The Redemption of Alexander Seaton (26 page)

I passed the book to him, and he retied the bindings before returning it, carefully, to the shelf. When he turned back to face me, I could see he was about to address a subject he did not much care for. He asked me to sit and then waited for the servant to finish lighting the room before proceeding. He cleared his throat. ‘In the course of my time, in my work, and due in some measure to my position in this world, I am obliged to conduct myself with all manner of men. I believe, though perhaps not all do, that God has given it to me to do this without offence to my fellow man. You are a guest in my house, Mr Seaton, and yet I believe
tonight that I have – albeit unwittingly – been a cause of discomfort to you and to others at my table.’

My heart pounded hard within me, and I felt my breathing grow deeper. I did not like the confidences of strangers, and what the essence of this was, I could guess. I wished myself anywhere else but this library.

‘I am sorry; I do not know what you speak of. I have been,’ I paused, thinking of Isabella Irvine – I was not going to claim some experience of warmth, ‘I have been treated with civility and hospitality. I can ask no more in the house of a stranger.’

‘And yet you should, in this house.’ He pushed back his chair and went to the window, looking out into the darkness. ‘My wife has told me, briefly, of your former closeness and your present estrangement from the family of Hay. She has told me what the enmity of the earl has cost you in the world. She has also told me – and I do not play with my words here – that the girl was sent from Delgatie to sever an attachment she had formed with you. This latter part she had from my niece, and I have no cause to doubt it, for she is an honest girl with no malice or thirst to slander. I suspect there has been much women’s talk between the pair over this whole business, long before you ever set foot in this house. You must excuse my niece’s coldness – and I did mark it at dinner – she has all the passionate notions of one who has not yet lived in the world. As for myself, I would never have talked on as I did had I known any of this.’

The warmth of the wine and the fire were working through me, and I felt a desire to meet the laird’s honesty with an honesty of my own. ‘The conversation gave me no discomfort that is not with me in any case. I do not like the study of
history because it cannot be changed – my history cannot be changed. I do not look for your sympathy. The family of Hay deserved better at my hands.’

He shuttered the window and turned back towards me. ‘Maybe so. But there must be a limit to retribution, or our society will never prosper; our godly commonwealth will wither and die before it ever bears fruit. The laird of Delgatie can be the warmest and most loyal of friends, but he is also a very dangerous enemy. I would counsel you to be careful of such an enemy, Mr Seaton.’ There was nothing for me to say in response.

Straloch seemed pleased to have got that business – that women’s business – over with. He strode over to his desk and poured us each a drink of wine. His manner was brisk now, no longer hesitant. ‘Well, then, let us get down to the matter in hand. Your good provost writes that the map he has sent you with was found amongst the belongings of a visitor to your town, and that he would have my advice on its nature. He asks that I should speak to no one but yourself about this business.’ He took a key from a chain in his pocket and unlocked the box I had seen him put the map next to that afternoon. I experienced some little relief to be fulfilling my commission at last, and sat back to wait.

The laird opened out the sheet and took an eyeglass from his desk. He began at the top left corner and worked very slowly with the glass over the entire sheet. As he did so, I studied the arras hangings on the panelled wall behind him – a well-worked suite depicting the journey of the Egyptian Princess Scota, daughter of the Pharaoh, and progenitrix of our race, to our cold shores. The myth had been used three hundred years ago to argue the rights of our nation against
the overlordship of an English king. What did Straloch think of those rights, now that the king in England was our own? I looked at my host; no word escaped him. At length he put the glass down, and sat heavily back into his chair. He looked up at me.

‘Have you seen this work, Mr Seaton?’

I affirmed that I had.

‘And what is your assessment of it?’

I had not expected this again, and had no intention this time either of making accusations against a man who was not able to answer for himself. My only course was to lie.

‘I have no assessment of it – none of any significance. It is a map, it is of the coast near Banff, and it is a tidy and detailed bit of work.’

I did not meet Straloch’s eye; I knew he did not believe me.

