CHAPTER XXV
THE DOGS AND THE WOLF HOLD COUNCIL
It was a week or two after the date of the great wappenshaw andtourneying at the Castle of Thrieve, that in the midmost golden hazeof a summer's afternoon four men sat talking together about a table ina room of the royal palace of Stirling.
No one of the four was any longer young, and one at least wasimmoderately fat. This was James, Earl of Avondale, granduncle of thepresent Earl of Douglas, and, save for young David, the Earl'sbrother, nearest heir to the title and all the estates and honourspertaining thereto, with the single exception of the Lordship ofGalloway.
The other three were, first, Sir Alexander Livingston, the guardian ofthe King's person, a handsome man with a curled beard, who wassupposed to stand high in the immediate favours of the Queen, and whohad long been tutor to his Majesty as well as guardian of his royalperson. Opposite to Livingston, and carefully avoiding his eye, sat aman of thin and foxy aspect, whose smooth face, small shifty mouth,and perilous triangular eyes marked him as one infinitely moredangerous than either of the former--Sir William Crichton, theChancellor of the realm of Scotland.
The fourth was speaking, and his aspect, strange and ofttimesterrifying, is already familiar to us. But the pallid corpse-likeface, the blue-black beard, the wild-beast look, in the eyes of theMarshal de Retz, ambassador of the King of France, were now more thanever heightened in effect by the studied suavity of his demeanour andthe graciousness of language with which he was clothing what he had tosay.
"I have brought you together after taking counsel with my good Lord ofAvondale. I am aware, most noble seigneurs, that there have beendifferences between you in the past as to the conduct of the affairsof this great kingdom; but I am obeying both the known wishes and theexpress commands of my own King in endeavouring to bring you to anagreement. You will not forget that the Dauphin of France is wedded tothe Scottish princess nearest the throne, and that therefore he is notunconcerned in the welfare of this realm.
"Now, messieurs, it cannot be hid from you that there is oneoverriding and insistent peril which ought to put an end to all yourmisunderstandings. There is a young man in this land, more powerfulthan you or the King, or, indeed, all the powers legalised andestablished within the bounds of Scotland.
"Who is above the law, gentlemen? I name to you the Earl of Douglas.Who hath a retinue ten times more magnificent than that with which theKing rides forth? The Earl of Douglas! Who possesses more than halfScotland, and that part the fairest and richest? Who holds in hishands all the strong castles, is joined by bond of service and manrentwith the most powerful nobles of the land? Who but the Earl ofDouglas, Duke of Touraine, Warden of the Marches, hereditaryLieutenant-General of the Kingdom?"
At this point the crafty eyes of Crichton the Chancellor were turnedfull upon the speaker. His hand tugged nervously at his thin reddishbeard as if it had been combing the long goat's tuft which grewbeneath his smooth chin.
"But did not you yourself come all the way from France to endue himwith the duchy of Touraine?" he said. "Doth that look like pulling himdown from his high seat?"
The marshal moved a politic hand as if asking silence till he hadfinished his explanation.
"Pardon," he said; "permit me yet a moment, most High Chancellor--buthave you heard so little of the skill and craft of Louis, our mostnotable Dauphin, that you know not how he ever embraces men with theleft arm whilst he pierces them with the dagger in his right?"
The Chancellor nodded appreciation. It was a detail of statecraft wellknown to him, and much practised by his house in all periods of theirhistory.
"Now, my lords," the ambassador continued, "you are here allthree--the men who need most to end this tyranny--you, my Lord ofAvondale, will you deign to deliver your mind upon this matter?"
The fat Earl hemmed and hawed, clearing his throat to gain time, andknitting and unknitting his fingers over his stomach.
"Being a near kinsman," he said at last, "it is not seemly that Ishould say aught against the Earl of Douglas; but this I doknow--there will be no peace in Scotland till that young man and hisbrother are both cut off."
The Chancellor and de Retz exchanged glances. The anxiety of thenext-of-kin to the title of Earl of Douglas for the peace andprosperity of the realm seemed to strike them both as exceedinglynatural in the circumstances.
"And now, Sir Alexander, what say you?" asked the Sieur de Retz,turning to the King's guardian, who had been caressing the curls ofhis beard with his white and signeted hand.
"I agree," he replied in a courtly tone, "that in the interests of theKing and of the noble lady whose care for her child hath led her tosuch sacrifices, we ought to put a limit to the pride and insolence ofthis youth!"
The Chancellor bent over a parchment to hide a smile at the sacrificeswhich the Queen Mother had made for her son.
"It is indeed, doubtless," said Sir William Crichton, "a sacrificethat the King and his mother should dwell so long within this Castleof Stirling, exposed to every rude blast from off these barrenGrampians. Let her bring him to the mild and equable climate ofEdinburgh, which, as I am sure your Excellency must have observed, ispeculiarly suited to the rearing of such tender plants."
He appealed to the Sieur de Retz.
The marshal bowed and answered immediately, "Indeed, it reminds me ofthe sunniest and most favoured parts of my native France."
The tutor of the King looked somewhat uncomfortable at the suggestionand shook his head. He had no idea of putting the King of Scotswithin the power of his arch enemy in the strong fortress ofEdinburgh.
But the Frenchman broke in before the ill effects of the Chancellor'sspeech had time to turn the mind of the King's guardian from thepresent project against the Earl of Douglas.
"But surely, gentlemen, it should not be difficult for two suchhonourable men to unite in destroying this curse of thecommonweal--and afterwards to settle any differences which may in thepast have arisen between themselves."
"Good," said the Chancellor, "you speak well. But how are we to bringthe Earl within our danger? Already I have sent him offers ofalliance, and so, I doubt not, hath my honourable friend the tutor ofthe King. You know well what answer the proud chief of Douglasreturned."
The lips of Sir Alexander Livingston moved. He seemed to be takingsome bitter and nauseous drug of the apothecary.
"Yes, Sir Alexander, I see you have not forgot. The words,'If dog eatdog, what should the lion care?' made us every caitiff's scoffthroughout broad Scotland."
"For that he shall yet suffer, if God give me speed," said the tutor,for the answer had been repeated to the Queen, who, being English,laughed at the wit of the reply.
"I would that my boy should grow up such another as that EarlDouglas," she had said.
The tutor stroked his beard faster than ever, and there was in hiseyes the bitter look of a handsome man whose vanity is wounded in itsweakest place.
"But, after all, who is to cage the lion?" said the Chancellor,pertinently.
The marshal of France raised his hand from the table as if commandingsilence. His suave and courtier-like demeanour had changed intosomething more natural to the man. There came the gaunt forward thrustof a wolf on the trail into the set of his head. His long teethgleamed, and his eyelids closed down upon his eyes till these becamemere twinkling points.
"I have that at hand which hath already tamed the lion," he said, "andis able to lead him into the cage with cords of silk."
He rose from the table, and, going to a curtain that concealed thenarrow door of an antechamber, he drew it aside, and there came forth,clothed in a garment of gold and green, close-fitting and fine,clasped about the waist with a twining belt of jewelled snakes, theLady Sybilla.