From him, they learned that Fat Father Jordan was still with Bel at his High Street house, where Bonne had joined them for Christmas. Nicholas had avoided the subject of Bel since he had met her in Stirling and again at the Castle. It made Gelis uneasy. She would have called on her valiant friend, or sent a message, but Nicholas had asked her if she would wait. What for, she didn’t know, but she gave in, as they all did. He was carrying enough. Keep to essentials.
They knew, from the thin stream of reports from the Council’s agents, of the reinforcements at Dunbar, and the land gifts with which Sandy was rewarding his new adherents, notably the bailie of Gordon, Alex Home of Home, damn the man. They also brought back lurid rumours of plots against the King’s life. One of these, with the horrifying facility of the Fotheringhay treaty, reached the ears of the King, who instantly commanded the dispatch of batches of letters begging armed help. The letters were written, but remained with Whitelaw unsent, while Andreas and Conrad prepared soothing draughts. The aim was to avoid confrontation, not to provoke it. As for the person who had left the Fotheringhay treaty, or spread the rumours, no one could trace who it was.
The physicians had other patients: Chancellor Laing was succumbing to his long fever, and Dunkeld, taking his duties, was poorly himself. It was as well that, discreetly meeting in the Cowgate or the High Street, Avandale and Argyll and Scheves and their burgess supporters were in vigour. Since confirmation of the peace between France and the Archduke Maximilian, Wattie’s French trip had been postponed. There was something else. Edward of England was not only furious with France, he was ill. If he was mortally ill, his brother Gloucester wasn’t going to linger about northern England, waiting to encourage Albany.
About this point, as January moved through its second week, Julius became restless. ‘Shouldn’t we know whether Albany has heard about that? Shouldn’t we make sure he knows that he can’t count on English help after all?’
It was one of the times that Nicholas was there. He said, ‘Yes. How?’
‘Let them capture a messenger.’
‘Hard on the messenger.’
‘Send them word of it direct.’
‘They wouldn’t believe it.’
John said, ‘They would if Julius took it. He’s well known to Liddell.’
‘All right,’ said Nicholas. ‘So long as you pay his ransom. I’m not raising it.’
Julius reddened. He said, ‘I’m not proposing to get myself captured, thank you. But I’d write the thing, and put it in the hands of someone local whom Liddell trusts. I could get near enough Dunbar to find someone.’
‘Well, that’s all right, then,’ Nicholas said. ‘But in fact we can manage without. I hope to tell Sandy myself fairly soon. We’ve written to him suggesting a meeting.’
There was a silence. Talks; bribes; dialogue through intermediaries: they had all been discussed, but foundered on the issue of safety. Sandy would never place himself in danger of capture and sentencing. And the King’s agents would hardly come unsupported, and risk death or capture for the King.
Tobie said, ‘It’s a trick? You’ve found some way of trapping Albany?’
Nicholas said, ‘No. It’s the suggestion of a very brave man, willing to speak for the King, unsupported. Do you remember when Pope Pius visited Scotland?’
So that was it. Gelis said, ‘Before he was Pope. When he survived a near-wreck, he kept his vow to walk barefoot to the shrine of St Mary at Whitekirk. Ten miles, he said. Tobie’s uncle not being as brilliant as Tobie, his feet were never the same.’
‘A healing well and a very fine church,’ Nicholas said. ‘Also a large number of cabins for pilgrims and others. The Abbot of Holyrood holds his courts there: it comes under the regality of Broughton, which makes Archie Crawford little King of Whitekirk. Adorne is proposing to walk from the Abbey kirk and cloister of North Berwick, unarmed, without servants, and meet Sandy at Whitekirk. Adorne will apologise for the King, excuse him on the grounds of sickness, and ask Sandy to come back on the same terms as before, and with no charges against him. He will also explain to him what has happened abroad, and why he can expect no help from England. He might even offer to have the King himself come, if Sandy asks.’
‘Would he?’ said Father Moriz.
Nicholas said, ‘Probably not. But it might help to safeguard Adorne’s life in the meantime.’
John said, ‘But it’s a trick. The King hasn’t relented. You say you talk to him daily, but he’s still enraged.’
