The Courtesan mog-2 Read online

  Patrick and David came forward. 'It is some years, sir, since we have had the pleasure, is it not?' the former went on, easily. 'You wear well, I see. And is that Gibbie with you? Brother Gibbie – a man now, a sober, respectable, man, I vow – and scarce like a Gray at all, at all! Greetings, brother. And to you, Mr Provost.'

  My lord smashed down his fist on the table-top. 'Silence!' he barked, though his voice broke a little. 'Quiet, you… you mincing jackdaw! You mocking cuckoo!' As Mary tugged at his arm, whispering, he shook her off roughly. 'Fiend seize me – what ill chance brings you here? How dare you darken any door o' mine, man?'

  'Dare, sir? Dare? Why, I am a very lion for daring. That at least I inherit from my sire – if naught else. Yet!' Patrick smiled. 'I dare, my lord, because I would see you, have word with you – who knows, even possibly come to terms with you!'

  'Never, curse you – never! I told you yon time – never did I want to see your insolent ninny's face again. I meant it then, by God – and I mean it yet!'

  'My lord… ' David began, but Patrick silenced him with a gesture.

  'My face, sir, may not please you – since it is vastly unlike your own… which no doubt contents us both well enough! But, I had thought that you at least would wish to look on the face of your eventual heir. The seventh Lord Gray, to be. You did not grace his christening. So I have brought him to Castle Huntly, that you may see him there.'

  'Then you may take the brat away again – and forthwith!' the older man returned. 'I want no more sight o' him that I do o' you, d'you hear? I ken you, you crawling thing, man! First you would come to me hiding behind a woman's skirts. Now, behind a suckling's wrappings. I'll no'… I'll no'… ' The Lord Gray all but choked to silence, his face congested, purple, his heavy jowls shaking. He staggered a little, and the hand which reached out for the table again trembled noticeably.

  Mary ran back to his side, to hold him, biting her lip.

  The Master's slender ruffled wrist was gripped strongly, as in a vice. 'Enough,' David said, low-voiced but commanding. He will take a hurt. He is your father – and mine. Enough, I say.'

  Patrick slowly inclined his handsome head. 'Very well,' he murmured. And louder, 'These family pleasantries over, then – I come to business, my lord. Private business, and pressing.' He turned to the two men at the other side of the table. 'Mr Provost – you will excuse us? You too, Gibbie, I think. Yes -go please.'

  Both sitters rose, the younger, thin, dark-featured, long-chinned, frowning. 'Sir… Patrick…!' Gilbert Gray protested. 'This is… this is insupportable! You'll no' treat me like a lackey… and in my father's house!'

  'Lord, Gibbie -1 treat you like I do the Provost, here. With great respect, but scarce requiring your presence in the private business, affairs of state, that I have to discuss with my lord. So – off with you both to somewhere else.'

  The Provost, a fat and perspiring bald man, ducked and bowed and mumbled in alarmed reaction to the authoritative, indeed imperious, orders, moving hastily if sidelong towards the door. Gilbert Gray, almost involuntarily did likewise, but more slowly and looking to his father.

  My lord was staring glassily straight ahead of him, breathing stertorously, aparently heeding none of them.

  As they reached the door, however, Patrick suddenly stopped them with a snap of his long fingers. 'Stay, Provost -a moment. You may as well hear this first. Before you go. You may spare your worthy citizens their unnecessary labours, man. Their hammerings and stone-masonry and running to and fro. Likewise, my lord, your distressing activities here. There is no need for such extremities. All unnecessary. Huntly is not coming south.'

  They stared at him, all of them.

  'Tut – do not gawp! You have jumped at shadows. Your panic is superfluous. Save yourself further troubles, gentlemen. And expense. Huntly will not move. His outliers will retire on Aberdeen by nightfall. Already they will have turned back. There is no danger to your douce town of Dundee.'

  'But…but…?'

  'How do you know this, Patrick?' David jerked.

  'I have my sources of intelligence, Davy. As you know.' Patrick smiled. 'Moreover, the King and a great Protestant host, filled with holy and Reformed zeal, will be beyond Strathmore and Jordan… or the Esk… by this! I left His Grace at Perth yesterday noon, rumbling martial thunderings from lips and belly. So there is naught to fear.'

  'My lord… honoured sir…,' the Provost gabbled. 'Is this… is this sooth? You are assured o' it…?'

