“Indeed, is he now?” Robert Leslie responded. “Well, I suppose I can make room although I was holding several chambers for last-minute arrivals who would have paid handsomely for the beds. Still, a kinsman to the king himself, although God knows half of Scotland has been spawned by the Stewarts’ loving nature, is a good guest to serve.”
Iver smiled, satisfied, drawing a gold coin from his jacket. “This will hold the accommodation for my master until he arrives,” he said, turning the sparkling coin over in his fingers several times. “Now show me the rooms you will give my lord and his lady. Then the coin is yers.”
“Follow me,” Robert Leslie said. He led his nephew up a flight of stairs, and down to the end of a corridor. Opening the door at the end of the hallway he said, “ ’Tis the best I have. A chamber for visitors, one for sleeping, and two small alcoves for the servants. It overlooks my garden, not the street, and is quiet.”
Iver stepped into the apartment and looked about. Each chamber had a hearth, which was good, for June could have cold nights here by the sea. But it was clean, and he doubted there was a better accommodation in all of St. Andrews. “ ’Twill do,” he said, and flipped the coin to his uncle, who caught it. “They’ll arrive on the tenth of the month. I’ll be with them. Have ye room in yer stables to sleep the men-at-arms?”
“Aye,” Robert Leslie said, “but ’twill cost ye more, for the town will be crowded, and any space that can be rented will be.”
“Lord Stewart has lived most of his life in Edinburgh,” Iver replied. “He knows the way of the world. We are agreed then?”
“We’re agreed, Nephew. How is yer da?” he inquired, unable to help himself.
“I wouldn’t know,” Iver admitted. “I haven’t been back to Glenkirk in at least ten years, Uncle. Yer nearer. Do ye never go?”
“When would I have time?” Robert Leslie said. “A man cannot be the landlord of a successful and busy inn and be somewhere else. If ye haven’t eaten, come into my kitchens,” the innkeeper said, feeling more jovial now that the transaction had been concluded, and the gold coin rested in his pocket. “And make a place for yerself in the stables tonight if ye will.”
“I’ll take the meal,” Iver replied, “but the day isn’t half over, and I can be well on my way back to the Borders by nightfall if I leave afterwards.”
“Suit yerself, Nephew,” Robert Leslie said. “I’ll see ye next month then.”
Iver was relieved to reach Brae Aisir several days later and report that he had secured a decent lodging for them to stay.
Maggie, usually so sure of herself, was very nervous about going to St. Andrews. Her earlier enthusiasm had suddenly vanished. “Could ye not go without me?” she asked her husband. “Davy is just getting used to Clara’s teat, and my milk only just dried up. I haven’t got the kind of clothes one would wear to a king’s wedding.”
“The king has asked us. I am his kin, and he likes yer kind heart,” Fingal said. “This isn’t an invitation we can refuse. We will not be among the first rank of guests, Maggie mine. The Gordons of Huntly, the Leslies of Glenkirk, they will be. And while I have avoided the subject for fear of distressing ye, the king has been very hard on several of our border families of late. The Johnsons, the Scotts, the Armstrongs, the Humes, have all suffered his wrath. Anyone he suspects of ties with the Douglases, his hated enemies, is suspect in his eyes. I will not allow the Kerrs to be touched by this behavior. We are asked to the wedding, and we will go. We may not be garbed as well as the earls and their wives, but we shall not bring shame to our name.”
Dugald Kerr sat by the hall hearth pretending to doze, but he took in every word Maggie’s husband uttered. Fingal Stewart was a blessing to Brae Aisir. He knew that the king, unfamiliar with his kinsman, for Fin had told him so, had had no idea the kind of man he sent into the Borders to wed Maggie Kerr. Nor had he cared. He had only wanted a portion of the revenues from the tolls the Kerrs collected. And he had taken the advice of his current mistress as to whom to send. She, of course, had offered him a member of not only her family, but the king’s. It could have been a disaster. And now thanks to his granddaughter’s good heart, the Kerrs of Brae Aisir had found favor in the sight of a volatile and fickle monarch. Maggie would go to the wedding if he had to take her himself, the laird decided.
But it was not necessary. When the time came for them to depart for St. Andrews, Maggie’s enthusiasm had returned. She bid her grandfather farewell, promising to bring him back a treat of some sort from St. Andrews. “Mayhap a medal blessed in the cathedral to help ease the winter ache in yer bones, Grandsire,” she said.
Their trip was relatively uneventful, but as they drew near to the ferry that would take them across the Firth of Forth into Fife, the roads became more crowded with all manner of folk going to St. Andrews. Some were guests, some merchants hoping to sell their wares to the excited folk; others were pickpockets and thieves, and many were going simply to gain a glimpse of the king and the new queen. Summer was almost upon them, and the air hummed with festivity. Iver rode a little ahead of them to secure them places on one of the ferries.
“How many?” the harbor agent demanded to know.
“Lord Stewart, his wife, two servants, fifteen men-at-arms, twenty horses,” Iver said. “Official guests for the king’s wedding.”
The harbor agent nodded. “Yer boat goes out on the hour. Get yer people here.” He handed Iver a small slip of parchment. “Don’t lose this. Next!”
Iver hurried back to help lead his party to the front of the pushing, chattering crowds. He handed the chit to the seaman seeing to the boarding, and they were waved through, across a gangway, and onto the vessel. Once on board, their men-at-arms saw to the horses, leading them into a sheltered corner on the open deck. The ferry was soon deemed filled, and it was freed from its moorings to slip out into the broad estuary.
Fin was relieved for Maggie’s sake that it was a calm sea. There was no strong wind, only enough of a breeze to help them cross the water piloted by the ferry’s oarsmen. It was a gray day, however, with a thick canopy of clouds overhead. Lord Stewart knew how both exciting and frightening the trip to St. Andrews was for Maggie. She had never been more than a few miles from her home in all her life. And then suddenly there appeared an impressive fleet of ships making its way towards the same harbor that their ferry was directing itself.
A shout of excitement went up from the captain, and he called down from the small pilothouse where he had been, “My lords! My ladies! ’Tis the king’s fleet, and that fine vessel in the middle of it all flying the royal lion pendant is carrying our new queen. Let us have three cheers for our own French Mary!”
And the ferry erupted. “Huzzah! Huzzah! Huzzah!”
And at the same time the ferry full of passengers saluted Marie de Guise, the sun broke through the cloud bank, a golden ray coming forth to seemingly touch the ship upon which she traveled. The ferry passengers gasped, excited, and the talk immediately began to make the rounds of how fortunate an occurrence this obvious show of God’s approval was for both King James and for Scotland.
Their ferry reached the other shore before the royal fleet, and the passengers quickly disembarked, for there was still a ride to make to St. Andrews, and if they were not ahead of the queen and her party, they would be delayed for hours. Those in the party from Brae Aisir were swiftly on their way. As they rode to the town Fin told his wife a little about it.
“There has been a town here for as long as anyone can recall,” he began. “There are three gates. The North, the South, and the Church. There are two ports. West Port, which opens into South Street, and the Marketgate Port. We’re entering through the South Gate. We’ll be on South Street, which has many important ecclesiastical buildings.”
“Where is our inn?” Maggie wanted to know. “If the queen has set her foot on Scottish soil, then the wedding will be tomorrow or the day after. My gowns need to be hung so the wrinkles are removed. Of course, they will be wed at the cathedral. Is it on South Street too?”
“We’ll pass it on the way to the Anchor and the Cross,” Fin answered her.
“What an odd name for an inn,” Maggie remarked.
