Kenric tarried not long in search of the ghostly figure that had
appeared before him so mysteriously in the dark forest of Barone. Whence
that figure had come and whither it had gone he could not tell. Nor did
he exercise his mind in fruitless questionings concerning her. Leaving
the rock behind him, he set off at a brisk pace through the shadows of
the trees, more timid than ever, and came out upon the high ground that
is behind Rothesay Bay.
Down by the water's brink, outlined against the moonlit waves, stood the
dark towers of Rothesay Castle. A light shone dimly in his mother's
chamber window; but the great banqueting hall wherein his father was
wont to entertain his guests was dark, and Kenric thought this passing
strange. Where were the strangers of whom he had heard? If they were not
in the banqueting hall, then they must surely have already left the island.
Hastening down the hillside, he hied him to the castle, and as he neared
the little postern in the western walls, a burst of boisterous song
reached his ears from the guardroom. Taking up a stone from the ground
he was about to knock three loud knocks, when the door was opened from
within, and a tall man with a thick plaid over his broad shoulders
slipped out, almost overthrowing Kenric as he ran against him.
"Duncan!" exclaimed Kenric, perceiving his father's seneschal, "whither
go you at this late hour of night?"
"Ah, master Kenric, and that is yourself, eh? And you are here, and not
at the abbey of St. Blane's? Well, sir, it's a bonnie night, you see,
and I even thought I would take a quiet saunter along the side of Loch Fad."
"Then," said Kenric, "I warn you, go not near to the forest of Barone,
Duncan; for I have but now come through, and therein I saw a sight that
would raise your hair on end. It was, as I believe, none other than the
werewolf that I saw. First there was an old gray wolf with a white patch
on its breast, and then, even as I looked, that wolf was spirited into
the form of a fair lady, and I was like to sink into the ground with fear."
"'Tis the first time that I have heard of a son of the house of Rothesay
knowing fear," said Duncan, smiling and showing his great yellow teeth
in the moonlight. "'Twas but the maid Aasta of Kilmory that you saw."
"Aasta? Then it is true that the maid has been bewitched? It is true
that she has that power of turning herself at will into the form of a wolf?"
"Men say so," answered Duncan. "But methinks 'tis no more true than that
other thing they say of her -- that though she looks but a girl of
eighteen, she is yet full five score winters old. 'Tis idle talk,
Kenric. But where saw you this sight? Was it not by the Rock of
Solitude, in the heart of the forest?"
"'Twas even there. But in an instant she disappeared, and I saw her no
more."
"If she be not there now," said Duncan, heaving a great sigh out of his
deep chest, "then will I return into the castle; for now do I mind me
that mine eyes are wanting sleep after the weary day that I have had
among the hills, running high and low as though I were but a dumb hound
made only to scent out game for those who know less of hunting than I do
of building a ship. That lazy old graybeard, the lord of Jura, may bring
his own gillies with him the next time he comes to the hunting in Bute.
Never again shall he get me to fetch and carry for him!"
"The lord of Jura?" said Kenric. "It is then true that there are
strangers in the castle."
"And is it not for that same cause that you have come home?" asked
Duncan. "Methought you knew that they were here -- three gallant kings
out of the west they are, and one of them is your own uncle, Earl
Roderic of Gigha, whom, when he was but a bairn as high as my girdle, I
taught to bend the bow and wield the broadsword. They are but now in the
feasting hall with my lord your father; for Sir Oscar and young Allan
have gone home to Kilmory, and my lady and Alpin have gone to their
chambers."
"Have you then left my father alone with these three strange men?" asked
Kenric as they entered the postern.
"My lord's own brother, Earl Roderic, is with him," said Duncan, looking
at Kenric in surprise. "You would not surely have me mount guard over my
lord's own guests! By the rood, that were strange hospitality!"
"Where are their dirks and swords?"
"Under my own keeping in the armoury, where 'tis right they should be;
for men of peace, as these most surely are, encumber not themselves with
the instruments of war."
"'Tis well," returned Kenric, much relieved. "Old Elspeth Blackfell was
but playing me with her groundless forewarnings of danger. Well, get me
some meat and a bowl of milk, Duncan, while I go up and see this uncle
of mine. He has seen much of the world, and methinks his discourse must
be full of instruction for a home-keeping youth."
So Duncan went into the guardroom, where two score of noisy retainers
were making merry over their cups, and Kenric went upstairs to the great
hall.
Up the steep stone steps he climbed, making little noise with his
deerskin buskins. Hearing footsteps at the head of the stairs, he
glanced along the north corridor, whose lancet windows looked out upon
the quiet sea.
