Black Douglas (Coronet Books)

by Nigel Tranter

  A volley of swift-fire and furious obscenity greeted them, shrill, venomous, vehement. Here indeed was the man they sought.

  A smoking, flaring pitch-pine brand was brought, to reveal the small, shrunken, twisted figure on the litter, sitting up under plaids, fully clad but wearing a night-cap on his over-large head. But though he might have seemed a figure of fun, none thought to smile. Laughter, other than his own cackle, came but unreadily in the presence of this man, Guardian of the King and principal Justiciar of the realm. He was not cackling now; indeed the sibilant stream of vituperation that issued from Alexander Livingstone, then, had some affinity with the hissing of a striking snake in its sheer virulence. Even Will Douglas had to draw on his hardihood to withstand the threat of it, unflinching.

  “Alexander Livingstone,” he said slowly, flatly. “Douglas has come for you. At last.”

  The other’s shrill tirade came to an abrupt stop. For moments there was silence, save for the hissing splutter of the torch. Then the little man spoke, almost conversationally, in his normal squeaking voice. “Hech, hech — so it’s the Douglas laddie again! Uncivil. Aye, uncivil, I call it, breaking in on an auld done man’s sleep, this way. Awa’ wi’ you, now. I’ll see you the morn, my lord — no’ now.”

  “You’ll see more than me, the mom! You’ll see six thousand Douglases, sir! Surrounding all your camp. But meantime, see you me. And my brothers. You’ll mind, once I said to you that you would not treat me as you treated my cousin, the Earl William? Him that you murdered, with his brother. Because I had five brothers — and I had not brought them with me, for you to seize. So that each could be Earl of Douglas after me. Now, Alexander Livingstone, at long last I have brought them. They are all here. Come for you! Jamie. Archie. Hugh. Johnnie. Harry. You have run your bloody course, man. This is the end of Livingstone.”

  The other’s quick throaty breathing rasped. He did not speak.

  “I could run you through, here and now. Or hang you from the nearest tree. It would be just, well-earned. But you have a liking for trials, have you not?” Will was speaking now, forcefully, dark eyes narrowed, fists clenched. “You are the Justiciar! Aye, you gave the Earl William a trial. Of a sort. And his brother. Before the King. And then murdered them. Then the axe. Your guests. So be it. You shall have your trial. Before the same King. You and yours. And then, again, the axe! Not clean steel, now. That I promise you — on the word of the Black Douglas!”

  “Word! Aye, words! Just words — loud, vaunting words!” Livingstone all but screamed, his little, lined ferret’s face contorted with hate and fury. “By Christ God — you can do nothing against me! Nothing’ Slay me now, if you dare, you braggart loon! For you’ll no’ do it after. I am still James Stewart’s governor. He’s no yet of age. I am Justiciar . . .”

  “And shall have your justice! You are taken, here, in open and frankest armed rebellion against the King’s Grace. In highest treason. I have waited for this, Livingstone, all these years. You I have now. Then it will be Crichton’s turn. Both the jackals! So prepare yourself. At first light, I, Lieutenant-General of this kingdom, take you bound to the King, and Council, at Edinburgh. You and all your brood. To face your assize.”

  “Words, I say! Vain belly-rumbling! . . .”

  “Enough of words, then.” Abruptly, almost savagely, Will swung on the others. “Hold him. As you value your lives! He raised his hand against Douglas! Hold him fast. And all his kin, his crew of sons and brothers and cousins. Bring them all before me, bound. You hear? Forthwith.”

  Pushing them all aside, his own brothers and friends, William, Earl of Douglas, strode out of that tent, into the night.

  Presently, indeed, they were all arrayed before him, in the light of blazing fires — Sir James, the heir, High Chamberlain, and captain of Stirling Castle; Robin, captain of Dumbarton Castle; John, captain of Doune Castle; Alexander, of Dunipace; David, of Greenyards; all sons. Robert, of Westquarter, keeper of Linlithgow; John, of Bonnytoun; William of Kilsyth; brothers. James Dundas of Dundas, son-in-law. And numerous kin less close. Lennox was apparently not in the camp; and though there were not a few Hamilton lairds, there were none close to James, Lord Hamilton himself. Will had intended to berate and harangue them. But suddenly he was tired, sick of them all, a man drained of anger, hate, of any emotion. After staring at them, at his blackest, for long moments, he shrugged and turned away.

