The Steps to the Empty Throne

However firm you hold them in, there will be some small spulzie and

pillage. Reiving, as we say in the East March of the Border, whence I

come. On neighbours’ lands. Comyn lands. I swear, so long as they

are there, no Comyn host will come south!”

Bruce almost whistled beneath his breath. Here was a crafty, nimble-witted clerk. Could it be that this was where the advice came that was turning Wallace from mere warrior into statesman?

“You would play the realm’s nobles one against the other, Sir Priest?” he challenged.

“They need but little encouragement in that, my lord! I but urge that, since all the land must be mustered in arms, it is only wise that sound men muster alongside those who might be led otherwise. I wish for no bloodshed, no fighting. But a due balancing of forces.”

“And Bruce is sound, in our cause, to be sure!” Wallace put in, smiling into his curling auburn beard.

“Since he it was who made me Guardian! With my lord of Mar’s aid.”

If there was derision in that, it was fairly well covered over.

Bruce saw very well that Wallace trusted none of the lords, himself included. He was for sending him north, away from his own great reservoirs of manpower, Carrick and Annandale, to far Garioch, his sister’s portion when she married Mar. There to distract Comyn, the Red Comyn in especial, who was his rival in so much.

“How do you know that I will not make common cause with the Comyns?” he demanded.

Wallace actually laughed, apparently having followed the younger man’s train of thought accurately.

“Because John Comyn is Baliol’s man,” he said simply.

“And you are… yourself!”

The acuteness of that silenced Bruce for the moment. Mar spoke.

“If our hosts are up in Moray and Mar, facing Comyn, then we cannot be aiding you here against the English.”

“A commander needs more hosts than one, my lord. It is wise not to pit all at one throw. He needs a reserve. Your combined hosts, in the north, will well serve as that.”

In other words, Wallace was well content to fight Edward with his own common folk, the masses assembled direct from the nation, holding the great lords’ levies at a distance. Bruce saw it, if Mar did not.

“Beware, sir, that you do not estimate Edward Plantagenet too lightly!” he said.

“That I do not,” the big man assured.

“By God, I do not! But all shall not be won, or lost, in one battle.”

There was a mutual silence for a little, as the four men considered each other. Then Bruce shrugged.

“You are Guardian of Scotland,” he said.

“Aye. Thanks to you, as I say.”

“I wonder!”

“You doubt my thanks, my lord? That is foolish. You did for me, then, what no other could, or would, have done. The knighting.

I will not forget it. For that, at least, I do most surely thank you. Your reasons for doing it I do not know. But the deed was good. Of much value. For this, I am in your debt.”

“It was merited,” Bruce said shortly.

“Never was knighthood more so.”

“Not all would agree with you! But … that is no matter.

What matters now is the future. How long do you give Scotland?

You who know Edward. Before he comes hammering at our gates?”

“Three months. A month to return from France. A month to set his own house in order—to bring the English nobles to heel.

A month to raise the men to march north. I give Scotland until June.”

“Aye. You have the rights of it, I think. Three months—and so much to be done! So much!”

“You can do it,” Lamberton said, in his crisp voice.

“You only. For the folk are with you.”

“We shall see, my friend. So you, my lords, go north …”

Chapter Nine

Strangely enough, that spring and early summer of 1298 was one of the

happiest periods of Robert Bruce’s life—for which he had to thank

William Wallace. He was, in fact, essentially a fairly cheerful and

light-hearted character—had he not a reputation for extravagance and

display?-and the last two years of stress and deep involvement in

national tumults had superimposed a gravity and tenseness on his nature

which was not normal. Now there was an intermission, a period of

enforced detachment—or so he was able to convince himself. His

prolonged periods of sham negotiation at Irvine and hard unremitting

restoration work in Annandale, had prepared him to embrace the

satisfactions of Kildrummy as it were with open arms.

He had not made his way there in unseemly servile haste, of course. He had his dignity to consider. He informed Wallace that he would take over the duties of governor of the SouthWest, with headquarters at Ayr—and Wallace had acceded with good grace, since it would have been impracticable to appoint anyone else in opposition to him. He had returned from Selkirk to Annan, set affairs there in order, specifically commanding that there was to be no general muster of the Annandale men, save for the lordship’s own defence, whatever instructions might come from the Guardian.

Then, taking Edward and Nigel with him, he had ridden north to Ayr, where he installed Edward as deputy, to raise the area in arms, including his earldom of Carrick, refortify the castle and keep an eye on Lochmaben—which, being to all intents impregnable, was still in English hands, like Stirling; possibly the insufferable Master Benstead was still there. Then he and Nigel, his favourite brother, had set out on the two hundred mile journey to Aberdeenshire.

Kildrummy Castle, principal seat of the age-old Mar earldom, was a handsome establishment set amongst the uplands of the Don, and guarding the mountain passes to the north-east. A remote secure place, centred in a world of its own, with the most magnificent hunting country for hundreds of square miles around, it was little wonder that its lord seldom chose to leave its fair attractions. Bruce found it much to his taste.

There was more than the place itself to hold him. Here his little daughter Marjory had been brought, when her mother, Mar’s sister, died. She was now a laughing, chubby brown-eyed girl of three, and Bruce, who had accepted fatherhood as he had accepted marriage merely as one more normal development in a man’s progress, now discovered delight, wonder, pride. This roguish, impulsive, affectionate child was his, all his, in a way that nothing else was his—and he had not realised or appreciated it before. On Isabella’s death, at seventeen, soon after the baby was born, he had been anxious only to deposit the unfortunate infant with his sister Christian, take himself off, and forget the whole sorry business, a loveless marriage arranged by his father, an ailing, delicate young woman who cared nothing for the world outside Kildrummy, and then left him at nineteen with a pulling, bawling girl-child. But now, here was Marjory Bruce, a poppet.

Christian Bruce, Countess of Mar, was herself good company, the gayest of the family, all vigour, energy and laughter, and twice as much a man as her gentle, slightly melancholy husband.

Though womanly enough in all conscience, so that young men were ever round her like a honey-pot; Gartnait of Mar was probably wise enough not to leave home too frequently. She welcomed her brothers with enthusiasm, and proceeded to ensure that time did not hang heavily for them. Nigel himself was a happy natured, carefree soul, and an excellent companion to take the mind off affairs of state.