Chapter 34
Montrose stood to greet his guest. The protocol perhaps called for him to remain seated. The practical politics of the matter meant that insisting on his personal representation of the king with all of the privileges of etiquette that went therewith would be unwise.
Nevertheless he took his seat before he invited Archibald Campbell, chief of Clan Campbell, to sit.
Campbell smirked as he sat, pausing while the servants laid bread and cheese and fruits on the table. “I hope you’re not playing any kind of etiquette game, Jamie,” he said, “because I could choose to take that as you acknowledging me the king’s equal.”
Montrose smiled back. “Now, now, Archibald. I invited a new acquaintance, and I hope a new friend, to my Edinburgh home that I might have a meal with him and discuss the interesting political issues of the day as between gentlemen of repute and influence. Without all the nonsense of court etiquette. We are not, after all, Frenchmen.”
“That we’re not,” Campbell agreed. “And if I’m to swear on it, a seat at table with stone walls around me seems like a better prospect to meet you, since our last.”
Montrose chuckled. “I don’t doubt you sent for word of the Americans’ rifles too. I’ve an order with a gunsmith at Suhl for one of my own.”
“Aye?” Campbell raised an eyebrow. “Sounds like a useful article for the hunting.”
“With any luck the thing will arrive in time for culling the deer. I fancy there’s some good sport to be had there.” Montrose watched Campbell’s face carefully. “Oh, were you looking for some subtlety, Archibald?”
Campbell chuckled. “I was, rather. I wish I’d thought of getting one of those rifles for myself. I’m no great shooter, but from what I hear they’re a hunting weapon of rare devising.”
Montrose noted that Campbell was not saying aloud that he’d ordered a case of the blasted things for his men to train with, and that at ruinous expense. A one-off gunsmith’s piece could be had readily. The products of the Americans’ machine shops with their interchangeable parts and ammunition? Considerably more expensive to the private purchaser, since the bulk of production was being bought up by the armed forces of the USE and Sweden. Montrose had deemed it not worth the expense or effort, not least because as a great officer of the king of England his order would be treated with greater suspicion than that of a local nobleman, however powerful.
What had been worth the expense was the hiring of two or three smart fellows with a little experience in the art of loosening incautious tongues.
It would be some while yet before Montrose had an intelligence office up to the business of a Lord Lieutenant of Scotland—if such a thing were possible, Scots being what they were—but the obvious first target was Campbell of Argyll. Any man who could put twenty thousand men in the field, if he called everyone to his banner that would come, that man was worth watching carefully.
Of course, putting twenty thousand men in the field was all very well, but the list of Campbell enemies was long and their grudges obdurate. Montrose had already had word back from assorted MacDonalds, MacLeans and MacArthurs, to name only the three largest, that they could and would rally in the highlands if the Campbells ever marched. Not, perhaps, Campbell’s twenty thousand, but they would be firmly and larcenously in his rear. Up to their thieving highlander balls, Montrose hoped.
Even some of those twenty thousand might be worked on. Lamont of the Lamonts, for one, personally loathed Campbell, and if given half the chance would enrich himself at Campbell’s expense. Of course, better still would be no need for such scheming and stratagems, but it made a pleasant thought as he sat at meat with his biggest problem to know that he could make that problem rather smaller. Still the occasion of much effusion of blood, but by no means the ruination of the kingdom that a simple appraisal of the matter might suggest.
“Speaking o’ hunting,” Campbell went on, “has your man Finnegan caught this Cromwell yet?”
“He’s not my man, as you know right well, Archibald,” Montrose said, carefully soothing the hot flame of irritation that had sprung up in his breast at the mention of both names. Cork’s letter had gone some way to assuring him that the tomfoolery unfolding in Edinburgh was not going to be laid at his door. He’d resolved to give Finnegan a week before intervening and having a lawyer appear to move that Finnegan’s commission was no lawful cold trod. While it would not do to appear to be prevailing on the bench for a particular result, he could surely make it clear to the gowned laggards that the matter was vacation business and for the sake of public order the courts could sit a day out of term to send the troublesome Irishman back south of the Tweed with his tail between his legs. Especially if he was, as rumored, assembling a crew of vagrant ruffians to bring his business to a head. If that wasn’t an abuse of posse comitatus, the law had no meaning whatsoever.
