Macbeth the King (21 page)

However, they had to swallow Thorfinn—and were enabled to do so with rather better grace in that he promptly offered to transport all concerned to Iona in his longships, an offer few thought to refuse, in the circumstances. The long and difficult journey across Highland Scotland and through the Hebrides appealed to none, at this stage—especially as, in this warm summer weather, the body would have to be conveyed quickly.

So, within three days of the Battle of Torfness, the main protagonists were heading north, in at least superficial amity, in a group of vessels flying the raven banner of Orkney, leaving the fighting-men behind, the dead king inconspicuous, rolled in sail-cloth. It would be inaccurate to suggest that they made a happy, comfortable or congenial company, or that any large proportion of the mormaors, thanes and chieftains were fully at ease in MacBelh's presence—much less Thorfinn's. MacBeth, head and arm bandaged, endeavoured to be conciliatory, or at least civil towards all, his brother making no attempt to be one or the other. However, Thorfinn made sure that only Glamis and Lennox and Angus, with the Moray and Ross thanes, abbots and bishops, travelled in his own dragon-ship, the others distributing themselves as they would in four other craft. Echmarcach of Dublin, with some of the Lothian and Strathclyde lords, was left behind, it not being any affair of theirs. They would lead the southern army on its homeward way.

MacBeth had given orders that he was to be treated only as Mormaor of Moray and Ross. He was not King yet, and might never be so. Nevertheless there was a new attitude towards him evident on all hands; even his own thanes less easy with him. He was uneasy even with himself, indeed. Whether or not he became the King, nothing could alter the fact that he had
slain
the King—he who had been so loth to raise hand against the Ard Righ. Nothing would change or undo that. He, MacBeth mac Finlay, had killed the crowned occupier of the Stone of Destiny. He had no doubt that one day destiny would call him to account.

Old Abbot Malmore and his bishops and "family" greeted the invasion philosophically, although they had scarcely envisaged another royal interment quite so soon. Nor were they evidently censorious as to the manner of the royal death. This time, at least, there was no need for such haste as heretofore—although the body was beginning to smell. It was put in a cave, meantime, on the west side of the island, while the monks made a suitable coffin. The mourners sought to adjust themselves to the circumstances and the suddenly changed tempo of events.

There were five mormaors present, in addition to MacBeth and Thorfinn, Lennox, Angus, Strathearn, Fife and the Mearns. Mar had been slain at Torfness, and Crinan of Atholl was absent. There was a total of twenty-one thanes, seven abbots, hereditary or otherwise, and three bishops other than the Iona ones, with a selection of chiefs, toiseachs and captains of clans. Earl Gillaciaran and his sons were there, from Colonsay. It was a vastly more representative gathering than on the last occasion.

Since feasting was in order, Thorfinn sent his men scouring adjacent Mull for the wherewithal, with instructions that, since it was ostensibly for the benefit of Holy Church, they should not just take all in normal Viking fashion, but pay for it. Whether they did or not, ample provision was quickly produced, sufficient indeed to keep the brethren well victualled for many a day after the visitors were fed and gone.

Although he did not deserve it, as Thorfinn proclaimed loudly, Duncan received a fuller and more dignified burial ceremony than had his grandsire, despite his brief reign. All must be done properly and in order, MacBeth insisted. There being no cold wind to hasten the recital, even the genealogy sounded more interesting, and one King's name longer. The coffin was lowered beside its predecessor in the Relig Oran, with not a single damp eye.

Afterwards, at the interment feast in the Abbey eating-hall, the more vital part of the proceedings took place. MacBeth had some difficulty in dissuading his brother from taking the lead in the matter, asserting unsuitability. Lennox assumed the duty. A quiet non-controversialist, he spoke formally and undramatically.

"When we, the mormaors and lesser kings of Alba, have buried one High King, it is the custom here in the Abbey of Columcille to name his successor, before the gathering of his thanes and officers. It was not done at Malcolm's burial through...mischance. Better that it should have been, I say. But that is past. Today there is but one man who should succeed to the high throne—MacBeth mac Finlay..."

Thorfinn vociferously led the cheering—although not all actually joined in.

"He is undoubted tanist," Lennox went on. "He is grandson of King Malcolm the Second and..."

"So is Maldred mac Crinan," MacDuff of Fife put in heavily.

Thorfinn hooted his opinion of Maldred, formerly called Prince of Cumbria, before Malcolm Big Head had been made to supersede him, Duncan's diffident and retiring brother.