  'A pox, fellow – do you doubt my word! You?'

  'Na, na – och, never that, sir! Never that…'

  'Then be gone. And you, Gibbie. Every minute will save money, will it not?' It was perhaps noteworthy that though the Master of Gray dismissed his lawful brother thus cavalierly, he did not make any similar gesture towards his bastard half-brother. Nor, for that matter, towards young Mary. Turning his elegant back on the pair from Dundee, he addressed his father, who appeared to be recovering. 'Perhaps you should sit down, my lord,' he suggested. 'That we may discuss our business in… ' – he glanced around him distastefully -'… in such comfort as this rickle of stones allows.'

  'I have… no business… to discuss… wi' you!' my lord rasped throatily, harshly – 'Now, or ever.' He did not move from his stance by the table.

  'Ah, but you have sir, I assure you. On a matter close to your heart, I vow. Siller, my lord – siller! Sillibawbys, merks and good Scots pounds! Sink me – have I not already saved you a pretty purseful by this intelligence that I bring? You no longer need spend a plack on this rat-ridden ruin. Send all your drudges home. And let your pocket thank me – even if naught else does!'

  From under heavy brows his father gazed at him, like a bull dazed and uncertain. 'This… is certain? About Huntly? And the King? We are safe, now?' he got out.

  'Now – and before. You never were in danger. Huntly makes a demonstration – that is all. For, shall we say, a variety of excellent reasons. He never had any intention of descending upon the south. The King of Spain, God preserve him, has sent Huntly a consignment of gold ducats, and he must make pretence of using them to good effect. Moreover, Huntly does not love my lord of Bothwell, and considers that his wings needed clipping. This achieves it. So King Jamie marches valiantly north, and will enjoy a notable, a resounding victory – since none will oppose him. Oh, some Highland caterans will be slaughtered and a few Aberdeen burghers hanged, no doubt, for dignity's sake – but Huntly will speak loving peace with His Grace, and some few of the ducats will belike find their way into Jamie's coffers…'

  'God's death – what mad rigmarole is this?' his father cried. 'Are you crazed, man?'

  'Hardly, sir! Do you really think it? Indeed, I humbly suggest otherwise. For, you see, good is served all round is it not? Elizabeth of England, perceiving the great stresses and dangers King Jamie lives under, in preserving the sacred cause of Protestantism, must needs increase her contributions towards the upkeep of a stronger and truly loyal guard in this happy realm. The matter is vital – for the Reformed faith, you understand. Already, indeed, the couriers are on their urgent way to London, to that effect. Heigho – all things work together for good, as I say, do they not?'

  My lord was speechless.

  It was David Gray who spoke, in a whisper. 'So soon!' he said. 'So soon! We are back where we were, i' faith! Nothing is changed. The… the Devil is come back to Scotland!'

  'Come, come, Davy – you flatter me! Besides, no harm is done. Quite the reverse, I vow. Are not all advantaged – or nearly all? Which brings me, my lord, to the matter of our business – so that we shall be advantaged also. The matter concerns the Abbey of Dunfermline.'

  'A-a-ah!' Lord Gray said, despite himself.

  'Exactly! I intend, you see, to recover my commendatorship and the revenues thereof. George Gordon of Huntly has enjoyed them quite sufficiently long for any small service that he effected. He is proving stupidly obdurate, however. Always George was stupid – do you not agree? And our Jamie is s
omething of a broken reed in the matter, I fear. Indeed, I suspect His slobbering Grace. So, I propose to sue George for Dunfermline in the High Court. And believe that, with a little forethought and judicial, er, preparation, I shall win. For Huntly has few friends amongst His Grace's judges – who are all good Protestants, of course!' Patrick sighed, a little. 'Unfortunately, such processes of law cost money. Siller, my lord – siller. A commodity of which I am, at the moment, somewhat short, more is the pity. Hence this approach… and your good fortune, sir.'

  His father gaped like a stranded fish. 'You… you…? Me…? Siller…?' With difficulty he enunciated consecutive words. 'Ha, you gon plain gyte, man? D'you think to win siller frae me? Me!'

