The Betrayal of Maggie Blair

Chapter 28

We didn't set out for Dunnottar the next day or even the day after, because that night Tam fell ill. I couldn't rouse him from his pile of rags in the morning. He stared up at me unseeingly, his cheeks sunk, his lips cracked, and his tongue as dry as a piece of felt.

"Old fool," Mistress Virtue said crossly, standing with her hands on her hips as she looked down at him, while I knelt on the floor, anxiously holding one of his hot, trembling hands. "He'd better not die on me. I should never have taken the pair of you in."

But she pulled some old dried herbs from a niche in the cellar wall and made up a concoction with them. I expected her to mumble spells as Granny would have done, but she only held the bad-smelling mixture to Tam's lips. I was surprised to see how patiently, even tenderly, she helped him to sip, though all the time she was muttering, "Stupid old Tam. Daft old man. You think you can get around Virtue, but you can't."

When the beaker was empty at last, she noticed me watching and stabbed a finger at me.

"What are you staring at, miss? There's not much I don't know about him. He's done more sinning than half the prisoners in the tolbooth, but he's more of a saint than all your prating Presbyterians."

"I—yes, I know," I said, taken aback.

"Well, get on with it," she said, rising to her feet with a creak of bones.

"Get on with what, Mistress Virtue?"

"If you want to stay here till he's out of the fever, you'll have to earn your keep. Get up to the pump and fill these buckets. There's washing to be done, in case you hadn't noticed."

I hardly stirred from Mistress Virtue's dreary cave for the next two weeks, except to run up the wynd to the pump on the High Street to fill her buckets and carry them down to her cellar again. My back ached every night, and my arms felt as if they'd been stretched by inches, but the pains of my body were nothing compared to the worries in my mind. What was happening to Uncle Blair? Was he still alive? How were they all managing at Ladymuir?

At least after the first two dreadful days, I could feel easier about Tam. Whether it was Mistress Virtue's remedies, or the rest he so badly wanted, or his own willpower, he came back from what had seemed like the brink of death. At the end of ten days, he was sitting once more on a stool by Mistress Virtue's fire, drinking too much whiskey and spinning outrageous stories, accepting her scoldings with meek nods of his head.

***

In the end, it wasn't even I who got us on the road at last, but Tam himself.

"If I stay another day in this airless hole, I'll turn into a goblin," he whispered to me at the end of the second week. "I feel like a worm that's been too long under a stone."

We set off the next morning. There must have been more money in the purse that Tam had stolen than I had realized, because Mistress Virtue grunted with surprised gratitude when Tam pressed a yellow coin into her hand.

"And there's to be no more skulking about on the moors and mosses on this journey," he told me proudly as we walked, at a slower pace than usual, down the road out of Edinburgh toward the port of Leith. "We've no need to hide now. Presbyterians aren't so hot and strong over in Fife, and the soldiers won't be so keen to know everyone's business. And, anyway"—he patted the pocket of Uncle Blair's coat and winked at me—"we've money enough to pay for our food and our beds, like gentlefolk."

I can't remember much about our slow progress to Dunnottar, only that I burned with impatience to hurry on, but often had to wait for Tam, who was still too weak to walk fast or go far in a day. It was already after the middle of July. The road, which must have been churned to a bog of mud in the winter, was thick with dust. It blew uncomfortably into our eyes in the east wind. There were many travelers going in both directions, mostly peaceful folk on foot, like ourselves, but an occasional troop of soldiers clattered by on horses. The first time I saw red coats, I dived down into the ditch at the side of the road, expecting Tam to do the same, but to my surprise he stood boldly in full view to let them past and even waved his bonnet.

"Weren't you scared?" I panted, scrambling back up the bank to join him.

He shook his head, unconcerned, and I was shocked to see how crumpled he looked, how worn and bent, with his old sharpness and springlike quickness gone.

He took my arm to lean on as we walked on.

"You think of them as enemies, Maidie, but every one's a mother's son. Think of that. Every one of them. A mother's son."

I was so irritated by his tolerance that I dropped his arm and hurried on ahead, and it was at the top of the next rise that I caught my first glimpse of Dunnottar Castle.

