Lord and Master mog-1 Page 3

  As they branched off on their different roads, David looked back. He saw only the one head in that gallant cavalcade turned towards him, as Patricks steel-gauntleted arm was raised in valedictory salute. David lifted ms own hand, and slowly waved it back and forth, before sighing and turning away. They were brothers, yet

  Fivemiles on, avoiding the climbing narrow streets of Dundee by keeping to the water-front and the boat-shore, David rode further to Broughty, another three miles eastwards, where the Firth narrowed to a bare mile across and a ferry plied. Here rose the soaring broken mass of another Gray castle, still proudly dominating land and sea despite being partly demolished after its bloody vicissitudes during the religious wars of a few years earlier. David sat waiting for the ferryboat beneath the frowning river walls, and cared nothing for the fact that his own great-grandfather had first built them, his grandfather had betrayed them to the English, and his father had gained his limp and almost lost his life in seeking to retake them.

  The ferry eventually put him across the swift-running tide, at Ferry-Port-on-Craig, where still another castle glowered darkly on all but friends of Gray, and which, acting in conjunction with that of Broughty over the water, could in theory defend the estuary and Dundee from invasion by sea, and in practise levy toll on all shipping using the narrows – thereby greatly contributing to my lord's income.

  A ride of no more than ten miles across the flat sandy links of North Fife brought David thereafter, by just afternoon, to the grey city of St Andrews, ecclesiastical metropolis of Scotland, with all its towers and spires and pinnacles a dream by the white-flecked glittering sea. The young man viewed it with mixed feelings as he rode in by the Guard Bridge and the narrow massive gateway of the West Port The blood of martyrs innumerable did not shout to him from the cobbles, nor did the sight of so many fair and handsome buildings in various stages of defacement and demolishment, eloquent witness to Reforming zeal, distress him overmuch; but here he had passed the two most free and happy years of his life, here he had studied and learned and laughed and sported, here he had met Mariota Davidson – and from here he had been expelled with ignominy, because he was the Master of Gray's shadow and dependent, but two days before.

  He rode down the narrow kennel of South Street, where pigs rooted amongst the mounds of garbage that half-filled the causeway outside every door, squawking poultry flew up from his pony's hooves, and the wooden house gables that thrust out on either side all but met overhead, enabling wives to exchange gossip above him from one side to the other in their own windows. Many of these timber houses were being pulled down, and the new stone ones being built by the Reformers out of the convenient quarries of the Cathedral and a score of fine churches, priories, nunneries, seminaries and the like, were set further back from the cobbles, so that one day the street would be wider, undoubtedly. But meantime the transported stonework lay about in heaps everywhere, along with defaced statues, smashed effigies and shattered marble, greatly adding to the congestion and difficulty of passage. The smells and the noises and the sights of St. Andrews, though all familiar, were not without their effect on the banished student

  David turned in at the arched entrance of St, Mary's College. He dismounted, left his pony loose amongst the cattle which grazed on the wide grassy square within, and made for the corner of the great quadrangle where was the Principal's house, a handsome edifice, formerly the college chapel. He approached the door, and rasped diffidently on the tirling-pin. Needless to say, he had never before used the front door of this august establishment, whatever he may have done at the back – but his instructions for the occasion, from his father, were positive.

  An arrogant man-servant answered his summons – and would have sent him packing with a flea in his ear, as one more presumptuous and threadbare scholar, had not David declared that he sought Master Davidson on an errand from my lord of Gray. Grudgingly, suspiciously, he was admitted, and thrust into a dark and book-lined room to wait.

  He had to wait, indeed. Though he could hear the Principal's sonorous and slightly nasal voice echoing, now from the room next door, now from the hall, it came no nearer than that as the minutes passed and lengthened into an hour. Undoubtedly Master Davidson had more important matters to attend to than such as he represented. David waited as patiently as he might. After a while, greatly daring, he glanced at some of the books on the shelves, and found them dull stuff, in Latin. He went to the window, and gazed out He paced round and round the perimeter of the stone floor, avoiding treading on its precious covering, one of the fine new carpets such as even Castle Huntly could not boast Sometimes he listened, ear to the crack of the door, not for the well advertised presence of the Principal, but for the possible sound of Mariota's voice. She must be somewhere in the house. He would have liked to see her before he spoke with her father – though liked hardly was the word but he did not see how this was to be achieved.

