Just Beyond Tomorrow Read online

  “There is but one woman in the hall, my lord, and so I assume ’tis she to whom ye refer. She is nae wench, but the lady of the castle. I will tell yer brother that ye are here.” He gave the Duke of Lundy a small bow and withdrew.

  Charles Frederick Stuart stared hard at Flanna. “The lady of the castle?” His look was perplexed.

  “I am yer brother’s wife, ye randy devil!” Flanna snapped.

  “Since when?” Charlie Stuart was having difficulty absorbing this.

  “Almost two months,” Flanna replied.

  “Well, I’ll be damned,” came the laughing reply.

  “Ye certainly will if ye continue in yer bad behavior,” Flanna told him sharply. “Do ye always enter a house and grab at the women ye find there? Ye ought to be ashamed of yerself, sir!”

  “Not all the women in the houses I enter are as tempting as you are, madame,” he told her with a mischievous grin. “I did not know Patrick was planning to wed.”

  “He wasna and neither was I,” Flanna said, “but circumstances intervened, and here we are.”

  “Does Mother know? I saw her several months ago, but of course she would not have known then. Circumstances? Are you with child, then, madame, that my brother decided to make an honest woman of you?”

  “Ye’re insulting, my lord,” Flanna said. “I was nae wi’ bairn when yer brother married me, but I hope I will be soon. Glenkirk needs an heir, and I intend to produce one as quickly as possible. I know my duty, my lord.”

  “Where did you come from, madame?”

  “I am the only daughter of the Brodie of Killiecairn and the heiress of Brae, sir,” Flanna told him proudly.

  “God’s blood!” the Duke of Lundy replied. “Killiecairn is a rustic backwater as I remember it from my days here at Glenkirk.”

  “We live simply at Killiecairn,” Flanna said with understatement. “Are ye always this rude, my lord, or is it just because ye’re English and think yerself superior to the Scots?”

  “Madame, I surely did not mean to give offense,” the Duke of Lundy began hastily.

  “Then, ye are merely careless and thoughtless in yer speech?” she asked him sweetly.

  “God’s blood, madame, you are as prickly as a thistle,” he responded. “I swear I did not mean to insult you. I am just very surprised to learn Patrick has taken a wife and none in the family know it. Why the need for secrecy if you are not with child?”

  “There’s nae secret about our marriage, my lord,” Flanna said stiffly. “Perhaps ye noticed the snow as ye came our way? Today is the first time in weeks the sun hae shone. Besides, what difference should our marriage make to yer family?”

  “Charlie!” Patrick Leslie came into the hall. “Welcome back to Glenkirk, big brother! What brings ye here at this terrible time of year? I see ye hae met my bride. Is she nae a beauty? Do ye note her hair? ’Tis the same color as my ancestress, Janet Leslie, who hangs over the fireplace. Look! Do ye see it?”

  “Does Mother know? She did not seem to when I left England in November,” Charles Frederick Stuart said by way of greeting to his brother.

  “Nae yet. The weather has been too poor to send a messenger south. Besides, I dinna know the political situation and hesitate to risk the life of a Glenkirk man,” Patrick answered. “When did ye leave Queen’s Malvern? And more important, why? Mother went down into England for the express purpose of making certain none of her bairns involved themselves in the king’s war, although now wi’ poor King Charles dead, ’tis a moot point, is it nae?”

  “King Charles II will be crowned at Scone on the first of January,” the Duke of Lundy announced.

  “King of what?” Patrick said scornfully.

  “Scotland, first. Then England and Ireland,” his brother replied. “He arrived in Scotland last summer.”

  “I know,” Patrick said. “And then came Dunbar, Charlie. Father died at Dunbar. To what purpose, I ask ye? So the royal Stuart has a crown upon his head again. I dinna gie a damn, big brother! He’ll nae be able to live much longer alongside his bigoted Covenanter masters, I guarantee ye. He’ll bolt soon enough and leave Scotland to survive as best it can. As for England, to hell wi’ the English as well!”

  “God’s blood, you’re bitter, Patrick!” the Duke of Lundy said.

  “Aye, I am. I miss Father, and I miss Mother as well. She would be here but for the Stuarts. They cause trouble for the Leslies of Glenkirk and always hae. But why are ye here, Charlie?”

