Costly Truths

‘People will not look forward to posterity
who never look backward to their ancestors.’
Edmund Burke (1729–1797)



In memoriam

David Balfour (c. 1533–1603)
Geillis Jamesoun (c. 1582–1611)



CHAPTER ONE

Early morning, and the wharves at the port of Leith, enveloped in the haar, are as busy as ever. Fishermen are unloading their catch onto the quayside. Carters hurry to and fro between vessels and vaults, laden with wine, whisky, and brandy. Wagons loaded with sacks of grain from the continent are carried to the local mills. Merchants and mariners huddle together clogging the lanes, bargaining, arguing, haggling, before heading off to the taverns to celebrate their deal. The Water of Leith itself, larger than a burn, smaller than a river, has twisted and curled all the way from its rising in the Pentland Hills, passing through gorges and puddocky shallows. Inhabited by trout, flounder, and grayling, eels and loaches, minnows and sticklebacks, its banks are the haunt of wagtails and woodpeckers, dippers and herons. Widening as it weaves its way past villages, mills, and merchants’ houses, at last it reaches the King’s Wark and the Shore, where, higher and more piercing than the creak of the boats and the chink-chink-chink of the running rigging, hungry gulls scream, plummeting to snatch and gobble whatever the traders and fisher-folk let fall.

More accustomed to anchoring at a mooring a little way out, and shuttling cargo and passengers back and forth in small skiffs, the Oosterschelde, a three-masted square-rigger, is being warped towards the pier. The kedging anchor has been dropped and the crew are pushing the capstan bars round, winding the stout rope tighter and tighter, until they reach the quay and the lines can be tied off. It has taken hours, and Will, pacing anxiously on deck, can barely contain his anxiety. The Captain approaches him.
‘It is done, mijn vriend. We kunnen let down your broer nu.’
‘He’s still out. Shall I go first?’
‘Ja. The mennen will fix the lijnen to the, what are you calling it, de brancard? Stretcher, ja?’
Slowly, slowly, the inert form is lowered over the side. The crew, well accustomed to loading and unloading crates and cannon, make it look easy. Will, his eyes fixed on the stretcher, holds his breath, and is startled when someone speaks from behind him.
‘Are ye needing a hand, sir? I’ve a cart here for hire? Take ye and yon laddie to the Trinity hospital?’
Will half-turns. ‘Ach, that’d be grand if you could. It’s my brother.’
‘Dinnae fash yersel. We’ll have him safe there in a trice. Back from yon Netherlands are ye?’
‘Aye. We …’
Will is about to explain, but the carter has darted off, to ensure the crew bring their fragile cargo to the right cart.

Two miles away, wiping her mouth with a damp rag, Geillis Jamesoun tips the foul vomit into the gutter outside the back door, swills out the pail, and replaces it in the corner of the kitchen.
Ugh! This morning sickness is going on and on, she thinks. Isn’t it supposed to have stopped by six months? It did with the others! Mebbe it’s a girl this time and that’s why it’s different. Ah, that’d be nice. Fifth time lucky perhaps?
Pushing her hair behind her ears, Geillis flops with relief onto the three-legged stool by the fire, reaches for a watered-down dram to clear the foul taste from her mouth, and tentatively nibbles on an oatcake. The sweet smoky smell from the peat stack soothes and comforts her. Closing her eyes, she imagines herself back at Ma Mayne’s wooden-framed cottage where she grew up, the uneven texture of the wattle and daub walls, the small movements of the thatched roof, the sounds of the squabs nestling among the rafters, and the chooks squawking in the yard.
Stone may be weather-proof and secure, she thinks, but I do miss the cosiness … and I miss those wee hens … Ach, but there’s no place for a henhouse here at the Tor … aye, and no dinner for me and the boys if I don’t get a move on, and get off to the market!
Glad the battering wind of the past few days has now eased, and tempted out by the prospects of a bargain and a blether the lanes are full of villagers coming through the drab morning. Some hurrying, some dawdling, in ones and twos, in family groups, in gaggles of neighbours, they come along the lanes to the marketplace. No matter the grey skies and the chill in the air, the weekly Restalrig market is like kirk on a Sunday, a ritual not to be missed. Geillis makes her way in the same direction, her shawl wrapped around her plump shoulders, her blue bonnet crammed onto her mouse-brown curls, entirely preoccupied with her worries.
Is my Hendrie safe and well? Does he miss us? Will he come home soon? Is wee Davie settling at school? What scrapes are Jack and Sandy getting into? Is Billy keeping them in order? He’s a good lad, but he’ll be finishing school and looking for work soon. Ach, I hope Hendrie doesn’t cajole him into the army! All Billy wants is to work with horses – he must get it from my dear pa…
With her mind as busy as a hornet’s nest in summer, and her smooth skin pleating into frowns, Geillis fails to see the small signs of spring that surround her, the sparrows fetching bits for their nests, the celandine poking their golden heads through the damp earth, the trees surreptitiously greening. She barely even hears the voices and clangour of the market until she turns the corner into the square.