  It was nearer two hours than one before the door opened to reveal the impressive figure of Principal Andrew Davidson. He was less lean and hungry-looking, was less hairy, than the generality of the Reformed clergy, being amply and comfortably made, and of an imposing presence. His beard, indeed, was only wispy – which must have been a sore trial to him, with the Old ' Testament prophet as the approved model – and it was said that the large flat black velvet cap, which he was rumoured to keep on his head even in bed, was to hide the tonsure which painfully laggard nature was failing lamentably to cover up. He was dressed in the full pulpit garb of black Geneva gown and plain white bands, now as always – though once again scurrilous student whisper had it that if the wind off the North Sea waxed more than usually frolicsome around a St. Andrews street corner, and the voluminous gown billowed up, much silken and ungodly coloured apparel might be glimpsed beneath. He swept into the room now, and the door slammed shut behind him.

  'You are David Gray, for want of a true surname,' he declaimed, in his stride as it were, as though in continuation of a previous discourse, hardly glancing at his visiter. 'A whore-mongering idler and a trifler with women, whom it seems, God pity me, I must accept as good-son because you have taken gross and filthy advantage of my foolish daughter. I cannot and shall not welcome you to this house that you have presumptuously defiled and outraged. God is not mocked, and his righteous wrath shall descend upon the heads of all such as yourself. Nor shall any dowry come to you with my unhappy and ravaged daughter, upon whom the Lord have mercy – think it not! Such dowry as she had, you have already lasciviously possessed, in fornicating shameful lust!' The resounding well-turned words and phrases slid in sonorous procession off what almost seemed to be an appreciatively savouring tongue. 'The carnal appetites of the flesh shall not inherit the Kingdom of Heaven, nor any goods and gear of mine. Jacta est alea! What provision has my Lord Gray made for you both, boy?'

  David was so overwhelmed by this flood of oratory and part mesmerised by the ceaseless and remarkable perambulations of the dignified speaker, that it was some moments before he realised that a question had been flung at him, and that the last sentence had not been merely one more rhetorical pearl on the string of eloquence. He gulped, as he found the other's imperious if somewhat protuberant eyes upon him, en passant, as it were.

  'I… I do not know, sir,' he faltered.

  'Almighty and Most Merciful – grant me patience! Grant a ravaged father restraint! Hark at him – he does not know! He knows how to steal a helpless lassie's maidenhead! He knows the sinful antics of the night! He knows the way to my door, with offers of marriage! But he does not know how to support the creature whom he hath got with child! What is my lord thinking of? He fobs me off with you, you – dolt, bastard and beggar – and sends no word of what he will pay! You have no letter, sirrah? No promissory token…?'

  'None,' David answered. 'My lord said that… that all was arranged.'

  'Arranged! Aye – arranged is the word for it, I vow! Arranged to cheat and defraud me! All a plot, a trick! By the holy and blessed Saint Mar… h'm
m… by the Sword of the Lord and His Kirk – does he esteem me a babe, a puling innocent to be foxed and duped? You are sure, knave, that there is no letter coming, no privy word?'

  'I do not know,' David reiterated. 'All my lord told me was that all was arranged. That you would be satisfied – satisfied with me as good-son. And that the marriage was settled for ere the month's end, before, before,..'

  'Aye – before yon fond fool through there thrusts her belly's infamy in the face of all who walk St. Andrew's streets, to make me a laughing-stock and a by-word before all men!' The reverend Principal had noticeably increased the pace of his promenade, in his agitation, so that now his gown positively streamed behind him. 'Father in Heaven – was ever a humble servant of Thine so used! Was ever the foul fiend's work so blatantly… boy – you did say satisfied? Satisfied was the word? My lord did declare that I would be satisfied with you as good-son – God help me! Aye – it must be that. Mean that I should be satisfied… receive due and proper satisfaction. Aught else is unthinkable. Perhaps I have done my lord some slight injustice? 'Fore God I hope that I have! Tell you my lord, fellow, that I await his satisfaction eagerly. You have it? Eagerly. Aye. Now… weightier matters await me, boy. You may go.'

