The Game Of Kings Part 5

Exquisitely done, my young man, thought Christian. She said aloud, "Well, to begin with, you were wearing an English cloak. We've disposed of that for your own sake. Feeling in Boghall about the Englishhas been running gallows high since Lord Fleming was killed. You're safe in this room with Sym and myself, but I shouldn't advise you to attract the attention of anyone else in the castle..

"I see. Or I shall meet my fate. Without pitie, hanged to be, and waver with the wind. My beard, if I had one-Lord, I nearly have- is full young yet to make a purfie of it, even to replace the one I've stained. And why, Mistress Stewart, should you and your henchman trouble to defend me from death and horrible maims?.

"What a suspicious mind you have." Blandly, Christian matched metre with metre. "Why do you think? For gold, for gude; for wage or yet for wed?.

"I think no such thing: you malign me, I a.s.sure you. Every coherent sentiment escaped from the louvre at the back of my head long ago, and I am swimming in a sea of foolishness. I've -already forgotten what we're discussing..

Simon Bogle, a single-minded person, had not. "Lady Christian and 1," he said dourly, "were wondering what your name and style might be?.

In a feverish silence, the young man stirred restlessly. "LadyChristian. d.a.m.nation. She has a t.i.tle and I don't know it. She lives ina bog; and of this also I am ignorant. Q.E.D. I cannot be Scots.

Therefore why your excessive kindness . . . Oh G.o.d! Of course.

Ransom..

"And natural virtue. For gold and for gude, in fact." Christian, visited by an unworthy satisfaction, was magnanimous. "But as part owner of the property, I think we should defer speech until you're more rested. You've had a sore knock there..

"Several sore knocks," he said, and fell silent, rousing himself only as she felt for and took away pillows. "Don't you want my name?" And dreamily, "This officer, but doubt, is callit Deid. . .

"No." Aware of Sym's silent resistance, she spoke firmly. "No, never mind. Not just now," feeling exhaustion and faintness overwhelm him. Even so, he managed a gruesome chuckle.

"O lady: nor later. Deceit deceiveth and shall be deceived. It's no good and I can't prove it's no good: I shall be as much use to you as the Nibelunglied. For I can recall nothing . . . nothing . . . not the remotest d.a.m.ned shred of my ident.i.ty..

* * *Christian left the situation in Sym's hands that night. Next morning, however, she woke thinking of her prisoner, and obtaining food and wine by a shameless lie in the kitchen, made her way with it up the private stair.

Inside the sickroom, she was aware of a strange step even before she shut the door; and indeed as she turned to do so, a voice said readily, "You may want to come back later, Lady Christian. Sym is out, and I'm up and standing by the window..

She shut the door. "Ab, you're feeling better. My dear man, not even an attack on my virtue would drive me downstairs till I've done. I've already climbed more steps this morning than a bell ringer..

He laughed, but did not come to help her, she noticed; and, respecting his tact, she took the tray herself to the window seat and laid it on a kist. Then, sitting by the bed, she ascertained that the fever was gone, the headache was less; that he was profoundly grateful, and remarkably well up in current events.

"So Simon has been talking to you..

"He has seldom stopped. He tells me Lord Fleming's widow and family are all at Stirling, and thinks it uncommonly rash of you to stay behind. With which, as a special hazard myself, I must agree..

She shrugged. "I can do more good here at the moment than in Stirling." And felt impelled to add, "Naturally, I can't risk being an enc.u.mbrance, or a hostage either. If things get much worse-or much better for that matter-a friend of the family will take me to Stirling..

"And I shall stay with captors somewhat less benign. Ah me," he said rather ruefully. "It may sound selfish but, as the poet said, words is but wind, but dunts is the devil..

"Doesn't that depend who you are?" she remarked. "If you bear a Scots name, you've nothing to fear. Or is this officer, but doubt, still callit Deid?.

There was a pause. Then he said, "Are you quoting from me?.

"Your very words last night..

