graceful. The moonlight shone on his dark hair, and on the dim cloth wrapped about his shoulders, fluttering in the sea wind, a highlander’s plaid.
‘Who’s yon?’ cried Murdoch in a loud, startled voice.
‘Why who else sir,’ said O’Niall, ‘but the Chevalier Ross?’
Antoine called then, softly from the railing. ‘Aye now, Marsali, are you liking my bonnie ship?’
Chapter Sixteen
A winter afternoon, dim with the early arctic dark, the Sea-Harrower rode before a west wind into the Minch. Barra lay off her larboard rail, a bleak grey shadow. She made for the Sound of Sleat, but would stand off the shore until morning; her sanguine French captain would not toy with the waters of the Western Isles.
Marsali wrapped herself in a tattered French shawl, gift of Rory’s thievery, and made her way with determined boldness to the cabin in the forecastle that was Antoine’s home. She had not been within it this journey, and hardly, but for that glimpse of him on the railing, in Dunkirk, seen Antoine at all. He had kept aloof from them, dined alone, spoke to no one. Once she had seen him, standing alone in the bow, leaning on the rail, with her old MacKinnon plaid wrapped around him, like a shroud. She had not dared approach.
Now s
he dared, spurred by the nearness of land, and a final parting. She rapped on the polished door, and there was no answer. But it was not locked, she found, and with angry courage she flung it open and stood waiting on the threshold. There was no light in the cabin but that which drifted through the slatting across the ports. In the barred shadow, she saw Antoine, sitting at a table, with a game of cards laid before him, and abandoned. He was staring at nothing, and for long did not even turn. When he did, she stepped quickly within, shutting the door behind her, before he could bid her leave.
He gestured lightly with one hand, indicating a chair. ‘Mistress MacKinnon, I trust your journey has been comfortable.’
‘It has not,’ she said. ‘And what pray do I call you, now we’ve grown so formal, Milord Sainte Marie, or are you now the Chevalier Ross, that fine, faithful friend of the prince?’
He shrugged. ‘If he chooses to call me his friend, who am I to argue? But pray tell, what ails you, that your journey was so lamentable? I have placed my ship at the disposal of your friends and their cause, and all for your bonnie sake. How have we failed you?’
‘’Tis loneliness that ails me, lad.’
‘I left you a companion,’ Antoine said with another shrug.
‘You put me in yon cabin I shared once with Ishbel, now, with Rory MacLeod, with whom I share friendship and nothing else. He, being a gentleman, took himself off below, where the crew and my brother sleep.’
‘He may be a gentleman, but not a very bright one. ’Tis wet and cold away down there, I am knowing. Your bed is, as I recall, a kinder place.’
‘I had thought you’d forgotten,’ Marsali said with a slight smile. Her calm blue-grey eyes wandered across him, like he were a stranger. Then she said, ‘The plaid you wear has a most familiar look; what’s taken you to the highland style?’
He smiled for the first time, but his eyes were yet solemn, and Marsali saw him suddenly older, much older than she’d ever thought him. ‘It is cold in your north country,’ he said. ‘One bit of cloth is as good as another. Besides, once it belonged to one who was kind to me ‒ Wherever she is, I doubt she will begrudge it. ’Tis but a small comfort.’ He toyed with the fringe, looking down at his knees.
‘Antoine.’ He did not look up. ‘Antoine, I am pregnant.’
His head came up at once, and his wide, uncanny eyes met hers with a brief bright spark of joy. Then he looked away, to the maps on the wall beyond and said calmly. ‘Indeed now. And who is the father?’
‘The devil take you. It can be no other.’
He stretched his long arms elaborately, so the plaid fell away from his shoulders. His white shirt was the brightest thing in the dimming room. Outside there was a rumbling splash, as the ship struck a large swell. ‘The sea is getting up,’ he said calmly. Then he added with a light callous smile, ‘Och well, if you’re fortunate, it will look like me.’
‘God preserve you. Is that all you can say?’
‘First the devil, then Himself, make up your mind, lass, they’ll not both have me. What else shall I say? I offer my congratulations, is that better?’
‘But what of me, what am I to do with your little gift?’ He looked at her blankly. ‘Why, whatever women do. You’ll suckle it and wipe its arse, I fancy. Do you not want to be a mother, Marsali? Do you not want my child?’ He looked at her with a dangerous narrowing of his strange eyes, under the black vivid brows.
‘Should I want a child before a husband?’
Antoine shrugged. ‘I fancy you’ll have both afore your days are done. You’re not without your charms. But mind now, if you do not want my child, that is another question … I am not liking that. No. Perhaps I will take it instead. Aye now, mind you treat it well, when it’s in your arms, lass. For I will know, and if you do not, I will come for it. I will come, one day, and take it away.’
He turned from her, with an eerie calm, and stared once more at his cards. He picked three from the heap and laid them carefully in a row. ‘Look yon,’ he said, ‘there is James.’ He had laid the king on the table.
‘Antoine,’ Marsali said, ignoring the card.
‘And look,’ he laid the rogue beside it, ‘here is Tearlach.’
‘Antoine, I have no words.’
‘Nor I, pretty cat. Look, here is myself.’ He had his hand over the card, and she glanced reluctantly. He raised the fingers slightly, so she could see and then dropped his hand again. ‘’Tis the fool, little cat. Good-bye.’ He closed his eyes, leaning back in his chair, her plaid wrapped loose about his waist.