  David gasped. 'Go?' he repeated. 'But, sir… that is not all, surely? That is not all I came to see you for?' 'All, fool? Enough and enough that I should have spared you thus much of my time. I am a man with great and heavy tasks upon me. I have the care of hundreds ofsouls in this place on my hands and heart I have to see that God's will is done in this University and city. How much more of my time would you have?'

  'But the marriage, sir? What of that? When is it to be? My lord said that you would arrange all…'

  'Arrange all? Arrange what, in the name of the good Lord? Think you that this unseemly union, devised under some back stair, should be ceremoniously celebrated with pomp and display? I vow not! A shamed and ungrateful wanton's mating to a nameless bastard! Faugh, sir – me arrange it?5 Davidson had his hand on the door latch. 'Wed you where and how you will – so long as wed you are. And before due witnesses – but not before me, I warrant you!'

  'I see, sir.' David's voice was level, set, now. 'And when? When is this to be?'

  'Should I care, man? When you like. Today if you have the wherewithal to pay the chaplain's fee. Wed the baggage now if you wish – so long as you take her away out of my sight, out of this house and this my city of St Andrews! But… see you have it lawfully witnessed…'

  That last was tossed over a black-gowned shoulder, as the ornament of the Kirk, fount of learning, and one-time prince of the Holy Church strode out into the hallway and was gone, leaving the door wide behind him.

  For long the young man stood in that dark room staring after the cleric with unseeing eyes.

  At length, sighing, David went in search of Mariota Davidson. He moved warily through to the rear of the house to the great kitchen. A serving wench there greeted his appearance with sniggers and giggles, but in answer to his enquiry pointed to an inner door, leading to a pantry. Nodding, he moved over, and opened the door.

  The girl sat by the window of the small room, her hands on her lap, staring straight before her. At sight of him she rose to her feet, and stood waiting, wordless, wide-eyed.

  'Mariota!' he said, his voice thick. 'Och, lassie, lassie!'

  She bit her lip, lowered her eyes, and drew a deep quivering breath.

  Quietly David closed the door behind him.

  Mariota Davidson was not notably mountainous, nor even too obviously pregnant – only somewhat thicker about the middle than her usual At fifteen, she was a well-built girl, almost as tall as David, a gentle fawn-eyed creature, bonny, auburn-haired, her burgeoning womanhood glowing for all to behold. Only, today those normally easily flushed and dimpled cheeks were pale and tear-stained, and the great hazel-brown eyes red-rimmed and a little swollen. Even so, she was bonny, warm, appealing – to David Gray perhaps the more so for her so evident distress. She was dressed in a short sleeveless homespun gown of dark green, almost black, as became a daughter of the Kirk, even an outcast one, the skirt split down the front and gathered back to show an underskirt of saffron linen, with a White linen sleeved sark or blouse above. She wore a brief apron also, at which she tugged and twisted

  David came near to her, but not too near. 'I… I am sorry, Mariota,' he said. 'You have been crying. I am sorry. Do not cry, lassie'

  She shook her capless head of reddish-brown curls, un-speaking. 'You are well enough?1

  'Yes,' she said, small-voiced. 'Where is… where is Patrick?'

  'He is not here. He is… he is with my lord.' David looked down at his feet 'He sent you greetings. He wishes you very well,' he lied.

  The girl did not answer. She was twisting and twisting that apron. 'Davy – oh, Davy – what is to become of me? she exclaimed, her voice catching.

  He swallowed. 'It is… we are… has your father not told you, Mariota?'

  'He tells me nothing. He will not even speak with me. None must speak with me. None must deal with me at all, in this house. He has ordered it No soul has spoken to me for three days. Oh, Davy… I' She choked.

  He took a step forward, to touch her, to take her arm – and then hesitated, withdrew his hand 'You know… you know nothing, then.

  'Only that I am lost, lost,' she wailed 'God will not have me, nor man either. None '

  He clutched at that 'I will,' he said 'I will have you, Mariota.'