“Aye, aye, I know,” Campbell admitted. “It seemed too ripe a jest to leave unplucked, though. Have you had words with Mackay about it?”
“Briefly,” Montrose admitted, grudgingly. It might do some good to take Campbell into his confidence in the matter. Forbearance with Mackay might give the Campbell reason to talk before raising his banners if the king got himself in an uproar again. “And I told him what I tell everyone: I’m charged with peace and quiet north of the Tweed, and if that means looking the other way once in a while, that I’ll do. It seems that this Finnegan has no more evidence against Mackay’s bastard than one sighting at fifty yards through a cloud of smoke. A drunken pupil of a barrister could raise cause to find that not proven. As best we can guess he wants Mackay as his tethered goat to catch Cromwell, who may or may not be lying low about Edinburgh. For myself, I believe the man has got the idea fixed in his head that holding Mackay in the Tolbooth is the thing he must do and he’s thought no further than that.”
Campbell nodded. “It’s not rare that a man gets himself to folly by a lot of clever steps, aye. Forbye, there’s no sighting of Cromwell anywhere but Edinburgh. I don’t doubt you’ve had word out?”
“Aye, over and above Finnegan’s,” Montrose agreed. “And for all I have every sympathy with you regarding the policy of preemptive arrest that His Majesty executed in England—”
“Rankest folly, and invidious to boot,” Campbell snapped.
“As you’ve always said.” Montrose carefully omitted to disagree or agree with the plain words. “For all that there are difficulties which any reasonable man might have with the policy, Cromwell by escaping has become the danger to the king’s peace that he never was before.”
Campbell shrugged. “The man was turbulent before, I’m told. Required to explain himself before the English privy council. Over a matter of the rights of the common folk, I understand.”
“Just so,” Montrose agreed. “Such men bear watching at the best of times. After prerogative arrest in which his wife and son were killed? What the man might do in the heat of his grief I shudder to think. What he might do if pursued to a spirit of cold vengeance? Such a man might laugh to see the world burn.”
Montrose could tell that that had hit home with Campbell. While the man himself had made no great store of enemies in his own person, he’d inherited centuries of grudges against his clan. They hadn’t gotten to the position of preeminent among the clans without reducing other contenders or even mere inconvenient obstacles to penury and wretchedness. And while penury and wretchedness were oftentimes remedied by the industry of descendants, the grudges lived on. Were nurtured, nursed and fed. A man bearing such a grudge against a whole nation, especially now that he seemed to have made friends in the USE, was a man who could create the kind of chaos that unmade even the greatest.
“Did you ask me here to discuss Cromwell?” Campbell asked after a moment’s thought.
“Among other matters, aye,” Montrose said. “I’m sure you have people here and there that report to you. And I saw you had a fine crew of bonny lads about you when last we met. And it would be poor form of me to involve myself directly in Finnegan’s misdeeds.”
“Aye?” Campbell had both eyebrows raised. He’d not been expecting a recruitment, that was for sure.
“Well, it seems to me that a man who’s all afire for the rights of Scotland might take offense at an Irish mercenary serving the English state holding a Scotsman prisoner while threatening a member of the Scots peerage. However felonious this Cromwell is, Finnegan’s cold trod is treading all over Scots prerogatives. Would you not agree?” Montrose had come prepared to hedge the matter all about with hints and suggestions. For some reason the imp of the perverse was upon him—Campbell ought not have jested with him, really—and he was spelling it out plain.
Campbell snorted. “I’ll grant ye the prize for audacity, my lord Montrose,” he said. “And aye, a man in my position could count himself much happier for the likes of Finnegan gone south of the Tweed.”
“Now, I’m in no case to make this a lawful command in the king’s name, but a charter of suppression making it lawful for one of His Majesty’s subjects to act in the name of the king’s peace, would that suit you for present purposes?”
“Present purposes being?”
“I essentially want Finnegan gone. Finnegan may gather what collection of drovers, copers and vagrants he may, your pockets are the deeper when it comes to that coin. If that puts Mackay in your debt, take what advantage you may. For my part, I may say that I unleashed you to the task and thus have some favor with the Mackays and through them ease the fears of the Scots serving abroad. I want them to come home sure of the king’s peace.”
Campbell roared with laughter. “Oh, now here’s an equivocator that swears in both scales!” he quoted when he got his voice back. “Keeping the king’s peace against the king’s own man—”
“He’s not and we both know it,” Montrose snapped.
