The Gowrie Conspiracy

by Alanna Knight

  Tam had an unhappy awareness that Alexander Ruthven was one of time’s misplacements born at least two hundred years too late. He belonged to the medieval age of knightly deeds and tournaments, and would have served well in the Crusades.

  The wedding of Will and Tansy was planned with remarkable speed to take place immediately and Alexander went back to Trochrie to fetch his brother.

  To Tansy’s anxious question whether Martin should be invited, Will shook his head. ‘Summoning cousin Hailes will delay us by at least another day and politeness would mean including Simon, his wife and family. And who knows how the word might spread and the crowds gather?’

  He shook his head. ‘No, my dearest. Neither of us would want that. To all who know us, for all intents and purposes except the legal ones, we have been long married. Martin will understand. You have been my wife in his eyes for a long time now. He can but add his blessing when next we meet and I have a fancy to take you to Edinburgh.’

  ‘And Edinburgh is not too far from Dirleton and my dear foster-mother. She will be so happy.’

  Tansy was secretly relieved at his decision for she felt this small miracle, this bubble of happiness, was fragile as thistledown on a summer’s day and any delays might cause it to blow away and vanish for ever.

  So Will summoned the minister from the parish church to prepare with all possible haste and in the late afternoon, accompanied by the two Ruthvens, the wedding party set off on foot to walk the quarter-mile across fields to the parish church.

  There Tam led a radiant Tansy down the aisle. She looked at him and smiled, a little self-conscious, pleased but feeling somewhat overdressed for a simple country wedding. The wreath of wild flowers on her red-gold hair was not quite appropriate for the elaborate satin dress that the queen had given to her for the other wedding which would be taking place a few miles away.

  As Tam handed her to Will, she blinked away tears. For the day that she had dreaded having to live through, so fraught with menace, with misery and fear had, by God’s grace, turned out to be the fulfilment of her heart’s desire, her own wedding day.

  As Tansy and Will stood before the altar they made before God and those witnesses present the vows to love, honour and obey, until death did them part – the same vows that made them man and wife which they had sworn to each other privately so many years ago.

  While Will slipped the ring back once again on Tansy’s finger, the sun beamed through the windows, touching their heads in benediction. And outside, the minister’s words were in keen competition with a blackbird singing most obligingly on a tree nearby.

  Over the empty echoing pews, two butterflies, radiantly blue, fluttered and danced, while a bee droned, busily sipping nectar from the posy of wild flowers that Tansy had set aside.

  As they left the church she smiled, kissed her foster-brothers and Tam. ‘If only this day could last forever,’ she whispered and added wistfully, ‘There will never be another day – not in my whole life, I know – as happy as this one.’

  And despite the warm sunshine, Tam shivered. For an instant the little group were frozen in time. The faces of bride and groom, the two handsome foster-brothers sharing in their wonder and delight.

  ‘It can never come again.’

  Tam felt Tansy’s wistful words hung on the air, and he wanted to push back the moment of prophecy, the darkness still to come which might blight all memories of that golden day.

  A simple wedding feast awaited them in Kirktillo. Wine and a joint of lamb with vegetables from the garden and a splendid apple pie.

  With his first chance to get acquainted more closely with the two brothers, Tam expecting another edition of Alexander decided that it was fortunate for the Ruthvens that John, his senior by three years, had inherited the title.

  Now Earl of Gowrie, he had been appointed Lord Provost of Perth when only fifteen years old. It took only half an hour in their company for the difference in their temperaments to become obvious. John was a much more cautious and responsible young man who regarded his fiery sibling with the apprehension of a man holding in check a team of wild horses.

  Alexander had a special place in Tansy’s heart and, walking ahead of the others in the gardens, he was eager to hear about Tam Eildor.

  In common with everyone else who first met him, Tam had made a deep impression on the boy.

  ‘Distant cousin, on my granddam Beaton’s side,’ was Tansy’s prompt response in reply to Alexander’s first question.

