Produced by Suzanne Shell, Sankar Viswanathan, and the
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[Illustration: "AND AT THE LAST HE ... SAILED OVER THE SEAS TO HIS OWN
LAND." _Frontispiece_]
The Black Douglas
By
S.R. Crockett
Author of "The Raiders," "The Stickit Minister," etc.
New York
Doubleday & McClure Co.
1899
COPYRIGHT, 1899,
By S.R. CROCKETT.
CONTENTS
CHAPTER I
The Black Douglas rides Home.
CHAPTER II
My Fair Lady
CHAPTER III
Two riding together
CHAPTER IV
The Rose-red Pavilion
CHAPTER V
The Witch Woman
CHAPTER VI
The Prisoning of Malise the Smith
CHAPTER VII
The Douglas Muster
CHAPTER VIII
The Crossing of the Ford
CHAPTER IX
Laurence sings a Hymn
CHAPTER X
The Braes of Balmaghie
CHAPTER XI
The Ambassador of France
CHAPTER XII
Mistress Maud Lindesay
CHAPTER XIII
A Daunting Summons
CHAPTER XIV
Captain of the Earl's Guard
CHAPTER XV
The Night Alarm
CHAPTER XVI
Sholto captures a Prisoner of Distinction
CHAPTER XVII
The Lamp is blown out
CHAPTER XVIII
The Morning Light
CHAPTER XIX
La Joyeuse baits her Hook
CHAPTER XX
Andro the Penman gives an Account of his Stewardship.
CHAPTER XXI
The Bailies of Dumfries
CHAPTER XXII
Wager of Battle
CHAPTER XXIII
Sholto wins Knighthood
CHAPTER XXIV
The Second Flouting of Maud Lindesay
CHAPTER XXV
The Dogs and the Wolf hold Council
CHAPTER XXVI
The Lion Tamer
CHAPTER XXVII
The Young Lords ride away
CHAPTER XXVIII
On the Castle Roof
CHAPTER XXIX
Castle Crichton
CHAPTER XXX
The Bower by yon Burnside
CHAPTER XXXI
The Gaberlunzie Man
CHAPTER XXXII
"Edinburgh Castle, Tower, and Town"
CHAPTER XXXIII
The Black Bull's Head
CHAPTER XXXIV
Betrayed with a Kiss
CHAPTER XXXV
The Lion at Bay
CHAPTER XXXVI
The Rising of the Douglases
CHAPTER XXXVII
A Strange Meeting
CHAPTER XXXVIII
The MacKims come to Thrieve
CHAPTER XXXIX
The Gift of the Countess.
CHAPTER XL
The Mission of James the Gross
CHAPTER XLI
The Withered Garland
CHAPTER XLII
Astarte the She-wolf
CHAPTER XLIII
Malise fetches a Clout
CHAPTER XLIV
Laurence takes New Service
CHAPTER XLV
The Boasting of Gilles de Sillé
CHAPTER XLVI
The Country of the Dread
CHAPTER XLVII
Cæsar Martin's Wife
CHAPTER XLVIII
The Mercy of La Meffraye
CHAPTER XLIX
The Battle with the Were-wolves
CHAPTER L
The Altar of Iron
CHAPTER LI
The Marshal's Chamber
CHAPTER LII
The Jesting of La Meffraye
CHAPTER LIII
Sybilla's Vengeance
CHAPTER LIV
The Cross under the Apron
CHAPTER LV
The Red Milk
CHAPTER LVI
The Shadow behind the Throne
CHAPTER LVII
The Tower of Death
CHAPTER LVIII
The White Tower of Machecoul
CHAPTER LIX
The Last Sacrifice to Barran-Sathanas
CHAPTER LX
His Demon hath deserted him
CHAPTER LXI
Leap Year in Galloway
THE BLACK DOUGLAS
CHAPTER I
THE BLACK DOUGLAS RIDES HOME
Merry fell the eve of Whitsunday of the year 1439, in the fairest and
heartsomest spot in all the Scottish southland. The twined May-pole
had not yet been taken down from the house of Brawny Kim, master
armourer and foster father to William, sixth Earl of Douglas and Lord
of Galloway.
Malise Kim, who by the common voice was well named "The Brawny," sat
in his wicker chair before his door, overlooking the island-studded,
fairy-like loch of Carlinwark. In the smithy across the green
bare-trodden road, two of his elder sons were still hammering at some
armour of choice. But it was a ploy of their own, which they desired
to finish that they might go trig and point-device to the Earl's
weapon-showing to-morrow on the braes of Balmaghie. Sholto and
Laurence were the names of the two who clanged the ringing steel and
blew the smooth-handled bellows of tough tanned hide, that wheezed and
puffed as the fire roared up deep and red before sinking to the right
welding-heat in a little flame round the buckle-tache of the girdle
brace they were working on.