‘We all talk to him,’ Nicholas said. ‘He will come to agree, when he is calm. Until then, we are fending off war. We’re not trying to trap or cheat Albany. He can stay away if he likes: perhaps he will. Or he may want to come with a fully equipped cavalry troop. Regardless, Adorne will be there, and on foot, and unarmed. There will be no hidden soldiers. If Albany loses his head, or takes bad advice, he may simply kill the King’s envoy. But it would be a very bad move. Think how bad.’
‘So Adorne is really safe?’ Gelis said. She spoke like an enemy. She knew Nicholas.
Father Moriz looked at her and then back to Nicholas. He said, as a statement, ‘You are going with him.’
Nicholas was still holding Gelis’s eyes. He said, ‘Yes. We all have a better chance if I go. Adorne, and Albany, and the country.’
He didn’t add anything. He didn’t ask her forgiveness, or say he didn’t do such a thing lightly, or explain at all. She understood.
No one spoke. She supposed they were all struggling with the same realisation. Then Julius said, ‘You’re mad.’ He sounded resigned. When he continued, it was with mild decision. ‘All right. They’ll kill you, but they might hesitate if they’ve heard from me beforehand. I’m still going to send Liddell that letter. I’ll even add, if you like, that you really will be unarmed.’
Tobie drew breath. Nicholas said, ‘What’s got into you? You just want to get out and build snowmen. All right. But if they capture you, I’m not paying more than I won off you last night at cards.’
John released his breath. He said, ‘Christ. That’ll get about one finger back.’
‘Well, why not?’ said Nicholas illogically. ‘The Pope turned his toes in for nothing.’
Later, he got hold of Julius.
‘You don’t need to go. Look, I’ve chosen this country, you haven’t. If all this becomes hopeless, you can go back to Germany, or give Gregorio or Diniz a hand.’
‘How exciting,’ said Julius.
Nicholas sighed. ‘Sugary pastries? Embroidered doublets? No Bonne?’
‘So why don’t you go back?’ Julius said.
He tried to think. He tried very hard to think of an answer that Julius would understand. In the end he just said, ‘I don’t know.’
JULIUS LEFT. ALEX Home of Home, to the general amazement, sent a messenger to the Netherbow Port asking leave to enter with his company of kinsmen and friends. It seemed that he had become disenchanted with Albany’s chances, and wished to return to the King. The King, his emotions assiduously tended by his doctors and friends, agreed to see him, forgave him, and promised him Chirnside in Berwickshire, which at that moment belonged to the Duke of Albany.
John said, ‘Julius must have got his letter in, and they believed it.’
Nine days later, they had stopped joking about Whitekirk, since the insubstantial proposal had suddenly solidified. Albany had replied to the approach to negotiate. He had accepted the rendezvous and expressed no antipathy to the envoys, who were to be the Baron Cortachy, the merchant Nicholas de Fleury and (a late suggestion) that well-known exponent of papal diplomacy Prosper de Camulio, the most reverend Bishop of Caithness. The date was to be Thursday, the twenty-third day of January, three days hence.
The day the reply came, Nicholas went and sat with Robin, away from the others. Recently, they had not spoken much to each other. Now Nicholas said, ‘About North Berwick.’
Robin flushed. He said, ‘I knew you would have a plan. You are bringing her out?’
&nbs
p; Kathi was still at the Priory, with Margaret and Rankin. It should be safe. It was on the coast, and at least five miles from Whitekirk. If Robin required further reassurance, he might recall that Jordan de Fleury was there.
Nicholas said, ‘I meant to have her brought back before, but the weather’s too rough for a boat, and I won’t risk it by land. But I did make a contingency plan.’
The spark had returned to Robin’s gaze. ‘Naturally.’
‘Yes. Mick Crackbene has been there from the beginning, with a squad of ten men. I’ll take a few more. There are also relays of couriers. Adorne and I go to North Berwick on Wednesday, and will be with her until we set off for Whitekirk next morning. We shan’t take the soldiers to Whitekirk, but if we don’t manage to return, the Priory could withstand an assault almost indefinitely. I don’t think it will get one. It would be ridiculous for Sandy to attack a Cistercian foundation and have all the rest—Melrose, for God’s sake, Newbattle, Coupar Angus, Haddington, Culross—turn on him. He’d lose all the noble families who support them, and it’d destroy him at Rome.’
