Clandara (43 page)

In the flickering light the maid looked up at her.

“For nearly seven years I've lived in this place among these cursed people,” she muttered. “There's no fear in my heart, only thankfulness to God that we will soon be free, and not without a proper vengeance!”

“Vengeance,” Margaret said, “is all I care about. I want to see him die and I want to see his face as our men make free with his daughter. I want to walk among the ashes of Clandara … After that I've little care for what becomes of me.” She smiled, a ghastly, drawn smile, and gave the girl a little push.

“Go! I'll watch by the window for you.”

Down the long stone corridor Jean went, protecting the candle flame from draughts, her felt-soled shoes making no sound; down past the door where members of the Earl's household slept and on down the sweeping staircase and through the Great Hall. One of the Earl's hunting dogs was lying by the grate, and as she passed it raised its head and, recognizing her, went back to sleep again. It was easy to open one of the doors into the courtyard from the servants' quarters. They were not even bolted at night, and she left the candle on a ledge half hidden in the wall. The night outside was as bright as day, and the enormous silver moon hung overhead in a sky which glittered with stars. A very light wind blew, chill but not strong, and it bent the tops of the bushes as she turned through the courtyard and into the garden at the back of the Castle. This was where James Macdonald of Dundrenan and Katharine Fraser used to walk, holding each other's hands, their heads close together and their pace the gentle gait of lovers to whom time was of no consequence. Jean used to watch them, full of disapproval, hating to see the son of her chief consorting with a woman from the Fraser clan, jeering at the wedding and listening to the jealous outbursts of her mistress. Her heart was hard with hatred for her enemies; there was no pity in it now for the woman who had proved her love for James Macdonald and was so soon to see him face to face. Jean had overcome her scruples. She did not intend to stand and gloat like the Countess.

She went through the garden and up to the high wall; a little to the left she found the north postern gate. When that was opened her part was played. The honour of her mistress and her own duty were satisfied; she did not wish to see what happened afterwards. Being Frasers, the way in which her people chose to kill them did not interest her. As for the English – she glanced behind her towards the dark mass of the stables where the Captain's troopers snored among the hay. It was more than likely that the Macdonalds would bolt them in and then set the stables on fire. From what she had heard of their treatment of the Highland families in the district it would be no more than they deserved. She lifted the iron bar with both hands, straining a little, and then gently eased it upwards and out of its sockets. It was heavy, but not in any way beyond her strength. She propped it against the wall, well out of reach of the gate so that when it opened the bar would not be knocked over. She tested the gate-handle and it opened easily. She had a quick glimpse out over the well-lit countryside, with the distant loch shimmering at the foot of the hill, and then shut the gate again. If the Countess's message had reached them in time, somewhere out there her people were creeping on the Castle; the idea made her shiver suddenly. If they were out there, every Fraser and every Englishman at Clandara would be dead before dawn. Jean had only a brief knowledge of the Bible and she could not read or write; the saying she knew best was that dark promise of the Old Testament – “An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth”.

The Frasers would pay very dearly for strangling James Macdonald's messenger and burning Kincarrig in their vengeance for Lord Robert's death. They would pay for not joining their prince, and for every beating inflicted on the Countess by her husband. With a sense of justice and excitement, Jean went back to the Castle to report to her mistress that she had done as she was told. There was nothing for them to do then but wait.

James had ordered his men to tether their horses among the trees on the loch shore. Each man tied his mount, and then wrapped his plaid tight round his chest, and with dirks and daggers in their hands, they began the ascent up the hill towards the Castle. They moved like shadows in the bright moonlight, taking what cover they could among the scrub bushes and the uneven places on the ground. But there were no sentries on the castle walls and no lights in the turrets or the outer wall. Half crouching, half running, James brought them to the base of the thick stone wall, the same wall beneath which their ancestors had beaten themselves in vain two hundred years before while the Red Fraser defied them from within and starved his hapless prisoner to death. But this time there would be no siege; James waved his arm and the Chief and his brother came up close behind him,

“Where is this gate?” Sir Alexander said.

