Читать книгу The Stalking-Horse - Рафаэль Сабатини - Страница 5

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The mention of Glenleven by Invernaion, at breakfast on the following morning, came to give Lochmore pause in his impulsive resolve of the previous night.

It reminded him of all that to which his absence would leave his honour, in the person of her ladyship, exposed, and so reawakened the jealousy that had momentarily slumbered.

The Earl of Lochmore was of those who fail to perceive that a man who can do nothing to deserve his wife's affection, can do nothing to command his own married happiness, and, therefore, for his own sake, were better out of the chafing ties of that association. All that his lordship considered was that at law his countess was his property, and his jealous anxiety to protect her was precisely that which he would have brought to the protection of any other of his chattels.

This feeling, now fully aroused, might well have turned him from his purpose but for the connection in which Glenleven was mentioned. What Invernaion said was that the matter concerned Glenleven as closely as any other Macdonald, and that he should be informed so as to be given the opportunity of collaborating.

"Although he may have faltered in his adherence to King James, it will surprise me if when he hears the truth of this affair he will not be impatient to shake the dust of England from his shoes, and cross the Channel with us."

This made a difference to Lochmore. If Glenleven were to be of the party, he need not go back on his intentions and his word; there would no longer be the need to stay to defend his preserves from the one poacher he seriously feared.

Glenleven was sent for and came promptly. With horror and indignation he heard the true facts of Glencoe, as must any man who possessed a heart at all. In that horror and indignation he shed most of the Whig sympathies which out of expediency he had embraced. But he did not shed them quite all.

Not only was he a Macdonald of Invernaion, but he stood next to Ian in the succession to the chieftainship of the clan. It must seem to follow—and it certainly so seemed to the sluggish wits of Lochmore—that a matter so closely concerning Ian must as closely concern Glenleven.

What Glenleven's shrewd mind first saw was that directly the matter did not concern Ian at all. Vengeance was the business, in the first place, of the survivors of Glencoe, and, in the second place, of some of those Macdonalds who stood closer to Glencoe than did Invernaion. Ian Macdonald's assumption of the mantle of the avenger was fortuitous and emotional: a surrender to the passions aroused in him by what he had witnessed.

He moved Invernaion's indignant amazement by some such observation.

"Does it not concern every man who bears the name of Macdonald? It may move me more hotly because I saw with my own eyes what others have learnt merely from report. But to all Macdonalds alike it must be a clear duty to pull down the man of blood who ordered that infamy."

"You should not need it to be repeated to you, Jamie," said her ladyship in a voice of cold displeasure.

"I did not need it," he was quick to answer. For he coveted her favour above all things, and he instantly realized that for him to remain a Whig in the face of these events was to forfeit all chance of that favour forever. "You mistake me. I commented rather upon the oddness of the circumstances that this should fall on us. For I am with you, Ian, body and soul, brain and arm. It would have needed less than this to have aroused my duty to King James."

"Then you are really with us?" said her ladyship, melting a little from her coolness before this announcement of a sudden conversion.

"Could you doubt it?"

It was Invernaion who answered him.

"No," he said. "For then I must believe you at once without heart and without ambition. Your fortunes, Jamie, stand, I know, none so high. Here is the chance to mend them. It is those who range themselves at His Majesty's side now, in the hour of his need, who will sit beside him in the high places when he returns to his own."

There was a crooked smile on Glenleven's narrow face. "You believe in the gratitude of princes? Well, well! I, who do not, am in this for conscience' sake."

Her ladyship's glance approved him with sudden warmth.

He was brisk and eager. He would accompany them to Saint Germains. He would seek a place in the great army that was preparing to invade England, or he would serve in any capacity which might be discerned for him.

Thus was Lochmore's uneasiness set at rest.

When, however, Invernaion announced that he was for the Romney Marsh that very night, and that he would sail so soon as he could find a boat to put him across, Glenleven was not unnaturally checked. He could not, thus, at a moment's notice pack and quit. Some days would be necessary for the dispositions he would have to make. Either they must wait for him, or else leave him to follow in a few days' time, so soon as his arrangements could be completed. Besides, in those few days he might enlist others: men of substance and position in the country.

"It is not," he explained, "that these few swords can materially strengthen the invading army. But the men who bear them will be of inestimable support to the cause. Their example is one that will have many followers." He mentioned several titled Tories, such as the Earl of Claybourne and Viscount Preston, and insisted upon the effect upon the country of beholding such men in the ranks of the army to be landed. He mentioned even Russell and Marlborough, whom he knew for Jacobites at heart, and who might possibly be brought over definitely now.

Both Invernaion and Lochmore were impressed by his fervour and her ladyship's eyes sparkled at the prospect Glenleven's words unfolded.

