Yet because I needed advice and had none to give it, I rode one day to Edinburgh to see Maister Robert Bruce. I found the whole city in an uproar. There was the beating of drums in all the streets and closes, and a great multitude of the common folk crying out 'For God and the Kirk!' Pikes danced merrily along the causeways, and good wives' heads were thrust through all the port-holes in the windings of the stairs. Their voices, shrill and vehement, kept up a constant deafening clamour, each calling to her John or Tam to 'come awa' in oot o' that,' or bidding them 'not to mell wi' what concerned them not.'
'What concern is the glory o' God o' yours—you that is but a baker in Coul's Close?' I heard one wife cry to her man, and it seemed to me a mightily pertinent question.
At last, after many inquiries, I heard how the Minister of Edinburgh had bearded the King, so that he was gone off to Linlithgow in great indignation, and how that in a day or two Maister Robert Bruce would either be King of Scotland or lay his head on the block.
Yet the minister was in his study chamber when I went to seek him, reading of his Bible and writing his sermon, as quietly as though there had been no King in Scotland—save, as it might be, the King in whose interest he had so often bearded King Jamie Stuart, sixth of that name.
Robert Bruce looked up when he saw me.
'Ah, Launcelot,' he cried, more heartily than ever I had heard him, 'ken ye, lad, that you are likely to be at the horn for communing with a wild rebel like me?'
'To be "at the horn" is no uncommon thing in Carrick,' I replied, 'and makes little difference either to the length of a man's life or the soundness of his sleep. I have been at the horn ever since I was eighteen years of my age.'
'Well, Launcelot,' he said soberly, 'so it has turned out even as I said. I know—I know. It is not in man that walketh to direct his steps. But I saw ye were all "fey" at Culzean.'
Then I told him the purpose of my coming all the way to Edinburgh to see him.
'What!' he said, 'ye have never come so far only to have speech of poor Robert Bruce, that was yesterday Minister of Edinburgh, and to-day is, I fear, doomed to lay his head on the hag-clog?'
I told him it was even so, and that, being the man of wisest counsel I had ever known, I would have gone ten times as far to have his friendly advice.
'Ay me,' he said sadly, 'wae is the man that has such a rumour and report of wisdom, yet cannot counsel himself what he should do in his own utter need.'
But, for all that, he went over everything that had happened in Carrick, with a clearness most like that of a lawyer when he sets in order his case before the judge. Then he sat a long while silent, with his finger tips drumming idly upon his writing.
'So Bargany is dead,' he said at last. 'He was the only considerable man of his own faction. Who is there to succeed him?'
'But a child!' said I, 'one that plays with puppets.'
'As do we all, Launcelot,' said Maister Bruce, smiling on me.
'And after him in that faction, of his own house and kin who comes—?' he asked.
'There are none besides the Tutor's murderer, Thomas of Drummurchie, and Benane his brother, but he is a deboshed man and of no account,' I made answer, not seeing his drift.
'Who leads them then—?'
'John Mure of Auchendrayne is their only considerable man, and he has waxen great and greater within these months.'
The minister nodded his head and sat still as one that considers all sides of a question.
'And of you that stand by the gold and blue—who remains?' he went on.
I told him but John, Earl of Cassillis, and his brother the Master.
'And in whose friendship is the Master?' he asked.
'In our country of Carrick he has an auld friendship with Auchendrayne, and a good-going feud with the Earl, his brother; but recently he has taken up with the Lord of Garthland in Galloway and married his sister.'
'Tell him from me,' said the minister of Edinburgh, 'to bide close in Galloway and get him bairns in peace. For gin he comes back to Carrick, of a surety his head shall be the next to fall.'
'And why so?' said I.
'Because,' said Maister Robert Bruce, 'John Mure designs that there shall be no power in Carrick nor in the Shire of Ayr besides his own and that of the Earl—till he get time to have him also killed. I tell you Auchendrayne hath the brains of any three of you.'
'And of the treasure of Kelwood, what?' said I.
'That,' said the minister, meditating, 'is a little forth of my province. But, if ye will know, I think it is in the keeping of some of Auchendrayne's tools. And I advise you, ere ye look for revenge, to go seek for it.' I was silent, for I hoped that he would tell me yet more.
'The treasure of Kelwood will lead you to your aim. I think ye will find that the same hands which reft it away are red with the blood of your master. And one thing I am sure of—that within that treasure chest lie your love, your land, and your lordship!'
I asked him what he meant, but he would not tell me more clearly. Only this he said, speaking like them that have the second sight,—
'James Stuart being what he is—a treasure-seeker—and John, Earl of Cassillis, being what he is—a treasure-gripper—if ye find the kist, ye have them both in your hand. And therein (or I am a false prophet) lie, as I say, your love, your land, and your lordship.'
