The Blood Tartan: Quest of the Five Clans

by Raymond St. Elmo

  Above waited a dark woods of webbed boxes, old barrels. Faint light from narrow windows, barred. Another set of steps. I swore inwardly, wanting to go slow through this rat-trap. But no sign of the girl. She’d hurried on. So I gritted teeth, hurried after.

  I lacked so much as a knife. If I fronted an enemy I would grapple and strike; then die. Brief sleep and the Feast of de Courcy had restored some strength. Not enough. All my chance of survival tonight lay in cautious scouting, slow steps through enemy lines. Lost now.

  I mounted the stairs to the floor above, grateful for the silence of bare feet. I stood within the night-silence of the Church of All Saints. I overlaid past memory with present dark view.

  Far older, smaller than the great Cathedral. A cold dark hall of a church, devoid of statue or station, a room lined with black-wood benches facing a stark cross. Elspeth worshiped here, far from the parish of our house. Each Sabbath waking at dawn, pressing sheet to breasts, shaking my shoulder, hoping the light of a rising sun would move my heart to faith. It moved me to put a pillow over my head, curse her in bad French.

  I yielded once. It went weary hours of stiff clothes, stern faces, solemn song. Though past the stricture of spiritual blither I felt a kindly interest among those gathered, warming as a fireside on winter’s day. They’d embraced young Miss Elspeth as sister, offered the hand-shake of Peace to the sinful Seraph. Goodly folk, eyes shining for the love of the Lord and one another. How they lusted to turn me from destruction! Alas, they had no better luck with my valet-pirate when she dragged him into the prayer-den.

  I’d taught El to read. I never pushed her to break with superstition, with scripture and hymn, all the stone and bone of belief. Her faith was too close to her heart. A part of her, how she fed bread to the birds, trembled at thunder, greeted strangers at the door.

  Was that arrogance? Patting her on her head, smiling at her beliefs? I considered the crucifix, entirely unmoved. Perhaps I should have treated Elspeth as equal. We could have read Voltaire, or argued the subtle disbelief of Blake.

  But no. Respect is simple enough. We leave each other to hear what music we can in the noise of life. This solemn stone box made a fine place to hear silence, and song, and the greeting of friends. There are far worse sounds, Seraph knows.

  And she succeeded in bringing Stephano and me here tonight. A final prayer answered, surely. I inhaled, hoping for a particle of her in the breath. I breathed old candle, old stone, old wood, yellowed hymnal; gray dust. Naught else.

  Far across the city, I listened to the bells of the Cathedral strike twelve solemn bronze sighs. Midnight. The dim figure of Flower flitted at a far corner where stairs spiraled to the belfry. She waved, then climbed, circling round and round. I cursed. Hunters lurk in high places, watching those below. I hurried after.

  Above waited a low garret, book-piled. Well-lit by window upon four sides. No assassin but myself. I sighed in relief. Above hung a bell, tail of a rope dangling. I resisted the idiot desire to tug it, just to set it clanging. Make all evil lurkers in the night startle in fear and guilt. I didn’t, it would have been suicidal idiocy. Yet tempting.

  Flower stood at a window, gazing out. She waved me to approach; General Flower surveying the field, wanting the opinion of the obedient adjunct. I sighed, and stepped over to peer down to the street.

  Night fog gave the view a seeming of distance. But a two-horse carriage waited before the church. Dark, windows curtained. The horse posed, half-asleep. The driver sat watching the night, straight backed, no slightest hint of sleep to his form. Even from far I knew that ugly face. Stephano. All the rest of the street lay in peace, under mist and moon.

  “That’s him,” I informed General Flower. “The field is ours.”

  We crept down the stairs, out the back of the church. I was not of a mind to hurry. The church-yard gave us cover of mist and head-stone; but then it offered the same to knives waiting for our throats. Flower took to walking behind me, mirroring each step, fascinated perhaps by my caution. Or just mocking.

  We reached the church gate, unlatched it, approached the carriage. The horses stirred. Stephano turned, studied us. I nodded. He took a flask from his coat pocket, leaned down to hand it to me. Our eyes met. He said nothing. Nor more did I. I opened the carriage door peering in for enemies. Empty, but for my best rapier, a fresh cloak.

