Topping the rise, he saw that this was the case: soldiers who had been clearly encamped in the meadow were now scattered between Lauder and the bridge, where fighting was taking place. All the tents seemed to be empty or struck but those of the King, which were closed, with a squad of armed men surrounding them. They looked surprised as he brought his troop down: as he suspected, his advance riders had failed him. It didn’t matter. He reported to Buchan, his counterpart, spurring up towards him, and then both made with speed for the bridge. The guns were there. He wondered how the hell the warmongers had got them away from Tam Cochrane. He had three of Tam’s relatives among the lairds and their men at his tail. They would give him the hard time he deserved. But first: secure the bridge with his spears and his bows, and they could reduce the rest of the trouble at leisure. He set to gallop, with Rothesay Herald and his trumpeters blaring beside him. That would stop it.
It did. The struggle in the field was coming to a halt even before he thundered through it; and the barrier of men preserving the approach to the bridge let them through into the only quarter where steel was still flashing. The bridge was packed, the guns rising in the midst two by two, like water-horses stuck in the Ark. As in the field, though, the war party was now outnumbered by those intent on halting the advance. Among the fallen were men wearing the tool-satchels of gunners and carpenters. Angus’s men and the rest had made it their business to strike first at the foundations of the advance: to reduce the services without which it could not take place. To render useless the smiths and the weapons; to abstract the gold that was to pay for its provisions and wages; to corral the quartermasters and the team of experts whose business it was to handle and furnish the King’s pavilions, and the acres of canvas required by the army. All such men were huddled under guard, Buchan had said; Dod Robieson and Jamie Hommyll among them, and where Dod’s treasure chest had gone was anyone’s guess.
Darnley kept his horse moving in the throng on the bridge, his sword drawn, shouting orders. He was a big, fleshy man, from a military family, and knew how to fight and how to manage others. He left his men to deal with the hand-to-hand scuffles and didn’t interfere, even when some youth screamed his name; even when it was reinforced by a second voice. Then someone tugged at his arm and he saw the latter belonged to the King’s mediciner, Dr Tobias, who certainly should not have been there. Beside him were three other men, one of them with a strap round his neck, and one just rising, bleeding, from a series of blows. The injured man, the boy who had screamed, was the heir of a Napier, and thus remotely his kinsman. Darnley called in return, and sent over his men to extricate the four from their attackers. It didn’t take long. When they staggered out, he pulled the boy, as seemed only friendly, into the saddle behind him, while the other three were accommodated by others. It transpired that one of them, John, was a gunner. Ned Cochrane, leaning over, addressed him.
‘So? Where’s Big Tam, the deil?’
The gunner looked round. His neck was black with bruising, and his face was mottled and glistening with white and red bristles. When he spat his answer, it was to Darnley, not Cochrane. ‘Where he wouldn’t have been, if you’d come when you said. I hope you have an excuse you can sleep with, you bastard.’
‘Where is he?’ said Darnley. His voice was quiet. As the fighting died, his other man gathered about him.
‘Oh, ye haven’t far to look,’ said the man. ‘Just glance over the parapet. Mind you don’t get dizzy, of course. It’s a fair distance down to the water.’ His words, cut from Aberdeen granite, occupied the space where all the drubbing and shouting and clattering had been, and then stopped, so that you could hear the sound of the river, and the jingle and snorting of horses, and the murmur of massed men in the distance.
John Stewart of Darnley dismounted, leaving the boy, and walked to the parapet, and looked over.
Three dead men hung there, swaying lackadaisically in the updraught from the river. Being the heaviest, Big Tam Cochrane had an ox harness bound round his neck, and there was still a trace of surprise on the suffused face above it. To one side of him depended his argumentative kinsman by marriage, Leithie Preston. And on his other side, his throat sealed in perpetuity by the bite of a thong, hung Will Roger.
Chapter 44
All commoun offis suld the massour zou schaw,
And by this purs the customeris ze ken.
Befor the knycht ar situat sic men,
For to this knycht as capitane of the tovne
Thai suld obeye in absens of the crovne.