Robin said, ‘I am not sure if I believe you, but I forgive you, for Jordan is there. Did Kathi know there might be some danger?’
‘She may have suspected.’
Robin’s eyes were still clear. ‘Yes. She took Margaret and Rankin, but she left Hob for me.’ He waited. ‘You must know that we think something is wrong. With you, not with the others.’
‘Yes. I know,’ Nicholas said. ‘If I don’t come back, you will know what it is.’
‘But not before?’
‘No. Everyone should have a last chance,’ Nicholas said. ‘And this, I can tell you, is Albany’s.’
He was not sure, then, whether or not he would see Robin again before he set out with Adorne. They had parted so often, all of them, that the grand farewell (as he had tried to say to his son) would have been trite. Nicholas knew what Robin felt: the extent of his love and gratitude had never been hidden. Nor had the truth. ‘Go,’ Robin had said, on one such occasion. ‘Come back, if God wills it. And if God offers a choice between my fate and death, then choose as I should have done.’
Nicholas had shaken his head, but said nothing. He felt the pain still, as if the earth had shown him its gold, and then, cracking further, the price of it. The price and the value of the high ground. The value of valour and the cost of pride, of the kind that had lost him eight years. The value of loyalty, honesty, patriotism. And how to divine when the price was too much.
Nicholas left, with Anselm Adorne, and Bishop Prospero, and the retinue which they would abandon at North Berwick. The day before they departed, Adorne rode to Linlithgow, where he spent some time privately in the church, before going to his own house to speak to his nephew Sersanders and to see his daughter Efemie. Bel of Cuthilgurdy had come to visit her for a few days, as she sometimes did when the old man was unusually difficult. It was good for the child; Sersanders did not mind, and Adorne himself had grown fond of the small, grey-haired lady, who was only four years older than himself. She came down to see him ride off, hoisting the child for his kiss, and setting her down to feed oats to his horse, her small palm spread dutifully flat. The child had no fear of horses, or of people, and had known only love. He could not regret having decided to see her.
Nicholas cancelled everything, that last night, to spend time in his chamber, talking, and then ceasing to talk with the angry rebel he had married, who had become this clever, beautiful, self-contained person, admired by women and men who did not suspect that in private, she was still clever and beautiful, but not self-contained in the least. Or perhaps—smiling at him broadly some mornings—the denizens of the Floory Land did guess, although on what evidence he couldn’t quite see. And Gelis, if she could have told him, did not.
Nicholas left, with Adorne, the next day. Four hours later, a Sinclair man raced into Edinburgh with news. It was said—by a fisherman you could usually trust—that a party had left Albany’s castle to sail to the south. He said it included Angus and Liddell and Lord Grey, and its purpose was to assure the English King of Albany’s loyalty, and to ask him for three thousand archers.
It sounded feeble enough. As an appeal, it would almost certainly fail. That, however, wasn’t the issue. The fact was that the Whitekirk meeting tomorrow was pointless: Albany had only agreed in order to squander some time.
‘So we send to tell Adorne to come back,’ said Will Scheves, at the rushed meeting called to consider the news.
‘Do you think so?’ said Avandale. ‘He should be told, of course; gallant friend, it is disappointing to say the least. But why don’t we suggest he go to the meeting as planned? Albany may not trouble to come. Or he may come, out of curiosity, but defer a decision. If his delegation has just left, it may be three weeks before it returns from Westminster. Sandy won’t want to close every bolt-hole before then, nor would he be wise to harm Adorne. The meeting should be safer than we expected.’
‘You have the truth of it,’ said Colin Argyll. ‘Leave the plan as it is, but have someone ride to North Berwick now and tell this to Adorne. He can decide on his tactics tonight, and set out for Whitekirk, if he thinks it expedient, tomorrow. Whom shall we send? Shall I go?’
‘Colin, you forget you are indispensable,’ said Drew. ‘Why don’t we ask Alex Home to go to North Berwick? With Chirnside under his belt, he ought to be willing.’
‘And having deceived Albany, he ought to be vigilant. Casting his left eye askance like a tunny. Aeschylus,’ offered Master Archibald Whitelaw, holding his spectacles up to the light.
