The Fortunes of Nigel

'I will blame no other for it,' said Richie; and with that undismayed pertinacity of conceit, which made a fundamental part of his character, he abode the issue, which was not long of arriving.

In a few minutes Maxwell himself arrived in the apartment, and demanded hastily who had placed a writing on the king's trencher, Linklater denied all knowledge of it; but Richie Moniplies, stepping boldly forth, pronounced the emphatical confession, 'I am the man.'

'Follow me, then,' said Maxwell, after regarding him with a look of great curiosity.

They went up a private staircase,—even that private staircase, the privilege of which at Court is accounted a nearer road to power than the grandes entrees themselves. Arriving in what Richie described as an 'ill redd-up' ante-room, the usher made a sign to him to stop, while he went into the king's closet. Their conference was short, and as Maxwell opened the door to retire, Richie heard the conclusion of it.

'Ye are sure he is not dangerous?—I was caught once.—Bide within call, but not nearer the door than within three geometrical cubits. If I speak loud, start to me like a falcon—If I speak loun, keep your lang lugs out of ear- shot—and now let him come in.'

Richie passed forward at Maxwell's mute signal, and in a moment found himself in the presence of the king. Most men of Richie's birth and breeding, and many others, would have been abashed at finding themselves alone with their Sovereign. But Richie Moniplies had an opinion of himself too high to be controlled by any such ideas; and having made his stiff reverence, he arose once more into his perpendicular height, and stood before James as stiff as a hedge- stake.

'Have ye gotten them, man? have ye gotten them?' said the king, in a fluttered state, betwixt hope and eagerness, and some touch of suspicious fear. 'Gie me them—gie me them—before ye speak a word, I charge you, on your allegiance.'

Richie took a box from his bosom, and, stooping on one knee, presented it to his Majesty, who hastily opened it, and having ascertained that it contained a certain carcanet of rubies, with which the reader was formerly made acquainted, he could not resist falling into a sort of rapture, kissing the gems, as if they had been capable of feeling, and repeating again and again with childish delight, 'Onyx cum prole, silexque—-Onyx cum prole! Ah, my bright and bonny sparklers, my heart loups light to see you again.' He then turned to Richie, upon whose stoical countenance his Majesty's demeanour had excited something like a grim smile, which James interrupted his rejoicing to reprehend, saying, 'Take heed, sir, you are not to laugh at us—we are your anointed Sovereign.'

'God forbid that I should laugh!' said Richie, composing his countenance into its natural rigidity. 'I did but smile, to bring my visage into coincidence and conformity with your Majesty's physiognomy.'

'Ye speak as a dutiful subject, and an honest man,' said the king; 'but what deil's your name, man?'

'Even Richie Moniplies, the son of auld Mungo Moniplies, at the West Port of Edinburgh, who had the honour to supply your Majesty's mother's royal table, as weel as your Majesty's, with flesh and other vivers, when time was.'

'Aha!' said the king, laughing,—for he possessed, as a useful attribute of his situation, a tenacious memory, which recollected every one with whom he was brought into casual contact,—'Ye are the self-same traitor who had weelnigh coupit us endlang on the causey of our ain courtyard? but we stuck by our mare. Equam memento rebus in arduis servare. Weel, be not dismayed, Richie; for, as many men have turned traitors, it is but fair that a traitor, now and then, suld prove to be, contra expectanda, a true man. How cam ye by our jewels, man?—cam ye on the part of George Heriot?'

'In no sort,' said Richie. 'May it please your Majesty, I come as Harry Wynd fought, utterly for my own hand, and on no man's errand; as, indeed, I call no one master, save Him that made me, your most gracious Majesty who governs me, and the noble Nigel Olifaunt, Lord of Glenvarloch, who maintained me as lang as he could maintain himself, poor nobleman!'

'Glenvarlochides again!' exclaimed the king; 'by my honour, he lies in ambush for us at every corner!— Maxwell knocks at the door. It is George Heriot come to tell us he cannot find these jewels.—Get thee behind the arras, Richie—stand close, man—sneeze not—cough not— breathe not!—Jingling Geordie is so damnably ready with his gold-ends of wisdom, and sae accursedly backward with his gold-ends of siller, that, by our royal saul, we are glad to get a hair in his neck.'

