‘Thunder?’

‘That’s the one. Now it seems to me ye’ll hardly be doing much tilting whilst ye’re Deputy Warden, and he’s the finest charger I’ve seen in a long weary while, myself. What would you say to selling him to me for, say, half the gold finder’s fee ye got from the Italian, at the same time as you sign over to me all the bank drafts in payment for the guns. Eh?’

Carey paused and then spoke carefully. ‘Let me be sure I’ve understood Your Majesty. You will give me the guns Lord Spynie reived from the Newcastle convoy to Carlisle...’

‘I never said they were the same, only that they were originally from the Tower of London.’

‘Of course, Your Majesty. You will give me your spare guns, release my men Red Sandy Dodd and Sim’s Will Croser from the Dumfries lock-up, give me all my gear back including my pair of dags...’

‘They’re waiting for ye downstairs,’ put in the King helpfully.

‘...in exchange for Thunder, several hundred pounds English of bankers’ drafts and half my liquid cash.’

‘Only half.’

‘Your Majesty, I am overwhelmed.’

‘Is it a done deal?’ asked King James.

‘If the weapons have not been tampered with by... any ill-affected persons, then yes, Your Majesty, it is a deal.’

‘Excellent,’ beamed King James. ‘Have some wine, Sir Robert. Oh, and what would ye like me to do with Sir Henry Widdrington?’

Carey compressed his lips together and looked down.

‘May I think about it, Your Majesty?’

‘Ye can, but not for long. He’s an Englishman, given leave to enter the realm, I must charge him and have him extradited or let him go. An’ I’m no’ so certain what the charge should be, neither.’

In fact this was another of King James’s games. He liked to tempt people; as usual he had already decided to release Sir Henry since it would save him a mountain of tedious letter-writing to the Marshal of Berwick, but he was interested to see what kind of revenge Carey would want.

He met the bright blue eyes and wondered uneasily if Carey had somehow penetrated his game. Carey still had his lips tight shut. At last he spoke.

‘If you still have him here, Your Majesty, I want to talk to him in private.’

‘Why?’

‘I am afraid for his wife. I know she was the one who came to you with the information on her husband’s doings, and he may... be angry with her for her betrayal.’

And small blame to him, thought King James, a typical woman to do such a thing.

‘Is she your mistress?’ King James asked nosily.

Carey’s face went red like a little boy’s. At first the King thought it was embarrassment, but then he realised that Carey was pale-skinned enough to go red with anger as well. Perhaps he had been a little tactless.

‘No, Your Majesty,’ Carey said quietly enough, and then smiled tightly. ‘Though not for want of my trying.’

‘Ay well,’ said the King comfortably. ‘They’re odd creatures, sure enough. I dinna understand my Queen at all and it’s not as if she’s been over-educated and addled her poor brains, she seems naturally perverse.’

Carey coughed and smiled more naturally. ‘Lady Widdrington is a woman of very strong character,’ he said. ‘If I could make her my wife, I would be the happiest man in the Kingdom.’

‘Oh ay?’ said the King, sorry to hear it and wondering if Carey was about to ask him to do away with his rival somehow.

‘Although to be honest,’ Carey continued, ‘what I would like is to petition Your Gracious Majesty to string her husband up and make an end of him, unfortunately I am completely certain that if I did, she would marry any man in the world except me.’

King James shook his head sympathetically. ‘There’s no pleasing them, is there?’ he said. ‘Ay well, I’m glad ye didna ask me to do it because I canna string him up in any case, our cousin the Queen would be highly offended if I took such liberties with any of her subjects.’

He caught Carey’s narrow look: that was as close as a King could come to an apology and he was glad that Carey had taken the hint.

‘It would be a shame,’ Carey said obligingly, ‘if Her Majesty were to be disturbed with any of these... er... problems.’

‘It would,’ agreed the King heartily.

‘Such a thing would only be necessary if there was a further... er... problem with the guns. Or if my Lady Widdrington were to die unexpectedly for any reason whatever.’

King James sniffed in irritation at this piece of barefaced cheek, justified though it was. ‘We are quite sure that the guns are as they should be.’

‘Lady Widdrington?’

‘I’ll speak with Sir Henry, if ye like. He’ll understand where his true interests lie.’

‘Of course, Your Majesty. There is also the practical problem of getting the guns back to Carlisle, since I brought hardly any men with me. And as I said, two of them are in the Dumfries lock-up for fighting.’

The King waved a hand. ‘Speak to the Earl of Mar and we’ll bail your men and find ye an escort. Can ye lay your hands on the money?’

‘I think so, Your Majesty,’ said Carey resignedly, no doubt thinking of what the funds could have bought him if he had managed to keep them. ‘I hope so.’ Still, you’ve no cause for complaint, Sir Robert, thought the King comfortably; I could have taken the lot of it for all the trouble you’ve caused me.

‘Speak to the Earl of Mar to fetch your gear. Ye can make the exchange today if ye move quickly.’

FRIDAY, 14TH JULY 1592, AFTERNOON

Sir John Carmichael had only just heard the latest gossip about the doings at the King’s court when the subject of it breezed into the alehouse in the late afternoon, free, armed and with his left hand bandaged and in a sling. At his heels trotted his Graham pageboy. Sir John was not quite sure how to treat the hero of such melodramatic stories but, for the sake of his father, led him into a private room and sent for wine.

It turned out that all Carey wanted to do was borrow the services of a trustworthy clerk and dictate an exact account of what had been going on in Dumfries and Carlisle over the past couple of weeks, particularly in relation to no less than two loads of mixed calivers and pistols which seemed to have had the most exciting time of all.

By the end of it, Sir John was calling for more wine and damning Lord Spynie’s eyes and limbs impartially. He was particularly shocked at the idea of a gentleman and cousin of the Queen being tortured by some jumped-up lad of a favourite as if he were a bloody peasant. Carey agreed with him, read over the fair copy and then took a pen in his purple fingers and painfully wrote a further paragraph in a numerical cipher, topping and tailing the whole with the conventional phrases of a son to his father. Sir John privately doubted that Sir Robert was in fact as humbly obedient to Lord Hunsdon, the absentee Warden of the East March, as he professed to be or indeed should have been.

‘My father’s in London,’ Carey said. ‘Would you make sure this reaches him without going near either Lord Scrope or Sir John Forster, nor even my brother in Berwick?’

Sir John Carmichael nodded sympathetically.

‘Will he show it to the Queen?’

‘Only if I die... er... unexpectedly in office, or that’s what I told him to do.’

‘Mphm. Ye’ll stay the night here, of course, since ye can hardly go back to Maxwell.’

Carey coughed. ‘Hardly. Thank you. Now, Sir John, I wonder if I could ask you another favour?’