THAT SAME AFTERNOON, a number of visitors called upon Jordan de St Pol at Kilmirren House, benefiting from the brief absence of Bel, his formidable hostess, in Linlithgow. The Preceptor of Torphichen stayed merely to exchange the news of the day, but other calls were more personal. The Mallochs, father and son, came to express friendly concern for Monseigneur, since the tragic deaths of his son and his grandson. His handsome grandson, so missed by Muriella.
The Borderer chatted pleasantly with the old man, while his son renewed his acquaintance with the young demoiselle Bonne von Hanseyck, so happily discovered to be residing in the same house. Naturally, there was a hired chaperone, but the demoiselle, rescued from atrophy, made him positively laugh at her accounts of the Charteris household, and Sister Monika’s Cistercian tattle.
Bel, returned rather wistfully from Efemie’s tight clasp at Linlithgow, found the visitors gone, and the old man mysteriously missing as well, having ridden out with his servants, Bonne said. It was then mid-afternoon, and the short winter day close to its ending. Bonne could tell her no more of her host, but was willing to regale her with an account of all the events she had missed. She was glad, she observed rather thankfully, to have Mistress Bel’s company again.
‘Aye,’ said Bel. ‘Well, I’m just away again, lassie. I need to call on a friend with a message. But I’ll be back for my supper, so get the board out, and the pieces, and I’ll play ye for who gets the box of marchpane I was given by Saunders.’
It wasn’t pleasant, when already chilled from a ride, to step out into the gloom of the High Street and slide and squelch through the filthy snow down through the Netherbow to the Canongate. But the steps of the Floory Land were all swept and dry, the lantern powerful, and the big windows lit and warm-looking. As soon as the door was pulled open, Bel could hear the busy, familiar voices inside. Andro Wodman came out of a room and stopped, looking surprised and then pleased, but Bel didn’t smile back.
She said, ‘I’ve come for advice. Alex Home is on his way to North Berwick, and that great fool Kilmirren has joined him, and maybe Knollys and Malloch as well. It doesn’t sound right. I don’t like it. I jalouse Adorne and Nicol and the rest of them could do with some help.’
They heard her out, and then sent for their horses. She thought, to begin with, that it was just going to be the men of the Land—Tobie and John and Andro and Moriz and Archie of Berecrofts, with maybe the doctor, A
ndreas. But then, at the last minute some news came, and suddenly there were others as well: the Earl of Huntly, for example, with a lot of his men, and others who had lands south of the Forth as well as in the north-east. And merchants and agents who had dealings with Adorne and Nicholas, like Dob Cochrane and Henry Cant, and Sir Jock Ross and Tom Yare.
It worried Bel, for you couldn’t go by informers, and to attack Whitekirk would destroy all their plans. But they said they weren’t going near Whitekirk: they would just make sure the Priory was all right.
She saw them off, and then went in with Clémence to sit beside Robin and wait. She thought about Malloch, and she thought about Knollys, former Rector of Whitsome, which was halfway between Chirnside and Upsettlington. Will Knollys and one David Ramsay had both been Procurators for the Priory of North Berwick, in the days when the Prioress was a Ramsay. And Jordan de St Pol had gone off with the same princely warrior-monk Knollys, whose bastard son Robert had married the cousin of young Johnnie Ramsay whom Darnley, they said, had saved with some reluctance at Lauder. Knollys, a former chaplain to Hearty James, Earl of Buchan, who was now in Dunbar, supporting Albany.
She thought about it all for some time, and then, presently, sent to tell Bonne that she was staying the night in the Canongate, and would see her tomorrow. It was then more than six hours after noon, and pitch dark.
IMMURED IN THE Cistercian Priory of St Mary of North Berwick under the rule of two Prioresses, Katelinje Sersanders would, under normal circumstances, have devoted her first week or so to observing, with joy, the silent power struggle between the two ladies: the dainty steel femininity of the resident, Elizabeth Forman, in opposition to the commanding personality of Euphemia Graham, her elderly semi-royal cuckoo from Eccles. The Master and chaplain, she gathered, had both promptly absconded to quieter foundations, and the nuns on each side, much reduced, had been in some disarray until a modus vivendi was found and the house settled down to a régime remarkably close to that of a double-sex monastery. Jordan, who was not effusive with Kathi, nevertheless showed from time to time that he, too, appreciated the joke. He was teaching Margaret to draw.
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