Richie got behind the arras, in obedience to the commands of the good- natured king, while the Monarch, who never allowed his dignity to stand in the way of a frolic, having adjusted, with his own hand, the tapestry, so as to complete the ambush, commanded Maxwell to tell him what was the matter without. Maxwell's reply was so low as to be lost by Richie Moniplies, the peculiarity of whose situation by no means abated his curiosity and desire to gratify it to the uttermost.

'Let Geordie Heriot come in,' said the king; and, as Richie could observe through a slit in the tapestry, the honest citizen, if not actually agitated, was at least discomposed. The king, whose talent for wit, or humour, was precisely of a kind to be gratified by such a scene as ensued, received his homage with coldness, and began to talk to him with an air of serious dignity, very different from the usual indecorous levity of his behaviour. 'Master Heriot,' he said, 'if we aright remember, we opignorated in your hands certain jewels of the Crown, for a certain sum of money—Did we, or did we not?'

'My most gracious Sovereign,' said Heriot, 'indisputably your Majesty was pleased to do so.'

'The property of which jewels and cimelia remained with us,' continued the king, in the same solemn tone, 'subject only to your claim of advance thereupon; which advance being repaid, gives us right to repossession of the thing opignorated, or pledged, or laid in wad. Voetius, Vinnius, Groenwigeneus, Pagenstecherus,—all who have treated de Contractu Opignerationis, consentiunt in eundem,—gree on the same point. The Roman law, the English common law, and the municipal law of our ain ancient kingdom of Scotland, though they split in mair particulars than I could desire, unite as strictly in this as the three strands of a twisted rope.'

'May it please your Majesty,' replied Heriot, 'it requires not so many learned authorities to prove to any honest man, that his interest in a pledge is determined when the money lent is restored.'

'Weel, sir, I proffer restoration of the sum lent, and I demand to be repossessed of the jewels pledged with you. I gave ye a hint, brief while since, that this would be essential to my service, for, as approaching events are like to call us into public, it would seem strange if we did not appear with those ornaments, which are heirlooms of the Crown, and the absence whereof is like to place us in contempt and suspicion with our liege subjects.'

Master George Heriot seemed much moved by this address of his Sovereign, and replied with emotion, 'I call Heaven to witness, that I am totally harmless in this matter, and that I would willingly lose the sum advanced, so that I could restore those jewels, the absence of which your Majesty so justly laments. Had the jewels remained with me, the account of them would be easily rendered; but your Majesty will do me the justice to remember, that, by your express order, I transferred them to another person, who advanced a large sum, just about the time of my departure for Paris. The money was pressingly wanted, and no other means to come by it occurred to me. I told your Majesty, when I brought the needful supply, that the man from whom the monies were obtained, was of no good repute; and your most princely answer was, smelling to the gold—Non olet, it smells not of the means that have gotten it.'

'Weel, man,' said the king, 'but what needs a' this din? If ye gave my jewels in pledge to such a one, suld ye not, as a liege subject, have taken care that the redemption was in our power? And are we to suffer the loss of our cimelia by your neglect, besides being exposed to the scorn and censure of our lieges, and of the foreign ambassadors?'

'My lord and liege king,' said Heriot, 'God knows, if my bearing blame or shame in this matter would keep it from your Majesty, it were my duty to endure both, as a servant grateful for many benefits; but when your Majesty considers the violent death of the man himself, the disappearance of his daughter, and of his wealth, I trust you will remember that I warned your Majesty, in humble duty, of the possibility of such casualties, and prayed you not to urge me to deal with him on your behalf.'

'But you brought me nae better means,' said the king—'Geordie, ye brought me nae better means. I was like a deserted man; what could I do but grip to the first siller that offered, as a drowning man grasps to the willow- wand that comes readiest?—And now, man, what for have ye not brought back the jewels? they are surely above ground, if ye wad make strict search.'

'All strict search has been made, may it please your Majesty,' replied the citizen; 'hue and cry has been sent out everywhere, and it has been found impossible to recover them.'