  'I do, naturally. And for good and excellent reason. I do not come to you out of mere, shall we say, family affection and esteem, my lord – admirable as are such sentiments. This is a matter of business, of lands and heritable properties. Heritable, I pray you note, is the significant word. Since, one day in God's providence, I or my son shall inherit from you the Gray lands, merest foresight and common prudence indicates that it is to you that I should offer Balmerino. So that, heigho, in the said God's time I shall have it back again! Balmerino, my lord – Balmerino!'

  Lord Gray was so much moved that he groped his way round the table, Mary supporting him, to sink into one of the chairs. He never took his eyes off his beautiful son – although from his expression the sight appeared to afford him only extreme distress.

  Well might the Master harp on that word Balmerino, of course. Balmerino Abbey, or the ruins thereof, with its little town and port, lay almost exactly across the Tay estuary from Castle Huntly. Its lands were extensive and fertile; more important however, from Lord Gray's point of view, was the fact that owing to the shallows and shoals of the firth at this point, its port commanded the ship-traffic of the upper reaches of the estuary. Taken in conjunction with the Broughty Castle and Ferry Port toll barriers, it could completely dominate all trade, internal as well as external, along the entire causeway, with a judiciously-placed cannon or two. Long had the Grays looked across at Balmerino in North Fife with covetous eyes. Its possession could vastly increase their revenues.

  Patrick answered his father's unspoken question. 'I have arranged with Sir Robert Melville an exchange of Balmerino for the Durifermline pendicle of Monimail near to his own lands of Melville. When I win back Dunfermline, Balmerino will be mine. Or rather, yours, my lord – for one thousand silver crowns. A bargain, you will admit!'

  His father uttered a groan of sheerest agony.

  'You perceive, my lord, how necessary it is that I come to you, rather than to any other? Balmerino is worth a score of times more to Gray than to anyone else in the kingdom. Am I not a dutiful son, after all?'

  'No!' the older man croaked. 'No! No!' he banged fist on the table time and again.

  'But yes, sir. You would not throw away Balmerino for a mere thousand pieces of siller?'

  His father was grimacing strangely. Undoubtedly it was the hardest decision of that nobleman's life, striking to the very roots of him. But he made it. 'Damn you… no! Never!'

  Patrick was still-faced, curiously blank-looking for a moment. But only for a moment or two. 'I am sorry,' he said, then, shrugging.

  "I… I vow you are, foul fall you!'

  'But, yes. I would be as foolish not to be so, as are you in throwing this aside, my lord. Blinded by… by whatever so blinds you. I can get the money elsewhere, to be sure – but not so profitably for Gray.'

  'Then get it, man – get it! For you'll no' win a plack frae me. All your days you've wasted and devoured my substance.

  You'll do it nae mair. You can beg for crusts in the vennels o' Edinburgh, for a' I care, d'you hear? You and your woman and your brat can starve…'

  'Oh, Granlord – no!' Mary cried.

  'Here are but doubtful fatherly sentiments, my lord! You scarce ever doted on me, I think – but it seems… excessive. What new ill have I done to you since last we met, I pray?'

  The other rose slowly to his feet, with something of dignity now. 'You butchered your Queen,' he said. 'You were the death o' the bonny Mary, that I loved well.'

  There was complete silence in that dim and musty chamber, for seconds on end.

  It was young Mary who broke it. 'It is not so, Granlord,' she said urgendy. 'Not so. He went to save her, and could not. That is not the same. Queen Elizabeth it was who killed our Queen. Not Uncle Patrick. He was not able to save her. But then, neither was Father. Neither was Sir Robert Melville, who went too. None could.' Her young voice seemed to echo desperately round the gaunt vaulted cavern of masonry, pleading.

  None of the men either looked at her nor answered the question behind her words.

  'Why must you be so hard on each other?' she asked. 'So cruelly hard?'

  'Mary – it would be better, I think, that you should leave us, child.'

  'No. No, Father. Do you not see…?'

  My lord spoke through her pleas. 'Go!' he commanded -but not to the girl. 'Go, Judas – and never let me see your false face again! I want nane o' you – nane, d'you hear? Judas!'

  The muscles of the Master's features seemed to work and tense. For once, there was little of beauty or attractiveness to be seen thereon, as glittering-eyed, ashen-lipped, he faced his father. 'For that word… you will be sorry!' he got out 'Sorry!'

  'Go…!'

  'Oh, yes – I shall go. But first, I will have my rights from you. What you will not give in love and affection, even in decency, you will yield as of right. For I am Master of Gray – heir to this lordship. I have never asked for it before – but I demand it now. I want my portion.'