‘Come now, Mr Seaton, you are a man of some intelligence. This document gives rise to no curiosity, no conjecture, in your mind?’

I met his gaze now. ‘Only a fool would not be curious,’ I said. ‘I am as curious as our provost and the rest concerned in this business to know what this map signifies. As to conjecture, though, I have learnt that it is a habit best indulged in solitude.’

Straloch nodded. ‘I believe you may well be right. If more of our countrymen were of the same opinion, this would be a more peaceable land.’ He laid the map on a table near the fire, and motioned for me to join him at it. ‘But as to this map, we must deal in specifics, and I cannot believe that you have not formed any view as to why it might have been drawn. The authorities in Banff would never have sent it to
me for examination had they no notion at all of what it might be used for. And you must be of their counsel, since you have been entrusted with the document itself, and with my reply – should I choose to make one.’

There might have been some hostility in the laird’s tone; I could not tell, for I did not know him well enough. I could not blame him for it: if I would not be frank with him, why should he be so with me? What did I owe to the town of Banff, or to those who had sent me on this commission, that I should lie for them? Straloch returned to the map. ‘I will tell you straightly. This is fine work, amongst the finest I have seen. Whose is it? Who is this mysterious visitor to the burgh who has such a thing in his possession?’ The provost had warned me that I was not to answer the laird’s questions, but I was a guest in the laird’s house, and the provost was not here.

‘It is the work of the provost’s nephew, apprentice to Edward Arbuthnott, apothecary of Banff.’

Straloch set down the document. The expression on his face did not allow of further dissembling. ‘Do you tell me that this map was drawn by the man lately found murdered in Banff?’ He saw my awkwardness but waved it away. ‘Do your minister and baillie really think such matters can be kept within the bounds of your burgh like a tethered cow? The whole country is alive with the news, and that the music master is in jail, suspected, all over the love of a woman. But what you bring me today is no lover’s trick. I think you fear you have the wrong man in jail, and perhaps for the wrong crime.’

‘I know that the wrong man is in jail. Charles Thom is no more capable of murder than I am, over a woman or
anything else. And as to the crime – I speak for myself here, you understand, and not for those who sent me?’

He acquiesced.

‘That there has been a crime is not in doubt; that there has been a murder, is not in doubt. The reason for the murder – that is in doubt. If once that can be established, the rest should follow. But in truth,’ and here I knew I was departing completely from the commission given to me, ‘I think those in whose place I have come – the provost, baillie, minister and notary public of Banff – have forgotten there ever was a murder, so aroused are their fears by the discovery of the document before you.’

Straloch looked up and spoke slowly. ‘And are there others?’

‘There are,’ I said. ‘In sequence they cover the entire coastline from Troup Head to Cullen, and inland towards Rothiemay and Strathbogie. There are pointers southwards for Turriff, Oldmeldrum, and Aberdeen.’

Straloch straightened and regarded me directly, no longer looking at the map. ‘And so the authorities of Banff fear their burgh is to be the first staging post for an invasion force, and you have been sent to ask me whether the Marquis of Huntly intends to head the invasion in person.’ A smile played upon his lips now, but his eyes were in deadly earnest.

‘They fear a Catholic invasion. That much it would be pointless to deny, but they mean no insult to you or to your noble patron, the marquis. It is in virtue of your learning and expertise in the matter of cartography that you are consulted. We,’ and now I revealed that I was of the inner counsel, ‘thought it might be possible that Patrick Davidson was acting on commission – a legitimate scholarly commission, and we could think of no one other than yourself who might
be in any way placed to know about such things.’

Straloch seemed to accept that there was some sense in this. But he knew also that I might well have worded it differently. I might have said, ‘The authorities in Banff do not trust you, and they trust your master less, but we have no choice other than to seek your advice.’ My host stood up and walked to a table on the other side of the room. It was covered in charts and sheaves of notes. ‘What you see here is the fruit – the bud, more rightly – of many years’ labour, my own and others. You have heard of Timothy Pont?’