“Oh, aye, and how many of the common folk know it? The man unfolds his royal commission more often than he unbuttons his britches.”
“The worse for him. A brigand’s a brigand, and him being under color of law means I have to step around the law to stop his brigandry. The man’s as much an officer of the law as a Border March Warden, without even the excuse of being a born savage—”
“The man’s an Irishman—” Campbell grinned.
Montrose snorted. “Aye, and there’s Irishmen and Irishmen. This one’s got his letters and is at least halfway to being a gentleman. Or do you think some illiterate bog-paddy could carry off the pretense of being a justice of the peace as long as he has? No, he’s Cork’s man, a hireling throat-cutter with education to make him dangerous. While I’ll sign no man’s death warrant without lawful judgment on him, should he perish in chance medley, I for one will not weep a single tear. And let Cork learn to keep his ruffians south of the Tweed.”
Julie could tell that her father-in-law was agitated, although he was hiding it. She knew he was going through a lot of Tom Stone’s finest, and the ease he’d had from the pain was doing him a power of good, but she’d heard that weed could make you paranoid. Did that explain the little tics that were giving his nerves away, or was this guy really that important? She chanced asking him.
“Oh, aye, that an’ more, lassie,” the old baron said, “that an’ more. I cannot imagine what brings the man here—a bare quarter-hour announced, at that—and I’ve surely no notion how I ought to have prepared.”
“Can you prepare for a meeting like this?”
A moment’s sharp look. “For the mightiest clan chief in Scotland? Aye, prepare, and that right well, for the de’il take him that does not.”
Julie gave him a level look. The man needed to calm the hell down, but telling him that outright was, she judged, not likely to help.
He took a deep breath. “But if you mean, as I suspect you did, can a man prepare for a meeting all unexpected such as this, no.”
“So Campbell hasn’t either, probably,” she said, “and I reckon that that tells us something too.”
Mackay raised an eyebrow. “Aye?”
“If he’s willing to be this close to being rude—” Julie had taken a while to pick up all of the little customs and rules that went with not being able to call ahead before you visited. Campbell was just a hair short of being actually impolite. Which said that, whatever it was, he wanted to keep his manners but it was urgent enough that he was willing to skirt the edges of unmannerly.
“True.” Baron Mackay took a deep breath and visibly settled himself. “The most we may do, I suppose, is be calm for the man. He’s clearly flustered.”
Julie smiled. “Yep. Poor fellow’s probably got his panties in a bunch, you’ve got to calm him down. Get no sense out of him otherwise.”
“Panties in a bunch? Och, awa’ wi’ ye, lassie.” Mackay was openly beaming now. Good, Julie thought. The last thing we need is the old boy panicking when he needs to be icy sharp. Probably the political equivalent of buck fever.
“I’ll listen in upstairs, if you turn the radio on. Since Darryl fitted that patch cable, I can get Gayle and Oliver on. Major Lennox too, if he’s not out buying horses. I think Darryl and Vicky are doing helping out at the Committee charity kitchen.”
“Very well,” Mackay said. “All the better if Oliver can be attending. The man has an excellent ear. One of Thomas’s boys came by to change the batteries this morning.”
“I’ll pass the word to Meg on the way out to see that there are refreshments ready for Campbell,” she said, and left.
“My Lord Argyll, forgive me for not rising,” Mackay said when Campbell entered.
Campbell waved it aside. “Forgive me in turn for the great fash I’ve put you and yours to,” he said, “but my Lord Montrose seems to have the imp of the perverse upon him this day.”
“Aye?” Mackay knew that Montrose was trying to carry out several sets of inconsistent orders, and that was apt to produce strange behavior, but enough to have Campbell agitated enough to be paying a call here but not raising his clan’s banners…
“Aye.” Campbell said, taking his seat. “I take it you’re not ignorant of the Irish ruffians and their antics? The pack of torai Cork has sent from his lands in Ireland?”
Mackay rolled his eyes. “Alexander in the Tolbooth. Wrong side o’ the blanket he may be, but my son for all that, and a bonnie youngest grandchild he’s brought me. Taking her nap upstairs at the moment.”
Campbell chuckled. “I’ve a while before I know that pleasure, I’m sure,” he said, “but if you’ll pardon the lateness, I’ll offer my congratulations. I understand you’ve a fair tribe?”