And as they hammered they talked together in alternate snatches and
silences?--Sholto, the elder, meanwhile keeping an eye on his father.
For their converse was not meant to reach the ear of the grave, strong
man who sat so still in the wicker chair with the afternoon sun
shining in his face.
"Hark ye, Laurence," said Sholto, returning from a visit to the door
of the smithy, the upper part of which was open. "No longer will I be
a hammerer of iron and a blower of fires for my father. I am going to
be a soldier of fortune, and so I will tell him--"
"When wilt thou tell him?" laughed his brother, tauntingly. "I wager
my purple velvet doublet slashed with gold which I bought with mine
own money last Rood Fair that you will not go across and tell him now.
Will you take the dare?"
"The purple velvet--you mean it?" said Sholto, eagerly. "Mind, if you
refuse, and will not give it up after promising, I will nick that
lying throat of yours with my gullie knife!"
And with that Sholto threw down his pincers and hammer, and valorously
pushed open the lower door of the smithy. He looked with bold, dark
blue eye at his father, and strode slowly across the grimy door-step.
Brawny Kim had not moved for an hour. His great hands lay in his lap,
and his eyes looked at the purple ridges of Screel, across the
beautiful loch of Carlinwark, which sparkled and dimpled restlessly
among its isles like a wilful beauty bridling under the gaze of a
score of gallants.
But, even as he went, Sholto's step slowed, and lost its braggart
strut and confidence. Behind him Laurence chuckled and laughed,
smiting his thigh in his mocking glee.
"The purple velvet, mind you, Sholto! How well it will become you,
coft from Rob Halliburton, our mother's own brother, seamed with red
gold and lined with yellow satin and cramosie. Well indeed will it set
you when Maud Lindesay, the maid who came from the north for company
to the Earl's sister, looks forth from the canopy upon you as you
stand in the archers' rank on the morrow's morn."
Sholto squared his shoulders, and with a little backward hitch of his
elbow which meant "Wait till I come back, and I will pay you for this
flouting," he strode determinedly across the green space towards his
father.
The master armourer of Earl Douglas did not lift his eyes till his son
had half crossed the road. Then, even as if a rank of spearmen at the
word of command had lifted their glittering points to the "ready,"
Sholto MacKim stopped dead where he was, with a sort of gasp in his
throat, like one who finds his defenceless body breast high against
the line of hostile steel.
"The purple velvet!" came the cautious whisper from behind. But the
taunt was powerless now.
The smith held his son a moment with his eyes.
"Well?" came in the deep low voice, more like the lowest tones of an
organ than the speech of a man.
Sholto stood fixed, then half turning on his heel he began to walk
towards the corner of the dwelling-house, over which a gay streamer of
the early creeping convolvulus danced and swung in the stirring of the
light breeze.
"You wish speech with me?" said his father, in the same level and
thrilling undertone.
"No," said Sholto, hesitant in spite of himself, "but I thought--that
is I desired--saw you my sister Magdalen pass this way? I have
somewhat to give her."
"Ah, so," said Brawny Kim, without moving, "a steel breastplate,
belike. Thou hast the brace-buckle in thy hand. Doth the little
Magdalen go with you to the weapon-show to-morrow?"
"No, father," said Sholto, stammering, "but I was uneasy for the
child. It is full an hour since I heard her voice."
"Then," said his father, "finish your work, put out the fire, and go
seek your sister."
Sholto brought his hands together and made the little inclination of
the head which was a sign of filial respect. Then, solemn as if he had
been in his place in the ordered line of the Earl's first levy of
archer men, he turned him about and went back to the smithy.
Laurence lay all abroad on the heap of charcoal of which the
armourer's welding fire was made. He was fairly expiring with
laughter, and when his brother angrily kicked him in the ribs, he only
waggled an ineffectual hand and feebly crowed in his throat like a
cock, in his efforts to stifle the sounds of mirth.
"Get up, fool," hissed his angry brother; "help me with this accursed
hammer-striking, or I will make an end of such a giggling lout as you.
Here, hold up."
And seizing his younger brother by the collar of his blue working
blouse, he dragged him upon his feet.
"Now, by the saints," said Sholto, "if you cast your gibes upon me,
by Saint Andrew I will break every bone in your idiot's body."
"The purple velvet--oh, the purple velvet!" gasped Laurence, as soon
as he could recover speech, "and the eyes of Maud Lindesay!"
"That will teach you to think rather of the eyes of Laurence MacKim!"
cried Sholto, and without more ado he hit his brother with his
clinched knuckles a fair blow on the bridge of his nose.