I had never seen, or could ever have imagined, a place so wild and cruel and desolate. I know that it was God's hand that had, in the days of creation, thrown up the mountains and poured forth the sea, but surely it must have been the Prince of Evil who had vomited up this vast black rock and cast it away from the land. It reared up out of the creaming waves with only one narrow spit connecting it to the land. And it must have been the sons of Satan who had chosen this place on which to build their castle, piling massive walls of stone above the edges of the rock, and making the only entrance at the bottom so steep and narrow that no one would dare to approach it. Even the screams of the gulls and kittiwakes circling around the dank black ledges were more mournful than any birds I had ever heard before.

Perhaps they're the souls of the damned, I thought with a shiver, or of poor prisoners who've died here.

Tam had caught up to me by now. He looked at the castle, then sat down heavily at the side of the road. He looked pale.

"Are you all right?" I said, worried by how ill he looked. "Is it the sight of the place? It scares me, Tam."

"Scares you, aye. It puts the fear of death into me."

"What do we do now?"

"We sit here for a moment so that I can get my breath back. I'm tired to my bones."

I felt guilty.

"I'm sorry. I shouldn't have hurried on. I shouldn't have made you come at all. You ought to be resting still."

He patted my knee.

"Time enough to rest in the grave, darling. I'd rather be out in the open, anyway, breathing the good air, than stifling to death in poor old Virtue's dungeon."

I was still feeling bad and defeated as well.

"I've made you hurry here and worn you out. And all for nothing. Look at this place. However could I get my uncle out of there, assuming he's still alive even? It's useless, Tam. We might as well go back to Edinburgh."

His lashless old eyes, red and sore from the dusty road, opened with astonishment.

"Go back? After we've traveled right across Scotland? Before we've even tried to find him? What are you thinking of, darling? When did Tam ever let you down? When did he ever fail to find a way?"

"It's true, you've been wonderful, but—"

"Did I or did I not get you out of the tolbooth in Rothesay under the nose of Donnie Brown?"

"You did, but—"

"Who got you in through the city gates of Edinburgh without a pass?"

"I know. It was you. But—"

"Who whipped you out from under your granny's nose that time when you broke her jug and she was going to beat you black and blue? Who hid you, till she'd calmed down, eh?"

I had to laugh. "I thought she was going to murder me."

"Not as much as I'll murder you if there's any more talk of giving up and going back to Edinburgh. Here, help me with this strap."

He was struggling to take off the sack that contained his bagpipes.

"What are you doing now?" I asked, as he removed the pipes lovingly from the worn old bag. "You're not going to play them here?"

"It's just what I'm going to do, girl. A lament. For the poor souls in that horrible place. Music solves many a problem. It'll make things happen. You'll see. And it'll help me clear my old head and think straight."

He stood up, walked across to the edge of the cliff, which fell away in a sickening drop to the crashing sea below, and put the chanter to his lips.

"No, Tam!" I cried, running after him. "There are soldiers down by the gateway. They're looking up at us. They'll hear you. They'll come and get you."

But it was too late. He had filled the bag with air, and the first notes of his wild, mournful lament were already echoing back to us from the grim rock walls. The music was so sad, so piercing and beautiful, so lonely and grand, that the breath caught in my throat and I stood unable to move.

Can you hear it, Uncle? He's playing it for you, I thought.

The path that ran from where we stood down to the castle entrance was so steep and winding that most of it was hidden, so neither of us saw the two men coming up it until they were right in front of us. I stepped back, my heart pounding in fright.

They were a savage-looking pair, their hair long and rough, their leather jerkins open in front, their legs bare from the knee down and streaked with mud. I stepped back, nearly stumbling over a stone, but Tam played on regardless.

To my relief, the men didn't seem interested in me. They stood listening to Tam, frowning with concentration. Tam finished his lament on a sudden cut note, and the echo died away from the castle walls.

"He's a good piper, isn't he, Wully?" said one.

"He is that. Play us a jig, Granddad."

I could see that the effort of playing was making Tam even more exhausted. He gasped for each breath needed to fill the bag, and sweat beads formed on his dreadfully white face, but his fingers flew over the chanter holes as fast as the feet of scampering mice, and the tune was so lilting and catchy that the two men began to hop about, and even I, scared as I was, couldn't stop my foot tapping.

When at last the jig was finished, one of them took Tam by the arm.

"Come on," he said. "You're just the man we need."

Tam gently shook him off.

"Hold on, son. What do you want me for?"

"We need you in there." The man lifted his chin toward the castle. "Our stupid piper went so hard at the bottle he fell halfway down the cliff. Broke his head and his right arm. He'll be weeks mending. The Earl Marischal needs piping into his dinner, and the lads are down without a note of music. There's not even a fiddle in the whole lousy place."

