Blood Line: An Inspector Faro Mystery Read online

'But not, I imagine, with anyone as adorable as Miss Haston.'

  'Who is young enough to be my daughter.'

  'When did that deter any lusty male? God created men to love for ever.'

  'Then let me put it another way. Do you think I'll ever fall in love, after what I have been through - or have you forgotten?'

  And seeing his expression, Vince patted his shoulder. 'No. And never will,' he added gently. 'Forgive me, Stepfather, I am being crass and more tactless than usual. I realise it's early days for you - after . . . '

  'Yes, yes,' Faro interrupted. He could not bear to go into the agonising details of his recent loss. 'And now, let's get down to these notes you've been reading.'

  As he ate Mrs Brook's standard 'cold collation' left for either the doctor or the Inspector if they were unfortunate enough to miss supper, Faro filled in the details of his visit to Edinburgh Castle and his meeting with Lieutenant Arthur Mace. As he spoke, he spread the two Queen Mary jewels side by side on the small table before them.

  'What do you make of it all, lad?'

  Vince sat back in his chair. 'I should say, Stepfather, that, regardless of Mace's theory, whatever that tomb in the wall contained - and I'm inclined towards a treasure hoard personally - we can certainly dismiss any notion that the small coffin was a hoax and contained the remains of some small animal.'

  'They couldn't have made a mistake?'

  Vince shook his head. 'You don't have to be a medical man to know about such things. You couldn't mistake a mummified monkey for a child, could you?'

  Faro shook his head. 'I don't think so.'

  'Nor, I assure you, could the most ignorant of workmen, unless they were also half blind, which I doubt. And having read your father's notes, I am convinced that this discovery was no practical joke, but one to be taken very seriously indeed.' Pausing, he put the tips of his fingers together and regarded his stepfather thoughtfully. 'Has it not occurred to you that the existence of this small coffin hidden for nearly three hundred years might well pose one of history's most intriguing questions? Was the man who succeeded Mary as King of Scotland and England really her son or was he an impostor?'

  'Yes, and in the words of Lieutenant Mace, if that were so, a great deal of our history would have to be rewritten, especially in regard to the royal succession,' Faro added slowly.

  'If the baby was James, then what have we in support of our theory? Where does the secret of that tiny coffin begin?'

  'Has your history improved, lad?'

  Vince grinned. 'Not much. It was always my weakest subject. Too dry and dusty when there were so many urgent matters in the present to engage one's interest. However, no one living in Edinburgh could be immune to Scotland's tragic Queen.'

  'You recall David Rizzio's murder?'

  'I do indeed. Every schoolboy worth his salt has gloated over the bloodstained boards in the Queen's supper room at Holyrood. Do you think it still gets another dose of ox's blood from time to time to keep it fresh?'

  Faro sighed. Keeping his stepson's mind on historical facts had always been difficult. 'Doesn't it intrigue you as a medical man to wonder why the Queen, who was six months pregnant when she witnessed Rizzio murdered before her eyes, with Ruthven's sword point at her stomach, did not miscarry?'

  Vince nodded. 'Wasn't her husband Darnley in the plot too?'

  'He was indeed. Listen to this. It's a contemporary account from a volume in the Records Office - very forthright in its language. The Queen's Secretary, Maitland of Lethington, is reported as saying of Darnley, "He misuses himself so far towards her that it is an heartbreak for her to think that he should be her husband." Yet when he had smallpox in Glasgow she went to nurse him personally.'

  'Poor Mary. Reading between the lines that smallpox was a polite name for another pox - syphilis, in fact,' said Vince.

  'What an appalling discovery for any young bride -especially the Queen of Scots,' said Faro.

  Vince smiled grimly. 'A discovery, alas, none too rare even in our own respectable society here in Edinburgh, if truth be told. Too much sowing of the wild oats down Leith Walk can leave a very nasty souvenir.'

  'Aye, and there's a suspicion that ladies of easy virtue were not Darnley's only debaucheries.'

  'A penchant for page boys?'

  'Indeed. Mary must have been horrified and disgusted when so soon after marriage she discovered that her golden lad was perverted. Perhaps even worse was to know that his love for her - if it ever existed outside her imagination - came a very poor second to his lust for the throne of Scotland.'