I confessed that I had not. My ignorance seemed to surprise him, but he continued. ‘Pont spent many years involved in the mapping of our country. On his death a few years ago, the task remained uncompleted. As you know, I have long had an interest in the subject, and it is an interest shared, I am glad to say, by my son James. Our researches go further than this work of your apothecary’s apprentice – we have a great interest in genealogy, in our local history and antiquities, but our cartography is not as fine as this. This is the work of a strategist, as is evident from the detail he chooses to include. One might well suspect that an invading army could put a document such as this to much use. I am certain that no legitimate commission was issued for the doing of this work – I would have been sure to hear of it. You must believe that it is experience, and not vanity, that make me confident in this.’

‘I would not have thought otherwise,’ I said.

‘I can assure you, in consequence, that I know of no project, other than that which I myself am engaged upon, to map this part of the country. I can also assure you, and you and
your masters may believe this as you wish, that there is no plot that I know of for the invasion of our country from the coastline of the firth of Moray.’

I was embarrassed to be the receiver of such an assurance from a man so learned and so worthy of respect as Robert Gordon of Straloch. My discomfort was all the greater in knowing that he knew my own history, and that I had proven myself unworthy of trust and undeserving of respect. He should never have had to make such a declaration to me. I was conscious now not only of the grandness of the room, of the hundreds of books that lined the shelves, but of the portrait of Robert Gordon himself that hung over the fireplace—Jamesone’s work, by the look of it – the smell of sandalwood, the painted mural on the far wall. This was a man of wealth, family and standing, and he had felt constrained to defend himself to me. I began to see now why I, rather than someone who mattered, had been sent here on the business of the burgh of Banff, and I did not like it. I assumed our interview was over and got up to leave, but he put out a hand to stay me. ‘Tarry a while, Mr Seaton. The hour is not yet late and I will not keep you long. I would know more of this bad business in Banff, if you are willing to tell me.’

In my head I heard again the provost’s words of warning: ‘our business here is none of his,’ but again I reasoned that the provost was not here and I was, and, with William Cargill’s admonitions still fresh in my mind, I was no longer sure that I trusted Walter Watt or any others in Banff who had sent me on this mission. ‘There is little enough to tell—little that I can understand, at any rate. What is it you wish to know?’

Straloch indicated the map. ‘Tell me about the murdered
man. What was a man capable of such work as this doing apprenticed to an apothecary?’

So again, for the laird of Straloch’s benefit, I rehearsed the tale of Patrick Davidson’s childhood, his years of study at home and abroad, his return to Banff under the roof of Edward Arbuthnott and the talk of his relationship with Arbuthnott’s daughter. The laird interjected once or twice in the course of the tale with ‘a good college’, ‘a wonderful city’, ‘a wise choice’, but said little more until I got to the end of it. Laughter and music were reaching us from the dining hall; it was at once comforting and yet incongruous as an accompaniment to our conversation. When I was finished the laird got up and raked at the fire.

‘It does not make sense, Mr Seaton. No, it does not make sense.’ He leant against the mantel in thought and then turned around to look at me. ‘Why did he come back to Banff? Why? When his love of botany had been strong enough to steer him away from the study of the law, and even medicine?’

‘He came to study the apothecary’s craft,’ I said, unsure what it was about this that so bothered the laird. It was plain enough to me that Patrick Davidson had returned to the town of his childhood because his connections of influence – his uncle – were able to secure him a place to train with a good master. But this did not satisfy Straloch.

‘No,’ he said. ‘When one has a passion such as this – or a calling even – it overrides all other considerations. If advancement in the study of botany and the usage of plants was his guiding desire, he would not have come to Banff. He would have stayed on the continent of Europe, war or no, where he would have learnt much. What is there in the
flora of our corner of Scotland that could engage the heart and the mind of one who already knew it from childhood? Nothing, I would wager, to what the Alps, the Pyrenees, the warm lands to the South have to offer, to say nothing of the exotic riches of the East or the undisturbed forests and swamps of the New World. No, one with a true passion for the understanding of plants would not cast all aside in order to play out his youth in the town of Banff.’