Susan Johnson (29 page)

“Fletcher says last he spoke to Hamilton, he promised to vote for our proposal,” David said.

“And when was that?” Johnnie asked. “He changes by the minute.”

“Last night.”

“Well have to keep someone at his side today to prod his good judgment, especially now that he lost the appointment for the Council of Trade.” Johnnie grimaced. “The Douglases have a history of selling out for personal gain. It’s a defect in their breed.”

“Why not pay him more than the English,” Robbie murmured, taking the proffered bottle from the servant and pouring a generous portion of brandy into his coffee.

“He’s angling for more than money. The court is luring him with titles we can’t deliver.”

“Ah, the enticements of the fashionable world and all its vanities,” Robbie returned. “Another failing of the Douglases.” He drank his heavily laced coffee and, pouring another considerable amount of liquor into his cup, indicated with a nod to a servant that he desired more coffee.

“Slow down on your drinking,” his brother cautioned. “Everything could turn on this vote. We need you thinking clearly.”

Robbie looked up from cutting his beefsteak. “Words of counsel from you, dear brother, who, rumor has it, rarely drew a sober breath until you married.”

“Rarely is perhaps better than never,” Johnnie retorted. “If Miss Lauder is causing you to drink so much, send her away.”

“Actually, she’s my curb on excess. In the boredom
of her company, I find transient relief from my dissipation.”

“You
could
go and see Roxane,” Johnnie bluntly said.

Robbie’s head came up like a shot, and the look he sent his brother was malevolent. “No, I could not.”

David’s gaze moved from brother to brother, and he spoke first, breaking the tense silence. “I wonder if it would be possible to get a definitive promise of support from Hamilton? And if so, could we depend on his word?”

He received no answer for what seemed a long time, and then Johnnie’s gaze swung around to him and he softly said, “We’ll talk to him again before the session. At least it’s worth a try.”

“What’s worth a try?” Amelia queried, coming into the room on a cloud of perfume, her rose silk morning gown sweeping the floor behind her.

“We’re debating Hamilton’s degree of deceit,” her husband explained.

“An unending debate.” She sat at the table and poured herself a cup of tea. “You look devilish fine this morning, Robbie. You needn’t have dressed for us.” A minute sharpness underscored her banter.

“And you look devilish fine as always, Amelia,” Robbie pleasantly returned, offering her a smile.

“Who entertained you last night?” She didn’t disguise her pique this time.

“Did I offend you somehow?” Robbie set his cup down and gazed at her across the table.

Amelia opened her mouth as though to speak, then shut it.

A small silence descended on the breakfast group.

“Tell me and I’ll apologize,” Robbie finally said.

It was obvious Amelia was wrestling with some issue as she twisted her teacup between her hands. Seconds passed, the sounds of the street outside the window suddenly intrusive. Then her hands went still and her gaze came up, chill and piercing. “Roxane’s pregnant.”

Robbie surveyed the three pair of accusing eyes trained on him. “Don’t look at me. I haven’t seen her for weeks.”

“She’s three months pregnant.” Amelia’s voice was soft.

Robbie leaned back in his chair and regarded them with a bland look. “And she doesn’t want anything to do with me.” Logical words, temperately delivered, but even as he spoke with constraint, he felt as though someone had gutted him, and his life was draining from his body. “Don’t look at me as though I were the black-hearted miscreant. I did everything but beg her not to leave me. And she told me to go to hell. Where I’ve been, by the way, ever since.”

“Do you want me to talk to her?” Johnnie asked.

“And say what? Are all the previous impossibilities suddenly irrelevant? Will true love prevail now that she has a child in her belly?” The stinging, caustic words matched his cynical mood. Was Callum the father? he sullenly wondered. “Look, I don’t care what you do,” he muttered, coming to his feet. “I’m going home to bed.” Suddenly achingly weary, he didn’t know if he could make his way from the room. He felt empty, depleted, sick at heart.

Both Carberrys looked at Johnnie when the door
shut on Robbie. “I’ll let him sleep for a few hours.” Johnnie sighed. “But we need him for the vote. Now tell me what you know of Roxane’s feelings, Amelia, and then well see what we can do to make everyone in this mess reasonably happy.”

Amelia shook her head. “
Roxane
never confided in me. Her maid told my maid. You know how servants are. They know more than we do.”

“Is Callum with her at Glenroth?”

“Apparently not. She and the children are alone. She’s planting two new orchards, she told me in her last letter. Nothing more.”

“At least this situation takes care of Miss Lauder,” Johnnie said with a grin. “Wouldn’t that have been a disaster.”

“He would have drunk himself to death,” David astutely observed.

“Roxane won’t let him do that.” Johnnie’s tone was assured.

“Are you that hopeful about a reconciliation?” Amelia cast him a questioning glance. “They’re both more stubborn than most. And she has a long list of what she considers practical assessments of their future, none of which have merit in my view. Love is love. You discovered that, didn’t you,” she said with a meaningful glance at Johnnie.

“Oh, yes,” he replied. “And I had considered myself the man least likely to succumb.”

“So there’s hope for them.”

“I’m in my bludgeoning mood, and they’re both behaving like sullen children. So after the session today, I’ll see if Robbie will ride down to see Roxane. And if he won’t go, I will.”

“And do what?” Amelia wasn’t as sure as he that either party would be easily bludgeoned.

“See that my brother does the right thing,” Johnnie rapped out.

“Regardless of the paternity?” David looked at them both. “Has anyone considered that possibility?”

Amelia shook her head. “She’d know. Roxane was always careful.”

“I’ll attest to that,” Johnnie said.

