Footsteps echoed down the corridors of Tantallon Castle in East Lothian. It was a very important echo for a very important man, with a very important message. Servants darted out of the way to let him pass, for the triumphant look on his face attested to the fact that he was not to be trifled with. Not this day, not now.
He stopped at the closed door to the solar, and gave a sharp rap.
“Is that you, Grant?” came a voice from within.
“It is I, Yer Lordship.” Grant opened the door to find George Douglas, the fourth Earl of Angus—also known as the Red Douglas—seated at a writing desk composing a letter.
“Well?” he said, without stopping.
“It is done, My Lord. They’ve escaped.”
“What of our messenger?”
“They’ve let him go unscathed—or near enough, at any rate. He’s completed the delivery of our agreement to the king that Albermarle is to be executed. Of course we ken it is now too late. But the important thing is that His Majesty doesna suspect yer involvement.”
“That is good. Send word to the lad’s mother that he shall return to her safe and sound. That bloody woman’s been at the castle every damned day asking after him. Let us put her heart at ease, shall we?”
“Of course, My Lord. I shall tell her myself.”
“And make sure MacLellan stays close to the castle from now on. Minimal patrols, and no travels. If those Douglas rebels and their supporters get wind that he was our creature all along, and no’ one of theirs, it will no’ bode well for him if he’s found out to have been a spy.”
“But surely if they learn he was spying for them, and no’ on them. Why, Yer Lordship’s plan to send a spy into the Black Douglases’ midst was sheer genius. I mean, for the Good Lord’s sake, ye were on their side, really. How else would ye have kent how long ye could delay giving in to the king’s demands?”
“One would think that would be the case,” the Red Douglas allowed. “But I dinna trust them to see that it was to their benefit in the end.”
“Ye’re right,” Grant agreed. “Of course ye are. Those Black Douglases, well, they may have been well organized, but they never could have pulled off that rescue wi’out yer invisible hand. Ye are to be commended.”
The earl frowned, warning Grant that he had gone too far in his flattery—he often did. But he still had one more thing to say.
“My Lord—I ken ’tis no’ yer fault. No’ any of it. We all ken yer hand was forced. Ye had to bend to His Majesty’s will sooner or later. Ye held out as long as ye could. And dinna blame yerself for what happened at Glen Craggan. Agnew may be yer man by virtue of blood, but he acted on the king’s orders, no’ yers.”
When the Red Douglas’s hand stilled, Grant thought he’d crossed a line, spoken in too familiar a way. But, in a rare, unguarded moment, the Red Douglas turned in his chair to look at him.
“’Twas no’ right, what His Majesty did to Lord William Douglas. I dinna care what was going on, or what he thought was going on, or any of the bad blood between the Crown and the Black Douglases. To murder him as he did, then throw him from a window— Well, ’twas the ultimate insult. And as to James Douglas, who calls himself the ninth earl, he turned out to be the snivelling coward I always kent he were. But Albermarle didna deserve to be the object against which the king’s wrath was leveraged. Edward were always an honorable man.”
“He is an honorable man,” Grant affirmed. “And wi’ yer help, he shall continue to be so.”
The Red Douglas pondered this for a brief time. Then, with a wave of his fingers, he dismissed the man and went back to his letter.
Grant backed out of the chamber and left the Red Douglas to his thoughts. Pray that one day those Black Douglases would know how much they had been helped by His Lordship. The Red Douglas had done much by risking his own standing with the king and delaying Lord Albermarle’s execution. It had given the Douglases just enough time to get themselves together and see their plan through.