  'Let's go back to Rizzio's murder,' said Vince. 'I seem to remember the hint was that Mary and Rizzio were lovers. Do you think there was any truth in it?'

  Faro snorted indignantly. 'I most certainly do not. An old grizzled hunchback. His intellect and talent as a musician must have excited and entertained her, but certainly would not be calculated to arouse her carnal appetite. From all accounts, we know that Mary was a very fastidious woman.'

  'So Darnley used Rizzio as an excuse?'

  'An excuse indeed. It was the throne of Scotland that Darnley was after and Mary carried the unborn heir who could displace him. He and the other conspirators were hoping that the Queen would not only miscarry but might also die and they would be rewarded for their efforts by the new King of Scots.'

  'They must have planned it very carefully, especially as her health was always problematic,' said Vince. 'Sixteenth-century medicine was based on a few simple premises. Doctors believed that the human body was governed by four cardinal humours - blood, phlegm, choler and melancholy, also known as black melancholy, and it was their abundance or absence which determined a person's temperament.'

  In his best textbook manner, Vince continued, 'We now know that Mary had all the symptoms of porphyria, attacks of severe abdominal pain, vomiting and diarrhoea, sometimes accompanied by a complete mental breakdown. These attacks are very severe but not long lasting and there are many women who have chronic illnesses but lose all such symptoms during pregnancy and are remarkably fit and well. And Mary must have been one such case to have survived.'

  'She not only survived, lad, she used her woman's wiles.

  Still wearing her gown soaked with Rizzio's blood, she persuaded Darnley she still loved him and, insisting that the conspirators meant to kill him too, she got him to help her escape from the royal apartments and flee to Dunbar, riding pillion behind one of her servants. Once she begged Darnley to slacken pace for the child's sake. "Ride on," he told her. "We can always make another bairn." God, how that thought must have revolted her.'

  'What happened at Dunbar?' asked Vince.

  'She was rescued by the loyal Provost of Edinburgh and the citizens and returned to the fortress of Edinburgh Castle, safer although a lot less comfortable than Holyrood, to await the birth of her child.'

  'In those days, Stepfather, it was the usual custom for noble ladies to ceremoniously take to their lying-in chamber a few weeks before the birth was due and to remain there like Indian ladies in purdah.'

  'What rumours there must have been down below the Castle in Edinburgh as the folk looked up wondering what on earth was taking place within its grim walls.'

  'And with good reason,' said Vince. 'A husband riddled with syphilis when the child was conceived. An expectant mother who had witnessed Rizzio stabbed forty times, and her own life threatened by the murderers. Then forced to endure a twenty-five mile gallop to Dunbar - about five hours, riding pillion. Well, Stepfather, even in these civilised days, I wouldn't give much for the chances of delivering a normal child with such a prenatal background.'

  'Aye, and in a less enlightened age, everyone expected her to give birth to a monster. Certainly no one expected her to leave her bed alive,' Faro added grimly.

  'How did they pass the time in all those weeks of waiting?'

  'The usual womanly pursuits, I imagine. Baby clothes, reading and playing the lute - and playing cards.'

  'With plenty of time to mak
e plans.'

  Faro smiled. 'You are absolutely right, of course. Can't you just see them whispering together, while the Queen slept. If there was ever an opportunity, then this was when the Queen's ladies must have decided that whatever happened, on no account should Darnley rule over Scotland.'

  'And if the Queen died, or the child was still-born, then a substitute royal Prince should be found. Were the four Marys still with her?'

  'Only Mary Beaton, married to Ogilvie of Boyne, and niece to Margaret Forbes, Lady Reres, also in attendance. And Mary Fleming's sister was there, too - the Countess of Atholl, reputed to be a witch.'

  'A loyal but strange collection of ladies, don't you think?'

  'And two of them related to the original four Marys,' said Faro. 'Her oldest, dearest childhood friends. Any one of them would have died for her.'

  'The perfect material for a conspiracy.'