"Well," said Tam, with a show of reluctance that made me hide a smile, "I don't know. What terms would you be offering me?"

"Terms?" They both burst out laughing.

"A drafty old hayloft to sleep in," said one.

"Your food, and it's not bad either. There's meat every day and venison sometimes."

"And we won't throw you off this cliff."

There was a pause, as the menace of this threat sank in.

"Plenty of whiskey. It's good stuff too."

Tam grinned with what I could see was real pleasure.

"Now you're talking, lads. But I'm not going anywhere without the lassie."

Both men turned in my direction, and I felt hot at the way their eyes crawled over me.

"She's my granddaughter," Tam said hastily, "and if any harm comes to her, I'll play 'The Unlucky Soldier.' Last time I had to do it, the plague struck the camp within the week. I felt bad about it, as a matter of fact. Twenty. Dead. In days."

The tune of "The Unlucky Soldier" was a new one to me, as I was sure it was to Tam, but the two men's mouths had fallen open, and they were looking at Tam with respect.

"It's a deal," one of them said. "We'll warn the boys. The girl's not to be touched. They'll find a job for her in the kitchen."

And so Tam and I walked boldly under the portcullis, through the archway, past the throng of guards, and into that fearsome place as easily as if we'd walked out onto the beach at Scalpsie Bay. I looked back when we were through the entrance, across the narrow land bridge, and up the cliff beyond. It had been almost too easy, getting in. It might be much harder getting out.

There were steep steps rising from the gatehouse. Halfway up them, Tam stopped and clutched at my arm for support.

"It'll end here, Maidie," he said hoarsely.

"What will end? What do you mean?"

He seemed to give himself a shake. "Your search for your uncle! He's here, I'm sure of it. Admit it, darling. Clever Tam got you in here as easy as a flying bird."

I squeezed his arm and smiled, but a knot of dread was tightening my throat.

"I do admit it. I can never manage anything without you."

He gave me a quizzical look, then struggled on up the steps.

It was easy to forget, once you were inside the castle, the terrifying rock on which it stood. The enclosing walls surrounded dozens of buildings, so that it felt almost like a town. There was a noble-looking keep and grand lordly houses, stables, pigsties, hen coops, workshops, open grassy spaces, stairways, passageways, and men everywhere. Some, in their shirtsleeves, were going in and out of the bakers and cellars and kitchens. Some, in leather aprons, were shoeing horses at the forge. Many, in soldiers' gear, were leaning against doorways, yawning and picking their teeth. There were men mending cartwheels, men sawing timber, men carrying baskets of fish on their heads.

I lost sight of Tam almost at once. He was borne off toward a beefy sergeant, who clapped him so hard on the shoulder that the old man nearly fell over. One of the soldiers who had brought us in told me to follow him to the kitchen.

I hesitated, scared of being separated from Tam.

"Follow him if you like," jeered the man. "But it's only whores who go into the barracks."

I blushed and hurried after him, lost at once in the maze of passageways that led to the kitchens, which seemed to be on the farthest side of the castle, facing out to the open sea. My eyes darted everywhere, but I saw no sign of a prison where a large number of people could be held.

A huge man came out at a call. He was naked to the waist and wet with sweat. He frowned at the soldier's explanation but nodded in the end. He pointed to a corner where I was to put my bundle and told me to follow him.

The heat from the roaring fire and gaping bread ovens nearly knocked me over, but I had no time to get used to it.

"Peel that lot and chop them up," the man said curtly, pointing to a huge stack of onions. For the rest of the day, I was kept hard at work with no break to eat or drink. But a kitchen isn't a bad place if you're hungry, and I managed to sneak an oatcake or two, and even picked a few scraps from the carcass of a roasted chicken before it went into the stockpot.

The kitchens were full of people working furiously under the eyes of the mountainous chief cook, but no one asked me about myself or exchanged any words except for curt commands.

"There's a new piper. That's his granddaughter," I heard someone say. "Till old Angus's bones have mended."

"That'll be the day," a scullion said with a sniff. "The man's going so hard at his bottle that his bones'll be liquid before they grow back together."

My heart sank.

We might have to stay here forever, I thought. If there's no other piper, they'll never let Tam go.

