Disorderly Knights - Dorothy Dunnett [219]
‘Those!’ said Cessford in tones of undisguised loathing. And ‘Those!’ repeated Ferniehurst with repulsion vaster still. ‘I’d go to jail first.’
‘You may,’ said the Scottish Warden mildly. ‘They are not, I admit, the flower of their race. But Kerr blood, for all we have been able to prove, may well run in their veins.’
‘Pah!’ said Walter Kerr of Cessford. Ferniehurst, more explicit by temperament, used a number of other words. ‘My lord!’ said Buccleuch, meekly.
The English Warden bent down. ‘Yes, Sir Wat?’
Buccleuch murmured.
Lord Wharton straightened. ‘An excellent idea. My good women, rise and bring your children forward. They are to receive a small gift. Some sweetmeats, to pacify their tempers and reward them for their patience. Pray allow the little ones to accept them.’
A bag of someone’s comfits, hastily pulled from a saddle-bag, was passed to each small illegitimate child, and the crying stopped. The bag, nearly empty, was brought back to Lord Wharton, who took one and passed it to Drumlanrig. ‘You will note,’ he said drily, ‘that every child accepted its sweet in the left hand.’
The uproar after that went on for a very long time, and in its essence consisted of Cessford’s plea, repeated over and over, that without proof no one could force him to take and rear a pack of English bastards as Kerrs. When at last Wharton whacked on the board with his whip, the noise took a full two minutes to die away, and the Cumberland man, all too furiously aware that a monumental joke was under way, was in a foul temper. When he had reasonable silence, he snapped.
‘The Scottish Warden and I have two solutions to offer.’ He glanced at Sir James Drumlanrig, who nodded, and back at the quietly delirious crowd. ‘There is no doubt that these accusations have been gathered from malice against the family Kerr. But we may not conclude from that, that the Kerr family is quite free of blame. In any case, the real sufferers seem likely to be these innocent children.’ Lord Wharton, averting his eyes from the innocent children, glared at Buccleuch, who grinned back.
‘Therefore we suggest either that the whole sanctions are continued to another March meeting, when more evidence may be forward and the matter may be argued again.…
‘That’s continuing the case until the next meeting sub spe concordiœ, in the hope that the parties may agree,’ Fergie Hoddim was saying. ‘An English love-day, they call it.’ And gazed surprised as Lancelot Plummer at his side suddenly choked, and had to be thumped on the back to stop his coughing.
‘—an English love-day,’ continued Lord Wharton, less innocent than Fergie, glaring round him. ‘That is one solution. The other has been put forward by Sir Walter Scott of Buccleuch. Since these poor women are incapable of rearing their offspring, and some of the best blood in Scotland may consequently (his phrase) weaken and waste, Sir Wat suggests that, failing support by their own putative fathers, he and his family will gratuitously, and for no payment other than his reward in Heaven, take these little children and rear them at Branxholm to bear proudly the name of Kerr.’
‘Over my deid wambles!’ yelled Cessford.
Wharton’s face was set like brown wood. ‘You object to Buccleuch’s paying for these children?’
‘He can pey for what he likes.… I see ye, ye canty de’il … but he’ll not call yon bunch of louse-ridden, snotty-nosed hedge-gets by the proud name o’ Kerr!’
Sir James Douglas’s cool gaze swept the old man. ‘Dinna be hasty,’ he advised. ‘Consider. Sir Walter is doing the State and ourselves quite a service. It’ll be no cheap matter, laying out money for yon flock, Kerrs or no. If he supplies the siller, he can fairly call the tune.’
‘Then I’ll have the love-day,’ said Cessford forebodingly, after a brief talk with his ally of Ferniehurst. Lord Wharton looked narrowly at the two.
‘In order to terrorize the ladies or the Scotts? If that is your purpose, you will be disappointed, gentlemen. At Sir Walter’s suggestion, we are asking Mr Francis Crawford