Turn of the Tide (32 page)

They found Patrick lounging in the dappled shade making clip-clopping noises for a boy of about three who galloped a hobby horse up and down the narrow path that dissected the twin squares of
lawn.

He broke off as they appeared in the archway and swung his legs off the bench.

‘The others are inside. I thought to wait for you here.’

It was an unexpected sensitivity. He glanced up at an open window, put two fingers in his mouth and whistled. The tousled head of one of the boys craned over the sill and above it, Elizabeth,
who withdrew, to re-appear minutes later at the door, Grizel and Jean close behind. She came to them, hands outstretched.

‘Munro. And you are Kate. I’m glad you came. Visitors are aye welcome, though Hugh and Robert and our other guest are not at home. Gone to an audience with the King.’

‘And are enjoying themselves immensely, no doubt.’

Only Kate failed to laugh at Patrick’s sarcasm and was annoyed in consequence. An annoyance that translated into resentment of his easy familiarity and the way he smiled at her, assuming a
friendship that she had not granted. Yet against her will as the day wore on she began to relax. It wasn’t just Patrick. Nor was it the children, for besides Hugh and Elizabeth’s babe,
Robert’s two boys were there, and although somewhat in the background as was fitting in the presence of strangers, nevertheless contributed to the general noise and chatter. She thought of
home and their own bairns and felt the pain afresh, now overlaid by a prick of regret
.
Another time, she thought, and perhaps we may all have a jaunt.

What threatened to complete the thaw was the fondness that the whole family, from Jean down, exhibited for each other. Their teasing amusing, even at times outrageous, yet always without
offence, given or taken, and thus infectious. She had never been to Kilmaurs, but suspected that she wouldn’t find there the ease that these Montgomeries exhibited.

Lunch was simple: partridge and roast vegetables, followed by a syllabub and early strawberries; the whole washed down with a Rhenish wine, that made Kate, less used to it than the others, a
little light-headed. A sensation that was, she discovered, not at all unpleasant. Afterwards she was glad to sit in the garden, leaning against the warm stone of the house wall, Grizel by her side,
while the children romped with Patrick and Munro, and Elizabeth dandled the baby. Bees harvesting the pollen in the walnut blossom made a constant background hum and she wondered idly if there were
boxes nearby and the honey for sale, or if they were wild, making their hives high on the hill behind the town. In the warmth of the sun, her eyelids drooped, the sounds around her receeding
gently.

‘Late in bedding last night? Or was it that the bed wasn’t conducive to sleep?’ Kate woke to Patrick looking down at her, his brown eyes mischievious. And
though his words were innocent enough, something in his expression made her flush, the colour seeping upwards from the lace at her breast, flooding her throat and neck. The sun, which had been full
on her face when she sat down, had moved round and would soon, she saw, desert the garden altogether.

‘How long did I sleep?’

‘Long enough to suggest . . .’ in the pause her colour deepened. ‘Either lack of sleep . . . for one reason or another . . . or over-indulgence in that fine wine.’

‘Patrick!’ Grizel, though her tone was reproving, was smiling. ‘Don’t mind him, he can’t resist to tease when we are among friends.’

Munro had come to stand at Kate’s side and she felt the light pressure on her arm as he echoed, ‘And we are among friends.’

She wanted to smile back, to surrender her last reserves. But remembrance of their Cunninghame connection held her back. She ducked her head, fingered the pearls at her waist, ‘I’m
not used with wine.’

Elizabeth and Grizel spoke at once, broke off and started again, still together, and collapsed laughing, so that the rest laughed with them. Talk turned to the preparations for the Queen’s
entrance and the best location from which to view it.

‘Is it really not to be till Wednesday?’ Kate asked.

‘Afraid so,’ Patrick turned to Munro. ‘But you’ll stay?’

He rubbed at his nose. ‘It’s stretching things. We were to leave on Monday, expecting that James wouldn’t wish to bide at Leith more than a night.’

‘And so it was intended, but for the small matter of the work not yet finished at Holyrood.’

‘Elizabeth cut in. ‘Oh but you must stay. Forbye that it will only happen the once and will be worth the wait, we are only begun to get acquaint.’

‘We have the bairns to think of and as for Agnes, the four days we settled on may already feel like four weeks for her.’

Kate heard the uncertainty in Munro’s voice and against her better judgement added her protest. ‘Agnes isn’t over soft and won’t be put upon.’ She bit her lip.
‘It’s what we came for.’

The weather held fair and despite Kate’s lingering resistance, the Munros spent little time in their own lodgings, pressed into the greater comfort to be had with the
Montgomeries. Hugh and Robert took themselves to Leith each morning to wait on the King, so that Patrick and Munro had four ladies to look to besides the bairns. Sigurd, his interest in Grizel
clear to all, was, though he also lodged with the Montgomeries, forced to spend most of the following days by the docks, his time divided between his private business and the careful unloading of
the Queen’s carriage and the paraphernalia that accompanied it.

The garden, pleasant enough for sitting, was a mite small to contain the Montgomerie children and so they spent most of each of the next two afternoons in the Holyrood Park. The first day, the
children clamoured to brave the breeze and walk the length of the crag. Jean, unable to relax, chivvied them away from the edge, lest it crumble under their feet and they be plunged headlong into
the park below. The second day, they set out to climb to the top of Arthur’s seat.

