The Royal Mile

by Mary Daheim

  It was a cloudy night with no moon and Fraser was grateful for that. He stood up and walked the few feet to the loch to take a deep drink. Then he cupped his hands and filled them with water, returning to Eglinton’s side where he splashed the other man’s face and washed the bloody gash on his forehead. The wound was only superficial, though it was a good three inches long. Fraser was not surprised to see the earl’s eyes flicker open and stare vaguely up at him.

  “You’re all right,” Fraser reassured him. “You got hit with a falling timber. But we’re outside now, by the Nor’ Loch.”

  The vague expression began to fade from Eglinton’s blue eyes. He raised his head to look around, taking in the dark bulk of Edinburgh Castle, the still waters of the loch in front of them and the quiet countryside beyond. “I thought we walked for miles!” he said in amazement. “But ’twas no distance at all!”

  “The passage winds a bit,” Fraser said. “An old smuggler’s route used by a previous owner.” Even at this late date, he’d rather Eglinton didn’t know the truth. “Can you stand?”

  Eglinton flexed his limbs. “I think so.” He let Fraser give him a hand to help him to his feet. A bit shakily, he walked around in a circle. “Aye, I can walk. Maybe moving will keep my mind off my aching head.”

  “Good man.” Fraser picked up his cloak and threw it to Eglinton, who had left his own at Ainslie’s Tavern. “You wear this. A chill could be fatal in your condition.” Eglinton started to demur but Fraser was already walking away from him, heading along the loch’s edge towards the Lang Dykes.

  “Where are we going?” he called out in a low voice.

  “Where’s Lord John?” Fraser asked back.

  “He planned to leave Edinburgh for Arbroath as soon as Parliament adjourned,” Eglinton replied, breathing with some difficulty. “He didn’t come to Ainslie’s Tavern.”

  Fraser grinned in spite of himself. “Good for Johnny,” he murmured. “Then I suggest you make for Arbroath, too,” he said in a slightly louder voice. “Can you manage alone?”

  “I can try,” Eglinton declared with a weak smile.

  “I’ll go with you as far as Leith. Mayhap you can get a boat to row you across the Firth tonight.”

  Eglinton accepted Fraser’s decision without further comment. The earl took a deep breath of cool April air and set off through the marshy ground toward the lonely fields above the loch.

  Confronted with a dozen moss-troopers, Dallas stood her ground in the hallway. Dressed in a violet peignoir which revealed a tantalizing glimpse of bosom, her thick hair falling over her shoulders and the brown eyes snapping with self-righteous wrath, she berated the men with a voluble spate of invective. The moss-troopers gaped at her, as much taken aback by her salty language as her provocative appearance.

  “Intruding upon husband and wife at such a time!” she went on. “Is there no privacy left in Scotland? And get your filthy feet off my clean floor!”

  One of the men was no ordinary moss-trooper but Bothwell’s henchman, Black Ormiston. “You waste our time, madame,” he announced rudely. “Where is your husband?”

  “Probably asleep,” Dallas retorted. “He was rather fatigued.”

  Ormiston’s crowlike eyes swept Dallas from head to foot. “I’ll not doubt that,” he muttered. Motioning to the mosstroopers, Ormiston commanded them to search the house. “Nay, madame, we have orders. Stand aside.”

  Dallas refused to budge. Behind her, Cummings and Simpson exchanged apprehensive glances. Flora was on the stairway, clutching her apron. Ormiston glowered at Dallas, then picked her up bodily and set her down by the drawing room door.

  “Whore’s spawn!” Dallas shrieked. “You dare lay hands on me!” But the men were moving swiftly through the hallway, forcing both Cummings and Simpson to step aside.

  As the men dispersed into the various rooms, Cummings sidled up to his mistress. “It’s been ten minutes,” he whispered. “They should be well into the passage. Don’t fret, madame.”

  “What if these churls find the passage?” Dallas hissed back. “Now that everything has been removed from the cellars, the entrances are exposed.”

  The thought had not eluded Cummings, but he was counting on the time factor. It should take Fraser and Eglinton no more than twenty minutes to make their way through the tunnel. Assuming, of course, that it was passable ....