I didn't dare ask anyone about the prisoners. The clatter and bustle in the kitchen was so great, anyway, that the talk was all in snatches. I heard a bit about the Earl Marischal's tempers and whims (he seemed to be the hardest of taskmasters), and some cursing over the countess's little dogs (though she seemed to be a kinder sort of person), and the soldiers' appetites (which were unreasonably huge, according to the head cook), and the poor quality of the rabbits delivered from the Marischal's mainland farms. But there was not one word about Presbyterians or Covenanters or prisoners.

Perhaps they're not here at all, I thought. Perhaps we've come to the wrong place, or they've been taken somewhere else.

And then, as the afternoon began to end and the light through the narrow windows began to dim, I was sent on an errand to the storeroom at the far end of the kitchen. The door into the passage beyond opened, and a servant came in. He brought with him a stench so appalling that I rocked back.

"Bah! Close that door!" bawled the master cook.

"What is it?" I dared to ask Agnes, a thin, pimply girl, who had smiled shyly at me once or twice as she'd hurried past and was now reaching over me to fill a pot with salted herrings from a barrel.

"Don't you know? It's coming from the prison."

"What prison? Who's in there?"

"The Presbyterians. The Covenanters. There's nearly two hundred of them. They're all crammed into a little cellar. There's not even space for them all to sit down. I know they're wicked, and against the king and all that, but I feel sorry for them really."

My heart had begun to pound.

How dare you call them wicked! It's the king who's wicked! I wanted to say. But I bit my lip and asked instead, "Have you seen them? Have you talked to any of them?"

She looked shocked.

"Why would I do that? They're traitors! I couldn't, anyway, even if I wanted to. There are soldiers guarding the door all the time. The only window's at the back, right over the cliff, and it's really small."

The door opened again, and the stink made me retch.

"Why does it smell so bad?"

Agnes had clapped her hand over her mouth and nose, and I could hardly make out her words.

"Nowhere in there for them to do their—you know. Been locked up for weeks, and they have to do it where they stand. Serves them right, I suppose, but it's disgusting when you think about it."

"But they must be getting sick! They must be dying!"

I was trying to stop my voice from rising in distress.

She shrugged.

"They do bring bodies out sometimes. I've seen them. Pah! I can't stand this stink any longer."

She had filled her pot with herrings and hurried back into the kitchen.

Then, above the banging of cooking pots, the shouts of the cook, and the ever-present crash and suck of the sea on the rocks below the kitchen windows came the sound of singing. It was a faint sound, tremulous, mournful, and full of longing.

"Lord, from the depths to thee I cried,

My voice, Lord, do thou hear!"





Tears pricked my eyes as I recognized a psalm, which I had sung so often on dark winter evenings and in the last blush of summer nights at Ladymuir.

"I wait for God, my soul doth wait,

My hope is in his word.

More than they that for morning watch,

My soul waits for the Lord."





"You! Girl! Come back here!" came an angry yell from the kitchen, but as I hurried back into the blistering heat, I felt a new certainty. Uncle Blair was close by, I was sure of it. And though thick walls of stone and armed guards stood between us, I would find a way to carry out my promise to reach him and give him help.

***

The chance I had hoped for came that very evening. The grand people in their stately rooms above the kitchens had had their luxurious supper of roasted beef and smothered rabbits, and the soldiers, servants, and workmen had gobbled down hearty stews and mounds of bannocks. The day's work in the kitchen was done, and it was time for the cooks and scullions to eat.

I made a sudden decision.

"Where's the latrine?" I asked the skinny girl. "I need to go."

She jerked her head toward the entrance to the kitchens through which I'd come.

"Up there, then down to the right."

I took a few steps, saw that her back was turned and hesitated, as if I was confused. No one was looking at me. I slipped down to the far end of the storeroom and opened the door into the passageway, biting my lip at the creak of the heavy hinges. The stench was so awful that I was afraid I would be sick, and I was glad I hadn't yet had supper, as I might have lost it all. To my left, I could hear men's voices and guessed they were the guards. To my right was an archway, and beyond it, in the near darkness, I saw the white crests of waves rolling in from the sea to break thunderously on the rocks.

The prison has a window, the kitchen girl had said. It's right above the sea.

I was lucky, I suppose, that the light was now so bad, because if I had been able to see the sickening drop, I might not have had the courage to set out along the little ledge that ran between the castle wall and the cliff edge. It was just wide enough to walk along but crumbling in places, and a single false step would have sent me hurtling down onto the rocks. I came at last to the window, a small, square hole at the height of my shoulders. The walls were so thick that I had to peer in to see anything. But then something white and living moved inside it, startling me so much that I nearly took a disastrous backward step. It was only a face, a man's face, pale and gaunt, the eyes wide and staring. He looked more terrified at the sight of me than I was of him.

