The Gowrie Conspiracy

by Alanna Knight

  He repeated that the carriage was only used on occasions involving the whole family. Like Will, he prefered to ride his own horse. Treating the incident in a light-hearted, almost merry manner, he hinted that such an escape would be a worthwhile adventure to entertain his dear wife.

  ‘A fine fellow,’ Will said to Tansy waving them farewell.

  Tansy interpreted his anxious look. ‘Indeed, but he does talk rather a lot. Some of his conversations are quite exhausting. Martin was in severe danger of dozing off – one needed a good deal of concentration to keep track of it all.’ To Tam she said, ‘Even you looked a little glazed on occasions. And you were very silent.’

  Tam laughed but the warning glance he exchanged with Will indicated the real source of his silence. Both shared the fear that Simon might reveal to Martin what the stable lad had overheard.

  That Tansy was the target of the villainous plan.

  As they returned across the lawns to the house, each of them nursed their own secret anxieties.

  Tansy was increasingly apprehensive as the day of the Tullibardine wedding approached. Although she tried to make light of it to Will, she told Tam privately that there was no escaping the fact that it would be a considerable ordeal for her.

  She sighed. ‘Alas, dissembling has never come easily to me. And I fear that my feelings – my loathing for a husband I have not met face to face for three years – will be transparent for all the world to see.’

  ‘It is just for a short while,’ said Tam consolingly.

  Tansy shook her head. ‘Family weddings last days, Tam. The Murrays have kin from many parts of Scotland. And I shall have to put on an amicable portrayal of a happy marriage, of a docile obedient wife, for the benefit of Walt’s family, since his inheritance might be in serious jeopardy should his staunch Presbyterian father suspect his son’s double life.’

  ‘Do they not know about his mistress?’

  Tansy shook her head. ‘I think not. Or at least they pretend not to.’

  Tam laughed. ‘Then that is the weapon you hold over him. Threaten to tell all.’

  ‘Oh Tam,’ she wailed. ‘You do not understand a husband’s power. He is a violent man and I am terrified of him.’ She looked at Tam imploringly. ‘You must suspect, as I do, that many of the things that night at the masque had his hand behind them. He wants my death. I know it!’

  Tam could not deny that. Aware that it may be true. Aware in addition what they were at pains to conceal from Tansy. That the deliberately damaged bridge had been intended for their carriage from Falkland.

  Instead he said reassuringly, ‘One day, perhaps two or three at most to endure, then it will all be over and you will be back here with Will.’

  ‘One day,’ she repeated and with a look of panic, ‘The wedding might last for several days. And nights. And I will be expected to share his bed.’

  ‘Surely not. Some excuse – ’

  ‘Surely yes! What reasonable excuse could a wife give for such a denial?’

  Before Tam could think of any answer to that, one of the servants appeared. Mistress Scott was required in the kitchen.

  Will had disappeared indoors. With the talkative Simon no longer his concern, he too was concerned and anxious about the Murray wedding. He had long since guessed, from Tansy’s description of her earlier life, the kind of ruthless, violent man she had married. A man who had brutally cast her aside because she was unable to bear children.

  Will had no doubts however that as Tansy grew lovelier with the passing years and with their own love fulfilled, Walt might also be aware of this change and see her through new and lustful eyes.

  Aware that she had found happiness and love, he was capable of delivering the final degradation. By making her share his bed and forcing himself upon her. How that would delight his depraved spirit.

  Will clenched his fists and groaned at the sight he tried not to imagine. The hours, God forbid that it should be days, when she was at Tullibardine would be a nightmare for him and he tried instead to concentrate on her return.

  A few days here together then he would see her safely installed at Gowrie House. Near neighbours, he had known the four Ruthven boys all their lives and the two eldest, John, the Earl of Gowrie, and Alexander, the Master of Ruthven, had been constant visitors.

  They knew of the circumstances of their foster-sister’s unhappy marriage and that she had found a new life with Will Hepburn and he was sure that they would gladly and often make him welcome at their town house.