Suddenly in the midst of the moonbeams that streamed in through the
western window, lighting the corridor with a clear silvery light, he saw
three men steal out of the banqueting hall. The last of the three moaned
grievously as they passed beyond into another apartment.
"Oh, Hamish, Hamish my brother!" he moaned, and his voice was as the
wailing of the wind, "what is this evil thing that I have done!"
Kenric drew back into the shadow of the stairway, and not seeing his
father with the three guests, he began again to fear some ill.
"What!" croaked the old man with the silvery beard, "and is this your
resolution? Is this your courage? I fear me, Roderic, you are but a weak
craven thus to deplore the fulfilment of our most righteous mission!"
Then the door of the smaller hall closed behind the three earls, and
Kenric was left alone. He still heard the rumour of their voices as he
walked with quick steps along the moonlit corridor, and he paused to
listen at the door.
"And now that we have done so completely with the fox," said a voice,
"what say you, comrades, to our making equal despatch with the vixen and
her cub? 'Twere easy doing, could we but discover in what corner we
might entrap them."
Kenric did not understand the purport of these words. He did not guess
that the "fox" meant his own father, and the "vixen and her cub" his
mother and Alpin. But he listened yet again.
"Wait, wait, my lord of Jura," said another voice. "'Twere better we
tarried until all the watchdogs are sound asleep. Fill me yon drinking
horn, Sweyn, for my hand trembles, and my mind is strangely cloudy."
Silence followed this speech, and Kenric crept along the corridor until
he came to the entrance of the great hall. He drew aside the arras
hangings and peered into the deserted room. All was silent as the grave.
The crackling embers of the fire gave but a sorry light, with only a
fitful glimmer that rose now and again from some half-consumed pine log.
But with the feeble moonbeams, that shone through the thin films of skin
that in those days -- except in the churches -- did service for glass,
there was still light enough in that vast room to show what terrible
deed had been enacted upon the hearthstone.
Kenric had taken but a few strides into the hall when his eyes rested
upon the form of his murdered father. He started back aghast at the
horrible sight.
"Oh, my father, my father!" he cried, flinging himself down upon the
bloodstained floor. "Father? father? It is I, Kenric -- your son. Tell
me, I beseech you, tell me, what foul villain has done this thing?"
Then he took hold of the earl's cold right hand and chafed it tenderly,
as he still tried to arouse him. But there was no response. He knelt
down closer and bent his head to his father's bare throat, and, putting
out his tongue, he felt with its sensitive touch if there was sign of
breathing, or if the pulses were beating in the veins.
As he rested his hand on the dead earl's chest he touched the haft of
the weapon that had worked this cruel deed. He knew the knife and
guessed how all had happened. He grasped the handle in his fingers and
tried to withdraw the long blade; but the blood gushed out from the
terrible wound, and the lad grew faint at the sight.
"Dead! dead!" he moaned, rising to his feet, and then from the halls
below came the shouts of the retainers as they pledged "waes hael" to
the lord of Bute.
Kenric hastened out of the hall and crept down the stairs to summon the
guard and station them in the corridor, that none of the three
traitorous guests might escape. He met Duncan the seneschal at the foot
of the stairs carrying the food that he had ordered, and by the light of
a lamp in the lower passage Duncan saw the lad's pale and terrified face.
"God assoil me!" cried Duncan, "what has happened?"
"A terrible thing, Duncan. My dear father has been brutally slain under
his own roof tree."
"Slain! My lord, the Earl Hamish slain? Nay, boy, it cannot be!"
"Alas, 'tis true! One of those miscreant traitors who came hither today
has plunged a knife into my father's heart. Take back the food. I will
neither eat nor sleep again until I have discovered the villain who has
done this foul crime. Turn out the guard this instant. Station them
without the door of the room wherein those three wicked men are now
carousing. And now to call my brother Alpin."
Kenric went softly to his brother's room, which was next to the chamber
of the Lady Adela, and he knocked gently at the door. Alpin was sound
asleep upon his couch, for his day's hunting had wearied his limbs.
Kenric went within and awoke him.
In the darkness Alpin did not see his brother's pallid face, and he
turned over with many complaints at being so roughly disturbed.
"Nay, Alpin, 'tis for no light cause that I disturb you," urged Kenric.
And hearing his husky, trembling voice, Alpin roused himself with sudden
terror.
"What brings you back to the castle?" he cried; "and wherefore do you
call me at this late hour?"
