LORD DRUMMOND AND ROBERT BARTON
"How can I 'scape Antonia!--how evade
A father's stern inflexible decree?
Paint but the means, I ne'er shall be afraid
To tread a path prescribed by love and thee."
_Bridal of Pisa_
While this atrocity was acted in the garden, and about a pistol shot
distant from the mansion, Robert Barton received from Lady Euphemia a
sorrowful and excited explanation of her father's new and peculiar
views regarding herself and her sister; on hearing which the lover
lost all patience, and said all one might be supposed to say on
receiving such startling information. David Falconer would, perhaps,
have heard it in silent sorrow, for he felt himself poor and
powerless; but the wealthy heir of old Sir Andrew Barton had no doubt
on the subject of his own conduct.
"'Zounds, Effie, what is this you tell me? Would your father, Lord
of that ilk, and Steward of Strathearn though he be, wrest thee from
me? thee whom the Church hath given me--who art all but my wife, and
wear on that dear hand the betrothal ring, which soon must be a
bridal one? No, no! Yonder lieth the frigate, and the barge's crew
are at the Craig of St. Nicholas; say but the word, and I shall place
the broad waters of the Tay between thee and these Lords of Home and
Hailes! They may be the prouder and the sterner, but that they are
either richer or better men than Robert Barton of Leith I deny.
'Sdeath, 'tis little I value such holiday loons! Mass! I would like
rarely to see them both piped aloft in a close-reefed topsail breeze
to send down the topgallant-yard, or haul out a weather-earing! On
my faith, it would be a sight for old Andrew Wood."
"Alas! they have seldom less than each a thousand lances at their
back; and thou, dear Robert, hath none."
"None, say ye, Effie? I have every man in yonder _Yellow Frigate_,
and the _Queen Margaret_ to boot; I have every seaman in Leith and
Dundee. Faith! I would not lie in the hosen of him who wronged the
son of Andrew Barton; but to let these lordlings get the weathergage
of me and Davie Falconer--Hailes and Home--two varlets only fit for
carrying powder or wringing wet swabs--no, no, Effie, it never shall
be!"
"But alack! they are both brave and determined."
"Likely enough--brave fellows in smooth water; but I'll teach them
how to dip their spoons in the captain's mess; by St. Mary I will!"
Euphemia Drummond threw herself upon his breast and wept, as she
said--
"Surely, they will never have the evil heart to take me from thee?
Oh, were my uncle the dean, or our good friend the old bishop here,
they dared not even to think of it."
"But your uncle the dean is attending a chapter at Dunblane, and our
good friend the bishop is drinking King Henry's sack in London Tower,
to which he has been wantonly conveyed a prisoner, by those same
Englishmen who quite as wantonly slew my poor father on the open
seas. But some one approaches--'tis thy father, Effie; leave me to
speak with him on this matter--for a moment only, my sweet one."
As the old lord raised the arras at one end of the apartment and
entered, his eldest daughter retired by a door at the other; and
Robert Barton, while his heart swelled with sorrow and honest
indignation, approached with a lowering brow the father of the girl
he loved, and one whom until now he had ever esteemed is a dear and
venerable friend.
"Good my lord," said he, "I pray you to pardon me, if I intrude upon
the grief occasioned by the disappearance of Lady Margaret, by making
a humble offer of my service and assistance."
"I thank you, Master Robert Barton," replied Lord Drummond, with
something of confusion and much of stern coldness in his manner; "but
I believe that to the king--and to him only--must I look for the
restoration of my dearest and most gentle daughter."
"To the king?----"
"Ay, to the king! I spoke plain enough. She is the wedded wife of
his son, the Duke of Rothesay----"
"Rothesay!"
"Ay, ye well may start; but James, still hankering after those
grasping Tudors (may God confound them all!) liked not the match, and
hath had her kidnapped. He hath dared to do this; but the act shall
cost him a crown, should I spend the last of my breath and the last
of my blood to tear it from his brow. False king!" he added,
apostrophising the wall; "didst thou forget even for a moment that
she was a daughter of Lord Drummond?"
