The Green Man (18 page)

Having given God this piece of my mind I felt better and commended my soul, and the souls of all those whom I loved, to His care throughout the hours of darkness. After that, I was at last able to sleep until the sounding of trumpets from the camp and the voices of the monks at their devotions – it was the hour of Prime – finally roused me.

Breakfast was a handful of oats, some black bread and a cold sausage in the monks' kitchen in the company of other low-life like myself, while our masters were, by the smell of things, feasting on bacon collops, honey cakes and the best of the abbey's home-brewed ale. There was, too, another faint aroma lingering on the air which Murdo MacGregor condescended to inform me was that of the famous ‘water of life', the ‘usquebaugh' (whisky we called it in England: we never were any good at getting our tongues round foreign words) that had first come over with the Scots from Ireland and been made here ever since. It was, he said, very good for warming the body, and the monks partook liberally of it to keep themselves warm during the office of Matins and Lauds. I sympathized. I knew from experience that the small hours of the morning can chill one to the marrow in an icy church, with the cold of the flagstones striking up through the bones and sinews.

Long before the abbey bells began to toll the office of Tierce, and before a pale sun was halfway to its zenith, my lord Gloucester, with Albany by his side and a cluster of his chosen nobles at his back, was mounted on his favourite horse, White Surrey, waiting in the Canongate – a borough independent of town or abbey – for the Scots deputation from the castle. I guessed he was none too pleased at the delay, but kept his features schooled to indifference, unlike Earl Rivers and his nephew, the Marquis of Dorset, who grumbled openly about bad manners, and others who were voicing their doubts about the good faith of the Scots. Albany said nothing, torn, no doubt, between resentment at these slurs cast at his countrymen and a rising hope that maybe members of the Scottish Council had changed their minds after all and that a siege would be the order of the day.

But, finally, as the clamour of the bells died away and the chanting of the monks began, trumpets sounded from beyond the city walls and, minutes later, the gates were opened to let a cavalcade of men and horses stream out to welcome in the Duke of Gloucester and his entourage. Heading this company were three men whom Davey Gray immediately identified as Albany's three half-uncles; the Earls of Atholl and Buchan, two of the chief architects of the coup at Lauder Bridge, and their brother, the Bishop of Moray.

Diplomatic pleasantries, palpably insincere, were duly exchanged, although I noticed that no one on the Scots' side actually addressed a word to Albany or responded to his greetings. All he received were glances of contempt and acute dislike, and it struck me then that however much a reigning monarch might be reviled, a usurper – or, in this case, a potential usurper – was hated even more. (I recalled that as a child I had heard old men talk about Henry of Bolingbroke's seizure of the throne from his cousin, King Richard, in the first years of the century, and how his great popularity with the masses had oozed away, turning to resentment after he had assumed the crown.)

At long last, we entered the city, the Duke of Gloucester riding shoulder to shoulder with the Earls of Atholl and Buchan, Albany behind them, side by side with his other uncle, the bishop, who remained tight-lipped and stared straight ahead between his horse's ears. His nephew's attempts to engage him in conversation were totally ignored, and after a while, Albany shrugged and gave up trying. But the expression on his face augured no good for his relatives if ever he did become king. For a minute or two, I speculated on how he thought he could achieve this end, what possible plan he could have up his elegant sleeve, but then I forgot about it as I looked around me, taking in details of my surroundings.

Albany had told me that this eastern approach to the castle was up a gentler incline than the stark rock faces of the north, south and west, but even so, it was a steady climb. What fascinated me most, however, was the medley – one might almost have said the muddle – of different kinds of dwelling. It soon became obvious that, originally, the community had been largely rural, owners of smallholdings and farmsteads, and a few of these spreads still remained, hens and pigs and even the occasional goat, wandering across the road as a snare to unwary horsemen. But new, two-storey wooden houses were springing up everywhere, although it was soon apparent that not every occupant was as yet prepared to abandon pastoral ways. Here and there, cattle and other livestock peered from ground-storey windows, while the goodman and his dame lived on the upper floor, reached by an outside staircase. In the midst of these dwellings, a fine, large church was under construction, the hammering of the masons and carpenters almost deafening us as we passed. I later learned that it was dedicated to Saint Giles, that preceptor and confessor of Charlemagne, and was rising on the site of the old Norman church, destroyed by the army of the last King Richard when English forces had ransacked the city nearly a hundred years earlier.