  ‘I guessed that,’ he grinned. ‘Two people so alike must be related. Brother John deeply regrets that he never met Lady Beaton. Was she really a witch?’ he asked.

  Tansy laughed. ‘Dear Alexander, you have asked me that question so many times and the answer is still the same.’

  ‘Indeed?’ he said eagerly.

  ‘Indeed. To me she was simply my granddam, loving and kind. And wise with herbs and simples. I never saw her in any other light.’

  ‘John would be disappointed. Despite that sober and scholarly manner, my brother became particularly interested in alchemy and necromancy when we were in Padua. He often said he would have liked to discuss it with her, that she might have been uncommon knowledgeable about it. He insists there is much to learn about that other world. What do you think, Tansy?’

  ‘I have no opinions on the subject,’ was the careful reply.

  Alexander frowned. ‘But even as a child, you saw things – things that other people were not aware of.’

  ‘Did I? An impressionable child. That was a long time ago,’ she said and, ignoring his look of disappointment, she hurried him in the direction of the other three, their heads bent in conversation.

  A dangerous topic for discussion, but she did not doubt that Tam could have shed a great deal of light on John’s curiosity about that other world beyond time that so intrigued him.

  The fact that Tam was devoted to Tansy was enough recommendation for Alexander to decide without knowing anything more about him that here was an excellent friend, a boon companion in the making.

  And had he needed further information, the knowledge that he was in retreat from Falkland Palace having spurned the amorous advances of King James was an unbreakable bond.

  He already felt he had found a brother in distress and once again he rode his favourite hobby horse, the degradation and iniquities he had suffered for that mercifully brief time before he had quit royal service as Gentleman of the Bedchamber.

  Banging his fists together, his eyes blazed that his friend Tam Eildor should have also suffered at the hands of the lustful king.

  ‘That murderous wicked man – who killed our father – expected me – his son – to be his catamite. If only I could make him suffer, for Master Eildor and for myself.’

  And quite suddenly, Alexander had an inspiration, a plan that would avenge them both.

  Visiting his mother in Dirleton he had met Robert Logan, an old conspirator whose stronghold was Fast Castle, on the wild Berwickshire coast. Lady Gowrie, was well aware of her young son’s vulnerability regarding stories of hidden treasure. She considered Logan a black-hearted schemer, a man not to be trusted and to be treated with extreme caution.

  But in common with many schemers, Logan also possessed plausibility and charm, attributes which he was ready and willing to shed on any who he thought might be useful to him. It took him less than an hour to impress the boy, who was incapable of seeing beneath the surface exterior of anyone who was kind and heavy on flattery.

  Logan was no friend of King James. Listening to Alexander’s tale of woe, of his grandfather and father both executed plus his own indignities at Falkland Palace at the hands of the king, Logan was quick to see opportunity lurking within his grasp.

  Telling Alexander just enough to encourage his interest, he hinted at a vague plan in the making to kidnap James, take him by boat from Leith to Fast Castle and keep him prisoner until he agreed to their terms, unspecified to Alexander.

  The only words which he listene
d to were, ‘To keep him prisoner as once your father kept him in Ruthven Castle.’

  Logan did not add that he had paid for it with his head.

  Alexander was bound to secrecy. On no account was he to tell anyone. He could be discreet when necessity demanded, however, he could not resist gleefully telling brother John of his meeting with Logan and the plan to abduct the king.

  John was horrified, appalled at such an idea. Proud to be the peace loving, respected young Earl of Gowrie, Lord Provost and God-fearing Presbyterian and keen upholder of the Protestant faith, he was eager to keep it that way and at that moment was conscientiously working on a sermon to be delivered at St John’s Kirk on Tuesday, 5th August.

  ‘Let it go,’ he warned his brother. ‘It is folly and far too dangerous. There can be no good outcome to such a scheme. Remember what happened last time – to our father, I entreat you.’

  ‘Do you not see, this is my very reason – and it should be yours too, brother.’

  ‘Alexander, we are living in peace now. The old wounds are forgotten. Or should be, for it is time to do so, if we wish to have any future.’

