by Jean Plaidy
Margaret sighed and leaned against him. Why not? She was after all a Drummond and an ancestor of hers, Annabella Drummond, had married Robert III of Scotland.
“Oh, James, would you indeed?”
“You may trust me,” he assured her. “I would I were King now…But no…I don’t.”
His brows were drawn together. He wanted to see his father, to tell him what nonsense it was to think that he, his eldest son, James, who wished to live in peace with everyone, would ever dream of harming him. James was imagining a pleasant scene when he would be brought face-to-face with his father and would heal the rift between him and his nobles; then he would take Margaret by the hand and say: “Father, this is the lady I have chosen to be my bride.” There would be great rejoicing throughout Scotland, for the discord would be healed by this marriage; Stirling would be the scene of joyous festivities and he would ride through the streets to Edinburgh, and there would be tournaments in the fields about the Castle and Holyrood House.
It was such a pleasant dream that it was a pity to wake from it. But he did not wish to be King since that must mean his father would be dead. He hated the thought of death; it would always remind him of the death of his mother.
Margaret understood; she pressed her lips tightly together because she knew it would hurt him if she said what was in her mind; she must not repeat what she had heard her father and his friends say, which was that it would be a good day for Scotland if James III were dethroned and his son set up in his place.
Everyone at Stobhall talked of it. She had discussed it with her sisters, particularly the younger ones—Anabella, Eupheme and Sibylla. It was for this reason that her father had brought the young heir to the throne to Stobhall, that he might be here in the hands of his father’s enemies when the need arose.
“I hate death,” whispered James. “And my father would have to die before I could be King.”
It was only about a year ago that his mother had died, and he was still aware of the void that had made in his life. It had changed the tenor of his days and he could still wake in the night and shed tears for the loss of his kind and tolerant mother.
And when she was no longer there his father’s enemies had decided to make him their figurehead. He should have protested, he knew; but Lord Drummond had brought him to Stobhall and here he had found Margaret.
She was impatient of the course the talk was taking, for she did not wish to make him melancholy.
“Let us take off our shoes,” she said, “and dabble our feet in the water.”
She cried out in mock dismay as the cold water splashed about her ankles; she held her skirts above her knees, as James splashed into the river after her and she pretended to run from him.
He caught her, as she intended he should.
“Why, James IV,” she cried, “how bold you are!”
“Is that your opinion then, Queen Margaret?”
They embraced there, while the water played about their ankles, and were astonished by their sensations. They were fifteen and people of their age who lived in the early sixteenth century in Scotland were invariably sexually awakened. They had both led more sheltered lives than most young people, and they felt in that moment impatient with their innocence. They seemed bound more closely together because they must lead each other, because they must explore together.
He drew her from the water and they lay on the bank together.
“This is the happiest day of my life,” said the future James IV of Scotland.
But even as they lay there on the bank they heard the sound of urgent voices calling the Prince.
“Heed them not,” whispered James. “They will go away.”
But the voices came nearer and Margaret struggled free of his arms and leaping to her feet smoothed her hair, straightened her rumpled gown.
He rose and stood beside her, and thus the messenger from Stobhall found them.
“I implore Your Highness to return to the house without delay,” James was told, and he caught the excitement in the voice of the man who addressed him.
Important events were close; he could not guess how important; but as he walked back with Margaret he sensed that the idyll on the bank of the Tay had been more than temporarily interrupted—perhaps it would be lost forever.
He felt the remorse even now, looking back over the years. What should I have done? he asked himself, as he had so often. Should I have refused?
But Margaret’s father was among those who pointed out his duty, and Margaret herself stood by with shining eyes watching him, telling him by her glances that he was no longer a boy.
They were persuading him where his duty lay and among them were some of the most powerful lords of Scotland: Angus, Argyle, the Humes and the Hepburns. And he gave way. Many a time he had said to himself: “I was but a boy of fifteen.” Yet he could never forget that he had allowed himself to ride out with them, while the red and gold banner of his ancestors had been held over his head.
There was one point on which he never ceased to thank God that he had insisted. “None is to harm my father,” he had declared. “If the battle goes in our favor he is to be brought to me.”
They had soothed him with gentle words, telling him that he was their leader and his word was law.
And thus he had ridden to Sauchieburn which was but a few miles from Bannockburn, the very spot where, nearly two hundred years before, the Bruce himself had defeated Edward II of England and restored independence to Scotland.
The horror of the battle of Sauchieburn stayed with him. Somewhere among the opposing army had been his father, the man who had shut himself away from his son because he believed that he would one day do him harm. Had this old prophecy been fulfilled? James wanted to cry out: But if you had been a natural father to me, if you had let love, not fear, govern the relationship between us, we would not be here this day at Sauchieburn fighting against each other.
He heard that his father had sent to Edinburgh Castle and ordered that the sword which Robert the Bruce had carried at Bannockburn should be brought to him, that he had said: “As it served the Bruce then, so shall it serve me now.”
