Nigel Tranter - The Price of the King's Peace

“No, Robert! No!” Elizabeth cried, when she could find words.

“Not so. It is not true. Never think it. This is not leprosy. I

swear it.

You are wrong, wrong!”

“It… it is my daily prayer that I am. But I fear …” He paused.

“It could be God’s will. His punishment.”

“No. You torture yourself. Just as you blame yourself too much.

You punish yourself, Robert. For what was no fault. Or little. The death of a fore sworn and dangerous traitor. The assumption of a crown that was yours by right both of blood and conquest. You punish yourself. God is less harsh, I vow!”

“Yet He punished full harshly others for less fault. For my fault.

My brothers. My sisters. Marjory. Christopher Seton. Atholl.

Isobel of Buchan. Your own self indeed …”

“Was that God? Or but the savagery of a man, a man crazed with hatred?

Edward Longshanks is not God!” She shook her head.

“Besides-this is not leprosy. The leper’s skin is white, not red, is it not?”

“I believed so once, told myself so. But in a lazar-house at Cashel, in Tipperary, I saw two men with skins as red as mine. Saw them, forced myself to speak with them. I tell you, they itched as do I!

Were fevered. One of them vomited. Not the other …”

“But were they lepers? You are sure?”

“They were in a leper-house. Believed themselves to be so.

Tended by the Brothers of Saint Lazarus.”

“That need mean little. Ignorance. The folly of neighbours. Have you

spoken with a physician, Robert?” “I have spoken with none. Until

you. I… I dared not.”

“And you were right, in that. I say you were right to speak of this

fear to none. This is not to be spoken of. None must hear of it”

“If I am unclean, my dear, shutting our eyes and ears to it will not cleanse me.”

“Merciful Mary-you are not unclean! Oh, Robert, my heart-never say it, never think it! It is a folly, a sin! This is no more leprosy than is a rash of the fowl-pox, or the ruby-pox. Say nothing of it to any, Robert. Or all the world will have you leper by the next day, as good as dead and buried! Men shunning you. You, the King!”

“And yet I must know, lass. For certain. I cannot live with this sore secret, uncertain. I have done so for too long as it is, gnawing at my mind …”

“But I tell you it is not leprosy. That you are wrong …”

“Because you wish it so, Elizabeth. You are my wife, my other part.

You cannot judge, I think, more truly than do I. I need another to tell

me, another who loves me less. But who will not noise it abroad. With

that I do agree. It must not be spoken of, until, until… God help

me, until I am sure it is true! Or the rule of this my kingdom will

become confusion impossible. A leper king! Already dead under the law! Banished the presence of clean men. Who would succeed me? There is none. This also I have thought on, through the long nights, and over many a weary Irish mile. None must learn of this-until it is sure …”

“Myself, I would tell no man,” Elizabeth said.

“But if you must, ask William Lamberton. He is wise, knowledgeable and discreet He would be best.”

“Ay—Lamberton. I will tell Lamberton. He should know, too, for he is my confessor, my spiritual adviser. He will tell me truly.”

The man paused, looking at her, surveying her, all her naked

loveliness, and frowning.

“Elizabeth,” he went on, from stiff lips, as though forced to it.

“And you? What of you, lass? If indeed I am a leper. What of you?”

“What of me, Robert? I am your wife.”

“You … you could not remain so.”

“I am your wife,” she repeated.

“Your other part, as you said but then. Said truly. For we are

one.”

“But… no, lass. I could not be. Tied to a leper. It is against the law, besides. You know it. All marriage ties are dissolved, the Jaw declares. The leper is dead, in the eyes of the law. A leper may not cohabit with a clean woman …”

“Robert-be silent! How can you say such things? I wed you for better or for worse, did I not? Before the altar in Linlithgow did we say aught about leprosy? Besides, you are no leper, I tell you.

But if you were, think you I would leave you? I, Elizabeth de

Burgh!”

“My heart-heed you. Would you become a leper too?

Already-already it may be too late! Already I may have given you this evil thing. Lying here with you tonight. I should not have done it, I was weak, wickedly selfish. By fouling this dear flesh …?”

“Mary-Mother- hear me! If you are leper, think you I would wish to be other? I waited eight years in English prisons-when I would not have cared whether I was leper or clean. Only waited for this, to be with you, you, once more. United with you. Your wife. Now, we are together-and I thank God daily. Think you that anything, anything under heaven, will part us now, save death itself? I, Elizabeth, am wife to Robert Bruce. I told you, on that island in Linlithgow Loch, that I would be a jealous wife. In this, more than in your casual taking of other women. Those whom God hath joined together let no man put asunder! No man, Robert Bruce-even you!”

“And the law of the land, woman?”

“You are the King. The law itself, and above the law. And even if you were not, I would say the same. God’s law is above man’s law, is it not?”

He sat up again, to take her in his arms.

“My dear, my dear,” he said.

Clean or unclean, they lay in each other’s arms through that night, although there was no more of passionate coupling.

Strangely, it was not long before the man slept, a sleep which he had been desperately needing. Hour after hour the woman lay at his side, staring up at the painted ceiling, an arm about his jerking, twitching troubled body. The cocks were crowing before her eyes closed.

The Primate, Bishop of St. Andrews, arrived there three days later, days in which a constant stream of visitors descended upon Turnberry, lords, sheriffs, councillors, officers, in great style or no style.

William Lamberton came in a litter, not because it became his dignity,

as did some clerics, with musicians and choirs of singing boys to mark

their presence, but because he was now partly crippled with arthritis

and found sitting a saddle almost as trying as walking. He had, in

fact, walked the length and breadth of Scotland too much, in too much harsh weather, slept under too many dykes, suffered too much hunger, exhaustion, for even such a powerful frame as his; so much that now he, who was Wallace’s friend before he was Bruce’s, and whose service with both had brought pain and sorrow as their main reward, though not yet fifty, had to travel in a litter slung between pacing jennets-even though the pace, for jennets, was apt to be forced and uncomfortable.

But if the great rawboned, lanky body somewhat failed the man, the spirit within, like the shrewd, searching, patient mind, did not.

Primate and King, in a corner of the parapet-walk that overhung the beach and the white lacework of the tide, sat on the rose red, sun-warmed masonry and looked out across the sparkling waters to the dramatic skyline of Arran and the Highland hills behind Bute -that is, when they were not considering each other’s appearance a little askance.

“It grieves me to see you so sore stricken in the joints, old friend,” Bruce declared.

“A hard burden for a doing man such as yourself. It should not have been for you to come all this way, from St. Andrews. Rather I should have come to you. I would-but Elizabeth had sent for you …”

“And think you I would have my liege lord waiting on me like some suppliant for a vicarage? I am not so far done that I cannot fulfill my duties, however halting my gait, Sire.”