LATE THAT MONDAY, trembling with fury and weakness, James, King of Scotland, was brought to the Castle of Edinburgh and there delivered to its Governor, his half-uncle Atholl. His other half-uncles also remained with him. So did his captor and escort, John Stewart, Lord Darnley, with sixty-six chief men of his train, including Maxwells and Drummonds, Muirs and Douglases of Morton, a Semple, a Crawford, a Fleming, a Wallace, a Brown and three Cochranes. And, of course, more Stewarts than anyone, including Walter, the half-brother of Avandale.
So quietly was it done that no one realised at first that the King had come back. The horses were left outside the town: only the King and his immediate circle had been mounted, and their animals had been immediately sent out. The rest of the army had already disbanded. Knollys returned to Torphichen. Some leaders—Nowie Sinclair, the Prestons—went back to their castles, taking their dead. Some had set out for their properties in the south, including Alexander Home, grandson of the bailie of Coldingham, sweetened beforehand by Huntly, who had lands down there by Gordon, of which Alex Home was now bailie for life. Others went east, to Haddington, the traditional muster-point for the region between Edinburgh and the east coast. The eastern muster, which included Archie of Berecrofts, had not, of course, been asked to set out for Lauder. Its part had still to be played.
For Tobie, the ride north was wretched, almost as the long journey from Nancy had been grim. The sick man this time was the King, who depended on Tobie, and yet recoiled from him as a traitor. Nor was it a relief, having arrived at the Castle, to relinquish his patient to Andreas, for even Adorne’s physician was tainted, in the King’s eyes, by his presence in what was a prison. By then, the King was in no doubt that his nobles, paid by England and Albany, had turned against him, and that he might end as Johndie had, dead in the care of his doctors. At present, there was no safe way of comforting him.
Leaving the Castle, the participants had been briefly thanked for their part in the stratagem, and asked to remain out of public view until morning. Colin Argyll had already gone, having taken no part in the physical delivery of the King to the Castle. So far as the outside world was concerned, the King’s other ministers had never left Edinburgh, and were innocent of any complicity. The same was true of Nicholas and Adorne, who had been in the Borders, and nowhere near Lauder.
Amid all that farrago of half-lies, it seemed to be true that Nicholas had somehow followed Adorne back to Edinburgh. About to join Moriz and John at the Castle gates, Tobie had turned back, on an impulse, to confirm it. After all the hapless, miserable losses at Lauder, the return of Nicholas would be something to exult over, at least. It struck him, abruptly, that Nicholas himself would not yet have heard about Lauder.
As he had hoped, John Stewart of Darnley had the information he wanted. Nicholas was back. He had had business in Kelso. Since it was no longer private, Darnley mentioned, regretfully, what de Fleury’s concerns at Kelso had been.
For a while, Tobie stayed in the Castle, speaking to no one, and doing nothing in particular. Then he walked slowly down to the guardroom, where John and Moriz were waiting.
They looked angry and anxious. John said, ‘So, what? Couldn’t you find out? Has something happened to Nicholas?’
‘No. He’s here,’ Tobie said.
John said, ‘Well, where? We ought to find him. I don’t want him hearing the news from just anybody.’
‘The news?’ Tobie said. He felt ill.
Then Father Moriz
said, ‘Of Lauder. Of the death of his friends. Tobie? What is wrong? What have you heard?’
Tobie looked at him. He said, ‘Darnley just told me why Nicholas didn’t come back with Adorne. He has been at Kelso all night.’
‘Kelso?’ said John. Moriz was silent, but he had taken his crucifix unthinkingly in his fingers.
‘Kelso Abbey,’ Tobie said. ‘Simon and Henry de St Pol both died yesterday, drowned in the Till during a skirmish. Nicholas brought them away, and carried them both to the Abbey. They are still there.’
‘And Henry?’ Moriz said. His fierce face was drawn. Of course, Moriz knew. He was one of the few people who knew. John did not.
John’s mouth had opened. He said, ‘Nicholas was coming from York. How could Simon be there, on the English side, at the same time? No one was supposed to know where Nicholas was crossing.’