“Twenty yards farther on,” James answered. “Wait here, Father, and keep the men with you while I go forward and see if it is open …”

The old man gripped his arm. “No,” he said. “Let David go. You wait with me. We will go in together, James.”

They waited, lying flat and close against the wall, while David crept round the base and disappeared. James did not look at his father. He felt nothing; his emptiness was so intense that he moved by instinct. He might have been leading an attack on any house where the English troops were quartered. Not until he was inside and the sword in his hand leapt at the first strange face he saw would he allow himself to think that he was at Clandara and that Katharine was asleep behind those walls. David came back, slipping fast along the ground.

“It's open. Margaret kept her word.”

Sir Alexander looked behind him at the waiting file of men. He raised his arm and they began to run quickly forward. They went through the gate so swiftly that in less than five minutes every man was inside the wall. The Chief looked round him; weapons shining in the moonlight, the Macdonalds clustered round him like a pack of wolves. He smiled a fierce smile at his eldest son.

“Lead us, James. You know the way in. And David and you, Douglas, have your daggers ready. Cut the throat of the first man or woman you see, but be silent about it. They shall have no warning until we're right among them … Ready? Follow me!”

James led them the way he knew the best, up through the garden and on to the walled terraces where he had often walked with Katharine, past the small summer-house where he had waited for her so long ago, with his wild plea for forgiveness for the crime Hugh had committed. Memory returned to him; the dumb and empty sense of hatred vanished and his pain and jealousy swept over him like fire. Here where he passed, with his kinsmen padding like animals behind him, here he had held her and gone on his knees to beg her pardon. The powerful muscles in his belly knotted at the thought of that tense and frightened body yielding suddenly in his arms, of the fierce withdrawal and the stinging blow she gave him.

“Why are you hesitating?” An angry whisper reached him and he turned to see his father's eyes upon him, full of cruelty and suspicion.

“There is the door leading into the Green Salon,” James answered. “From there we will be in the heart of the house. I'll open it now.”

It was latched, but not locked, and they stepped quietly inside.

“Beyond this door is the passage leading to the Great Hall,” James explained. “Behind the screen there are the kitchen quarters. Let twenty men go down there and put every one to the sword. Another ten go out of the Great Hall by the main door and across to the stables. Like as not that's where the English troopers are. Bolt the doors fast.”

“Gather what wood and straw you can find and set them on fire,” Sir Alexander added. “Cut down any of the dogs who break out through the flames. David, that will be your task. You take ten men and give our English friends a little roasting. The rest of us will go with you, James, and give our attention to the Frasers in the Castle. Where are their sleeping apartments?” he demanded.

“Upstairs,” James answered. “On the floor above this; that's all I know.”

“Ach, we'll find them,” the old man muttered. “We'll find where they're lying, and their friends the English officers. And such an awakening we'll give them! Come on!”

Captain Booth was dreaming. It was a confused dream in which he was pursuing a fleeing Rebel, and the figure grew and diminished as the chase went on, sometimes so large and close that it was within reach of his sword which then became too heavy to lift, or else so small that it became a running dot which he could not catch up with; just when the quarry came close again it suddenly turned and looked at him, and as he raised his sword once more the face he saw was that of Katharine Fraser, her red hair streaming in the wind, her mouth wide open in a terrible scream. It was the scream which woke him, and it came from below where some of the women servants had escaped into the Great Hall and were being caught and murdered by the Macdonalds. The screaming rose and fell, and as he sprang out of his bed, still dazed with sleep, groping for his pistol, the door of his room burst open and a man with a blazing resin torch rushed through it, his bearded face and matted hair illumined in the red light. Captain Booth never had time to fire his pistol at that face because another figure leapt at him and plunged a foot of steel into his middle. He gave a choked shout, half of warning, half of pain, and then he was stabbed again and again until his white nightshirt was soaked in blood, and the clansman with the torch shouted that he was dead, and the men ran out in search of other prey.

