James Robertson - The Fanatic

A shadow fell across Mitchel’s gaze. A hand lighted like a trained bird on his shoulder. His nose twitched at the familiar smell of cheap, stale tobacco.

The tall man beside him said, ‘That is the empty head of a vain and prideful villain.’

Mitchel turned. ‘I ken,’ he said. Then he added, ‘But he yince held Scotland in his hand.’

‘For a few months only,’ the tall man said. ‘A moment – less than a moment – in God’s scale of time.’

Major Weir was no stranger to Mitchel: they were neighbours in their Cowgate lodgings, and Weir had often spoken to him, coolly but not unkindly, in his deliberate, Englished tones. Still, Mitchel found it hard not to be in awe of the older man, who was recognised and deferred to everywhere he went, either as a preacher or as an officer of the City Guard.

Although he ought not to have been surprised at Weir’s appearance, since the Major’s duties took him all over the town, day and night, sometimes he wondered at the frequency with which they met away from Mistress Whitford’s house. It was ridiculous to imagine that Weir followed him; and yet Weir’s eye always seemed to be taking note of his appearance or behaviour. There was something both flattering and unnerving in this assessment.

‘Why do you look upon that head?’ Weir asked. ‘Not with regret, nor in adulation, I can see that. What does the dead mouth of James Graham tell you?’

‘Naethin,’ Mitchel said. ‘It is silent. I never saw him in life, but when I was a bairn he had Scotland chitterin on its knees, and folk fleggin ye wi tales o his army. But when I look noo I’m no feart. And he disna say ocht.’

Weir tapped the ground with his staff. ‘Or ye dinna hear ocht,’ he said. He shifted his hand from Mitchel’s shoulder to his elbow, turned him with the slightest pressure.

‘Walk with me, James,’ he said, once more in his clipped, careful voice. ‘I was at the Netherbow Port, inspecting the guard, and now I am on my way to a prayer-meeting. I would be obliged if ye’d convoy me to the Grassmarket.’

They began to walk up the street, past the hulk of St Giles, Weir’s left hand cleiking Mitchel’s arm, while his right leaned heavily on the staff. His grip was tight, but he seemed to be labouring on the hill, like a man well beyond his mid-fifties. When he stumbled, Mitchel asked hesitantly if he felt unwell.

‘I am fine, I am fine,’ he said. ‘Just weary. It’s a hard path that we have trod since Graham was dealt with. Scotland was delivered out of his hands, it seems, only to be given over to Cromwell and his vile English army. And now they say when Cromwell and the English go, we’ll hae a Stewart back again. All this suffering, all this long dark nicht, and for what? You say you heard nothing, but when I look up at Graham’s head, I sometimes fancy I hear him laughing at us.’

He stopped as they reached the top of the West Bow, and they stood looking down the long street, across which a few well-wrapped figures were flitting. Weir coughed and spat on the ground.

‘I had him in my charge the night before he was executed, did ye know that? In that very prison which his head now adorns. He laughed at us then, the savage. Combing his locks and preening himself, and brushing out his finery as if God would care a docken what he looked like when He cast him into the furnace. And he spurned the services of the ministers sent to attend him by the General Assembly – good men, strong in the Covenant that he himself had signed and then betrayed, Davie Dickson and James Durham and James Guthrie and Robert Traill. He said he, the Marquis of Montrose , would make his own peace with God. Doubtless he’d have corrected God if God didna address him by that false title. He was a proud and foolish man, James. There was a huge scaffold biggit for him, thirty feet high, and the street was tight with folk come to see him die. But when I took him out there in the forenoon, he still would not show remorse for his crimes. He climbed that thirty feet as if he were going to his bed.’

He broke off and drew himself up to his full height, and rapped the staff hard on the stones. ‘But we are stronger,’ he said sharply. ‘We are stronger because we have God with us. The godly will prevail.’