  Flower prepared to climb in. I stopped her.

  “What about Brick?” I asked.

  She scrunched her face. “Who?”

  I sighed. “Boy. Wild hair. Pointed ears. Holds lamp. Waiting below street.”

  “Oh, him,” she scoffed. “He’s gone by now. We’ll meet again as we need. It’s what we do.”

  I hesitated. Wrong to leave a companion behind. Still, he had a light, a knowledge of the tunnels, and his weird family ways. So also the girl. Did she play any further part in my war? Of course not. I had serious business with banks, with papers of credit and identification. With killers and killings. I could not be taking children along. Best give a few coins, wish a quick god-speed.

  She stared at the horses, fascinated. Night-damp placed drops on her tangles, dew on rose-brambles. Her bare feet swept back, forth across the dirt, dancing to faerie music or mad heart-beat. I shivered, as if the rag-child before me rivaled the weighted significance of the stone church behind me.

  The horses neighed, anxious. This was not a safe place to linger.

  “Let’s go, then,” I told Stephano. General Flower and I climbed in.

  The carriage rattled loud and lonely over cobbles. We passed few others. I belted the rapier, drew it. We might yet be stopped by watchmen or brigands. I opened the flask Stephano gifted me. The whiskey-tang filled the carriage. I took a sip, allowed myself a second, gifted myself a third then capped it again. I did my best to enjoy, but in truth it tasted flat. After the battle-tension to reach this moment of safety, all wounds suddenly ached, and weariness presented Notice of Payment Due to the ledger-book of my body.

  I considered the last few days, sighed. I had lost my house, my influence, my reputation. Lost Elspeth. Lost friends. Seen my allies join with those I opposed. I’d achieve nothing but a continuation of breathe. My art, I suppose. Continuing to breath. With the help of strange allies, of a mad and useless sort.

  I considered Flower. I could just see her in the dark carriage, night-eyed that I am. She sat opposite me, poised and quiet as a cat in a midnight kitchen, watching bright-eyed all that moved beneath stove and cupboard.

  “I owe your family thanks,” I told her. “I shall pay with more than words, when I can.”

  “Hmm,” she replied. She shifted slightly. “Where are we going?”

  “I have no idea,” I admitted. “Somewhere Stephano will have chosen for the moment. I could ask but I’d rather lurk inside here for the while. Be a pity to be seen escaping.”

  “Hmm,” again. The carriage picked up speed. She muttered to herself in Gaelic.

  I decided then and there to learn the damned language. Elspeth refused to teach me Irish. She claimed it too holy a tongue for heathens from overseas. She called me that. Her Heathen from Overseas. But she named me Great-heart when we read Pilgrim’s Progress. Not flirtation nor flattery; but affirmation of some hidden worth she saw in me…

  Again I saw Elspeth lying dead. Last writing lesson done, in a final ink.

  “In your Gaelic. What does the word ‘Cainteech’ mean?” I asked the child in the dark before me.

  She sniffed. “Ach. One who talks all the time”.

  I sighed. No message there. A last tease, perhaps. Or a complaint. Better to have left some final word of love, or the name of who struck her down. Who struck her down. Who…

  “Mr. Talkative,” I whispered. Our name for Stephano. I tried to rise, but my limbs had gone cold as those of Chevalier de Courcy beneath his stone.

  I struggled, my turn to send a last message. Flower stared at me with great cat eyes. The carriage slowed. Lights were all about. Loud voices shouted
. I struggled to lift the rapier, it tumbled to the floor.

  “Run,” I whispered to the girl.

  Chapter 16

  Testimonies before the court

  I languished long weeks in chains and boredom, awaiting my hanging. The trial was guided by Black, and went as Black: quick, short and sly. I stood in the dock before Aldermen and Magister, admitted my blame in the warehouse fire, denying I had murdered my servant. The deaths of the guards in the burning of my own house were more problematic. I took credit for some, assigned the rest to flame and riot. I had no interest in explaining Lalena or the Bird Man to the honored court. I doubted I could explain.