And he had ridden into battle on the fleetest horse in Scotland, the Bruce’s sword in his hand.
James believed then that Sauchieburn would haunt him all his life; and it was true that his dreams were even now disturbed by the sound of the trumpets and the clash of spears. They had not allowed him to enter the thick of the fight—nor had he any heart for it—but he sat his horse fearfully watching, as he had in those days in Stirling Castle, for a man of noble bearing who might be his father.
And when they had come to him and told him that the enemy was routed and the victory was his he had felt the childish tears well into his eyes and he wanted to cry out: How can I rejoice when my victory is my father’s defeat?
“Where is my father?” he demanded.
But no one knew.
“It would seem, my lord, that he left the battlefield before the end. He may well have escaped to the Forth and left Scotland in one of Sir Andrew Wood’s ships which were waiting there to help him in such an emergency.”
“I must know what has happened to my father,” James insisted.
He asked that he might be alone. Then he knelt in the privacy of his tent and prayed that his father might be safe, that they might meet and all differences between them be dissolved.
He was in Stirling Castle when Lord Drummond and others of the rebel lords brought a stranger to him. This was one of the most handsome men James had ever seen—tall, with an air of fearlessness.
James went forward eagerly holding out his hands.
“Sir,” he cried, “are you my father?”
When the man put his hands over his eyes to hide his emotion, Drummond said sourly: “Nay, my lord, this is Sir Andrew Wood. He has come ashore because his friends have hostages of ours for his safekeeping. He has been sheltering our enemies on his ships in the Forth.”
Sir Andrew remove
d his hand and said firmly: “I am not Your Highness’s father, but I am his true servant, and I shall continue to be the enemy, until I die, of those who are disloyal to him.”
Drummond said: “If you know where the King is, it would be well for you to say.”
“I know not,” was the answer.
“But some of my father’s men have found refuge in your ships?” James put in eagerly.
“That is so, my lord.”
“Are you sure my father is not among them?” asked the boy pleadingly.
“Yes, my lord. Would to God I could tell you that he is safe with us, but he is not and I know not where he is. If I knew I would tell you; but I fear the worst, and I trust that one day will see the hanging of the traitors who have cruelly murdered him.”
“Murdered!” cried James, his face turning pale with horror.
But the lords had seized Andrew Wood and hustled him from the apartment.
Murder! pondered James, and then the remorse began.
Some days passed before he learned what had really happened to his father at Sauchieburn, and he felt sick with horror when the tale was recounted. His father had left the battlefield before the end, being advised by his generals that he should escape to the Forth where, while there was yet time, he could find shelter with Wood’s fleet. To stay would be to die in the field; to escape would be to live to fight another day.
A few miles from the battlefield, near a millstream, he met a woman with a pitcher which she had come to fill. Seeing the horse and rider making straight for her, and fearing they would trample her under foot she dropped the pitcher and ran. The pitcher rolling under the horse’s hoofs so startled the terrified animal that it shied and stumbled, its weary rider was thrown and lay unconscious in the dust while the horse went galloping on.
The story had been slowly pieced together by the people who had witnessed it. James heard how workers had come from the mill and carried the King inside, how he recovered consciousness and when the miller’s wife—a forceful woman—had asked his name, answered: “James Stuart is my name, and this morning I was your King.”
“Saints above us!” the miller’s wife had cried. “We have the King under our roof. And dying maybe. A priest! Fetch a priest for the King.”
She dashed out of the mill and began to run to the priest’s house, but before she reached it she saw a rider coming from the direction of Sauchieburn. “Stop!” she cried. “The King is in our mill. He is sorely hurt and needing a priest.”
The man drew up and said: “I am a priest. Lead me to him.”
The miller’s wife led him back to the mill, shouted for a boy to take his horse and then took him into the mill where the King was lying on the floor.
“I am a priest,” said the man, kneeling beside the King.
“Welcome,” murmured the King.
“Are you mortally wounded?”
“I think not, but I wish to confess my sins and to ask pardon for the faults of a lifetime.”
Then, so quickly that none of those about him realized what was happening until it was done, the man drew his sword and, saying, “This will give you pardon,” plunged it into the King’s body.
Withdrawing it, he walked out of the mill, took his horse from the boy who held it, mounted and rode away. And none ever knew his name.
Young James was in his apartment at Stirling Castle when the nobles came to him. He was astonished by their solemn looks.
“What news?” he asked.
Lord Drummond was kneeling before him as he heard the shout which resounded through the room: “Long live the King!”
James recoiled. “My father…?” he began.
“Sire, you no longer have a father. Long live James IV of Scotland and the Isles.”
It was then he heard the story of his father’s end; but he could not share their joy. He could only tell himself that never again would he look into the faces of handsome strangers and wonder whether at last he was face-to-face with his father.
Already he seemed to feel the crown weighing heavily on his head. His father defeated by his enemies and murdered by them! Not until that moment had he understood how they had involved him in their treacherous conflict, and there was deep sorrow in understanding. His father had died and it might seem that he himself bore some responsibility for that death.