  Tam had his own misgivings, none of which had any connection with the Murray wedding. He was deeply concerned about the future, realising that this was a smooth plateau and only part of the picture had been revealed to him. There were threads in plenty but he had no idea where they fitted into the main event of his chosen time-quest which still lay ahead, some unsolved episode in Scotland’s history.

  He had been taken by surprise. Imagining that they would be safe after their flight from Falkland, he saw that he had been unprepared for the pattern which begun with Mistress Agnew’s murder, and culminating in the attempted murder of Tansy – and himself – at the Masque.

  Helpless to speed up the pace of time he must keep patient vigil with Tansy and Will, who he had once wistfully regarded as a rival for her affections.

  But Tansy had made perfectly clear that she was Will’s and his alone. And even if Tam could have had her love, it could only, he knew, have been an interlude. Now he enjoyed a growing friendship and respect for them both, recognizing that they had much in common with himself, despite belonging to centuries which were six hundred years apart.

  Will had a great love of poetry and an excellent library although most of the books were of an intellectual depth and language beyond Tam. But the paintings were more easily understood. Portraits and landscapes are not so affected by the passage of time.

  Most striking of all was their common delight in nature, in the outdoors, for Will was the perfect laird. Eager to accommodate his guest while Tansy took over the reins of mistress of Kirktillo and spent many hours in earnest conversation with servants, setting this and that to rights, talking patterns for bed-curtains and windows, Will and Tam spent many hours in companionable silence fishing in the burn, which in a more turbulent existence had qualified as a moat.

  An inadequate catch at the end of most days did not bother either of them. If fish were small then Will threw them back and said, ‘Swim in peace, grow in splendour.’

  Perhaps it was Will’s exceptional general knowledge of the animal world that Tam found most appealing as well as their mutual love of Tansy. On occasions she joined them and they picked cherries and berries in the orchard to reappear later that day in the appetising form and smell of baked pies.

  Tam decided this was a good life and he was grateful. One day all too soon, it would end. Tansy would return from the dreaded wedding and together they would leave for the readornment of Gowrie House.

  Meanwhile, he would enjoy the peaceful interlude of Kirktullo’s tranquil gardens. He grew increasingly fond of his delightful room up the crooked stair over the gatehouse, with panelled walls that still retained the smell of fresh wood and a windowseat overlooking the garden.

  Had he been born into this century, he decided, this would have been his ideal household.

  Here he was offered every comfort, servants at his command, with warm water for his ablutions each morning and night, to wash and shave. Changes of linen were also laid out for him.

  In the fireplace, logs were set ready for lighting against chilly evenings. But the summer weather continued and in his south-facing room he loved the night air – although it was commonly regarded as highly dangerous – and found it pleasant and refreshing to unlatch the window.

  From his deep, soft, many-pillowed bed, its sheets perfumed with lavender and rosemary, he watched the sky. Night brought a blaze of stars, so close that he could almost reach out a hand and touch them, marvelling that these same stars and moon also shone
on that other world, still far away in time, that he had temporarily abandoned. Although he was denied all memory of it, it existed somewhere out there in space.

  Sleeping dreamlessly, he awoke to the sounds of the early morning with birdsong and bees already busy amid the honeysuckle growing close to the window.

  How good it was. He had an ominous feeling that the sprawling Gowrie House in the centre of Perth would be far less accommodating. He hoped he was wrong and that the chilling exterior, so unwelcoming on their flight from Falkland, was due to its long emptiness and neglect.

  He had not confided these feelings to Tansy or Will, of his particular sensitivity to houses.

  He yawned and opened his eyes, hearing the house below stretch itself into day. Servants voices, some girl who sang with a sweet voice, laughter too, dogs barking. Horses in the stables, neighing a greeting to the grooms.

  The sound of a galloping horse.

  A rider – urgent – with a message.

  And such a message. Coming sleepily downstairs, Will and Tansy had awakened to a small miracle.

  They were hearing that all their present anxieties were at an end. No happy ending but a happy beginning.

  In an instant the whole story of their lives had changed.

  Walter Murray was dead.

