Three Sisters, Three Queens

BERWICK CASTLE, ENGLAND, SEPTEMBER 1515

The town is closed; the curfew is dusk to dawn. Alexander Hume goes to the gate in the curtain wall and hammers on the door. There is a bell rope beside it and he pulls on it. A great bell tolls over our heads, and I can see lights coming on in the guardroom. A hatch in the great door opens, and a dark face peers out.

“Who goes there?”

“The Queen Regent of Scotland and the Earl of Angus, her husband, demand admittance,” Alexander bellows.

I sit a little straighter in the saddle, expecting the bolts to shoot back and the huge gate to open. This is a fortified town, an English town. I have come home, I have come to my own country. I remember Berwick: the town square, and the castle with its own portcullis and drawbridge. I remember the welcome they gave me when I rested here on my way to Scotland. I am thinking of dinner and the merciful release from pain when I can get into bed.

“Who?”

“The Queen Regent of Scotland and the Earl of Angus, her husband, demand admittance. Send for the governor to welcome them at once.”

There is a scuffling from behind the gate but still the bolts are not opened. Archibald glances over my shoulder. “We couldn’t send ahead,” he says.

Obviously, we should have done that to say that we were coming, and he did not think to do so, and now we have this cold welcome, and a delay until they open up, and I have longer to wait before I can be comfortable.

There are lights at the hatch and someone glares out at us and then at last the gate opens but it does not swing back to admit us. A man comes out with two guards on either side of him, a cape thrown over his nightgown. He stares at me for a moment and then he bows very low. “Your Grace, forgive me.”

“Anything! If you will let me in and give me a bed for the night,” I say, trying to keep the fury out of my voice. “I am very tired and I am with child and we have come all the way from Scotland. I expected a better welcome to my own country than this.”

He bows his head and then looks at Archibald. “Do you have papers of safe conduct?” he asks.

Obviously, we don’t. We don’t have food or my jewels or my wardrobe or my shoes. We don’t have my horses or my hawks or my furniture. We don’t have my tapestries or my silver plate. We don’t have my books or my musicians or my secretary. We don’t have the late King James’s lute. We don’t have a safe conduct because we are seeking safety.

“This is the queen regent!” Archibald shouts. “She doesn’t need a safe conduct to get into her own brother’s castle! You should be on your knees welcoming her in. She is carrying my child! She is the mother of the King of Scotland. Open the gates or by God I will—”

He breaks off. He does not say what he will do. Of course, this just reminds everyone that there is nothing he can do. We are a party of a dozen people and three of us are ladies and one of us is eight months pregnant. What are we going to do if the governor refuses us entry?

“Sir Anthony,” George Douglas says pleasantly, “out of chivalry, out of loyalty, you must admit the king’s sister in the middle of the night when she is flying from Scots traitors.”

“I can’t,” he says miserably. He bows low to me. “I am commanded, absolutely commanded by the king himself, to admit no one from Scotland without a safe conduct from the king himself. Without a signed and sealed safe conduct, my gates must be kept closed.”

“To the king’s sister?” I repeat.

He bows in silence and I think, this is what sisterhood with those two women has brought me: nothing.

“What are we to do?” Archibald goes from rage to helplessness. “We have to get her somewhere safe. She is less than a month from her time. We have to get somewhere safe!”

“What about Coldstream Priory?” Sir Anthony says, eager to move us on. “The abbess will admit her, and from there you can send for help from London.”

“She has to come in here!” Archibald rages again. “I insist!”

“How far is it to Coldstream?” I ask shortly.

“Only about four hours,” the governor replies. “Three,” he says when he sees my face.

George throws his reins to one of the servants and comes to Archibald and myself. “He won’t let us in; he can’t,” he says. “We waste time and we lose our dignity begging here. Coldstream is our best chance. We’re in England now, we should be safe. Albany probably won’t cross the border. Let’s force this fool to give us food and we’ll go down the road and get a bed for the night in an abbey or a house or somewhere, and go on to Coldstream in the morning.”

“I’m so tired,” I say quietly. “I don’t think I can.”

“We’ll stop as soon as we can,” George promises me.

“I tell you, I can’t,” I say, my voice catching on a sob.

“You’ve got to,” Archibald replies. “You should not have left Linlithgow if you were not prepared to run to England.”