"Hark you, my lord; I am the king's liegeman, and deplore you should
nurse thoughts of treason, or have such words of danger on your
tongue; but still more do I deplore that you should harbour in your
heart sentiments repugnant to the principles of honour, and to the
happiness of your eldest daughter."
A flush of anger reddened the brow of the proud old noble.
"What mean you, Captain Barton?" he asked.
"Why, my lord, have you proposed to cast me adrift--I who am
affianced to Euphemia, and who love her with a true and honest heart?
Come, my lord, be fair and above-board with me; remember that our
dear Effie is my plighted wife--plighted and betrothed to me in
happier times than these."
"Pledges made in peace are often broken in war," replied the noble,
coldly, and without noticing a gesture of impatience which escaped
the honest seaman; for he remembered how anxious the conspirators at
Broughty were to obtain the king's ships. In his ambition to achieve
this, and also obtain vengeance upon James, he condescended to
subterfuge.
"Captain Barton," said he in a low voice, "all correspondence between
the king and his nobles is at an end, and another day may see their
swords unsheathed against him. Promise me, should this event occur,"
he continued, sinking his voice into a whisper, "that you will
contrive to have yonder war ships delivered unto such captains and
mariners as the vice-admiral who acts under his Grace the Duke of
Albany may appoint; or that you will serve the nobles--and my pledge
to you may yet remain inviolate."
"_May_? God forgive thee, thou subtle old man, for such a cruel
alternative," replied Barton, with deep emotion, while his eyes
filled and their lashes trembled. "I love your daughter better than
my life; Heaven knows how long I have loved your Effie, how dearly
and how well; but I also love that good king who was ever my father's
friend; and the curse of that dead father would arise from his grave
in the Englishman's sea, and follow me to the end of my days on sea
and on land, if I proved false to my allegiance. My dear Effie!
accursed be the policy which would make thee the boon for which I am
to barter name and fame, honour and soul!"
Lord Drummond whose perceptions of right and wrong (never too clear
at any time) were somewhat clouded and warped by the quarrel of the
barons and king, against whom he now felt a deadly hatred, witnessed
this deep burst of feeling unmoved, for he had not the smallest
intention of yielding up his daughter to her betrothed, even though
the latter were base enough to betray the admiral and surrender those
great caravels, which were the terror of the northern sea, and the
flower of the infant navy.
"You will not join us, and deliver up two paltry ships," resumed the
politic tempter; "what! not even for a bride so fair?"
"No--not as the king's rebellious subject."
"So, so," muttered the lord, impatiently, "if you go from this on
your feet, you may warn James of the cloud that gathers round his
throne."
"Alas! I will never betray your lordship. As the father of
Euphemia, I almost considered you mine. Heaven judge between us, my
lord, for I love and revere you still; natheless, this duplicity to
me, and this falsehood to our beloved king."
Instead of being touched by the depth of feeling displayed by Robert
Barton, the cruel noble now only feared that in his efforts to serve
that desperate cause in which he had enlisted himself, he had
betrayed too much to the king's true man, and saw at once the danger
thus incurred. Raising the arras, he whispered to young Drummond of
Mewie, who stood without, and was in attendance upon him,--
"Summon Carnock, Balloch, and their people; they are loitering in the
hall, the street, or garden. Tell them that this man knoweth more
than should be risked with others than ourselves. Dost thou
comprehend me?"
Mewie, a savage-looking and unscrupulous young Celt from Strathearn,
muttered something under the thick red beard that fell in shaggy
volume under the brow of his steel cap, while he grinned and
withdrew. Then Lord Drummond turned once more to poor Barton, who,
under the old noble's calm exterior, could never have divined the
deadly intentions of one he loved so well, but gazed sadly at him as
if he sought to gather some new hope for himself and for Euphemia.
"Then in this approaching raid, Captain Barton, you will permit that
long Toledo of yours to rust in its velvet scabbard?"
"Not if the king's enemies are in the field; but, good my lord, let
us talk of that which is nearer my heart than broil or battle.
Consider how this sudden enmity to me has filled my soul with sorrow.