  “Whelps, lacking the old dog!” he said. “Others can whip them. Hold them, fast bound. I shall sleep. But wake me with the dawn. We ride, with the sun, for Edinburgh . . .”

  James Stewart and James Kennedy, between them, lacked no resolution in this instance. The king had long years of bullying and harsh coercion to wipe out; and the Bishop had not forgotten ravaged Church lands in Fife, St. Andrews, and his famous cursing. And the Privy Council saw clearly on which side its bread was presently buttered; Lennox absented himself and only the Lords Hamilton and Gray spoke up for the Livingstones — and prevailed nothing. Sentence of forfeiture of all property, reduction from all offices, and final execution, was passed on the entire family.

  In the end, all were not slain, though not a few went to the block. That two of his sons should have been shortened by a head while old Sir Alexander himself escaped the axe, is perhaps typical of the course of justice in other eras than 15th-century Scotland; however, the old sinner was kept confined in the damp vaults of Blackness Castle, by the Forth, and his death undoubtedly hastened as a result, which was possibly a worse fate. Strangely enough, his eldest son managed to effect his escape from the same grim fortress, it was said with King James’s concurrence, and fled to the Hebrides. Many were the wonderings about this eventuality; but it was known that James Livingstone had amassed a large fortune, no doubt hidden away securely — and thereafter the monarch appeared to be much less straitened financially than formerly. But for the rest of the family, it was the end of the road. The Livingstones’ fall was of a magnitude and swiftness to satisfy almost all, even Margaret Douglas.

  Will Douglas himself took little or no part in this punitive process. His part was played. A moderately grateful monarch and Council bestowed on him three smallish properties of the vast forfeited estates, Blairmakkus, Ogilface and Culter, and these he passed on to his brothers. He found the taste of vengeance somewhat bitter on the tongue.

  PART THREE

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  THERE, in the vast and crowded salon, where five thousand candles in a hundred great glittering crystal chandeliers turned night into day and set the amoretti dancing amongst the archangels and saints of the lofty coved plaster ceiling — there, amongst the crowned heads and the cream of Christendom’s aristocracy, chivalry and beauty, in the Grand Salon of the Vatican Palace in Rome, Will Douglas took the two heavily-sealed packets which Rob Fleming had brought him, and turning into a nearby alcove, already filled by the statue of a beckoning naked nymph, there and then broke open one of the letters. Being the man he was, he chose to open first the one sealed with the arms of the Lordship of Balveny.

  “The couriers say that they killed nineteen horses bringing these from Scotland,” Fleming mentioned, at his back, his homely Scots voice, for all its concern, sounding reassuringly normal and reliable amongst all the high-pitched chatter and jabber around them.

  Smoothing out the stiff thick paper from its folds, Will knitted black brows to read Johnnie’s strong if uneven, angular script. Johnnie had never been the scribe of the family.

  At Threeve of July 9.

  Will I cunsal that you cum home. Al is not wel. The king is turned aganst Dugles I think. He has made Criton chancler agen, the Bp Kendy agreing wel. They say you are genral no mor. Your castel of Lochmabin is taken and thron doun. Also Crag Dugles is yaro, his Gce doing this his oun self. I gather much men but best you cum.

  Yr loving bro

  Jhon of Belvany.

  “The fools! The treacherous, damned fools!” Will burst out, smashing letter and fist against the nymph’s thigh
. “God preserve us from fools in high places! And rogues! I but turn my back! . . .”

  “Ill tidings, Will?” Fleming asked, anxiously.

  Will thrust the epistle at him, wordlessly. He had left Johnnie behind, in Scotland, as commissioner and representative, in charge of the far-flung Douglas estates and interests, Johnnie being perhaps the most vigorous, single-minded and able of his brothers, although only twenty. But here was work beyond Johnnie. Deadly work. Crichton again! . . .

  “James Stewart digs his own grave!” Fleming jerked. “What sort of king is this, who stabs in the back his own friends? And this Bishop! Churchmen I never trust! What does the Lady Margaret say? She has more wits than the Lord Balveny.”

