Game of Kings - Dorothy Dunnett [3]
Hob, who had done all he had been paid to do, disappeared.
The steward slipped to the floor, and stayed there.
The sow approached her water dish, sniffed it with increasing favour, and inserted both her nose and her front trotters therein.
Crawford of Lymond tied up the steward, left the stye, and climbed the stairs to Mungo Tennant’s apartments.
In the gratified presence of their host, Sir Walter Scott of Buccleuch and Tom Erskine were still hard at it. Buccleuch, beaked like a macaw, was a baroque and mighty Scots Lowlander with a tough mind, a voice like Saint Columba’s, and one of the biggest estates on the Scottish Border. Erskine, much the younger, pink, stocky and vehement, was a son of Lord Erskine, who was head of one of the families nearest the throne, and captain of the Queen’s fortress of Stirling.
“Just wait,” Buccleuch was roaring. “Just wait, man. Protector Somerset will get his damned English rabble together and march into Scotland up the east coast. And he’ll tell off his commander, Lord Wharton, to get his Cumberland English together and invade us at the same time up the west coast. And half the west coast landowners are pensioners of the English already and won’t resist ’em. And all the rest of us’ll be over here at Edinburgh fighting Ned Somerset—”
“Not all of us,” said Erskine neatly.
Buccleuch’s whiskers promenaded. “Who’ll stay in the west that’s worth a docken?”
“Andrew Hunter of Ballaggan?”
“Christ. Andrew’s a nice, gentlemanly lad, but his estate’s been bled dry; and as for the ill-armed crew he calls followers—Man, they’d lay on a battlefield like dandruff.”
“The third Baron Culter?” suggested Tom Erskine, and Buccleuch got the derisive note and turned red at the wattle.
“I know fine the cheeky clack of the court,” shouted Buccleuch. “They say Culter’s not to be trusted.”
Tom Erskine lifted the broad, brocade shoulders. “They say his younger brother’s not to be trusted.”
“Lymond! We know all about Lymond. Rieving and ruttery and all manner of vice—”
“And treason.”
“And treason. But treason’s not Lord Culter’s dish. There are those that want to take time and men to hunt down Lymond and his band of murderers; and those that demand that Culter should lead them as proof of his loyalty. But if Richard Crawford of Culter won’t interfere; says he has better business to attend to and refuses flatly to hound down his brother baying like the Wild Jagd, that still doesn’t make him a traitor.” And inflating the great chasms of his cheeks, Buccleuch added, “Anyway, Culter’s just got married. D’ye blame him for keeping his shield on the hook and his family blunders all tied up at the back of the armory?”
“Damn it,” said Tom Erskine, annoyed, “I don’t blame him for anything. It isn’t my fault. And if it’s that black Irish beauty he married, I don’t expect he’d notice if the Protector knocked on the front gate at Midculter and asked for a drink of water. But—”
The large red face had calmed down. “You’re dead right, of course,” said Buccleuch cordially. “In fact you’ve given me a wee notion or two I can use to the fellow himself. If Culter’s going to be in credit at court at all, he’ll need to bring himself to capture that honey-faced de’il.”
Mungo Tennant, the silent and flattered host, was able to make respectful comment at last. “Crawford of Lymond, Sir Wat?” he said. “Now, he’s not in this country, as I heard. He’s in the Low Countries, I believe. And when he’ll be back, if ever, God knows.… Bless us, what’s that?”
It was only a sneeze; but a sneeze outside the door of their chamber,