"Please," I said, "are you one of the Presbyterians?"

"I have that honor." He licked his dry lips. "Are you an unearthly being? Have you come with more mockeries to torment us? I say unto you, get thee behind me, Satan!"

"No!" I looked back along the way I had come, scared in case my voice could be heard. "I'm looking for my uncle, Mr. Hugh Blair of Ladymuir in Kilmacolm. Is he here?"

Two other faces squeezed beside the first to look out through the small space. I heard interest and even excitement ripple back through the dense mass of humanity, and I could sense rather than see the close-packed crowd of bodies inside.

"Who is it?" voices said. "A girl? What's she doing out there? She's asking for Hugh Blair? Where are you, Hugh? Come over here. There's a lassie asking for you."

The displacement of bodies inside the vault stirred the foul air, and it poured out of the window in a nauseous cloud. And then Uncle Blair was suddenly, unmistakably there, inches away from me, and though his lower face was covered with a beard and his head had become as thin as a grinning skull, I knew his eyes and his voice as he cried out, "Maggie! Dear girl! Are you real or a dream? Oh take care! Don't step backwards. There's a terrible drop behind you."

I heard a heavy door crash shut in the castle, and with tense fingers I fumbled for the coins that I had kept and carried so carefully for this moment. I thrust them through the bars.

"What's this? Where did this silver come from?"

"From home. From Ladymuir. Ritchie borrowed it from the laird. I came to give it to you."

He gave a shaky laugh.

"The Lord heard my prayer and answered me in my distress. There are poor souls here, faithful to Christ, in more severe trouble than I am. This will go some way to..."

"No, Uncle, please!" I spoke too sharply, scaring myself, and lowered my voice again. "I came here for your sake, and for the family at home." I couldn't bear to think that this precious money might not help Uncle Blair after all. "I—I risked everything to come here. This money is for you."

It was too dark to read the expression on his face, but I knew that knots of moral struggle would be creasing his forehead.

"It's time to move on, Hugh," came a quiet voice at his shoulder.

"I must go back in, my dear." Uncle Blair's hand reached out, and for a moment our fingers touched. "We must take turns to breathe at the window, or we suffocate. My brethren have already been too patient. I will use these precious coins to buy food, Maggie dear, and I promise I will eat some of it myself."

The pale face of another man took his place, his mouth gaping open, a black hole, sucking in the few precious gasps of fresh air. Behind him came a murmur of voices.

"Your uncle wishes you to know," the man at the window said, "that your coming has cheered him like a shaft of light direct from Heaven."

He moved, and the next man stood at the window. There was more murmuring behind him.

"How are his wife and the children? He has been tormented by fears for them."

"They're well," I whispered. "Ritchie borrowed enough from the laird to pay the fine. They're managing."

Another face appeared.

"Your uncle wants to warn you that you're in great danger if the enemy discover that you came here as our friend. Others who have done so have been thrown in here with us."

"Tell him," I said, "that I'll be safe. The piper Tam brought me. They think I'm his granddaughter."

I wished at once that I'd held my tongue. Uncle Blair wouldn't like to know that a lie had been told.

But the next man, having listened to the voice behind him, said simply, "Your uncle thanks you from his heart. He will call upon the Lord to help you and see you safely home."

Another door banged somewhere behind me, and voices came floating out from the passageway. I edged back along the ledge, ran through the arch into the passageway, and made it almost to the door that led back into the storeroom.

"Hey! You!" shouted a rough voice. "Where do you think you're going?"

A guard hurried toward me, and I caught the glint of a dagger in his hand.

"I'm sorry," I said hastily. "I'm new here. I work in the kitchen. I'm looking for the latrine."

"Up there," the man said, pointing behind him. Then he peered closely at me through the gloom. "Don't come this way again."

"I won't."

He put out a hand. I was afraid he would grab me, and I slid past him and ran on up the passage.

Back inside the storeroom, I stood against the door for a long moment, my eyes shut. The horror of what I'd seen had shaken me so much that I was trembling uncontrollably.

He can't survive much longer. He looks like a corpse already, I thought. And I can't help him any more.

"There you are!" Agnes had come in search of me. "Got lost, did you? Took me ages when I first came to find my way around. I kept some supper for you. You'd better come and eat it quickly, or they'll clear it all away."