The morning mist still lingers. It glistens on the grass, beads the cobwebs, and drifts and twines around the bare branches of the trees. Cold droplets fall onto the traders below, busy unloading carts, setting up stalls, putting out baskets. A friendly cluster of alewives banter competitively, leaning on their barrels, sniffing the air. The pungent salt smell from last night’s catch masks the stink of human sweat, sour mounds of excrement, and rotting waste, swirled into heaps by the fierce winds of the past two days. Farmers’ wives stack boxes of cabbages and kale, carrots and onions, balance eggs in precarious piles. The Edinburgh tailors, milliners, and haberdashers display their samples of breeches and bonnets, ribbons and buttons and bows – temptations to lure folk to their shops in the town. A crate of pigeons rustle their feathers and peck-peck-peck against the wicker bars. Old MacMorran halts his wagon, heavy with hessian sacks full of flour from the mills at Leith. Beckoning for a drop of ale, he helps himself cheekily to a carrot for the horse, munched down by the creature in a moment with a snort of steam and the stamp of a great hairy hoof.
‘Ye’re looking mighty pleased with y’self, old man!’ Ma Mayne calls across to him from her stall under the oak tree. ‘Out with it! What’s to do, eh? Are the French come back? Is it the King?’
‘Nay, old woman. It’s not the King. It’s the Queen, the Sassenach Queen. She’s dead!’

With such news to share, the busy, bustling, noisy market is more hectic than ever, an uproar of shouts, cries, and exclamations. Geillis steadily weaves her way through to where Ma Mayne stands by her stall, surrounded as usual by a clutch of her cronies. Every week Geillis’ former foster-mother travels the two miles from Duddingston, her cart piled with the excess from her well-tended plot of land – and she always returns with a heavier purse and an empty cart.
My word, but everyone seems a bit agitated, Geillis thinks. Has something happened?
‘Ma, what’s all the kerfuffle? Is there news?’
The older woman pulls Geillis into a warm hug.
‘Geillis, my lass, Miller MacMorran here just told us. It’s the Queen. She’s dead!’
‘The Queen’s dead? What, Queen Anne? Surely not! Oh, no, you mean the English queen, Elizabeth? Oh! So what does it mean for us?’
‘It means, dearie,’ chips in Miller MacMorran, ‘that the court is all of a to-do, packing up to flit south with King James. He’ll be claiming the English throne for Scotland at last!’ The old man grins with satisfaction. ‘Let’s see how the Sassenachs like a Scotsman for a king!’
‘Why, I can hardly believe it! When did the news come?’ Geillis asks.
‘Why just this morn,’ MacMorran tells her. ‘Yon lads from the town heard it, and they tell’t it me when we met on the way here. Mind, the nobs themselves only knew yestereve, when a rider came, the last of a string of gallopers all the way from Richmond Palace. They say he couldna’ stand, he’d ridden so hard through the storm, and straight in to the King, with never a wash and nothing to sup until his news was told. Died in her bed Sunday night, and her ladies watching over her.’
‘Oh, it’s so exciting! I must tell Missy! Has she been along yet this morning, Ma? Have you seen her?’
‘No, lass, not yet. It’s a bit early for her, isn’t it?’
‘Aye, you’re right! I’ll nip along to Hawkhill and tell her, then come back later. Is that all right?’
‘Of course it is. Leave your basket here, and take ye’er time, Geillis. I know ye lasses will likely be needing a good old chin-wag after two days stuck at home!’

Edging through the excited crowd, Geillis turns away from the clamour and heads west. Unencumbered for once by boys or baskets, she stretches out her short legs across Sleigh Lane, past the dairy, and right at the clay pit, towards Hawkhill. A few stragglers are still making their way to the market, passing Geillis with a greeting, a nod, a smile, and Geillis smiles back smugly, already knowing the news they’re about to hear. Hurrying along, she can’t wait to tell her friend, and within minutes here she is at Hawkhill itself. The great wooden door is shut fast, but Geillis does not need to knock. Over the years, she has become a familiar visitor, first as the school friend of the youngest Balfour girl, Missy, and, for the past eleven years, as sister-in-law to Missy herself, her elder sister Elspeth, and their six other siblings. Geillis takes the side passage into the yard, brushing past the pots and tubs of hardy herbs that have survived the winter under Missy’s care. Later, Geillis knows, they’ll be made into lotions and potions, simples and salves, although, if she’s quick, the housekeeper, Alys, may snitch a few, to hang from the beams to dry, then sew into sachets for the press, stir into stews, chop over chicken, maybe even share with Geillis herself for her baking.