Farther down the corridor his two ensigns managed to make a fight of it. They fired their pistols into the doorway and one of the Macdonalds dropped with a yell; the rest jumped over his body and fell upon the two young Englishmen who defended themselves as bravely as they could against half a dozen attackers. They were lucky, like the Captain, for they died very quickly and were spared the agonies of Sergeant Brewster and his troopers who were roasting to death in the locked inferno in the courtyard, while David and his men stood guard outside, shooting at the twisted faces which appeared at odd moments at the windows and firing regularly into the blazing doorways to drive back the desperate men who tried to escape through the roaring flames.

Angus died in the quarters below, one hand under his straw mattress searching for his dirk; he had no time to find it. A blow from a broadsword killed him instantly. Somewhere in the Castle a clock struck four; the chimes were lost in the tremendous uproar which told of the arrival of James and his father with their men among the private quarters of the Castle. They did not catch the Earl unawares; he had awoken at the first sound, and hundreds of years of ancestral experience told him exactly what had happened. Unlike Captain Booth, he was ready when they found his room, and he went for them, sword in hand, and behind him his steward appeared from an inner room, also armed, and a bitter fight developed. Out into the corridor Clandara forced his two assailants, and, since they were ordinary clansmen and unskilled at indoor fighting, he killed one of them and wounded the other. There were blazing torches everywhere; some of the wall hangings had been set alight, and through the smoke and glare he saw the plaid and sett of the Macdonalds as they swarmed through the rooms, some engaged in hand-to-hand fighting with members of his household, others pursuing unarmed servants. And then the short, thick figure of Sir Alexander Macdonald came towards him down the corridor, his dirty plaid wound round his arm, the dirk in his left hand gleaming and the sword ready in his right.

They shouted together, the two mortal enemies, with their hatred burning their souls, and they met like tigers.

At the foot of the stairs at the end of the passage the Countess of Clandara stood in her yellow gown, with a branch candlestick held high in one hand, watching the slaughter and calling out directions to the Macdonalds.

“Through that door on the right there – the piper's boys sleep there!”

The three boys in their teens fled yelling from the Macdonalds, and the Countess held her candles higher and laughed aloud. It was she who cost the Earl his life. He was fighting Sir Alexander like a madman; they circled each other, lunging and parrying, and already there was a wound in the Macdonald's left arm where his enemy's point had ripped through the plaid in a stroke aimed at his heart. No one interfered in that combat between the two chiefs, and it might soon have ended with the death of Sir Alexander, except that Margaret Clandara came down the steps to watch. It was the movement of her yellow dress, seen in a flash as the Earl made a parrying movement, that distracted him for that vital second and took his attention off his enemy. And that was when Sir Alexander ran him through the chest. The last thing the Earl of Clandara saw before he died was the smiling and triumphant face of his wife bending over him. Very deliberately she spat on him. The old man stood watching her, leaning on his sword. His chest was heaving and the plaid round his arm was turning dark and wet from his wound.

“I wanted him to see her die,” she said slowly. “I wanted him to watch while our men took their pleasure with her, and then you could have killed him.” She looked down at the dead man and frowned. One hand touched the shoulder of her gown. There was a scar there, made by his riding whip, which all Jean's skill had failed to heal.

“It was too quick,” she said. Sir Alexander glared at her; she looked strange and mad in the flickering light, standing unmoved as his men ran past her, shouting and laughing. Some of them were looting the rooms and the bodies. He looked round for his son James, and saw him coming down the corridor towards him, his reddened sword in his hand, half a dozen clansmen close behind him.

“Be content,” the old man said to his cousin. “We've no time for rape and torture. It will be light in two hours, and this place will be a grave. I'll burn it as those swine burnt Dundrenan. James!”