Angus spoke up, a sad-faced man of middle years, with a lachrymose eye. "None has ever considered Maldred for King. He has not himself, I say. He has not the quality for it. Any more than, than..." He did not finish that.

"The Lord MacBeth has to wife the Lady Gruoch nic Bodhe, who was son to Kenneth the Second," Lennox resumed. "Had she been a man, she would have had better claim to the throne than any. For this reason also her husband should be King."

There was a long growl of agreement. Much of it came from the thanes present. They had no say nor vote in this matter but at least they could make their preference known to their lords, the mormaors.

"There is only one other, close, of the royal line, and of age." Lennox glanced over at Thorfinn. "The Earl of Orkney. But he declares that he has no wish to wear the crown..."

"I prefer to be Earl of Orkney," that man interjected. "I may make kings, or unmake them. That is enough for me!"

MacBeth turned his bandaged head to look thoughtfully at his half-brother.

There was a pregnant silence.

Then MacDuff spoke again. "The King—Duncan—has a son. Donald Ban."

"What of it?" Strathearn demanded, a thin, cadaverous-looking man. "We do not seek bairns for our High King."

"I but remind all." Even MacDuff would not dare to mention the bastard Prince of Strathclyde and Cumbria, Malcolm Big Head.

Lennox cleared his throat. "The issue is clear then, I say. I name to you MacBeth mac Finlay as our next High King."

"As do I," Angus put in.

"And I," Colin of the Mearns added.

With four of the mortuaths held by MacBeth and his brother, it did not demand any deep calculation to perceive that the thing was settled.

"I also," Strathearn muttered, if without enthusiasm.

MacDuff of Fife grunted something which might be taken as assent.

As a great sigh swept the company, Thorfinn rose to his feet and, without the normal necessity of standing on his seat, lifted one mighty leg to place his foot on the table-top itself. So standing he held high his drinking-horn.

"To MacBeth mac Finlay, High King of Scots!" he shouted. "Health—and a sharp sword!"

There was a considerable noise as men rose and forms were pushed back. Only the other mormaors present might stand on their seats, feet on the table, but all the rest of the gathering stood, horns and beakers raised.

"MacBeth the King!" they shouted. "Hail the King! Hail the King! Long live MacBeth!" and drank deep, each to empty his cup to the dregs. MacBeth alone remained seated.

When at length the hubbub subsided, the mormaors climbed down and all resumed their seats, he rose slowly, having to steady himself with a hand on the table—for the dizziness was still there. Thorfinn banged a mighty fist on the board for silence.

"My friends, I thank you all," he said, husky-voiced. "You do me too much honour. But
...
I accept your naming. In my wife's name as in my own. I can do no other. But—you go too fast, to hail me as King. I am not the King until I am crowned at Scone. This is only nomination. Until I am seated on the Stone I am only mormaor, selected and named. No more. Let none forget it, as I do not. Then will be time enough to hail me. I shall travel to Scone as soon as is possible. With the Princess Gruoch. For she will share the throne with me. Not merely as wife and consort, but as reigning Queen. For she is the true heir-of-line. Being a woman she could not be tanist. Whether she could sit on the Stone I do not know—but it has never been done. But she can
share
the throne, and will do. That I swear."

The reaction to that was mixed, some applauding, some nodding but as many looking doubtful or expressionless. The Celtic tradition made much of women in story and song, as inspirers of heroism and mothers of heroes—but not in authority, not on thrones. A woman should not be the Fount of Honour, it was felt, since she could not hold knighthood. The King must be of knightly status. Yet there was no law which said that a Queen could not reign.

Thorfinn slapped his knee—but in amusement rather than in acclaim.

MacBeth went on. "I shall seek to be a true and good King, honest, just, a protector of the weak, and as strong as God in His wisdom allows." He looked slowly, deliberately all around the great ring of faces, seeming almost to miss none, certainly not his own brother's, over which he actually appeared to linger a moment. "The high throne is the symbol of the greatness and enduring glory of our ancient race. I shall maintain it so, with God's help—let none mistake, foe or friend. While I am High King—if so I become—none other shall usurp or overshadow my part and calling. Even though he be better man than

I am. I promise—and warn—all here. You have still time to change your nomination, before Scone. Think well! For the rest, I am grateful to you all. I am in your hands." He sat down, in silence.

Presently a medley or talk and comment, question and discussion arose, by no means all of it favourable-sounding.

Thorfinn leaned over. "That was strange speaking, Brother," he said, and did not seek to lower his strong voice.