"It is that our father has been entertaining enemies unawares," said
Kenric. "Entering the hall but a few moments ago I found him lying dead
upon the hearth with a cruel knife in his heart."
Alpin gave a piercing cry of sudden grief and sprang up from his bed.
"No, no, it cannot be!" he exclaimed, recovering himself as he threw on
some clothing. "You have made some strange mistake. These friends could
not have harmed our father. They were not armed. And what could our
uncle Roderic gain by such treachery?"
Kenric drew his brother out into one of the dark passages, not observing
that their mother's chamber door had opened and that the Lady Adela,
roused from her slumber by Alpin's cry of grief, had taken the alarm and
was preparing to follow.
"Alas, he has but too much to gain," said Kenric. "Had he been left to
carry out his base plot to the end, you and I, Alpin, must surely have
fallen as our father has fallen -- victims to Earl Roderic's ambition to
make himself lord over Bute."
"If this be so," returned Alpin, raising his voice in wrath, "then with
my own hands will I take a deadly vengeance. I swear it now, Kenric --
by our holy faith I swear that if Roderic of Gigha has indeed slain our
father, then Roderic shall die by my hand!"
"Will such vengeance give back the life that has been taken?" asked
Kenric solemnly. "Will vengeance restore to our dear mother the
happiness that she now has lost? Methinks it had been wiser in you,
Alpin, to have stayed by our father's side instead of slinking off to
your bed and leaving him thus exposed to danger. Come, let us arm
ourselves and confront these evil men, that we may learn which one of
them has dealt this fatal blow."
"With what weapon, say you, was my father slain?" asked Alpin, as, being
now in the armoury, they proceeded to don their coats of chain mail.
"With the great knife wherewith he was wont to carve the venison and
meat," said Kenric, taking down a sword.
"Ah!" cried Alpin with swift recollection, "now do I perceive the reason
wherefore Earl Roderic took that same knife from off the board and
placed it so cunningly above the hearth. Oh, villain that he is! He
designed even then to do as he has done.
"Now," he added, snatching up a great two-handed sword, "I am ready. Let
me but meet him -- let me but face him for a moment, and I will slay him
like a dog."
"Think well ere you strike the blow you contemplate," said Kenric as
they ascended a side stairway that led to the upper floors of the
castle. "Remember that you are now the rightful lord over Bute, and that
you will have power to inflict due punishment upon this man without
taking a personal vengeance that would surely lead to an endless blood
feud."
"Tush! You are but a timid boy, Kenric. What priestly precepts has the
old Abbot Thurstan been cramming you with? Would you pardon the man who
has slain our own father?"
"Pardon him?" exclaimed Kenric. "No, never will I do that. If you slay
him not, Alpin, then, by the holy rood, I myself will do so. But it
shall be in fair fight that I will overcome him, and by no mean subterfuge."
The two lads were now at the entrance of the larger hall, wherein the
good Earl Hamish lay dead. Alpin went within, and there, bending over
his father's body, he was overwhelmed by his grief. He staggered to a
seat and sat down with his head in his hands, weeping piteously.
Kenric heard loud voices in the corridor, and grasping his sword he
hastened to where the guards were stationed. Duncan Graham, of the long
arm, was holding parley with the three earls within the smaller hall.
His broad frame filled up the half-open doorway, so that the presence of
the armed guard was not yet known to Roderic and his two companions.
"More wine it may be you can have," said Duncan; "but as to bringing you
your swords, that I cannot do without orders from my master."
"I am now your master!" said the gruff voice of Roderic of Gigha; "and
again I command you to bring us our swords and dirks."
"You are no master of mine, Earl Roderic," said Duncan; "and now for
your insolence shall you have neither wine nor weapons," and with that
he slammed to the door.
"Insolent varlet!" growled Roderic within the room.
"Nay, calm yourself, good Roderic," said the voice of Erland the Old;
"we had better have tarried till daylight. It may be that they have
already discovered what you have done. Truly you were an arrant
simpleton to leave the weapon in your brother's breast. 'Twould have
served our further purpose well."
Kenric heard these last words, and though they were spoken in the
Danish, yet full well did he understand that the further purpose of Earl
Roderic was indeed the slaying of the Lady Adela and Alpin.
Assured that the three miscreants were unarmed, he drew Duncan aside and
whispered his commands, which were that four of the guards should follow
him into the room and make prisoners of the three island kings.
Thereupon Duncan went back to the door and forced it open, and Kenric,
with buckler on arm and sword in hand, marched in, and standing firmly
upright faced the three men defiantly.
"Which man of you is Earl Roderic of Gigha?" said he.