“So you mean—?”
“I mean that any man well enough paid to take part in a plot like this would take more money without thought to kill an ongoing threat to his paymaster. And Tidwell, through no fault of his own, has become such a threat.”
“No more than the others, surely?” My question earned me a pitying look from my uncle.
“Infinitely more, Jamie. We know Tidwell. That’s why he’s dangerous to Graham. The others are unknown. They could be anyone, anywhere.”
“So what must we do?” Will asked, addressing all of us.
“We must find a way to deal with this disgusting Graham fellow.” Lady Margaret’s contribution took everyone’s attention, and I am sure no one missed the emphasis she placed on her opening word. “You, on the other hand, dear nephew, must leave here until we have done so.” She whipped up a warning hand to cut off Will’s protest before it could be formed. “Do not argue, William. Your life is in danger, and we have no hint of the identity of the possible assassins, any one of whom could kill you from concealment at any time. And so you will leave here, for a time at least, and let us deal with this serpent Graham. We will put an end to him through his employer, as soon as his lordship returns. The Bruce will not tolerate such treachery among his people. Until then this Graham will no doubt think himself safe, with Tidwell gone, since he dare not ask questions that might point to his involvement and he knows nothing of what transpired while you were in Glasgow. And thinking himself safe, he will come after you again. But by then you will be far from here, in the south with Ewan, who has always wanted to visit Selkirk Forest. That was Ewan’s idea, and your uncle believes it to be a good one. I am not so sure, but I am prepared to accept my husband’s judgment.”
Will, from being unwilling to budge, was seduced instantly by the prospect of losing himself in the forest with Ewan, subsisting there on their own merits and unbeholden to anyone. Of course, it did not escape my attention—nor perhaps anyone else’s—that the route to Selkirk and the great southern forest led directly past Lanark, and Mirren’s home in Lamington was less than a good spit away from there.
Dinner that night was remarkably sombre, and although I was itching to know what Bishop Wishart had wanted to talk to Will about, I hesitated to bring the matter up when no one else did. Immediately after dinner, however, Sir Malcolm took Will away to talk to him alone, and I suspected that he, too, had the same curiosity but had not wished to air the subject openly at table. I stayed awake for a long time that night, waiting for Will to return to the room we shared, but at length I fell asleep, and he did not waken me when he sought his own bed.
3
“Are you ever going to tell me what the Bishop wanted you for?” It was early the next morning, and I was in the stable yard, helping Will brush down his horse, brushing the right side of the sturdy animal while he worked on the other. This was not the fine animal he had ridden on his previous journey, for this time he would be travelling through the lawless territory of the Selkirk Forest, where a fine horse would have been too much of a temptation to flaunt. So his mount this time, like Ewan’s, was a stocky Scots garron, the hardy, shaggy, sure-footed breed native to the North.
Will’s face appeared over the garron’s back, gazing at me with troubled eyes. “He’s in love wi’ me, Jamie,” he said in a deep, sombre voice. “He wanted me to do terrible, unnatural things, and my immortal soul’s in peril. I’d tell you what he said, but I’m feared to scandalize your priestly ears.”
I felt horror rise up in me, but then I saw the leering grin flash out.
“Whoreson,” I spat, and threw my horse brush at him. “You could burn in Hell for saying things like that.”
“The Devil isna ready for me yet, Jamie,” he said, bobbing back up, his grin wider. But then, within a heartbeat, he sobered. “He wanted to talk. To me,” he said in the scholarly Latin he had grown to love as a student. “Don’t ask me why, because I can’t tell you, any more than I could before. Not even Uncle Mal could tell me why. But that’s what he wanted.”
“To talk … Well, he’s wanted that before, for the same reasons, whatever they may be. And what did he want to talk about this time?”
“About this English business—the growing numbers of them and their reasons for being here. He’s worried that there’s more to what we’re seeing than what we’re seeing, if you know what I mean.”
“And? Did you tell him you agreed with him? That you think the same thing?”