"Woe me!" she cried. "That I may not wield a sword beside you; that I am but a woman."

Thus reminded of her womanhood and its troublesome contingencies, Lochmore swung back to his fears, and would have had them wait for Glenleven. But Invernaion would not hear of it. He was all impatience to be gone; and Lochmore, having now committed himself, could not withstand the heat and imperious will of his brother-in-law.

So that very day the twain set out for Sussex and the sea.

Her ladyship's parting kiss to her lord was perhaps the first kiss of real affection that had passed between them since their wedding. He was magnified in her eyes by the mission upon which he went. For the first time she saw him engaged in something that was not concerned with self-indulgence, something that commanded her respect.

To her brother she clung passionately for a moment, thrilled by an alarm for him which had been entirely absent from her embrace of her lord.

"God guard you, Ian," was her fervent whisper. "I shall pray for you, and I shall work for you here. You can depend upon me for that, and for all else. You have but to send me your commands."

He knew that he could so depend upon her. He had a high regard for her intelligence, and he was aware of the strength of her romantic attachment to the Stuart cause. He could desire no better agent in England.

Another agent, nevertheless, he was soon to possess in Glenleven. The Viscount gradually discovered that he had underrated the time necessary for those dispositions that were to be made, and particularly for the proselytizing work which he had announced that he would take in hand. Days grew to weeks, and still his departure was postponed. Finally, by the month of June, he found himself so deeply enmeshed in the business of stimulating active Jacobitism in England that he abandoned altogether—and entirely with Invernaion's concurrence—the notion of crossing to France. He could be far more valuable to King James at home, marshalling the friends of His Majesty, kindling loyalty in some and fanning into a blaze the smouldering embers of loyalty in others, by diligently spreading the true story of Glencoe. He would have, he announced, the nucleus of an army under his hand by the time His Majesty landed in England.

Ailsa Lochmore, observing his diligence, approved him, and, negligent of risks, turned her house into a meeting-place for the malcontents whom Glenleven was industriously assembling and stimulating.

Invernaion, informed of this in the course of the steady if discreet correspondence which he maintained in cipher with his sister, desired her to convey to Glenleven that His Majesty, sensible of the Viscount's diligence on his behalf, commanded him to remain at the post which he had created in London and to pursue the valuable work that he was performing there.

The only one who was not quite satisfied was Lochmore. He was pervaded—and probably not without reason—by a sense that he had been tricked, that Glenleven had never been sincere in the avowed intentions of following them to France. But there were compensations for him. He received civilities at the dour, priest-ridden court of Saint Germains such as had never yet fallen to his lot. He was happy in them because he failed to perceive that he owed them not to any merit discerned in himself, but to the fact that he was Invernaion's brother-in-law.

For Invernaion there had been the warmest welcome. There were too few Scots of eminence in the following of King James that he could afford to treat lightly the services offered by an influential young chieftain whose call would raise a thousand claymores in the day of battle, and who was, moreover, aflame with a holy ardour that would stop at nothing.

Such a man seemed almost sent by Heaven at such a moment. Louvois, that great statesman of Louis XIV, had devised the simplest of all schemes for definitely delivering his master from the anxieties caused him by the pestilential Prince of Orange. It was this William of Orange who held together the coalition that opposed the megalomania of Louis XIV, which would have rendered France the despot of Europe. Even to the genius of William of Orange such a task was not easy. Without him the coalition would fall to pieces, and its component members would lie severally at France's mercy. All that was necessary, then, to achieve this desirable end was William's removal, an entirely justifiable homicide in the eyes of Louvois.

Louvois, however, died before he could arrange for the execution of the scheme. But he bequeathed it, among other treasures, to his son, Barbesieux, who worked it out in detail.

The moment was propitious. William of Orange was in the Netherlands, at the head of the allied army, and at these headquarters would be fairly accessible.

King James was aware of and approved the simple expedient which was not merely to serve the ends of Louis XIV, but at the same time was to open wide, as he supposed, the door for his own return to his throne.

All that was lacking when Invernaion presented himself at Saint Germains was the instrument.

Now considering the risk to be run, indeed the practical certainty, whether successful or not, of being taken and of suffering the horrible fate of Ravaillac, an instrument was not easy to find. No brutal professional murderer or bravo for hire would serve. The task demanded some fanatical zealot on grounds be it of religion, be it of patriotism, who would be prepared to suffer martyrdom; and aspirants to martyrdom have not been common in any age.

Therefore the sudden but timely appearance at Saint Germains of this young Scot, his soul steeped in righteous abhorrence of William of Orange, aflame with the desire to avenge the blood of his kin so mercilessly and treacherously shed at Glencoe, appeared to King James to be a definite sign that Heaven favoured the enterprise.