  The messenger who brought the news to Tansy had been redirected to Kirktillo from Falkland Palace. He was offering condolences, bowing. Sad and respectful.

  Tansy asked him to repeat it. Fearful that her white face meant she was about to faint, he looked at Will helplessly.

  ‘Your husband, madam, Walter Murray, is dead.’

  Tansy sat down. ‘What happened?’

  ‘Two days ago when he was hunting, his horse refused a fence and threw him. He was carried home.’ Pausing, the messenger shook his head. ‘But he was already dead, his neck broken in the fall.’

  Tansy stared at him, conscious of Will’s hand upon her shoulder. ‘I beg your pardon. We will get you some refreshment.’

  And in a desperate attempt at normality, ‘Your name, sir?’

  ‘John Jeffers. I am – was – your late husband’s lawyer. The funeral has been arranged by Mistress Embleton. It will take place on Monday afternoon in the village church. Master Murray will be laid to rest in the family vault.’ He looked down at Tansy and said sternly, ‘Mistress Embleton does not expect you to attend either the service or to appear at the kirkyard.’

  ‘Mistress Embleton?’ said Tansy dazedly.

  Then at the man’s confusion she remembered Judith Embleton was the name of Walt’s mistress. She nodded weakly.

  Straightening his shoulders Master Jeffers plunged on. ‘Mistress Embleton, as you might imagine, is distraught with grief and she hopes you will abide by her wishes in this respect.’

  ‘That I will do gladly. Please offer my condolences.’

  Tansy was tempted to add her gratitude to that request. More than that she had a sudden vision of the unimposing white-bearded grey-faced lawyer in the unlikely role of her guardian angel.

  Master Jeffers had brought her the best possible news that she need no longer hate or be haunted by fears of Walt Murray. She was free.

  With a certain diffidence, the lawyer was mentioning the legalities which had occasioned his personal visit to the estranged wife.

  Tansy listened, her heart suddenly racing with joy. Walt had long ago changed his will to leave all to Judith Embleton and the son she had borne him.

  ‘Inform Mistress Embleton that it is not my intention to contest my late husband’s will, and I gladly relinquish any rights that I might have had under the law to moneys and property from his estate.’

  Master Jeffers bowed politely, although he must have been well aware for several years of his client’s matrimonial situation. Declining Will’s offer of bread and ale, on the excuse that he had matters to attend in Perth, the lawyer eagerly took his departure and rode away from Kirktillo, greatly relieved at the outcome of what had promised to be an extremely difficult visit.

  A patient listener for some years to horrendous accounts of the iniquities of Master Murray’s legal wife and their disastrous marriage, he had been prepared for a sharp-toothed vixen of somewhat the same category as Mistress Embleton.

  Instead he had been greeted by the gentle and quite lovely Mistress Tansy Scott, who was obviously deeply shocked by her late husband’s sudden death.

  Deeply shocked indeed, but not quite as the good lawyer imagined.

  Closing the door on him, Tansy turned and flung herself into Will’s waiting arms. Bewildered still, as he held her she whispered, ‘I am free, Will. Free at last – after all these years. I cannot believe it.

  ‘Nor can I, my dearest.’

  ‘I do not know whether to laugh or cry. I fear that I might wake up and find that it was just another dream and that Walt is still alive and waiting outside the door to brutally ill-use me.’

  There was panic in her voice as she clung to him. ‘Tell me that will not happen, Will. Tell me this is no dream.’

  Tenderly Will kissed her, cradled her like a child in his arms. ‘No more bad dreams, my dearest love. Not ever again. Now you are mine forever.’

  ‘I only ever wanted to be free of him. Not his death,’ she whispered. ‘And although he treated me so badly, I am sorry for the child who has lost a father and for his grieving mistress. Like myself she has been an unofficial wife for many years.’

  ‘I should not waste too much sympathy in that direction. Think instead of how many times the two of them must have wished you dead,’ said Will sternly.

  ‘Aye, and done more than that. Remember the incidents at the queen’s Masque. Think how he would have rejoiced had news of your death been carried to him. To have heard that you had been the victim of a misplaced arrow or a goblet of poisoned wine,’ he added grimly.