  'Let's look at Lady Reres, who was somewhat significantly, in the light of later events, also pregnant. The story of those days before the Queen was delivered . . . '

  'The details of that historic royal accouchement, which every Scottish medical student hears about at some time,' Vince interrupted. 'It is one of the few sixteenth-century examples to be documented. A long and difficult labour...'

  '"With the Queen so handled that she began to wish that she had never been married",' read Faro from his notes, '"and those who attended her feared for her life and the Countess of Atholl cast the childbirth pains on Lady Reres, who lay suffering with her mistress.'"

  'Now that is an extremely interesting coincidence. Both the Queen and Lady Reres, not only pregnant, but in childbed at the same time.'

  'Was it a coincidence, or had this been carefully taken into account in the conspiracy? Remember the blood royal. Lady Reres's niece, Lady Jean Stuart, was the natural daughter of James V.'

  'Mary's half-sister.'

  '"When at last the Queen's sufferings were at an end, the child was born with a thin membrane over its face.'"

  'No mention of its sex - a Prince or Princess?'

  'Nothing. On 19 June, it was announced that a royal Prince had been born whom Mary proclaimed her heir. But the child was not shown immediately to the waiting populace as was the custom. Even the doctors who one imagines would be in attendance maintained what might be called a stout silence. Not one word or comment on its condition.'

  Vince whistled. 'In fact the doctors behaved like very loyal and cautious men.'

  'Or very frightened ones. And the first time young James appears is some hours after his birth, when he is shown to Darnley. Here's the scene in the Queen's bedchamber as described by Lord Herries. "About two o'clock in the afternoon, the King came to visit the Queen and was desirous to see the child. "My Lord," says the Queen, "God has given you and me a son begotten by none but you." Then she took the child in her arms, and discovering his face said ..."

  '"Discovering his face?"' interrupted Vince. 'Did Herries mean "un-covering"?'

  'I agree it is an odd expression. Does it give you the feeling that Darnley came reluctantly and wasn't offered a close look?'

  'All newborn babies look alike. I should think, however, that they would want him to keep at a safe distance in his diseased condition.'

  'Very convenient for our conspirators. I imagine they laid great stress upon Darnley's unwholesome presence at his wife's childbed.'

  'Exactly. Proceed...'

  'Here are Mary's words. "My Lord, here I protest to God, as I shall answer for him at the great day of Judgement, this is your own son, and no other man's son, and, as I am desirous that all here, both ladies and others, bear witness, for he is so much your own son that I fear it may be the worse for him hereafter."'

  Faro laid aside the notes and waited for Vince's comments.

  'Rather unusual, wouldn't you say, Stepfather?'

  '"Methinks the lady doth protest too much", as the Bard would have it,' said Faro grimly.

  'And there's more than a hint of warning in such an extraordinary public statement, "begotten by none but you". Suggests that Lord Darnley had been casting doubts upon the child's paternity.'

  Faro consulted his notes. 'The next visitor, eight days later, was Killigrew, Ambassador of Queen Elizabeth, who reported, "I was brought to the Queen's bedside where her Highness received thankfully her Majesty's letters and commendation...'

  Laying aside the papers, Faro smiled grimly. 'Rumour had it that Elizabeth received the glad tidings of her cousin's safe delivery by screaming, "Alack, the Queen of Scots is lighter of a bonny son, and I am but of barren stock." But to continue. Killigrew remarked upon the Queen's "delicate condition and she spoke with a hollow cough. I took leave and was brought to the young Prince sucking of his nurse."'

  'Lady Reres?'

  'The same.'

  'How very convenient. Do go on.'

  'Killigrew continued, "Afterwards I saw him as good as naked, well proportioned and like to prove a goodly prince.'"

  'A moment, Stepfather. Let's consider that very convenient spell of the Countess of Atholl. Since Lady Reres was wet nurse, she must have given birth recently, either immediately before or after the Queen was delivered. And if we are considering a changeling, then Lady Reres appears to be the likeliest person to provide a substitute Prince.'

