The Wisest Fool

by Nigel Tranter

  The Queen collapsed to tears in Henrietta of Huntly's arms, and was led sobbing to the other door, and out.

  Lennox and Heriot eyed each other.

  "That was ... a right royal occasion, was it not!" the Duke said, his voice just a little unsteady. "Only James could have achieved it. I will not forget the day I was made Knight of the Garter."

  "We were not meant to forget it."

  "True. What an astonishment he is ! He had me feeling like a whipped child—and deservedly whipped. The royal buffoon—who is anything but 1"

  "Alison Primrose has a better name for him—the Unicorn Rampant 1 A strange creature such as never was, which yet supports the crown! Tonight he taught us all a lesson."

  "A lesson, yes. And not for the first time. All this of his balancing and playing the factions, Cecils, Howards, Greys and the rest. You think there is any fact in it, Geordie? Or do they play him!"

  "I have told you. I'd liefer lend my money to James Stewart than to all the English lords and commons lumped together!"

  "So-o-o 1 Perhaps you will do both, then! Since you are not to go back to Scotland, it seems. You believe that James will win, then, Geordie? With the English. But, with the Queen

  "Of that I am less certain. But—I shall be a mite surprised if he does not"

  'And you would aid him, in this? If you could?"

  "I serve them both. But he is my sovereign lord. And they are man and wife..."

  7

  IN THE WEEKS and months that followed, the Edinburgh goldsmith's reckoning of the dynastic situation was very largely substantiated. James Stewart, whatever his outrageous behaviour and apparent headstrong bungling, nevertheless was always one step ahead of the forces which would use him, control him, or even unseat him—for there always had been a faction against his accession to Elizabeth's crown who would have put his cousin, the Lady Arabella Stewart, on the throne. Arabella was the only child of the late Charles Stewart, Earl of Lennox, brother of Darnley, James's father. Her line of succession to the English throne therefore was of the same order as his own, in that they were both great-grand-children of Margaret Tudor, Henry the Eighth's sister, married to James the Fourth of Scots—save that James was a great-grandson on both his mother and father's sides. But this disadvantage was outweighed, for many in England, by the fact that Arabella was wholly English by birth, residence and outlook, her mother a Cavendish. A month or two of James on the throne had the effect of much reviving and strengthening the Arabella faction.

  But the King somehow managed to keep the many groups and factions isolated, to prevent them from coalescing against him. And especially from gravitating towards Arabella. This was no mean feat, for certain conditions did tend to bring the hostile groupings together—in especial the Scots presence. This, in fact, had quickly grown to be one of James's greatest problems. For apart from all those who had come south with the King's, and then the Queen's, trains—these mainly aristocracy—a constant tide of Scots, from the highest to the lowest, thereafter flooded over the Border, all with the same objective of making their fortunes, getting their own back for centuries of English invasion and warfare, and generally demonstrating their undoubted superiority in almost everything—except the superior manner, in which of course the English led the world. Not only so, but they expected their own King Jamie to co-operate and see that good Scots got most of the worthwhile appointments and positions of profit and honour in this newly-united kingdom—profit especially —and at first the King was inclined to concur. Not unnaturally the English, though an easy-going and tolerant people, began to seethe and then to rise in wrath. The Scots soon became a hissing and a booing. Popular songs were composed and sung against them in every inn and market-place; clergy preached on the plague the Lord had sent upon their devoted land; play-actors parodied the Scots accents; lampooners did a roaring trade. There were actually riots and public disturbances. A more unifying factor for the English family and political factions would have been hard to conceive. And, of course, some of it all rubbed off on James himself, 'the Scotch monkey', and his personal popularity.