They entered the park by the Abbey church, and took a path that curved in a gradual incline towards St Margaret’s Loch. There they dallied, the adults watching the sunlight dappling the
water and the occasional soft plop as a fish broke the surface for air; the boys amusing themselves by guddling with sticks at the water’s edge, disturbing the speckled trout parr that lurked
between the pebbles. The elder Montgomerie boy lay flat on his front dabbling with both hands, his padded trunk hose ballooned against his back, his legs stretched out behind him like thin brown
sticks. Though he managed to hold his hands far enough down and still so that the tiny fish flashed backwards and forwards over his palm, each time he tried to scoop them up they darted an escape
through his fingers.

Kate, seeing his growing frustration, glanced at Munro, who nodded upwards.

‘If we wish to reach the top today, we should perhaps move.’

They carried on through a small glen, the children’s voices echoing as they chased among the trees, emerging into the sunlight at the head of the corrie. Ahead of them, the hill rose
steeply.

Patrick gestured to the left. ‘There is an easier route with a fine view I believe, of Dunsapie Loch on the way.’

‘Can we not go straight?’ The boys clung on Patrick.

He looked enquiringly at Munro. ‘Why do we not give the bairns a scramble and the ladies can take the more gradual way?’

‘It seems you haven’t much choice.’ Kate jerked her head towards the boys already clambering over the rough ground. Jean frowned as if she thought to call them back, but
Patrick smiled reassurance.

‘We’ll see they come to no harm.’

The path that the ladies took was well trodden, the ground so dry their shoes scuffed up dust. There was only room for two to walk abreast, so Grizel moved ahead with Jean, Kate and Elizabeth
dawdling behind.

Elizabeth linked Kate. ‘You will stay for the entry?’

‘Nothing has been said and if we were to go home as planned it would be tomorrow . . .’ Kate pulled a stem of grass and stroked its bearded head across her cheek. ‘I
don’t even know if we can keep our lodgings.’

‘You needn’t worry over that. We have plenty of space, and can easy accommodate you.’

The sun slid behind a cloud and Kate, thinking of the Cunninghames, shivered. ‘What of Jean?’

‘Ardrossan is a bleak place and over large and with no-one of her own age, a mite isolated. Hugh reported her as a mouse, but here she has come out of herself and will, I think, miss the
company when she goes home. They say the dowager Lady Eglintoun has never recovered from the business after Annock.’

Kate shivered again.

‘You aren’t cold?’

She shook her head, threw the grass aside, looked down at her feet. ‘Perhaps we should go home. . .’ The moment’s silence seemed to stretch far into a future that she had,
against her will, begun to wish for.

‘Your man isn’t the only Cunninghame connection here.’ Elizabeth’s pressure on Kate’s arm was firm.

She looked up, startled.

‘My mother is a Cunninghame. We feared . . .’ Kate felt the hesitation, ‘. . . that it might count against me with Hugh. But it didn’t, or not in the end.’ Jean and
Grizel had disappeared round a turn in the path, the low murmur of their voices fading.

Elizabeth turned to face Kate, gripping both her wrists. ‘So you see, there isn’t a reason why we can’t be friends.’

‘Munro . . .’ Kate began, and stopped, the words stuck in her throat.

‘What hasn’t been said is easy forgot.’ Elizabeth’s voice was soft, but with a strength in it that brooked no refusal. ‘The past is gone. Leave it there. We are
none of us fit to cast the first stone.’ She linked again and pulled Kate forward. ‘We don’t want them to think us pauchled and not able to climb a wee bit hill. Can you
run?’

At Kilmaurs, Glencairn circled his horse: a chestnut stallion with a white flash on his forehead and a wicked glint in his eye. John Cunninghame was also mounted: on a bay that
had a sweet mouth and the manners to match, and so stood still, snorting gently. A stable boy held the head of a third horse that moved restively on the damp cobbles.

Archie appeared at the door.

‘Where’s William? Tell him he’s ready now or we leave without him.’ Glencairn was nursing his impatience. ‘The King has been two days in Leith already and there are
those who will no doubt make much of our delay.’

John said, ‘He may not have eyes for much other than the Queen. Rumour has it that she’s prettier than her portrait and pregnant forbye.’

‘James aye notes those who have obeyed his summons speedily and those who haven’t and it won’t be counted to our credit that we had the ill luck of a messenger whose horse took
lame.’ Glencairn snapped his reins, causing all three horses to start.

Archie poked his head into the kitchen. ‘Anyone seen William? Glencairn is gey impatient.’

The steward, occupied in decanting ale, barely lifted his head. ‘Try his bed. He hasn’t eaten, that I do know and last night . . . let’s just say it was gone three in the
morning when he knocked me up to let him in.’ He bent to replace the bung in the barrel. ‘I wouldn’t be the one wishing to wake him.’

‘You’re not between a rock and a hard place.’

William’s eyes were bloodshot. ‘What d’you want?’

‘Your father is waiting. Already saddled. And threatening to leave without you.’

‘Is that so? You can tell my father I’ll be with him presently.’ And when Archie didn’t make a move, sneered, ‘I do believe you’re feart.’ He gestured
into the room. ‘Take my stuff with you, to look as if I follow.’

Archie picked up the saddlebag.

‘I have a goodbye or two to make first. My mother and . . .’ there was malice in his smile, ‘. . . that fine lass you brought me from Renfrew.’

Archie plunged back down the stair, gripping the rope handrail so tight that it burned his palm, William’s voice taunting him,

‘A fine lass indeed.’