these were the hundred pikemen of the king's guard, under Sir Patrick Gray and Sir Thomas MacLellan; and high over all this array towered the castle rock, crowned by its old enceinte, or wall of defence, and its bastel-houses, in the three greatest of which, to wit, the Royal Lodging, King David's Tower, and that of the constable, originated the heraldic triple-towered fortress which, from time immemorial, has formed the arms of the city.
As Douglas and his train approached, bombarde, moyenne, and culverin thundered from the ramparts; loud and shrilly twanged the trumpets and horns, and the great crowd assembled in the narrow street made an immediate and simultaneous movement towards the guarded archway.
When the earl's train came near, the quick eyes of the chancellor, as readily as those of our lover, detected the absence of the countess and Murielle. Gray could scarcely repress his anxiety and natural surprise at a circumstance so unexpected; but the chancellor bit his nether lip with vexation, for Margaret, as heiress of Galloway, was the second head of that mighty house which he had sworn to humble for ever. Then a strange smile flitted over his usually impassible face when next he missed the sardonic visage and stealthy eyes of James Douglas, earl of Abercorn.
"Traitor lordling," he muttered, "thou too, in time, shalt dree thy destiny!"
At the distance of thirty paces from the gate the earl of Douglas alighted from his horse, and relinquishing the bridle to a page, advanced bonnet in hand towards the chancellor, who also dismounted, and approached in the same manner, while all present who were not men-at-arms also quitted their saddles, or as the abbot of Tongland says in his MSS. "lichted down."
They greeted each other with a cold formality, over which Crichton, the elder by many years, and the more politic, endeavoured to spread the shallow veil of friendly warmth and courtly dissimulation.
"Welcome, lord earl, most welcome; or shall I say, duke of Touraine?"
"I am prouder of my father's name of Douglas than of any foreign duchy, Sir William," replied the haughty boy as he presented his hand with cold politeness. "Here I am but a Scottish earl."
The chancellor bowed, and stifled his indignation, for in this reply three things offended him; the earl's avowal of family pride, addressing him plainly as Sir William instead of lord chancellor, and then presenting his hand gloved– a token of mistrust.
"And this young gentleman," began the chancellor, —
"Is my brother Lord David Douglas," said the earl.
"Most welcome too; but the countess, once the Fair Maid of Galloway," said Crichton, with a bland smile; "will she not grace our young king's board to-day?"
"The king's grace, and you, Sir William Crichton, must hold the countess, her sister, and likewise the Lady Ormond, excused to-day; the ways are rough and the journey long from Thrave to Edinburgh."
"True; but the measure of – of my happiness (he had almost said vengeance) will be incomplete without them."
"There are Douglases enough here to supply their places," said the earl, glancing at his mail-clad followers with a significant smile; and Crichton said, —
"Enter, lord earl, the king's grace and the regent await you in the great hall."
After each declining to precede the other, the wily chancellor, while making a sign previously agreed upon and understood by James Achanna and Romanno of that ilk, constable of the garrison, gave a hand to each of the brothers, and led them within the gate.
There was an immediate rush among their rough and tumultuary followers to press in after them, but the king's guard and the chancellor's vassals, with levelled pikes, bore back alike the excited multitude of citizens and the wild Scots of Galloway, bare-kneed and bare-armed, with their habergeons of jangling iron rings, and the strong barrier-gate was closed with haste and difficulty. Lord Ormond, Sir Malcolm Fleming, Sir Alan Lauder, and a few others, in virtue of their rank, being alone permitted to enter.
This coup was the more easily effected, as at the moment of the earl's entrance Douglas of Pompherston, his purse-bearer, cried "largesse! largesse!" and to add to the incidental popularity of his lord, scattered several handfuls of silver coin among the people, who scrambled in pursuit of them, and rolled over each other in heaps, while the reckless young earl and his brother laughed and threw more, to increase the uproar and merriment.
Then the portcullis, a massive iron grille, was lowered slowly down in its stony grooves, and when its iron spikes reached the causeway, James Achanna, the double tool of Abercorn and the chancellor, exchanged with the latter one of those deep and rapid smiles by which courtly villains can read each other's hearts and convey a volume of subtle thoughts.
Unheeding, or unobservant of all these circumstances, the earl and his brother accompanied the chancellor into the fortress, and as they slowly proceeded up the steep steps and winding path, which led in a north-westerly direction, to the summit of the rock, Crichton expatiated on the joy this meeting occasioned him, as being the precursor of domestic peace, of good will and unity, between his master the king and the great house of Douglas; but while speaking he could perceive the haughty young peer exchanging secret smiles with his brother; so, nothing daunted, the chancellor continued to flatter, and secretly smiled in his turn.
"Great as the house of Douglas has been – "
"Is, my lord," interrupted the earl, haughtily.
"Pardon me," stammered Crichton, reddening with anger to find himself thus addressed by a boy; "I was about to say, that in ages past, its chief glory was ever in its obedience to the crown, from whence its greatness and its honours sprung."
"Well?" observed the boy-noble impatiently.
"Enemies have accused you of treason – "
"Yourself, for instance, Sir William."
"True – as first officer of the crown," continued the chancellor, with a severity that increased with the bitterness that grew in his heart, "I have blamed you deeply and frequently; but this day will free you of all those suspicions which that unwise embassy to France occasioned."
"Sir William Crichton!"
"I am a man four times your age, lord earl," interrupted the chancellor, speaking very fast to avoid explicit or excited answers, "so pray excuse my grey hairs if they permit me to assume a monitory tone and venture to yield advice. I would but pray you to execute justice on your vast estates of Galloway, Annandale, and Balvenie with impartiality and gentleness; and not to protect from the just vengeance of the king, our lord and master, those lawless barons who levy feudal war and destroy each other's towers, villages, and territories, and by so doing impoverish the realm and oppress the people. Disobedience to the king has been the ruin of the most ancient and noble families; thus, I would pray you, my lord, to content yourself with the splendour attained by your house, and the glorious name it has borne for ages in peace and in war, nor seek to raise it above that throne in defence of which so many of the Douglas name have died in battle. Ave Maria! If you would surpass your king in anything, let it be in religion, in bounty and charity to your countrymen; surpass him thus, and I, whom you have long deemed your enemy, will pray with my latest breath for the glory and prosperity of the lordly line of Douglas, and that Scotland may long have cause to remember with joy the vigil of St. Catherine."
To all these remarks, which so well became the station and superior years of the chancellor, the petulant young earl disdained to reply, save by a cold and disdainful smile or so forth; and as Crichton concluded, they found themselves in the banquet-hall of the castle, and in presence of the king and the regent of Scotland.
CHAPTER XII
THE BLACK BULL'S HEAD
Edinburgh castle, town, and tower,
God grant ye sinke for sin;
And yat even for ye black dinour
Erle Douglas gat therein. —
The hall in which this banquet was given, was the upper chamber of David's Tower.
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