  “Wine, my lords?” Flanna had busied herself as the men spoke.

  “Am I forgiven, madame?” Lundy asked as he took a goblet.

  “I will consider it, my lord, but I suspect ye will take a bit of getting used to. Ye’ll be staying the night, I assume.”

  “Aye, and my children, too,” the Duke of Lundy said quietly.

  Flanna looked startled, but before she might speak, Patrick said, “Your children? What has happened, Charlie?”

  “Bess is dead. I had to find a safe place for my children, Patrick. They are no longer safe in England, I fear. For one thing, my wife’s family are not Anglicans any longer. They would steal my sons and daughter from me, raising them to be as joyless and as narrow-minded as they are. I cannot allow that. It isn’t that I care one way or the other as to how a man worships. Did not our Lord Christ say that there were many mansions in His father’s house? Common sense would dictate that if there are many mansions, there are many roads leading to those mansions. Let each man follow his own conscience. I hate this bigotry over religion!”

  “How did yer wife die, Charlie?” Patrick remembered his sister-in-law, Elizabeth Lightbody, the Earl of Welk’s daughter. She had caught his brother’s roving eye when she was but sixteen and Charlie twenty-six. While her family had looked askance at Charles Frederick Stuart’s birth, they had also, with a more practical eye, noted his wealth, his estates, his title, and his closeness to the king, his uncle. They had managed to overcome their qualms and allow the marriage. It had been a very happy one.

  “She was shot by one of Cromwell’s troopers,” the Duke of Lundy replied. “I was away for the day in Worcester. It was one of those raiding parties Cromwell uses to put fear into ordinary folk. Worcester is, of course, a royalist town. Cromwell’s troopers occasionally raid the outlying estates and farms. They burst into the house and shot Smythe, my majordomo, who attempted to restrain them. When Bess ran forward to protest, they shot her, too. She died instantly, I am told. Autumn survived by remaining silent. She killed the trooper who shot Bess, but that’s another story. They looted the house of what they could find, which was not a great deal. We had hidden and buried everything we could several years ago when all this began. We will regain it when this rebellion is settled. As they left, they torched the house.”

  “They burned Queen’s Malvern?” Patrick was shocked. This had been his mother’s home in England as a girl, his great-grandparents’ house. He had spent many a happy summer there as a child.

  “It’s damaged, especially the east wing, but I will restore it one day when I can go home again. The servants I settled with their families upon the estate. They will watch over the house while I am away. My children I have brought to you, Patrick. Will you shelter them for me? They will not be much trouble, for they are good bairns.”

  “Of course we will take them,” Flanna said before her husband might speak. “Where are they, my lord? Surely they hae nae been out in the cold all this time? Fetch them in at once!”

  “Biddy,” the Duke of Lundy called, “come into the hall and bring the children, please.” He turned to his sister-in-law. “Biddy,” he explained, “is the children’s nurse. She was Bessie’s nurse, too.”

  A small, plump woman of indeterminate years came forth now. With her were three children. The youngest she carried in her arms. The two others were a girl and a boy. They looked both tired and frightened.

  Flanna’s heart contracted. “Ah, the poor bairns,” she said. “What a terrible time for them. Come by th
e fire my wee ones and warm yerselves.”

  Charles Frederick Stuart smiled softly. His brother’s bride had a good heart. “These are my chicks,” he said. “Sabrina is almost ten, Freddie is seven, and Willy is three. And, of course, this is our good Biddy, without whom none of us can survive.” He smiled at them, then continued, “Children, this is my brother, your Uncle Patrick, and his bride, your Aunt Flanna. They will shelter you and look after you while I am gone away to help the king.”

  “But, Papa, we do not want you to go away,” Sabrina Stuart said, with tears in her amber eyes. She clung to him.

  “I shall not go until you are well settled, Brie. The king is not due in Aberdeen for another two weeks. By then Glenkirk will be as familiar to you as Queen’s Malvern was,” her father promised.

  “We’ll hae ponies for ye to ride, lassie,” Patrick Leslie told his niece. “Ye like to ride, dinna ye?”

  “Why do you speak so oddly?” Sabrina asked him.

  “I’m a Scot, lassie, nae an Englishman. Ye’re in Scotland now,” he answered. “Ye’ll get used to it shortly.”