‘Except Adorne,’ Tobie said suddenly. ‘Adorne was on the Borders,and knew. If someone arranged this, I am going to find him and kill him.’ Then he broke off and said, ‘But, dear God, that is the least of it.’
Father Moriz closed his eyes. He said, ‘To Nicholas, certainly. This, to Nicholas, is more than the death of a handsome man, and a … beautiful stripling.’
John said, ‘I suppose he’ll never find out, now, whether he was Simon’s son. It will stop Julius’s prying, at least.’
‘It hasn’t,’ said Tobie. ‘This very afternoon, apparently, Nicholas knocked him off the steps of Kilmirren House, and kept at his throat all the way down to the Nor’ Loch. Julius has been put to bed in the Canongate, and Nicholas has been removed from public view by his disapproving superiors. He isn’t at home.’ He sneezed. It felt like a cramp in the vein of his heart.
‘Bless you,’ said the priest gently.
Tobie took out his kerchief and blew his nose. He couldn’t remember when he had last felt so sick, or so helpless. He said, ‘So you see, we have nothing so momentous to tell Nicholas, have we? Nothing, by the divine pity, so terrible as the darkness he is walking through now.’
FAR DISTANT FROM the mishaps that beset every grand plan, the complex strategy of the King of England’s campaign unfolded: half evolved by its own leadership, and half dictated by changing circumstances, which, however exasperating, were proof of a Scottish incompetence of truly marvellous proportions. By the evening of that same Monday, the memorable twenty-second day of July, it was known to the English command that the advance against them had stopped. That, for some shameful reason, the King of Scotland’s army had revolted at Lauder, and had refused to march further south. An hour later, and they heard that it had disbanded.
To Sandy Albany, hedged about with English magnates, the news was pure bliss. ‘They refused to fight me! The people want me! Now we can march!’
Smiling, Dickon of Gloucester agreed. Now they could march. Not (had he not mentioned?) across the entire Border, but across the eastern part of it, certainly, where Sandy’s loyal supporters were to be found; leaving a good, solid siege in place at Berwick, just in case anyone thought of relieving the town. But with what fervour the rest of the army would pour over the frontier on a front as far west as Coldstream and, marching in parallel, would leave their mark upon all those disaffected rich regions where lurked Sandy’s enemies, the Homes and the Sinclairs and the rest. Upsettlington would feel their displeasure; and Hutton Hall and Kimmerghame, and Auchencrow, and all the places belonging to Coldingham Priory. He was sure Sandy would agree that they might find a good few acres of crops and inflammable buildings round Coldingham Priory.
In private, with Percy and Dorset, Stanley and Woodville, the Duke did not disguise his true feelings. ‘These giddy, lamentable Scots! A cowardly army, and a King so weak that he cannot control it! So what now? He is under arrest in his own Castle. We can neither fight him nor treat with him.’
Dorset said, ‘We could enter Edinburgh and starve them out of the Castle. We have twenty thousand.’
‘We have three weeks,’ said Neville. ‘Then the money runs out. And the supplies.’
Dickon grunted. Percy said, ‘Is it possible …’
‘What?’
‘Is it possible,’ said Harry Percy, ‘that this is deliberate? That they know how short a time we can stay, and have removed the King for that reason?’
‘How could they know?’ Gloucester said. ‘The only one who knew all our intentions was the Burgundian, and I am assured that he drowned in the Till.’
CANNILY PROTECTING THIS particular asset, Master Secretary Whitelaw permitted Nicholas to sleep until the night was half over, and then sent for Gelis, his wife, who had not been allowed to see him since his return from York. By that time she knew, as Nicholas did not, what had happened at Lauder, having given beds to three of its warriors. Coming to Whitelaw’s, she left John and Moriz but brought Dr Tobie, who chose to remain tactfully out of Nicholas’s room until called, sitting on an uncomfortable chair and falling asleep from time to time, neck askew.
Had he been there, he would have seen nothing of intimacy, none of the fever that had marked other reunions. When Gelis entered, Nicholas had exchanged his bed for a chair, and was standing beside it, wrapped in a robe. When she crossed to him, he touched her elbows, drawing her close for his kiss, and then set her as gently apart. His face was open and grave and quite steady. ‘Cry mercy,’ he said. Be kind. Be guided.