“Oh, aye, my posterity is fair provided for. Alexander’s my eldest, but I’ve three with my late wife besides him, and all grown and wed. For a wonder, all four are fast friends. I imagine it helps that Alexander did well by himself in the Germanies and so needs not be a drain on my legitimate sons’ patrimony. If I’ve a piece of advice for younger men, it’s to see your by-blows are well-found.”
“I’ll take that on board, not that I’ve any I’m aware of,” Campbell grinned. He was, especially measured against the older baron, a very young man. Twenty-seven at last birthday, and near ten years married—a loving match with four children already—there was still plenty of time for him to be indiscreet. “And perhaps it’s as good a way to introduce the subject as any. Did you hear rumors that this Finnegan is recruiting vagrants as a posse to attack your house?”
“More than rumors,” Mackay affirmed. “I’ve people who gathered it direct.”
“Aye, so perchance you’ve begun to prepare?”
“As well I may, we being watched and all. I’ve stable-lads and footmen a-plenty, and coin to pay their ruffian friends and relations to stand by for a month or two. And Major Lennox, that has become a fast friend to the family, has friends in plenty among the returning veterans of the German wars. Should it come to conclusions, Finnegan and whatever trash he sweeps up will be roughly used.”
“Well, there I can add some hands to make light of the work, since my Lord Montrose spoke with me this morning.” Campbell shifted uneasily in his seat. “But that’s the thing. I’m as keen to do right by my fellow-man as anybody. And heaven forfend I should miss a chance to have so illustrious a clan as the Mackays obliged to me—”
“—as I’m sure we would be, in mine own person at the very least,” Mackay put in, with a grin. Having a care with Campbells bearing gifts was an imperative that left mere warnings about Greeks as, at best, guidelines.
Campbell snorted at the interruption, doubtless as aware of his clan’s reputation as any man. More so, for it affected his every dealing outside his clan for good or ill, and in no small measure. “Aye, that’s by-the-by. What brings me here hot-foot is the implication of Montrose’s action in charging me with this part of the peace of this town.”
“He’s made it official?”
“As may be. No particular names o’ no particular national character were named, but he made it clear that if he were rid o’ a particular turbulent Irishman he’d not take it much amiss.” Campbell’s face turned gloomy as he spoke the words.
“Montrose realizes the full import o’ what he’s doing?”
“More than likely. I think Cork must have given him some small insult, and Jamie’s a prickly wee bastard when he’s a mind to be. And it’s plain as day he’s had no end of foolish orders to carry out from the king. I think he’s setting his heels for a good run of pigheaded obdurate awkward Scotsman for the benefit of my lord Cork. Who, let us remember, is entirely English for all he holds an Irish title.”
“I don’t doubt there’s been some correspondence between them over Finnegan’s tomfoolery, not least this mummery that he’s a justice in lawful cold trod. I’ve not met the man myself, but the history of him is littered with grievances and grudges. Ireland’s the native soil of the man’s spirit, if not his body, I think.”
Campbell laughed out loud at that. “All of the Erse and the Scots are cousins under the skin, fondly though the lowlanders would like to forget it. And don’t think that in my person as MacCailein Mor I don’t know it in my very bones. The feuds within the Campbells are only a little less fervent than those without. And I suspect that that is how Jamie thinks that this will work. Only I’m no idiot. Did my lord Reay mention I’ve been in correspondence with him?”
“He did not,” Mackay said, although he’d deduced as much from the general tenor of the letters his clan chief had sent.
“Aye, well, there’s nothing agreed between us except for the general principle that we’re all for the common wealth of Scotland. So, taking note that you’re well-found for defense, I’ll simply have a band of stout laddies nearby against trouble. And I ask only that you inform my lord Reay that I’m asking nothing in return. Really nothing, not some subtle, roundabout Frenchified way of asking for something in particular. It so happens that I rather fancy the notion of administering a glove across the face of my lord Cork, albeit by proxy. Whatever Jamie Montrose wants by way of silence north of the Tweed, I want more of it by way of meddling Englishmen kept out of it.”
Mackay nodded.
“It is more or less only today that I can visit with you, and this briefly,” Campbell said, rising to his feet again. “And I shall take my leave with only this: I can read future histories too.”