  And at his brother’s stubborn look, he added, ‘I absolutely forbid you to go ahead with this mad scheme. I warn you of its dangers and I want no part.’

  Alexander, disappointed, feeling let down and betrayed, thereupon decided that Tam Eildor, a brother in spirit, bold and fearless, would be the perfect accomplice.

  He had it all worked out. Together they would make the king smart, put the fear of God in him.

  And so Tam listened to his vague hints and tried to dissuade the impetuous Alexander with his wild ideas emanating from Logan, about whom he knew nothing, but could guess quite a lot of what was in his mind, when Alexander spread a plan of Fast Castle on the table before him.

  ‘Take a look, Tam, see what possibilities it has for us,’ said Alexander excitedly. ‘It stands on the very edge of a perpendicular cliff, its only access by a natural staircase cut in the living rock.’

  Pausing, he looked eagerly at Tam. ‘Already it is known as the meeting-place of smugglers and Papist spies with gold in their purses, chosen because it is an impregnable fortress, with the wild North Sea on one side and landward a waste of bent and dune from which it is severed by a narrow rib of rock over a deep gorge spanned by a drawbridge.’

  Tam tried in vain to reason with him. How could he hope to accomplish all this, kidnap the king with a handful of loyal servants – there were about six only at Trochrie who would be going with the Ruthvens to open up Gowrie House.

  ‘There is a saying that twenty men could hold Fast Castle against all Scotland,’ said Alexander triumphantly.

  ‘That may be so. But first you would need a whole army to get him there, from Falkland to Leith and down the treacherous Berwickshire coast.’

  Alexander pondered for a moment. ‘We could take a ship from Perth down the River Tay – ’

  At that Tam stopped listening. He decided that the boy with his fantasies was not really dangerous. He was just a little mad. A madness, he hoped, that age and wisdom would cure.

  Back at Falkland Palace, the arch conspirator Sandy Kay was also mad.

  Mad with rage. News of Walter Murray’s sudden death had deprived him of a reasonable income, based on plans to rid his one-time master of Tansy Scott, his legal wife who was now his widow.

  Since the attempts on her life had failed miserably he could not expect to be reimbursed for the fracas of the mistimed accident with the bridge at Kirktillo. It had cost him the services of two out-of-work mercenaries hired at a local inn.

  As they were now out for his blood – quite literally. He decided to quit Falkland Palace quite sharply since he had also failed the Duke of Lennox in that other important mission.

  To discredit Tam Eildor. A task no longer necessary, since Master Eildor had been removed from under His Grace’s amorous eye to Gowrie House.

  Ludovick Stewart had no quarrel with the young Earl and his brother. His first wife Sophia, who died some eight years ago, had been their elder sister, a relationship he was not inclined to brag about, aware of James’s violent antipathy to any mention of the hated Ruthvens.

  Chapter Eighteen

  The morning of August 3rd saw Kirktillo in a flurry of activity.

  The newlyweds were leaving for Edinburgh, and thence to Lady Gowrie at Dirleton Castle. But first they would call upon Simon Fuller and bring the glad tidings of their marriage to Martin Hailes, with the certain hope that he would offer to accommodate them at his Lawnmarket house.

  The bridge repaired, Will took out his seldom-used carriage with a groom delighted at the chance of a rare jaunt to Edinburgh.

  Tansy embraced Tam in farewell and said, ‘This is just a short parting, you will see me at Gowrie House very soon. As soon as my dear husband here will release me,’ she added with a mock curtsey in Will’s direction.

  As Tam glanced quickly at Will who smiled, Tansy said defiantly, ‘I gave my word. They need my assistance. Two young lads, helpless as babes where refurbishing a house is concerned.’

  Will laughed and kissed her hand. ‘I think I can spare her for a short while. I cannot be greedy – what are a few days when she has the rest of her life to spend with me?’

  They radiated happiness, the certainty of a future which stretched ahead exactly as they had always imagined. The dream they had believed in for so long had at last come true. And watching the carriage depart, wishing them God-speed, Tam closed his eyes, willing it to be so.