  'Especially as it was announced that she was to be governante, a kind of foster mother to the boy while the Queen was absent from Edinburgh.' Faro paused before adding, 'There is one other contender, however - the Countess of Mar. Young James was brought up in her household and I'm told that his portrait bears an uncanny resemblance to his foster brother the Second Earl of Mar, who was six years older. It is quite possible that the Countess also had another son at the same time as the Queen, and because she was related to the Lennox Stuarts she might have been persuaded to substitute her own child.'

  'Which would account for that mysterious rumour which has persisted through the centuries of an infant being lowered in a basket from Edinburgh Castle. In this case, it would be the other way round,' said Vince.

  'These were desperate times, lad. Loyalty was a gamble and it was all too easy to choose the wrong side. What if Mary died childless and Scotland fell into the hands of Lord Darnley and the power-crazed Lennox family? I dare say there were many frightened nobles who had a lot to lose, including ancient lands and titles, aye, and their heads, too. The only hope of peace was for Mary to leave a legitimate heir.'

  'To have told Mary the truth that her agony was all in vain and that the royal Prince was still-born or so delicate that he was unlikely to survive, in her exhausted postnatal condition might well have been the fatal blow,' said Vince. 'So why not solve all her problems by substituting the lusty newborn baby of the willing Lady Reres or the Countess of Mar?'

  'One thing seems certain, lad, that closed and devoted circle in the lying-in chamber had ample opportunity.'

  'Do you think Mary knew?'

  Faro shook his head. 'I think that the Queen was innocent of any deception and never believed otherwise than that the child placed in her arms on 19 June was the one she had just brought into the world. Listen to this letter she wrote many years later, from imprisonment at Tutbury in 1585, two years before her execution, "Without him I am and shall be of right as long as I live, his Queen and Sovereign, but he independently of me, can only be Lord Darnley or Earl of Lennox, that being all he can be through his father." '

  'Sad and pathetic, isn't it, that her love and longing remained constant for the son she had not seen since infancy. He was ten months old when she abdicated in his favour and lost him for ever after Darnley's murder at Kirk o'Fields and her disastrous marriage to the Earl of Bothwell.'

  'But didn't he plead his mother's cause with Queen Elizabeth,' said Vince, 'try to get her released from that long and terrible imprisonment?'

  'No. Not once did he voice even the mildest protest. In fact, he made it so abundantly plain that he was hell-bent on securing the Crown for himself that even Queen
Elizabeth was shocked by his eagerness to sell his own mother. "That false Scotch urchin!" she called him. "What can be expected from the double dealing of such an urchin as this?'"

  'Since Elizabeth wasn't noted for her kind and gentle nature, then James must have been a monster, if not in outward shape then certainly in mind and heart.'

  'Yes, Vince. But all the evidence points out that only substitution could decently explain his complete indifference to his mother's fate.'

  'I agree. That picture of heartless betrayal is only less terrible if in fact James knew that there was no blood tie between them.'

  'There is evidence, albeit too superficial to convince judge and jury, in his appearance too. Even in youth he had a wizened old man's face. His tongue was over large for his mouth; his personal habits were disgusting and obscene even when he wasn't slobbering and fondling his effeminate favourites. He was untidy, dirty, and as he seldom if ever washed more than the tips of his fingers he smelled abominably.'

  'There certainly isn't much likeness in the portraits to either of his tall and strikingly handsome "parents",' said Vince.

  'His mother was one of the bravest women who have ever lived, right through her life to her death at Fotheringhay. But James's craven cowardice was a byword and the legendary charm of the Stuart monarchs was replaced in him by political cunning.'

  '"The wisest fool in Christendom", wasn't that what he was called?'

  'Aye, and with good reason.'

  'I wonder when he learned the truth?' asked Vince.

  'It might have proved to be a secret very hard to keep. And in large families skeletons have an unhappy way of falling out of the cupboard when least expected. At a guess I would say he learned the truth from his tutor George Buchanan, who was Mary's enemy.'

  'And thereafter lived forever in mortal terror of denouncement,' said Vince. 'No wonder drawn swords and any violent movement terrified him.'

  'Aye, knowing what he knew. But not knowing how many other people were privy to the secret - and Scotland's nobles had a long and notorious record of getting rid of their unwanted kings. Very, very few ever died in their beds.'