  Oddly enough, the other plague helped the King in his peculiar battle, in that it kept him and his Court out of London, hot-bed of more troubles than one; had the effect of preventing large gatherings of people and gave him a good excuse for refusing to call a parliament, which might have served as a fulcrum for discontent-James had a typical Stewart dislike for parliaments, much preferring personal rule. Democracy he conceived to be the rule of the Devil—and moreover he could prove it in reason, logic, metaphysics and Holy Writ

  So he survived the first difficult months, even if not all of his Scots compatriots did. But in his personal relationship with the Queen, success was less obvious. In public they preserved a decent facade of conjugality and toleration, but in private they went their own ways. Anne it was, undoubtedly, who maintained the cold front—for whatever else he was, James was not cold, no chilly disapprover or distance-keeper. But the Queen, though gay, laughter-loving, flighty almost and spreading her wings widely in this warmer, richer, southern ambience, was inflexible as far as James her husband was concerned. He was good at forgiving; she was not.

  The Court was split into two distinct households, with little in common; the one concerned with music, dancing, masques, gossip, match-making; and the other with hunting, gambling, drinking and rudery, shot through with political manoeuvring. The two subsisting under the same roof, as it were, led to many a curious and tense situation.

  The coronation, with all its mystic and spiritual connotations and concepts might have been a unifying factor—for Anne was at least superficially of a religious nature and tended towards the sacerdotal. But the plague contra-indicated any full and major ceremony in Westminster Abbey—which the English were united in declaring was the only conceivable venue—and only a very brief, truncated and elementary service was held there eventually, attended by a small number of selected witnesses and no contact with the infectious populace, on 25th July. Moreover, the levity with which James treated the entire proceedings further offended the Queen—and not only the Queen—he pointing out that he had been crowned monarch already, thirty-six years before, at the age of one year, and this was merely a homologation. There was actually a scene in the Abbey when his newest favourite, Philip Herbert, responded to one of the King's little kindnesses by kissing him lasciviously before all—to James's chuckles, but the scandal of some.

  Thirty thousand Londoners had died of the plague, and were still dying at the rate of one hundred a day. The royal palaces were all either in or too near London for comfort, and there had been an outbreak of the plague in Windsor town. So a prolonged tour of the great country houses of the nobility was indicated—especially those where hunting facilities were available on a major scale, with well-stocked deer-parks—an economical arrangement moreover, where the cost of maintaining the two royal establishments fell upon other than James's purse. A start was made at Loseley Park; then Farnham Castle, seat of the Bishop of Winchester; then Thruxton, and on to Wilton in Wiltshire. Wilton was the Earl of Pembroke's palatial seat, where as well as the delights of the chase on Salisbury Plain there was the pleasurable company of the aforementioned Philip Herbert, who was Pembroke's younger brother.

  This touring programme had an advantage for George Heriot, allowing him release from Court attendance for a spell, since numbers had to be reduced considerably. Moreover the King's "new ploy", which he had expounded to his goldsmith and banker, required the latter's sojourn in London for some time—it being nothing less ambitious than the compulsory summoning to receive knighthood of every land-holder in England with rental of over forty pounds Sterling; at a price, naturally, and if for any reason this royal honour should be declined, it could be compounded for at a still higher fee. James had concocted this splendid scheme during one of his marathon drinking sessions, using the old feudal-system theory of a knight's fee, whereby all land-holders had to provide armed men for national defence
as a condition of the tenure of their lands, the standard being a minimum of one knightly horseman in armour plus a certain number of armed retainers on foot. This military tenure, of course, gave no actual title of knighthood to the land-owner, but James saw how the English love of titles could be utilised thereby, to his own infinite profit. An enormous amount of clerical work would be involved, naturally, in tracing and listing all such land-owners, the country over, assessing their potentialities and sending out the summonses. Geordie Heriot was just the man to supervise this counting-house labour which had to be carried out in London where the English national land-records were stored.

  James saw millions of pounds just around the corner. And he was going to need it—for he had discovered that the Exchequer was four hundred thousand pounds in debt over Elizabeth's last Irish campaign alone. And that was but a drop in the horse-trough.