  Willing it to be so, he thought again as, ready to leave for Gowrie House with his saddlebags, he headed for the stables. Why should he suddenly prickle with terror of the unknown? If only he knew its nature and could warn them.

  ‘Tam!’

  The horseman racing across the bridge was Alexander. ‘I met Tansy and Will on the road.’ He laughed. ‘My timing could not have been better. Now you are to come to Gowrie, John is already on his way there, but I told him I would collect you. John has a great deal on hand at the moment. He is to deliver a sermon at St John’s Kirk in two days time. He sends his apologies.’

  Walking alongside, Tam bowed in acknowledgement, thinking this was a great deal of trouble for the Earl and his brother to personally escort a servant from one house to another, only a few miles distant.

  A groom appeared leading Tam’s horse and as he mounted, Alexander said, ‘A moment, where pray, is your luggage?’

  ‘Here, sir.’ Tam patted the saddlebags. ‘A servant, even a steward, needs little luggage, sir. Merely a few necessities.’

  Alexander shook his head and said sternly. ‘No servant, Tam Eildor and no steward, for we have one already from Trochrie. And no “sir” either. You come to Gowrie as our dear friend and honoured guest.’

  As they rode out, Tam marvelled at such a generous invitation on a mere three days’ acquaintance. Alexander called across to him, ‘You shall hunt with us if you have a mind to it and perhaps advise on certain other matters before you return to Peebles.’

  That was the story Tansy had told Alexander allowing Tam an open door and the freedom to leave when he must. As for those ‘certain other matters’, Tam hoped that young Ruthven had accepted his final word on the madcap scheme of the king’s kidnapping.

  Riding swiftly down through twisting lanes from Kirktillo on to the tree-lined roads that led to Perth, the countryside had the mellow look of a hot summer that had burned itself out, its day almost over.

  The distance was short and Tam was thankful.

  He was able to handle a horse competently enough. Even the wild stallion whose life he had saved from King James’s wrath had settled down very happily to domestic life with Queen Anne’s mares.

  At last the roofs of houses and the tall spire of St John’s Kirk appeared above the distant treetops and a few minutes later they were riding towards Shoe Gait, or South Street, the city’s chief thoroughfare, crossed at right angles with Spey Gate on the right and Water Gate on th
e left.

  There, behind high walls with locked gates, glimpses of handsome turreted houses half-hidden by trees, were the homes of Perth’s richest citizens and merchants and the town houses of county lairds.

  The gateway of Gowrie House was directly opposite the end of Shoe Gait, with a wall extending the length of the Spey Gate and concealing vast gardens stretching down to the River Tay.

  Recalling their earlier unsuccessful visit en route for Kirktillo and the uneasy atmosphere exuded by the empty house, Tam hoped that a sunny day would bring about a great improvement.

  There was none; the house, a pile of buildings of assorted dimensions like an inverted ‘L’ faced east and west. Only late afternoon would obliterate the dark shadows of its north-facing courtyard and warm west-facing apartments with the gleam of a sunset sky.

  Grooms took their horses and Alexander led the way into the house by-passing a door which lay open revealing a narrow spiral staircase, which Tam presumed to be the main entrance.

  Alexander shook his head. ‘That is another way. Quicker access to the upper apartments of the house, but so dark and dismal it has always been known as the Black Turnpike. Follow me.’

  The main doorway led up a great wheel-staircase to emerge into the Great Hall dominated by a handsome stone fireplace and bare stone walls. Beneath lay rolled tapestries and carpets while items of furniture, dust-sheeted chairs and tables, stood everywhere, awaiting distribution.

  ‘This will appear a great deal more comfortable once Tansy gets to work on deciding how and where the tapestries should be hung,’ said Alexander, almost apologetically, as if, Tam thought, he was indeed some honoured and distinguished guest.

  As Alexander opened a door on the left Tam had a glimpse of a panelled room whose central table and chairs proclaimed it as a dining-room before following across the hall through a door with an external stair which he said led into the garden.