  My lord belched rudely. 'That for your portion, man!'

  This crude coarseness seemed to have the effect of steadying the younger man, of enabling him to revert to something of his usual assured air of mastery of any situation. 'I think not,' he said, actually smiling again. 'The heir to Gray has certain rights, beyond the mere style. I have not sought them of you…'

  'Any such you ha' forfeited long since. You ha' squandered my siller…'

  'I refer, sir, not to your precious siller, but to more enduring claims. My patrimony. Properties. You have, I understand, settled Mylnefield on Gibbie. Brother James, I am told, has Buttergask and Davidstoun. William is in Bandirran. I am not wholly uninformed, my lord. Myself, I require the heir's portion.'

  His father was breathing deeply, purpling again. 'Curse you – you'll get nothing! Nothing, I say. Knave and blackguard that you are! I… I…' Of a sudden, my lord's heavy features seemed to lighten a little. 'Or… aye, I have it! That's it. Your portion, my bonny Master o' Gray! You have it, man – you're standing in it! This is your portion – all you'll get, while I am above the sod! Broughty Castle!' Hooted harsh laughter set the older man coughing. ' 'Tis yours, Patrick – all o' it, yours, by God!' he spluttered. 'See to it, Davy. The papers and titles – to Patrick, Master o' Gray, in life rent, Broughty Castle. The building only, mind. No' a stick or stone else. No' an inch o' land. No' a penny-piece o' the tolls. A rickle o' stones you named it, Patrick? Aye – then take it, and I pray to God it falls on your scoundrelly head and makes your sepulchre!'

  Pushing Mary aside roughly, the Lord Gray stalked heavily past his sons without a further word or glance, and out of the arched doorway to the winding stairs.

  Tears were trickling down the girl's face from brimming dark eyes, though she made neither sob nor sound.

  'I shall build up these crumbling wall, I tell you – raise new towers and battlements. I shall root out these mouldering

  boards and rotting beams. I shall open up these wretched holes of windows, and let in air and light. I shall hang these bare walls with Flemish tapestries and cover the floors with carpets from the East, and furnish these barren chambers with the finest plenishings of France and Spain and the Netherlands, such as not another house in this realm can show!' The Master of Gray was striding back and forward across the uneve
n bat-fouled flagstones of Broughty Castle's hall, set-faced, eyes flashing. 'I shall make of this stinking ruin a palace, I swear! A mansion which every lord in the land shall envy. Where the King will come to sup and wish his own. I shall make it so that Castle Huntly seems a hovel, a dog's kennel, by comparison, and its proud lord shall come here seeking admission on his bended knees! I swear it, I say – and swear it by Almighty God!'

  'Uncle Patrick – don't!' Mary Gray said. 'Please don't. Please.'

  David and the girl were watching the extraordinary, almost awesome spectacle of the most handsome man in all of Europe, the brightest ornament of the Scottish scene, the most talented gallant in two realms, in the grip of blind unreasoning bitter hurt and passion, tormented, distraught. Helplessly they watched him, listened to him, anguish and sorrow in their own eyes – for they loved him, both. Mary had never seen the like, although she had witnessed some shocking, savage scenes in that strange and contentious family. David had his arm around the girl's shoulders, holding her; he indeed had seen the like before – and it turned his heart sick within him.

  Patrick Gray changed his tune. He stopped his pacing, and began to curse. Tensely, almost softly, but fluently, comprehensively, he commenced to swear in breath-taking ingenious ferocity.

  David Gray acted. Leaving Mary, he strode up to his brother, grasped him by both elegant padded shoulders, and with abrupt violence shook him as a terrier shakes a rat. 'Quiet!' he commanded. 'Quiet, I say. Patrick – be silent! Mary – by God, mind Mary!'

  The evil flow was choked back, partly through sheer physical convulsion, partly by a real effort of will. Gasping and panting a little, the Master stepped back, and the scorching fury in his gaze at his half-brother faded. Slightly dazed-seeming, he moistened his lips and shook his head.

  'I… I apologise,' he said thickly. 'My thanks, Davy. I… Mary, my dear – forgive me. If you can.' He looked over to her, and the change in his expression was quite extraordinary.

  She came to him, then, wordless, to take his hand.