"It required to be said."

"Perhaps. But—to whom?"

"To
all
who heard me. Did I not say? Foe and friend alike."

"So-o-o! It is that way, is it?"

"That way," MacBeth nodded. "If I am to sit on the Stone. If you mislike it you may still claim the throne, Thor. You might have new allies now, Elder Brother!"

The other looked at him through narrowed eyes for long moments. Then he laughed aloud, and slapped a huge hand on MacBeth's shoulder, making that man wince.

"Son of Life!" he cried. "Live on!"

They came to
Scone, in the Stormounth, on the banks of Tay, almost a month later, on the Eve of Saint Cuthbert. Scone was accepted as the place of greatest significance in Fortrenn, or Southern Pictavia, for here was the highest point on Tay reached by the tide, where the salt waters with their powers of death were turned back by the living waters of the river. The great Abbey of Scone was situated on a terrace above a bend of the wide river, a fine place amongst open woodlands, centring on a large partly-artificial mound called the Moot Hill. No doubt, there had been originally a circle of standing-stones there in the Druid era, for it had always been a sacred place, and was extended for present ceremonial purposes. There was a stone church, much more commodious than in the generality of Celtic abbeys and cashels; and this was the resting-place of the
Lia Fail,
the famous Stone of Destiny, talisman of the race, the Abbot of Scone its keeper. The normal scatter of subsidiary buildings surrounded, but these were much more extensive than usual, to cater for the large numbers who thronged here on great occasions. Otherwise it was a typical Celtic monastery, functional and unadorned.

The MacBeth family had travelled southwards slowly and in state, with a large company from Moray and Ross. They were far too many to put up within the abbey, so they had to be sent over to the township of Bertha across the river, for the present vastly extended with tents and pavilions. There was no palace at Scone, the royal residence being some seven miles to the north-east, in the Sidlaw heights, at Dunsinane. But MacBeth felt that it was unsuitable to go there before he was officially monarch, so he and Gruoch and the children put up meantime in the abbey guest-house, asking no more than any other visitor.

Abbot Cathail, to be sure, fussed over them like a hen with but one chick.

It was customary for the monarch-to-be to spend some portion of the night before his coronation in a vigil of prayer and meditation. MacBeth, with Duncan's death on his mind, might well have spent hours in the quiet and dimly-lit chapel before the altar, had Gruoch not put her foot down strongly and dragged him off to bed. For so beautiful and spirited a woman she had a strong vein of practicality.

All the following morning the nobility and high clergy of Alba, Lothian, the Merse, Strathclyde, Dalar and Argyll were arriving. Thorfinn, bringing Ingebiorg with him, was one of the last to appear, from longships brought as far up Tay as was possible—MacBeth having wondered, indeed, whether he had been offended by the nomination speech sufficiently to absent himself altogether. Perhaps he did delay until the last moment deliberately, to arouse just such a fear—it was the sort of thing that man might do, Neil Nathrach said. He was cheerful enough on arrival, however, and Ingebiorg her usual uncomplicated self.

The Primate of All Scotland, Abbot of Dunkeld, should have been in over-all charge of the ceremonies; but this was, of course, Crinan of Atholl, and he was the only mormaor not present. His place probably should have been taken by the Abbot and Co-Arb of Iona, Saint Columba's successor and senior cleric of the Church; but he was an old man, frail, and had moreover already given MacBeth his blessing at Iona. It would have been a long and difficult journey for him. So the duty was to be performed by Malduin, Bishop of St. Andrews,
Ard Episcop,
High or King's Bishop, assisted by the Abbot of Scone, Keeper of the Stone.

The coronation ceremony was a mixture of the ancient Pictish and Scoto-Irish inaugural proceedings, with the original pagan basis overlaid by Christian rites and additions. Most of it still was conducted in the open air before the assembled people, as was proper. Indeed the initial service in the abbey-church was more in the nature of a personal preparation and extension of the night before's vigil than any vital part of the coronation itself, attended only by the monarch-to-be himself, his family, the mormaors and officers of state. Then, to the sweet chanting of a large choir of men and boys, the procession filed out into the midday sunlight, led by the master-of-ceremonies, the Great Sennachie, the clerics, the principal guests and the mormaors, these carrying variously the crown, the sceptre, the sword-of-state, the Book of Laws and the purple robe. MacBeth and Gruoch came last, except for Neil Nathrach with Lulach and little Farquhar now four. The baby Luctacus had been left at Spynie.