‘I believe that,’ said Mitchel, as they started to walk again. ‘It is oor destiny. Principal Leighton at the college, afore oor laureation, tendered tae us the Covenant, and I subscribed tae it. Ye canna tak some and no the haill o that document. It is signing away your life tae Christ.’

‘The life of the haill nation, James, but you see how many who have signed it have fallen away from its principles. Beware of Robert Leighton even. His tongue speaks the right words, but he is ower tolerant. The land is full of holy wobblers like him, and they are a great danger. At least a man like Montrose, you could mark him for an enemy.’

At the foot of the Bow, where their ways parted, Weir stopped again, but did not release his grip.

‘Will you not come to the meeting, Maister Mitchel? You a graduate and a man of the right party. Why do we not see you at our meetings? Do you not like my company, or the sound of my voice?’

‘Na, na, I hae often heard ye preach,’ said Mitchel. ‘And admired ye, tae.’

‘You should hear me pray,’ said Weir. ‘A sermon is a text with a wind at its back. But prayer, prayer is wind and fire together. Why do you not come?’

Mitchel shook his head, and looked away to the bottom of the Grassmarket, behind which the last of the light was now a deepening red in the sky. ‘I am uncertain,’ he said, then added in an embarrassed mumble, ‘if I hae grace.’

He felt Weir shift his position, heard him sigh heavily.

‘You are very young, James. Ye needna be ashamed. You have grace. Look at me when I tell ye this. You have grace. You are of the elect. I can feel it.’

‘I must be sure, though,’ Mitchel said. He looked at the blaze in the older man’s eyes, and longed for such conviction.

‘There’s no harm in prayer, even if you are in a state of doubt,’ Weir told him. ‘Prayer can lead to assurance. You should come.’

But Mitchel stepped back. ‘I am indebted tae ye, sir. And I will come. But no this nicht. This nicht I must pray alane.’

Weir nodded. ‘Very well. But this will not last. The Lord will find you work, James, and you will receive assurance. Believe me, it will happen.’

Jackie Halkit left a message on Hugh Hardie’s answer-machine: ‘Thought I might go on your tour tonight. Maybe see you there?’ He didn’t return the call, but she decided to go anyway. It didn’t matter about paying three or four pounds or whatever the fee was. She was more interested in seeing Carlin playing the ghost. Since the meeting at Dawson’s it was as if he had set up camp in her mind.

It was still early spring, and cold at night. Only seven other people turned up: three Japanese visitors – two men and a woman – and a slightly drunk office party – three women and a man. The man kept going ‘Whooooh!’ and running his fingers over his companions’ necks. It was amazing to Jackie that they seemed to get almost as much of a kick out of this as he did. When the guide started to talk the man settled down, and tried instead to impress the women with the seriousness with which he paid attention. ‘That’s very interesting. God, I never knew that, did you know that?’ he would say periodically, and chuckle knowingly at the guide’s jokes. The Japanese said nothing, but smiled politely when the others laughed.

Jackie had to admit, the tour was quite well done. The script was informative and not too patronising, though it spared little in the way of gore and the macabre. The guide was dressed in black, and introduced himself, removing a hood with rough-cut eyeholes, as a former public executioner who had made it his life’s work to gather all the sins of the city together. He started with a dramatic gob on the heart-shaped setts in Parliament Square which marked the site of the entrance to the old Tolbooth: it was an act, he explained, originally performed by prisoners when they were released from the jail, but since these unfortunates were all long dead he felt an obligation, as the man who had despatched so many of their fellows on the scaffold, to uphold the tradition on their behalf. ‘Oh,’ said the office party man, ‘I thought you were a Hibs fan.’ The guide shook his head. ‘I make it a rule never to discuss football, there’s been too much blood in these streets already,’ he said. The office man was delighted to get such a lad-conscious response. The guide led his party up the High Street to the Lawnmarket, telling stories all the way, then, via the surviving upper section of the West Bow, down some steps onto Victoria Street, towards the site of his former work in the Grassmarket, thus retracing the old route of those condemned to die.