Oh, my lord, to say how much poor Effie and I have loved each other
were a vain and useless task; but to reflect that the very day on
which we were to wed was named--to think----"
"Come, come," replied Drummond, with a lowering brow and a grim
smile, as he heard the trampling of feet in the arcades below, and
knew that his clansman, Mewie, and others were assembling there;
"this may not be; Cupid must not shoot his shafts amid a civil war,
nor Hymen light his torch at the flame of burning towns. We can have
no dalliance now; the dame to her bower, and the knight to his
saddle. If, Robert Barton, thou wilt deliver up Sir Andrew Wood and
the king's ships to the governor of Broughty, thou mayst yet have thy
bride; to not, seek a mate in another nest than the house of
Drummond, and as its foe, _gang warily_. Fare ye well, sir,--ha! ha!
my daughters shall wed with new made earls."
"'Tis true, my lord, I am no noble, and consequently I am the better
Scotsman; but I believe I am rich enough to please even you. My
father has left me a fair estate upon the Forth and Almond, where the
land is so fertile that, as the old rhyme says,
"A rood of land on links of Forth
Is worth an earldom in the north."
"I care not," replied Lord Drummond, doggedly; "thou shalt never have
daughter of mine, wert thou rich as James III., and rumour says his
black chest in the castle of Edinburgh is brimming with ingots and
precious stones. I will not wed a Drummond to the son of a merchant
trader."
"My Lord,"--Barton began, proudly--
"Nay, nay," interrupted the old lord, impatiently; "get thee some
huckster lass about the timber holfe, at Leith; she will better suit
old Barton's son than will a daughter of the Steward of Strathearn."
At this gross speech Barton grew deadly pale, and laid a hand on his
sword, but immediately relinquished it, saying with calmness,
"No insult will tempt me to forget that you are the father of my dear
Euphemia; that your hairs are grey as my poor father's were; and more
than all, that (alas!) you loved me once!"
"Zounds, fellow, I shall lose all patience!" replied the lord,
angrily, for, in truth, he felt ashamed of himself, and wished to be
worked up into a passion. "Wouldst thou place thyself in competition
with the Lord Home, the son of the Hereditary Bailie of Coldinghome,
or with the Lord Hailes, the son of that gallant peer who slew the
Lieutenant-general of England at the battle of Sark, and won that
glorious day for Scotland?"
"The son of Sir Andrew Barton may compete with any man! True, _he_
began life as a poor ship-boy and skipper's varlet; but he died a
knight and Laird of Barnton. Woe to both Home and Hailes, if they
come within arm's-length of me; some day I may overhaul them, and
show them the foretop with a vengeance! Farewell, my lord; when next
we meet I will not trouble you with entreaties even for your
daughter; and so, till then, God keep you."
Barton bowed, and with a heart swollen almost to bursting with rage
and grief, and a brain that seemed to swim under the influence of his
conflicting emotions, he staggered from the chamber, and descended
unattended to the outer-door, and with all the aspect of a man
flushed with wine. On gaining the pavement he saw the Drummonds of
Carnock, Balloch, and Mewie, all with the holly-branch in their
bonnets or helmets, loitering under the arcades in the Fish-street,
and all well armed. He was hurrying past them towards St. Clement's
Wynd, when some one called aloud,--
"Hallo!--Captain Barton!"
Too much occupied by his own bitter thoughts, he did not hear the
cry, but walked hurriedly on.
"Dost thou not hear us, rascal?" cried several voices.
Barton now turned to discover who was addressed.
"Ah," said Lord Hailes, who with Home and others issued into the
street, "I thought he would know we meant _him_."
"Villain!" said Barton, unsheathing his sword, and trembling with a
terrible joy; "what mean you by this?"
"By the black rood, my fine fellow, but your tone is high for a
skipper of Leith!" said Home.
"It is the tone to which I am entitled."
"Ah, we shall prove that," said Borthwick, drawing his sword, while
his eyes gleamed with cruelty and malice; and the rest, to the number
of seven or eight, also unsheathed their weapons.