  ‘We must tell Tam,’ said Tansy.

  Tam was greatly relieved at the news. Like Will, he suspected that Walt’s hand could have directed the attempts on Tansy’s life. Now he too could also breathe freely at last, with one less item on his growing list of concerns.

  ‘Now we can be wed,’ said Will. And to Tansy, ‘We need not wait any longer. Not one day. Tomorrow will be our wedding day.”

  ‘How can that be?’ asked Tansy softly, gazing at him adoringly.

  ‘We have long been man and wife in the sight of God, now only the legalities remain. I shall ask Reverend Wilton to perform the ceremony. Here in our own home.’

  To Tam he explained, ‘Reverend Wilton is our parish minister and has always shown a great deal of understanding for our living together as man and wife which was not of our choosing, but forced upon us after Tansy sought refuge at Kirktillo long ago – ’

  ‘A moment, Will dear,’ Tansy interrupted. ‘Make it the day after tomorrow,’ she begged.

  ‘You say that – after waiting so long. My patience, dearest love, is at a very low ebb. I want to claim before the whole world that Tansy Scott is now Mistress Hepburn, until death do us part.’

  And so saying, he whirled Tansy around in his arms, while she laughed, kissing him and calling upon him to desist, that the whole world was whirling about her ears.

  At last on terra firma again, Tansy said excitedly, ‘We must invite John and Alexander from Trochrie. They shall be our witnesses.’

  ‘We need a man to give the bride away,’ said Will. And smiling at Tam, ‘A father’s duty, but as Tansy’s true friend, one you will perform very well indeed.’

  Tam bowed and as Tamsy hugged him and kissed his cheek, he decided wryly that she could be very bold at displaying her affection. Especially since he could not take her in his arms, as he longed to, in front of Will.

  Chapter Seventeen

  Into this happy scene rode a newcomer.

  Alexander Ruthven, on his way to Gowrie House from Trochrie, had decided to call in at Kirktillo and pay his respects to his foster-sister and his dear friend and neighbour Will Hepburn.

  A
n onlooker, Tam found himself in the midst of family jubilation at the announcement of their unexpected wedding.

  Embracing Tansy and Will, Alexander shook Tam warmly by the hand and said that this was the best possible news. He had never met Walter Murray but anyone who was unkind to his dearest Tansy was his enemy for life.

  Tam, observing the bond of affection between the pair, realised that Tansy had been more fortunate in her foster-family than many orphans are with their own kin. In too many homes, the unfortunate child thrust upon them to rear as a matter of grudging duty becomes the jealous target of foster-siblings and, bullied and ill-treated all round, is regarded as little more than the lowest unpaid menial.

  Tam’s thoughts on the matter were confirmed when Alexander, with his arm about Tansy’s shoulders, kissed her cheek and said to him, ‘There is no blood kin between us and had dear Tansy not this very day promised to be Will’s wife, then I would have married her tomorrow.’

  ‘You would not,’ laughed Tansy. ‘I am far too old for you.’

  ‘A mere fourteen years,’ sniffed Alexander indignantly. ‘A mere nothing if our roles were reversed. Old men take wives young enough to be their grandchildren,’ he added earnestly.

  Will produced a bottle of fine claret and a toast was drunk to the wedding. Amid talk of Lady Gowrie’s health and whether she was making a good recovery at Dirleton with their sister Beatrix, as well as other matters relating to the family in which Tam had no part, he had a chance to observe the Master of Ruthven.

  Alexander had a fiery nature to match his fiery red hair. A nineteen-year-old whose life was already full of passionate loves and passionate hates.

  Listening to tales of Padua from whence he had recently returned, and his revolt against the appalling conditions among the poor and the imprisoned, Tam decided they must have been dire indeed to make such an impression, considering the appalling conditions of such poor wretches in his own native land.

  It was not difficult to make an assessment of Alexander Ruthven. Intensely chivalrous, he was ready to spring into action to right wrongs, fight imaginary dragons and rescue damsels whether or not they were in distress and whether or not they even wished to be rescued.