  “I want my mother,” Freddie Stuart said in a woeful tone.

  “Mama’s dead, you dunce! The wicked soldier shot her,” his sister reminded him. “She has gone to heaven to live with Jesus.”

  “I don’t want her to live in heaven with Jesus,” Freddie now wailed. “I want her to live with us! Why won’t she come home?”

  “Because she won’t,” his sister told him grimly.

  Flanna knelt so she might face the little boy. “Do ye know how to use a longbow, laddie?” she asked him.

  Wordlessly, he shook his head.

  “I do,” Flanna said. “Would ye like me to teach ye?”

  “Could you?” Freddie was intrigued with this red-haired lady with her appealing talent who smelled so good. Mama hadn’t even let him have the little sword his cousin, Prince Henry, had sent him on his last birthday.

  “I can,” Flanna said. “Tomorrow if it doesna snow, or rain, we’ll hae the butts set up in the courtyard and begin our lessons.” She turned her head to Sabrina. “I’ll teach ye, too, if ye like.”

  “I never knew a lady who could shoot a longbow,” Brie said, equally fascinated with her new aunt.

  “Well,” Flanna told her with a chuckle, “I’m just learning to be a lady, lassie; but I’m nae one yet, and I shoot a longbow verra well.” She stood up and chucked the baby beneath his chin. “And ye, wee Willie, we’ll teach to sit a pony come the spring. Now, however, we must get these bairns fed and tucked into warm beds. Ye’ve come far.” She turned her attention from the children, calling out, “Angus, where hae ye gotten to, man?”

  “I am here, my lady,” the majordomo said, coming forward. He bowed to the two gentlemen. “I hae already spoken wi’ the housekeeper, my lady. We are preparing rooms in the east tower for the bairns. I’ll take them to the kitchens to be fed wi’ yer permission.”

  Flanna nodded, then turned to her guests. Biddy’s eyes were enormous as she took in Angus, and the children looked frightened again. “Angus will nae harm ye, my bairns,” Flanna said. “Like yer Biddy, Angus came wi’ my mother when she wed wi’ my da. He helped to raise me. Now he has come wi’ me to Glenkirk. He is my friend as well as my servant. Ye must rely upon him for anything ye need. He will take good care of ye, I promise.”

  “Thank you, my lady,” Biddy said, still looking somewhat doubtful rather than reassured.

  Freddie, however, had regained his voice. He looked up at Angus and asked him, “How tall are you?”

  “Seven feet high, laddie,” came the reply.

  “What is it like to be so big?” Freddie persisted.

  Reaching down, Angus lifted the little boy up into his arms. “Like this, laddie. What do ye think?”

  Freddie laughed. “I like it!” he shouted, laughing.

  “Take me up, too,” Sabrina cried, and shrieked gleefully as Angus complied with her command.

  “Follow me, Mistress Biddy,” Angus said. “We’re off to find a good supper in the kitchens.” And he marched out with his two new young friends, Biddy hurrying to keep up with him, Willie in her arms.

  The Duke of Lundy turned to Flanna. “How can I thank you, madame? I can see my children will be happy and safe in your care.”

  “There is little to keeping bairns happy, my lord,” Flanna told him. “Now, I must go and make certain the maidservants hae the children’s apartment properly prepared.” She curtsied and left them.

  “Come, and sit down, Charlie,” Patrick said. “I want all the news. Ye dinna come up to Scotland just for yer bairns, I’m certain.”

  The two men sat facing each other by one of the two large fireplaces in the Great Hall. Glenkirk refilled their goblets.

  “How is Mother?” he asked. “When did ye see her last, and why did ye nae leave yer bairns at Cadby with Henry and his family?”

  “Mama grieves deeply for Papa,” Charlie answered his brother. Like all his mother’s offspring by their various fathers, Charles Frederick Stuart, the not-so-royal Stuart who had never known his deceased sire, had called the late Jemmie Leslie Father, for in truth his mother’s third husband was the only father he could remember. “She has taken Autumn to France along with her faithful quartet of servants, including your Glenkirk man, the one married to Toramalli. I do not think he misses this Highland lair of yours at all.”

  “Is there any danger of Cromwell’s soldiers attacking Cadby as they did Queen’s Malvern?” Patrick queried his elder sibling.