"Oh. I must have been in dire spirits. Have you ever lost your memory? I suppose not. It's an experience. Pleasant but precarious, like the gentleman who sat under palm trees feeding fruit to a lion . . ." Pausing for breath, he added, "I rely on you to put down any lacunac to the effects of a blow on the head. I am but ane mad man that thou hast here met-.

"-I do you pray," she said gravely, "cast that name from you away..

Delighted, he took her up at once. "Yes, of course. Call you Hector, or Oliver . . . What else? Sir Porteous-Amadas--Perdiccas-- Florent . . . How common the predicament seems to be. Most of the heroes and all the poets appear to have been there before me. I am as I am, and so will I be; but how that I am, none knoweth trulyDisdain me not without desert! Forsake me not till I deserve, nor hate me not till I offend." And he abandoned English plaintively.

"Li rosignox est mon p?re, qui chante sur le ram~e, el plus haut boscage.

La seraine, ele est ma mt~re, qui chante en la mer salle, el plus haut rivage . .

"Your French is excellent, of course," said Christian. "And you disliked being called English..

"Thank you..

"Implying Scottish rather than English affinities-.

"I hoped you'd notice that..

"-In which case," said Christian reasonably, "do you not owe it to yourself to appear in public? Someone here might even recognize you..

"A shrewd move, decidedly," said the prisoner with interest. "If I disagree, I am undoubtedly lying about my loss of memory. On the other hand, it might be genuine, and my belief that I am Scots might be unfounded; in which case your friend Hugh, according to Sym, will be apt to give free play to his prejudices, and your hopes of a ransom will vanish..

"You must think us very mistrustful," said Christian equably. "Why should you be lying? If you are English, you would have no motive for hiding your name. The sooner we know, the sooner we should arrange your freedom..

"I find the Socratean method even more uncomfortable than plain sarcasm. I propose to say what you wish me to say, viz.: there are two exceptions in your category. If I were English but dest.i.tute, and if I were English and politically important, I should avoid identification like the plague..

''-Therefore?.

"Therefore when I say, as I do, that I have no wish to appear to your friends before my memory comes back, you have no means whatever of proving the honesty of my reasons-.

"Which in fact are . . .

"Funk," he said promptly. "Sheer terror of the dark. I don't like standing outside the door of a crowded room any more than you do, waiting to be pounced on from inside..

Christian said, "A priest would tell you this was pride and selfconceit.

"If anyone so described it to you, I hope you impeached him for a pompous liar..

"My dear man, would you have me excomnlunicate? It's a process of hardening one goes through. You would find me hard to shock..

"And to deceive?.

She smiled, and threw his own quotation back at him. "Deceit deceiveth and shall be deceived. You have an incorruptible voice and a lawyer's tongue. One thing I commend in you: you refused to add to the sins of the poets. A false pedigree is always worse than none at all..

"Avoiding your traps, O virtuous lady, O mixt and subtle Christian. But, as you see, I am honest and good, and not ane word could lie..

She laughed. "I deduce that you've lived on Hymettus on honey and larks' tongues..

"And can, I suppose, die in a bog as well as anywh~re," he said dryly.

No one likes to appear cheap. Betrayed into archness, Christian caught her temper and said evenly, "I can't, of course, answer for what will happen to you if I leave before your memory comes back. But meanwhile, until it does, you may have grace to stay anonymous, if you wish..

She rose, adding briskly, "And meantime, there are many would envy you. Make the most of your freedom, my friend-you've more of it than any of us..

"True. Only lunatics have more. I'm ungrateful to find it intolerable; and more than intolerable, of course, not to know the extent of the burden I'm putting on you..

Christian had reached the door. She turned, and said ironically, "No burden at all. You haven't forgotten.

"Ho, ho: say you so;Money shall make my mare to go..

She shut the door, smiling, and left him to think it over.

This was Thursday, the 15th of September. Tom Erskine had gone south on Monday: he might very well be back for her any day now.

In the meantime, the demands on her time and her resources were continuous. All the lands of Biggar and Kilbucho, Hartree and Thankerton were in the care of the castle. In the absence of all the able men who had followed Lord Fleming to Pinkie and who had not yet returned-who might never return-the families on these lands must be succoured: given advice, news and medical help as they needed it; and plans made for their reception if the invaders broke through.

