The Border Lord and the Lady (57 page)

“I’ve brought ye some whiskey, Roddie Douglas,” she said, holding out a stone flask to the man. “ ’Tis a chilly night for the middle of May.”

“Aye,” the man-at-arms agreed. “ ’Tis kindly, Bethia, but I hope you’re not looking at me for a second husband, for I’m not of a mind to wed.”

“Nay, nay, and especially as you’re futtering that widow at the end of the village,” Bethia cackled. “I’m too dried up for a fine young lad like you, Roddie Douglas.”

He chuckled and, taking the flask, drank down a good portion of the liquid. “Thank you,” he said.

“I’ll give the rest to your mate,” she said. “Who is at the other end of the beach?”

“That will be Black William,” Roddie replied.

Bethia sauntered off into the dusk, seeking the second man-at-arms. Finding him, she offered him the flask. He was happy to drink the remaining whiskey down. She left him and, returning to where she had left Roddie Douglas, she found him collapsed and snoring on the sand. With a smile of satisfaction she waited a few minutes, then sought out the second man-at-arms. Bethia found him in the same state as the first.

Walking back up the shore to where Roddie Douglas lay, Bethia picked up his dark lantern. She removed the shade from the lamp and the light exploded. Bethia raised the lantern and waved it slowly back and forth as she stood facing the water. A twinkle of light from across the small loch answered her. And then her sharp ears picked up the sound of horses entering the water, swimming, coming closer and closer. She was able to make out the form of her brother, Durwin, leading the raiders.

“Welcome to Glengorm, brother,” Bethia said, grinning. “How may I be of service to you, Durwin, my kinsman?”

Durwin slid from his horse. “You are certain we can take what we want, that the laird’s away, and their defense is scant? I am not of a mind to lose any men. The Douglases have severely decimated the ranks of the Grahames. We’re going to be taking women from the village for concubines. Those we have can’t produce bairns quick enough. You’ll know those old enough to futter and produce. How many men left?”

“None of fighting age. Lads and grandfathers. The few fighting men are up at the house. But once they hear a commotion in the village they’ll come running. When they do you can creep into the
house and steal the lady. Futter her if you will, but she will actually be worth more in ransom,” Bethia said.

“Agreed,” her brother replied. “Now, as we have discussed, sister, take the wee boat on the shore here and row yourself across to the other side to wait for us. I’ve brought a horse for you. We’ll bring the women we’re stealing to you. If you say they’re too old or too young we’ll toss them in the water. If they can swim home they will have their lives. If not . . .” Durwin Grahame shrugged. “Is your husband with the laird?”

“The bastard is dead,” Bethia said. “His old mother died first.” She smiled evilly, and her brother knew Bethia had killed the woman in some manner. “I poisoned her. It was too cold, and the ground was frozen, so we cremated her. Then came the storm. It snowed for three days. I killed my man the first day. Then, while the storm raged, I cut him up into pieces. Some I burned. Some I fed to the dog. The rest I put in a sack with stones. I kept it in the snow behind my cottage, meaning to dump it in the loch when it opened up. But some wild beasts found the sack and ran off with it. I couldn’t even find his bones.”

“Get in the boat then,” her brother said. His sister was a far more dangerous woman than he had imagined. He would have to kill her before they began their return over the border today. He couldn’t spend the rest of his life wondering about when she would turn on him. She was a traitorous bitch who thought only of herself. Despite being married to a Douglas, and living with the Douglases for all these years, Bethia had betrayed them without so much as a single regret. She would betray him too, given the opportunity, but he would not give her that opportunity.

Bethia nodded to him, obeying, and when she was settled in the small boat he pushed it from the sandy shore into the loch. “I’ll see you on the other side,” he said. Then, turning, he mustered his men, who had been waiting silently. “We’ll leave the horses here and go on afoot into the village,” Durwin Grahame told them.

In her cottage at the end of the village nearest the path to the house, Mary Douglas lay sleepless. She never slept well when her husband was away. A dog suddenly sent up a bark. Then she heard a yelp, and for a moment it was silent before Mary thought she heard a scream. She got up and peered through the small window to see the dark shapes of men running through the village and into the cottages. Mary did not wait. Grabbing her dark cloak, she slipped out of the little door at the rear of her cottage and, using the trees on the hillside as cover, made her way up the hill to the laird’s dwelling. The shrieks of frightened women had become more audible.