The people watching our cavalcade pass by were silent and sullen, refusing to raise so much as a cheer, even for their own lords and masters who, for the most part, ignored them. I could see that the Duke of Gloucester was ill at ease, used as he was to the cheering, adulatory crowds of York and London. The English generally were tense, and Earl Rivers more than once fingered the jewelled haft of the dagger he wore at his belt as though he expected treachery from his hosts. But we reached the castle in safety with only one incident when an onlooker scooped up a handful of mud from the roadway and, with a muttered curse, flung it at the Bishop of Moray. Men-at-arms immediately moved to restrain the offender, one of them felling him to the ground with a single blow. They were big men, these Scots, even though many of them were pale and gaunt with hunger, the ravages of the past winter having taken their toll on a yet greater scale here than in the northern shires of England. (And that, believe me, was saying a very great deal.)

As we crossed a rugged forecourt, I was surprised to see fewer defences than I had anticipated; but Davey, who had manoeuvred his mount alongside my cob in order to constitute himself my guide, told me that all of them had been demolished by the Scots themselves at the beginning of the previous century, after an English occupation of the fortress in the reign of the first Edward.

‘But why?' I asked.

The page chuckled. ‘So that when you Sassenachs overran us again, you were unable to defend the castle, and so it was easily retaken. Rebuilding was only started after King David II was released from his English captivity. He built that great tower yonder and this defensive wall.'

As a Wessex man, born and bred, and with forebears equally native to the west country, the wars between England and Scotland had barely touched my consciousness, except as something that happened a very long way away. Wales, Ireland and even France were all nearer than this distant northern land, and once again I was nearly physically sick with the longing for home that engulfed me.

In the forecourt, the cavalcade drew to a halt and everyone dismounted. Grooms came to lead the horses to the stables while we humans were led up a steep flight of stone stairs by the portcullis gate to the very summit of the rock, where all the main buildings of the castle seemed to be crowded inside a curtain wall. The chief of these was a great hall, built of timber, which, as I soon discovered was used for sleeping, eating and recreation by all household servants and retainers, including those of visiting dignitaries, and consequently was hot, smelly and noisy eighteen or nineteen hours a day.

The royal apartments lay on the south-eastern point of the rock; a series of chambers built, so Davey informed me, by Albany's grandfather, the first King James, the one who had eventually been murdered by his nobles, and whose ghost was said to haunt the place, even though he had not been killed there. Arrangements had been made to house my lord of Gloucester in the royal bedchamber – no one knew where King James was being held: it was thought probably in Craigmillar Castle – his squire and other household officers using the ante-room. Earl Rivers and his nephew, the Marquis of Dorset, were lodged in the Constable's tower, while the remainder of the English lords were left to shift for themselves and find what accommodation they could, either in the castle itself or in the town.

At this point, obviously growing bored with my company and his self-appointed task as my guide and mentor, Davey abruptly disappeared, presumably in search of Murdo or Donald or even old friends and acquaintances, some of whom he must have had in the castle. Where Albany was I had no idea, but guessed him to be closeted with his uncles and the Duke of Gloucester. Not for the first time, he seemed able to do without my protection when it suited him, although I doubted if anyone was really interested in his demise any more. I couldn't help feeling that his importance as a political pawn to both sides was diminishing by the minute. The Scots nobles had their king securely under lock and key, but had no intention of deposing him in favour of his brother, while the English, provided their terms were met – Berwick ceded and Princess Cicely's dowry refunded – were quite willing to negotiate with King James and his spokesmen. My part was played, and I experienced a surge of anger that I was still being treated as though my presence were essential to Albany's well-being.

