Part 28 (1/2)
”There is something in what you say, Sholto.”
”My lord, if the blow fall, let not your line be wholly cut off. I pray you let five good lads ride straight for Douglasdale with David in the midst--”
”Sholto,” cried the boy, ”I will not go back, nor be a palterer, all because you are afraid for your own skin!”
”My place is with my master,” said Sholto, curtly, and the boy looked ashamed for a moment; but he soon recovered himself and returned to the charge.
”Well, then, 'tis because you want to see Maud Lindesay that you are so set on returning. I saw you kiss Maud's hand in the dark of the stairs. Aha! Master Sholto, what say you now?”
”Hold your tongue, David,” cried his brother; ”you might have seen him kiss yet more pleasantly, and yet do no harm. But, after all, you and I are Douglases and our star is in the zenith. We will fall together, if fall we must. Not a word more about it. David, I will race you to yonder dovecot for a golden lion.”
”Done with you!” cried his brother, joyously, and in an instant spurs were into the flanks of their horses, and the young men flew thundering over the green turf, riding swiftly into the golden haze from which rose ever higher and higher the dark towers of the Castle of Edinburgh.
Past grey peel and wind-swept fortalice the young Lords of Douglas rode that autumn day, gaily as to a wedding, on their way to place themselves in the power of their house's enemies. The sea plain pursued them, flecked green and purple on their right hand. Little s.h.i.+ps floated on the smooth surface of the firth, hardly larger in size than the boats of fisher folk, yet s.h.i.+ps withal which had adventured into far seas and brought back rich produce into the barren lands of the Scots.
At last they entered the demesne of Holyrood, and saw the deer crouching and basking about the copses or scampering over the broomy knowes of the Nether Hill. As they came near to the Canongate Port, they saw a gallant band gaily dressed coming forth to meet them, and the Earl's eye brightened as it caught in the midst the glint of ladies' attiring.
”See, Sholto,” he cried, ”and repent! Yonder is not a single lance s.h.i.+ning, and you cannot turn your grumbling head but you will see nigh two score, with a stout Douglas heart b.u.mping under each.”
”Ah,” said Sholto, without joy or conviction, ”but we are neither in nor yet out of this weary town of Edinburgh!”
As the cavalcade approached, there came a boy on a pony at speed towards them. He carried a switch in his hand, and with it he urged his little beast to still greater endeavours.
”The King!” cried David, cheerfully. ”I heard he was a st.u.r.dy brat enough!”
And in another moment the two young men of the dominant house were taking off their bonnets to the boy who, in name at least, was their sovereign and overlord.
”Hurrah!” cried the lad, as he circled about them, reckless and irresponsible as a sea-gull, ”I am so glad, so very glad you have come. I like you because you are so bold and young. I have none about me like you. You will teach me to ride a tourney. I have been hearing all about yours at Thrieve from the Lady Sybilla. I wish you had asked me. But now we shall be friends, and I will come and stay long months with you all together--that is, if my mother will let me.”
All this the young King shouted as he ranged alongside of the two brothers, and rode with them towards the city.
King James II. of Scotland was at this time an open-hearted boy, with no evident mark of the treachery and jealous fury which afterwards distinguished him as a man. The schooling of Livingston, his tutor, had not yet perverted his mind (as it did too soon afterwards), and he welcomed the young Douglases as the embodiment of all that was great and knightly, n.o.ble and gallant, in his kingdom.
”Yesterday,” he began, as soon as he had subdued the ardour of his frolicsome little steed to a steadier gait, varied only by an occasional curvet, ”yesterday I was made to read in the Chronicles of the Kings of Scotland, and lo, it was the Douglas did this and the Douglas said that, till I cried out upon Master Kennedy, 'Enough of Douglases--I am a Stewart. Read me of the Stewarts.' Then gave Master Kennedy a look as when he laughs in his sleeve, and shook his head.
'This book concerneth battles,' said he, 'and not gear, plenis.h.i.+ng, and tocher. The Douglas won for King Robert his crown, the Stewart only married his daughter--though that, if all tales be true, was the braver deed!' Now that was no reverent speech to me that am a Stewart, nor yet very gallant to my great-grandmother, was it, Earl Douglas?”
”It was no fine courtier's flattery, at any rate,” said the Douglas, his eyes wandering hither and thither across the cavalcade which they were now meeting, in search of the graceful figure and darkly splendid head of the girl he loved.
The Lady Sybilla was not there.
”They have secluded her,” he muttered, in sharp jealous anger; ”'tis all her kinsman's fault. He hath the marks of a traitor and worse. But they shall not spite nor flout the Douglas.”
So with a countenance grave and unresponsive he saluted Livingston the tutor, who came forth to meet him. The Chancellor was expected immediately, for he had ridden in more rapidly by the hill way in order that he might welcome his notable guests to the metropolitan residence of the Kings of Scotland.
The Castle of Edinburgh was at that time in the fulness of its strength and power. The first James had greatly enlarged and strengthened its works defensive. He had added thirty feet to the height of David's Tower, which now served as a watch-station over all the rock, and in his last days he had begun to build the great hall which the Chancellor had but recently finished.
It was here that presently the feast was set. The banquet-hall ran the width of the keep, and the raised dais in the centre was large enough to seat the whole higher baronage of Scotland, among whom (as the Earl of Douglas thought with some scorn) neither of his entertainers, Crichton and Livingston, had any right to place themselves.
But the question where the Lady Sybilla was bestowed soon occupied the Douglas more than any thought of his own safety or of the loyalty of his entertainers. Sybilla, however, was neither in the courtly cavalcade which met them at the entrance of the park, nor yet among the more numerous ladies who stood at the castle yett to welcome to Edinburgh the n.o.ble and handsome young lords of the South.