For the news from the east was pitiful. The army, ill-a.s.sorted and suspicious of itself, had crowned tactical blunder with panic: breaking up on the field, it had given way and had been hunted into extinction. While, forty miles to the north, the Court had found temporary refuge at Stirling, the English Protector, moving victorious toward Edinburgh, had put his horse into empty Leith, camped outside, and embarked on leisurely discussions about its fortification while English ships, sailing unchecked up the east coast, took and garrisoned the island of St. Colme's Inch, strategic gem in the midst of the Forth estuary north of Edinburgh.

And at any moment, they might hear of the approach from the southwest of Lord Wharton and the Earl of Lennox, and their English soldiers.

The day at Boghall wore on. The strain was bearing on them all:Christian began to feel herself drained of comfort and vitality. In midafternoon, she made time to visit the deserted wing, aware of increasing irritation with the situation. Baulked meantime of his hopes of ransom, Sym might well have tired, she thought, of acting nursemaid-c.u.m-jailer, and think there would be less danger and more fun if he brought Hugh into the affair. In accepting four years of Sym's unshakable loyalty, she had discovered his weaknesses. Thinking thus, she made for the private stair.

A clash of swords above her drove the blood from her heart. She stopped, and was rewarded with a crack of gasping laughter. "Man, it's not shinty! Use yourself neatly: see, to the left; forward; then up and through..

There was a further clatter as pupil evidently followed suit. She swept to the stairhead.

"You pair of fools: they can hear your swords in Biggar. Sym. Is this the way you look after a sick man? And you, whoever-you-are!You're taking our care of you very lightly." Ignoring excuse and apology, she dispatched Sym to keep guard at the top of the stair, and seized the other man by the arm. "You deserve to hop like St.

Vitus: turning fencing master with the fever hardly off you. Sit down at the stair bottom. Your head-.

"-Would serve a cat in a bowl eight days," he said, with another gasping laugh, and set about controlling his breath.

The doorway in the turret looked onto her private garden. Overlooked by the deserted wing and surrounded by an eight-foot wall it was silent and secret. The sun was warm; the peace absolute.

Beguiled from her duty she rested too, shoulders held by the wail, face upturned to the sun. Nothing moved but great rumours of perfume swelling and fading, sforzando and diminuendo; an orchestration of woodwind in the warm air.

Silence, broken by three golden notes of a lute: her own, she remembered, left on the bottom step. She said, "If you play, please go on. Music's my joy and my obsession..

"What shall it be?" He ruffled the strings, and made a false start. Then a spray of notes flew into the air, modulating in descending arpeggios. He suddenly sang, neatly and gaily,"En mai au douz tens nouvelQue raverdissent prael,Qi soz un arbroiselChanter le rosignolet.

Saderala don!Tant jet bonDormir lez le buissonet..

He paused, and evidently accepting her smile, continued. Tentatively, Christian joined him next time:"Saderala don! Tant jet bon Dormir lez le buissonet..

They sang the last chorus together, melody and descant, and when he stopped she said trumphantly, "Sang School! I knew it!.

Plucking crotchets like raindrops, he responded. "Am I a schoolmaster, think you?.

"Or a monk?"-innocently.

Laughter intensified in the voice. "When clerics sing like littlebirds?-No, surely not . . ." and he swept tempestuously into a song made immortal by its far from clerical sentiments; and from there to an estampie she did not recognize.

His playing was restrained and skilled. Drifting from this to that composer~ he discoursed gently about musical theory and philosophy; and she found herself stating her own views, asking questions, listening intently. With humble and rather touching delight, she entered into her own world; the world of sound, and was happy until Conscience put a hand on her shoulder. She said suddenly, "Who is Jonathan Crouch?.

"Who?" he said lazily. "Oh, Jonathan Crouch. He's an Englishman, at present pns- The hiatus, the inhalation, the shaken voice, were plain for her to hear. "You use drastic methods, don't you?" he said.