Then I asked him if he had any counsel to give me ere I went.
'Be brave,' he said, 'read your Testament. Tell no lies. Carry no tales. Seek carefully for the man that wears the grey cloak, and then for the man that runs like a beast and carries the knife in his teeth.'
He went to the window as one that has spoken his last word.
'Hear ye that?' he said. 'That is the warrant for my heading.'
There circulated a great crowd of people without, apprentices and suchlike mostly, with here and there among them a decent, responsible man of the trades. They were singing at the utmost pitch of their voices:—
'We'll hae nae mair Jeems Davie-son, Davie's son—Davie's son! We'll gie his loons the spavie sune, Spavie sune, spavie sune, An' the deil may tak Jeems Davie-son.'
'They might as well shear my head at once as sing that song,' said Maister Robert Bruce. 'There is nothing that James Stuart likes so ill as to be called the son of Davie, unless it be the man who upholds the right of private judgment!'
'Ah,' he cried again, 'the Blue Blanket—this waxes serious. I must put on my gown and sally forth.'
Then up the Canon gate there came a great crowd of citizens all marching together and crying, 'God and the Kirk! God and the Kirk!' And in the midst there was borne the famous flag that has ever staggered in the front of a bicker, foretelling storms and the shaking of thrones—the Blue Blanket of the trades of Edinburgh.
Robert Bruce drew his black Geneva gown about him, and taking his little Bible and his oak staff in his hand he went out. As he stood forth upon his step, he was hailed with shouts of joy and rejoicing.
'Hearken Maister Bruce! Hear the minister! God and the Kirk! Doon wi' Jeemie Fat-Breeks!'
And the Blue Blanket wavered and waggled, being borne this way and that by the press. All about the skirts of the crowd, and down the closes angry drums were beating, and a hundred idle 'prentices thundered on great folk's doors and garred the window panes rattle on the causeway—which was a sin when glass was so dear, and to be seen in so few places besides the citizen houses of the great.
'Men of Edinburgh,' cried Bruce, 'hear your minister. Wherefore this tumult? I bid you to depart quietly to your homes. We have a difference with the King, it is true; but let us who are the servants of God and of the Kirk of Scotland settle our own affairs with the King. What is your concern in the matter?'
But the more he spoke of the King the more loud grew the tumult.
'God and the Kirk! God and the Kirk!' they cried, and the Blue Blanket waved higher than ever, being held up by one man standing upon the shoulders of other two.
'Ay, ay, even so; it is a good cry,' said the minister; 'but it would set you better to be a little more ready to obey both God and the Kirk at other times. The most part of you know not for what cause ye are come together. Ye want to roll your minister's head in the dust—'
'No, no!' cried the throng; 'we will keep you safe, or know the reason why.'
'Depart—scatter instantly to your firesides!' cried Bruce. 'And so ye will the better serve the Kirk of Scotland and me, her unworthy servant.'
And with this he motioned to them with his hands, dismissing them. So great was his power that they went, scattering like peet reek on a windy day. In a minute or two there was not one of them to be seen on the street. The minister and I were left alone.
'What think ye, Launcelot? Why stand ye so moody?' my companion said to me.
I told him that I liked not much to tell him; that it was no fitting thought to tell a minister.
'Say on,' he said. 'I have listed to strange speeches in my time.'
'Well then, sir,' I made answer, 'I was thinking what a pity to see so many limber lads with stark pikes in their hands, and nobody a penny the worse! I would to God I had them in Carrick. John Mure of Auchendrayne would hear news of it right briskly.'
The minister clapped me on the back.
'Ah, Launce, it will be a strange Heaven that you win to, unless you mend your ways. Ye are nocht but a wild Carrick savage. But ye maun e'en dree your weird, young Launcelot, and auld Robert Bruce maun dree his. Fare ye weel.'
So we parted there on the steps of his own house. And with that I betook me to horse, and forth through the turbulent city that could yet make so little of its tulzies; and as I went I thought, 'Lord, Lord, for one hour of Gilbert Kennedy and me to show them a better way of it; or even Robert Harburgh. And it would be like capturing Heaven by violence, to enter Holyrood House in the way of stouthrief and spulzie!'
But I only thought these things without intent to do them, for I am a King's man and peaceable—besides which, I had but lately spoken good words to a minister of religion. Nevertheless, what a booty would there not have been in that palace at the Canongate foot! Not that I would lay hand upon a stiver of it, even if I got the chance, but the thought of it was marvellously refreshing, I own.