Nigel Tranter - Past Master

'See here the Right Excellent, High and Magnanimous Henry Frederick, Frederick Henry, by the Grace of God, Knight, Baron of Renfrew, Lord of the Isles, Earl of Carrick, Duke of Rothesay, Prince and Great Steward of Scotland!'

This over, and the child's health and well-being pledged by all James suddenly wearied, as he was apt to do, and began to look around him.

'Mistress Mary,' he called, querulously. 'Where are you? Vicky – where's your Mary Gray? Where is she, man?'

'She has gone, Sire. To see to our own child, I think.'

'Then she shouldna ha' done, Vicky. She hadna our royal permission to leave. We are displeased. Aye, right displeased. Fetch her back. Here to me.'

'As you will, Sire.'

'No – wait, now. We havena the time. It's no' suitable for us to wait on the lassie. Take you the bairn to her, Vicky.'

Ludovick, faced with the unenviable task of abstracting the infant from its mother's embrace, went about the business but hesitantly. Seeing which, James himself hurried over, took his son from his wife's protesting grasp, and handed him to Lennox.

'Off wi' him. And watch him well, mind. The bairn's no' to be wearied, see you. I'll no' have him unsettled.'

'As you say, Sire.'

'Aye. Well -1 shall retire. I'll need to prepare for the masque. Anne! Fetch Her Grace, Patrick man. Lyon – your trumpets…'

'How does it feel, Patrick, to sit and watch all dancing to your tune? To move men like pawns in a game? To watch all that you have contrived come to pass?'

'Not all, my dear. Most perhaps, but not all,' the Master amended lightly.

'Does it make you happy?'

'Happy? What is happiness, Mary? If you mean am I contented -I am not. Nor elated. Nor proud. Say that I see a good beginning, and am encouraged and hopeful.'

'I think perhaps that you even deceive yourself, Patrick -as well as others!'

'But not Mary Gray! Eh? Never Mary Gray!'

She did not answer that. Father and daughter were sitting together in quite a lowly position at the banquet in the Great Hall – Ludovick being required to take his due place up at the dais table near the King, amongst all the ambassadors and chief guests. The Queen was not present, pleading a headache – and undoubtedly James was in better fettle for her absence.

'You accuse me of deceit, Mary,' her father said conversationally. 'Because, on occasion, I do not tell all the truth – all that I know. But where is the virtue in a surfeit of truth? Look around you this August night. What do you see? The King merry, and safe. The new prince secure. The realm as near at peace as it has been all this reign. Bothwell abandoned by Queen Elizabeth and skulking a fugitive in his Border mosses. Indeed Elizabeth godmother to the precious child, her cousin Sussex bringing rich gifts and sitting at the King's side – and the English succession that much the nearer. All this, and more, that might not have been. And you see naught in it but deceit!'

'The English succession!' she took him up. 'That, to you, is all-important, is it not? Paradise! The Promised Land itself! Why, I have never understood.'

'I should have thought that wits so sharp as yours would require no telling. Only when the two realms are united under one king, will our land have settled peace, Mary. Only then will Scotland open and flourish as she should, with hatred past and opportunity before her. Always, the threat of England's might has constrained us, hedged us in. Always there has been an English party in Scotland, betraying the nation…'

' You say that! You who have betrayed so much and so many? Who have accepted so much of Elizabeth's gold…!'

'Aye. I say it. For I have chaffered with Elizabeth for Scotland's sake, not to line my own pockets, girl! As do the others. What you name my betrayals have been done that Scotland might survive. Always I have laboured and contrived that this realm should survive in the face of all that would tear it apart, sufficiently long for King Jamie there to be accepted also as King in England…'

'And Patrick Gray a power in two kingdoms!'

He sighed. 'You are hard on me, lassie. In some ways, those bonnie eyes of yours, that see so much, are strangely blind. You see me as crazed for power. That I have never been. As hungry for wealth. That I do not seek, save to carry out my purposes. As pursuing vengeance on those who counter me…'

'I see you as a puppet-master, Patrick – with men and women as your puppets. Aye, and kings and queens and princes. Even Christ's church! Puppets that you discard at will, caring not that they have hearts and souls! The puppet-show alone matters to you, not the puppets. Can you deny it?'

He was silent, then, for a little, his handsome face without expression.

As so often was the way it went, Mary could not withhold her love and pity – although pity was scarcely a word that could be used in respect of the Master of Gray – from this extraordinary sire of hers. Her hand went out to touch his arm.

'I am sorry, Patrick. Sorry that I should seem to think so ill of you. But… I cannot forget what you have done.'

'You speak out of ignorance, Mary. You do not know one tenth of the circumstances.'

'Perhaps not. But the tenth is more than sufficient. I would not wish to know more.' She paused. 'Though that, I think, is not wholly true. I would much like to know, Patrick, how your present triumph was achieved?'

'I do not take you? You have seen what has been…'

'Do not cozen me, Patrick. Credit me with some of those wits you spoke of! Do not tell me that much of all that has happened was not planned months ago. Before ever you came to Fast Castle. Someone planned it, surely. And neither Bothwell nor Huntly has the head for it. Moreover it has worked out only to your advantage…'

'And the King's.'

'Perhaps. But King James did not plot it, that is certain. Was any of it true, Patrick? Was the realm ever in real danger? Did Bothwell ever really design the King's death? And the capture of the prince? This move to Stirling – was it not all that you might draw the King away from the Chancellor Maitland? Did Bothwell ever intend to attack Edinburgh? Was the threat no more than a device that you might gain the Kirk to your side? You that I think are a Catholic at heart! I think that I see your hand behind Bothwell in all. But Bothwell is now a fugitive -whilst you, that was a banished outlaw, now guide the King's hand!'

'On my soul, girl, you attribute me with the powers of a god!'

'Not a god, Patrick!'

'Are you finished, my dear?'

'You have not answered any of my questions.'

'Save to say that all are nonsense. Something has disordered your mind, I fear. Childbirth, perhaps?'

'Is it nonsense that you devised this threat to the prince, for your own ends? To separate him from his mother? In order that the King and Queen should be thus at odds – and you have the

greater hold over both?'

' 'Fore God, girl – you are bewitched! Spare me more of this, for sweet mercy's sake! You are, I think, clean out of your mind!' Mary uttered a long sigh. 'Perhaps I am, Patrick. It may be so. Sometimes I tell myself that I am. Indeed, I would wish with all my heart that it is so. And yet…' She shook her head, and left the rest unsaid.

He considered her, and then patted her hand. 'There is ill and good in all of us,' he said, more gently. 'Allow me some of both! Even the Kirk is prepared to do that! Is my daughter less generous than Master Melville and his crew?'

'The Kirk! The Kirk would be wise to take care with the Master of Gray, would it not?'

'The Kirk must learn who are its friends. I have spent much time and labour this day aiding the Kirk. Convincing the King that he must allow the Kirk some part in the christening – for he would have had only the Bishop. Ensuring that the Bishop was discreet – and swift. Soothing Master Lindsay over the anointing oil. It is only because of the shameless and heretical Master of Gray that the righteous representatives of the Kirk are sitting here tonight.'