Nigel Tranter - Lord and Master

It was largely through Patrick that the Court became centred in Edinburgh, for he saw that efficient government could not be maintained from ever-changing localities. James and Arran still spent much of their time elsewhere, hunting, hawking and riding the kingdom, but more and more the capital city reverted to being the seat of government In this, strangely enough, Patrick was aided by the Lady Arran, who disliked traipsing about where she could not surround herself with non-transportable luxuries. She quickly perceived that Patrick was infinitely more efficient in most respects than was her husband, and acted accordingly. There were not a few who suggested that she might well be preparing to switch husbands once more.

David watched all this extraordinary change in his brother with wonderment, for he could not believe that Patrick's ambitions really lay in garnering a multiplicity of offices, in the wielding of executive authority, in the daily management of affairs. If he was doing all this, he was doing it for some specific purpose, David felt sure. The fact that Patrick's closest companion, these days, tended to be Sir Edward Wotton, whom Elizabeth had sent north to replace Mr Bowes as English ambassador, worried his brother. Also the great sums of money which Patrick undoubtedly now had at his command, and which did not seem to come from the chronically threadbare Scottish Treasury.

Not that David had much time for worrying. Being Patrick's secretary, under this new dispensation, ceased to be a sinecure, a mere nominal position, and became an office of much responsibility in itself, demanding all his time and attention. He did not particularly relish the work, nor the mass of detail in which he became involved. Had he wished, undoubtedly he could have had a choice of lucrative and more or less permanent positions for himself, in some sphere of government with which he was in daily contact; but he preferred to remain free, his brother's secretary and left hand. That he was not his right hand, he knew very well; clearly there was a great deal that Patrick kept from him, particularly in his relations with Wotton and the English.

One of the English items with which David was not fully conversant, was the matter of the exiled Ruthven lords. One of the points of Patrick's embassage had been James's, or rather Arran's, request to Elizabeth to take steps against these nobles, who had settled just over the Border in Northumberland and constituted a constant threat; a plea that she would send them back to Scotland for trial. Elizabeth did indeed remove them, ostensibly out of danger's way, but only deeper into England. With this the King had to be content And secretly, David knew, one of them, the Earl of Angus, Morton's nephew and head of the Douglases, had already returned home and was in hiding somewhere in his own Douglasdale. Patrick seemed to suspect that the others might follow at short intervals. As to the purpose of his manoeuvre, Patrick did not commit himself.

The Master of Gray did not allow his preoccupation with English affairs to prejudice other matters, of course; for instance, his good relations with the Guises. He kept up a regular correspondence with them, through the Archbishop of Glasgow and the Jesuit couriers – with not all of which was David conversant either. One letter which he did see, however, contained an extraordinary document – a Papal pronunciamento, no less, declaring Patrick Gray's marriage to the Lady Elizabeth Lyon to be null and invalid, on account of the ceremony being heretically and improperly performed. Patrick laughed at David's expression when he saw this. A precaution, he asserted-a mere question of providing for all contingencies. One could not be too careful where these divines were concerned, could one?

Arrangements for the annulment of Patrick's unfortunate marriage were in feet going on through certain channels in the Kirk, Bishop Davidson indeed haying the matter in hand, most suitably. Divorce being more difficult and apt to be prolonged -moreover requiring some small co-operation from the lady in the case – annulment seemed the preferable course. That the parties to the marriage had. both been minors at the time was a great convenience. Patrick also claimed duress on the part of his father and Lord Glamis. If this failed, he could always assert that he had, in feet, been secretly married prior to the wedding, to an unnamed woman now fortunately dead. But he did not think that it would be necessary to go to such lengths. Elizabeth Lyon or Gray, it seemed, was now showing a certain interest in young William Kirkcaldy of Grange.

David did not have to wait long to hear further word of Mary Stuart She had been moved to Tutbury Castle soon after the Scots visit to Wingfield, presumably as an added precaution. Then, one January afternoon, Sir Edward Wotton came strolling into the room in Gowrie House where Patrick worked amidst parchments and papers innumerable, and David with him. Sir John Maitland, the Secretary of State, was there also, brother to Mary's late Maitland of Lethington.

'Ah, you are busy, Patrick – always busy!' he said. 'You have become a very glutton for papers, I do declare. I had hopes of better, from you 11 will see you anon.'

'I am just finishing,' Patrick assured. 'Davy, the blessed Davy, will do the rest for me. I believe that he actually likes handling pen and paper! And Sir John is just going – are you not, Mr. Secretary?'

Maitland, a thin, ascetic, unsmiling man, able but friendless, looked sourly at the English ambassador. He did not like him, nor anything to do with England. Yet he was accepting Patrick's money, David knew, as were many others – and not enquiring whence it came. He bowed stiffly, and stalked out

Wotton came and sat on the edge of Patrick's littered table. 'I have despatches,' he said. 'Some of which will interest you, my friend. Your Mary Stuart is a great letter-writer – which is a great convenience.'

Patrick sat back. 'You mean that Walsingham has been reading her correspondence – and has intercepted something else of interest to England?'

'Exactly. She is remarkably explicit in her writings, the good lady.'

'I wonder that she does not realise that her letters will be tampered with. If not herself, Nau or Melville at least It seems..'. elementary'

'Ah, but she does, Patrick. We have allowed for her unkind suspicions, however. Walsingham arranged for the brewer who supplies the beer to her household to claim to be a fervent Catholic and supporter of Mary, and to offer her the use of a specially-contrived beer-barrel which should go in and out of her quarters with a secret container within for letters. And so the fair lady may now write to whom she will, with an easy mind -and Sir Francis has a convenient inspection of the letters and their answers. A truly useful barrel!'

David, head down over his papers, had to choke back his fury and indignation. Patrick laughed, however.

'Very neat' he admitted. 'And I take it that something of note has how come out of your barrel?

'Indeed it has. Many things. But in especial one in which you will be interested. A letter written to Mendoza, former Spanish ambassador to Elizabeth, and a friend of your Mary, as you know. In it she tells of your interview with her and declares that, to bring her son to his senses and to halt this Protestant alliance, she proposes to name Mendoza's master – Philip of Spain, her heir instead of James – heir to the throne of Scotland, and her reversion to the throne of England likewise! How think you of that, Master Patrick?

'Lord!' Patrick was sitting up straight, now. "This is… fantastic! She would do this? The proud Mary would go so far? To disinherit her own son – for the Spaniard!'

To say that she would do so, at all events'

'Aye. It is likely but a gesture, a ruse'