  Will tore open the seals of the second package. Here was a longer letter, a deal more neatly written. It was also headed from Threave and dated two days earlier than Johnnie’s.

  My good lord,

  It is my hope that you are in good health and find the long journeying none too great weariness. It is now seven long months since you are gone, and for myself I weary for your return.

  Perchance that may be more soon than might have been, for I fear I must send you tidings but little to your liking. Much has gone amiss in this realme since you have left it. I misdoubted this embassage from the beginning, you will mind. It is most clear now that the Bp. of Sa. Andrews did envisage it but to get you furth of Scotland. With your friends. And now he has his way. His Grace well pleased, I vow. The more so with her Hieness now big with childe. You are like to be heire but little longer.

  His Grace has assumed the full rule and governance, declaring himself of full age, albeit he yet lacks ten months. So that all offices of the crown made in his minority do fall in. Bp. of Sa. Andrews is resygned and given the seales to that evil man and your enemy Crichton, who is now again Chancellor, and very chiefe with His Gce. Did I not tell you, my lord, that you should have dealt well with him long ere this? Now it may be ower late.

  His Gce declares now that he has no need for other General than himself. So it is that you are no more Lieutenant of this kingdom. That done, he declares that there is great skaith, robbery and violence done to honest lieges on your lands and by your representers, and that your brother Balveny does permit and condone these and so is in rebellion. Johnnie is less wyse than you are, God knows, and makes mistakes, but this charge is untrue. So His Gce has acted his own General and has struck at your castles of Lochmaben and Craig Douglas, raizing them bothe. What next he will do the good God knows. It is Crichton’s work, to be sure. Would that you were here.

  I pray you to send me word and your commands, for I esteem this matter gone beyond Johnnie. I constantly do seek God’s blessing on you, my lord, and send my true wifely devotion. I beg you give my sisterly affection to Jamie, for whom I also pray. Meg desires that I send you her duty. She sais that you should come home forthwith, for Scotland does have more need of Douglas than does His Holines.

  Margaret of Galloway.

  Will did not hand this letter to Fleming. Thrusting it into his silken doublet, he said, “It is worse. Worse than Johnnie knows. Seek me an audience of the Pope, Rob. To take our leave. We ride tomorrow.”

  The other sighed. “Aye. It is necessary. I am sorry.”

  “Yes. Send the others to me.”

  Eyeing the gay and glittering throng around him as he waited, Will Douglas pondered on power and what it did to men, to the wielders as much as to those on whom it was wielded. What had power done to him? He knew well that he was not the man that he had been only a few short years before. He had lost something, lost much — eagerness, ardour, faith. hope. Aye, and charity also. Lost faith in himself, as well as in others. Since, in face of the demands of power, he knew that all would crumble, himself and his better desires, with the rest. This was the bitter fruit of power. And what had he gained, beside the power itself? Yet he had not deliberately sought power. It had been thrust upon him. But neither had he rejected it. As Jamie would have done. But with power there were no half-measures. You either wielded it, or were wielded by it.

  He was surrounded by power here, God knew. Everywhere he looked he saw it, and something of its effects. Probably seldom before had so much concentrated power, the might of Christendom, been brought together in one place as in this Papal Jubilee of 1450. Here were kings, electors, princes, grand-dukes, rulers of every description, power personified.

  Moreover, here was the acme of that other power, almost more dreadful, over the mind as well as the body, in the shape of the Pontiff himself, the Holy Office, the cardinals and archbishops. And what did he actually see? Handsome clothes, colour, magnificence, brilliance everywhere — and darting uneasy eyes, cruel mouths, forced laughter, suspicion, envy, malice, fear. In this Vatican Palace, the Church’s heart, he saw more veiled savagery, more nakedness of women, more blatant whoring, concubinage, perversion, more flagrant sins of the flesh, than he had even imagined to exist. In the next alcove to his own a slobbering pimply youth, who could not have been more than seventeen, in the scarlet of a cardinal, had all the upper half of a laughing complaisant woman exposed, save for her sparkling jewellery, and was tugging and biting at her white flesh like an animal — with none caring. Near by, on the floor, when the dancers parted sufficiently for him to see it, lay the overdressed, bloated and drunken body of the man who had earlier been pointed out to him as the reigning Duke of Tuscany. Not far off, on the marble steps to a gallery, were two exquisites, painted and beribboned, who fondled each other shamelessly before all. One was said to be the love-son of a previous Pope.

