“She had a lover, she betrayed me,” muttered Sir David.
“Ay,” said the King, “And you betrayed me. If it hadnae been for Sir Robert, an Englishman, I wad be suffering and dying by now. And ye thought I had swived yer wife. Dear God, when? I’m never alone.”
He turned aside, his mouth wry. “Sir Robert, are ye well aside fra yer hand? Ye didna take hurt fra the poison?”
“No, Your Majesty, I spat it out.” That wasn’t entirely true since Carey was feeling quite sick and dizzy, but he put that down to reaction.
“A’right then, gentlemen, and my dearest Queen, nothing has happened. We’ll review how the tasting is done, make it more English, I think. Sir David, ye’ll confess the whole thing and…”
“But she betrayed me,” whispered Sir David. “If it wasn’t the King, who was it?”
“What d’ye think, my dear?” the King asked the Queen.
The Queen shrugged. “Sir David iss a fool,” she said. “Ve all knew she vos haffing an affair with Jonathan Hepburn, it vos obvious.”
For some reason Sir David started crying into his hands and would say no more.
***
When Janet Dodd awoke, she found the Court like an animal that has had a fright: confused, uncertain, and taking refuge in the familiar. Then when the King and Queen showed themselves, walking through the snowy garden as if nothing at all had happened, it relaxed and went about its business.
Lady Widdrington came to find Janet and Widow Ridley, and found both of them in their best kirtles, and Janet with a wonderful green hat on her head, preparing to go to market to sell the linen and take a look round the town. She talked to them and heard the tale of the mysterious alchemist and brought them both to the audience chamber to tell the King and Queen.
King James had changed his doublet and hose, which was very unusual for him, and was magnificent in tawny and peach, although he still hadn’t shifted his shirt.
He was affable and friendly and a little abstracted, wiggled his fingers at Janet for her promptness and Widow Ridley for her curiosity, gave the Widow a silver goblet with the King’s crest that he had just got from a merchant. He promised Janet a pension.
The Queen came personally to see the linen sheets and aprons and ordered the elderly lady in charge of the Sweet Coffers to buy the lot of them at a very fair price, which Janet added to her moneybelt. She tasted the flowerwater and snapped that up too. The money was enough for extra feed this year and even next year if they needed it, which God send they wouldn’t.
Janet couldn’t go home yet since Henry had disappeared and she didn’t want to think about what he was probably doing. So she and Widow Ridley went into Edinburgh and exclaimed at everything, the house where John Knox hadn’t lived but a silver merchant had, and the alehouses, and the Tron and the Tollbooth, and of course, the castle, partly wrecked and in piles from the gunpowder and cannon in the siege twenty years before, with scaffolding and masons getting on with rebuilding it.
***
George Kerr was at Lennox, already aboard the ship that would take him to Spain through the dangerous winter seas, stowing his chest. He heard the sound of boots on the deck, looked through a hatch hoping to see his friend Sir David Graham and his men and instead saw the minister of Paisley, Andrew Knox, looking grim and behind him was Lord Spynie. He knew he was doomed. He took the two most important pieces of paper, the one from the Spanish King and the one setting out how and where the troops would land and be disposed in Scotland, and he gulped them down in strips with a lot of good wine.
He would have started on the blank sheets with the signatures of the Scottish Catholic lords, but by that time the cabin door was juddering to the kicking and the bolt broke and seconds later he was on his face on the deck, protesting that he was a merchant, until they found the papers and then he shut up. The minister of Paisley looked at him with contempt and then stood carefully on his hand.
“Traitor,” he spat. “Traitor tae the Kirk and to the King and the realm.”
“I am not a traitor to the true Church,” he answered, rather well he thought, and got kicked hard in the ribs.
“Ye admit you are a traitor to the King and the realm,” said Spynie, kicking him a couple of times in the crotch. “Good, that saves time.”