  She did not seem to hear him. 'I would kill myself, if I knew how,' she went on, tonelessly. 'I have tried – but it is not so easy…'

  'Och, hush you!' the young man cried, shocked 'What way is that to talk? Wicked, it is.'

  'Aye – but I am wicked I wish that I was dead, Davy.'

  'Lord, lassie-never say that! Never. You will be happy yet I swear it I will see to it – believe me, lassie, I will.'

  'You are kind, Davy. Always you were kind But what canvyou do? It was kindly of you to come and see me…after what I have done. I wonder that you came. But there is nothing that you can do, you see…'

  'I' faith, girl -I am to marry you!' Almost he shouted that, to get it out 'Marry, d'you hear? I am to marry you!'

  Her breath caught, as she stared at him. She put a hand to her high young bosom. She opened her lips, but found no words.

  David took her arm this time, earnestly. 'I am sorry, Mariota. I should not have bawled at you, that way. Sorry for everything. Sorry about Patrick. He would… do not blame him too much, lass. My lord would not hear of it. He has other plans for Patrick. I… well, I am the best that you can do, I fear. I am not Patrick… but I like you, lassie. I like you very well.'

  The girl seemed not so much to be listening as searching, searching his eyes with her own, huge, alight, but fearful It was her turn to reach out, with both her hands, to grip him. 'Davy,' she whispered, 'you would not cozen me? You would not do that to me? Not now?'

  'No,' he agreed 'I would not do that, now or any time. See. you, Mariota – it is best this way. The child shall be my child Folk will not question it – not in the Gray country, anyway…'

  He got no further. Mariota threw herself upon him, her arms around his neck, suddenly laughing and sobbing in one, and near to hysteria, her full weight upon him, head hard against his shoulder.

  'Davy, Davy!' she cried, panting. 'My dear Davy! Is it true? True? You will marry me? You will! Oh, Davy lad… God be praised!'

  All but choked, throttled, by the vehemence of her, the young man struggled for air, blinked – but patted her heaving back too. 'Och, mercy!' he exclaimed 'There, there. Of course it is true. That is why I am here – why I came. But… och, wheesht, lassie. Do not cry. Wheesht, now – wheesht!'

  The tears were welling up fast now – but they were tears of joy and thankfulness and relief. He put her a little way from mm, and took the corner of her twisted apron gently to wipe and dab at her cheeks and nose, whilst shining-eyed, trembling, she gazed at him through the gl
istening curtain of them.

  Then abruptly, her lower lip fell, her eyes clouded, her whole face seemed to crumple. 'My father…!' she quavered.

  'I have seen your father,' he told her. 'I have just left him. It is all right. He will have me as good-son. He will have me – if you will…?'

  'Oh, Davy – he will?'

  'Aye. He would liefer it was Patrick, mind – as I swear would you, lass. But…'

  'Patrick!' she.cried. 'Patrick – never! I think… I think that I hate Patrick, Davy!'

  'Eh…?Och, no-how could that be? After…after…?'

  'Aye – after what I did! With him!' The colour had come flooding back to Mariota's cheeks. 'Nevertheless, I hate him -for what he made me do. Do to you, Davy. Thank God it is not him that I am to marry.'

  'But, lassie – I thought…' David floundered. 'Why did you let him do it, then?

  'Well may you ask, Davy! Sweet Jesu – how I have asked myself! For it was not Patrick that I liked. Och, I liked him well enough, sometimes – but not..,' She shook her head vigorously. 'It was I.vow, Davy – always you. But Patrick is… Patrick is… well, he is Patrick!' She stopped, biting her lip.

  'Aye – he is Patrick!' his brother said. But it was his eyes that were shining now. 'Och, my dear – forget Patrick!' he cried. 'Here's you saying that you like me, like me well enough to… och, Mariota lassie – here is a wonder! Here is joy – for I like you fine too! Just fine. And we are to be wed – you and me, just. Man and wife. Dear God – I just canna believe it!'

  Laughing, if somewhat brokenly, unsteadily, he took her to him – and she came to his arms eagerly.

  So they clutched and clung to each other in that pantry, her tears wetting his face, her urgent body pressed against his, the hps tight fused together. For them a blessed miracle had been wrought.