  Dallas seemed to read his mind; she had wondered the same thing. “The men who are still outside will know they haven’t gone out by any regular door,” she said. “If Iain is trapped down there ....” She stopped abruptly as Ormiston and three of his men tramped down the stairway.

  “Your husband is not in your bedchamber, madame,” Ormiston declared, his dark visage glowering at her. “Now where are he and that traitor Eglinton hiding?”

  Dallas lifted her little chin defiantly. “Who knows? St. Giles, in Knox’s pulpit?”

  Ormiston considered using force on the obstinate wench but thought better of it. Lady Fraser and Bothwell had been on good terms over the years. He had a feeling his master might not want her mishandled. As for the two children upstairs in the nursery with their terrified governess, Ormiston had no stomach for threatening them either. Confident that his prey still must be somewhere within the town house, he announced they would continue the search if it took all night. As Dallas glared after him he stalked off towards the kitchen with his men.

  A few moments later, she heard them open the door to the cellar. “Jesu,” she breathed to Cummings, “we must stop them.”

  “No, madame,” Cummings protested. “If you go after them, you’ll only call attention to the trap door!”

  But Dallas was already hurtling down the corridor and into the kitchen. They’d see the trap door anyway; but at least she could detain them for a few more precious minutes.

  “Fools!” she called out, racing down the stairs. “Can’t you see this place has been cleaned out? Where would anyone hide down here?”

  Ormiston was in the act of lighting a candle. “We’ll make sure they didn’t,” he retorted. But Dallas flung herself at him, knocking the candle from his hand. It fell to the floor, rolled just a few inches away from the trap door and sputtered out. Ormiston grabbed Dallas by the arm, swinging her away from him. “God’s eyes!” he cursed, “you’ll make me do you a mischief yet!”

  Dallas’s hands reached out to scratch at his face, but with one great thrust, he pushed her away. She fell, stumbling over the edge of the trap door, and crumpled to the floor.

  “Fetch another candle!” Ormiston roared to one of his men. “And get this troublesome slut out of here!”

  One man raced back upstairs while another came over to pull Dallas to her feet. But Dallas didn’t move. The man pulled at her arm, then hesitated as she moaned aloud.

  Ormiston hovered over her, his temper raging. “Enough tricks! I swear I’ll arrest you along with your husband, if you don’t get up!”

  Dallas rolled over just enough so that Ormiston could see her face in the half-light which filtered down from the kitchen. “I can’t move,” she gasped. “I’m losing my babe!”

  Half-stunned, half-suspicious, Ormiston knelt down warily. “You’re lying! Get up!” But then, as the mosstrooper he’d sent to fetch the candle reappeared and held the light by Dallas’s face, Ormiston saw that she was ashen and in obvious pain. “Bring that maid down here!” he commanded, fervently wishing Bothwell had never sent him to Gosford’s Close.

  By the time Flora came charging anxiously down the stairs, Dallas had fainted.

  John Hamilton had not left for Arbroath that evening. He had gone from Parliament to Gavin’s house to await word of the Ainslie’s Tavern meeting. Hamilton did not think it wise to leave Edinburgh until he found out what had transpired between Bothwell and the other lords.

  When her husband, Hugh, had not returned by midnight, Hamilton’s sister Jane grew anxious. “I wish he had stayed away, as you did,” she told her brother. “We should all have left the c
ity as soon as Parliament adjourned.”

  Hamilton said nothing. He had thought Hugh unwise but refused to meddle with another man’s conscience. A few minutes later Black Ormiston pounded on the door with word that the Earl of Eglinton and Baron Fraser were on the run.

  “His Lordship fled from Ainslie’s Tavern, angering Lord Bothwell,” Ormiston declared, resettling his helmet in place. The past hour or so he had spent at the Fraser town house had gotten on his nerves, with an unconscious ladyship, an outraged maid and a hysterical governess to contend with.

  “So my brother-in-law and Fraser escaped together?” Hamilton inquired, carefully concealing his distress. Jane had just come into the hallway where she rushed up to grasp her brother’s arm. “It’s all right,” he soothed her, “Hugh is apparently safe.”