The anger receded, giving place to an even greater panic than I had known earlier. A gnawing fear that I would never get home again suddenly grew into an overwhelming conviction that this was not merely some nightmare that would eventually be vanquished by common sense, but the brutal reality. I broke into a sweat, even though the day was chilly, and discovered that I was trembling. I needed help, and urgently.

I found it close at hand.

Davey had pointed out to me a small, square stone building, probably one of the oldest on the site, as the chapel of Saint Margaret of Scotland, the second wife of King Malcolm III and a lady of whom I had learned much from Brother Hilarion during my days as a novice at Glastonbury. Although she might never have lived in the west country, and although her mother had been a Magyar princess, on her father's side, Margaret was descended from all the Wessex kings from Cerdic, through Alfred to her great-grandfather, Ethelred Unraed, who had tried to keep England free of the Danes with payments of gold. For by that time, the descendants of the Cerdingas were rulers of all England, not just of Wessex, and Saint Margaret had been of their line, brought to Scotland with her brother, the Atheling, and sister for safety after the Norman Conquest.

I pushed open the chapel door and went in.

Inside it was very cold and dark, a smell of dampness lingering on the air. But there was a light burning on the altar and I stumbled towards it, falling on my knees and lifting my eyes to the effigy of the saint which stood in a niche behind the guttering candles. I lit a fresh one at a flame of one of the three already burning there, then clasped my hands and sent up a silent prayer to be returned safely to my home and family. I don't know exactly what I said now, after all these years, but I remember that I prayed with an intensity so great that I almost cracked my finger bones. I recollect vaguely that I also asked for the intercession of that other son of Somerset, Saint Dunstan, sometime Abbot of Glastonbury and, later, Archbishop of Canterbury, and also of Saint Patrick, born and bred in the west before being sold into slavery in Ireland. With such a trio of saints on my side, how could I fail to return home to Adela and the children?

Slowly but surely the panic drained out of me, leaving me with a feeling akin to emptiness, like a vessel that has been cleaned and scoured. And gradually, in its turn, calmness and sanity returned. I was not alone any more. I was sure, although I had had no sign, that my prayers would be answered.

The chapel door creaked open and I turned my head. A man's form was framed in the doorway.

‘What, by all that's holy, are you doing in here, Roger?' Albany demanded. He sounded annoyed. ‘Murdo and Donald have been searching everywhere for you.'

I
turned my head.

A shaft of pale sunlight – too pale for early August, though I guessed that to be normal this far north – inched its way across the threshold elongating Albany's shadow and making him appear both taller than he was and somehow menacing. Motes danced along its length, whirling and spinning. Somewhere I could hear a cat mewling and a faint smell of cooking wafted from the castle kitchens, borne on a freshening breeze.

‘Do you want me, my lord?' I asked, surprised. I moved towards him across the dusty floor. ‘I thought you would be closeted with the duke and your uncles, working out terms of the peace. I presume there is going to be peace?'

‘All that can wait,' Albany answered tersely, adding on a bitter note, ‘Whatever they decide, I doubt it will concern me. At least, not yet.' He grinned, baring his teeth like a hunting dog scenting his prey. Not for the first time I speculated about this plan of his that would secure him the throne of Scotland in the face of what was obviously turning into a combined opposition of friends – well, former friends – and foes alike. There was nothing to be gleaned from his expression as he moved out of the sunlight and glanced around him, a little contemptuously I thought, at the meagre proportions of the chapel. ‘You still haven't said what you're doing here. Is our sainted Queen Margaret of such interest to you?'

I explained her descent from the kings of Wessex, including Alfred, and her relationship of half-great-niece to the Confessor himself, and then told him bluntly that I had sought her protection to see me safely home again to the west country. I added that I had also offered up prayers to those other two sons of the Somerset soil, Saint Dunstan and Saint Patrick.