They couldn’t head back to Edinburgh without some rest, for the horses as well as the men, and Andrew Knox put them up in his manse in Paisley. They left Kerr in the town lock-up where the ministry of the town came to dispute with him and break his legs in the Boot. They slung him weeping across a horse three hours before the next sunrise, and headed back to Edinburgh.
On the 2nd of January 1592/3 they had acquired the full plan of the Catholic earls along with a complete account of the King of Spain’s addendum requiring the murder of the King before he committed any troops, leaving both Scotland and England without an heir and safe for Spain to invade.
***
James listened to Carey as he gave his report verbally—he started on both his knees but James soon had him on a stool with wine at his elbow. The two books that Mr Anricks had given him for New Year’s presents lay on the table. One was Thomas Digges, on the revolutions of the planets, as yet unopened. The other book was the magnificent volume on hunting by Twiti which was lying open with a goblet keeping the place.
“D’ye think it could ha’ worked?” asked James.
“Yes, Your Majesty,” said Carey, “both realms are vulnerable until you have at least one son. With you gone and no issue, I hate to think what would have happened here or in England. It could have triggered the Bond of Association and started a general killing of Catholics, which would, as night follows day, have led to civil war. We have only to look at the state of France to know we want no such thing.”
“The Bond of Association was originally against my martyred mother.”
“It was, of course, because she would not stop plotting.”
“Surely that was her duty, as a sovereign monarch detained illegally in another country.”
Carey smiled. “It was, Your Majesty, and I conceived it as my duty if she succeeded to kill her and her fellow Papists.”
“You signed it?”
“Of course. Most of the Court did, it swept the country.”
James heaved a sigh. “What d’ye think to it now?”
“Perhaps I am less enthused,” said Carey carefully, “for since then I have been in France and seen a land riven by civil and religious war.”
James nodded. “All I ask, ye know, is that I may be a peacemaker. That’s all.”
“Her Majesty, too, wishes she could do away with war—though for her, her chief complaint is the expense of it.”
“Ay,” said James, “typical woman. So let’s see these papers.”
Carey handed over the blanks with their flamboyant semi-illiterate noble signatures across the bottom.
“No mair?”
“No, Your Majesty, he had disposed of any others. My Lord Spynie is not sure how as there was no fire nor ashes, but he may have eaten them since he looked green about the gills.”
“Was he given the Boot?”
“Yes, Your Majesty,” said Carey with a quick grimace of disgust. “The ministers insisted. It didn’t take long.”
“Ay,” said the King, “the ministers are awfy keen on it, I find. We’ll hang the poor fellow as soon as we can. We’ll hang that fool Graham of Fintry as well.”
“I think he is at least half mad.”
“Ay and he has a verra nice inheritance which will have tae be confiscated for a while, I fear. I’m deporting Father Crichton back tae Spain.”
Carey said nothing for a moment and then asked, “And the Catholic earls? Maxwell, Huntly? Angus?”
“Ay well, they’ve been verra naughty boys and will have tae be warded for a while, but then…”
“Y
ou will free them.”
“Ay,” James blinked at the window where it had started to rain an unpleasant mixture of snow and rain, a kind of flying readymade slush. “I know ye think Ah’m wood fer not clapping them all in irons and having their heads off. The ministers think the same—they are having a day of fasting in thanks for my deliverance, God save them.”
“At least execute Lord Maxwell and the Earl of Huntly, Your Majesty. When I think of what they tried to do to you with the oil of vitriol…” said Carey, slipping off the stool onto his knees again.
“The engineer, Jonathan Hepburn?”
“I’m not clear how much he did nor who he was working for, but I know he brought the oil of vitriol from Keswick, whatever he was doing with Marguerite on the side. He rode from the Court as soon as it was set up and we don’t know where he went.”
“Might he have gone back to Keswick?”
“Yes, or he might have taken ship for the Netherlands at Leith.”
“Find him,” said the King. “Find him and kill him. He’s an Englishman and now he’s run, I dinna have jurisdiction and my cousin of England might be annoyed. So I leave it to ye, Sir Robert.”