  “It’s not all right with Lord Bothwell,” Ormiston said sharply. “The two culprits left the house before we arrived, though the others there let on that both men were still inside. They wanted to play for time.”

  “I’ll not have the Earl of Eglinton referred to under this roof as a culprit,” Hamilton asserted, with a menacing gesture of his right arm. “I must ask you to leave.”

  “And I must ask to search the house—sir.” Ormiston wasn’t keen on ruffling a proud Hamilton’s feathers. He silently damned his new set of orders and waited for Hamilton to step aside.

  “Let them search!” Jane urged. “Let them waste their time! Oh, dear God, where is my poor Hugh?” She buried her head against her brother’s shoulder.

  After Ormiston and his men had made their desultory search, they left the house grumbling among themselves. Hamilton, sitting alone in the library, had insisted that Jane go to bed. He hadn’t known that Fraser had reentered the city. Was Dallas there, too? For the better part of an hour, he mulled over his course of action. If Hugh were apprehended, he might not be punished severely since until this evening his loyalty to the Queen was above reproach. Fraser’s case was different: He was an outlaw already and rumored to have quarreled bitterly with the Queen. If Fraser were captured there was little doubt in Hamilton’s mind that the Highlander would face execution. He would be sacrificed as John Gordon had been, to show all Scotland that Mary Stuart could act decisively when challenged by arrogant lords who refused to offer total obeisance. And if anything happened to Fraser, Dallas would be left a widow ....

  Hamilton got up from his chair, grabbed his cloak and went out into the night.

  Chapter 32

  The French barque was to sail at nine o’clock. When Dallas and the others had not arrived by eight, Fraser began to pace the decks. The ship was unfamiliar to him and he was relieved that she had never been one of his victims during his days as a pirate. Only a handful of other passengers were aboard, mostly Frenchmen, and so far he had attracted no special attention.

  But now the captain, Romain LeClerc from La Rochelle, noticed the newcomer’s apparent anxiety. “There are others in your party, I understand,” he said with a friendly smile. “I assume you are wondering if they’ll arrive in time for our departure.”

  “If they don’t, I won’t be sailing either,” Fraser asserted. “You needn’t worry, you can keep the passage money.”

  But the Frenchman seemed genuinely offended. “No, monsieur, I’m not concerned about that. It’s just that I sensed your distress. It is your family you await, is it not? Under the name McKim I have some eight passengers listed.”

  Cummings had secured their passage under the maiden name of Fraser’s mother. He himself had been very careful about making the arrangements, sending a trusted friend who would not be recognized by Bothwell’s men.

  But it was Cummings who now came hurrying up the gangplank. Fraser turned quickly from the captain, scouring the pier for Dallas and the children.

  “Sir,” Cummings called out, gesturing for Fraser to come by the rail out of the captain’s hearing range, “if you please.”

  Before Fraser could start asking questions, Cummings recited his story as quickly as possible. “Her Ladyship has miscarried,” he said low, not pausing for Fraser’s stunned oaths, “but she is all right. Of course she cannot come with you, though she has insisted you sail without her. We will join you as soon as she’s recovered.” Cummings had spoken as if by rote, following Dallas’s instructions to the letter.

  “Christ!” Fraser exclaimed between clenched teeth. “I had no idea the lassie was with child! Why didn’t she tell me?”

  Cummings cleared his throat and clutched at his cap as a brisk wind picked up off the Firth. “She was afraid her condition might hamper your escape, sir. I understand also that until this past week she herself wasn’t certain about, um, her impending motherhood.”

  Fraser stood with his hands on the rail, staring down into the deep water between the ship and the dock. Abruptly, he turned to Cummings. “The moss-troopers—did they harm her?”

  There was the smallest pause before Cummings replied. “A small scuffle, provoked by Her Ladyship, occurred in the upper cellar. She fell over the trap door, and as it turned out, Ormiston and his men never did find the secret entrance in all the confusion.”

  By accident or design, Dallas had managed to conceal the means of his escape. Fraser shook his head ruefully, thinking that her effort was hardly worth the price she’d paid.