  Occasionally I heard shouts of crowds in the streets. Perhaps for my release, perhaps for my hanging. Perhaps about the price of eggs. It can’t always be about me.

  Old friends testified I was a cheerful, violent sort, inclined to give myself airs. Green put in a good word for my intentions. In his view, I was a would-be Robin Hood, dashing through the night, perching on roof-tops to lecture the modern world on just payments and labor laws.

  Dealer and other merchants swore I’d always carried a heavy purse, an easy hand with coin. Black asked of the chamber from where came such wealth? The question drew concerned looks on the faces of the robed assemblage, half being my patrons. Black soothed these frowns by offering the theory that Rayne Gray was ‘an agitator from the colonies, paid by French and Spanish princes intent on destroying the prosperity of the kingdom’.

  My former valet Stephano grudgingly agreed that I was secretive, frequently in conversation with late night visitors of strange accent. He agreed I was violent, perhaps mad; but scoffed to believe these things shamed a gentleman. He complained of long speeches I gave denouncing the laws of king and city, fat Aldermen and corrupt Magisterium. But he stood fast to one point: I would never have harmed Elspeth. All the room was touched by that display of servile loyalty.

  His words fired my only attempt to knock down guards, leap for throats. I cleared the railing but failed to reach the dock where Stephano sat, his pirate’s face a scarred fist of scowl and fury. I was beaten and chained; he was excused from the stand.

  I made a decent speech upon the sentencing. I rose before the Council of Aldermen and the Magisterium in my rags and chains, feeling no great rage, no great sorrow. I considered the faces of friends, of former allies, of current foes; dinner table friends avoiding my glance, or returning it in defiance. All said, I sighed and judged this a lesser gathering than the solemn mad feast upon the stone of Sieur de Courcy.

  “Sirs, I know you. Most by mere face. Some by long association. Today you have judged me murderer, traitor. In return I judge you goodly people. Kind hearts, of the sort to give a hungry neighbor your aid, never revealed so that the joy of charity remains unspoiled by praise. Yet, you smile at laws that create a nation of starving neighbors.

  “Yours are the kindly eyes who see a wounded dog in the street, while others look away. You alone dare to take it in, warm it by your fire, feeding it scraps from your table. Yet you close your eyes to entire towns of fellow men sent to die in ditches, driven there by laws signed by your hands.

  “In short, sirs, you serve God in your humility, and the Devil in your pride. I have been a swaggering fool in daily life, and so come to the dock and a noose. Yet I have worked to free chained men, women and children. You, of good hearts and wise faces, have only labored to strengthen those chains. I, traitor, arsonist, killer, stand condemned today because I dared say aloud the words you forbid spoken, from your pulpits or your mirrors. The truth that the poor are not dogs in the street, playthings for your charity, cogs for your mills. They are your equals, your brothers, joint heirs with you to the wealth and freedoms of this kingdom.”

  Truly, I had not expected to speak so without being silenced. I observed scowls of anger, sneers of contempt, light yawns, slight nods. While Black smiled, as he had done across dinner tables and tavern benches while we parried and riposted, sampling argument and port. He knew the true worth of words. Debate, eloquence, speeches: ceremonial flowers to grace events with the proper tone.

  What words left to say? Flower and Bricks, and the tale of their strange family came to mind. I stared into the faces of my former friends and present judges, and wished they had attended the alley-way puppet-show, heard the strange tale…

  “Sirs, there is for every soul a memory of Eden. A time of lost glory. Not because we ever were happy, ever lived justly. But because each day we the people of this kingdom settle for a fallen world, a lesser world, when we have but to lift our heads, unclasp our fists, and step into a paradise where we are not rich and poor, king and subject, owner and the owned. We are free.

  “So I will hang. And you will feast. And the poor shall increase, for all you seek to starve them, ship them to far shores, herd them into work-prisons. They shall increase, till the deluge comes. And after it, the Eden we never had, but our hearts recall. Because the lost glory for which our souls ache is only the longing for a world yet to come.”

  Done. Quick and clean for such matters. My judgement upon them, and theirs upon me. I was sentenced to hang for a traitor. I did not protest the charge of treason. I was feeling rebellious of late. Down with the King, why not.

  I received four visitors of note.