“Yes, Your Majesty,” said Carey firmly, “I will be honoured to end his life. And Maxwell and Huntly…”
James leaned over and caught Carey’s face between his two soft fleshy hands. “I know,” he whispered, “if it werenae for the wee Jew philosopher that knocked me over and backwards, I’d likely be dead or burning to death in invisible flames. D’ye think I dinna ken that? D’ye think I dinna ken that they all think I’m soft as shite and silly and they call me Queen James, and worse, d’ye think I dinna ken? Ay, I ken, and still I’ll forgive them and keep forgiving them and keep on forgiving them until they understand or someone else kills them. I will have peace, Sir Robert. I will have peace in my lands and with Spain and with France, too. I will have peace, by God.”
He let go of Carey’s face and drank so the Englishman wouldn’t see the tears in his eyes, before he could snort them down, waiting for the cynical smile, the supercilious look.
Carey stayed where he was for a moment, his chestnut head bowed. When he spoke it was in an oddly strangled tone of voice.
“I think Your Majesty is the bravest Prince I have ever heard of.”
“Ye do?”
“Yes. It’s easy for a Prince to seek war, that’s instinctive to men, it’s expected of him. But for a Prince to seek peace—that takes true courage.”
“Ay?” James thought about it. “Ay, perhaps it does.”
“I will help you in any way I can, Your Majesty,” said Carey. He sounded sincere. Maybe he was.
“Thank ye,” said James. “Now be off wi’ ye and take yer wee Maimonides south, too. There’s nae more need for him to stay here and spy on me.”
Carey rose gracefully to his feet, bowed, backed to the door.
“Ay, tell my cousin of England and her little hunchbacked Secretary, thank you for sending him.”
“Yes, Your Majesty.”
“And tell Lord Spynie to come in now.”
Carey bowed again as he went out the door. James sighed. Such a pity the handsome Englishman was in thrall to the she-devil still, as Buchanan called all women, though his lady-love Lady Widdrington was a remarkable woman with almost a man’s intelligence. In fact he had recently come to appreciate more the softer plusher charms of women and had enjoyed himself with his young Queen, more than he would ever have expected. Still…for companionship and sheer delight, there was nothing to match a young man, such as Spynie had been, or as his darling Esmé Stuart, Duc D’Aubigny had been before the lords had poisoned him. That he could not forgive, try as he might and the Gowrie family would pay for it one day. But Huntly and Angus and Erroll and all their silly conspiracies? They were just naughty boys, after all, Huntly especially whom he couldn’t help sighing over.
James stood and looked out of the window. God had given him a mission and he had known what it was since the age of five when he had watched his foster father, the Earl of Mar, bleeding to death from a dozen stab wounds. He had promised himself through tears and gritted teeth that he would be a peaceful monarch and he would have peace. He had never forgotten it.
***
Dodd kicked his tired pony up a small hill and down into the slushy valley. Half an hour before, it had started to sleet and they were still six miles from Stobs.
Dodd had said maybe four words the whole way and they had taken it in turns to sleep in a sheepfold. Hughie had thought he could kill the man then but found Dodd watching him every time he got up and so he pretended he had a flux and went out into the snow and wind each time.
Now they had been riding all day, slowed down by the slippery snow and the sleet. On the other hand, Dodd was tired. He was riding the pony because an unshod pony was much nimbler among the rocks and tussocks of the hills. Men guarding the herds in the infields had asked their business and Hughie had explained they were going to his sister at Stobs. Two men, one obviously not a good rider and not a reiver despite his size, were only a threat if they were scouting for a larger party. They were taking a message, they said.
Hughie was tired as well but the hope of seeing the pretty red blood on the snow and the anticipated joy of killing, actually killing Henry Dodd, kept him going. When he brought that head in to Wee Colin’s hall, there would be fire and feasting for sure, he’d be the star, maybe Wee Colin would reward him. And then he could go back to Carey when the weather was better and tell him some lie about where he had been and then later on kill him too and get his thirty pounds from Hepburn.