Tapping briefly on the door, Geillis steps into Alys’ kitchen where so often she has eaten with family and friends. But this morning the hub of Hawkhill is empty and quiet, as clean and tidy as if no one has yet breakfasted or thought to start preparing the dinner.
‘Hello! It’s me, Geillis! Hello?’
She carries on through into the big hall.
‘Missy, where are you?’
Footsteps hasten down the oak staircase, and Alys hurtles into the hall. Skinny as a skelf, thin grey hair wound tight into a bun, hands worn with work, knuckles knobbly and sore, Alys always offers a bright smile and a warm welcome – and always keeps a few comfits in her pocket for the weans.
‘Mistress Geillis! I’m sorry. Wee Nellie – you’ve met our new maid, haven’t you? Well, she’s at the market, and I was starting the cleaning above. Were ye looking for Missy? Aye? She’s away out. Ye’ve missed her.’
‘Away out, at this time of day? That’s not like her, it’s barely nine!’
Alys ventures a smile, knowing her youngest mistress well.
‘Aye, but she’s been fussing and fretting like a bird in a cage since Sunday, and then this morn’ I heard her leave while I was still helping Mistress Elspeth get up and dressed. Her back’s that bad just now …’
‘Oh.’ Geillis’ eager face falls. ‘It’s just, there’s news about the king. I was hoping to tell her myself and have a bit of a blether.’
‘Och, she’ll be at those wretched old ruins, I dare say. You know she still goes there to collect the wildlings sometimes, the ones she wants for her remedies that won’t grow in pots. And she says it’s a good quiet place for thinking. Thinking! It gives me the willies down there. It’s been left to rot this many a year, and who knows what’s lurking there? But yon Missy, she’s nay a scarety cat like me! Now Geillis, will ye no take a sup of tea with me before ye go and fetch her? Ye must mind y’self now ye’re getting big.’
‘Thanks, Alys, but I won’t stop, if you don’t mind.’
‘Och, that’s fine. Tell me before ye go, have ye heard from Master Hendrie at all?’
Geillis’ mood plummets at Alys’ innocent question.
‘Ach no, Alys, not a word. I’ve heard nothing for months. I don’t know …’
There’s something to do with my Hendrie that I can’t quite put my finger on, Geillis thinks, and I’m not sure I want to, if I’m honest.
‘Och, dinna worry, lass,’ Alys says, noticing Geillis’ crestfallen face. ‘They must need him there, and they’re sure to keep him busy. How can they manage without their Captain, eh? He’ll be home again as soon as he can be, I’m sure.’

Geillis re-traces her steps to the top end of the loch, then follows the path along its east bank. Whinny Hill rises a mile or so before her, with Arthur’s Seat looming in the distance, but Geillis hasn’t the mind for the hills today, and besides, they’re no place for any wise woman to go wandering on her own. The breeze is making her nose run. Sniffing, she reaches into the pocket hanging around her waist for a rag – and pulls out a stone.
Oh, it’s the pebble I picked up by the loch, all those months ago …
Almost against her will, Geillis hears again her own and Hendrie’s voices as they parted, back in the autumn. She’d tried so hard to persuade him to stay longer, but he was adamant. She’d married a soldier, he’d said, and his way of life wasn’t about to change. As he walked away along the lane, his pack over his shoulder, his words scratched their way deep into Geillis’ heart, leaving a blistering trail that never quite heals.
‘I love you!’ she’d called after him, choking back her distress, twisting her fingers in her tangle of hair, scrabbling for a way to armour herself against hurt.
Aye, and it was later that same day, when Davie and I went for a wee walk along the shore of the loch, that I spotted this. It’s shaped like a wonky heart, my wonky heart … Ach, I do love Hendrie, but what’s the good of love, if it only goes in one direction?
Geillis gives a lusty sniff and shakes her head.
Enough now, she tells herself. Hendrie will be back. He always comes back, ‘though never often enough nor for long enough. It is what it is, and maundering on won’t help! I must find Missy, that’s the thing. She’ll cheer me up, just like she always does!
Bustling on, patting her hand against her slightly breathless chest, and pulling her bonnet on tighter against the breeze, Geillis passes Lochend, Laird Logan’s fine new house, rounds the bend in the lane, and her goal is in sight.

Where once the King’s Chapel stood proud over Saint Triduana’s Well, just a few stones now remain, crumbling into the weeds and the brambles. It’s been some time since Geillis was here, but this was the site of their den, she, Missy, and Agnis Lundie, back in the days when they were younger and wilder, before Agnis went to Holyrood as Lady-in-Waiting to Queen Anne, before Hendrie and Geillis made Billy and got wed. Only a few years ago, but it seems like a lifetime to Geillis, and with the threesome down to a pair, and herself married into the Balfour family, Missy matters even more.
‘Missy! Missy, come away out, I’ve news to tell!’
Geillis scrambles down towards the old well, excited and eager.
‘Missy!’
There is no answering call, only a hollow silence and the chill touch of the mist.

Disappointed, and a little puzzled but, for once, not especially worried, Geillis scans the ruins but has already sensed that no one else is there. She kicks idly at a few of the smaller stones at the foot of one of the six old walls and then sets off again. She cuts across the green, stepping over branches broken off in the storm, leaving a trail of small footprints in the sodden grass. Passing Master Dunlop’s School for Boys – Have my lads heard the news? Or will I tell them at dinner time? – she reaches the marketplace. It is quieter now, just a few folk lingering, whiling away a few more minutes, wondering how life is about to change. What will it be like, without the colourful court just half an hour’s walk away? Will the extravagant, handsome Queen go too? And what about the little Princes and Princesses? Will the royal family ever come back to Holyrood? Nobody knows.