Reaching the house, she pounded upon the little kitchen door until the lad, Gabhan, peered out and, seeing her, opened the portal to let her in. “Bar the door, lad! The Grahames are upon us!” Mary cried. “Where is Frang? We must rouse the house!”

“This entry won’t hold against an assault,” Gabhan told Mary.

“Then quickly, wake Mab and the lasses and get upstairs,” Mary told him as she hurried to climb the stairs into the hall. There she found Frang snoring in a bedspace. “Get up! Get up!” She shook him. “The Grahames are upon us, man!”

He was awake in an instant. “How? Where?”

“In the village for now, stealing women, but they’ll be at the hall soon enough,” Mary told him. “They came from the loch side, or they’d have had me. I couldn’t sleep, and heard a noise, saw the shadows, and ran.”

“I’ll get the men, and we’ll go into the village and settle this,” Frang said.

“Nay! Nay! You mustn’t leave the lady and her bairns unprotected. The ransom would be fierce, and ’twould beggar the laird. Besides, it appeared there were more of them than there are of us.”

The door at the end of the hall opened, and Cicely stepped out. “What is it?” She saw Mary Douglas, and her brow lifted questioningly. She was wearing a long chemise.

“The Grahames are in the village,” Frang said.

“Is the house secure?” Cicely asked him.

He nodded.

“Nay, the kitchen can be breached,” Mary said. “Gabhan said so.”

“Then we’ll seal the entry from the hall to the kitchen stairs,” Frang told them.

“Where are Mab, the lasses, and Gabhan?” Cicely wanted to know. “Get them upstairs immediately.”

Frang hurried down into the kitchen, where he found Mab, her two helpers, and her great-nephew shoving the big kitchen table so that it blocked the outside door, which was also barred. It was a good strategy. He helped them to get it the last few feet, and then shooed them all up into the hall. Cicely had gone into the large bedchamber with Mary Douglas, and they pulled the outer wooden shutter closed over the chamber’s single window. The window was now made of glass, but they had not yet dispensed with the inner wood shutters. They pulled them tightly and laid a wooden bar across them. Then they piled the trunks in the room before the windows. With great effort someone would be able to get into the chamber eventually, but all they needed was time.

“I want you, the bairns, the women in that chamber,” Frang said. “You’ll be safe unless someone manages to break in, and you’ll have time to reach the hall if they do. You can then bar that door to gain more time for us.”

“Can we send to Sir William or Ben Duff for aid?” Cicely asked.

Frang shook his head. “Their men are also with the king but for a few, my lady.”

Cicely nodded. “Then we are on our own,” she said. “Sine, go up. Wake the children and their nursemaid. Bring them downstairs. Where are Mab and her lasses?”

“Here, my lady,” the old woman said. She held a large wooden rolling pin in one hand. Her helpers, Bessie and Flora, held wooden mallets used to tenderize the meat.

“You are well armed, I see,” Cicely remarked. “Let us pray they cannot breach the house,” she said, leading them into the enclosed bedchamber. But she kept the door open, and after she had quickly dressed Cicely went back into the hall to speak with Frang. Kate came downstairs with the two children. She was wide-eyed, but calm.

“What are our chances of avoiding a fight?” Cicely asked Frang.

He shook his head. “We’ll try to hold out until either they grow weary of the game and depart with their booty, or offer decent terms for our surrender,” he said. “And, of course, they could go away with what they have gained today, and return another day.”

“I don’t want anyone’s blood on my hands,” Cicely quietly told the captain of the men-at-arms. “I could not bear to lose any of you.”

He gave her a warm smile. “We will do our best, my lady,” Frang promised. But he knew that if the Grahames managed to reach the hall it would be a fight to the death. He crossed himself and prayed silently for a miracle. Then he sent one of his men up to the second floor to see what was happening, and relay it down to them.

“The village is burning,” the man called. “I can see it from here.”

Frang shrugged. “It was to be expected,” he said sanguinely.

“The women are shrieking up a storm,” the lookout said. “They are having quite a time containing them. I can see some of them running, being chased.”