Barton did not wait for the attack but fell on bravely, dealing long
and sweeping cuts with many a thrust between. One of the latter
ripped up the sword-arm of Borthwick, and hurled him against the wall
of a house; one of the former fell full upon the harnpan which Lord
Hailes wore under his velvet bonnet, and rolled him ignominiously in
the gutter; but the rest closed in, fighting in a circle, and
notwithstanding his bravery, skill, and that strength of arm peculiar
to all seamen, Barton would have been beaten down and slain without
mercy had not the sudden arrival of old Sir Andrew Wood, Cuddie
Clewline, the coxswain, and the whole barge's crew, armed with
boatstretchers and poniards, given a sudden change to the aspect of
the conflict. With a stentorian shout, such as only can come from
the throats of those who are wont to out-bellow the wind and waves,
they rushed into the fray, with cries of--
"Ho for Barton! Clear the hause here, loons and lubbers! Ware your
gingerbread masters--Largo for ever!"
Barton, who had been driven back against the wall of a house, was
soon freed, and his assailants put to immediate flight, but not
before several severe blows had been given and received. With the
admiral there was a tall and handsome man, who was clad in a coat of
rich gold brocade, and whose face was concealed by a salade. This
person immediately assailed Lord Home with great impetuosity, and at
every blow cried--
"Down with the traitor nobles--perdition to the foemen of the king!"
Home met him with great resolution, but on receiving from Caddie a
side blow, right in the pit of the stomach, this great lord of the
Merse was doubled up, as the admiral said, "like a bolt of old
canvas," and stretched without breath on the causeway.
"Now that we have cleared the fairway, let us trip our anchors and be
off," said the admiral, "for Home has a hundred mosstroopers and more
in the market-place. Away to the Craig of St. Nicholas, my lads, and
shove off!"
They soon reached the landing-place and sprung into the barge; the
oars were shipped, Barton grasped the tiller, and with the blue
ensign trailing in the water astern, they pulled away towards the
ships. In his excitement the captain forgot his poor friend
Falconer; then suddenly the recollection flashed upon him; he turned
to address the admiral, when lo! he found that the tall gentleman
whose voice and sword had been so active in Fish-street, had now
removed his salade, and was no other than the--king!
On recognising him, the barge's crew suspended rowing for s moment,
and doffed the bonnets amid deep silence, while Barton also uncovered.
"Give way, my lads," said the admiral, smiling; "'tis his Majesty the
King, who, finding only falsehood and rascality among the loggerheads
ashore, is coming to sail merrily with us on the sea, where we shall
teach him how to knot and splice, to grease a mast, to hand, reef,
and steer, and to sleep in the topgallant-sail, as soundly as in the
Castle of Stirling. Barton," he added, in a whisper, "the nobles are
rising in arms; the men of Angus are already mustering in the Howe,
and the barons hold conclave at the Tower of Broughty. We are on the
eve of a dark rebellion, and as yet, nowhere hereabout could the king
be safe but on board the _Yellow Frigate_."
Barton bowed, for he had no words to reply in. His heart was already
too full of anxieties of his own--anger, bitterness, and sorrow, not
unmingled with fear for the persecution that might be endured by
Euphemia, and the domestic tyranny to which she might be subjected.
In a few minutes they were close to the frigate. Cuddie caught the
mainchains by his hook, and the boat sheered alongside the steps.
The boatswain's pipe was heard--the kettledrum beat, and the
arquebussiers stood to their arms as the king stepped on board,
followed by Wood and Barton. He was then marshalled with great
formality and the deepest respect to the great cabin.
Then the royal standard, the yellow banner with the red lion rampant,
was hoisted at the mainmast-head, to indicate that the king was on
board. On this appearing, a commotion was observable immediately on
board the _Margaret_, which lay a bowshot further up the river; her
drum was beaten and her barge's crew piped away, to bring old Sir
Alexander Mathieson, "the King of the Sea," on board the Admiral,
while all her port-lids were triced up, and the cannon run out.
The salutes of the two great ships, which fired each a hundred guns,
announced to the people of Dundee and of the opposite coast, that the
king was on board. Hence arose that rumour, which proved perhaps so
fatal to the interests of James--_that he had abdicated_, and was
going with Admiral Wood to Holland or Flanders. Circulated
industriously by the highborn enemies of the throne, the report
spread like wildfire, and though there were no means of travelling in
those days but on foot or on horseback, it was known with many
strange additions at the cross of the metropolis on the following
day, and it gave a great impetus to the bad cause of the malcontent
nobles.