She went stiffly to the door and opened it. ‘Marsali,’ he called.
‘Go to hell.’ She went out and closed the door.
She did not see him again until morning. The Sea-Harrower lay in Loch Nan Uamh, from whence, years past now, the prince himself had fled. Beyond, the mountains of the mainland rose grandly from the silver waters, into the mist. Marsali stood on the deck between two black cannon, and wept.
Rory came and put his hands on her shoulders and rested his face against her hair. ‘It is not so bonnie, when you think,’ he said. ‘It is only that it is ours.’
The deck was wet with a cold rain. The anchor held the ship, with her tentative bow ever turning to the wind, as if the beast there longed to be away once more to the open sea. All her canvas but the main topsail was furled and still. On the starboard side, the sailors were silently lowering the longboat. High in the shrouds, a solitary French boy of twelve watched, proud of the important task, for a sign of an ominous sail.
‘Surely there is no harm in our landing,’ Marsali said. ‘There is no war now with the French.’
‘No,’ Rory said. ‘But they are all over anxious to start another. Besides, what we do, we do best in privacy. Come, lass, our boat is ready. Have you bid our kind host farewell?’
Marsali shook her head. ‘Nor will I,’ she said.
But before Rory could answer, Murdoch, who had watched the longboat into the water, came up to them, hurriedly, and said, ‘Look yon.’
Antoine was striding down from the forecastle deck, his sword strapped about his waist, and her plaid wrapped with flourish about his shoulders. When he reached them he grinned broadly and bowed to her with; a sweep of his black hat and said, ‘I fancy a look at your grey and sullen land, lass. Could you by chance be showing me the way?’
The next day, they rode to within miles of Glentarvie before she spoke to him. She said then, only, ‘Why have you come? Your safety lies in Loch Nan Uamh, and your loyalty in a foreign land. ’Tis not for love of me, and those with me,’ she gestured to Rory and Murdoch riding side by side ahead, ‘mean little enough to you. What are you doing here, on the shores of Loch Arkaig, with the cursed highland rain yet falling down?’
‘I read my luck in the cards, lass; they said I must come. Where now is the cave we seek, for the rain is surely falling, and like to turn to snow, and I would like a shelter for my head. Last night was not to my fancy.’
Last night they had slept in the open moor, with a thin hazel wood for a roof.
‘It is not far from Glentarvie, and that four miles hence. We may shelter there, if you like, though there is scant a roofbeam upon it. But the cave is sound, if you fancy the luxury of sleeping on a bed of French gold.’
‘I can think of softer beds,’ he said quietly. ‘But we will gather that gold for all that, and maybe shelter in your cave. And by daylight, we would be wise to be away.’
Murdoch had dropped back and said, ‘There are houses we should visit on the way. If we are to gather support for the prince, we would be best to start at once. ‘Last time, things did not go so good.’
Then Rory joined and the two fell to debating, Rory being sure that the gold was of first importance and must be moved at once to Doctor Cameron in Stirling. ‘Then, lad, we can call up our loyal friends. You do not want to give them over much in the way of time. A day or two to think, and they’ll most like think better. Catch them in the fire of the moment, and get them riding, that
’s the only way.’ He grinned back at Antoine and said suddenly, ‘You now, sir, are a worthy addition. It is glad I am to see you among us. You may have taken my lass, but I’ll still not mind fighting at your side.’
Antoine smiled and acknowledged that with a touch of his hand to his white cockaded hat. Marsali looked from one to the other with a slow, bewildered fury. Then she looked down at the shaggy mane of the pony they’d begged, with the others, from a loyal house at Arisaig, and shrugged. Love was a game they all played with pleasure, but the game they loved was war. Such were men. She looked up then, and saw the ravaged eaves of Glentarvie, black against the winter sky.
They did not stop, but rode on beyond, purposeful up the old needle-silken path between the great Scots pines that shifted and groaned on the rocky hill, like the masts of a landbound ship. The path was narrow, and dangerous, following up a spine of rock that ended, Marsali knew, in a fearsome cliff. But below the cliff, in the grey licheny rocks at its side, was a cleft of darkness, and to that she led them, with a child’s long memory.
‘’Tis there,’ she said to Antoine, ‘below that great tree, where the lightning has struck.’
‘’Tis nothing,’ he said, ‘just a crack in the rock.’
But it was more; and she got down from the pony to show him. Below the great swaying pines the day was unnaturally dark, and the wind howled and whistled incessantly. Far out, glimpsed through the straight, narrow trunks, the silver waters of the loch flashed. The broken chimney of Glentarvie House was yet in sight.
Before the dark cleft, there was a black stain on the ground, ash, of a recent fire. ‘Tinkers,’ Rory whispered. ‘Travelling folk. Mind now, if they’ve found our little treasure, well yet have a sad surprise for Tearlach.’
Marsali shook her head. ‘The travelling folk would not come here. Nor is that a good fire, just a scorch on the ground. It will be children, playing forbidden games. Look there, at what they’ve left.’ At the foot of one great pine, tucked into the sticky, sap-run bark, were two scraps of red cloth, and a broken spoon, split up the handle, those mysterious treasures only children keep. ‘The bairns have been playing, that is all.’ Then she went forward and said, to Antoine, who was at her shoulder with his hand on his sword hilt, ‘Come!’
The Sea-Harrower: A Scottish Highlander Historical Romance Page 30