The next moment the two youths were grappling together like wild cats,
striking, kicking, and biting with no thought except of who should
have the best of the battle. They rolled on the floor, now tussling
among the crackling faggots, anon pitching soft as one body on the
peat dust in the corner, again knocking over a bench and bringing down
the tools thereon to the floor with a jingle which might have been
heard far out on the loch. They were still clawing and cuffing each
other in blind rage, when a hand, heavy and remorseless, was laid upon
each. Sholto found himself being dabbled in the great tempering
cauldron which stood by his father's forge. Laurence heard his own
teeth rattle as he was shaken sideways till his joints waggled like
those of a puppet at Keltonhill Fair. Then it was his turn to be
doused in the water. Next their heads were soundly knocked together,
and finally, like a pair of arrows sent right and left, Laurence sped
forth at the window in the gable end and found himself in the midst of
a gooseberry bush, whilst Sholto, flying out of the door, fell
sprawling on all fours almost under the feet of a horse on which a
young man sat, smilingly watching the scene.
Brawny Kim scattered the embers of the fire on the forge-hearth, and
threw the breastplate and girdle-brace at which the boys had been
working into a corner of the smithy. Then he turned to lock the door
with the massive key, which stood so far out from the upper leaf that
to it the horses waiting their turns to be shod were ordinarily
tethered.
As he did so he caught sight of the young man sitting silent on the
black charger. Instantly a change passed over his face. With one
motion of his hand he swept the broad blue bonnet from his brow, and
bowed the grizzled head which had worn it low upon his breast. Thus
for the breathing of a breath the master armourer stood, and then,
replacing his bonnet, he looked up again at the young knight on
horseback.
"My lord," he said, after a long pause, in which he waited for the
youth to speak, "this is not well--you ride unattended and unarmed."
"Ah, Malise," laughed the young Earl, "a Douglas has few privileges if
he may not sometimes on a summer eve lay aside his heavy prisonment of
armour and don such a suit as this! What think you, eh? Is it not a
valiant apparel, as might almost beseem one who rode a-courting?"
The mighty master-smith looked at the young man with eyes in which
reverence, rebuke, and admiration strove together.
"But," he said, wagging his head with a grave humorousness, "your
lordship needs not to ride a-courting. You are to be married to a
great dame who will bring you wealth, alliance, and the dower of
provinces."
The young man shrugged his shoulders, and swung lightly off his
charger, which turned to look at him as he stood and patted its neck.
"Know you not, Malise," he said, "that the Earl of Douglas must needs
marry provinces and the Lord of Galloway wed riches? But what is there
in that to prevent Will Douglas going courting at eighteen years of
his age as a young man ought. But have no fear, I come not hither
seeking the favour of any, save of that lily flower of yours, the only
true May-blossom that blooms on the Three Thorns of Carlinwark. I
would look upon the angel smile on the face of your little daughter
Magdalen. An she be here, I would toss her arm-high for a kiss of her
mouth, which I would rather touch than that of lady or leman. For I do
ever profess myself her vassal and slave. Where have you hidden her,
Malise? Declare it or perish!"
The smith lifted up his voice till it struck on the walls of his
cottage and echoed like thunder along the shores of the lake.
"Dame Barbara," he cried, and again, getting no answer, "ho, Dame
Barbara, I say!"
Then at the second hallo, a shrill and somewhat peevish voice
proceeded from within the house opposite.
"Aye, coming, can you not hear, great nolt! 'Deed and 'deed 'tis a
pretty pass when a woman with the cares of an household must come
running light-toe and clatter-heel to every call of such a lazy lout.
Husband, indeed--not house-band but house-bond, I wot--house-torment,
house-thorn, house-cross--"
A sonsy, well-favoured, middle-aged head, strangely at variance with
the words which came from it, peeped out, and instantly the scolding
brattle was stilled. Back went the head into the dark of the house as
if shot from a bombard.
Malise MacKim indulged in a low hoarse chuckle as he caught the words:
"Eh, 'tis my Lord William! Save us, and me wanting my Ryssil gown that
cost me ten silver shillings the ell, and no even so muckle as my
white peaked cap upon my head."
Her husband glanced at the young Earl to see if he appreciated the
savour of the jest. Then he looked away, turning the enjoyment over
and over under his own tongue, and muttering: "Ah, well, 'tis not his
fault. No man hath a sense of humour before he is forty years of his
age--and, for that matter, 'tis all the riper at fifty."
The young man's eyes were looking this way and that, up and down the
smooth pathway which skirted like a green selvage the shores of the
loch.