  These, then, were some of the fruits of power. And now these letters, carried hot-foot to him across Europe, spoke of other fruits. He was not so greatly surprised over James Stewart. Kings were ever a law unto themselves, preoccupied with power, suspecting all and that young man had served a grievous apprenticeship. But Kennedy he had esteemed an honest, able and trustworthy man. Yet Margaret was undoubtedly right. Kennedy it was who, as both Primate and Chancellor, had declared that Scotland must indeed be represented at the Papal Jubilee. And who more suited to do it than the illustrious Earl of Douglas, next in line to the Throne — since priests in Holy Orders, such as himself, might not be so. Who moreover had insisted that, as well as all the Douglas brothers and in-laws, a further brilliant entourage should accompany him, for the honour of Scotland — naming the Lords Hamilton, Graham, Seton, Saltoun and Oliphant, and numerous knights, in fact all the magnates who might have been expected to resist the raising up of Crichton once more, and any assault upon Douglas. Will had accepted the embassage, and the vast expense involved — for it was out of the Douglas purse all had to be paid, the Treasury being, as usual, empty — not because of any special regard for the Papacy but as a patriotic duty, an opportunity to see the world, and perhaps, just a little, to further enhance the name of Douglas. And this had been the reason for it all — a deep-laid assault, conceived in that lofty, reputable episcopal brain, a device to bring down a friend and raise up an enemy — all in the interests of power, and its balance.

  Hugh was the first of the Scots party to return to Will’s side. Hanging on his arm was a bold-eyed, raven-haired Roman beauty, somewhat older than his twenty-two years, with red-painted nipples peeping provocatively over the top of her pearl-encrusted gown. Even as Hugh asked his brother the reason for the summons, his eyes were straying speculatively to the busy cardinal in the other alcove.

  ‘I’d counsel you to bid the lady goodnight, Hughie — rather than what you contemplate!’ Will told him. ‘We go to take leave of the Pope. By this hour tomorrow I hope to be in Perugia.’

  ‘Save us — what’s this? Take leave? We are here for yet a month . . .”

  “Lochmaben and Craig Douglas are smoking ruins. King James himself made them so. Crichton is Chancellor again. So we ride.”

  “Christ God!” The Earl of Ormond dropped his contessa’s arm as though it had bitten him.

  “Aye. And we are a thousand miles a
nd more from Scotland! See — go you and help Rob Fleming fetch in the others. Yonder, is Archie, with the Frenchwoman. And Seton, with that fat duke.”

  It was strange how the Scots did, in fact, stand out in all that crowded company, seeming somehow more taut, stocky, compact, whatever their personal build, more sober of dress — although all were in their best clothing — altogether more self-contained and controlled than almost all the rest of that vivid gesticulating, demonstrative throng.

  Fleming was back before all were assembled. His Holiness would see them now, in an ante-chamber.

  Will gathered his people round him in a knot and told them briefly of the situation. But he pointed out that whilst he and those closest to him would start the long journey back to Scotland at the earliest possible moment and with all speed, some of their lordships were not so immediately concerned and need not all cut short their visit. However, all looked equally concerned at the news, and none was for remaining behind.

  A gorgeously bedecked Papal chamberlain conducted them by marble corridors and statuary-lined galleries to a much-guarded doorway.

  There was, Will knew, all sorts of elaborate ceremonial prescribed for Papal audiences, most of it of a sort that no self-respecting Scot would consider for a moment. He had gone as far as he was prepared to do, in this respect, on their initial interview. Now he contented himself with bowing once just inside the anteroom doors, then striding forward to within a few feet of the thronelike chair, and bowing again shortly. Behind him the cluster of Scots lords did exactly likewise.

  “Your Holiness,” he said, in his stilted student’s Latin. “I regret that we must take our leave. Without delay. It is unfortunate. To return to Scotland. We seek your permission to leave Rome.” And, as an afterthought. “And your blessing.”