“Good,” Frang said. “They may have to decide if they want the women more, or what’s in this house more. If they can’t control our lasses they can’t storm the house.”

 

Durwin Grahame was learning, to his annoyance, the truth of this as the women scattered about the village, evading his men, half of whom were chasing after them while the other half fired the cottages. “Leave that cottage at the end alone,” he called to his men. “We’ll pen the women in there with two of you to guard them. Then we’ll go after the laird’s wife and bairns for the fine ransom they’ll bring us.”

After several hours of running the younger women of Glengorm down, the raiders finally had them bound and incarcerated in Mary Douglas’s cottage. The older women and the children they had let run off, for they weren’t interested in them. And while the elderly had protested the destruction of their homes, the Grahames had waved them away threateningly, telling them they were fortunate not to be killed. There were some who might have killed them, and another time Durwin Grahame might have. Today, however, he was interested in only two things: women to bear Grahame bairns, and a fat ransom.

Their prisoners contained, the Grahames moved purposefully towards the laird of Glengorm’s house. The sky was beginning to lighten now with the mid-May dawn. The air was filled with the scent of burning, but the day would be clear. Suddenly Durwin Grahame saw a herd of six fat cows, in a pen near the barn. His eyes lit up. He wanted those cows, whose udders were enormous with milk and cream right now. He pointed to three of his men. “Swim that group across the loch,” he told them. “Then come back.”

The trio went off to do his bidding as Durwin led the rest of his men to the house. They had almost reached it when a hail of arrows flew from the upper story of the building. The arrows found targets. Howls of pain from some of his men pierced the air. He signaled his men back far enough to avoid the arrows, and so he might think. He could see that the front door was heavy and bound with iron. There had to be another way to gain access to the dwelling. In the meantime he set several men to cutting down a tree, from which they would strip the branches, and then use the trunk as a battering ram. Another two he sent to walk about the house to find its weakness.

Fortunately none of his men had been seriously injured by the arrows, although their wounds were painful. Care would have to be taken that the wounds did not become infected. The arrows were all yanked out and cast aside, while the injuries were bound up. The two men returned to report that they had found another smaller door near
a kitchen garden that might be breached. And there was a shuttered window in an extension.

“We will try the door first,” Durwin Grahame said. “If it is the kitchen there will be access to the hall from there.” But try as they might, they could not get in through that small door. Durwin began to wonder if the portal were iron instead of blackened old wood. “We’ll try the shuttered window then,” he finally announced.

 

Inside the bedchamber the women heard the outside shutter being dismantled. They were silent. Flora whimpered as they heard the glass window being broken. Cicely debated their course of action. She stepped into the hall, saying to Frang, “They are already through the outside shutter and glass. Once they destroy the inner shutter it is just a matter of pushing the trunks away. I think the children and the women should be upstairs now, Frang. We can be contained there. Here we are open to attack from two sides, I fear.”

“You’re right, my lady,” he agreed.

“Quickly,” Cicely called to the women in her bedchamber. “Get upstairs into the nursery chamber before these villains break through into the house.”

The women hurried from the chamber, carrying the children, and rushed upstairs.

“You, too, my lady,” Frang said quietly.

Cicely opened her mouth to protest, and then, seeing the foolishness of it, nodded. “Do not get yourself killed,” she said.

He grinned at her. “I’ll take a few Grahames with me for company if I do,” he promised her.

Cicely ran for the stairs and joined the others upstairs. What if they fired the house? she wondered. Could they all get out safely?
Blessed Mother!
This certainly wouldn’t have happened if Kier had been here. Was James Stewart’s war with the MacDonald of the Isles more important than the survival of Glengorm? She smiled wryly to
herself. The answer to that question depended upon who was asking the question. She already knew both answers to her query.

 

Almost within sight of his home Kier Douglas and his Glengorm men saw the smoke. The laird of Glengorm raised his hand to signal a stop. From the hill they had just topped they saw the village alight. Kier heard the men behind him beginning to swear. His gaze moved to the house. It was being assaulted. He turned. “It would seem that the Grahames have come calling, lads. No mercy!” Then he spurred his horse down the road leading to his home, his clansmen riding hard behind him.