"Malise," he said, as if he had already forgotten his late eager quest
for the little Magdalen, "Darnaway here has a shoe loose, and
to-morrow I ride to levy, and may also joust a bout in the tilt-yard
of the afternoon. I would not ask you to work in Whitsuntide, but that
there cometh my Lord Fleming and Alan Lauder of the Bass, bringing
with them an embassy from France--and I hear there may be fair ladies
in their company."
"Ah!" quoth Malise, grimly, "so I have heard it said concerning the
embassies of Charles, King of France!"
But the young man only smiled, and dusted off one or two flecks of
foam which had blown backwards from his horse's bit upon the rich
crimson doublet of finest velvet, which, cinctured closely at the
waist, fell half-way to his knees in heavy double pleats sewn with
gold. A hunting horn of black and gold was suspended about his neck by
a bandolier of dark leather, subtiley embroidered with bosses of gold.
Laced boots of soft black hide, drawn together on the outside from
ankle to mid-calf with a golden cord, met the scarlet "chausses" which
covered his thighs and outlined the figure of him who was the noblest
youth and the most gallant in all the realm of Scotland.
Earl William wore no sword. Only a little gold-handled poignard with a
lady's finger ring set upon the point of the hilt was at his side, and
he stood resting easily his hand upon it as he talked, drawing it an
inch from its sheath and snicking it back again nonchalantly, with a
sound like the clicking of a well-oiled lock.
"Clink the strokes strongly and featly, Malise, for to-morrow, when the
Black Douglas rides upon Black Darnaway under the eyes of--well--of
the ladies whom the ambassadors are bringing to greet me, there must
be no stumbling and no mistakes. Or on the head of Malise MacKim the
matter shall be, and let that wight remember that the Douglas does not
keep a dule tree up there by the Gallows Slock for nothing."
The mighty smith was by this time examining the hoofs of the Earl's
charger one by one with such instinctive delicacy of touch that
Darnaway felt the kindly intent, and, bending his neck about, blew and
snuffled into the armourer's tangled mat of crisp grey hair.
"Up there!" exclaimed MacKim, as the warm breath tickled his neck, and
at the burst of sound the steed shifted and clattered upon the
hard-beaten floor of the smithy, tossing his head till the bridle
chains rang again.
"Eh, my Lord William," an altered voice came from the door-step, where
Dame Barbara MacKim, now clothed and in her right mind, stood louting
low before the young Earl, "but this is a blythe and calamitatious day
for this poor bit bigging o' the Carlinwark--to think that your honour
should visit his servants! Will you no come ben and sit doon in the
house-place? 'Tis far from fitting for your feet to pass thereupon.
But gin ye will so highly favour--"
"Nay, I thank you, good Dame Barbara," said the Earl, very courteously
taking off the close-fitting black cap with the red feather in it
which was upon his head. "I must bide but a moment for your husband to
set right certain nails in the hoofs of Darnaway here, to ready me for
the morrow. Do you come to see the sport? So buxom a dame as the
mistress of Carlinwark should not be absent to encourage the lads to
do their best at the sword-play and the rivalry of the butts."
And as the dame came forth courtesying and bowing her delighted
thanks, Earl William, setting a forefinger under her triple chin,
stooped and kissed her in his gayest and most debonair manner.
"Eh, only to think on't," cried the dame, clapping her hands together
as she did at mass, "that I, Barbara MacKim, that am marriet to a
donnert auld carle like Malise there, should hae the privileege o' a
salute frae the bonny mou' o' Yerl William--(Thank ye kindly, my
lord!)--and be inveeted to the weepen-shawing to sit amang the leddies
and view the sport. Malise, my man, caa' ye no that an honour, a
privileege? Is that no owing to me being the sister--on my faither's
side--o' Ninian Halliburton, merchant and indweller in Dumfries?"
"Nay, nay, good dame," laughed the Earl, "'tis all for the sake of
your own very sufficient charms! I trust that your good man here is
not jealous, for beauty, you well do ken, ever sends the wits of a
Douglas woolgathering. Nevertheless, let us have a draught of your
home-brewed ale, for kissing is but dry work, after all, and little do
I think of it save" (he set his cap on his head with a gallant wave of
his hand) "in the case of a lady so fair and tempting as Dame Barbara
MacKim!"
At this the dame cast up her hands and her eyes again. "Eh, what will
Marget Ahanny o' the Shankfit say noo--this frae the Yerl William. Eh,
sirce, this is better than an Abbot's absolution. I declare 'tis mair
sustainin' than a' the consolations o' religion. Malise, do you hear,
great dour cuif that ye are, what says my lord? And you to think so
little of your married wife as ye do! Think shame, you being what ye
are, and me the ain sister to that master o' merchandise and Bailie o'
Dumfries, Maister Ninian Halliburton o' the Vennel!"
And with that she vanished into the black oblong of the door opposite
the smithy.