"On my knees, sire, I beg you to let the task be mine."

A flame flickered in the eyes of the pallid, hatchet-faced monarch, who would, himself, gladly have gone on his knees to Invernaion to beg the service which Invernaion so fervently begged to be allowed to perform.

"Benedictus sis," he murmured, feeling that no lesser language than Latin was worthy of so sacred an occasion. "Accomplish this and rest forever in the certainty of my favour."

Invernaion smiled. "When it is accomplished, sire, I shall be beyond the reach of any favour but God's. I shall look to be remembered in your majesty's prayers."

King James glanced quickly down on him from the high chair in which he sat, a funereal figure, all in black save only for the bright blue ribbon of the Garter. He was about to speak, to rebut the assumption of such complete self-sacrifice. But the calm, smiling intrepidity of the handsome countenance into which he looked gave him pause. This was not one with whom it was necessary or desirable to prevaricate.

The cold, harsh face of the exiled monarch softened in its expression. For once perhaps that selfish marble heart was touched by pity that one so young and eager must be immolated in his sacred cause. But because his cause was sacred there could be no hesitations. He spoke softly.

"For those whose devotion makes for such sacrifice is the Kingdom of Heaven." Having added this to the Beatitudes, he fetched a sigh. "Go now, my friend. Tomorrow you shall have a letter from my Lord Marquis of Barbesieux, who will instruct you." He turned to his minister, Lord Melfort, who, behind his master's chair, was the only witness of the scene. "Go with him, Melfort. See him cared for."

Early on the morrow, however, before the King had written to Barbesieux there came from Barbesieux a letter by the hand of a French officer, named Grandval, which announced to James that the bearer was the instrument sought. He was sent to Saint Germains to receive His Majesty's benediction before setting out for Uden, whence he was to repair to the headquarters of the allies, where William of Orange was to be found.

The dull-witted King was in a quandary. He took counsel alone with Melfort. He was almost peevish.

"Voilà un embarras de richesses," he complained.

Melfort perceived no embarrassment: "A sign," he declared it. "A sign of the favour of Heaven, wearied, sire, by the iniquities of Your Majesty's heretical son-in-law."

The gloomy face of the monarch lighted a little. "It was to have been expected. Yes. I am a man of little faith when all is said, Melfort. But what is to be done? This Frenchman has already received his commission from Barbesieux, and I have promised mine to Macdonald of Invernaion."

"It is plain, sire. Should Grandval fail, you have Invernaion in reserve for another attempt. Should Invernaion go now and fail, you do not know that Grandval will again be available. That clearly indicates the solution."

Thus it was decided; and the French officer was brought back to the royal presence. James proffered his hand to the lips of Grandval. The letter had announced that the officer would have two associates in the enterprise.

"Go with God," James said to him. "If you and your companions do me this service you shall never want."

To Invernaion His Majesty was almost apologetic. But Invernaion's answer relieved the royal distress at disappointing the Scot of the crown of martyrdom. It was an answer that fully confirmed Melfort, and confirmed it almost in Melfort's own words.

"So that it is done, it matters little, sire, whose the hand. Should your present messenger have the mischance to fail, I still remain for this or any other service Your Majesty may command."

His Majesty was pleased with the answer, and thereafter Invernaion was honoured as an aspirant for martyrdom should be honoured by those on whose behalf he is to suffer it. The sun of the royal favour blazed upon him, and lesser mortals in the royal following courted and caressed him. On the other hand, it is eminently possible that jealousy was aroused against him for the favour shown him by a prince usually stingy in the matter. It is also certain that there were traitors at Saint Germains who kept the Government at home informed of what was happening at the court of the exiled king.

Be all that as it may, the fact is that when Grandval failed, betrayed by his coadjutors, and was taken, tried and executed, to the names of his associates published in England was added that of Ian Macdonald of Invernaion.

Thus for the first time did the name of that young Scottish chieftain leap into questionable fame in England. It was to be heard again a few months later, after Steinkirk had been fought and after King William had returned to England, when James Whitney, the highwayman, was caught and put upon his trial.

In an attempt to save his life, the ruffian announced himself privy to a plot to assassinate the King. Some eminent Jacobites had offered him, he swore, a great price to murder the King whilst he was hunting in Windsor Forest. He boldly named some great names, and amongst them was that of Ian Macdonald of Invernaion, who, he affirmed, had crossed from France to make him a specious proposal.

No credit was attached to his word, and no measures were taken against any of those he accused. But it was remembered, and was matter for comment, that Macdonald of Invernaion had been named also in connection with the Grandval attempt.