B
UT ROBBIE WASN’T SO SURE, AND THE VILE POSSIBILITY
that the child might not be his plagued his thoughts. As did the worse possibility that Roxane might marry someone else even if the child
were
his. Utterly fatigued, he still found it impossible to sleep, and he spent the morning sequestered in his bedroom, drinking—a habit he’d acquired of late when the woman he loved had walked out of his life.

Slouched in his chair, a bottle close at hand, he alternately cursed and coveted her, one moment contemplating the exaltation of his child growing inside her, the next irritably recalling her on Callum’s arm, as she’d been so often of late. He’d swear again at that point and lift the bottle to his mouth. As his mood turned more benighted and his resentments grew, he finally realized there wasn’t, nor would there be, enough liquor in the world to completely purge Roxane from his thoughts. So once this vote was over today, he sullenly decided, he’d ride to Glenroth and see if the child was his.

The Carres had never bred saints; benevolence had nothing to do with his visit.

To that purpose, and fully aware of the importance of the vote that day, he heaved himself out of his chair, called for his valet, and saw to his toilette. By noon, he was bathed, shaved, dressed, and waiting when his brother came to fetch him.

“You’ll go to see her?” Johnnie was scarcely through the bedroom door when he spoke, his expression grave.

“When the vote’s over.”

“What exactly are your intentions?”

Bristling at the tone, Robbie coolly said, “You sound like her father.”

“And I’ll act like her father if you don’t treat her properly.”

“What precisely does that mean?” Even sober he took orders poorly, and he was far from sober.

“Cross me and you’ll find out,” Johnnie replied, contemplating his brother with an irate gaze.

“You should have married her yourself.”

“I’ll let that pass. You’re three parts drunk.”

“Did you ever consider it?” Robbie pugnaciously asked, jealous of every man Roxane had ever known.

“No, nor did she. Look,” Johnnie said, “I’m not your rival. We were friends. She didn’t love me. Satisfied?”

“Sorry.” Robbie’s response was rueful. “I’ve never been jealous before, and now I can’t stand to have a man within a mile of her.”

“Then you’ll have to convince her to marry you.”

Robbie softly swore, a fleeting grimace crossing his face. “Or someone will.”

Sensible of the effects of jealousy, his brother didn’t extend the argument. Time enough for coercion later, should it be necessary. “You look presentable,”
Johnnie declared, his gaze drifting over Robbie’s well-cut bottle-green coat and tan breeches. “Now, if you were only sober.”

“Don’t need to be sober to vote against the bloody English. I could do that in my sleep.”

T
HE SESSION WAS PARTICULARLY BITTER THAT DAY
, the opposition trying to impose restrictions on treating for union, the court pressing hard to block those measures. The level of debate reached tinder point. But the various opposition factions couldn’t agree and by late afternoon, the court was finally successful in winning acceptance for a treaty. But all wasn’t lost for those wanting independence for Scotland; considerable maneuvering was still required before acceptance advanced to a conclusive settlement. Those wishing to retain Scotland’s liberty could insist that Parliament elect the commissioners. If they could triumph on that vote and the nominations were left to the Scottish Parliament, then any negotiations would prove abortive. The opposition had more than enough votes, even if Argyll and Queensberry mustered every bought and bribed man. Above the raucous debate, Johnnie and Robbie exchanged a satisfied glance. They were gleeful, anticipating a stalemate to the Parliament of 1705, just like those of the previous two years.

With evening approaching, Hamilton, the ostensible leader of the opposition, assured his followers that the question of appointing the treaty commissioners would not come to a vote that day and many left to go home to their families or clubs to dine. But no sooner had they departed Parliament House than
Hamilton called to be heard, and after making a speech that shifted disturbingly from conciliatory to ingratiating, he ended by moving that the nomination for treaty commissioners be left to the queen.

The Carres and all who had been fighting for Scotland’s liberty for so long were struck dumb. Not only had none of them expected the proposal to be moved that night, but never at any time by His Grace, the Duke, who had from the beginning of Parliament to that day roared and exclaimed against it on every occasion. Twelve or fifteen men ran out of the house in rage and despair, crying aloud that there was no purpose in staying any longer when the Duke of Hamilton had so basely betrayed them. Those more sensible scrambled to recall their colleagues from their dinners, or hurriedly rose in the assembly to make sharp, angry speeches against the duke. But the government ministry, apparently prepared for this remarkable perfidy, seized the chance and called a hurried vote before the absent members could be recalled from their homes and lodgings. The resolution was carried by a mere four votes.

The irascible Fletcher nearly burst a blood vessel, and Lockhart spoke for all who stood shocked and speechless at the vile treachery of their leader. “From this day,” he said, “may we date the commencement of Scotland’s ruin.”

Now there would be no real negotiation for union, but simply an arrangement between two groups, each nominated and controlled by the queen’s English ministers.

It was over.

Scotland was lost.

T
HE LONG STRUGGLE FOR INDEPENDENCE HAD
been sacrificed for the most ignoble greed, and all those who gathered at Patrick SteiPs that night talked of nothing else. Some spoke in whispers as though at a wake, others cried for vengeance, many were left speechless—so awful, so horrendous their desolation.

A small cadre tried to suggest parliamentary obstructions to the terrible consequences of the vote, but even they knew it would be little more than delaying tactics. What was done was done, and Scotland was to be swallowed up by England without hope of reprieve.
¹⁹

Robbie had been silent during the postmortem in SteiTs, too wretched and disenchanted to muster a response. Not only had his country been crushed under the heel of England, but his personal life was as afflicted.

Men like Queensberry and Argyll would be dominant in the affairs of Scotland now, appropriating whatever government funds were available, giving out offices and places in return for favors, legally raping the country.

While Callum Murray, possible father to Roxane’s child, was definitely in favor with the Countess of Kilmarnock. Probably wooing her right now—despicable thought.