He was trailing behind again but Dodd seemed tranced by the sleet and the difficulty of the ground. Maybe now? Very very quietly he took his favourite weapon out of the bag at his back. It wasn’t a full-size crossbow but it had a very powerful bow that he was just able to cock. He stole another glance at Dodd who was negotiating a slippery spot. Quickly he fitted the crossbow stirrup to his toe and pulled upwards. It was hard but he was strong and he managed it with no more than a grunt. Lost in thought, Dodd didn’t even look back.
Whitesock noticed and pulled at the leading rein Dodd was holding, tried to pull away, neighed. Dodd glowered at him and pulled the rein sharply. “Will ye get on!” he snarled.
Now was the time. Hughie kicked his pony up the little hillock, putting in the heavy bolt as he went up behind Dodd who was in an argument with his horse, up close to the jack, leaned across, close enough to touch him and his fingers were numb, but he levelled the crossbow and pulled the lever and the bolt went straight into Dodd’s back, hopefully into a kidney.
“Aah…” he whispered, and that was good to hear, he was in agony. He clapped his hand to the bolt, found it—ay, it was a good way in—tried to draw his sword but couldn’t do it, managed to draw his dagger with his other hand.
Hughie had backed off. Whitesock pulled free with the leading rein trailing and whinnied high and deafening, again and again. Slowly, like taffy falling off a stick, Dodd leaned over and over until he was lying alongside the pony’s neck and then slower still he fell off into the snow where the sleet fell on him and the bolt sticking out of his back.
Hughie waited a minute and then dismounted from his own pony, drew his sword, went over to where Dodd was lying with his face in the snow, slowly writhing, his lips drawn back in a grimace of pain. Hughie set himself, trying to remember how did the executioner do it. He wanted Dodd’s head off neatly, not with all meat and bone dangling, but through the neckbones and gullet where it was soft and easy.
“Ma name is Hughie Elliot,” he said loudly, in case his blood enemy could still hear him, “And that’s why ye’re gaunae die.”
He took aim with his sword and one eye half-closed against the sleet, lifted it and then screamed and dropped the sword.
The bastard had stabbed him in the calf. Dodd’s dagger
was sticking out of his leg.
For a minute, Hughie kicked Dodd as hard as he could, then he picked up the sword, set himself again…
And something bit his arm and pulled him over. He staggered on the ice, the blade in his calf hurting, dropped the sword again. Then he saw Whitesock with his eyes white and rolling, his ears right back and his ugly tombstone teeth pulling and biting at him, rearing up, striking with his front hooves, shod they were…Hughie ducked once, and the second hoof caught him neatly on the head so he went down half-stunned. Then Whitesock turned his back, kicked out with both back feet, Hughie went down in the snow on his back.
The last thing he saw was the outraged horse rising up above him and he felt the front hooves come down again and again on his chest, trampling him with iron hooves until his chest was jelly and his heart had stopped.
He didn’t hear Dodd making little pants and grunts because the pain was so bad and he didn’t see the horse lie down on his belly in the snow beside him.
By that time Hughie Elliot’s eyes had set and a crow had already spotted the unexpected meal and was dropping down through the falling snow with joyous caws.
Glossary
at the horn—outlawed
at the lure—flying a falcon at a piece of meat or a bunch of feathers on a string
attacks of the mother—original term for hysteria
hunting par force de chiens—hunting with dogs
infirmity in my bones—rickets
out on the trod—out in pursuit of reivers
take her chamber—a woman would stay in one room for the final weeks of pregnancy
Allemaynes, Deutsch—Germans
apothecary—like a modern chemist or druggist
bag pudding—steamed savoury pudding, often made with suet
banket—a buffet of sweets, creams, custards, and cheeses, after a feast
bedfellow—someone you slept with, not necessarily sexual
birthing stool—a stool designed to help a woman squat in the second stage of childbirth
blankmanger—medieval dish made of almonds, cream, and chicken
A Clash of Spheres Page 30