I believe I shall never know complete peace again, he told himself.
In the weeks that followed his accession, so great had been his remorse that he had even forgotten Margaret. Night and morning he had prayed for the soul of his father in the Chapel-Royal at Stirling Castle.
“How can I atone for my father’s death?” he demanded of his confessor.
“Pray…pray for forgiveness,” was the answer.
But he found only brief comfort in prayer, and soon afterward he took to wearing an iron belt about his doublet, which was heavy and caused him great discomfort.
But he felt happier wearing it. It was a way of doing penance for the murder of his father.
That had happened long ago and one could not grieve forever. He had quickly discovered that it was pleasant to be a king. His friends, important men such as Argyle, Hailes, Lyle and Hume, were eager for him to enjoy life and to leave tiresome state matters to them.
“Why,” they said, “you are the King; and living as you did in Stirling Castle, what chance did you have of enjoying your life?”
He changed; he was no longer retiring, but discovered himself to be a high-spirited boy, and there was hunting and hawking over the glorious countryside; there were balls and banquets to be arranged; dancing to be watched and indulged in. His father was buried in state at Cambuskenneth Abbey and lay there with his wife, so there was nothing more his son could do for him, except to wear the iron belt now and then to remind himself and the world that he still regretted the manner in which his father had died.
There had been days when pleasure had been constantly with him; he remembered the occasion when Margaret Drummond had joined him at Linlithgow Castle and he had ordered gold, azure and silver cloth to make her a gown which would dazzle all who saw it; and when she sat with him in the place of honor at the table, the masked singers, luters, and harpists performed for them alone.
Had he followed his own inclination he would have married Margaret then as he had promised to; but there were jealous men about him who were determined that the Drummonds should not become too powerful and, although Margaret and he were allowed to enjoy each other’s company in the weeks immediately following his succession, excuses were made to part them.
And he had allowed it to happen—just as he had allowed his father’s enemies to place him at their head. He could always make the excuse: “I was but a boy.” To become a king would naturally overwhelm one so young; it was understandable that he should find life more absorbing than it had been in Stirling Castle or at Stobhall. He became interested in the governing of his country; and the lords of Scotland were too quarrelsome ever to live in peace with one another, so there was continual strife. Was it for that reason that he allowed himself to drift away from Margaret? Or was it because he had discovered that the longings she had aroused within him could be stimulated—though not with the same tenderness or delight—by any pretty woman? Now that he was King there were so many to smile on him.
Women—more knowledgeable than Margaret—beckoned him continually. He hesitated for a while, remembering his first love; then he hesitated no longer and he knew that, of all the sports and pastimes which delighted him, nothing would appeal to him quite so strongly as making love to women.
His advisers laughed at him. They would not have it otherwise. Let him chase women who would keep him occupied, preventing him from dabbling in state affairs. What could better suit their purpose?
“’Tis kingly in a man to love women,” they told him. “A habit of all good kings—and a custom the Stuarts ever observed.”
So there need be no remorse. He forgot to sigh for Margaret; he even forgot h
is remorse for his father’s death. Those were the carefree years.
Women! A succession of women—highborn ladies and tavern wenches. He had changed from that inexperienced boy who had dallied with Margaret Drummond on the banks of the Tay.
Yet being sentimental, he looked for one particular woman. Women there would always be, but among them he sought always the perfect mistress. He thought he had found her in Marian Boyd, the daughter of the Lord of Bonshaw—comely, witty, a charming mistress. He had been faithful to Marian for months, and she had borne him two children of whom he was very proud. He gave Alexander and Catherine the name of Stuart, for he was not ashamed to recognize them as his own. He took time from his state duties to visit them often, for he loved playing with children and he was determined that his children should never be treated by their father as he had been by his.
Marian might have remained his chief mistress had it not been for Janet Kennedy.
Janet was different from any other woman he had ever known. Redheaded and tempestuous, already she had been the mistress of Archibald Douglas, Earl of Angus, known as the Great Earl and Bell-the-Cat, one of the most notorious of all Scottish lords. It had been an achievement therefore for James to take her from Angus, even though he was a king and Angus a mere earl.
Angus had always been a leader in the country’s affairs, and had earned the nickname Bell-the-Cat, by which he was always known, some years before when the English had threatened to attack Scotland and certain of the nobles refused to stand with James III to repel this enemy. When James had been preparing to march to the Border, certain of his own countrymen such as Huntley, Angus, Lennox, Gray and Lyle were gathering together an army to pursue the King’s and present certain demands to him before they joined forces with him against the English. When they were deciding who should present the demands, Lord Gray told the fable of the mice who planned to put a bell about the cat’s neck to warn them of its approach. All very well, was the answer, but who should bell the cat? It was Angus who spoke up: “I will bell the cat,” and forever after he was known by that name. Shrewd, brilliant, Angus never failed to seize an opportunity which would advance the Douglases.