Nigel Tranter - The Price of the King's Peace

The least I could do, when he was hazarding all, deep in England To protect his rear. But I will raise it now. End it. Assail Berwick instead, where we have more chance …” His voice tailed away, and the soldier was quickly superseded by the man again.

“But what matters Carlisle! Or Berwick either. With what this room portends. Destiny is here, not in Carlisle. Here is the prize!

That!

And here the price paid!” Bitterly he said it.

She shook her head, and took his arm.

“Your grandson,” she reminded.

“And motherless. Helpless.”

“Aye.” Nodding, he stooped then, to reach out and pick up the closely bundled infant.

“So be it. This, then, is my heir. Scotland’s heir. One day this

will wear my crown!”

“Perhaps,” the Queen said, strangle-voiced.

“Perhaps not, Robert.”

“If God has any mercy for me, he will. Is it too much to hope?

You say that he is well-made? Healthy?”

She moistened her lips.

“He is a fine boy, yes. But still, he may not wear your crown. Who knows? For I … I am pregnant, Robert! At last At my age! Sweet Jesu—I am pregnant…!” Her voice broke.

For moments he could not so much as speak, lips parted. Then, “Dear God of all the saints,” the man gasped.

“Christ, Son of me Father-pregnant! You! It is true?”

Dumbly she nodded.

“You are sure? Not some false sign? Some cozening of the body …?”

“No. It is sure. Oh, Robert…!”

Hurriedly but gently, then, he laid his grandson back in the cradle, and turned to take his wife in his arms.

“My dear, my dear!”

he said.

“Here is wonder. Here is miracle. Here, here …” He wagged his head.

“Lord Jesu, woman-what are we? What are we I say? The playthings of God? Playthings, no more …!”

“Say it not, Robert-say it not!” she urged, chokingly. She turned her face and buried it in his chest, clutching him convulsively, half-sobbing, half-laughing.

Chapter Nine

Two months later, almost reluctantly, the King was besieging Berwickon-Tweed instead of Carlisle. He was against siegery, on principle. Being almost wholly devoid of the necessary engines for the business—mangonels, trebuchets, ballista, rams, sows and the like where fortresses could not be successfully assaulted, stormed or infiltrated, or their water-supplies cut, he was left with the wearisome business of starving them out. And this was quite foreign to Bruce’s vigorous, not to say impatient nature. The siege maker has to have special qualities-and this man just did not have them.

But pressure to invest Berwick had been strong. It was the only Scots soil still in enemy possession, and as such a standing reproach, a denial of their limited victory. Moreover, it had usually been the headquarters of the English administration over Scotland, and for it still to be in Edward’s grasp was galling in the extreme.

Now that MacDougall was put down, this assault was the only action the King could take, within his own realm, to hasten Edward’s acceptance of the peace treaty. Also James Douglas, Warden of the Marches, saw Berwick as a perpetual challenge to his authority, and claimed that he could not go raiding deep into England with any peace of mind leaving this occupied stronghold, which could be reinforced by sea, behind him.

Douglas, of course, had a sort of vested interest in Berwick. Here his

father had been governor, in 1296, had gallantly withstood Edward the

First’s siege throughout the terrible sack of Berwick town, had been

tricked into terms by the English, and then shamefully betrayed and

sent walking in chains, like a performing bear, down through England to

imprisonment in the Tower. James was concerned to avenge his father.He was, in fact, the moving spirit in this siege, the King, though present, being less than well. Since his daughter’s death he had been moody, at odds with himself and others, dispirited for so purposeful a nature. It was not that he was actually and recognisably ill. He went about, if somewhat lethargically, and indeed denied that there was anything wrong with him. But those close to him knew well that he was not himself, and veterans like Gilbert Hay and Lennox claimed that they recognised the same symptoms that had laid him low at Inverurie in 1307, and at Roxburgh in 1313though, they admitted, with much less virulence. Certainly Bruce itched a great deal, his skin hot and dry, and of an evening was apt to be flushed with a slight fever. Elizabeth, who had little objection to camp-life and had accompanied her husband to Berwick, was anxious-but Bruce was not a man to fuss over and she had to content herself with small ministrations and watchfulness.

This was the situation one evening of late May when the burly, grizzled and tough Sir Robert Boyd of Noddsdale was ushered into the royal presence, from long travelling. He found the King and Queen, with Lennox, Hay and Douglas, in the vicarage of Mordington a mile or two north-west of the walled town, which had been Bernard de Linton’s pastoral charge before he became royal secretary, Abbot of Arbroath and Chancellor of the realm. It was a small house for so illustrious a company, and plainly plenished, but the nearest stone and slated residence left intact near the beleaguered citadel.

“Welcome, Sir Robert,” Bruce greeted him.

“Here’s an unexpected pleasure. Have you fallen out with my brother? Or have you come to aid us in this plaguey siege? You have the soundest head for such matters in my kingdom, I vow.” News of late from Ireland had been good, and he had no reason to anticipate ill tidings.

“Your siege I know not of, Sire,” the other returned.

“I came at the command of my lord of Moray. And in haste. To outpace another. From your royal brother. Another courier, from the Lord Edward. My lord of Moray conceived that you should have warning.”

“Warning of what, man? Not defeat? Only a week past we had word of victories, progress …”

“No defeat, no. Quite otherwise. The Lord Edward has assumed the crown. Has been enthroned King of Ireland.”

“Wh-a-t!” Not only Bruce but all other men in the room were on their feet at this bald announcement.

“King, no less. Crowned and installed. At Dundalk. Ten days past.

“But … great God-how came this? Is it some mummery?

Some foolish playacting?”

“Not so, Sire. It was a true coronation. He was solemnly led to the throne by O’Neil, King of Tyrone. And supported by many sub-kings and chiefs. All assenting. Crowned High King of All Ireland.”

“It is scarce believable. My brother. To do this …”

“Only Edward would do it!” Elizabeth said.

“Only he would conceive it possible. The bold Edward!”

“Bold, woman! This is … more than boldness. This is folly, beyond all. Treason indeed-highest treason.”

“You say so? How can it be treason, Robert? Against you? You are not king in Ireland.”

“Do you not see? Edward went to Ireland as my lieutenant and representative. Leading an army of my subjects. On a campaign to advance the interests of my realm of Scotland. Now, he has thrown all that to the winds. He has made himself a monarch, and therefore no subject of mine. He thus rejects both my authority and my interests. The campaign to win a peace treaty.”

“But may not this but aid in it? In bringing the English to treat?

If he unites Ireland, as its king …”

“Save us-you should know the English better! This will end all

possibility of a treaty. For us to defeat their minions, in a

rebellion.

To drive many of their captains out of Ireland-that might have served our purpose. But to set up Edward as King of All Ireland-that is no mere rebellion. That is the greatest challenge to England’s might and pride. For to them Ireland is a province.