  The first was Dealer. He declined to enter my cell, though I crouched chained by the neck to the wall. I could hardly strike unless he came foolishly close. Say within reach of a foot that I could swing out to trip him, pull him in to throttle with my chains… hmm. Perhaps he was wise to stay beyond the door.

  He spoke through the grate by which watchmen and the curious peered at the Chained Seraph. My guards made a good sum the first weeks. Penny a peek. After that curiosity tapered off. They requested I growl and howl a bit, make it more a show. I refused, till they began games with my daily meal. So I performed a decent bit of howl. I even added a chain rattle, my own touch. Still, the show declined in popular appeal.

  “I haven’t come to say I forgive,” declared Dealer. “I only say I intend to forget.”

  The declaration did not surprise overmuch. I considered its tangle of syntax and perspective. “You betrayed me to Black,” I pointed out.

  Dealer was silent a while. “No I did not,” he tried. The lie rang hollow to his artistic ear. So he added, “No, you betrayed me. You led your fox-hunt to my shop. They threatened all I have. You are a cheerful killer, Rayne. You speak of liberties and justices while cutting throats. But I have a, a higher purpose. I put that purpose before friendship.”

  I rattled chains, forgoing a howl. “You put reward first.”

  More silence. It surprised him that I knew of that, as I knew of his betrayal. He switched themes, trying the face in the mirror at a different angle.

  “So you may tell yourself. But I serve Art. You only served Death.”

  Served. I was of the past now. To friend and foe alike, no doubt.

  “What art in selling out a friend?” I laughed. It seemed comic enough. “You’ve made yourself bad art, man. Something to hide from sight, under a sheet of excuses. Or toss to the fire.”

  “So very self-righteous,” sighed Dealer. “A killer for pay. The killer of Elspeth.”

  “Tell yourself that,” growled the philosophical bear. “But can you trick your mirror to believe it? I remember you as vain and greedy. I don’t recall you being a fool.”

  “Believe it? I know it. She spied for Black. She betrayed you. You did what you do. Killed.”

  “Liar. Elspeth was loyal to me and mine.”

  Bitter laugh. “Black was as much a patron of my shop, as you. Talking of art and courtesans, he showed me his private collection. A grand portrait of his mistress, in style of Titian. Whites and pinks, red hair on gold silk. Green eyes. A bit younger, a bit plumper.”

  “Again, a lie.” I tested my chains. The left wrist band hinted a faint give in the rattle.

  Dealer muttered, more to himself than this side of the grat
e. “It used to infuriate me, seeing your bear-paws touching my porcelains, my crystal. Most of all, touching her.”

  “You never saw me touch her, man. You only dreamed of doing so yourself. I did touch her, as it happened. But Black never did. Nor will you.”

  There was silence awhile. No chains breaking. No words from beyond the grate. I could see no face. It occurred to me that Dealer was not there, had not been there. I was speaking to phantoms, debating shadows in my cell.

  I wondered if it mattered. I shook my chains and declared it did not. Let the court of my mind convene in formal hearing. Within this foul cell we shall extract the truth from phantoms, interrogate each ghost till testimony reveals the meaning and the message in the letters of flame and spilled blood, the point of the ash and the loss.

  “What reward did Black offer, old friend?”

  Silence. Perhaps Dealer debated denying any reward. Perhaps the shadows had no answer. But no, the man lurked beyond the door. And real enough to give the fraud up for lost.

  “He offered me your house. You were under proscription, Rayne. It was to be seized by the city. What choice did I have? It was to accept or watch my own shop burn. All my wares, all my porcelains and portraits. I would have saved for you all you had. Had you won out, as we all hoped, then I would have returned it every piece.”

  I the court thought that probably true. He would have returned all. He was a dealer, not a thief. But I did not picture him weeping if he found himself possessing the objects of my home.

  “Poor Dealer. You traded your soul for title to smoke and ash.”

  “Art is my soul, you butcher. I do not ask you to understand. You and Green always talked of changing the world by changing laws, adding more votes to the noise of decision. As Black did by building a world of machines and banks. None of you saw that what counts in life is meaning. Only art can reveal human meaning, to human hearts.”