She said, ‘Andro described it all. There is nothing you need to say, unless you want to. Or only one thing. Adorne says someone betrayed you?’
‘It was going to happen,’ he said, ‘whether someone betrayed me or not. It isn’t important. Gelis, I know you are concerned, but I should be a poor pupil if I ran crying from this. I can carry it.’
‘I think you can,’ she said. She touched his face, and he took her fingers and kissed them, but did not keep them. She said, ‘We all can.’
She tried to speak with conviction. She, too, had learned patience. She had learned how to keep her afflictions to herself, as he did. She had also learned to give up her privacy sometimes, because it bore too hard on others. But he had to think of that for himself.
She said, ‘There is only one thing I want to say. Don’t blame Simon. Don’t blame yourself. I have never seen anyone work as hard as you did to redeem Henry, but I don’t think you could or maybe even should have succeeded. And don’t imagine that you have failed Katelina. She made the wrong choice. She didn’t give you a chance to recognise or rear your own son. She committed you both, out of foolishness, to a deception. If you can forgive her, then you must forgive everyone, including yourself.’
‘Everyone?’ he said. ‘No. I know what you mean. Let’s leave it at that. Thank you. I knew you would say something wise.’ His eyes rested on hers, and she returned his gaze. She couldn’t tell what he was thinking. She was taking such care that her breathing kept lapsing.
There was another chair. She slowly sat, and after a moment he resumed his own, with a smoothness that she could see was deliberate. I have recovered. And, behind that, I can ride. I can leave. I am sorry.
She supposed then that the shutters had closed; and that she no longer had the chance to tell him anything else. Instead, he said suddenly, ‘What does Jodi think?’ He had used the little name, to keep the old man out of the conversation.
She had not lost the chance. She didn’t know whether to take it. Her throat aching, she answered his question. ‘Robin explained that soldiers die, and Jodi is thinking about it. We all have to do that, about different losses.’
As she had learned to read him, so he read her. She said only that, and saw his face change. He said, ‘Something else has happened? Something at Lauder? Tobie?’
She spoke quickly then, as he would have done. ‘Tobie is downstairs. John and Moriz are at home. No.’ And as he stared at her, she said, ‘There was trouble over the guns. Big Tam lost his head, and Leithie stood up for him. Anyone who got in the way was liable to be attacked. The army was defying the King. Men were frightened.’
‘Gelis?’ he said. ‘Tam Cochrane and Leithie Preston are dead? And who else?’
‘And Will Roger,’ she said. ‘He loved the King. You risked your life in York. He did the same, going to war. You happened to survive, and he didn’t.’
All her concern was for him. The only measure she had of Roger’s importance was the measure Nicholas gave it. She should not have been surprised when he looked at her and said, ‘What have I to do with it? The world has lost him.’ Then he said, ‘Tobie is here?’
‘I’ll call him,’ she said.
It was the correct decision. The least sentimental of men (as he said himself), Tobie delivered an accurate account of the day’s events with speed and belligerence and then proceeded, encouraged by Nicholas, to seek and identify the truth of what had led to the hangings. For, of course, Tam Cochrane had not been killed solely because he had blindly obeyed the King’s desire to send his guns to defend Berwick. He was killed because his particular skills and abilities were essential to and penetrated every aspect of Scottish affairs, including the shipping of the necessary materials for war and for peace. And from that had stemmed the reciprocal exports, of salmon and timber, whose success had aroused jealousy against all its agents, including Leithie Preston who, like others, had so notoriously traded with England.
And there was much more, of course, to dislike about large, rich men who came from your neighbourhood and whose father you had known. Mint masters were casters, and casters were gunsmiths, and gunsmiths, like Will Goldsmith the Halfpenny Man, employed Big Tam Cochrane to build their stone cunzie houses and import the skills and tools and even the metal they needed to mint their bloody black money, which had ruined the kingdom; in return for which, they supplied guns. Gibbie Fish of Berwick used to work with Tam Cochrane. No wonder Tam Cochrane wanted to hang on to Berwick.
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