  “Nay, I doubt it. That was why I brought my children to you, Patrick. Henry has been very careful in avoiding the appearance of favoring any faction at all. If I had brought my chicks to him, he could have become a target for the fanatics. Like all of us, Henry was disgusted at the old king’s execution, but he saw the bigger picture. One day all the horror will be over, and the young king restored to his rightful place. If the Lindleys of Westleigh are to survive until that time, they must remain impartial. That is Henry’s way, and I, too, espoused it despite my close ties to the royal family. I, however, was always suspect because of those blood ties. When Bessie was slaughtered, I knew I could not stand idly by any longer. I had to choose sides, and so I declared for the king. My children could make me vulnerable, Patrick. Here at Glenkirk they are safe, for there are few in England who know my extended family. You, brother Patrick, in your splendid isolation, will keep my children secure and unharmed. Mama knows where her Stuart grandchildren are and will not worry now.”

  Patrick nodded, sipping his wine slowly; then he spoke. “And ye will be doing what, Charlie, while I watch over yer young offspring? What rashness are ye planning? The Scots parliament keeps a tight rein on young Charles Rex. Did I nae hear ye tell yer daughter that the king would be in Aberdeen in two weeks? Why is he coming to Aberdeen?”

  “We need to recruit an army, Patrick,” Charlie replied. “If England is to be retaken from the rebels, we must have an army.”

  “Ye’re mad! Did nae Father’s death teach ye anything, Charlie?” the Duke of Glenkirk angrily shouted at his brother.

  “The Scots would have never lost the battle of Dunbar if General Leslie hadn’t, in his overwhelming pride, brought his troops down from the hills where he held the advantage and camped them directly in front of the English lines. Did it not occur to that pompous old trout that the English, being desperate, might attack first? England is in the grip of a monster. People have had enough. A strong army to retake it, and the king will be welcome home once again!”

  “A Scots army, ye bloody fool!” Patrick said angrily. “Do ye really believe that an invading Scots army will rally the English to Charles Stuart’s side? Two Stuart kings hae nae eased English fears of an invading Scots army! When they see all those men in their plaids, banners flying, bagpipes skirling, coming at them, the English will rise up to drive the Scots back, nae run out to greet them wi’ hymns of joy and welcome. For two generations the Stuarts hae been th
ought of as foreigners by the English.”

  “That was because King James and the first Charles were born in Scotland. This Charles was born in St. James’s Palace. He is English-born, and the people loved him when he was their prince. They have not changed, Patrick. They love him yet. They have had enough of Cromwell, his brutal soldiery, and the psalm singers who would purge our church of its liturgy, its bishops, and its worshipful joy,” Charlie finished passionately.

  “I dinna disagree wi’ ye, Charlie,” Patrick said, “but ye canna restore the young king to his English throne wi’ a Scots army. The English will nae hae it. Ye may even hurt the king’s cause.”

  “He wants to go home,” Charlie said softly. “Bessie was killed in late September. I came north in mid-November. We have been with the court, if you can call it a court, ever since. The Scots parliament has virtually cut the king off from his true friends, banishing them from his court. Their clerics preach at him day and night. Do you know what they told him after Dunbar? That the Scots’ loss was the fault of the royal Stuarts because they had not accepted the National Covenant sooner. Because they persisted in clinging to their Anglican church ways instead of leading the nation into the path of Presbyterianism! The only reason they brought him to Scotland and will go down into England with him is that they hope to bring their religion with them and enforce it on all the English.”

  Patrick shook his head wearily; then he said, “Do ye recall the stories Mama used to tell us of our grandfather, the Grande Mughal, Akbar? That he invited all faiths to his court and allowed them to speak freely. Catholics, Anglicans, Orthodox Greeks, Protestants, Jews, Muslims, Hindus, Buddists, Jains, Zoroastrians. Any and all religions he encountered, he brought to his court at Fatehpur Sikri. For years he listened as they fought and argued wi’ one another over whose faith was best, was the true faith. And in the end he founded his own religion which he practiced, having taken what was best from all the others. And he forced no one to accept his faith, nor did he forbid any their particular form of worship. When I see what is going on about us, Charlie, I can easily understand our grandfather’s reasoning.”