Christian replied quickly. "Memory's a strange thing, taken unawares. Sym told me you spoke the name in your sleep..

"Did I? Then it must have some personal importance, I suppose but what? I'm sorry. It's vanished. Try again..

"Then it probably isn't your own name?.

His laugh sounded genuine enough. "G.o.d forbid! Surely I'd know it if I heard it?.

"It might strike you suddenly. Or maybe you'd rather select one? O Dermyne, O Donnall, O Dochardy droch..

"No," he said. "Look, we could go on forever. I think I prefer being an old, nameless article to a new-minted one with a false label around my neck. Or, indeed, anything of a ropelike character. Leave me to spend my remaining wit on Jonathan Crouch, and in the meantime let there be dancing and singing and all manner of joy . .

The lute sang, irresistibly, and so did he.

"The Frogge would a wooing rideHumble-dum, hum ble-dumSword and buckler by his sideTweedle, tweedle twino.

"When he was upon his high horse setHumble-dum, humble-dumHis boots they shone as black as jet-.

The break was as violent as if death itself had struck. The four strings gasped, once, under clenched fingers, and there was silence.

Alone with the hammering of her heart, with infinite patience, Christian waited.

"Memory's a strange thing." What aspect of the bold, ill-fated frog had opened the gates? Frogs-and wells. What lay at the bottom of a well? Cats; and kelpies; and curses; and cures for warts . . . and Truth, of course.

As if the thought had reached him, there was a movement beside her. The light insouciant voice showed no inclination to dive into wells.

'I-Tweedle, tweedle, twino. I have a confession to make. The first rule of prison life is to curry favour with your jailer. This I have done with some success: Sym tells me he has no desire either to hang or to impoverish me. On the contrary: this afternoon he showed me how to escape with the key of the postern and over a secret path in the bog. I promised not to use it without your permission..

Christian said, "I see. You seem to have been working very hard. And what is the rule when there are two jailers?.

He was silent for a moment; then said, "Look: swear me G.o.d from top to toe in one breath if you will; but remember, I exposed myself voluntarily..

"All right," she said. "Provided you have a clear idea of the situation. I take it you've recovered your senses, and your ident.i.ty is not one that would be pleasing to Hugh. You are likewise unwilling to be a source of profit or revenge to Simon or myself. You are therefore asking us both, in view of past favours, to connive at your escape..

If she had expected him to betray any further emotion, she was disappointed. "Admirably just, and justly d.a.m.ning," said the voice equably. "Well, the remedy is in your own hands." And he quoted mockingly:"Se'l ser un Si, scrivero'n rima;Se'l ser un no, amici come prima..

There followed a pause, during which Christian came to the annoyed conclusion that she had once more been outmanoeuvred. Possessing the key, he had flung himself on her mercy. Why? It occurred to her that when referring to the enslavement of Sym, he had refrained with the utmost tact from drawing a parallel. He had left her to do that. To betray him now would suggest the vindictiveness of a disappointed woman, and she might well, in his opinion, shrink from that.

"Amici come prima, indeed!" repeated Christian viciously to herself, and added aloud, "I a.s.sure you that if you've persuaded Sym out of his dream of wealth through sheer weight of personality, I'm unlikely to insist on furca and fossa out of spite or low curiosity. But what I must and will have clear is that once free, you'll do us no harm..

"I could give you my word on that, except that, like the wonders of Mandeville, my probity is problematical..

"The thought had occurred to me," admitted Christian. "Therefore while accepting your promise-of course-I must make one other condition. Tell me your interest in Jonathan Crouch..

"G.o.d!" he said; and this time she heard genuine amus.e.m.e.nt. "Next time I'll make straight for Hugh. Rather the thumbscrews than the confessional. But I warn you, it's a poor bargain. You won't trace me through Crouch..

"I'll risk that," she said, and then had further words struck from her by a sudden, vast commotion, echoing among the towers. At the same moment, a familiar voice rolled down the stair. "Good news, Christian! Are you there? Can I come down? Christian!.