  So Heriot at last won free of attendance at Court, to devote at least some of his time to his own affairs. He was not afraid of the plague as was his royal master and set up business premises, with a modest house above, at the New Exchange, on the Cornhill near Threadneedle Street, a convenient area for his trade. Here he installed craftsmen and clerks to deal with both the jewellery and money-lending branches of his vocation—and was happy to busy himself in the work for which he was trained. There was a vast backlog of arrears to clear up, as well as rich new ground to be broken. Clearly, in time, he could teach the London money-market a thing or two. Not that he enjoyed London as a city; it was too large, stuffy after the sea-breezes of Edinburgh, with no views and prospects, so that a man felt suffocated in the unending narrow streets and lanes. And it stank to highest heaven. But there was money here, to make Edinburgh's a mere pittance. The King's knighthood business was a nuisance but, worked on a commission basis, was like to prove very lucrative.

  This was the situation when, one day in mid-October, George Heriot was pacing up and down the central aisle of St. Paul's Church above Ludgate Hill—for much of London's business was in fact conducted here, as a highly convenient and central venue, and moreover, free. Suddenly he halted in his walking, excused himself to Master William Herrick, goldsmith to the late Queen, with whom he was in process of fixing up a working agreement, and hurried through the press of pacers, arguers and bargainers to where he had glimpsed a young and richly-dressed individual, solitary as a peacock amongst a flock of more sober barn-door fowl, and looking somewhat lost

  "My lord Duke—Vicky !"he exclaimed, holding out both hands.

  Here is unexpected pleasure, on my soul! What brings so exalted a figure to St. Paul's this autumn day ?"

  "You do, Geordie. I called at your house in the Exchange, to be told you were here. It seemed an odd time for your devotions!" He shrugged, grinning his boyish smile. "It is good to see you, man. Dammit. I've missed you! Aye and not only myself."

  "You are too kind. But I am no courtier, do not belong to your world. Where have you come from ? Do not say that King and Court have come to London at last!"

  "No, no. Despite being Christ's Vice-Regent, James Stewart is far too frightened of the wrath of God, in the form of this plague! Besides, he's very happy where he is. At Wilton. I've come from there with messages for you."

  "For me? From the King? Do not say that Majesty sends the Duke of Lennox with messages for his goldsmith 1"

  "One from the King, yes. One from my . . . one from Mary Gray. From Scotland."

  "Ah. Come—where we may talk privily. Yonder side-chapel."

  "I do not know that my tidings is talk for church and chapels! But, as you will..."

  '"This is England, where they worship a more accommodating God than ours, I think! Your news from Scotland is good?"

  "Not very. But first the King's message. It is about some great jewel which he has ordered, some toy. He would have you bring it to Wilton to him, and at the earliest. Claims that you should have had sufficiently long to finish it Wants it to hang on a double gold chain. He requires it three days from now, no more. You know how he talks."

  "Yes. It is a great pendant of St. George and the Dragon. The Garter badge. In enamels. Set with diamonds and sapphires. A costly trinket. I judge it must be for the Queen. A peace-offering, perhaps."

  "It may be—I know not. But he is urgent for it I am to take you back with me to Wilton. James would talk with you on other matters also. This folly of the knightings, I expect."

  Heriot frowned. "I have so much to do, here. Work—it ever increases ..." -

  "I need you at Wilton also, Geordie. I need help. Mary writes from Methven. She has wind of more trouble. A plot..." "Save us—not another!"

  "Yes. And this one even more grevious. For the King's very life is threatened, she thinks. She said to tell you, and seek your aid." "It is here, in England, then?"

  'Yes. Though her father is, of course, involved in it, this must be based where the King is. It is, she says, a Catholic conspiracy to kill James and place Arabella Stewart on the throne."

  "Arabella, But... there has been talk of that for long. Ever since Elizabeth died."

  "Yes, talk But this is more than talk There are very powerful folk behind it, she says. And not only Catholics."

  "And what has the Master of Gray to do with it?"

  "That is not clear to me. Mary's letter says only that Patrick insists that Henry and young Elizabeth are not to be harmed. Nor the Queen. And they are to be sent back to Scotland. No doubt for Henry to be proclaimed King of Scots. The old story, with a new turn to it"

  "Does she name any names ? Here in England ?"