  “Wait here, Cummings,” Fraser said suddenly and moved to the foredeck where Captain LeClerq was talking with his first mate. Cummings watched as Fraser and the Frenchman exchanged a few words, then saluted each other.

  “Let’s go,” Fraser called to Cummings, as he strode towards the gangplank.

  “My lord!” Cummings exclaimed, “you can’t go ashore! I promised Lady Fraser I’d see that you left for France!”

  But Fraser was already heading for the dock. “She won’t blame you,” he said over his shoulder as Cummings hurried to catch up. “I’ll not leave without her and that’s that.”

  Huffing a bit, the serving man drew abreast of his master. “But you dare not enter the city! The moss-troopers are everywhere! I only got through Leith Wynd this morning because Bothwell was riding out to join the Queen at Seton and his Borderers were cheering him on.”

  They had left the dock area and were heading into Leith. The local citizens had started another day, pushing carts through the streets, carrying produce in large baskets, chasing geese into the fowlers’, moving wagonloads of furniture, lumber, bricks, straw, peat and all the other necessities to keep life going. Scotland might tremble on the verge of civil war, but her people went about their business in an isolated sea of routine.

  Cummings stopped trying to dissuade Fraser from his reckless course. He had no idea what his master planned to do. The tunnel was impassable; he’d found that out for himself when he’d tried to leave the town house by that route earlier in the morning.

  Leith Wynd was even busier than the town itself. The day had turned sunny as the wind blew the threatening rain clouds out to sea. The two men passed by Holy Trinity Church, then slowed their pace as the wynd grew steeper and more crowded. Cummings realized that Fraser intended to brazen his way into Edinburgh and groaned inwardly at such recklessness.

  As Cummings feared, the plan was doomed to failure. At first, Fraser was more curious than alarmed, for the men who blocked the city gate weren’t moss-troopers but private retainers.

  “This way,” Fraser said, steering Cummings towards an adjoining wynd. But two more of the armed men stood in their path, and as Fraser glanced around him he realized they were surrounded. He also saw that the men wore the badge of Hamilton.

  “You’re under arrest,” called a voice just a few feet behind Fraser. John Hamilton, flanked by his retainers and a gawking crowd of onlookers, stood with a cocked pistol in his hand.

  “Christ!” Fraser gazed bemusedly at the other man, wondering if Hamilton were serious. He knew Hamilton had not attended the meeting at Ainslie’s Tavern. He also knew that Hamilton and Bothwell were old adversaries, going back to th
e scandal over Alison Craik. But Hamilton had never veered in his loyalty to the Queen. And he did not look like a man playing a prank.

  “Take him,” Hamilton commanded, motioning to his men. At least twenty retainers surged forward, hemming in Fraser and Cummings. The first instinct was to fight, to take one last heedless chance at escape. But the sheer numbers were too much, even for Fraser, and he was still unsure of Hamilton’s true intentions.

  When they entered the city gate, a half-dozen mosstroopers ordered the group to halt. “Is this Baron Fraser?” a heavily bearded Borderer demanded.

  “It is,” Hamilton replied, stepping up to the man. “He is my prisoner. As a member of Parliament and a loyal supporter of Queen Mary, I have a right to take him into custody.”

  The bearded man frowned. His legal knowledge was scant but he recognized Lord Hamilton. While he had no wish to gainsay such an important noble, he also had orders from Bothwell. “Then let us accompany you to the Tolbooth,” the man said. “We’ll make sure Baron Fraser is secured.”

  Hamilton stood with his arms crossed, the pistol held in his right hand. “I need no help. I’ve waited five years for this moment. The enmity between Baron Fraser and myself is long-standing and deep. I’ll brook no interference.”

  Instinctively, the Borderer stepped back a pace. Hamilton towered above him, proud as any prince, royal as any personage in Scotland except the Queen herself.

  “As you say, my lord,” the man replied deferentially. Then he added nervously, “I fear my lord Bothwell might think his own followers have failed him.”

  “Dammit, man, let us pass! What matters who captures this Highland devil as long as he’s made to pay for his crimes?” Hamilton deliberately let the pistol stray towards the Borderer’s chest. “Now move!”