  "Aye, three. Our friend the Lord Grey de Wilton, Cobham, the Lord Warden of the Cinque Ports, and, of all folks, Sir Walter Raleigh!"

  "Ph-e-ew! Raleigh! I scarce can believe that Not a man of Raleigh's stature. He has not cause to love James, no doubt—who has deprived him of the Captaincy of the Guard, But that is because he advocates war with Spain—it is a madness with the man. But James still allows him to be Governor of Jersey. Cobham is his cousin—but I would have thought that they had little in common. As for Grey de Wilton, he is a Puritan, no Catholic..."

  "You have not been long, Geordie, in learning what’s what, as our leige would say, about the English nobility "

  "My trade demands that sort of knowledge, my lord Duke I Did the letter say aught else ?"

  "It named one other—Markham. Sir Gervase, I think was the name. I have not heard of him. That, and to watch Mar again."

  "So-o-o! And what am I to do ?"

  "The good God knows! She said just to tell Geordie Heriot—he would help."

  Exasperatedly the man stared at his younger and so trusting friend, and sighed. He transferred his gaze to the lofty windows of stained glass.

  "Myself, I do not know how to begin," Lennox admitted.

  "Have you told the King ?"

  "Not yet. You know what James is—frightened of his own shadow, yet laughing to scorn anything J tell him! We'd need more to show him than another letter from my Mary "

  Heriot admitted that. But he did not want to get involved in another thankless exercise in dynastic counter-plottery.

  "There is another who looks for your return to Court, Geordie," the Duke went on. "Mistress Primrose. She told me to tell you that Court was a different place, lacking you. That's a lively piece, on my soul! And don't these English know it! They are round her like flies. Some young lord will snap her up."

  "I hope not." The other frowned. "She is little more than a child."

  "No child that, but a very knowing young woman. And as bonny as she is bright Besides, was not Anne, her mistress, wed at fifteen? Myself I was but sixteen. Staveley has just wed a fourteen-year-old. The girl has a fondness for you, all know."

  "As an older man. An uncle, perhaps. I am old enough to be her father. Nor, nor am I looking for a wife."

  "I but gave you her message. She has the sharpest wits in the Queen's household."

  "That I believe—since Mary Gray placed her there . Very well,
Vicky—I shall come back with you to Wilton. I must, if the King commands it. For a few days only. But I have affairs to settle here, first..."

  "We ride tomorrow, then..."

  * * *

  Wilton House, some three miles west of Salisbury, was an experience for George Heriot—indeed, until six months previously, even for James Stewart. Built on the site of a one-time Saxon nunnery, it was not like most of the seats of the new Tudor aristocracy basically conventual buildings, abbeys, priories and the like, taken over from the Church at the Reformation and handed over by Henry the Eighth to his friends and servants. The Herberts had been at Wilton for centuries, and their rambling establishment had grown over the years into what was practically a town of its own, set in an enormous park on the southern skirts of Salisbury Plain. In an atmosphere of vast wealth, almost total security and at least local peace, the need for defence—which cooped up even the greatest Scots lord in strong stone towers— just did not apply; and every whim of the occupying generations had been met and. exploited. Seven hundred servants—not men-at-arms—serviced this mighty sprawling domain; and Pembroke himself frequently became lost in his house's labyrinths. Wilton had three great halls as well as eight dining-rooms—apart from the servants' eating-places; three chapels—and five chaplains, four bakeries; a brewery; two theatres, one indoors, one out; an ape-house, a bull-ring, a bear-pit and half-a-dozen cock-fighting-yards. It had its own race-course; a pleasure canal-system, with ornamental lakes, temples and grottoes; and its gardens covered scores of acres. The inner park had a wall twelve miles round; and the outer, stocked with game, extended over whole parishes and included many estate villages. To Wilton frequently came Ben Jonson and Thomas Campion, with their masquers; also William Shakespeare and his Lord Chamberlain's players—Pembroke being Chamberlain. Here Philip Sidney had written much of his Arcadia, and Francis Bacon was a frequent visitor.