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diff --git a/old/61466-0.txt b/old/61466-0.txt deleted file mode 100644 index cf288db..0000000 --- a/old/61466-0.txt +++ /dev/null @@ -1,19324 +0,0 @@ -The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Queen's Quair, by Maurice Hewlett - -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most -other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions -whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of -the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at -www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you'll have -to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this ebook. - -Title: The Queen's Quair - or, The Six Years' Tragedy - -Author: Maurice Hewlett - -Release Date: February 20, 2020 [EBook #61466] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: UTF-8 - -*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE QUEEN'S QUAIR *** - - - - -Produced by Tim Lindell and the Online Distributed -Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was -produced from images generously made available by The -Internet Archive) - - - - - - - - - - -THE QUEEN’S QUAIR - -OR - -THE SIX YEARS’ TRAGEDY - -[Illustration] - - - - - THE - QUEEN’S QUAIR - OR - The Six Years’ Tragedy - - BY - MAURICE HEWLETT - - ‘Improbus ille puer, crudelis tu quoque Mater’ - - New York - THE MACMILLAN COMPANY - LONDON: MACMILLAN & CO., LTD. - 1904 - - _All rights reserved_ - - COPYRIGHT, 1903, - BY MAURICE HEWLETT. - - COPYRIGHT, 1903, 1904, - BY THE MACMILLAN COMPANY. - - Set up, electrotyped, and published May, 1904. - - Norwood Press - J. S. Cushing & Co.—Berwick & Smith Co. - Norwood, Mass., U.S.A. - - - - -BY HIS PERMISSION AND WITH GOOD REASON THIS TRAGIC ESSAY IS INSCRIBED TO - -ANDREW LANG - - - - -CONTENTS - - - PAGE - - AUTHOR’S PROLOGUE 1 - - BOOK THE FIRST - - MAIDS’ ADVENTURE - - CHAP. - - 1. HERE YOU ARE IN THE ANTECHAMBER 7 - - 2. HERE YOU STEP INTO THE FOG 25 - - 3. SUPERFICIAL PROPERTIES OF THE HONEYPOT 36 - - 4. ROUGH MUSIC HERE 47 - - 5. HERE ARE FLIES AT THE HONEYPOT 67 - - 6. THE FOOL’S WHIP 77 - - 7. GORDON’S BANE 91 - - 8. THE DIVORCE OF MARY LIVINGSTONE (_To an Italian Air_) 106 - - 9. AIR OF ST. ANDREW: ADONIS AND THE SCAPEGOAT 121 - - 10. THEY LOOK AND LIKE 135 - - 11. PROTHALAMIUM: VENUS WINS FAIR ADONIS 146 - - 12. EPITHALAMIUM: END OF ALL MAIDS’ ADVENTURE 169 - - BOOK THE SECOND - - MEN’S BUSINESS - - 1. OPINIONS OF FRENCH PARIS UPON SOME LATE EVENTS 191 - - 2. GRIEFS AND CONSOLATIONS OF ADONIS 201 - - 3. DIVERS USES OF A HARDY MAN 214 - - 4. MANY DOGS 229 - - 5. MIDNIGHT EXPERIENCES OF JEAN-MARIE-BAPTISTE DES-ESSARS 236 - - 6. VENUS IN THE TOILS 250 - - 7. AFTERTASTE 270 - - 8. KING’S EVIL 287 - - 9. THE WASHING OF HANDS 306 - - 10. EXTRACTS FROM THE DIURNALL OF THE MASTER OF SEMPILL 318 - - 11. ARMIDA DOUBTFUL IN THE GARDEN 328 - - 12. SCOTCHMEN’S BUSINESS 340 - - BOOK THE THIRD - - MARKET OF WOMEN - - 1. STORMY OPENING 351 - - 2. THE BRAINSICK SONATA 363 - - 3. DESCANT UPON A THEME AS OLD AS JASON 381 - - 4. SHE LOOKS BACK ONCE 394 - - 5. MEDEA IN THE BEDCHAMBER 404 - - 6. KIRK O’ FIELD 414 - - 7. THE RED BRIDEGROOM 430 - - 8. THE BRIDE’S PRELUDE 451 - - 9. THE BRIDE’S TRAGEDY 474 - - 10. THE KNOCKING AT BORTHWICK 484 - - 11. APPASSIONATA 490 - - 12. ADDOLORATA 502 - - EPILOGUE 506 - - - - -AUTHOR’S PROLOGUE - - -_If one were in the vein for the colours and haunted mists of Romance; -if the thing, perhaps, were not so serious, there might be composed, -and by me, a Romance of Queens out of my acquaintance with four ladies -of that degree; among whom—to adopt the terms proper—were the Queen of -Gall, the Queen of Ferment, and the Queen of Wine and Honey. You see that -one would employ, for the occasion, the language of poets to designate -the Queen-Mother of France, the Queen-Maid of England, and the too-fair -Queen of Scots: to omit the fourth queen from such a tale would be for -superstition’s sake, and not for lack of matter—I mean Queen Venus, who -(God be witness) played her part in the affairs of her mortal sisters, -and proclaimed her prerogatives by curtailing theirs. But either the -matter is too serious, or I am. I see flesh and spirit involved in all -this, truth and lies, God and the Devil—dreadful concernments of our -own, with which Romance has no profitable traffic. La Bele Isoud, the -divine Oriana, Aude the Fair (whom Roland loved)—tender ghosts, one and -all of them, whose heartaches were so melodious that they have filled -four-and-twenty pleasant volumes, and yet so unsubstantial that no one -feels one penny the worse, or the better, for them afterwards. But here! -Ah, here we have real players in a game tremendously real; and the hearts -they seem to play with were once bright with lively blood; and the lies -they told should have made streaks on lips once vividly incarnate—and -sometimes did it. Real! Why, not long ago you could have seen a little -pair of black satin slippers, sadly down at heel, which may have -paced with Riccio’s in the gallery at Wemyss, or tapped the floor of -Holyroodhouse while King Henry Darnley was blustering there, trying to -show his manhood. A book about Queen Mary—if it be honest—has no business -to be a genteel exercise in the romantic: if the truth is to be told, let -it be there._ - - * * * * * - -_A quair is a ~cahier~, a quire, a little book. In one such a certain -king wrote fairly the tale of his love-business; and here, in this other, -I pretend to show you all the tragic error, all the pain, known only to -her that moved in it, of that child of his children’s children, Mary of -Scotland. What others have guessed at, building surmise upon surmise, -she knew; for what they did, she suffered. Some who were closest about -her—women, boys—may have known some: Claude Nau got some from her; my -Master Des-Essars got much. But the whole of it lay in her heart, and to -know her is to hold the key of that. Suppose her hand had been at this -pen; suppose mine had turned that key: there might have resulted ‘The -Queen’s Quair.’ Well! Suppose one or the other until the book is done—and -then judge me._ - -_Questions for King Œdipus, Riddle of the Sphinx, Mystery of Queen Mary! -She herself is the Mystery; the rest is simple enough. There had been -men in Scotland from old time, and Stuarts for six generations to break -themselves upon them. Great in thought, frail in deed, adventurous, -chivalrous, hardy, short of hold, doomed to fail at the touch—so -ventured, so failed the Stuarts from the first James to the fifth. -There had been men in Scotland, but no women. Forth from the Lady of -Lorraine came the lass, born in an unhappy hour, tossing high her young -head, saying, ‘Let me alone to rule wild Scotland.’ They had but to -give her house-room: no mystery there. The mystery is that any mystery -has been found. Maids’ Adventure—with that we begin. A bevy of maids -to rule wild Scotland! What mystery is there in that? Or—since Mystery -is double-edged, engaging what we dare not, as well as what we cannot, -tell—what mystery but that?_ - -_A hundred books have been written, a hundred songs sung; men enough of -these latter days have broken their hearts for Queen Mary’s. What is -more to the matter is that no heart but hers was broken in time. All the -world can love her now; but who loved her then? Not a man among them. A -few girls went weeping; a few boys laid down their necks that she might -walk free of the mire. Alas! the mire swallowed them up, and she must -soil her pretty feet. This is the nut of the tragedy; pity is involved -rather than terror. But no song ever pierced the fold of her secret, no -book ever found out the truth, because none ever sought her heart. Here, -then, is a book which has sought nothing else, and a song which springs -from that only: called, on that same account, ‘The Queen’s Quair.’_ - - - - -BOOK THE FIRST - -MAIDS’ ADVENTURE - - - - -CHAPTER I - -HERE YOU ARE IN THE ANTECHAMBER - - -It is quite true that when they had buried the little wasted King -Francis, and while the days of Black Dule still held, the Cardinal of -Lorraine tried three times to see his niece, and was three times refused. -Not being man enough to break a way in, he retired; but as he knew very -well that the Queen-Mother, the King, the King of Navarre, and Madame -Marguerite went in and out all day long, he had a suspicion that they, or -the seasons, were more at fault than the hidden mourner. ‘A time, times, -and half a time,’ he said, ‘have good scriptural warrant. I will try once -more—at this hour of high mass.’ So he did, and saw Mary Livingstone, -that strapping girl, who came into the antechamber, rather flushed, and -devoutly kissed his ring. - -‘How is it with the Queen my niece?’ - -‘Sadly, Eminence.’ - -‘I must know how sadly, my girl. I must see her. It is of great concern.’ - -The young woman looked scared. ‘Eminence, she sees only the Queen-Mother.’ - -‘The more reason,’ says he, ‘why she should see somebody else. She may be -praying one of these fine days that she never see the Queen-Mother again.’ - -Livingstone coloured up to the eyes. ‘Oh, sir! Oh, Lord Cardinal, and so -she doth, and so do we all! They are dealing wickedly with our mistress. -It is true, what I told you, that she sees the Queen-Mother: that is -because her Majesty will not be denied. She forces the doors—she hath -had a door taken down. She comes and goes as she will; rails at our lady -before us all. She, poor lamb, what can she do? Oh, sir, if you could -stop this traffic I would let you in of my own venture.’ - -‘Take me in, then,’ said the cardinal: ‘I will stop it.’ - -In the semi-dark he found his niece, throned upon the knee of Mary Beaton -for comfort, in heavy black weeds, out of which the sharp oval of her -face and the crescent white coif gleamed like two moons, the old within -the new. Two other maids sat on the floor near by; each had a hand of -her—pitiful sentinels of spoiled treasure. When the gentleman-usher at -the curtain was forestalled by the great man’s quick entry, four girls -rose at once, as a covey of partridges out of corn, and all but the Queen -fell upon their knees. She, hugging herself as if suddenly chilled, -came forward a little, not very far, and held out to the cardinal an -unwilling hand. He took it, laid it on his own, kissed, and let it drop -immediately. Then he stood upright, sniffed, and looked about him, being -so near the blood royal himself that he could use familiarity with -princes. It was clear that he disapproved. - -‘Faith of a gentleman!’ he said: ‘one might see a little better, one -might breathe a little better, here, my niece.’ - -‘The room is well enough,’ said the Queen. - -It was dark and hot, heavy with some thick scent. - -As she pronounced upon it the cardinal paused half-way to the shutter; -but he paused too slightly. The Queen flushed all over and went quickly -between him and the window—a vehement action. ‘Leave it, leave it alone! -I choose my own way. You dare not touch it.’ She spoke furiously; he -bowed his grey head and drew back. Then, in a minute, she herself flung -back the shutters, and stood trembling in the sudden glory revealed. The -broad flood of day showed him the waves of storm still surging over her; -but even as he approved she commanded herself and became humble—he knew -her difficult to resist in that mood. - -‘I thought you would treat me as the Queen-Mother does. That put me in a -rage. I beg your pardon, my lord.’ As she held out her hand again, this -time he took it, and drew her by it along with him to the open window. He -made her stand in the sun. Far below the grey curtain-wall were the moat, -the bridges, the trim gardens and steep red roofs of Orleans, the spired -bulk of the great church; beyond all that the gay green countryside. A -fresh wind was blowing out there. You saw the willows bend, the river -cream and curd. The keen strength of day and the weather made her blink; -but he braced her to meet it by his words. - -‘Madam,’ said he, ‘needs must your heart uplift to see God’s good world -still shining in its place, patient until your Majesty tires of sitting -in the dark.’ - -She smiled awry, and drummed on the ledge with her long fingers, looking -wilfully down, not choosing to agree. The maids, all clustered together, -watched their beloved; but the cardinal had saner eyes than any of them. -As he saw her, so may you and I. - -A tall, slim girl, petted and pettish, pale (yet not unwholesome), -chestnut-haired, she looked like a flower of the heat, lax and delicate. -Her skin—but more, the very flesh of her—seemed transparent, with colour -that warmed it from within, faintly, with a glow of fine rose. They -said that when she drank you could see the red wine run like a fire -down her throat; and it may partly be believed. Others have reported -that her heart could be discerned beating within her body, and raying -out a ruddy light, now fierce, now languid, through every crystal -member. The cardinal, who was no rhapsodist of the sort, admitted her -clear skin, admitted her patent royalty, but denied that she was a -beautiful girl—even for a queen. Her nose, he judged, was too long, her -lips were too thin, her eyes too narrow. He detested her trick of the -sidelong look. Her lower lids were nearly straight, her upper rather -heavy: between them they gave her a sleepy appearance, sometimes a sly -appearance, when, slowly lifting, they revealed the glimmering hazel of -the eyes themselves. Hazel, I say, if hazel they were, which sometimes -seemed to be yellow, and sometimes showed all black: the light acted -upon hers as upon a cat’s eyes. Beautiful she may not have been, though -Monsieur de Brantôme would never allow it; but fine, fine she was all -over—sharply, exquisitely cut and modelled: her sweet smooth chin, her -amorous lips, bright red where all else was pale as a tinged rose; her -sensitive nose; her broad, high brows; her neck which two hands could -hold, her small shoulders and bosom of a child. And then her hands, -her waist no bigger than a stalk, her little feet! She had sometimes -an intent, considering, wise look—the look of the Queen of Desire, who -knew not where to set the bounds of her need, but revealed to no one -what that was. And belying that look askance of hers—sly, or wise, or -sleepy, as you choose—her voice was bold and very clear, her manners -were those of a lively, graceful boy, her gestures quick, her spirit -impatient and entirely without fear. Her changes of mood were dangerous: -she could wheedle the soul out of a saint, and then fling it back to him -as worthless because it had been so easily got. She wrote a beautiful -bold hand, loved learning, and petting, and a choice phrase. She used -perfumes, and dipped her body every day in a bath of wine. At this hour -she was nineteen years old, and not two months a widow. - -All this the cardinal knew by heart, and had no need to observe while -she stood strumming at the window-sill. His opinion—if he had chosen to -give it—would have been: these qualities and perfections, ah, and these -imperfections, are all very proper to a prince who has a principality; -for my niece, I count greatly upon a wise marriage—wise for our family, -wise for herself. He would have been the last to deny that the Guises had -been hampered by King Francis’ decease. All was to do again—but all could -be done. This fretful, fair girl was still Queen of Scotland, _allons_! -Dowager of France, but Queen of Scotland, worth a knight’s venture. -Advance pawns, therefore! He was a chess-player, passionate for the game. - -He surveyed the maids of honour, bouncing Livingstone and the rest of -them, too zealous after their mistress’s ease, and too jealous lest the -world should edge them out; and found that he had more zest for the -world and the spring weather. ‘Ah, madam,’ he said, ‘ah, my niece, this -cloister-life of stroking, and kindly knees, is not one for your Majesty. -There are high roads out yonder to be traversed, armies to set upon them, -cities and towns and hill-crests to be taken. But you sit at home in the -dark, nursed by your maids!’ - -She raised her eyebrows, not her eyes. ‘Why,’ says she, ‘the King, my -husband, is dead, and most of his people glad of it, I believe. If my -kingdom lies within these four walls, and my government is but over -these poor girls, they are my own. What else should I do? Walk abroad -to mass? Ride abroad to the meadows? And be mocked by the people for a -barren wife, who never was wife at all? And be browbeat openly by the -Apothecary’s Daughter? Is this what you set before me, Lord Cardinal?’ - -The cardinal put up his chin and cupped his beard. ‘The rich may call -themselves poor, the poor dare not. You have a realm, my niece, and a -fair realm. You stand at the door of a second. You may yet have a third, -it seems to me.’ - -Queen Mary looked at him then, with a gleam in her eyes which answered -for a smile. But she hid her mind almost at once, and resumed her -drumming. - -‘King Charles is hot for me,’ she said. ‘He is a brave lad. I should be -Queen of France again—of France and England and Scotland.’ She laughed -softly to herself, as if snug in the remembrance that she was still -sought. - -The cardinal became exceedingly serious. ‘I have thought of that. To my -mind there is a beautiful justice——! What our family can do shall be -done—but, alas——!’ - -She broke in upon him here. ‘Our family, my lord! _Your_ family! Ah, that -was a good marriage for me, for example, which you made! That ailing -child! Death was in his bed before ever I was put there. My marriage! -My husband! He used to cry all night of the pain in his head. He clung -to the coverlet, and to me, lest they should pull him out to prayers. -Marriage! He was cankered from his birth. What king was Francis, to make -me a queen?’ - -The cardinal lifted his fine head. ‘It was my sister Marie who made -you a queen, madam, by the grace of God and King James. Through your -parentage you are Queen of Scotland, and should be Queen of England—and -you shall be. God of gods, you may be queen of whatso realm you please. -What do I learn? The whole world’s mind runs upon the marrying of you. -The Archduke Ferdinand hath here his ambassadors, attendant on the -Queen-Mother’s pleasure—which you allow to be yours also. Don Carlos, his -own hand at the pen, writes for a hope of your Majesty’s. The Earl of -Huntly, a great and religious prince in Scotland, urges the pretensions -of his son, the Lord of Gordon. Are these to be laid before the -Queen-Mother? To the duchess, your grandmother, writeth daily the Duke -of Châtelherault concerning his son, the Earl of Arran. On his side is -my brother the Constable. More! They bring me word from England that the -Earl of Lennox, next in blood to your Majesty, next indeed to both your -thrones, is hopeful to come to France—he, too, with a son in his pocket, -young, apt, and lovely as a love-apple. All these hopeful princes, -madam——’ - -Queen Mary coloured. With difficulty she said: ‘I hear of every one of -them for the first time.’ - -‘Oh, madam,’ cried the cardinal, ‘so long as you sit on your maids’ knees -and give the keys of your chamber to the Queen-Mother, you will only hear -what she please to tell you. And more’—he raised his voice, and gave it -severity—‘I take leave to add that so long as your Majesty hath Mistress -Livingstone here for your husband, your Majesty can look for no other.’ - -‘I am never likely to look on a better,’ says Queen Mary, and put her -hand behind her. Mary Livingstone stooped quickly and snatched a kiss -from the palm, while the cardinal gazed steadily out of doors. But he -felt more at ease, being sure that he had leavened his lump. - -And so he had. The sweet fact of great marriages beyond her doors, and -the sour fact of the Queen-Mother within them, worked a ferment in her -brain and set her at her darling joy of busy scheming. What turned the -scale over was the mortifying discovery that Catherine de’ Medici was in -reality dying to get rid of her. She flew into a great rage, changed her -black mourning for white, announced her departure, paid her farewells, -and went to her grandmother’s court at Rheims. Queen Catherine watched -her, darkling, from a turret as she rode gaily out in her troop of -Guises. ‘There,’ she is reported to have said, I know not whether truly -or not, ‘there goes Madam Venus a-hunting the apple. Alas for Shepherd -Paris!’ The reflection is a shrewd one at least; but it was not then so -certain that Orleans had seen the last of Queen Mary. It was no way to -get her out of France to tell her there was nothing you desired so much. - -The old duchess, her grandam, talked marriages and the throne of -Scotland, therefore, into ears only half willing. The little Queen was by -no means averse to either, but could not bring herself to lose hold upon -France. ‘Better to be Dowager of France than an Empress in the north,’ -she said; and then ‘Fiddle-de-dee, my child,’ the old lady retorted; -‘give me a live dog before a dead lion. Your desire here is to vex La -Medicis. You would make eyes at King Charles, and we should all lose our -heads. Do you wish to end your days at Loches? The Duke of Milan found -cold quarters there, they tell me. No, no. Marry a king’s son and recover -England from the Bastard.’ Thus all France spake of our great Elizabeth. - -Queen Mary, though she loved her grandmother, pinched her lip, looked -meek, and hardened her heart. She had obstinacy by the father’s mother’s -side—a Tudor virtue. - -It was just after she had gone to Nancy, to the court of her cousin of -Lorraine, that she veered across to the side of the Guises and determined -to adventure in Scotland. Two Scots lords came overseas to visit her -there: one was the Lord James Stuart, her base-brother, the other a -certain Father Lesley, an old friend of her mother’s. The priest was a -timid man, but by good hap and slenderness of equipage gained her first. -She might have been sure he was a faithful friend, though doubtful if a -very wise one. Faithful enough he proved in days to come: at this present -she found him a simple, fatherly man, of wandering mind, familiar, -benevolent, soon scared. He was enchanted with her, and said so. He -praised her person, the scarlet of her lips, the bright hue of her hair. -‘A bonny brown, my child,’ he said, touching it, ‘to my partial eyes.’ -She laughed as she told him that in Paris also they had liked the colour. -‘They will call it foxy in Scotland,’ he said, with a sniff; and she -found out afterwards that they did. At first she was ‘madam’ here, and -‘your Majesty’ there; but as the talk warmed him he forgot her queenship -in her extreme youth, had her hand in his own and patted it with the -other. Then it came to ‘Child, this you should do,’ or ‘Child, I hope -that is not your usage’; and once he went so far as to hold her by the -hands at arms’ length and peer at her through his kind, weak eyes, up -and down, as he said to himself, ‘Eh, sirs, a tall bit lassie to stand -by Bruce’s chair! But her mother was just such another one—just such -another.’ - -She thought this too far to go, even for a churchman, and drew off with a -smile and shake of the head—not enough to humiliate him. - -He cautioned her with fearful winks and nods against the Lord James -Stuart, her half-brother, hinting more than he dared to tell. ‘That man -hath narrow eyes,’ he said; then, recollecting himself, ‘and so hath -your Majesty by right of blood. All the Stuarts have them—the base and -the true. But his, remark, are most guarded eyes, so that you shall -not easily discover in what direction he casts his looks. But I say, -madam,’—and he raised his wiry voice,—‘I say that the throne is ever at -his right hand; and I do think that he looks ever to the right.’ - -The Queen’s eyes were plain enough at this—squirrel-colour, straight as -arrows. Being free-spoken herself, she disliked periphrasis. ‘Does my -brother desire my throne? Is this your meaning?’ - -He jumped back as if she had whipped him, and crossed himself vehemently, -saying, ‘God forbid it! God forbid it!’ - -‘I shall forbid it, whether or no,’ said the Queen. ‘But I suppose you -had some such meaning behind your speech.’ And she pressed him until she -learned that such indeed was the belief in Scotland. - -‘Your misborn brother, madam,’ he said, whispering, ‘will tell you -nothing that he believeth, and ask you nothing that he desireth; nor -will he any man. He will urge you to the contrary of what he truly -requires. He will take his profit of another man’s sin and rejoice to see -his own hands clean. My heart,’ he said, forgetting himself,—and ‘Ah, -Jesu!’ she records, ‘I was called that again, and by another mouth,’—‘My -heart, if you tender the peace of Holy Church in your land, keep your -brother James in France under lock and key.’ - -She laughed at his alarms. ‘I wish liberty to all men and their -consciences sir. I am sure I shall find friends in Scotland.’ - -He named the great Earl of Huntly and his four sons; but by now she was -tired of him and sent him away. All the effect of the poor man’s speeches -had been to make her anxious to measure wits with her base-brother. He -came in two or three days later with a great train, and she had her -opportunity. - -What she made of it you may judge by this, that it was he and no other -who spurred her into Scotland. He did it, in a manner very much his own, -by first urging it and then discovering impossible fatigues in the road. -This shows him to have been, what he was careful to conceal, a student of -human kind. - -A certain French valet of the Earl of Bothwell’s—Nicolas Hubart, from -whose _Confessions_ I shall have to draw liberally by-and-by, and of -whom, himself, there will be plenty to say—made once an acute observation -of the great Lord James, when he said that he was that sort of man who, -if he had not a black cloak for Sunday, would be an atheist or even an -epicurean. There was no one, certainly, who had a more intense regard -for decent observance than he. It was his very vesture: he would have -starved or frozen without it. It clothed him completely from head to -foot, and from the heart outwards. Much more than that. There are many in -this world who go about it swathed up to the eyes, imposing upon those -they meet. But this man imposed first of all upon himself. So complete -was his robing, he could not see himself out of it. So white were his -hands, so flawless of grit, he could never see them otherwise. Supposing -Father Lesley to have been right, supposing that James Stuart did—and -throughout—plot for a throne, he would have been the first to cry out -upon the vice of Brutus. It may well be doubted whether he once, in all -his life, stood alone—so to speak—naked before his own soul. Perhaps such -a man can hardly be deemed a sinner, whatever he do. There are those at -this hour who say that the Lord James was no sinner. How should he be? -they cry. His own soul never knew it. - -This tall, pale, inordinately prim nobleman, with his black beard, black -clothes, and (to the Queen’s mind) black beliefs, seemed to walk for -ever in a mask of sour passivity. He never spoke when to bow the head -could be an answer, he never affirmed without qualification, he never -denied or refused anything as of his own opinion. He was allowed to -have extraordinarily fine manners, even in France, where alacrity of -service counted for more than the service itself; and yet Queen Mary -declared that she had never seen a man enter a doorway so long after -he had opened the door. He seldom looked at you. His voice was low and -measured. He cleared his throat before he spoke, and swallowed the moment -he had finished, as if he were anxious to engulf any possible effect -of his words. Of all the ties upon a man he dreaded most those of the -heart-strings: she never moved him to natural emotion but once. But, at -this first coming of his, he paid her great court, and bent his stiff -knees to her many times a day: this notwithstanding that, as Mary Seton -affirmed, he had water on one of them. She said that she had that from -his chaplain, but her love of mischief had betrayed her love of truth. -The Lord James always stood to his prayers. - -When the Queen saw him first it was in the presence of her women, of Lord -Eglinton, of the Marquis D’Elbœuf, and others—persons who either hated -him with reason or despised him with none. He moved her then, almost with -passion, to go ‘home’ to Scotland, saying that it behoved princes to -dwell among their own people. But at a privy audience a few days later, -he held to another tune altogether, pursing his lips, twiddling his two -thumbs, looking up and down and about. Now he said that he was not sure; -that there were dangers attending a Popish Queen, and those not only -within the kingdom but without it. She begged him to explain himself. - -‘Better bide, madam,’ said he, ‘until the wind change in England.’ - -Any word of England always excited her. The colour flew to her face. -‘What hath my sister in England to do with my kingdom, good brother?’ - -‘Why, madam,’ he said, ‘it has come to my sure knowledge that you shall -get no safe-conduct from the English Queen, to go smoothly to Scotland.’ - -He never watched any one, or was never observed to be watching; but his -guarded eyes, glancing at her as they shifted, showed him that, being -angry now, she was beautiful—like a spirit of the fire. - -‘I should be offended at what you report if I believed it possible,’ she -said after a while. ‘And yet England is not the only road, nor is it the -best road, to my kingdom.’ - -‘No indeed, madam,’ he agreed; ‘but it is the only easy road for a young -and delicate lady.’ - -‘Let my youth, brother, be as God made it,’ she answered him; ‘but as for -my delicacy, I am thankfully able to bear fatigue and to thrive upon it. -If my good sister, or you, my lord’—she spoke very clearly—‘think to keep -me from my own by threats of force or warnings of danger, I would have -you understand that the like of those is a spur to me.’ - -This was a thing which, in fact, he had understood perfectly. - -‘I am not a shying horse,’ she continued, ‘to swerve at a heap of sand. I -believe I shall find loyalty in my country, and cheerful courage there to -meet my own courage. There be those that laugh at danger there, as well -as those who weep.’ - -He said suavely here that she misjudged him, that only his tenderness for -her person was at fault. ‘We grow timid where we love much, madam.’ - -At this she looked at him so unequivocally that he changed the subject. - -‘If your Majesty,’ he pursued, ‘knows not the mind of the English Queen, -or misdoubts my reading of it, let application be made to Master -Throckmorton. I am content to be judged out of his mouth.’ - -Master Throckmorton was English Ambassador to the Queen of Scots, a -friend of the Lord James’s. His lordship, indeed, had the greater -confidence in giving this advice in that he had already convinced Master -Throckmorton of what he must do, and what say, if he wished to get Queen -Mary into Scotland—as, namely, decline to help her thither; decline, for -instance, a letter of safe-conduct through English soil. - -‘Let application be made presently, brother,’ said the incensed young -lady, and gladly turned to her pleasures. - -She had been finding these of late in a society not at all to the mind of -the Lord James. Three days before this conversation the Earl of Bothwell, -no less, had come to court, making for the North from Piedmont. - -In years to come she could remember every flash and eddy of that shifting -garden scene when first he came to her. A waft of scented blossom, the -throb of a lute, and she could see the peacock on the wall, the gay June -borders, the grass plats and bright paths in between, quivering with the -heat they gave out. There was a fountain in the midst of the quincunx, -on the marble brim of which she sat with her maids and cousin D’Elbœuf, -dipping her hand, and now and then flicking water into their faces. A -page in scarlet and white had come running up to say that the Duke was -nearing with his gentlemen; and presently down the long alley she saw -them moving slowly—crimson cloaks and bared heads, the Duke in the midst, -wearing his jewelled bonnet. He was talking, and laughing immoderately -with some one she knew not at all, who swung his hat in his hand, and to -whom, as she remembered vividly, the struck poppies bowed their heads. -For he hit them as he went with his hat, and looked round to see them -fall. The Duke’s tale continued to the very verge of the privy garden; -indeed he halted there, in the face of her usher, to finish it. She saw -the stranger throw back his head to laugh. ‘What a great jowl he hath,’ -she said to Mary Fleming; and she, in a hush, said, ‘Madam, it is the -Earl Bothwell.’ A few moments later the man was kneeling before her, -presented by the Duke himself. She had time to notice the page to whom -he had thrown his hat and gloves—a pale-faced, wise-looking French boy, -who knelt also, and watched her from a pair of grey eyes ‘rimmed with -smut-colour.’ His name, she found out afterwards, was Jean-Marie-Baptiste -Des-Essars. She liked his manly looks from the first—little knowing who -and what he was to be to her. Jean-Marie-Baptiste Des-Essars! Keeper of -the _Secret des Secrets_—where should I be without him? - -The Earl of Bothwell—whom she judged (in spite of the stricken poppies) -to be good-humoured—was a galliard of the type esteemed in France by -those—and they were many—who pronounced vice to be their virtue. A -galliard, as they say, if ever there was one, flushed with rich blood, -broad-shouldered, square-jawed, with a laugh so happy and so prompt that -the world, rejoicing to hear it, thought all must be well wherever he -might be. He wore brave clothes, sat a brave horse, kept brave company -bravely. His high colour, while it betokened high feeding, got him the -credit of good health. His little eyes twinkled so merrily that you did -not see they were like a pig’s, sly and greedy at once, and bloodshot. -His tawny beard concealed a jaw underhung, a chin jutting and dangerous. -His mouth had a cruel twist; but his laughing hid that too. The bridge -of his nose had been broken; few observed it, or guessed at the brawl -which must have given it him. Frankness was his great charm, careless -ease in high places, an air of ‘take me or leave me, I go my way’; but -some mockery latent in him, and the suspicion that whatever you said or -did he would have you in derision—this was what first drew Queen Mary -to consider him. And she grew to look for it—in those twinkling eyes, -in that quick mouth; and to wonder about it, whether it was with him -always—asleep, at prayers, fighting, furious, in love. In fine, he made -her think. - -Mary Livingstone liked not the looks of him from the first, and held him -off as much as she could. She slept with her mistress in these days of -widowhood, but refused to discuss him in bed. She said that he had a -saucy eye—which was not denied—and was too masterful. - -‘You can tell it by the hateful growth of hair he hath,’ she cried. -‘When he lifts up his head to laugh—and he would laugh, mind you, at the -crucified Saviour!—you can see the climbing of his red beard, like rooted -ivy on an old wall.’ - -It is true that his beard was reddish, and gross-growing; his hair, -however, was dark brown, thick and curling. Mary Livingstone sniffed at -his hair. He stayed ten days at Nancy, saw the Queen upon each of them, -and on each held converse with her. She liked him very well, studied -him, thought him more important than he really was. He laughed at her -for this, and taxed her with it; but so pleasantly that she was not at -all offended. The Lord James would not speak of him, nor he of the Lord -James: he shrugged at any reference to him. - -‘Let it be enough, madam, to own that we do not love each other,’ he said -when she pressed him. ‘We view the world differently, that lord and I; -for I look on the evil and the good with open face and what cheer I can -muster, and he looks through his fingers and sadly. We speak little one -with the other: what he thinks of me I know not. I think him a——’ - -‘Well, my lord? You think my brother a——?’ - -‘A king’s son, madam,’ he said, demurely; but she saw the gleam in his -eye. - -He spoke fluent French, and was very ready with his Italian. He was a -latinist, a student of warfare, had read Machiavelli. He scared away a -good many poetasters by a real or an affected truculence; threatened -to duck one of them in the fountain, and proved that he could do it by -ducking another. The effect of this was, as he had intended, that Queen -Mary for a day laughed with him at the art of poetry, which was no art of -his. That day he had a private half-hour, and spoke freely of himself and -his ventures. - -‘A man rich in desires,’ he confessed himself, ‘and therefore of great -wealth. Put the peach on the wall above me, madam, and I shall surely -grow to handle it. And this other possession is mine, that while I -strive and stretch after my prize I can laugh at my own pains, and yet -not abate them.’ - -She considered every word he said, and dubbed him Democritus, her -laughing philosopher. - -‘You will have need of my sect in Scotland, madam,’ he replied with a -bow. ‘Despise it not; for in that grey country the very skies invite -us to mingle tears. You have a weeper beside you even now—the Lord -Heraclitus, a king’s son.’ - -She had no difficulty in discovering her stiff brother James under this -thin veil. - -All was going on thus well with my Lord of Bothwell when Mary Livingstone -heard him rate his page in the forecourt one morning as she came back -from the mass. She caught sight also of ‘his inflamed and wicked face,’ -and saw the little French boy flinch and turn his shoulder to a flood of -words, of which she understood not half. She guessed at them from the -rest. ‘They must needs be worse; and yet how can they be? And oh! the -poor little Stoic with his white face!’ The good girl snapped her lips -together as she hurried on. ‘He shall see as little of my bonny Queen -as I can provide for,’ she promised herself. ‘I have heard sculduddery -enough to befoul all Burgundy.’ Being a wise virgin, she said little to -her mistress save to urge her to beg the French boy from his master. - -‘Why do you want him, child?’ the Queen asked. - -‘He hath a steadfast look, and loves you. I think he will serve your -needs. Get him if you care,’ was all the reply she could win. - -The thing was easily done, lightly asked and lightly accorded. - -‘Baptist, come hither,’ had cried my lord; and the boy knelt before the -lady. ‘I have sold thee, Baptist.’ - -‘Very good, monseigneur.’ - -The Queen sparkled and smiled upon him. ‘Wilt thou come with me, -Jean-Marie?’ - -‘Yes, willingly, madam.’ - -‘And do me good service?’ - -‘Nobody in the world shall do better, madam.’ - -‘But you are positive, my boy!’ - -‘I do well to be positive, madam, in such a cause as your Majesty’s.’ - -She turned to the Earl. ‘What is his history?’ - -He shrugged. ‘The Sieur Des-Essars—a gentleman of Brabant—disporting in -La Beauce, accosts a pretty Disaster (to call her so) with a speaking -eye——’ - -Jean-Marie-Baptiste held up his hand. ‘Monseigneur, ah——!’ - -‘How now, cockerel?’ - -‘You speak of my mother, sir,’ he said, his lip quivering. - -‘By the Mass, and so I do!’ said the Earl. - -The Queen patted the lad’s shoulder before she sent him away. ‘You shall -tell me all about your mother, Jean-Marie, when we are in Scotland.’ - -Jean-Marie-Baptiste Des-Essars quickly kissed her sleeve, and became her -man. More of him in due time, and of what he saw out of his ‘smut-rimmed’ -eyes. - - * * * * * - -When English Mr. Throckmorton was reported as within a day’s ride of -Nancy, my Lord Bothwell thought it wise to take leave. His odour in -England was not good, and he knew very well that the Lord James would not -sprinkle him with anything which would make it better. So he presented -himself betimes in the morning, said his _adieux_ and kissed hands. - -‘Farewell, my lord,’ says Queen Mary. ‘Lorraine will be the sadder for -your going.’ - -‘And ever fare your Majesty well,’ he answered her gaily, ‘as in Scotland -you shall, despite the weepers.’ - -‘Do you go to Scotland, my lord?’ - -‘Does your Majesty?’ says he, his little eyes all of a twinkle. - -‘My question was first, my lord.’ - -‘And the answer to mine is the answer to your Majesty’s.’ - -‘My Lord Democritus, am I to laugh when you leave me?’ - -‘Why, yes, madam, rather than to lament that I outstay my welcome.’ - -She showed her pleasure; at least, he saw it under the skin. So he left -her; and Mary Livingstone, as she said, could ‘fetch her breath.’ - -Now, as to Mr. Throckmorton—if the Lord James had desired, as assuredly -he did, to get his sister to Scotland, unwedded and in a hurry; if the -Queen of England desired it—which is certain,—neither could have used -a better means than this excellent man. The Queen was in a royal rage -when he, with great troubles and many shakings of his obsequious head, -was obliged to own the safe-conduct through England refused. She shut -herself up with her maids, and endlessly paced the floors, avoiding their -entreating arms. They besought her to rest, to have patience, to sit on -their knees, consult her uncles of Lorraine. ‘I shall sit in no chair, -nor lie in any bed, until I am at sea,’ she promised them, and then -cried: ‘What! am I a kennel-dog to the Bastard in England?’ - -Nothing in the world should stop her. She would go to her country by -sea, and as soon as they could fit out the galleys. And she had her -way—with suspicious ease, if she had had patience to observe it; for -it happened to be the way of three other persons vitally interested in -her: the Queen-Mother of France, who wished to get rid of her; the Queen -of England, who hoped she would get rid of herself; and the Lord James -Stuart, uncomfortably illegitimate, who hid his designs from his own -soul, and looked at affairs without seeming to look. - - * * * * * - -Two galleys and four great ships took her and her adventurous company -from Calais, on a day in August of high sun and breeze, with a misty -brown bank on the horizon where England should lie. Guns shot from the -forts were answered from the ships; to the Oriflamme of France the Scots -Queen answered with her tressured Lion, and the English Leopards and -Lilies. Of all the gallant company embarked there was none who looked -more ardently to the north than she who was to sit in the high seat at -Stirling. Let Mary Fleming look down, and Mary Beaton raise her eyebrows; -let Mary Seton shrug and Mary Livingstone toss her young head; they -are greatly mistaken who suppose that Mary Stuart went unwillingly to -Scotland, or wetted her pillow with tears. She cried when she bade adieu -to her grandmother—tears of kindness those. But her heart was high to be -Queen, and her head full of affairs. How she judged men! What measures -she devised! Ask Mary Livingstone whether they two slept of nights, or -whether they talked of the deeds of Queen Mary—what she should do, what -avoid, how walk, how safeguard herself. She lay in a pavilion on the -upper deck, and turned her face to where she thought Scotland should be. -But Mary Livingstone showed Scotland her back, and sheltered her Queen in -her arms. - - - - -CHAPTER II - -HERE YOU STEP INTO THE FOG - - -Now, when they had been three days at sea, standing off Flamborough in -England, the wind veered to the southeast, and dropped very soon. They -had to row the ships for lack of meat for the sails to fill themselves; -the face of the world was changed, the sun blotted out. It became chilly, -with a thin rain; there drew over the sea a curtain of soft fog which -wrapped them up as in a winding-sheet, and seemed to clog the muscles -of men’s backs, so that scarcely way could be made. In this white -darkness—for such it literally was—the English took the Earl of Eglinton -in his ship, silently, without a cry to be heard; but in it also they -lost the Queen’s and all the rest of her convoy. Rowing all night and all -next day, sounding as they went in a sea like oil, the Scots company drew -past St. Abb’s, guessed at Dunbar, found and crept under the ghost of the -Bass, came at length with dripping sheets into Leith Road by night, and -so stayed to await the morn. They fired guns every hour; nobody slept on -board. - -That night which they began with music, some dancing and playing -forfeits, was one of deathly stillness. The guns made riot by the clock; -but the sea-fog drugged all men’s spirits. The Queen was pensive, and -broke up the circle early. She went to bed, and lay listening, as she -said, to Scotland. As it wore towards dawn she could have heard, if yet -wakeful, great horns blown afar off on the shore, answering her guns, -the voices of men and women, howling, quarrelling, or making merry after -their fashion; steeple bells; sometimes the knocking of oars as unseen -boats rowed about her. Once the sentry on the upper deck challenged: ‘Qui -va là?’ in a shrill voice. There was smothered laughter, but no other -reply. He fired his piece, and there came a great scurry in the water, -which woke the Queen with a start. - -‘Was that the English guns? Are we engaged?’ - -‘No, no, madam; you forget. We are in our own land by now, safe between -the high hills of Scotland. ’Twas some folly of the guard.’ - -She was told it had gone six o’clock, and insisted on rising. Father -Roche, her confessor, said mass; and after that Mary Seton had a good -tale for her private ear. Monsieur de Bourdeilles, it seems, the merry -gentleman, had held Monsieur de Châtelard embraced against his will under -one blanket all night, to warm himself. This Monsieur de Châtelard, a -poet of some hopefulness, owned himself Queen Mary’s lover, and played -the part with an ardour and disregard of consequence which are denied to -all but his nation. A lover is a lover, whether you admit him or not; -his position, though it be self-chosen, is respectable: but no one could -refuse the merits of this story. Monsieur de Bourdeilles was sent for—a -wise-looking, elderly man. - -‘Sieur de Brantôme,’ says the Queen—that was his degree in the world—‘how -did you find the warmth of Monsieur de Châtelard?’ - -‘Upon my faith, madam,’ says he, ‘your Majesty should know better than I -did whether he is alight or not.’ - -‘I think that is true,’ said Queen Mary; ‘but now also you will have -learned, as I have, to leave him alone.’ - - * * * * * - -The Grand Prior—a Guise, the Queen’s uncle and a portly man—came in to -see his niece. He reported a wan light spread abroad: one might almost -suppose the sun to be somewhere. If her Majesty extinguished the candles -her Majesty would still be able to see. It was curious. He considered -that a landing might be made, for news of the ships was plainly come -ashore. Numberless small boats, he said, were all about, full of people -spying up at the decks. Curious again: he had been much entertained. - -‘You shall show yourself to them, madam, if you will be guided by me,’ -says Mary Livingstone. The Grand Prior was not against it. - -‘Well,’ says the Queen, ‘let us go, then, to see and be seen.’ - -One of the maids—Seton, I gather—made an outcry: ‘Oh, ma’am, you will -never go to them in your white weed!’ - -‘How else, child?’ - -Seton caught at her hand. ‘Like the bonny Queen Mab—like the Fairy Vivien -that charmed Tamlane out of his five wits. Thus you should go!’ - -The Queen turned blushing to the Grand Prior. - -‘How shall I show myself, good uncle?’ - -‘My niece, you are fair enough now.’ - -‘Is it true?’ she said. ‘Then I will be fairer yet. Get me what you will; -make a queen of me. Fleming, you shall choose.’ - -Mary Fleming, a gentle beauty, considered the case. ‘I shall dress your -Majesty in the white and green,’ she declared, and was gone to get it. - -So they dressed her in white and green, with a crown of stars for her -hair, and covered her in a carnation hood against the cold. Then she -was brought out among the four of them to lean on the poop and see the -people. A half-circle of stately, cloaked gentlemen—all French, and -mainly Guises—stood behind; but Monsieur de Châtelard, shaking like a -leaf, sought the prop of a neighbouring shoulder for his arm. It was -modestly low, and belonged to Des-Essars, the new page. - -‘My gentle youth,’ said the poet, after thanking him for his services, -‘I am sick because I love. Do you see that smothered goddess? Learn then -that I adore her, and so was able to do even in the abominable arms of -Monsieur de Brantôme.’ - -‘I also consider her Majesty adorable,’ replied the page with gravity; -‘but I do not care to say so openly.’ - -‘If your wound be not kept green,’ Monsieur de Châtelard reproved him, -‘if it is covered up, it mortifies, you bleed internally, and you die.’ - -Des-Essars bowed. ‘Why, yes, sir. There is no difficulty in that.’ - -‘Far from it, boy—far from it! Exquisite ease, rather.’ - -‘It is true, sir,’ said Des-Essars. ‘Well! I am ready.’ - -‘And I, boy, must get ready. Soothsayers have assured me that I shall die -in that lady’s service.’ - -‘I intend to live in it,’ said Des-Essars; ‘for she chose me to it -herself.’ - -Monsieur de Châtelard considered this alternative. ‘Your intention is -fine,’ he allowed; ‘but my fate is the more piteous.’ - -Whether the people knew their Queen or not, they gave little sign -of it. They seemed to her a grudging race, unwilling to allow you -even recognition. She had been highly pleased at first: watched them -curiously, nodded, laughed, kissed her hand to some children—who hid -their faces, as if she had put them to shame. Some pointed at her, some -shook their heads; none saluted her. Most of them looked at the foreign -servants: a great brown Gascon sailor, who leaned half-naked against the -gunwale; a black in a yellow turban; a saucy Savoyard girl with a bare -bosom; and some, nudging others, said, ‘A priest! a priest!’—and one, a -big, wild, red-capped man, stood up in his boat, and pointed, and cried -out loud, ‘To hell with the priest!’ The cold curiosity, the uncouth drab -of the scene, the raw damp—and then this savage burst—did their work -on her. She was sensitive to weather, and quick to read hearts. Being -chilled, her own heart grew heavy. ‘I wish to go away. They stare; there -is no love here,’ she said, and went down the companion, and sat in her -pavilion without speaking. She let Mary Livingstone take her hand. At -that hour, I know, her thought was piercingly of France, and the sun, and -the peasant girls laughing to each other half across the breezy fields. - -Barges came to board the Queen’s galley; strong-faced gentlemen, muffled -in cloaks, sat in the stern; all others stood up—even the rowers, -who faced forward like Venetians and pushed rather than pulled the -slow vessels. Running messengers kept her informed of arrivals: the -Provost of Edinburgh was come, the Captain of the Castle, the Lord of -Lethington, Maitland by name, secretary to her mother the late Queen; her -half-brothers, the Lords James and Robert Stuart, and more—all civil, all -with stiff excuses that preparations were so backward. She would see none -but her brothers, and, at the Lord James’ desire, Mr. Secretary Maitland -of Lethington. Him she discerned to be a taut, nervous, greyish man, with -a tired face. She was prepared to like him for her mother’s sake; but -he was on his guard, unaccountably, and she too dispirited to pursue. -Des-Essars, in his _Secret Memoirs_, says that he remembers to have -noticed, young as he was, how this Lethington’s eyes always sought those -of the Lord James before he spoke. ‘Sought,’ he says, ‘but never found -them.’ Sharply observed for a boy of fourteen. - -Well, here was a dreary beginning, which must nevertheless be pushed to -some kind of ending. Before noon she was landed—upon a muddy shore, the -sea being at the ebb—without cloth of estate, or tribune, or litter, with -a few halberdiers to make a way for her through a great crowd. She looked -at the ooze and slimy litter. ‘Are we amphibians in Scotland?’ she asked -her cousin D’Elbœuf. His answer was to splash down heroically into the -mess and throw his cloak upon it. ‘Gentlemen,’ he cried out in his own -tongue, ‘make a Queen’s way!’ He had not long to wait. A tragic cry from -Monsieur de Châtelard informed all Leith that he was wading ashore. Fine, -but retarding action! His cloak was added late to a long line of them—all -French: the Marquis’s, the Grand Prior’s, Monsieur D’Amville’s, Monsieur -de Brantôme’s, Monsieur de La Noue’s, many more. There were competitions, -encouraging cries, great enthusiasm. The people jostled each other to get -a view; the Scots lords looked staidly on, but none offered their cloaks. - -Thus it was that she touched Scottish soil, as Mr. Secretary remarked -to himself, through a foreign web. A little stone house, indescribably -mean and close, was open to her to rest in while the horses were made -ready. Thither came certain lords—Earls of Argyll and Atholl, Lords -Erskine, Herries, and others—to kiss hands. She allowed it listlessly, -not distinguishing friend from unfriend. All faces seemed alike to her: -wooden, overbold, weathered faces, clumsy carvings of an earlier day, -with watchful, suspicious eyes put in them to make them alive. Her ladies -were with her, and her uncles. The little room was filled to overflowing, -and in and out of the passage-ways elbowed the French gallants shouting -for their grooms. No one was allowed to have any speech with the Queen, -who sat absorbed and unobservant in the packed assembly, a French guard -all about her, with Mary Livingstone kneeling beside her, whispering -French comfort in her ear. - -Above the surging and the hum of the shore could be heard the beginnings -of clamour. The press at the doors was so great they could scarcely -bring up the horses; and when the hackbutters beat them back the people -murmured. Monsieur D’Amville’s charger grew restive and backed into -the crowd: they howled at him for a Frenchman, and were not appeased -to discover by the looks of him that he was proud of the fact. There -was much sniffing and spying for priests,—well was it for Father Roche -and his mates that, having been warned, they lay still among the ships, -intending not to land till dusk. How was her Majesty to be got out? It -seemed that she was a prisoner. The Master of the Horse could do nothing -for his horses; the Master of the Household was penned in the doorway. -If it had not been for the Lord James, Queen Mary must have spent the -night on the sea-shore. But the people fell back this way and that when, -bareheaded, he came out of the house. ‘Give way there—make a place,’ he -said, in a voice hardly above the speaking tone; and way and place were -made. - -Two or three of the French lords observed him. ‘He has the gestures of a -king, look you.’ - -‘You are right; and, they tell me, a king’s desires. Do you see that he -measures them with his eye before he speaks, as if to judge what strength -he should use?’ - -They brought up the horses; the Queen came out. Up a steep, straggling -street, finally, they rode in some kind of broken order, in a lane cut, -as it were, between dumb walls of men and women. Monsieur de Brantôme -remarked to his neighbour that it was for all the world as if travelling -mountebanks were come to town. Very few greeted her, none seemed to -satisfy any feeling but curiosity. They pointed her out to one another. -‘Yonder she goes. See, yonder, in the braw, cramoisy hood!’ ‘See, man, -the bonny long lass!’ ‘I mind,’ said one, ‘to have seen her mother -brought in. Just such another one.’ Some cried, ‘See you, how she arches -her fine neck.’ Others, ‘She hath the eyes of all her folk.’ ‘A dangerous -smiler: a Frenchwoman just.’ - -She did not hear these things, or did not notice them, being slow to -catch at the Scots tongue. But one wife cried shrilly, ‘God bless that -sweet face!’ and that she recognised, and laughed her glad thanks to the -kindly soul. - -Most eyes were drawn to the French princes, and missed her in following -them and their servants. The Grand Prior made them wonder: his -stateliness excused him the abhorred red cross; but chief of them all -seemed Monsieur de Châtelard, very splendid in white satin and high -crimson boots, and a tall feather in his cap. Some thought he was the -Pope’s son, some the Prince of Spain come to marry the Queen; but, -‘Havers, woman, ’tis just her mammet,’ said one in Mary Beaton’s hearing. -The Queen laughed when this was explained to her, and remembered it for -Monsieur de Brantôme. But she only laughed those two times between Leith -shore and Holyroodhouse. - -Her spirits mended after dinner. She held an informal court, and set -herself diligently to please and be pleased. She desired the Lord -of Lethington, in the absence of a Lord Chamberlain, to make the -presentations; he was to stand by her side and answer all questions. He -spoke her language with a formal ease which she found agreeable, betrayed -a caustic humour now and again, was far more to her taste than at first. -She saw the old Duke of Châtelherault and his scared son, my Lord of -Arran. - -‘Hamiltons, madam,’ said Lethington tersely, and thought he had said -all; but she had to be told that they claimed to stand next in blood to -herself and the throne of Scotland. - -‘The blood has been watered, it seems to me,’ she said. ‘One can see -through that old lord.’ - -‘Madam, that is his greatest grief. He cannot, if he would, conceal his -pretensions.’ - -‘Explain yourself, sir.’ - -‘Madam, you can see that he is empty. But he pretends to fulness.’ - -‘And that white son of his, my Lord of Arran? Does he too pretend to be -full—in the head, for example?’ - -She embarrassed Mr. Secretary. - -Mary Livingstone, at this point, came to her flushed and urgent: ‘Madam, -madam, my good father!’ A jolly gentleman was before her, who, in the -effusion of his loyalty, forgot to kneel. ‘Your knees, my lord, your -knees!’ his daughter whispered; but the fine man replied, ‘No, no, my -bairn. I stand up to fight for the Queen, and she shall e’en see all my -gear.’ - -Queen Mary, not ceremonious by nature, smiled and was gracious: they -conversed by these signs of the head and mouth, for he had no French. - -To go over names would be tedious, and so might have proved to her -Majesty had not Lethington fitted each sharply with a quality. Such a -man was of her Majesty’s religion—my Lord Herries, now; such of Mr. -Knox’s—see that square-browed, frowning Lord of Lindsay. Mr. Knox had -reconciled this honourable man and his wife. It was whispered—this for -her Majesty’s ear!—that all was not well between my Lord of Argyll and -his lady, her Majesty’s half-sister. Would Mr. Knox intervene? At her -Majesty’s desire beyond doubt he would do it. The Duke of Châtelherault -held all the west as appanage of the Hamiltons, except a small territory -round about Glasgow, to which her Majesty’s kinsman Lennox laid claim. -The claim was faint, since the Lennox was in England. It was supposed -that fear of the Hamiltons kept him there; but if her Majesty would be -pleased she could reconcile the two houses. - -The Queen blinked her eyes. ‘Reconciliation seems to be your Mr. Knox’s -prerogative. I have not yet learned from you what mine may be.’ - -‘Yours, madam,’ said Lethington, ‘is the greater, because gentler, -hand—to put it no higher than that! Moreover, the Stuarts of Lennox share -your Majesty’s faith; and Mr. Knox——’ - -‘Ah,’ cried the Queen, ‘I conceive your Mr. Knox is Antipope!’ - -Mr. Secretary confessed that some had called him so. - -‘And what does my cousin Châtelherault call him?’ she asked. - -He explained that the Duke paid him great respect. - -‘Let me understand you,’ said Queen Mary. ‘The Duke is master of the -west, and Mr. Knox of the Duke. Who is master of Mr. Knox?’ - -‘Oh, madam, he will serve your Majesty. I am sure of him.’ - -She was not so sure: she wondered. Then she found that she was frowning -and pinching her lip, so broke into a new line. - -‘Let us take the south, Monsieur de Lethington. Who prevails in those -parts?’ - -He told her that there were many great men to be considered there: my -Lord Herries, my Lord Hume, the Earl of Bothwell. This name interested -her, but she was careful not to single it out. - -‘And is Mr. Knox the master of these?’ - -‘Not so, madam. My Lord Herries is of the old religion; and my Lord of -Bothwell——’ - -‘Does he laugh?’ - -‘I fear, madam, it is a mocking spirit.’ - -‘Why,’ says she, ‘does he laugh at Mr. Knox?’ - -Mr. Secretary detected the malice. ‘Alas! your Majesty is pleased to -laugh at her servant.’ - -‘Well, let us leave M. de Boduel to his laughter. Who rules the north?’ - -‘The Earl of Huntly is powerful there, madam.’ - -‘I have had intelligence of him. He is a Catholic. Well, well! And now -you shall tell me, Mr. Secretary, where my own kingdom is.’ - -‘Oh, madam, it is in the hearts of your people. You have all Scotland at -your feet.’ - -‘Let us take a case. Have I, for example, your Mr. Knox at my feet?’ - -‘Surely, madam.’ - -‘We shall see. I tell you fairly that I do not choose to be at his. He -has written against women, I hear. Is he wed?’ - -‘Madam, he is twice a widower.’ - -‘He is severe. But he should be instructed in his theme. He may have -reason. Where is my brother?’ - -‘The Lord James is at his prayers, madam.’ - -‘I hope he will remember me there. I see that I shall need advocacy.’ - -Her head ached, her eyes were stiff with watching. She said her -good-night and retired. At that hour there was a great shouting and -crying in the courtyard, and out of the midst there spired a wild music -of rebecks, fiddles, scrannel-pipes, and a monstrous drum out of tune. -The French lords said, ‘Tenez, on s’amuse!’ and raised their eyebrows. -The Queen shivered over a sea-coal fire. Now at last she remembered all -fair France, saw it in one poignant, long look inwards, and began to cry. -‘I am a fool, a fool—but, oh me! I am wretched,’ she said, and rocked -herself about. The comfort of women—kisses, strokings, mothering arms—was -applied; they put her to bed, and Mary Livingstone sat by her. This young -woman was in high feather, surveyed the prospect with calmness, not at -all afraid. Her father, she said, had put before her the desires of all -those gentry: he had never had such court paid him in his long life. This -it was to be father to a maid of honour. The Duke had taken him apart -before dinner, urging the suit of his son Arran for the Queen’s hand. The -Lord James had spoken of an earldom; Lethington could not see enough of -him. ‘Hey, my lamb,’ she ended, stroking the Queen’s hot face, ‘we will -have them all at your feet ere this time seven days; and a lass in her -teens shall sway wild Scotland!’ The Queen sighed, and snuggled her cheek -into the open hand. - -Just as she was dozing off there was to be heard a scurry of feet along -the corridor, the crash of a door admitting a burst of sound—in that, the -shiver of steel on steel, a roar of voices, a loud cry above all, ‘He -hath it! He hath it!’ The Queen started up and held her heart. ‘What do -they want of me? Is it Mr. Knox?’ Livingstone ran into the antechamber -among the huddling women there. Des-Essars came to them bright-eyed to -say it was nothing. It was Monsieur D’Elbœuf fighting young Erskine about -a lady. The duel had been arranged at supper. They had cleared the tables -for the fray. - - - - -CHAPTER III - -SUPERFICIAL PROPERTIES OF THE HONEYPOT - - -When they told her what was the name Mr. Knox had for her, and how it -had been caught up by all the winds in town, Queen Mary pinched her -lip. ‘Does he call me Honeypot? Well, he shall find there is wine in my -honey—and perchance vinegar too, if he mishandle me. Or I may approve -myself to him honey of Hymettus, which has thyme in it, and other sane -herbs to make it sharp.’ - -A honey-queen she looked as she spoke, all golden and rose in her white -weeds, her face aflower in the close coif, finger and thumb pinching her -lip. She seemed at once wise, wholesome, sweet, and tinged with mischief; -even the red Earl of Morton, the ‘bloat Douglas,’ as they called him, who -should have been cunning in women, when he saw her preside at her first -Council, said to his neighbour, ‘There is wine in the lass, and strong -wine, to make men drunken. What was Black James Stuart about to let her -in among us?’ It was a sign also of her suspected store of strength that -Mr. Knox was careful not to see her. He had called her ‘Honeypot’ on -hearsay. - -No doubt she approved herself: those who loved her, and, trembling, -marked her goings, owned it to each other by secret signs. And yet, -in these early days, she stood alone, a growing girl in a synod of -elders, watching, judging, wondering about them, praying to gods whom -they had abjured in a tongue which they had come to detest. For they -were all for England now, while she clung the more passionately to -France. If she used deceit, is it wonderful? The arts of women against -those half-hundred pairs of grudging, reticent eyes; a little armoury -of smiles, blushes, demure, down-drooping lids! Was it the instinct to -defend, or the relish for cajolery? She had the art of unconscious art. -She looked askance, she let her lips quiver at a harsh decree, she kissed -and took kisses where she could. She laughed for fear she should cry, -she was witty when most at a loss. She refused to see disapproval in -any, pretended to an open mind, and kept the inner door close-barred. -Never unwatched, she was never found out; never off the watch, she never -let her anxiety be seen. Alone she did it. Not Mary Livingstone herself -knew the half of her effort, or shared her moments of dismay; for that -whole-hearted girl saw Scotland with Scots eyes. - -But she succeeded—she pleased. The lords filled Holyroodhouse, their -companies the precincts; every man was Queen Mary’s man. The city wrought -at its propynes and pageants against her entry in state. Mr. Knox, grimly -surveying the company at his board, called her Honeypot. - -There were those of her own religion who might have had another name for -her. One morning there was a fray after her mass, when the Lord Lindsay -and a few like him hustled and beat a priest. They waited for him behind -the screen and gave him, in their phrase, ‘a bloody comb.’ Now, here was -a case for something more tart than honey—at least, the clerk thought so. -He had come running to her full of his griefs: the holy vessels had been -tumbled on the floor, the holy vestments were in shreds; he (the poor -ministrant) was black and blue; martyrdom beckoned him, and so on. - -‘Nay, good father, you shall not take it amiss,’ she had said to him. -‘A greater than you or I said in a like case, “_They know not what they -do._”’ - -‘Madam,’ says the priest, ‘there spake the Son of God, all-discerning, -not to be discerned of the Jews. But I judge from the feel of my head -what they do, and I think they themselves know very well—and their master -also that sent them, their Master Knox.’ - -‘I will give you another Scripture, then,’ replied she. ‘It is written, -“_By our stripes we are healed._”’ - -‘Your pardon, madam, your pardon!’ cried the priest: ‘I read it -otherwise. St. Peter saith, “_By His stripes we are healed_”—a very -different matter.’ - -She grew red. ‘Come, come, sir, we are bandying words. You will not tell -me that you have no need of heavenly physic, I suppose?’ - -‘I pray,’ said he, ‘that your Majesty have none. Madam, if it please you, -but for your Majesty’s kindred, the Lord James and his brethren, I had -been a dead man.’ - -‘You tell me the best news of my brothers I have had yet,’ said she, and -sent him away. - -She used a gentler method with Lord Lindsay when he next showed her his -rugged, shameless face. He told her bluntly that he would never bend the -knee to Baal. - -‘Well,’ she said, with a smile, ‘you shall bend it to me instead.’ And -she looked so winning and so young, and withal so timid lest he should -refuse, that (on a sudden impulse) down he went before her and kissed her -hand. - -‘I knew that I could make him ashamed,’ she said afterwards to Mary -Livingstone. - -‘I would have had him whipped!’ cried the flaming maid. - -‘You are out, my dear,’ said Queen Mary. ‘’Twas better he should whip -himself.’ - -Although she took enormous pains, she succeeded not nearly so well -with her bastard brothers and their sister, Lady Argyll, the handsome, -black-browed woman. James, Robert, and John, sons of the king her father, -and Margaret Erskine, all alike tall, sable, stiff and sullen, were alike -in this too, that they were eager for what they could get without asking. -The old needy Hamilton—Duke of Châtelherault as he was—let no day go by -without begging for his son. These men let be seen what they wanted, but -they would not ask. The vexatious thing with their sort is, that you may -give a man too much or too little, and never be sure which of you is the -robber. Now, the Lord James greatly coveted the earldom of Moray. Would -he tell her so, think you? Not he, since he would not admit it to his -very self. She received more than a hint that it would be wise to reward -him, and told him that she desired it. He bowed his acceptance as if he -were obedient unto death. - -‘Madam, if it please your Majesty to make me of your highest estate, it -is not for me to gainsay you.’ - -‘Why, no,’ says the Queen, ‘I trow it is not. You shall be girt Earl of -Mar at the Council, for such I understand to be your present desire.’ - -It was not his desire by any means, yet he could not bring himself to say -so. Her very knowledge that he had desires at all tied his tongue. - -‘Madam,’ he said, sickly-white, ‘the grace is inordinate to my merits: -and, indeed, how should duty be rewarded, being in its own performance a -grateful thing? True it is that my lands lie farther to the north than -those of Mar; true it is that in Moray—to name a case—there are forces -which, maybe, would not be the worse of a watchful eye. But the earldom -of Moray! Tush, what am I saying?’ - -‘We spake of the earldom of Mar,’ she said drily. ‘That other, I -understand, is claimed by my Lord of Huntly, as a right of his, under my -favour.’ - -He added nothing, but bit his lip sideways, and looked at his white -hands. She had done more wisely to give him Moray at once; and so she -might had he but asked for it. But when she opened her hands he shut his -up, and where she spoke her mind he never did. She ought to have been -afraid of him, for two excellent reasons: first, she never knew what he -thought, and next, everybody about her asked that first. Instead, he -irritated her, like a prickly shift. - -‘Am I to knock for ever at the shutters of the house of him?’ she asked -of her friends. ‘Not so, but I shall conclude there is nobody at home.’ - -Healthy herself, and high-spirited, and as open as the day when she was -in earnest, she laughed at his secret ways in private and made light of -them in public. It was on the tip of her saucy tongue more than once or -twice to strike him to earth with the thunderbolt: ‘Did you hasten me to -Scotland to work my ruin, brother? Do you reckon to climb to the throne -over me?’ She thought better of it, but only because it seemed not worth -her while. There was no give-and-take with the Lord James, and it is dull -work whipping a dead dog. - -Meantime the prediction of Mary Livingstone seemed on the edge of -fulfilment. Queen Mary ruled Scotland; and her spirits rose to meet -success. She was full of courage and good cheer, holding her kingdom in -the hollow of her palms. Honeypot? Did Mr. Knox call her so? It was odd -how the name struck her. - -‘Well,’ she said, with a shrug, ‘if they find me sweet and hive about me, -shall I not do well?’ - -She made Lethington Secretary of State without reserve, and remarked that -he was every day in the antechamber. - -The word flew busily up and down the Canongate, round about the Cross: -‘Master Knox hath fitted her with a name, do you mind? “She is Honeypot,” -quoth he. Heard you ever the like o’ that?’ Some favoured it and her, -some winked at it, some misfavoured; and these were the grey beards and -white mutches. But one and all came out to see her make her entry on the -Tuesday. - - * * * * * - -One hour before she left Holyrood, Mr. Knox preached from his window in -the High Street to a packed assembly of blue bonnets and shrouded heads, -upon the text, _Be wise now therefore, O ye Kings_—a ring of scornful -despair in his accents making the admonition vain. ‘I shall not ask ye -now what it is ye are come out for to see, lest I tempt ye to lie; for I -know better than yourselves. Meat! “Give us meat,” ye cry and clamour; -“give us meat for the gapes, meat for greedy eyes!” Ay, and ye shall have -your meat, fear not for that. Jags and slashes and feathered heads, ye -shall have; targeted tails, and bosoms decked in shame, but else as bare -as my hand. Fill yourselves with the like of these—but oh, sirs, when -ye lie drunken, blame not the kennel that holds ye. If that ye crave to -see prancing Frenchmen before ye, minions and jugglers, leaping sinners, -damsels with timbrels, and such-like sick ministers to sick women’s -desires, I say, let it be so, o’ God’s holy name; for the day cometh -when ye shall have grace given ye to look within, and see who pulls the -wires that sets them all heeling and reeling, jigging up and down—whether -Christ or Antichrist, whether the Lord God of Israel or the Lord Mammon -of the Phœnicians. Look ye well in that day, judge ye and see.’ - -He stopped, as if he saw in their midst what he cried against; and some -man called up, ‘What more will you say, sir?’ - -Mr. Knox gathered himself together. ‘Why, this, my man, that the harlotry -of old Babylon is not dead yet, but like a snake lifteth a dry head from -the dust wherein you think to have crushed her. Bite, snake, bite, I -say; for the rather thou bitest, the rather shall thy latter end come. -Heard ye not, sirs, how they trounced a bare-polled priest in the house -of Rimmon, before the idol of abomination herself, these two days by -past? I praise not, I blame not; I say, him that is drunken let him be -drunken still. More becomes me not as yet, for all is yet to do. I fear -to prejudge, I fear to offend; let us walk warily, brethren, until the -day break. But I remember David, ruler in Israel, when he hoped against -hope and knew not certainly that his cry should go up as far as God. -For no more than that chosen minister can I look to see the number of -the elect made up from a froward and stiff-necked generation. Nay, but -I can cry aloud in the desert, I can fast, I can watch for the cloud of -the gathering wrath of God. And this shall be my prayer for you and for -yours, _Be wise, etc._’ He did pray as he spoke, with his strong eyes -lifted up above the housetops—a bidding prayer, you may call it, to which -the people’s answer rumbled and grew in strength. One or two in the -street struck into a savage song, and soon the roar of it filled the long -street: - - The hunter is Christ, that hunts in haste, - The hounds are Peter and Paul; - The Pope is the fox, Rome is the rocks, - That rubs us on the gall. - -A gun in the valley told them that the Queen was away. It was well that -she was guarded. - -Des-Essars, the Queen’s French page, in that curious work of his, half -reminiscence and half confession, which he dubs _Le Secret des Secrets_, -has a note upon this day, and the aspect of the crowd, which he says was -dangerous. ‘Looking up the hill,’ he writes, ‘towards the Netherbow Port, -where we were to stop for the ceremony of the keys, I could see that the -line of sightseers was uneven, ever surging and ebbing like an incoming -sea. Also I had no relish for the faces I saw—I speak not of them at the -windows. Certainly, all were highly curious to see my mistress and their -own; and yet—or so I judged—they found in her and her company food for -the eyes and none for the heart. They appeared to consider her their -property; would have had her go slow, that they might fill themselves -with her sight; or fast, that they might judge of her horsemanship. We -were a show, forsooth; not come in to take possession of our own; rather -admitted, that these close-lipped people might possess us if they found -us worthy—ah, or dispossess us if they did not. Here and there men among -them hailed their favourites: the Lord James Stuart was received with -bonnets in the air; and at least once I heard it said, “There rides -the true King of Scots.” My Lord Chancellor Morton, riding immediately -before the Queen’s Grace, did not disdain to bandy words with them that -cried out upon him, “The Douglas! The Douglas!” He, looking round about, -“Ay, ye rascals,” I heard him say, “ye know your masters fine when they -carry the sword.” He was a very portly, hearty gentleman in those days, -high-coloured, with a full round beard. But above all things in the -world the Scots lack fineness of manners. It was not that this Earl of -Morton desired to grieve the Queen by any freedom of his; but worse than -that, to my thinking, he did not know that he did it. As for my lords -her Majesty’s uncles, their reception was exceedingly unhappy; but they -cared little for that. Foolish Monsieur de Châtelard made matters worse -by singing like a boy in quire as he rode behind his master, Monsieur -d’Amville. This he did, as he said, to show his contempt for the rabble; -but all the result was that he earned theirs. I saw a tall, gaunt, -bearded man at a window, in a black cloak and bonnet. They told me that -was Master Knox, the strongest man in Scotland.’ - -It is true that Master Knox watched the Queen go up, with sharp eyes -which missed nothing. He saw her eager head turn this way and that at any -chance of a welcome. He saw her meet gladness with gladness, deprecate -doubt, plead for affection. ‘Out of the strong came forth sweetness: but -she is too keen after sweet food.’ She smiled all the while, but with -differences which he was jealous to note. ‘She deals carefully; she is no -so sure of her ground. Eh, man, she goes warily to work.’ - -A child at a window leaped in arms and called out clearly: ‘Oh, mother, -mother, the braw leddy!’ The Queen laughed outright, looked up, nodded, -and kissed her hand. - -‘Hoots, woman,’ grumbled Mr. Knox, ‘how ye lick your fingers! Fie, what a -sweet tooth ye have!’ - -She was very happy, had no doubts but that, as she won the Keys of the -Port, she should win the hearts of all these people. Stooping down, -she let the Provost kiss her hand. ‘The sun comes in with me, tell the -Provost,’ she said to Mr. Secretary, not trusting her Scots. - -‘Madam, so please you,’ the good man replied, clearing his throat, ‘we -shall make a braver show for your Grace’s contentation upon the coming -out from dinner. Rehearse that to her Majesty, Lethington, I’ll trouble -ye.’ - -‘Ah, Mr. Provost, we shall all make a better show then, trust me,’ she -said, laughing; and rode quickly through the gate. - -She was very bold: everybody said that. She had the manners of a boy—his -quick rush of words, his impulse, and his dashing assurance—with that -same backwash of timidity, the sudden wonder of ‘Have I gone too -far—betrayed myself’ which flushes a boy hot in a minute. All could see -how bold she was; but not all knew how the heart beat. It made for her -harm that her merits were shy things. I find that she was dressed for the -day in ‘a stiff white satin gown sewn all over with pearls.’ Her neck -was bare to the cleft of the bosom; and her tawny brown hair, curled and -towered upon her head, was crowned with diamonds. Des-Essars says that -her eyes were like stars; but he is partial. There were many girls in -Scotland fairer than she. Mary Fleming was one, a very gentle, modest -lady; Mary Seton was another, sharp and pure as a profile on a coin of -Sicily. Mary Livingstone bore herself like a goddess; Mary Beaton had a -riper lip. But this Mary Stuart stung the eyes, and provoked by flashing -contrasts. Queen of Scots and Dryad of the wood; all honey and wine; bold -as a boy and as lightly abashed, clinging as a girl and as slow to leave -hold, full of courage, very wise. ‘Sirs, a dangerous sweet woman. Here we -have the Honeypot,’ says Mr. Knox to himself, and thought of her at night. - -After dinner, as she came down the hill, they gave her pageants. Virgins -in white dropped out of machines with crowns for her; blackamoors, Turks, -savage men came about her with songs about the Scriptures and the fate of -Korah, Dathan, and Abiram. She understood some, and laughed pleasantly -at all. Even she took not amiss the unmannerly hint of the Lawn Market, -where they would have burned a mass-priest in effigy—had him swinging -over the faggots, chalice and vestment, crucifix and all. ‘Fie, sirs, -fie! What harm has he done, poor soul?’ was all she said. - -The Grand Prior was furiously angry; seeing which, the Earl of Morton cut -the figure down, and then struck out savagely with the flat of his blade, -spurring his horse into the sniggering mob. ‘Damn you, have done with -your beastliness—down, dogs, down!’ The Lord James looked away. - -At the Salt Tron they had built up a door, with a glory as of heaven upon -it. Here she dismounted and sat for a while. Clouds above drew apart; a -pretty boy in a gilt tunic was let down by ropes before her. He said a -piece in gasps, then offered her the Psalter in rhymed Scots. She thought -it was the Geneva Bible, and took it with a queer lift of the eyebrows, -which all saw. Arthur Erskine, to whom she handed it, held it between -finger and thumb as if it had been red hot; and men marked that, and -nudged each other. The boy stood rigid, not knowing what else to do; -quickly she turned, looked at him shyly for a moment, then leaned forward -and took him up in her arms, put her cheek to his, cuddled and kissed -him. ‘You spake up bravely, my lamb,’ she said. ‘And what may your name -be?’ She had to look up to Lethington for his reply, but did not let go -of the child. His name was Ninian Ross. ‘I would I had one like you, -Ninian Ross!’ she cried in his own tongue, kissed him again, and let him -go. - -People said to each other, ‘She loves too much, she is too free of her -loving—to kiss and dandle a bairn in the street.’ - -‘Honeypot, Honeypot!’ said grudging Mr. Knox, looking on rapt at all this. - -Des-Essars writes: ‘She believed she had won the entry of the heart; she -read in the castle guns, bells of steeples, and hoarse outcry of the -crowd, assurance of what she hoped for. I was glad, for my part, and -disposed to thank God heartily, that we reached Holyroodhouse without -injury to her person or insult to cut her to the soul.’ - -I think Des-Essars too sensitive: she was fully as shrewd an observer as -he could have been. At least, she returned in good spirits. If any were -tired, she was not; but danced all night with her Frenchmen. Monsieur de -Châtelard was a happy man when he had her in his arms. - -‘Miséricorde—O Queen of Love! Thus I would go through the world, though I -burned in hell for it after.’ - -‘Thus would not I,’ quoth she. ‘You are hurting me. Take care.’ - -They brought her news in the midst that the Earl of Bothwell was in town -with a great company, and would kiss her hands in the morning if he might. - -‘Let him come to me now while I am happy,’ she said. ‘Who knows what -to-morrow may do for me?’ - -She sent away Châtelard, and waited. Soon enough she saw the Earl’s -broad shoulders making a way, the daring eyes, the hardy mouth. ‘You are -welcome, my lord, to Scotland.’ - -‘But am I welcome to your Majesty?’ - -‘You have been slow to seek my welcome, sir.’ - -‘Madam, I have been slow to believe it.’ - -‘You need faith, Monsieur de Boduel.’ - -‘I wish that your Majesty did!’ - -‘Why so?’ - -‘That your Majesty might partake of mine.’ - -They chopped words for half an hour or more. But she had her match in him. - -She was friends with all the world that night, or tried to think so. Yet, -at the going to bed, when the lights were out, the guards posted, and -state-rooms empty save for the mice, she came up to Mary Livingstone and -stroked her face without a word, coaxing for assurance of her triumph. -Wanting it still—for the maid was glum—she supplied it for herself. ‘We -rule all Scotland, my dear, we rule all Scotland!’ - -But Mary Livingstone held up her chin, to be out of reach of that -wheedling hand. Coldly, or as coldly as she might, she looked at the -eager face, and braved the glimmering eyes. - -‘Ay,’ she said, ‘ay, you do. You and John Knox betwixt you.’ - -The Queen laughed. ‘Shall I marry Mr. Knox? He is twice a widower.’ - -‘He would wed you the morn’s morn if you would have him,’ says -Livingstone. ‘’Tis a fed horse, that Knox.’ - -‘He feeds on wind, I think,’ the Queen said; and the maid snorted, -implacable. - -‘’Tis a better food than your Earl of Bothwell takes, to my mind.’ - -‘And what is his food?’ - -‘The blood of women and their tears,’ said Mary Livingstone. - - - - -CHAPTER IV - -ROUGH MUSIC HERE - - -The Earl of Huntly came to town, with three tall sons, three hundred -Gordons, and his pipers at quickstep before him, playing, ‘Cock o’ the -North.’ He came to seek the earldom of Moray, a Queen’s hand for his son -George, and to set the realm’s affairs on a proper footing; let Mr. Knox -and his men, therefore, look to themselves. His three sons were George, -John, and Adam. George, his eldest, was Lord Gordon, with undoubted -birthrights; but John of Findlater, so called, was his dearest, and -should have married the Queen if he had not been burdened with a stolen -wife in a tower, whom he would not put out of his head while her husband -was alive. So George must have the Queen, said Huntly. That once decided, -his line was clear. ‘Madam, my cousin,’ he intended to say, ‘I give you -all Scotland above the Highland line in exchange for your light hand -upon the South. Straighter lad or cleanlier built will no maid have in -the country, nor appanage so broad. Is it a match?’ Should it not be a -match, indeed? Both Catholics, both sovereign rulers, both young, both -fine imps. If she traced her descent from Malcolm Canmore, he got his -from Gadiffer, who, as every one knows, was the brother of Perceforest, -whose right name was Betis, whose ancestor was Brutus’ self, whose root -was fast in Laomedon, King of Troy. ‘The boy and girl were born for -each other,’ said Huntly. So he crossed the Forth at Stirling Brig, and -marched down through the green lowland country like a king, with colours -to the wind and the pipes screaming his hopes and degree in the world. -But he came slowly because of his unwieldy size. He was exceedingly -fat, white-haired and white-bearded, and had a high-coloured, windy, -passionate face, flaming blue eyes, and a husky voice, worn by shrieking -at his Gordons. Such was the old Earl of Huntly, the star of whose house -was destined to make fatal conjunctions with Queen Mary’s. - -His entry into Edinburgh began at the same rate of pomp, but ended in the -screaming of men whose pipes were slit. There were Hamiltons in the city, -Hepburns, Murrays, Keiths, Douglases, red-haired Campbells. The close -wynds vomited armed men at every interchange of civilities on the cawsey; -a match to the death could be seen at any hour in the tilt-yard; the -chiefs stalked grandly up and down before their enemies’ houses, daring -one another do their worst. It seemed that only Huntly and his Gordons -had been wanting to set half Scotland by the ears. The very night of -their incoming young John of Findlater spied his enemy Ogilvy—the husband -of the stolen wife—walking down the Luckenbooths arm-in-arm with his -kinsman Boyne. He stepped up in front of him, lithe as an otter, and says -he, ‘Have I timed my coming well, Mr. Ogilvy?’ Ogilvy, desperate of his -wife, may be excused for drawing upon him; and (the fray once begun) you -cannot blame John Gordon of Findlater for killing him clean, or Ogilvy of -Boyne for wounding John of Findlater. Hurt as he was, the young man was -saved by his friends. Little he cared for the summons of slaughter sued -out against him in the morning, with his enemy dead and three hundred -Gordons to keep his doors. - -The Earl his father treated the affair as so much thistledown thickening -the wind; but his own performances were as exorbitant as his proposals. -He quarrelled with the high Lord James Stuart about precedence. Flicking -his glove in the sour face, ‘Hoots, my lord, you are too new an Earl -to take the gate of me,’ he said. He assumed the title of Moray—which -was what he had come to beg for—in addition to his own. ‘She dare not -refuse me, man. It is well known I have the lands.’ The Lord James turned -stately away at this hearing, and Huntly ruffled past him into the -presence, muttering as he went, ‘A king’s mischance, my sakes!’ He had a -fine command of scornful nicknames; that was one of them. He called Mr. -Secretary Lethington the Grey Goose—no bad name for a tried gentleman -whose tone was always symptomatic of his anxieties. The Earl of Bothwell -was a ‘Jack-Earl,’ he said; but Bothwell laughed at him. The Duke and his -Hamiltons were ‘Glasgow tinklers’; the Earl of Morton, ‘Flesher Morton.’ -His pride, indeed, seemed to be of that inordinate sort which will not -allow a man to hate his equals. He hated whole races of less-descended -men; he hated burgesses, Forbeses, Frenchmen, Englishmen; but his peers -he despised. Catholic as he was, he went to the preaching at Saint Giles’ -in a great red cloak, wearing his hat, and stood apart, clacking with his -tongue, while Mr. Knox thundered out prophecies. ‘Let yon bubbly-jock -bide,’ he told his son, who was with him. ‘’Tis a congested rogue, full -of bad wind. What! Give him vent, man, and see him poison the whole -assembly.’ Mr. Knox denounced him to his face as a Prophet of the Grove, -and bid him cry upon his painted goddess. The great Huntly tapped his -nose, then the basket of his sword, and presently strode out of church by -a way which his people made for him. - -Queen Mary was amused with the large, boisterous, florid man, and very -much admired his sons. They were taller than the generality of Scots, -sanguine, black-haired, small-headed, with the intent far gaze in their -grey eyes which hawks have, and all dwellers in the open. She saw but -two of them, the eldest and the youngest—for John of Findlater, having -slain his man, lay at home—and set herself to work to break down their -shy respect. For their sakes she humoured their preposterous father; -allowed, what all her court was at swords drawn against, that his pipers -should play him into her presence; listened to what he had to say about -Gadiffer, brother of Perceforest, about Knox and his ravings, about the -loyal North. He expanded like a warmed bladder, exhibited his sons’ -graces as if he were a horsedealer, openly hinted at his proposals in -her regard. She needed none of his nods and winks, being perfectly well -able to read him, and of judgment perfectly clear upon the inflated -text. In private she laughed it away. ‘I think my Lord of Gordon a very -proper gentleman,’ she said to Livingstone; ‘but am I to marry the first -long pair of legs I meet with? Moreover, I should have to woo him, for he -fears me more than the devil. Yet it is a comely young man. I believe him -honest.’ - -‘The only Gordon to be so, then,’ said Livingstone tersely. This was the -prevailing belief: ‘False as Gordon.’ - -Then came Ogilvy of Boyne and his friends before the council, demanding -the forfeiture of John Gordon of Findlater for slaughter. Old Huntly -pished and fumed. ‘What! For pecking the feathers out of a daw! My fine -little man, you and your Ogilvys should keep within your own march. You -meet with men on the highways.’ The young Queen, isolated on her throne -above these angry men, looked from one to another faltering. Suddenly -she found that she could count certainly upon nobody. Her brother James -had kept away; the Earl of Bothwell was not present; my Lord Morton the -Chancellor blinked a pair of sleepy eyes upon the scene at large. ‘Let -the law take its course,’ she faintly said; and old Huntly left the -chamber, sweeping the Ogilvys out of his road. That was no way to get -the Earldom of Moray and a royal daughter-in-law into one’s family. He -himself confessed that the time had come for serious talk with the Queen. - -Even this she bore, knowing him Catholic and believing him honest. When, -after some purparley, at a privy audience, he came to what he called -‘close quarters,’ and spoke his piece about holy church, sovereign -rulers, and fine imps, she laughed still, it is true, but more shrewdly -than before. ‘Not too fast, my good lord, not too fast. I approve of my -Lord Gordon, and should come thankfully to his wedding. Yet I should be -content with a lowlier office there than you seem to propose me. And if -he come to _my_ wedding, I hope he will bring his lady.’ She turned to -the Secretary. ‘Tell my lord, Mr. Secretary, what other work is afoot.’ - -Hereupon Lethington enlarged upon royal marriages, their nature and -scope, and flourished styles and titles before the mortified old man. He -spoke of the Archduke Ferdinand, that son of Cæsar; of Charles the Most -Christian King, a boy in years, but a very forward boy. He dwelt freely -and at length upon King Philip’s son of Spain, Don Carlos, a magnificent -young man. Mostly he spoke of the advantage there would be if his royal -mistress should please to walk hand in hand with her sister of England -in this affair. Surely that were a lovely vision! The hearts of two -realms would be pricked to tears by the spectacle—two great and ancient -thrones, each stained with the blood of the other, flowering now with two -roses, the red and the white! The blood-stains all washed out by happy -tears—ah, my good lord, and by the kisses of innocent lips! It were a -perilous thing, it were an unwarrantable thing, for one to move without -the other. ‘I speak thus freely, my Lord of Huntly,’ says Lethington, -warming to the work, ‘that ye may see the whole mind of my mistress, her -carefulness, and how large a field her new-scaled eyes must take in. -This is not a business of knitting North to South. She may trust always -to the affection of her subjects to tie so natural a bond. Nay, but the -comforting of kingdoms is at issue here. Ponder this well, my lord, and -you will see.’ - -The Earl of Huntly was crimson in the face. ‘I do see, madam, how it is, -that my house shall have little tenderness from your Majesty’s’—he was -very angry. ‘I see that community of honour, community of religion count -for nothing. Foh! My life and death upon it!’ He puffed and blew, glaring -about him; then burst out again. ‘I will pay my thanks for this where -they are most due. I know the doer—I spit upon his deed. Who is that -man that cometh creeping after my earldom? Who looketh aslant at all my -designs? Base blood stirreth base work. Who seeketh the life of my fine -son?’ - -The Queen flushed. ‘Stay, sir,’ she said, ‘I cannot hear you. You waste -words and honour alike.’ - -He shook his head at her, as if she were a naughty child; raised his -forefinger, almost threatened. ‘Madam, madam, your brother James——’ - -She got up, the fire throbbing in her. ‘Be silent, my lord!’ - -‘Madam——’ - -‘Be silent.’ - -‘But, madam——’ - -Lethington, much agitated, whispered in her ear; she shook him away, -stamped, clenched her hands. - -‘You are dismissed, sir. The audience is finished. Do you hear me?’ - -‘How finished? How finished?’ - -‘Go, go, my lord, for God’s sake!’ urged the Secretary. - -‘A pest!’ cried he, and fumed out of the Castle. - -She rode down the Canongate to dinner that day at a hand-gallop, the -people scouring to right and left to be clear of heels. Her colour -was bright and hot, her hair streamed to the wind. ‘Fly, fly, fly!’ -she cried, and whipped her horse. ‘A hateful fool, to dare me so!’ -Lethington, Argyll, James her brother, came clattering and pounding -behind. ‘She is fey! She is fey! She rides like a witch!’ women said -to one another; but Mr. Knox, who saw her go, said to himself, ‘She is -nimble as a boy.’ Publicly—since this wild bout made a great commotion -in men’s thoughts—he declared, ‘If there be not in her a proud mind, a -crafty wit, and an indurate heart against God and His truth, my judgment -faileth me.’ Neither he nor his judgments were anything to her in those -days; she heard little of his music, rough or not. And yet, just at that -time, had she sent for him she could have won him for ever. ‘Happy for -her,’ says Des-Essars, writing after the event, ‘thrice happy for her if -she had! For I know very well—and she knew it also afterwards—that the -man was in love with her.’ - -At night, having recovered herself, she was able to laugh with the maids -at old Huntly, and to look with kind eyes upon the graces of his son -Gordon. - -‘If I cared to do it,’ she said, ‘I could have that young man at my feet. -But I fear he is a fool like his father.’ - -She tried him: he danced stiffly, talked no French, and did not know what -to do with her hand when he had it, or with his own either. She sparkled, -she glittered before him, smiled at his confusion, encouraged him by -softness, befooled him. It was plain that he was elated; but she held -her own powers so lightly, and thought so little of his, that she had no -notion of what she was doing—to what soaring heights she was sending him. -When she had done with him, a strange tremor took the young lord—a fixed, -hard look, as if he saw something through the wall. - -‘What you see? What you fear, my lord?’ she stammered in her pretty Scots. - -‘I see misfortune, and shame, and loss. I see women at the loom—a shroud -for a man—hey, a shroud, a shroud!’ He stared about at all the company, -and at her, knowing nobody. Slowly recovering himself, he seemed to -scrape cobwebs from his face. ‘I have drunk knowledge this night, I -think.’ - -She plumbed the depth of his case. ‘Go now, my lord; leave me, now.’ - -‘One last word to you, madam, with my face to your face.’ - -‘What would you say to me?’ - -He took her by the hand, with more strength than she had believed in him. -‘Trust Gordon,’ he said, and left her. - -‘I shall believe your word,’ she called softly after him, ‘and remember -it.’ - -He lifted his hand, but made no other sign; he carried a high head -through the full hall, striding like a man through heather, not to be -stopped by any. - -She thought that she had never seen a prouder action. He went, carrying -his devotion, like a flag into battle. Beside him the Earl of Bothwell -looked a pirate, and Châtelherault a pantaloon. - -‘He deserves a fair wife, for he would pleasure her well,’ she -considered; then laughed softly to herself, and shook her head. ‘No, no, -not for me—such a dreamer as that. I should direct his dreams—I, who need -a man.’ - -That pirate Earl of Bothwell used a different way. He bowed before her -the same night, straightened his back immediately, and looked her full in -the face. No fear that this man would peer through walls for ghosts! She -was still tender from the thoughts of her young Highlander; but you know -that she trusted this bluff ally, and was not easily offended by honest -freedoms. She had seen gallants of his stamp in France. - -‘Pleasure and good answers to your Grace’s good desires,’ he laughed. - -She looked wisely up at him, keeping her mouth demure. - -‘Monsieur de Boduel, you shall lead me to dance if you will.’ - -‘Madam, I shall.’ He took her out with no more ceremony, and acquitted -himself gaily: a good dancer, and very strong, as she had already -discovered. What arms to uphold authority! What nerve to drive our rebels -into church! Ah, if one need a man!... - -She asked him questions boldly. ‘What think you, my lord, of the Earl of -Huntly?’ - -‘Madam, a bladder, holding a few pease. Eh, and he rattles when you do -shake him! Prick him, he is gone; but the birds will flock about for the -seeds you scatter. They are safer where they lie covered, I consider.’ - -She followed this. ‘I would ask you further. There is here a remarkable -Mr. Knox: what am I to think of him?’ - -He stayed awhile, stroking his beard, before he shrugged in the French -manner, that is, with the head and eyebrow. - -‘In Rome, madam, we doff caps to the Pope. I am friendly with Mr. Knox. -He is a strong man.’ - -‘As Samson was of old?’ - -He laughed freely. ‘Oh, my faith, madam, Delilah is not awanting. There’s -a many and many.’ - -She changed the subject. ‘They tell me that you are of the religion, -Monsieur de Boduel, but I am slow to believe that. In France I remember——’ - -‘Madam,’ says he, ‘my religion is one thing, my philosophy another. Let -us talk of the latter. There is one God in a great cloud; but the world, -observe, is many-sided. Sometimes, therefore, the cloud is rent towards -the south; and the men of the south say, “Behold! our God is hued like -a fire.” Or if, looking up, they see the sun pale in a fog, with high -faith they say one to another, “Yonder white disc, do you mark, that is -the Son of God.” Sometimes also your cloud is parted towards the north. -Then cry the men of those parts, “Lo! our God, like a snow-mountain!” -Now, when I am in the south I see with the men of the south, for I cannot -doubt all the dwellers in the land; but when I am in the north, likewise -I say, There is something in what you report. So much for philosophy—to -which Religion, with a rod in hand, cries out: “You fool, you fool! God -is neither there nor here; but He is in the heart.” There you have it, -madam.’ - -She bowed gravely. ‘I have heard the late king, my father-in-law, say the -same to Madame de Valentinois; and she agreed with him, as she always did -in such matters. It is a good thought. But in whose heart do you place -God? Not in all?’ - -‘In a good heart, madam. In a crowned heart.’ - -‘The crowned heart,’ said she, ‘is the Douglas badge. Do you place Him -then in the heart of Monsieur de Morton?’ - -This tickled him, but he felt it also monstrous. ‘God forbid me! No, no, -madam. Douglas wears it abroad—not always with credit. But the crowned -heart was the heart of the Bruce.’ - -She was pleased; the sudden turn warmed her. ‘You spoke that well, and -like a courtier, my lord.’ - -‘Madam,’ he cried, covering his own heart, ‘that is what I would always -do if I had the wit. For I am a courtier at this hour.’ - -Pondering this in silence, she suffered him to lead her where he would; -and took snugly to bed with her the thought that, in her growing -perplexities, she had a sure hand upon hers when she chose to call for it. - - * * * * * - -As for him, Bothwell, he must have gone directly from this adventure in -the tender to play his bass in some of the roughest music of those days. -That very night—and for the third time—he, with D’Elbœuf and Lord John -Stuart, went in arms, with men and torches, to Cuthbert Ramsay’s house, -hard by the Market Cross; and, being refused as before, this time made -forceful entry. - -To the gudeman’s ‘What would ye with me, sirs, good lack?’ they demanded -sight of Alison, his handsome daughter, now quaking in her bed by her -man’s side; and not sight only, but a kiss apiece for the sake of my Lord -Arran. She was, by common report, that lord’s mistress—but the fact is -immaterial. - -‘Come down with me, man—stand by me in this hour,’ quoth she. - -But her husband plainly refused to come. ‘Na, na, my woman, thou must -thole the assize by thysel’,’ said the honest fellow. - -She donned her bedgown, tied up her hair, and was brought down shamefast -by her father. - -‘Do me no harm, sirs, do me no harm!’ - -‘Less than your braw Lord of Arran,’ says Bothwell, and took the -firstfruits. - -The low-roofed parlour full of the smoke of torches, flaring lights, -wild, unsteady gentlemen in short cloaks, flushed Alison in the midst—one -can picture the scene. The ceremony was prolonged; there were two nights’ -vigil to be made up. On a sudden, half-way to the girl’s cold lips, Lord -Bothwell stops, looks sidelong, listens. - -‘The burgh is awake. Hark to that! Gentlemen, we must draw off.’ - -They hear cries in the street, men racing along the flags. From the door -below one calls, ‘The Hamiltons! Look to yourselves! The Hamiltons!’ - -Almost immediately follows a scuffle, a broken oath, the ‘Oh, Christ!’ -and fall of a man. Lord Bothwell regards his friends—posterior parts of -three or four craning out of window, D’Elbœuf tying up his points, John -Stuart dancing about the floor. ‘Gentlemen, come down.’ - -He wrapped his cloak round his left arm, whipped out his blade, and went -clattering down the stair. The others came behind him. From the passage -they heard the fighting; from the door, as they stood spying there, the -whole town seemed a roaring cave of men. Through and above the din they -could catch the screaming of Lord Arran, choked with rage, tears, and -impotence. - -‘Who is the doxy, I shall ask ye: Arran or the lass?’ says Bothwell, -making ready to rush the entry. - -Just as he cleared the door he was stabbed by a dirk in the upper arm, -and felt the blood go from him. All Edinburgh seemed awake—a light in -every window and a woman to hold it. Hamiltons and their friends packed -the street: some twenty Hepburns about Ramsay’s door kept their backs to -the wall. For a time there was great work. - -In the midst of the hubbub they heard the pipes skirling in the Cowgate. - -‘Here comes old Huntly from his lodging,’ says Lord John to his -neighbour. This was Bothwell, engaged with three men at the moment, and -in a gay humour. - -‘Ay, hark to him!’ he called over his shoulder; and then, purring like -some fierce cat, ‘Softly now—aha, I have thee, friend!’ and ran one of -his men through the body. - -The pipes blew shrilly, close at hand, the Gordons plunged into the -street. Led by their chief, by John of Findlater and Adam (a mere boy), -they came rioting into battle. - -‘Aboyne! Aboyne! Watch for the Gordon!’—they held together and clove -through the massed men like a bolt. - -‘Hold your ground! I’ll gar them give back!’ cried old Huntly; and -Bothwell, rallying his friends, pushed out to meet him: if he had -succeeded the Hamiltons had been cut in two. As it was, the fighting was -more scattered, the _mêlée_ broken up; and this was the state of affairs -when the Lord James chose to appear with a company of the Queen’s men -from the Castle. - -For the Lord James, in his great house at the head of Peebles Wynd—awake -over his papers when all the world was asleep or at wickedness—had -heard the rumours of the fight; and then, even while he considered it, -heard the Gordons go by. He heard old Huntly encouraging his men, heard -John of Findlater: if he had needed just advantage over his scornful -enemy he might have it now. He got up from his chair and stood gazing -at his papers, rubbing together his soft white hands. Anon he went to -the closet, awoke his servant, and bade him make ready for the street. -Cloaked, armed and bonneted, followed by the man, he went by silent ways -to the Castle. - -When he came upon the scene of the fray, he found John Gordon of -Findlater at grapple with a Hamilton amid a litter of fallen men. He -found Adam Gordon pale by the wall, wounded, smiling at his first wound. -He could not find old Huntly, for he was far afield, chasing men down -the wynds. D’Elbœuf had slipped away on other mischief, Bothwell (with -a troublesome gash) had gone home to bed. He saw Arran battering at -Ramsay’s door, calling on his Alison to open to him—and left the fool to -his folly. It was Huntly he wanted, and, failing him, took what hostages -he could get. He had John of Findlater pinioned from behind, young Adam -from before, and the pair sent off guarded to the Castle. - -To Arran, then, who ceased not his lamentations, he sternly said, ‘Fie, -my lord, trouble not for such a jade at such an hour; but help me rather -to punish the Queen’s enemies.’ - -Arran turned upon him, pouring out his injuries in a stream. - -The Lord James listened closely: so many great names involved! Ah, the -Earl of Bothwell! Alas, my lord, rashness and vainglory are hand-in-hand, -I fear. The Marquis D’Elbœuf! Deplorable cousin of her Majesty. The Lord -John! Tush—my own unhappy brother! One must go deeply, make free with the -knife, to cut out of our commonwealth the knot of so much disease. - -‘My Lord of Arran,’ he concluded solemnly, ‘your offence is deep, but the -Queen’s deeper than you suppose. I cannot stay your resentment against -the Earl of Bothwell; it is in the course of nature and of man that you -should be moved. But the Earl of Huntly is the more dangerous person.’ - -My Lord James it was who led the now sobbing Arran to his lodging, and -sought his own afterwards, well content with the night’s work. It is not -always that you find two of your enemies united in wrong-doing, and the -service of the state the service of private grudges. - -When the archers had cleared the streets of the quick, afterwards came -down silently the women and carried off the hurt and the dead. The -women’s office, this, in Edinburgh. - - * * * * * - -The Queen was yet in her bed when Huntly came swelling into -Holyroodhouse, demanding audience as his right. But the Lord James had -been beforehand with him, and was in the bedchamber with the Secretary, -able to stay, with a look, the usher at the door. ‘It is proper that your -Majesty should be informed of certain grave occurrents,’ he began to -explain; and told her the story of the night so far as was convenient. -According to him, the Earl of Bothwell mixed the brew and the Earl of -Huntly stirred it. D’Elbœuf was not named, John Stuart not named—when -the Queen asked, what was the broil about? Ah, her Majesty must hold him -excused: it was an unsavoury tale for a lady’s ear. ‘I should need to be -a deaf lady in order to have comfortable ears, upon your showing,’ she -said sharply. How well he had the secret of egging her on! ‘Rehearse the -tale from the beginning, my lord; and consider my ears as hardened as -your own.’ He let her drag it out of him by degrees: Arran’s mistress, -Bothwell’s night work, so hard following upon night talk with her; -Huntly’s furious pride: rough music indeed for young ears. But she had -no time to shrink from the sound or to nurse any wound to her own pride. -At the mere mention of Bothwell’s name Mary Livingstone was up in a red -fury, and drove her mistress to her wiles. - -‘And this is the brave gentleman,’ cried the maid, ‘this is the gallant -who holds my Queen in his arms, and goes warm from them to a trollop’s -of the town! Fit and right for the courtier who blasphemes with grooms -in the court—but for you, madam, for you! Well—I hope you will know your -friends in time.’ - -The Queen looked innocently at her, with the pure inquiry of a child. -‘What did he want with the girl? Some folly to gall my Lord Arran, -belike.’ Incredible questions to Livingstone! - -Just then they could hear old Lord Huntly storming in the antechamber. -‘There hurtles the true offender, in my judgment,’ said the Lord James. - -‘He uses an unmannerly way of excuse,’ says the Queen, listening to his -rhetoric. - -‘Madam,’ said Mr. Secretary here, ‘I think he rather accuses. For his -sort are so, that they regard every wrong they do as a wrong done to -themselves. And so, perchance, it is to be regarded in the ethic part of -philosophy.’ - -‘Why does he rail at my pages? Why does he not come in?’ the Queen asked. -Whereupon the Lord James nodded to the usher at the door. - -Delay had been troublesome to the furious old man, fretting his nerves -and exhausting his indignation before the time. He was out of breath as -well as patience; so the Queen had the first word, which he had by no -means intended. She held up her finger at him. - -‘Ah, my Lord of Huntly, you angered me the other day, and I overlooked -it for the love I bear to your family. And now, when you have angered me -again, you storm in my house as if it was your own. What am I to think?’ - -He looked at her with stormy, wet eyes, and spoke brokenly, being full of -his injuries. ‘I am hurt, madam, I am sore affronted, traduced, stabbed -in the back. My son, madam——!’ - -She showed anger. ‘Your son! Your son! You have presumed too far. You -offer me marriage with your son, and he leaves me for a fray in the -street!’ - -Startled, he puffed out his cheeks. ‘I take God to witness, liars have -been behind me. Madam, my son Gordon had no hand in the night’s work. -He was not in my house; he was not with me; I know not where he was. A -fine young man of his years, look you, madam, may not be penned up like -a sucking calf. No, no. But gallant sons of mine there were—who have -suffered—whose injuries cry aloud for redress. And, madam, I am here to -claim it at your hands.’ - -‘Speak your desires of me: I shall listen,’ said she. - -The old man looked fixedly at his enemy across the bed. ‘Ay, madam, and -so I will.’ He folded his arms, and the action, and the weight of his -wrongs, stemmed his vehemence for a while. Dignity also he gained by -his restraint, a quality of which he stood in need; and truly he was -dignified. To hear his account, loyalty to the throne and to his friends -was all the source of his troubles. He had come down with proffers of -alliance to the Queen, and they laughed him to scorn. He with his two -sons rose out of their beds to quell a riot, to succour their friends—— - -‘And whom do you call your friends?’ cried the Queen, interrupting him -quickly. - -He told her the Hamiltons—but there certainly he lied—good friends of his -and hopeful to be better. The Queen calmed herself. ‘I had understood -that you went to the rescue of my Lord Bothwell,’ she began; and true -it was, he had. But now he laughed at the thought, and maybe found it -laughable. - -‘No, no, madam,’ he said: ‘there are no dealings betwixt me and the -border-thieves. But the Duke hath made a treaty with me; and it was to -help my Lord Arran, his son, that I and mine went out.’ Well! he had -stayed the riot, he had carved out peace at the sword’s edge. ‘Anon’—and -he pointed out the man—‘Anon comes that creeper by darksome ways, and -rewards my sons with prison-bars—he, that has sought my fair earldom and -all! Ay, madam, ay!’—his voice rose—‘so it is. Of all the souls in peril -last night, some for villainy’s sake, some to serve their wicked lusts, -some for love of the game, and some for honesty and truth—these last are -rewarded by the jail. Madam, madam, I tell your Majesty, honest men are -not to be bought and sold. You may stretch heart-strings till they crack; -you may tempt the North, and rue the spoiling of the North. I know whose -work this is, what black infernal stain of blood is in turmoil here. I -know, madam, I say, and you know not. Some are begotten by night, and -some in stealth by day—when the great world is at its affairs, and the -house left empty, and nought rife in it but wicked humours. Beware this -kind, madam—beware it. What they have lost by the bed they may retrieve -by the head. Unlawful, unlawful—a black strain.’ - -The Lord James was stung out of himself. ‘By heaven, madam, this should -be stopped!’ - -The Queen put up her hand. ‘Enough said. My Lord Huntly, what is your -pleasure of me?’ - -Old Huntly folded up his wrath in his arms once more. ‘I ask, madam, the -release of my two sons—of my son Findlater, and of Adam, my young son, -wounded in your service, sorely wounded, and in bonds.’ - -‘You frame your petition unhappily,’ said the Queen with spirit. ‘This is -not the way for subjects to handle the prince.’ - -He extended his arms, and gaped about him. ‘Subjects, she saith! -Handling, she saith! Oh, now, look you, madam, how they handle your -subject and my boy. He hath fifteen years to his head, madam, and a chin -as smooth as your own. I fear he is hurt to the death—I fear it sadly; -and it turns me sick to face his mother with the news. Three sons take -I out, and all the hopes I have nursed since your Majesty lay a babe -in your mother’s arm. With one only I must return, with one only—and -no hopes, no hopes at a’—madam, an old and broken man.’ He was greatly -moved; tears pricked his eyelids and made him fretful. ‘Folly, folly of -an old fool! To greet before a bairn!’ He brought tears into the Queen’s -eyes. - -‘I am sorry for your son Adam,’ she said gently; ‘but do not you grieve -for him. He is too young to suffer for what he did under duress. You -shall not weep before me. I hate it. It makes me weep with you, and that -is forbidden to queens, they say.’ - -A man had appeared at the curtain of the door, and stood hidden in it. -The Lord James went to him while the Queen was turned to the Secretary. - -‘Mr. Secretary,’ said she, ‘you shall send up presently to the Castle. I -desire to know how doth Sir Adam of Gordon. Bring me word as soon as may -be.’ She had returned kindly to the old Earl when her brother was back by -the bed. - -‘Madam,’ he said to her, but looked directly at his foe, ‘the injuries of -my Lord Huntly’s family are not ended, it appears. They bring me news——’ - -That was a slip; the Queen’s cheeks burned. ‘Ah, they bring _you_ news, -my lord!’ - -He hastened to add: ‘And I, as my duty is, report to your Majesty, that -Sir John Gordon of Findlater hath, within this hour, broken ward. He is -away, madam, leaving an honest man dead in his room.’ He had made a false -step in the beginning, but the news redeemed him. - -The Queen looked very grave. ‘What have you to say to this, Lord of -Huntly?’ - -‘I say that he is my very son, madam,’ cried the stout old chief, ‘and -readier with his wits than that encroacher over there.’ - -Mr. Secretary Lethington covered a smile; the Queen did not. But she -replied: ‘And I say that he is too ready with his wits; and to you, my -lord, I say that you must fetch him back. I will not be defied.’ - -She saw his dogged look, and admired it in him. Well she knew how to -soften him now! - -‘There shall be no bargain between you and me,’ she continued, looking -keenly at him; ‘but as I have passed my word, now pass you yours. I will -take care of the boy. He shall be here, and I will teach him to love his -Queen better than his father can do it, I believe. That is my part. Now -for yours: go you out and bring me back Sir John.’ - -Old Huntly ran forward to the bed, fell on his knees beside it, and took -the girl’s hand. The tears he now felt were kindlier, and he let them -come. ‘Oh, if you and I could deal, my Queen,’ he said, ‘all Scotland -should go laughing. If we could deal, as now we have, with the hearts’ -doors open, and none between! Why, I see the brave days yet! I shall -bring back Findlater, fear not for it; and there shall be Gordons about -you like a green forest—and yourself the bonny, bonny rose bowered in the -midst! God give your Majesty comfort, who have given back comfort and -pride unto me!’ - -The Queen’s eyes shone with wet as she laughed her pleasure. ‘Go then, my -lord; deal fairly by me.’ - -He left her there and then, swelling with pride, emotion, and vanity -inflamed, meaning to do well if any man ever did. He brushed aside -Lethington with a sweep of the arm—‘Clear a way there—clear a way!’ - -In this Gordon conflict the iniquities of Lord Bothwell were forgotten, -for the Queen’s mind was now set upon kind offices. She took young Adam -into her house and visited him every day. As you might have expected, -where the lad was handsome and the lady predisposed to be generous, -she looked more than she said, and said more than she need. Young Adam -fell in love with this glimmering, murmuring, golden princess. Fell, -do I say? He slipped, rather, as in summer one lets oneself slip into -the warm still water. Even so slipped he, and was over the ears before -he was aware. Whatever she may have said, he made mighty little reply: -the Gordons were always modest before women, and this one but a boy. He -hardly dared look at her when she came, though for a matter of three -hours before he had never taken his eyes from the door through which she -was to glide in upon him like a Queen of Fays. And the fragrance she -carried about her, the wonder of her which filled the little chamber -where he lay, the sense of a goddess unveiling, of daily miracle, of her -stooping (glorious condescension!), and of his lifting-up—ah, let him who -has deified a lady tell the glory if he dare! The work was done: she was -amused, the miracle wrought. She had found him a sulky boy, she left him -a budded knight. Here was one of the conquests she made every day without -the drawing of a sword. Most women loved her, and all boys and girls. -But although these are, after all, the pick of the world—to whom she was -the Rose of roses—we must consider, unhappily, the refuse. They were the -flies at the Honeypot. - -Mary Livingstone, not seriously, chid her mistress. ‘Oh, fie! oh, fie!’ -she would say. ‘Do you waste your sweet store on a bairn? They call you -too fond already. Do you wish to have none but fools about you?’ - -‘If it is foolish to love me, child,’ said the Queen, pretending to pout, -‘you condemn yourself. And if it is foolish of me to love you, or to love -Love—again you condemn yourself, who teach me day by day. Are you jealous -of the little Gordon, or of the little Jean-Marie? Or is it Monsieur de -Châtelard whom you fear?’ - -‘Châtelard, forsooth! A parrokeet!’ - -The Queen laughed. ‘If you are jealous, Mary Livingstone, you must cut -off my hands and seal my mouth; for should you take away all my lovers, I -should stroke the pillars of the house till they were warm, and kiss the -maids in the kitchen until they were clean. I must love, my dear, and be -loved: that I devoutly believe.’ - -‘Lord Jesus, and so do I!’ groaned the good girl, and thanked Him on whom -she called that Bothwell’s day was over. For although she said not a -word of the late scandal, she watched every day and lay awake o’ nights -for any sign that he was in the Queen’s thoughts. All she could discover -for certain was that he came no more to Court. And yet he was in or near -Edinburgh. The old Duke of Châtelherault had himself announced one day in -a great taking, with a pitiful story of his son Arran. Lord Bothwell’s -name rang loud in it. His son Arran, cousin (he was careful to say) of -her Majesty’s, being highly incensed at the affront he had suffered, -had challenged the Earl of Bothwell to a battle of three on a side. The -weapons had been named, the men chosen. My Lord Bothwell had kept tryst, -Arran (on his father’s counsel) had not. Thereupon my Lord Bothwell cries -aloud, in the hearing of a score persons, ‘We’ll drag him out by the -lugs, gentlemen!’ and set about to do it. ‘My son Arran, madam, goes in -deadly fear; for so ruthless a man, a man so arrogant upon the laws as -this Lord of Bothwell vexeth not your Majesty’s once prosperous realm. -Alas, that such things should be! Madam, I gravely doubt for my son’s -safety.’ - -‘Why, what would you have of me, cousin?’ says the Queen. ‘I cannot fight -your son’s battle. Courage I cannot give him. Am I to protect him in my -house?’ - -‘It is protection, indeed, madam, that I crave. But your Majesty knows -very well in what guise I would have him enter your house.’ - -This was too open dealing to be dextrous in such a delicate market. - -‘Upon my word, cousin,’ says the Queen, ‘I think that you carry your -plans of protection too far if you propose that I should shelter him in -my bed.’ - -The old Duke looked so confounded at this blunt commentary that she -repented later, and promised that she would try a reconciliation. ‘But I -cannot move in it myself,’ she told him. ‘There are many reasons against -that. Do you say that my Lord Bothwell threatens the life of your son?’ - -‘Indeed, madam, I do fear it.’ - -‘Well, I will see that he does not get it. Leave me to deal as I can.’ - -The Queen sent for Mr. Knox. - - - - -CHAPTER V - -HERE ARE FLIES AT THE HONEYPOT - - -‘The Comic Mask now appears,’ says _Le Secret des Secrets_ in a -reflective mood, ‘the Comic Mask, with a deprecatory grin, to show how it -was the misfortune of Scotland at this time that, being a poor country, -every funded man in it was forced to fatten his glebe at the cost of -his neighbour’s. So house was set against house, friendship made a vain -thing, and loyalty a marketable thing. More than that, every standard of -value set up to be a beacon or channel-post or point of rally (whichever -you chose to make it), became _ipso facto_ a tower of vantage, from -which, if you were to draw your dues, it was necessary to scare everybody -else. When Mr. Knox sourly called Queen Mary a Honeypot, he intended to -hold her out to scorn; but actually he decried his countrymen who saw -her so; and not saw her only, but every high estate beside. For them -the Church was a honeypot, the council, the command of the shore, the -wardenry of the marches. “Come,” they said, “let us eat and drink of -this store, but for God’s sake keep off the rest, or it will never hold -out.” Round about, round about, came the buzzing flies, at once eager and -querulous; and while they sipped they looked from the corners of their -eyes lest some other should get more than his share; and the murmurs of -the feasters were as often “Give him less” as “Give me more.” Yet it -would be wrong, I conceive, to call the Scots lords all greedy; safer to -remember that most of them must certainly have been hungry.’ So Monsieur -Des-Essars obtrudes his chorus—after the event. - -Young Queen Mary, hard-up against the event, had no chorus but trusty -Livingstone of the red cheeks and warm heart; nor until her first -Christmas was kept and gone was she conscious of needing one. She -had maintained a high spirit through all the dark and windy autumn -days, finding Bothwell’s effrontery as easy to explain as the Duke’s -poltroonery, or the hasty veering of old Huntly. Bothwell, she would -extenuate, held her cheap because women were his pastime, the Duke -sought her protection because he was a coward, Huntly shied off because -his vanity was offended. If men indeed had ever been so simple to be -explained, this world were as easy to manage as a pasteboard theatre. The -simplicity was her own; but she shared the quality with another when she -sent for Mr. Knox because she thought him her rival, and when he came -prepared to play the part. - -The time was November, with the floods out and rain that never ceased. -It was dark all day outside the palace; raw cold and showers of sleet -mastered the town; but within, great fires made the chambers snug where -the Queen sat with her maids and young men. The French lords had taken -their leave, the pageants and dancings were stayed for a time. In a -diminished Court, which held neither the superb Princes of Guise nor -the hardy-tongued Lord of Bothwell—in a domesticated, needleworking, -chattering, hearth-haunting Court—there was a great adventure for the -coy excellences of Monsieur de Châtelard. Discussing his prospects -freely with Des-Essars, he told him that he had two serious rivals only. -‘Monsieur de Boduel,’ he said, ‘forces my Princess to think of him by -insulting her. He appears to succeed; but so would the man who should -twist your arm, my little Jean-Marie, and make cuts with the hand at -the fleshy part. He would compel you to think of him, but with fear. -Now, fear, look you, is not the lady’s part in love, but the man’s, the -perfect lover’s part. For it may be doubted whether a woman can ever be a -perfect lover—if only for this reason, that she is designed for the love -of a man. The Lord Gordon, eldest son and heir of that savage greybeard, -Monsieur de Huntly, is my other adversary in the sweet warfare. She looks -at him as you must needs observe a church tower in your Brabant. It is -the tallest thing there; you cannot avoid it. But what fine long legs can -prevail against the silken tongue? Not his, at least. Therefore I sing my -best, I dance, I stand prayerful at corners of the corridor. And one day, -when I see her pensive, or hear her sigh as she goes past me, do you know -what I shall do? I shall run forward and clasp her knees, and cry aloud, -“We bleed, we bleed, Princess, we bleed! Come, my divine balm, let us -stanch mutually these wounds of ours. For I too have balsam for thee!” Do -you not think the plan admirable?’ - -‘It is very poetical,’ said Des-Essars, ‘and has this merit, usually -denied to poetry, that it is uncommonly explicit. I think I know better -than you what are the designs of Monsieur de Boduel, since he was once -my master. He does not seek to insult or to terrify my mistress, as you -seem to suppose—but to induce her to trust him. He would wish to appear -to her in the character of the one man in Scotland who does not seek -some advantage from her. My Lord Gordon’s designs—to use the word for -convenience, though, in fact, he has no designs—are as simple as yours. -He is infatuated; the Queen has turned his head; and it is no wonder, -seeing that she troubled herself to do it.’ - -‘If he has no designs, boy,’ cried Monsieur de Châtelard, ‘how can you -compare him with me, who have many?’ - -Des-Essars clasped his hands behind his head. ‘I suppose you are the same -in this, at least,’ he said, ‘that both of you seek to get pleasure out -of my mistress. Let me tell you that your most serious rival of all is -one of whom you know nothing—one who seeks neither pleasure nor profit -from her; to whom, therefore, she will almost certainly offer the utmost -of her store.’ - -‘Who is this remarkable man, pray?’ - -‘It is Master Knox, the Genevan preacher,’ said Des-Essars. ‘I think -there is more danger to the Queen’s heart in this man’s keeping than in -that of the whole Privy Council of this kingdom.’ - -Monsieur de Châtelard was profoundly surprised. ‘I had never considered -him at all,’ he admitted. ‘In my country, Jean-Marie, and I suppose in -yours also, we do not consider the gentry of religion until our case is -become extreme. Of what kindred is this man?’ - -‘He is of the sons of Adam, I suppose, and a tall one. I have seen him.’ - -‘You mistake me, my boy. Hath he blood, for example?’ - -‘Sir, I will warrant it very red. In fine, sir, this man is King of -Scotland; and, though it may surprise you to hear me say so, I will be so -bold as to add in your private ear, that no true lover of the Queen my -mistress could wish her to give up her heart into any other keeping which -this country can furnish.’ - -Monsieur de Châtelard, after a short, quick turn about the room, came -back to Des-Essars vivacious and angry. ‘You speak absurdly, like the -pert valet you are likely to become. What can you know of love—you, who -dare to dispose of your mistress’s heart in this fashion?’ - -Des-Essars looked grave. ‘It is open to me, young as I am, to love the -Queen my mistress, and to desire her welfare. I love her devotedly; but -I swear that I desire nothing else. Nor does my partner and sworn ally, -Monsieur Adam de Gordon.’ - -‘Love,’ said Monsieur de Châtelard, tapping his bosom, ‘severs -brotherhoods and dissolves every oath. It is a perfectly selfish passion: -even the beloved must suffer for the lover’s need. Do you and your -partner suppose that you can stay my advance? The thought is laughable.’ - -‘We neither suppose it nor propose it,’ replied the youth. ‘We are -considering the case of Mr. Knox, and are agreed that, detestable as his -opinions may be, there is great force in them because of the great force -in himself. We think he may draw the Queen’s favour by the very neglect -he hath of it; and although our natures would lead us to advance the suit -of my Lord Gordon, who is my colleague’s blood-brother, as you know—for -all that, it is our deliberate intention to throw no obstacle in the way -of any pretensions this Master Knox may chance to exhibit.’ - -‘And, pray,’ cried Monsieur de Châtelard, drawing himself up, ‘and, pray, -how do you look upon my pretensions, which, I need not tell you, do not -embrace marriage?’ - -‘To tell you the truth, sir,’ Des-Essars replied, ‘we do not look upon -them at all.’ - -Monsieur de Châtelard was satisfied. ‘I think you are very wise,’ he -said. ‘No eye should look upon the deed which I meditate. Fare you well, -Jean-Marie. I speak as a man forewarned.’ - -Jean-Marie returned to his problems. - -Standing at the Queen’s door, he had his plan cut and dried. When the -preacher should be brought in by the usher, he would require a word with -him before he pulled back the curtain. He does not confess to it in his -memoirs; but I have no doubt what that word was to have been. Remember -that there was this much sound sense on the boy’s side: he knew very well -that the Queen had thought more of Mr. Knox than she had cared to allow. -His inferences may have been ridiculous; it is one thing to read into -the hearts of kings, another to dispose them. However that may be, the -Captain of the Guard had received his orders. He himself introduced the -great man into the antechamber, and led him directly to the entry of the -Queen’s closet. Mr. Erskine, who held this office, was also Master of the -Pages, and no mere gentleman-usher. He brushed aside his subaltern with -no more ceremony than consists in a flack of the ear, and, ‘Back, thou -French pullet—the Queen’s command.’ Immediately afterwards he announced -at the door, ‘Madam, Mr. Knox, to serve your Majesty.’ - -‘Enter boldly, Mr. Knox,’ he bade his convoy then, and departed, leaving -him in the doorway face to face with the Queen of Scots. - -She sat in a low chair, tapestry on her knees, her needle flying fast; -in her white mourning, as always when she had her own way, she looked a -sweet and wholesome young woman. Mary Livingstone, self-possessed and -busy, was on a higher chair behind her, watching the work; Mary Fleming -in the bay of the window, Lord Lindsay near by her, leaning against the -wall. Mary Beaton and Mary Seton were on cushions on the floor, each -holding an end of the long frame. Mr. Secretary regardful by the door, -and a lady who sat at a little table reading out of _Perceforest_ or -_Amadis_, or some such, completed as quiet an interior as you could wish -to see. While Mr. Knox stood primed for his duty, scrutinised by half a -dozen pair of eyes, the Queen alone did not lift hers up, but picked at a -knot with her needle. - -The tangle out, ‘Let Mr. Knox take heart,’ she said, with the needle’s -eye to the light and the wool made sharp by her tongue: ‘here he shall -find a few busy girls putting to shame some idle men.’ Seeing that Mr. -Knox made no sign—as how should he, who needed not take what he had never -lost?—she presently turned her head and looked cheerfully at him, her -first sight of a redoubtable critic. Singly her thoughts came, one on -the heels of the other: her first, This man is very tall; the second, He -looks kind; the third, He loves a jest; the fourth, which stayed long by -her, The deep wise eyes he hath! In a long head of great bones and little -flesh those far-set, far-seeing, large, considering eyes shone like lamps -in the daylight—full of power at command, kept in control, content to -wait. They told her nothing, yet she saw that they had a store behind. -No doubt but the flame was there. If the day made it mild, in the dark -it would beacon men. She saw that he had a strong nose, like a raven’s -beak, a fleshy mouth, the beard of a prophet, the shoulders and height -of a mountaineer. In one large hand he held his black bonnet, the other -was across his breast, hidden in the folds of his cloak. There was no man -present of his height, save Lethington, and he looked a weed. There was -no man (within her knowledge) of his patience, save the Lord James; and -she knew him at heart a coward. Peering through her narrowed eyes for -those few seconds, she had the fancy that this Knox was like a ragged -granite cross, full of runes, wounded, weather-fretted, twisted awry. Yet -her four thoughts persisted: He is very tall, he looks kind, he loves -a jest—and oh! the deep wise eyes he hath! Nothing that he did or spoke -against her afterwards moved the roots of those opinions. She may have -feared, but she never shrank from the man. - -Now she took up her words where she had left them. ‘You, who love not -idleness, Mr. Knox, are here to help me, I hope?’ - -He blinked before he answered. ‘Madam,’ then said he, ‘I am here upon -your summons, since subjects are bound to obey, that I may know your -pleasure of me.’ ‘A sweet, dangerous woman,’ he thought her still; but -he added now, ‘And of all these dainty ladies the daintiest, and the -shrewdest reader of men.’ - -‘Come then, Mr. Knox, and be idle or busy as likes you best,’ she said, -and resumed her needle. ‘I am glad to know,’ she added, ‘that you -consider yourself bound anyways to me.’ - -He, not moving from his doorway—making it serve him rather for a -pulpit—when he had thought for awhile, with quickly blinking eyes, began: -‘I think that you seek to put me to some question, madam, but without -naming it. I think that you would have me justify myself without cause -cited. But this I shall not do, lest afterwards come in your Clerk of -Arraigns and I find myself prejudged upon my plea before I am accused at -all. Why, in this matter of service of subjects, we are all in a manner -bound upon it. Many masters must we obey: as God and His stewards, who -are girded angels; and Death and his officers, who are famines, diseases, -fires, and the swords of violent men, suffered by God for primordial -reasons; and next the prince and his ministers, among whom I reckon——’ - -‘Oh, sir; oh, sir,’ she cried out, ‘you go too fast for me!’ - -‘Madam,’ said he, ‘I speak with respect, but I do think you go as fast as -I.’ - -She laughed. ‘I am young, Mr. Knox, and go as fast as I can. Do you blame -me for that?’ - -‘I may not, madam,’ said he steadily, ‘unless to remember that you sit in -an old seat be to blame you.’ - -‘I sit at my needlework now, sir.’ - -He saw her fine head bent over the web, a gesture beautifully meek, but -said he: ‘I suspect the seat is beneath your Majesty. It is hard to win, -yet harder to leave when the time comes.’ - -‘But,’ said she, ‘if I put aside my seat, if I waive my authority, how -would you consider me then?’ - -He turned his head from one to another, and then gazed calmly at the -Queen. ‘Madam,’ he said, ‘if you waive your authority and put aside your -seat, the which (you say) you have from God, why then should I consider -you at all?’ - -When the room stirred, she laughed, but it was to conceal her vexation. -She pricked her lip with her needle. - -‘I see how it is with you and your friends, sir,’ she said drily. ‘You -love not poor women in any wise. When we are upon thrones you call us -monsters, and when we come off them you think us nothing at all. It is -hard to please you. And yet—you have known women.’ - -‘A many,’ said he. - -‘And of these some were good women?’ - -‘There was one, madam, the best of women.’ - -Her eyes sparkled. ‘Ah! You speak kindly at last! You loved my mother! -Then you will love me. Is it not so?’ - -He was silent. This was perilous work. - -‘I have sent for you, Mr. Knox,’ she continued, ‘not for dialectic, in -which I can see I am no match for you; but to ask counsel of you, and -require a benevolence, if you are ready to bestow it. We will talk alone -of these things, if you will. Adieu, mes enfants; gentlemen, adieu. I -must speak privately with Mr. Knox.’ - -What had she to say to him? Not he alone wondered; there was Master -Des-Essars at the door—Master Des-Essars, who, with the generosity of -calf-love, was prepared to surrender his rights for the good of the -State. Mary Livingstone, to whom one man, lover of the Queen, was as -pitiable as another, swept through the anteroom without a word for -anybody. The others clustered in the bay, whispering and wondering. - -But as to Mr. Knox, when those two were alone, she baffled him altogether -by asking him to intervene in the quarrel between the Lords Bothwell and -Arran: baffled him, that is, because he had braced himself for tears, -reproaches, and what he called ‘yowling’ against his ‘Stinking Pride’ -sermon, which of late had made some stir. In that matter he was ready -to take his stand upon the holy hill of Sion; he had his countermines -laid against her mines. Yea, if she had cried out upon the book of the -_Monstrous Regiment_ itself, he had his pithy retorts, his citations -from Scripture, his Aristotle, his Saint Paul, and Aquinas—for he did -not disdain that serviceable papist—his heavy cavalry from Geneva and -his light horsemen from Ayrshire greens. But she took no notice of -this entrenched position of his: she drew him into open country, then -swept out and caught him in the flank. Choosing to assume, against all -evidence, that he had loved her mother, assuming that he loved her too, -she pleaded with him to serve her well, and used the subtlest flattery of -all, which was to take for granted that he would refuse what she begged. -This was an incense so heady that the flinty-edged brain was drugged by -it, declined ratiocination. As she pleaded, in low urgent tones, which -cried sometimes as if she was hurt, and thrilled sometimes as though she -exulted in her pure desire, he listened, sitting motionless above her, -more moved than he cared afterwards to own. ‘For peace’s sake I came -hither, young as I am, and because I desire to dwell among my own folk. -I hoped for peace, and do think that I ensued it. Have I vexed any of -you in anything? Have I oppressed any?’ At such a time, against such -pleading, he had it not in his heart to cry out, ‘Ay, daily, hourly, you -vex, thwart, and offend the Lord’s people.’ - -Seeing him silent, pondering above her, she stretched out her arms for a -minute, and bewitched him utterly with her slow, sad smile. ‘If a girl of -my years can be tyrant over grave councillors, if that be possible, and -I have done it, I shall not be too stiff to ask pardon for my fault, or -to come to you and your friends, Mr. Knox, to learn a wiser way. But you -cannot accuse me. I see you answer nothing.’ Whether he could or not, he -did not at that time. - -She came back to her first proposition. ‘Of my Lord of Bothwell I know -only this,’—she seemed to weigh her words,—‘that in France he approved -himself the very honest gentleman whom I looked to find him here. He is -not of my faith; he favours England more than I am as yet prepared to -do; he is stern upon the border. What his quarrel may be with my Lord -of Arran I do not care to inquire. I pray it may be soon ended, for the -peace’s sake which I promised myself. Why should I be unhappy? You cannot -wish it.’ - -‘Madam,’ he said, in his deep slow voice, ‘God knoweth I do not.’ - -She looked down; she whispered, ‘You are kind to me. You will help me?’ - -‘Madam,’ he said, ‘God being with me, I will.’ She looked up at him like -a child, held out her hand. He took it in his own; and there it lay for a -while contented. - -Upon this fluttering moment the Lord James, walking familiarly in king’s -houses, entered with a grave inclination of the head. The Queen was -vexed, but she was ready, and resumed her hand. Mr. Knox was not ready. -He stiffened himself, and opened his mouth to speak: no words came. The -Lord James went solemnly to his side and put a hand on his shoulder. The -Queen’s eyes flashed. - -‘Madam,’ he said, ‘I am glad that my friend Mr. Knox should be here.’ - -‘Upon my word, my lord,’ cried the Queen in a rage, ‘why should you -be glad, or what has your gladness to do with the matter?’ Mr. Knox, -before she spoke, had gently disengaged himself; now he made her a deep -obeisance and took his leave—not walking backwards. ‘That is a true man,’ -was her judgment of him, and never substantially altered. What he may -have thought of her, if he afterwards discovered how she had used him -here, is another question. He set about doing her behests, at any rate. -There was a probability that my Lord Bothwell would show himself at Court -again before many days, and without direct invitation of hers. - - - - -CHAPTER VI - -THE FOOL’S WHIP - - -After a progress about the kingdom, which she thought it well to make for -many reasons—room for the pacifying arm of Mr. Knox being one—it befell -as she had hoped. Speedily and well had the preacher gone to work: the -Earl of Arran walked abroad without a bodyguard, the Earl of Bothwell -showed himself at Court and was received upon his former footing. The -Queen had looked sharply at him, on his first appearance, for any sign -of a shameful face; there was not to be seen the shadow of a shade. It -is not too much to say that she would have been greatly disappointed -if there had been any; for to take away hardihood from this man would -be to make his raillery a ridiculous offence, his gay humour a mere -symptom of the tavern. No, but he laughed at her as slyly as ever before; -he reassumed his old pretensions, he gave back no inch of ground—and, -remember, in an affair of the sort, if the man holds his place the maid -must yield something of hers. It is bound to be a case of give or take. -She felt herself in the act to give, was glad of it, and concealed it -from Mary Livingstone. When this girl, her bosom friend and bedfellow, -made the outcry you might expect of her, the Queen pretended extreme -surprise. - -‘Do you suppose this country the Garden of Eden, my dear? Are all the -Scots lords wise virgins, careful over lamp-wicks? Am I Queen of a Court -of Love by chance, and is my Lord of Bothwell a postulant? You tell me -news. I assure you he is nothing to me.’ - -Now these words were spoken on a day when he had declared himself -something as plainly as was convenient. Exactly what had happened was -this:— - -On the anniversary-day of the death of little King Francis of France, -the Queen kept the house with her maids, and professed to see nobody. -A requiem had been sung, the faithful few attending in black mourning. -She, upon a faldstool, solitary before the altar at the pall, looked a -very emblem of pure sorrow—exquisitely dressed in long nun-like weeds; -no relief of white; her face very pale, hands thin and fragile, only one -ring to the whole eight fingers. Motionless, not observed to open her -lips, wink her eyes, scarcely seen to breathe, there she stayed when mass -was done and the chapel empty, save for women and a page or two. - -At noon, just before dinner, she walked in the garden, kept empty by -her directions—a few turns with Beaton and Fleming, and Des-Essars for -escort—then, bidding them leave her, sat alone in a yew-tree bower in -full sun. It was warm dry weather for the season. - -Presently, as she sat pensive, toying perhaps with grief, trying to -recall it or maintain it—who knows?—she heard footsteps not far off, -voices in debate; and looked sidelong up to see who could be coming. It -was the Earl of Bothwell who showed himself first round the angle of -the terrace, arm-in-arm of that Lord Arran whom she had procured to be -his friend; behind these two were Ormiston, some Hamilton or another, -and Paris, Lord Bothwell’s valet. They were in high spirits and free -talk, those two lords, unconscious or careless of her privacy; Bothwell -was gesticulating in that French way he had; the other, with his head -inclined, listened closely, and sniggered in spite of himself. Both were -in cheerful colours; notably, Bothwell wore crimson cloth with a cloak of -the same, a purpoint of lace, a white feather in his cap. Arran first saw -the Queen, stopped instantly, uncovered, and said something hasty to his -companion; he stared with his light fish-eyes and kept his mouth open. -Bothwell looked up in his good time and bared his head as he did so. It -seems that he muttered some order or advice, for when Lord Arran slipped -by on the tips of his toes, all the rest followed him; but Lord Bothwell -walked leisurely over the grass towards the Queen, as who should say, ‘I -am in the wrong—in truth I am a careless devil. Well, give me my due; -admit I am not a timorous devil.’ - -As he stood before her, attentive and respectful in his easy way, she -watched him nearly, and he waited for her words. It is a sign of how -they stood to one another at this time that she began her speech in -the middle—as if her thoughts, in spite of herself, became at a point -articulate. - -‘You also, my lord!’ - -‘_Plaît-il?_’ - -‘Oh, you understand me very well.’ - -‘Madam, upon my honour! I am a dull dog that can see but one thing at a -time.’ - -She forced herself to speak. ‘I ask you, then, if this is the day of all -days when you choose to pass by me in your festival gear? I ask if you -also are with the rest of them?’ - -He made as if he would spread his hands out—the motion was enough. It -said—though he was silent—‘Madam, I am no better than other men.’ - -‘Oh, I believe it, I believe it! You are no better indeed; but I had -thought you wiser.’ - -He caught at the word, and rubbed his chin over it. ‘Hey, my faith, -madam—wiser!’ - -The Queen tapped her foot. ‘If I had said kinder, I might have betrayed -myself for a fool. Kindness, wisdom, generosity, pity! In all these -things I must believe you to be as other men. Is it not so?’ - -Seeing her clouded eyes, he did not affect to laugh any more. He was -either a bad courtier or one supremely expert; for he spoke as irritably -as he felt. - -‘Madam, I know few men save men of spirit, therefore I cannot advise -you. But you know the saw, _Come asino sape così minuzza rape_: “The -donkey bites his carrot as well as he knows.” Wisdom is becoming to a -servant; kindness, generosity, and the rest of these high virtues are -the ornament of a master, or mistress. Why, madam, if I desire the warmth -of the sun, shall I ever get it by shivering? Is that a wise reflection?’ - -She clasped her hands over her knee, and looked at her foot as she swung -it slowly; but if the action was idle the words were not. ‘If I asked -you, my lord, to wear the dule with me upon this one day of the year, -should you refuse me? If I grieve, will you not grieve with me?’ - -He never faltered, but spoke as gaily as a sailor to his lass. ‘Faith of -a gentleman, madam, why should I grieve—except for that you should grieve -still? For your grieving there may be a remedy; and as for me, far from -grieving with you, I thank the kindly gods.’ - -She bit her lip as she shivered. ‘You are cruel,’ she said: ‘you are -cruel. I knew it before. Your heart is cruel. This is the very subtlety -of the vice.’ - -‘Not so, madam,’ he answered quietly; ‘but it is dangerous simplicity. Do -you not know why I give thanks?—I think you do, indeed.’ - -Very certainly she thought so too. - -She sat on after he was gone, twisting her fingers about as she spun her -busy fancies; and was so found by her maids. Little King Francis and -the purple pall which signified him were buried for that day; and after -dinner she changed her black gown for a white. It was at going to bed -that night that she had rallied Mary Livingstone about Scots lords and -wise virgins, and declared that Lord Bothwell was nothing to her. And the -maid believed her just as far as you or I may do. - -Not that the thing was grown serious by any means: the maid of honour -made too much of one possible lover, and the Queen, very likely, too -little. The difference between these two was this: Mary Livingstone -looked upon her Majesty’s lovers with a match-maker’s eye, but Queen Mary -with a shepherding eye. The flock was everything to her. Just now, for -example, she was anxious about certain other strays; and, as time wore on -to the dark of the year, she began to be impatient. The Gordons, said her -brother James, were playing her false; but it was incredible to her—not -that they should be at fault, but that her instinct should be so. She -could have sworn to the truth of that fine Lord Gordon, and been certain -that she had won over old Huntly at the last. The mistake—if she was -mistaken—is common to queens and pretty children, who, finding themselves -in the centre of their world, give that a circumference beyond the line -of sight. Because all eyes are upon them they think that there is nothing -else to be seen. She was to learn that Huntly at Court and Huntly in -Badenoch were two separate persons; so said the Lord James. - -‘Sister, alas! I fear a treacherous and stiff-necked generation’; and he -had more to go upon than he chose her to guess as yet. - -So far, at least, she had to admit that old Huntly was a liar: John of -Findlater was never brought back. Her messengers returned again and -again, saying, ‘The Earl was in the hills,’ or ‘The Earl was hunting -the deer,’ or ‘The Earl was punishing the Forbeses.’ And where was her -fine Lord Gordon, with his sea-blue, hawk’s eyes? She was driven at -last to send after him—a peremptory summons to meet her at Dundee; but -he never came—could not be found or served with the letter—was believed -to be with the Earl, his father, but had been heard of in the west with -the Hamiltons, etc. etc. The face of Lord James—his eyes ever upon the -Earldom of Moray—was sufficient answer to her doubts; and when she turned -to Lord Bothwell for comfort, he laughed and said, reminding her of a -former conversation, ‘Prick the old bladder, madam, scatter the pease; -then watch warily who come to the feast.’ - -Then a certain Lord Ruthven entered her field, sent for out of Gowrie—a -dour, pallid man, with fatality pressing heavily on his forehead. It -seemed to weigh his brows over his eyes, and to goad him at certain -stressful times to outbursts of savagery—snarling, tooth-baring—terrible -to behold. He hated Huntly as one Scots lord could hate another, for no -known reason. - -‘You ask me what you shall do with Huntly, madam? I say, hang him on a -tree, and poison crows with him. It will be the best service he can ever -do you.’ - -He said this at the council board, and dismayed her sorely. It seemed to -her that he churned his spleen between his teeth till it foamed at his -loose lips. - -She flew to the comfort of her maids: here was her cabinet of last -resource! They throned her among them, put their heads near together, -and considered the case of Scotland. Mary Livingstone could see but one -remedy for the one deep-set disease. Bothwell’s broad chest shadowed all -the realm as with a cloud: chase that away, you might get a glimpse of -poor Scotland; but while the dreadful gloom endured the Gordons seemed to -her a swarm of gnats, harmless at a distance. ‘Let them starve in their -own quags, my dear heart,’ she said; ‘you will have them humble when they -are hungry. Theirs is the sin of pride—but, O Mother of Heaven, keep us -clean from the sin that laughs at sinning!’ - -Mary Fleming put in a word for the advice of Mr. Secretary Lethington, -but blushed when the others nudged each other. The Secretary was known to -be her servant. Mary Beaton said, ‘I thought we were to speak of Huntly? -_Ma belle dame_, touch his heart with your finger-tips.’ - -‘So I would if I knew the way,’ said the Queen, frowning. - -‘Send him back his bonny boy Adam,’ says Beaton; ‘I undertake that he -will plead your cause. You have given him good reason.’ - -The Queen thought well of this; so presently Adam Gordon was sent north -as legate _a latere_. - - * * * * * - -Christmas went out, Lent drew on, the months passed. The Ark of State -tossed in unrestful waters, but young Adam of Gordon came not again -with a slip of olive. ‘If that child should prove untrue,’ said the -Queen, ‘then his father is the lying traitor you report him.’ This to -Mr. Secretary Lethington, very much with her just now, at work for Mr. -Secretary Cecil of England, trying his hardest to bring about a meeting -between his mistress and the mistress of his friend. Lethington, knowing -what he did know, had little consolation for her; but he bore word to -his master, the Lord James, that the Queen was angering fast with the -Gordons; a very little more and the fire would leap. - -‘In my poor judgment,’ he said, ‘the kindling-spark will be struck when -she sees the scribbling of her love-image. She hath fashioned a very Eros -out of George Gordon.’ - -‘I conceive, Mr. Secretary,’ said the Lord James, making no sign that he -had heard him, ‘that the times are ripe for our budget of news.’ - -‘I think with your lordship,’ the Secretary replied, ‘but will you be -your own post-boy?’ - -‘Ah! I am a dullard, Mr. Secretary,’ said my lord. ‘Your mind forges in -front of mine.’ - -He was fond of penning his agents in close corners. Let them be explicit -since he would never be. Lethington gulped his chagrin. - -‘My meaning was, my lord, that it will advantage you more to confirm than -to spread your news concerning the Lord Gordon. Whoso tells her Majesty -a thing to anger her, I have observed that he will surely receive some -part of her wrath. Not so the man who is forced to admit the truth of -a report. He, on the contrary, gains trust; for delicacy in a courtier -outweighs integrity with our mistress. Therefore let the Duke bring the -news, and do you wait until you can bow your head over it. Perhaps I -speak more plainly than I ought.’ - -‘I think you do, sir, indeed,’ says the Lord James, and lacerates his -Lethington. - - * * * * * - -There was a masque upon Shrove Tuesday, the last day of Carnival, and -much folly done, which ended, like a child’s romp, in a sobbing fit. Amid -the lights, music, laughter of the throng, the Queen and her maids braved -it as saucy young men, trunked, puffed, pointed, trussed and doubleted; -short French cloaks over one shoulder, flat French caps over one ear. -Mary Livingstone was the properest, being so tall, Mary Fleming the least -at ease, Mary Beaton the pertest, and Mary Seton the prettiest boy. -But Mary the Queen was the most provoking, the trimmest, most assured -little gallant that ever you saw; and yet, by that art she had, that -extraordinary tact, never more a queen than when now so much a youth. -Her trunks were green and her doublet white velvet; her cloak was violet -threaded with gold. Her cap was as scarlet as her lips; but there was no -jewel in her ear or her girdle to match her glancing eyes. By a perverse -French courtesy, which became them very ill, such men as dared to do -it, or had chins to show, were habited like women. Queen Mary led out -Monsieur de Châtelard in a ruff and hooped gown; Des-Essars made a nun -of himself, most demure and most uncomfortable; Mary Fleming chose the -Earl of Arran—the only Scot in the mummery—a shepherdess with a crook. -Mary Livingstone would not dance. ‘Never, never, never!’ cried she. ‘Let -women ape men, as I am doing: the thing is natural; we would all be men -if we could. But a man in a petticoat, a man that can blush—ah, bah! -_pourriture de France!_’ - -That night, rotten or not, Monsieur de Châtelard played the French game. -Queen Mary held him, led him about, bowed where he curtsied, stood -while he sat. He grew bolder as the din grew wilder; he said he was the -Queen’s wife. She thought him a fool, but owned to a kind of sneaking -tenderness for folly of the sort. He called her his dear lord, his sweet -lord, said he was faint and must lean upon her arm. He promised to -make her jealous—went very far in his part. He swore that it was all a -lie—he loved his husband only: ‘Kiss me, dear hub, I am sick of love!’ -he languished, and she did kiss his cheek. More she would not; indeed, -when she saw the old Duke of Châtelherault struggling through the crowd -about the doors, she felt that here was a chance of getting out of a -tangle. She flung the sick monkey off and went directly towards the Duke. -He had come to town that day, she knew, directly from his lands in the -west: perhaps he would know something of the Gordons. He was a frail, -pink-cheeked old man, with a pointed white beard and delicate hands; so -simple as to be nearly a fool, and yet not so nearly but that he had -been able to beget Lord Arran, a real fool. When he understood that this -swaggering young prince was indeed his queen, he gave up bowing and -waving his hands, and dropped upon his knee, having very courtly old ways -with him. - -‘Dear madam, dear my cousin, the Lothians show the greener for your -abiding. ’Tis shrewish weather yet in the hills; but you make a summer -here.’ - -‘Rise up, my cousin,’ says the Queen, ‘and come talk with me.’ She drew -him to a settle by the wall. ‘What news of your house and country have -you for me?’ - -‘I hope I shall content your Majesty,’ he said, rubbing his fine hands. -‘We of the west have been junketing. We have killed fatlings for a -marriage.’ - -She was interested, suspecting nothing. ‘Ah, you have made a marriage! -and I was not told! You used me ill, cousin.’ - -‘Madam,’ he pleaded somewhat confusedly, ‘it was done in haste: there -were many reasons for that. Take one—my poor health and hastening years. -Nor did time serve to make Hamilton a house. It was a fortalice, and must -remain a fortalice for my lifetime. But for your Grace——’ He stopped, -seeing that she did not listen. - -She made haste to turn him on again. ‘Whom did you marry? Not my Lord of -Arran, for he is pranking here. And you design him for me, if I remember.’ - -‘Oh, madam!’ He was greatly upset by such plain talk. ‘No, no. It was my -daughter Margaret. My son Arran! Ah, that’s a greater thing. My daughter -Margaret, madam——’ - -‘Yes, yes. But the man—the man!’ - -‘Madam, the Lord of Gordon took her.’ He beamed with pride and -contentment. ‘Yes, yes, the Lord of Gordon—a pact of amity between two -houses not always too happily engaged.’ - -There is no doubt she blenched at the name—momentarily, as one may at a -sudden flash of lightning. She got up at once. ‘I think you have mistook -his name, cousin. His name is Beelzebub. He is called after his father.’ -She left him holding his head, and went swiftly towards the door. - -The dreary Châtelard crept after her. ‘My prince—my lord!’ - -‘No, no; I cannot hear you now.’ She waved him off. - -Bowing, he shivered at his plight; but ‘Courage, my child,’ he bade -himself: ‘“Not _now_,” she saith.’ - -All dancing stopped, all secret talk, all laughing, teasing, and -love-making. They opened her a broad way. The Earl of Bothwell swept the -floor with his thyrsus: he was disguised as the Theban god. But she cried -out the more vehemently, ‘No, no! I am pressed; I cannot hear you now. -You cannot avail me any more,’ and flashed through the doorway. ‘Send me -Livingstone to my closet,’ she called over her shoulder, ‘and send me -Lethington.’ She ran up her privy stair, and waited for her servants, -tapping her foot, irresolute, in the middle of the floor. - -Mary Livingstone flew in breathless. ‘What is it? What is it, my lamb?’ - -‘Get me a great cloak, child, and hide up all this foolery; and let Mr. -Secretary wait until I call him.’ - -Mary Livingstone covered her from neck to foot, took off the scarlet cap, -coifed her head seemly, brought a stool for her feet: hid the boy in the -lady, you see, and all done without a word, admirable girl! - -The Queen had been in a hard stare the while. ‘Now let me see M. de -Lethington. But stay you with me.’ - -‘Ay, till they cut me down,’ says Livingstone, and fetched in the -Secretary. - -She began at once. ‘I find, Mr. Secretary, that there is room for more -knaves yet in Scotland.’ - -‘Alack, madam,’ says he, ‘yes, truly. They can lie close, do you see, -like mushrooms, and thrive the richlier. Knaves breed knavishly, and -Scotland is a kindly nurse.’ - -‘There are likely to be more. Here hath the Duke married his daughter, -and the Lord of Huntly that brave son of his whom of late he offered to -me. Is this knavery or the ecstasy of a fool? What! Do they think to win -from me by insult what they have not won by open dealing?’ - -Mr. Secretary, who had known this piece of news for a month or more, did -not think it well to overact surprise. He contented himself with, ‘Upon -my word!’ but added, after a pause, ‘This seems to me rash folly rather -than a reasoned affront.’ - -The Queen fumed, and in so doing betrayed what had really angered -her. ‘Knave or fool, what is it to me? A false fine rogue! All rogues -together. Ah, he professed my good service, declared himself worthy of -trust—declared himself my lover! Heavens and earth, are lovers here of -this sort?’ - -Mary Livingstone stooped towards her. ‘Think no more of him—ah me, think -of none of them! They seek not your honour, nor love, nor service, but -just the sweet profit they can suck from you.’ - -The Queen put her chin upon her two clasped hands. ‘I have heard my aunt, -Madame de Ferrara, declare,’ she said, with a metallic ring in her voice -which was new to it, ‘that in the marshes about that town the peasant -women, and girls also, do trade their legs by standing in the lagoon -and gathering the leeches that fasten upon them to suck blood. These -they sell for a few pence and give their lovers food. But my lovers in -Scotland are the leeches; so here stand I, trading myself, with all men -draining me of profit to fatten themselves.’ - -‘Madam——’ said Lethington quickly, then stopped. - -‘Well?’ says the Queen. - -‘I would say, madam, the fable is a good one. Gather your leeches and -sell them for pence. Afterwards, if it please you, trade no more in the -swamps, but royally, in a royal territory. Ah, trade you with princes, -madam! I hope to set up a booth for your Majesty’s commerce, and to find -a chafferer of your own degree.’ - -She understood very well that he spoke of an English alliance for her, -and that this was not to be had without a husband of English providing. -‘I think you are right,’ she replied. ‘If the Queen of England, my good -sister, come half-way towards me, I will go the other half. This you may -tell to Mr. Randolph if you choose.’ - -‘Be sure that I tell him, madam.’ - -‘Good dreams to you, Mr. Secretary.’ - -‘And no dreams at all to your Majesty—but sweet, careless sleep!’ - -The Queen, turning for consolation to her Livingstone, won the relief of -tears. They talked in low tones to each other for a little while, the -mistress’s head on the maid’s shoulder, and her two hands held. The Queen -was out of heart with Scotland, with love, with all this skirting of -perils. She was for prudence just now—prudence and the English road. Then -came in the tirewoman for the unrobing, and then a final argument for -England. - -Monsieur de Châtelard, who truly (as he had told Des-Essars) was a -foredoomed man, lay hidden at this moment where no man should have lain -unsanctified. I shall not deal with him and his whereabouts further than -to say that, just as Frenchmen are slow to see a joke, so they are loath -to let it go. He had proposed on this, of all nights of the year, to -push his joke of the ballroom into chamber-practice. Some further silly -babble about ‘wifely duty’ was to extenuate his great essay. If jokes -had been his common food, I suppose he would have known the smell of a -musty one. As it was, he had to suffer in the fire which old Huntly and -his Hamilton-marriage had lit: his joke was burnt up as it left his lips. -For the Queen’s words, when she found him, clung about him like flames -about an oil-cask, scorched him, blistered him, shrivelled him up. He -fell before them, literally, and lay, dry with fear, at her discretion. -She spurned him with her heel. ‘Oh, you weed,’ she said, ‘not worthy -to be burned, go, or I send for the maids with besoms to wash you into -the kennel.’ He crept away to the shipping next day, pressing only the -hand of Des-Essars, who could hardly refuse him. ‘His only success on -this miserable occasion,’ the young man wrote afterwards, ‘was to divert -the Queen’s rage from Monsieur de Gordon, and to turn her thoughts, by -ever so little more, in the direction of the English marriage. He was -one of those fools whose follies serve to show every man more or less -ridiculous, just as a false sonnet makes sonneteering jejune.’ - - * * * * * - -Lent opened, therefore, with omens; and with more came Lady Day and the -new year. The Gordons, being summoned, did not answer; the Gordons, then, -were put to the horn. The Queen was bitter as winter against them, with -no desire but to have them at her knees. As for lovers and their loves, -after George Gordon, after the crowning shame of Monsieur de Châtelard, -ice-girdled Artemis was not chaster than she. My Lord of Bothwell, after -an essay or two, shrugged and sought the border; the Queen was all for -high alliances just now, and Mr. Secretary, their apostle, was in favour. -He was hopeful, as he told Mary Fleming, to see two Queens at York; -and who could say what might not come of that? And while fair Fleming -wondered he was most hopeful, for like a delicate tree he needed genial -air to make him bud. You saw him at such seasons at his best—a shrewd, -nervous man, with a dash of poetry in him. The Queen of England always -inspired him; he was frequently eloquent upon the theme. His own Queen -talked freely about her ‘good sister,’ wrote her many civil letters, and -treasured a few stately replies. One wonders, reading them now, that they -should have found warmer quarters than a pigeon-hole, that they could -ever have lain upon Queen Mary’s bosom and been beat upon by her ardent -heart. Yet so it was. They know nothing of Queen Mary who know her not -as the Huntress, never to be thrown out by a cold scent. Mr. Secretary, -knowing her well, harped as long as she would dance. ‘Ah, madam, there -is a golden trader! Thence you may win an argosy indeed. What a bargain -to be struck there! Sister kingdoms, sister queens—oh, if the Majesty of -England were but lodged in a man’s heart! But so in essence it is. Her -royal heart is like a strong fire, leaping within a frame of steel. And -your Grace’s should be the jewel which that fire would guard, the _Cor -Cordis_, the Secret of the Rose, the Sweetness in the Strong!’ - -Mary Fleming, glowing to hear such periods, saw her mistress catch light -from them. - -‘You speak well and truly,’ said Queen Mary. ‘I would I had the Queen -of England for my husband; I would love her well.’ She spoke softly, -blushing like a maiden. - -‘Sister and spouse!’ cries Lethington with ardour. ‘Sister and spouse!’ - -For the sake of some such miraculous consummation she gave up all -thoughts of Don Carlos, put away the Archduke, King Charles, the Swedish -prince. Her sister of England should marry her how she would. Lethington, -on the day it was decided that Sir James Melvill should go to London upon -the business, knelt before his sovereign in a really honest transport, -transfigured in the glory of his own fancy. ‘I salute on my knees the -Empress of the Isles! I touch the sacred stem of the Tree of the New -World!’ - -Very serious, very subdued, very modest, the Queen cast virginal eyes to -her lap. - -‘God willing, Mr. Secretary, I will do His pleasure in all things,’ she -said. - -The Lord James, observing her melting mood, made a stroke for the Earldom -of Moray. Were the Gordons to defy the Majesty of Scotland? With these -great hopes new born, with old shames dead and buried—never, never! The -Queen said she would go to the North and hound the Gordons out. - - - - -CHAPTER VII - -GORDON’S BANE - - -On the morning of Lammas Day the Queen heard mass in the Chapel Royal -with a special intention, known only to herself. Red mass it should have -been, since she felt sore need of the Holy Ghost; but she had given up -the solemn ornament of music for the sake of peace. So Father Lesley read -the office before the very few faithful: her maids, Erskine, Herries, -the esquires, the pages, the French Ambassador, the Ambassador of -Savoy—with him a certain large, full-blooded Italian, of whom there will -be something to say anon. Mr. Knox had been scaring off the waverers of -late: the Catholic religion was languid in the realm. - -She knelt before the altar on her faldstool very stiffly, and looked more -solitary than she felt. Her high mood and high endeavour still holding, -there was but one man in Scotland who could make her feel her isolation, -make her pity herself so nearly that the tears filled her eyes. Her -brother James and his party, ostentatiously aloof, she could reckon with. -All was said of them long ago by that old friend of hers now facing God -in the mass: ‘Your brother stands on the left of your throne; but he -looks for ever to the right.’ With this key to the cipher of my Lord -James, what mystery in his sayings or doings? Then the grim Mr. Knox, -who had worked her secret desires, and since then railed at her, scolded -her, made her cry—she had his measure too. He liked her through all, and -she trusted him in spite of all: at a pinch she could win him over. Whom, -then, need she consider? The Earl of Bothwell—ah, the Earl of Bothwell, -who laughed at everything, and had looked drolly on at her efforts to be -a queen, and chosen to do nothing to help or hinder: there was a man to -be feared indeed! She never knew herself less a queen or more a girl than -when he was before her. Laughed he or frowned, was he eloquent or dumb -as a fish, he intimidated her, diminished her, drove her cowering into -herself to queen it alone. Christ was not so near, God not so far off, -as this confident, free-living, shameless lord. Therefore now, because -she dared not falter in what she was about to do, or see herself less -than she desired to be, she had sent him into Liddesdale to hold the -Justice-Court, and had not cared even to receive him when he came to take -his leave. Lady Argyll, who had stood in her place, reported that he had -gone out gaily, humming a French air. With him safely away, she had faced -her duty—duty of a Prince, as she conceived it. And here she knelt in -prayer, prone before the Holy Ghost—solitary (but that is the safeguard -of the King!)—and searched the altar for a sign of assurance. - -Over that altar hung Christ, enigmatic upon His cross. The red priest -bent his head down to his book, and made God apace. - -The Queen’s lips moved. ‘My Saviour Christ, I offer Thee the intention of -my heart, a clean oblation. If I do amiss in error, O Bread of Heaven, -visit it not upon me. I have been offended, I have been disobeyed; they -call upon me to claim my just requital. But be not Thou offended with me, -my Lord, and pardon Thou my disobedience. As for my punishment, I suffer -it in seeking to punish.’ - -It is not often that women pray in words: an urgency, a subjection, a -passionate reception is the most they do—and the best. But she prayed so -now, because she felt the need of justifying herself before Heaven, and -the ability to do it. For Bothwell was in far Liddesdale, and she on her -throne. - -In three days’ time she was to go to the North; and, though the country -knew it not, she would go in force to punish the Gordons. You may judge -by her prayers whether she was satisfied with the work. Plainly she was -not. Her anger had had time to cool; she might have forgotten the very -name of the clan, except that their men had had honest faces, and that -two of them had certainly loved her once. But she had not been allowed to -forget: the record remained, held up ever before her eyes in the white -hand of Lord James. Contumacy! Contumacy! Old Huntly had been traitor -before, when he trafficked with the enemies of her mother, and tried -to sell herself to the English king. The Gordons would not surrender; -they had mated with the Hamiltons, a stock next to hers for the throne. -Was there not a shameful plot here? Would she not be stifled between -these two houses? Yes, yes, she knew all that. But they were Catholics, -they had shown her honest faces, two of them had loved her. She was not -satisfied; she must have a sign from heaven. - -God was made, the bell proclaimed Him enthroned, Queen Mary bowed her -head. Now, now, if the Gordons were true men, let God make a sign! The -tale was told that once, when a priest lifted up the Host above his head, -the thin film dissolved, and took flesh in the shape of a naked child, -who stood, burning white, upon the man’s two hands. Let some such marvel -fall now! Intimacies between God and the Prince had been known. She -hid her face, laid down her soul; the vague swam over her, the dark—a -swooning, drowning sense. In that, for a moment, as vivid clouds chased -each other across her field, she saw a face, a shape—mocking red mouth, -vivacious, satirical hands, the gleam of two twinkling eyes: Bothwell, -hued like a fiend, shadowing the world. She shuddered; God passed -over, as the bell called up the people. With them she lifted her head, -stiffened herself. The spell was broken. Without being more superstitious -than her brethren, she may be pardoned for finding in this experience an -ominous beginning of adventure. - -Nevertheless, she so faced the heights of her task that, on the day -appointed, she set out as bravely as to a hunting of stags. Jeddart -pikes, bowmen from the Forest, her Lothian bodyguard—she had some five -hundred men about her; too many for a progress, too few to make war. She -herself rode in hunting trim, with two maids, two pages, two esquires; -her brother, of course, in command; with him, of course, the Secretary. -At fixed points along the road certain lords joined her: Atholl at -Stirling, Glencairn and Ruthven at Perth, these with their companies. -Lying at Coupar-Angus, at Glamis, at Edzell, her spirits rose as she -breasted the rising country, saw the cloud-shadowed hills, the swollen -rivers, the wind-swept trees, the sullen moors, the rocks. She grew happy -even, for motion, newness, and physical exertion always excited her, and -she was never happy unless she was excited. No fatigue daunted her. She -sat out the driving days of rain, bent neither to the heat nor to the -cold fog. She was always in front, always looking forward, seemed like -the keen breath of war, driven before it as the wind by a rain-storm. -Lethington likened her to Diana on Taygetus shrilling havoc; but the -Lord James said: ‘Such similitudes are distasteful. We are serious men -upon a serious business.’ She rode astraddle like a young man, longed -for a breastplate and steel bonnet. She made Ruthven exercise her with -the broadsword, teach her to stamp her foot and cry, ‘Ha! a touch!’ and -cajoled her brother into letting her sleep one night afield. Folded in -a military plaid, so indeed she did; and watched with thrills the stars -shoot their autumn flights, and listened to the owls calling each other -as they coursed the shrew-mice over the moor. She pillowed her head on -Mary Livingstone’s knee at last, and fell asleep at about three o’clock -in the morning. - -In the grey mirk—sharply cold, and a fine mist drizzling—Lethington -and his master came to rouse her. Mary Livingstone lifted a finger of -warning. The Queen was soundly asleep, smiling a little, with parted lips -and the hasty breathing of a child. Mary Seton, too, was deep, her face -buried in her arm. The two men looked down at the group. - -‘Come away, my lord: give them time,’ said the Secretary. - -But my Lord James did not hear him. He stood broodingly, muttering to -himself: ‘A girl’s frolic—this romping, fond girl! And Scotland’s neck -for her footstool—and earnest men for her pastime. O King eternal, is it -just? Man!’ he said aloud, ‘there’s no reason in this.’ - -Mr. Secretary misunderstood him, not observing his wild looks. ‘Give them -a short half-hour, my lord. There are two of them sleeping; and this poor -watcher hath the need of it.’ - -The Lord James turned upon him. ‘Who sought to have women sleeping here? -Are men to wait for the like of this? Are men to wait for ever? She -should have counted the cost. I shall waken her. Ay! let her have the -truth.’ - -‘She will wake soon enough,’ says Lethington, ‘and have the truth soon -enough.’ - -The Lord James gave him one keen glance. ‘I command here, Mr. Secretary, -under the Queen’s authority. Bid them sound.’ - -The trumpet rang; the Queen stretched herself, moved her head, yawned, -and sat up. She was wide awake directly, laughed at Livingstone for -looking so glum, at Seton’s tumbled hair. She kissed them both, said her -prayers with Father Roche, and was ready when the order to march was -given. - -When she came to Aberdeen she was told that a messenger from the Earl of -Huntly was waiting for her with his chief’s humble duty, and a prayer -that she would lodge in his castle of Strathbogie. This was very insolent -or very foolish: she declined to receive the man. Let the Earl and his -son Findlater render themselves up at Stirling Castle forthwith, she -would receive them there. No more tidings came directly; but she learned -from her brother news of the country which made her cheeks tingle. It -was the confident belief of all the Gordon kindred, she was given to -know, that her Majesty had come into the North to marry Sir John Gordon -of Findlater. He was to be created Earl of Moray and Duke of Rothesay -to that end. True news or false, she was in the mood to believe it, and -cried out, with hot tears in her eyes, that she could have no peace -until that rogue’s head was off. Needing no prompter at her side, she -took instant action, marched on Inverness and summoned the keys of the -castle. They told her that the Lord of Findlater was keeper; none could -come in but by his leave. Findlater! But the man was out of his mind! -She grew very quiet when, after many repetitions of it, she could bring -herself to believe this report; then she sent for Lethington and bade -him raise the country. The counsel was her brother’s, and meant that -the clans—Forbeses, Grants, MacIntoshes—were to be supported and turned -against the Gordons. The Lord James considered that his work was as good -as done. So did the captain of the castle of Inverness; and rightly, for -when his charge was surrendered he was hanged. The town did its best to -appease the Queen with humble addresses and crocks full of gold pieces; -but she concealed from nobody now that she had come up with war in her -hands. Captains and their levies were sent for from the south; roads -marked out for Kirkcaldy of Grange, Lord John Stuart, Hay of Ormiston; -rendezvous given at Aberdeen. And presently she went down to meet them, -full of the purpose she had. - -Old Huntly came out to watch. They saw his men, some hundred or more, in -loose order at the ford of Spey. Queen Mary’s heart leapt for battle, -real crossing of swords to crown all this feigning and waiting; but the -enemy drew off to the woods, and nobody barred her road to Aberdeen. -Uncomfortably for herself, she lodged at Spynie on the way, where -Bishop Patrick of Moray made her very welcome. He was Lord Bothwell’s -uncle, true Hepburn, a scapegrace old Catholic, _anathema_ to the good -Lord James, and proud of it. Something of Bothwell’s gleam was in his -cushioned eyes, something of Bothwell’s infectious gaiety in his rich -laugh. Like Bothwell, too, he was a mocker, who saw things sacred and -profane a uniform, ridiculous drab, shrugged at the ruin of the faith in -Scotland, and supposed Huntly had been paid to be a traitor. The Queen’s -fine temper made her sensitive to depreciation of the things she strove -at; under such rough fingers she was bruised. She felt cheapened by her -intercourse with this bishop; and not only so, but her business sickened -her. The old pagan made light of it. - -‘’Tis but a day in the hedgerows for ye, madam. Send your -terriers—Lethington and siclike—into the bury, you shall see the Gordons -bolt to your nets like rabbits, and old Huntly squealing loudest of all.’ - -Now, the Gordons had been fair in her sight, noble friends and hardy -foes. But if George Gordon was to squeal like a rabbit, then war was -playing at soldiers, and she a tomboy out for a romp. She left Spynie -feeling that she hated the Gordons, hated their fault, hated their -chastisement, and hated above all men under the tent-roof of heaven the -whole race of Hepburn. - -‘Vile, vile scoffers at God and His vicars! They make a toy of me, these -Hepburns. Uncle and nephew—I am a plaything for them.’ - -‘Just a Honeypot, madam,’ said Livingstone, and was snapped at for her -respect. - -‘Am I “Madam” to you now? What have I done to make you so petulant?’ - -‘I wish you would be more “Madam” to the Hepburns,’ replied the maid. ‘I -could curse the whole brood of them.’ - - * * * * * - -John Gordon defended two good castles, Findlater and Auchindoune. He -expected, and was prepared for, a siege; but when the reinforcements came -up from the Lowlands, somewhat to his consternation the Queen joined them -at Aberdeen and hung about that region indefinitely, as if the autumn -were but begun. Perhaps the suspense, the menace, told on old Huntly’s -nerves; at any rate, something brought him to his knees. He sent petition -after petition, promise upon promise; was reported by Ormiston to be -very much aged, tremulous, given to sobbing, and when not so engaged, -incoherent. This worthy went to Strathbogie, hoping to surprise him; -failed to find him at home, but saw the Countess and a young girl, -strangely beautiful, the Lady Jean, sole unmarried daughter of the house. -The Countess took him into the chapel. - -‘Do you see that, Captain Hay?’ says she. - -‘What in particular, ma’am?’ - -There were lighted candles on the altar, a cross, the priest’s vestments -of cloth of gold laid ready. She pointed to these adornments. - -‘There is why they hunt us down, Captain Hay, because my lord is a -faithful Christian gentleman. And woe,’ cried she, ‘woe upon her who, -following wicked counsels, persecutes her own holy religion! It had been -better for her that she had never been born. Tell your mistress that. -Tell her that Gordon’s bane is her own bane. Ah, tell her that.’ - -He repeated the piece to the Queen in council, and she received it in a -cold silence, looking furtively round about her at the lords present, -for all the world (says Hay of Ormiston) as if she would see whether -they believed the words or not. Her brother sat on her left, Morton the -Chancellor on her right; Argyll was there, Ruthven, Atholl, Cassilis, -Eglinton. Not one of them looked up from the table, or saw her anxious -peering. Atholl whispered Cassilis without moving his head, and Cassilis -nodded and stared on. What did she think during that constrained silence? -Gordon’s bane her own bane! Could it be true? Perhaps the gibe of old -Bishop Hepburn came to her timely help: ‘Rabbits in a bury, and old -Huntly squealing first and loudest.’ - -She threw up her head, like a fretful horse. ‘My lords,’ she said in -her ringing, boyish voice, ‘you have heard the message sent me by the -Countess of Huntly. I am not of her mind. Gordon has tried to be my bane, -but is not so now. I think Gordon’s bane is Gordon’s self, and fear not -what he can do against me. And if not I, why need you fear? Take order -now, how best to make an end of it all.’ Order was taken. - -Huntly was summoned before the council, and sent his wife. The Queen -would not see her. The royal forces moved out of Aberdeen; John Gordon -cut to pieces an outlying party; then the Earl joined hands with his son, -and the pair marched on Aberdeen. The fight was on the rolling hills of -Corrichie, down in the swampy valley between, over and up a burn. Their -cry of ‘Aboyne! Aboyne!’ bore the Gordons into battle; their pride made -them heroic; their pride caused them to fall. It was a case, one of the -first, of the ordnance against the pipes. No gallantry—and they were -gallant; no screaming of music, no slogan nor sword-work, nor locking of -arms, could hold out against Kirkcaldy’s cannon or Lord James’s horse. -They huddled about their standard and so died; some few fled into the -lonely hills; but Huntly was taken, and two of his tall sons, and all -three brought to the Queen. John of Findlater and Adam were in chains; -the old man needed none, for he was dead. They say that when he was taken -he was frantic, struggled with his captors to the last, induced so an -apoplexy, stiffened and died in their arms. They guessed by the weight -of him that he was dead. All this they told her. She neither looked at -the body nor chose to see the two prisoners; received the news in dull -silence. ‘Where is the Lord Gordon?’ She did ask that; and was told that -he had not been engaged. - -‘Coward as well as traitor,’ she gloomed; ‘what else is left him to -adorn?’ - -‘Madam, tumbril and gallows,’ croaked Ruthven, like a hoody crow. - -Next morning she awoke utterly disenchanted of the whole affair. Nothing -would content her but to be quit of it. ‘I seem to smell of blood and -filthy reek,’ she said to her brother James. ‘Take what measures you -choose. Ruin the ruins to your heart’s content. The house was Catholic, -and I suppose the stones and mortar are abominable in your eyes. Pull -them down; do as you choose—but let me go.’ - -He asked her desire concerning the prisoners. This caught villain -Findlater, for instance. - -‘You seek more blood?’ she asked bitterly. ‘Take his, then. He has had -his fill of it in his day; now let him afford you a share.’ - -Adam Gordon? She took fire at his name. ‘You shall not touch a hair of -his head. I do not choose—I will not suffer it. He is for me to deal -with.’ - -He swore that she should be obeyed; but she called in Lethington, and put -the lad in his personal charge, to be brought after her to Stirling. At -this time Lethington was the only man she could trust. - -Lastly, her brother hinted at the reward of his humble services to her -realm. - -‘Oh, yes, yes, brother, you shall have your bonny earldom. God knows how -you have wrought for it. But if you keep me here one more hour, I declare -I shall bestow it on Mr. Secretary.’ - -He thanked her, saying that he hoped to deserve such condescension by -ever closer attention to her business. She chafed and fidgeted till he -was gone, then set about her escape. With a very small escort, she pushed -them to the last extreme in her anxiety to be south. - -There should have been something of the pathetic in this struggle of a -girl to get out of throne-room and council-chamber; one might almost hear -the shrilling of wings; but Scots gentlemen fearful of their treadings -must be excused for disregarding it. They told her at Dundee that the -Duke of Châtelherault lay there, awaiting her censures. Hateful reminder! - -‘What can he want with me at such an hour, in such a place as this?’ - -‘Madam, it is for his son-in-law’s sake he hath come so far.’ - -She flamed forth in her royalest rage. ‘Is the Lord Gordon so poor in -heart? Can he not beg for himself? Can he not lie? Can he not run? He can -hide himself, I know, while his kinsmen take the field. Let him learn -to whine also, and then he will be armed _cap-à-pie_.’ The old Duke was -refused: let the Lord Gordon surrender himself at Stirling Castle. - -Thither went she, shivering in the cold which followed her late fires; -and sat in the kingly seat to make an end of the Gordons. Thither then -came the young lord whom she had once chosen to bewitch, walking upright, -without his sword. He could not take his eyes from her face when he stood -before her; nor could she restrain her fury, though many were present; -no, but she leaned forward, holding by the balls of the chair, and drove -in her hateful words fiercely and quick. - -‘Ah, false heart, you dare to meet me at last!’ - -He said, ‘I have offended you, and am here at your mercy.’ - -‘What mercy for a liar?’ - -‘There should be none.’ - -‘For a disobedient servant?’ - -‘None, madam, none.’ - -‘For a craven that hides when war is adoing?’ - -He answered her steadily. ‘Whether is that man the greater coward who -fears such taunts as these, and for fear of them does hardily; or he that -refuses to draw sword upon his sovereign, though she throw in his face -his refusal? If I was able to dare your enmity, it is a small thing to me -that now I must have your scorn. There is no man in this place shall call -me craven; but from your Majesty I care not to receive the name, because -I am proud to have deserved it.’ - -This was well spoken, had she not been too fretful to know it. - -‘Do you think, sir,’ cried she, ‘to scold me? Do you think me so light as -to forget? I am of longer memory than you. Trust Gordon, said you! Trust -Gordon? I would as lief trust Judas that sold his master, or Zimri that -slew his.’ - -Young Gordon held his peace, not knowing how to wrangle with a woman. At -the door there was some commotion—hackbutters looking about for orders, -the captain of the guard forbidding the entry, his hand uplifted to shut -men out. They told her that Lady Huntly was there. - -‘Let her in,’ says the Queen. ‘I will show her this son of hers.’ - -The widow came, feeling her way down the hall; distracted with grief, -using her hands like a blind man. Beside her, really leading her, was -a tall girl, exceedingly handsome, dark-haired, pale, with proud, shut -lips. She looked before her, at nothing in particular—neither at the -young Queen stormy on her throne, nor at the circle of watchful men about -her, nor at her brother’s bowed head, nor at the full doorways. She saw -nothing, seemed to take no part, to feel no shame. Except the Queen only, -she seemed the youngest there; with the Queen, whose eyes she held from -the beginning, she was the only girl among these grim-regarding men. - -‘Who is that? Who is that girl?’ the Queen asked Lethington, without -ceasing to look. - -‘Madam, it is the Lady Jean Gordon.’ - -‘She has a frozen look, then. Why does she not see me? Is she blind?’ - -‘They say she is proud, madam.’ - -‘Proud? What, to be a Gordon?’ - -She watched her the whole time of the process, finding her a cold copy -of her brother, admitting freely her great beauty, admiring (while she -grudged) her impassivity. She herself was all on edge, quivering and -intense as a blown flame, her face hued like the dawn, her eyes frosty -bright. The other was so still! But the Queen was never quiet. Her -eyelids fluttered, the wings of her nose; her foot tapped the stool; she -saw everything, heard every breath. Jean Gordon had no colour, and might -have been carved in stone—a sightless, patient and dumb goddess, staring -forward out of a temple porch. Huddling in her great chair, resting her -chin on her hand, her elbow on her knee, Queen Mary watched her closely, -sensing an enemy; and all this while Lady Huntly called upon God and man -to testify to Gordon’s bane. - -‘Malice,’—thus she ended her wailing,—‘Malice hath wrought this woe; -far-reaching, insatiable malice! There was one that craved a fair -earldom, and another the fair trappings of a house: there was one must -have the land, and another the good blood. Foul fare they all—they have -their desires in this world! Where is Huntly? He is dead. Where is my -fine son John? Dead! dead! Where is Adam, my pretty boy? Fetters on his -ankles, madam, the rats at his young knees. Come, come, come: you shall -have all the Gordons. There you have the heir, and here the widow, and -here the fatherless lass. Let them plead for your mercy if they care. I -have no voice left but a cry, and no tears but bloody tears. What should -I weep but blood?’ - -The Queen still looked at Jean Gordon. ‘Do you plead, mistress?’ she -asked her. - -‘I do not, madam.’ - -She turned unwillingly to Gordon. ‘What do you plead, sir?’ - -‘Nothing, madam.’ - -She flew out at them all. ‘Insolence! This is not to be borne. You think -to save your faces by this latter pride. You should have been proud -before—proud enough not to promise and to lie. You expect me to be -humble, to sue you to plead! If my mercy is not worth your asking, it is -not worth your receiving. My Lord Gordon, surrender yourself to the law’s -discretion. Madam, you gain nothing by your reproaches; and you, young -mistress, nothing by your silence. The council is dissolved.’ - -Lord Gordon walked into ward. The Queen told Lethington that all the -forms of law must be observed; by which Lord Gordon’s execution was to be -understood. - -When she reached Holyrood she sent for Adam Gordon: this shows you that a -thaw had set in. She received him in private, alone. This proves that she -wanted something yet from the Gordons. - -The lad stood shamefully by the door, red with shame, and by shame made -sullen. But the Queen had melted before he came; the tears stood waiting -in her eyes. ‘Oh, Adam, Adam Gordon, they have hurt you! And you have -hurt me!’ She held out her arms. - -He looked at her askance, he fired up, he gulped a sob; and then he -jumped forward into the shelter of her and cried his heart out upon her -bosom. After a time of mothering and such-like, he sat by her knee and -told her everything. - -His father’s exorbitant pride, Findlater’s ambitions, the clamours of the -clan and want of ready pence, had undone the house of Huntly. Findlater -was restless. He knew that the country would have him chief; he knew that -he was a better man than his father or the heir; and old Huntly knew it -too, and would never lag behind. His brother Gordon, said Adam, was an -honest man. For why? He had refused to bear arms against her Majesty, -when it came to that or ruin. That hurt him so much with the kindred that -he had gone away. If he was a coward, Adam held, such cowardice was very -noble courage. ‘And be you sure, madam, from what I am telling you, that -he loves you over-well.’ - -‘He should love his wife, my child.’ - -‘His wife, indeed! Not he!’ cried Adam. ‘Why, he loved your Majesty from -the very first, and begged you to trust him. And should he go back upon -his word?’ - -‘Well,’ said the Queen, smiling, ‘maybe I will try him again.’ - -‘So please your Majesty, think of this,’ Adam said. ‘A man, they say, -weds with his hand. But he loves not with the hand.’ - -‘Would you wed with the hand, boy?’ - -He blushed. ‘I would, madam, if I must. But I would cut it off first.’ - -The Queen was delighted with him. She asked about his sister—was very -curious. How old was his sister Jean? She was told. Nineteen years! -Younger than herself, then—and looking so much older. Was she affianced? -Not yet? What made the men such laggards in the North? She looked proud -and cold: was she so indeed? - -‘She is cold,’ says Adam, ‘until you warm her.’ - -‘A still girl,’ says the Queen. - -And Adam, ‘Ay, deep and still.’ - -The Queen became pensive. - -‘I think I might be pleased with her in time.’ - -Adam knew better. ‘No, no, madam. She is not one for your Majesty.’ - -‘How so?’ - -‘Madam, so please your Majesty, when you love it is easy seen, and when -you hate also. All your heart beats in your face. But Jean hides her -heart. If she loves, you will never see it. If she hates, you will never -know it, until the time comes.’ - -‘And when should that be, Adam?’ - -‘Eh,’ says he, ‘when she has you fast and sure.’ - -This singular character attracted the Queen. She thought much of Lady -Jean Gordon, and for many days. - - * * * * * - -Hateful ceremonies were enacted over the ruins of the house of Huntly. -The old Earl in his coffin was set up in the Parliament-house and -indicted of his life’s offence: a brawling indeed in the quiet garden of -death. They flung shame upon the witless old head; they stripped the -heedless old body of the insignia it wore. The Queen made a wry face when -she heard of it. - -‘Whose is the vulture-mind in this?’ she asked, but received no reply -from her stony brother. She bade them stop their nasty play and deliver -up the corpse to Lady Huntly to be buried. Then she learned that the -widow and her daughter and the condemned lord had been present. She -turned pale: ‘I had no hand in this—I had no hand!’ she cried out -breathlessly, and was for telling the mourners. Adam Gordon told her that -they would be very sure of it. - -‘Well,’ she said, ‘I will trust them to be as true-minded as thou.’ - -She shortly refused to allow Gordon’s execution, and told her brother so. - -‘You and your friends,’ said she, ‘have paddled your hands long enough. -Go you to your homes and wash. The Lord Gordon shall go to Dunbar to -await my pleasure.’ - -‘Tell him,’ she said to Adam, ‘that because he asked not his life I give -it him; and say also that I trust him to make no escape from Dunbar. -Remind him of his words to me aforetime. If I trust him again he must not -prove me a fool.’ - -They say that, at this pungent instance of royal clemency, Lady Huntly -broke down, fell before her, and would have kissed her feet. The Queen -whipped them under her gown. - -‘Get up, madam. But get up! That is no place for the afflicted. You do -not see your daughter there.’ - -It was very true. Lady Jean stood, composed and serious. - -‘How shall I find the way into that fenced heart?’ thinks the Queen. - -But now she turned her face eagerly towards England, whither, Mr. -Secretary Lethington assured her, ran an open, smiling road. - - - - -CHAPTER VIII - -THE DIVORCE OF MARY LIVINGSTONE - -(_To an Italian Air_) - - -The ranging eye of the Muse, sweeping up the little with the big, -rediscerns Monsieur de Châtelard, like a derelict ladybird, tide-swept -into Scotland once more. It is true, unfortunately, that you have not yet -done with this poet, though the time is at hand. - -He came warily pricking back in October; and, nosing here and there, -found a friend in a certain portly Italian gentleman, by name Signior -David, who professed to be deeply attached to him on very short notice, -and whose further employment was, discoverably, that of foreign -secretary to her Majesty. Needing alliances—for his venture was most -perilous—Monsieur de Châtelard had sought him out; and found him writing -in a garret, wrapped in ample fur. A cup of spiced wine stood by him, a -sword and toothpick lay to hand: no Italian needs more. He was a fine, -pink, fleshy man, with a red beard, fluff of red hair in his ears, light -eyelashes, blue eyes. His hair, darker than his beard, was strenuous and -tossed. - -He was not very clean, but his teeth were admirable. Monsieur de -Châtelard, coming in with great ceremony, credentials in hand, hoped that -he might have the satisfaction of making Signior David a present. - -The Italian was franchise itself. ‘Per la Madonna, my lord, you may -make me many presents. I will tire you out at that pastime.’ He ran his -eye over the Marquis D’Elbœuf’s letter. ‘Aha, we have here Monsieur -de Châtelard, poet, and companion of princes! Sir,’ said he, ‘let two -adventurous explorers salute each other. If I were not a brave man I -should not be here; still less would your honour. A salute seems little -testimony between two such champions. You are Amadis, I am Splandian. We -should embrace, Monsieur de Châtelard.’ - -They did; the poet was much affected. ‘I come with my life in my hands, -Signior David.’ - -‘Say, rather, on the tips of your fingers, dear sir!’ - -‘You see in me,’ continued the Frenchman, ‘a brave man. You said as much, -and I thank you. But you see more. You see a poet.’ - -‘Aha!’ cries the other, tapping his chest with one finger; ‘and here is -the little fellow who will sing your verses as merrily as you make them.’ - -‘Allow me to perorate,’ says Monsieur de Châtelard. ‘You see also, -signore, a disgraced lover of the Queen, who nevertheless returns to kiss -the hand that smote him.’ - -‘_Sanguinaccio!_ my good friend,’ Signior David replied: ‘I hope I don’t -see a fool.’ - -Monsieur de Châtelard considered this aspiration with that gravity it -deserved. He hesitated before he made answer. ‘I hope not, Signior -David,’ he said wistfully; ‘but, as a lover, I am in some doubt. For a -lover, as you very well know, is not (by the nature of his case) many -removes from a fool. He may be—he is—a divine fool. Fire has touched his -lips, to make him mad. He speaks—but what? Noble folly! He does—but what? -Glorious rashness!’ - -‘Undoubtedly,’ said the Italian. ‘But does he not know—when a Queen is in -the case—that he has a neck to be wrung?’ - -‘He knows nothing of such things. This is the sum of his knowledge—I -love! I love! I love!’ - -The Italian looked at him with calmness. ‘I speak for my nation,’ he -said, ‘when I assure you that an Italian lover knows more than that. He -considers means, and ends too. Hungry he may be; but how shall he be -filled if you slit open his belly? He may be thirsty; but if you cut his -throat? However, I am speaking into the air. Let us be reasonable. How -can I serve you, dear sir?’ - -‘Signior David,’ says the poet, ‘I shall speak openly to you. Howsoever -brave a man may be, howsoever dedicated to impossible adventure, there -is one wind which, blowing through the forest, must chill him to the -heart. It is the wind of Indifference. By heaven, sir, can you sing -before mutes, or men maimed of their hands? And how are you and I to do -admirable things, if no one admires, or cares whether we do them or not? -The thought is absurd. Here, in this grey Scotland, which is Broceliande, -the enchanted forest hiding my princess, I suffer acutely from my -solitude. Formerly I had friends; now I have none. Sir, I offer you my -friendship, and ask yours again. Be my friend. Thus you may serve me, if -you will.’ - -The Italian took up the fringe of his beard and brushed his nose with it. -‘I must know one little thing first. What do you want with your enchanted -princess in the middle of your forest? Everything?’ - -Monsieur de Châtelard opened wide his arms, strained them forward, -clasped them over his bosom, and hugged himself with them. - -‘Everything,’ he said; and the Italian nodded, and sank into thought. - -‘If I assist you to that, good sir,’ says he presently, looking at his -client, ‘it will be a very friendly act on my part.’ - -‘Sir,’ replied the Frenchman, ‘I require a friendly act.’ - -Signior David looked down, ever so lightly, at the jewel in his hand, -which the poet had put there. ‘But!’ and he raised his eyebrows over -it, ‘it will be impossible for future rhapsodists to devise an act more -friendly than this! It might be—I do not say that it will be, for I am a -simple scribe, as you see—it might be a partaking which Achilles would -never have allowed to Patroclus.’ - -‘But you, signore, are not Achilles,’ urged Monsieur de Châtelard. - -The Italian shrugged. ‘I have not yet found Achilles in this country; but -many have offered themselves to be Patroclus. ‘Come,’ he added, with -a pleasant grin, ‘Come, I will serve you. We will be friends. For the -moment I recommend discretion. Her Majesty returned but two days ago, -and is already in the midst of affairs. This annoys her extremely. She -thought she had done with business and might begin her dancing. But I -cannot think that she will dance very long, the way matters are tending.’ - -Monsieur de Châtelard went away, to brace himself for the opening scene -of a new act. He came often back again to see his friend, to submit to -his judgment such and such a theory. How should the lover encounter his -mistress, against whose person he had dared, but not dared enough, the -storming of the sweet citadel? Here was the gist of all his inquiry. - -‘Show yourself, dear sir, show yourself!’ was his friend’s advice, whose -own tactics consisted in never showing himself and in making his absence -felt. - -The Frenchman, finally, did show himself, with very little result one way -or the other. The Queen, occupied as she had been with Huntly’s ruin, -and now with the patching up of a comfortable fragment out of it, hardly -knew that he was there. This was the way of it. A lightly-built young man -with a bush of crimped hair sprang out of the press in hall at the hour -of the _coucher_, and fell upon his knees. ‘Ha, Monsieur de Châtelard, -you return?’ If she smiled upon him, it was because she smiled on all the -world when the world allowed it. - -‘Sovereign, the poor minstrel returns!’ - -‘I hope he will sing more tunefully. I hope he will follow the notes.’ - -‘All the notes of the gamut, Princess; faithfully and to the utterance.’ - -She nods and goes her way, to think no more about him. - -From this unsubstantial colloquy, the infatuated gentleman drew the -highest significance. Why, what are the notes of the chant which a lover -must follow? There is but one note; the air is a wailing monotone: -_Hardiesse, Hardiesse, Hardiesse!_ O Queen, potent in Cyprus, give your -vassal effrontery! - -_Amantium iræ!_ She had hopes that the piping times were come, with an -air cleaner for the late storms. She had won back young Adam Gordon, as -you know, and sealed him to her by kisses and tears. She had hopes of his -elder brother, now a faithful prisoner at Dunbar. James Earl of Moray -proved a kinder brother than Lord James Stuart had ever been; Ruthven -was gorged, somnolent now, like a sated eagle, above the picked bones of -Huntly. Morton was at Dalkeith, out of sight, out of mind; Mr. Secretary -wrote daily to England, where Sir James Melvill haggled with bridegrooms; -Mr. Knox reported his commission faithfully done. He had laboured, he -said, and not in vain. Her Majesty knew that the two lords, Bothwell -and Arran, had been reconciled. He took leave to say that, since her -expedition to the North, he had rarely seen a closer band of friendship -between two men, seeming dissimilar, than had been declared to every eye -between the Earls Arran and Bothwell. - -The news was good, as far as it went; it made for the peace which every -sovereign lady must desire. So much she could tell Mr. Knox, with truth -and without trouble. But—but—the Earl of Bothwell came not to the Court. -He had been seen in town, in September, when she was fast in the hills; -he was now supposed to be at Hailes; had been at Hamilton, at Dumbarton, -at Bothwell in Clydesdale. Why should he absent himself? If by staying -away he hoped to be the more present, he had his desire. The Queen grew -very restless, and complained of pains in the back. What he could have -had to do with these is not clear; but the day came very soon when she -had a pain in the side—his work. - -That was a day when there was clamour in the quadrangle, sudden rumour: -the raving of a man, confused comment, starting of horses, grounding -of arms; the guard turned out. The Queen was at prayers—which is more -than can be said for the priest who should have lifted up her suffrages; -for if she prayed the mass through, he did not. The poor wretch thought -the Genevans were after him, and his last office a-saying. Whatever she -thought, Queen Mary never moved, even though (as the fact was) she heard -quick voices at the chapel doors, and the shout, ‘Hold back those men!’ - -She found Lethington waiting in the antechapel when she entered it. He -was perturbed. - -‘Well, Mr. Secretary, what have my loving subjects now on hand?’ - -He laughed his dismay. ‘Madam, here is come, with foam on his lips, my -Lord of Arran, the Duke’s son.’ - -‘Doth he foam so early?’ says she. ‘Give him a napkin, and I will see him -clean.’ - -Presently they admitted the disordered man, frowning and muttering, much -out of breath, and his hair all over his face. Kirkcaldy of Grange held -his arm; the Secretary and Lord Lindsay hovered about him; through the -half-open door there spied the anxious face of Des-Essars. - -‘Speak, my Lord Arran,’ says the Queen. - -‘God save us all, I must, I must!’ spluttered Arran, and plunged afresh -upon his nightmare. - -If that can be called speech which comes in gouts of words, like tin -gobbling of water from a neck too narrow, then Lord Arran spoke. He wept -also and slapped his head, he raved, he adjured high God—all this from -his two knees. Mystery! He had wicked lips to unlock. He must reveal -horrid fact, devilish machination, misprision of treason! God knew the -secret of his heart; God knew he would meet that bloody man half-way. In -that he was a sinner, let him die the death. Oh, robber, curious robber! -To dare that sacred person, to encompass it with greedy hands—robbery! -God is not to be robbed—and who shall dare rob the King, anointed of God? -Such a man would steal the Host from the altar. Sorcery! sorcery! sorcery! - -When he stopped to gasp and roll his eyeballs in their sockets, the -Queen had her opportunity. She was already fatigued, and hated noises at -any time. ‘Hold your words, my lord, I beg of you. Who is your bloody -man? Who steals from a king, and from what king steals he? Who is your -sorcerer, and whom has he bewitched? Yourself, by chance?’ - -Arran turned her the whites of his eyes—a dreadful apparition. ‘The Earl -of Bothwell’—he spoke it in a whisper—‘the Earl of Bothwell did beguile -me.’ - -‘Then I think he did very idly,’ said the Queen. ‘He has been profuse of -his sorcery. Tell your tale to the Lord of Lethington, and spare me.’ - -And away she went in a pet. Let the Earl of Bothwell come to her or not, -she did not choose to get news of him through a fool. - -Yet the fool had had seed for his folly. He was examined, produced -witnesses; and his story bore so black a look that the council confined -him on their own discretion until the Queen’s pleasure could be known. -Then her brother, Mr. Secretary and others came stately into her cabinet -with their facts. Mr. Knox, said they, had waited upon the Earl of -Bothwell to urge a reconciliation with Lord Arran. The Hepburn had -been very willing, had laughed a good deal over the cause of enmity—a -kiss to a pretty woman, etc.—in a friendly manner. The two lords had -met, certain overtures were made and accepted. Very well; her Majesty -had observed with what success Mr. Knox had done his part. But wait a -little! Friendship grew apace, until at last it seemed that the one Earl -cared not to lose sight of the other. Incongruous partnership! but there -were reasons. A few weeks later my Lord of Bothwell invites his friend -to supper, and then and there proposes the ravishment of the Queen’s -person—no less a thing! - -At this point of the recital her hand, which had been very fidgety, went -up to her lip, pinched and held it. - -‘Continue, my lord,’ she said, ‘but—continue!’ - -‘I am slow to name what I have been slow to believe,’ says my lord of -Moray, conscious of his new earldom, ‘and yet I can show your Majesty the -witness.’ - -The plan had been to surprise her on her way from Perth to the South, -take her to Hamilton, and marry her there by force to the Earl of Arran. -Bothwell was to have been made Chancellor for his share. He had asked no -greater reward. The Queen looked down to her lap when she heard this. -What more? My lord of Arran concealed his alarms for the moment, and told -no one; but the secrecy, the weight of the burden, worked upon him until -he could not bear himself. Before the plot was ripe he had confessed it -to half-a-dozen persons. Bothwell threatened him ravenously; his mind -gave way—hence his frantic penance. Here was a budget of treason for -the Queen to take in her hands, and ponder, wildly and alone. Alone she -pondered it, in spite of all the shocked elders about her. - -If he had done it! If he had—if he had! Ah, the adventure of it, the -rush of air, the pounding horse, and the safe, fierce arms! Marry her -to Arran, forsooth, and possess her at his magnificent leisure: for of -course that was the meaning of it. Arran and his Hamiltons were dust -in the eyes of Scotland, but necessary dust. He could not have moved -without them. Thus, then, it was planned—and oh! if he had done it! So -well had she learned to school her face that not a man of them, watching -for it, expecting it, could be sure for what it was that her heart beat -the tattoo, and that the royal colours ran up the staff on the citadel, -and flew there, straining to the gale. Was it maiden alarm, was it -queenly rage, that made her cheeks so flamy-hot? It was neither: she knew -perfectly well what it was. And what was she going to do in requital of -this scandalous scheme? None of them knew that either; but she again knew -perfectly well what she was about. She was about to give herself the -most exquisite pleasure in life—to deal freely, openly, and as of right, -with her secret joy; to handle in the face of all men the forbidden -thing, and to read into every stroke she dealt her darling desire. None -would understand her pleasure, none could forbid it her; for none could -under-read her masked words. And her face, as glacial-keen as Athena’s, -like Antigone’s rapt for sacrifice; her thoughtful, reluctant eyes, her -patient smile, clasped hands, considered words—a mask, a mask! Hear the -sentences as they fell, like slow, soft rain, and listen beneath for the -exulting burthen: ‘If he had! Oh, if he had!’ - -‘My lords, this is a fond and foolish adventure, proceeding from a -glorious heart to a distempered head. My dignity may suffer by too -serious care for it. But as I may not permit any subject of mine to -handle my person, to deal familiarly with my person, even in thought, I -must take as much notice of it as the fact deserves. Let the Lords Arran -and Bothwell be committed to ward during pleasure. Prepare such writs as -are needful. They shall see my sign-manual upon them.’ - -She rose, they with her, and went across to the curtain of the private -rooms; she held the curtain as she stayed to look back. - -‘Be secret, Mr. Secretary, and swift.’ - -‘I shall obey your Majesty in all things.’ - -Sitting alone and very still, she wrought her hardest to be offended -at this tale, as became a sovereign lady. She bit her red lip over it, -frowned, covered her eyes—acting a horror which she could not feel. -Resolutely then she uncovered them again, to look it in the face and -see it at its worst. But what she saw, and exulted to see, was a Man. -And the face of the man was broad-jowled, flushed, and had a jutting -under-jaw; its mouth snarled as it laughed, its eyes were bloodshot and -hardily wicked, it was bearded from the throat. Wicked, daring, laughing -Bothwell—hey, yes, but a Man! - -His plot—how could she but admire it as a plot? It was a chain of fine -links. Arran was heir-presumptive, and would hold the South; Arran’s -sister married to Huntly’s son—there’s for the North. In the midst, -Bothwell with the wittold’s wife—herself. Now, if that were the plan, -then Bothwell was her lover. Observe the plain word: her lover, not her -adoring slave. Also, if that were the plan, and Arran a catspaw, then -Bothwell would be her master. Another plain word for a plain proposal, -with which no woman, be she chaste or frail, is altogether offended. - -Certainly this young woman was not offended, as she dallied with each -thought in turn—weighing, affecting to choose. Lover! Master! This saucy, -merry robber. How should she be offended? It was only a thought. Lancelot -had loved his queen, and Tristram his. Let the plot be put before these -two to judge, Lancelot would have laughed and Tristram grieved. Arran had -been like Tristram, and she curled her lip to think of him, and laughed -aloud as she chose for Lancelot. Ah, how can you be offended with Love -and his masterful ways? Or with the blithe lover, who laughs while he -spoils you? It is _son naturel_; and must we not follow our nature? -Love, which made George Gordon glum, made Bothwell merry. He would go, -humming the same southern air, to battle or to bride-bed, to midnight -robbery or the strife of love. He was a man, do you see? They had such in -France, a plenty; but in Scotland what had they but pedlars, hagglers, -cattle-drovers, field-preachers? What other in Scotland would have shaped -such a plan as this, and gaily opened it to a fool? The Earl of Morton, -do you suppose—that thick schemer? Her brother Moray, the new Earl, sour, -careful merchant of his store? Dead old Huntly, John of Findlater, wordy, -bickering hillmen? Or George Gordon, chastened and contrite at Dunbar? -Not one of them, not one. Gordon was her lover—accorded. But Gordon made -eyes,—and this other, plans to carry her off. Oh, here is the difference -between a boy’s kisses and a man’s. The one sort implies itself, the -other all the furious empery of love. - -The slim, pale, wise young witch that she looked—sitting here alone, -spelling out her schemes, glancing sidelong from her hazel eyes! _Tenez_, -she was playing with thoughts, like a girl hot upon a girl’s affair. -Not thus meditates a prince upon his policy! She began to walk about, -looked out of window, fingered the arras; and all the while was urging -herself to princely courses. As a prince, she would certainly make a high -alliance; as a prince, she must show disorderly subjects that she was -not to be touched too familiarly. The man must be reminded; prison walls -would cool his fevers. Let him think of her in confinement. When he came -out she would be affianced, perhaps wedded—safe in either case. Then it -would be lawful to see him again, and—and—oh, what a laughing Lancelot -went there! - - * * * * * - -She kept her own counsel, having made up her own mind, and contrived to -seem severe without being so. The Earl of Arran was sent to Dumbarton, a -nominal confinement; but Bothwell was warded in Edinburgh Castle, the -length of a street away. ‘He is more dangerous, it seems, the farther -off he is lodged,’ she gave as her reason. It was easy to learn that he -made good cheer, kept a generous table, saw his friends and had all the -Court news; not quite so easy to pretend not to learn it. Yet, I suppose, -she knew by the next day everything that he had said or done overnight. -Des-Essars was go-between, not officially, of course, but as by accident. -Few beside Mary Livingstone remarked that this discreet and demure youth -was off duty for half the day at a time. Then Bishop Hepburn, my lord’s -reprobate, chuckling uncle, came to Edinburgh, and sauntered up and down -the hill as he chose; an old hand at a game as old as Troy town. Playing -a round at cards with the Queen, he treated the late escapade as a family -failing. But this was a false step of his: the Queen was not to be caught. - -‘When you say that the thing was folly, you are more cruel than I have -been. I have punished your nephew for presumption and crime, but have -never accused him of being a fool. However, since you are in a position -to judge, I am willing to take it from you.’ - -He stood corrected, but did not cease to observe. The Queen’s -circumspection filled him with wonder, and at the same time taught him, -by its accuracy, all he wanted to know. His lesson pat, he went up to the -Castle again. - -‘Nephew,’ he said, ‘the cage-door is not set open, but I believe you have -only to turn the handle when you please.’ - -‘I shall not turn it just yet awhile, my good lord bishop,’ said -the Earl, playing a tune upon his knee; ‘I find this a fine post of -observation.’ - -It was Mary Livingstone who first found out the truth of matters, and -by plunging into the fire to save her mistress succeeded in nothing but -burning herself. When, after a sharp examination, she learned where -Des-Essars had spent his free days, she could not contain herself. ‘Fine -use for pages! Fine use!’ - -This provoked a quarrel. The Queen stamped her foot, flung up and down, -shed tears. ‘You are too masterful, my girl, too much the husband. You -mistake a game and play for a bout-at-issue. I do not choose to be -mistressed by a maid of honour. There must be an end of this.’ - -Livingstone listened gravely. ‘Do with me as you will, madam. Put me in -my place. What is your pleasure?’ - -‘To rule my people, child.’ - -‘Rule, madam, rule. Command me in anything. Forbid me everything, but one -thing.’ - -‘I shall forbid you what is unwholesome for you, and for me also.’ - -‘You shall not forbid me to love you,’ said the maid, very white. - -‘Nay, that I cannot do!’ cried the Queen, laughing and weeping at once. -So they kissed. - -But, for all that, she removed Livingstone from her side, and chose -Fleming. Mr. Secretary, acceptable widower in that lady’s sight, rubbed -his hands over the choice; and Fleming herself was so sweetly gratified -that nobody could grudge her her promotion. She was a gentle-natured, -low-voiced, modest girl, with the meek beauty of an angel in a Milanese -picture. Older than the Queen, she looked younger; whereas Livingstone -was younger and looked older. No doubt this one felt her fall; but, being -as good as gold and as proud as iron, she held her head the higher for -her lower degree, and smiled benevolently at the raptures of the new -favourite. - -‘My dear,’ she said to Fleming, ‘do not think that I grudge thee. In -truth, I do not. What I said was done advisedly. I knew what must come -of it; I sought it, and shall put up with it. I have a deal to think on, -these days, and my thoughts will be my night-company.’ - -‘She will never love me as she loves thee,’ says Fleming; and was -answered: - -‘I care not greatly if she do or no; nor will I measure loves with any -one. Our affair the now is to get her fast wedded.’ - -‘So saith Mr. Secretary at all hours,’ said Fleming. - -But Livingstone tossed her head. ‘Fine he knows the heart of a lass, your -Lethington body!’ - -Fleming looked serious. ‘He hath spoken to me of my Lord of Lennox,’ she -said, in a lower tone. ‘This lord is near akin to our mistress; nearer, -if the truth were known, than the Duke. He hath a likely son in England, -a noble young man—my Lord of Darnley. The Queen of England holds him -dear, and (they say) looketh to him to be her heir.’ - -Livingstone made an outcry. ‘Then she looketh askew! It is well known to -her and hers who the heir of England is. Who should it be but our own -lady?’ - -But Fleming persisted in her quiet way. ‘Mr. Secretary speaks of him as -a hopeful prince—having seen and had speech with him. I do but use his -own words. Sir James Melvill writes of him. Mr. Randolph owns him to be -something, though unwillingly. And, says Mr. Secretary, we may depend -upon it that when Mr. Randolph admits some grace in a Scots lord, there -is much grace.’ - -Livingstone’s open eyes showed that the thing had to be considered. -‘There may be some promise in all of this,’ says she. ‘What you tell me -of Mr. Randolph gives me thoughts. Had he nothing more to own? Has Mary -Beaton got nothing from him?’ English Mr. Randolph, you must know, was -apt to open his heart to Mary Beaton when that brown siren called for it. - -‘He told Mary Beaton,’ Fleming replied, ‘that the Queen of England valued -one lord no more than other, until—until—I know not how to put it. In -fine, he said, that if any lord of her court was sought after by another, -then his Queen would need that lord more than any other. Do you follow?’ - -‘Ay,’ says Livingstone, ‘I follow thee now. My lord of Darnley, he is -called? Why, let him come up then: we can but look at him.’ - -‘Oh, my dear chuck,’ Fleming protested, ‘princes are not wed by the eyes’ -favour.’ - -‘They have the right to be,’ said her mate; ‘and it is only thus, let -me tell you, that our Queen will be well wedded.’ She grew exceedingly -serious. ‘Look you, Fleming, she is in danger, she is dangerous. I know -very well what is passing up and down between this and the Castle rock. -Ask me not—seek not to learn. It is not enough for her that she contract -with this man or that. I tell you, _she must want him_.’ - -Fleming blushed painfully, but there was no gainsaying the truth. ‘It is -true, she hath a great spirit.’ - -‘Ay,’ muttered Livingstone grimly, ‘and needeth a greater.’ - -‘They say,’ Fleming continued, ‘that the Lord Darnley’s is a royal soul.’ - -And Livingstone ended the council. ‘Let the young man come up. We can but -look at him.’ - - * * * * * - -Mary Livingstone, the divorced, had a secret of her own, but made very -light of it. The Master of Sempill demanded her person; said he could not -be denied. Her father was willing, and his father more than willing; yet -she laughed it all away. ‘I am husband of the Queen of Scots,’ she said, -‘or was so yesterday. What should I do with the Master?’ - -The old lord, her father, tapped his teeth. ‘You speak pleasantly, -daughter, of a pleasant privilege of yours. But the Master is a proper -man, who must have a better answer.’ - -‘Let him bide till I am ready,’ says the good Livingstone. - -‘I doubt he will do it, my lass. He may spoil.’ - -‘Then he is not worth the having, my lord,’ replied the maid. ‘What use -have I for perishable goods?’ - -The Master chose to wait; and when the Court moved to Saint Andrews he -waited in Fife. - -The Court went thither with various great affairs in train, whose conduct -throve in that shrill air. The Queen would work all the forenoon with -Lethington and her useful Italian, play all the rest of the day, and to -bed early. She played at housewifery: bib and tucker, gown pinned back, -all her hair close in a clean coif. The life was simple, the air of -homely keenness, the weather wintry; but the great fire was kind. All -about her made for healthy tastes; inspired the hale beauty of a life -within the allotted fence, a taskwork smoothly done, and God well pleased -in His heaven. Lethington, a pliant man, lent himself to the Queen’s -humour; Signior David was never known to be moody; there were Adam Gordon -and Des-Essars to give their tinge of harmless romance—a thin wash, as it -were, of water-colour over the grey walls. Sir James Melvill, too, who -had been to England upon the high marriage question, and returned, and -was now to go again, arrived, full of importance, for last words. It had -come to this, that the Queen was now to choose a husband. - -Sir James was struck by her modest air, that of a tutored maid who knows -that she is called to matronhood. ‘_Ecce ancilla Domini!_’ In truth she -was listening to those very words. - -‘I shall strive in all things, Sir James Melvill, to please my good -sister. Whether it be my Lord Robert[1] or my cousin Darnley, I trust I -shall satisfy my well-wishers.’ - -Soft voice, lowly eyes, timid fingers! ‘Who has been pouring oil upon -this beading wine?’ asked himself Sir James. Who indeed, but Saint -Andrew, with his frosty sea-salt breath? - -It was just at this time, as things fell out, that the Earl of Lennox, -father to that ‘hopeful prince’ of Mary Fleming’s report, came to -Scotland, as he said, upon a lawsuit concerning his western lands. But -some suspected another kind of suit altogether; among whom, for the best -of reasons, were the Queen’s brother James, and the Lord of Lethington -the Secretary. Another was Signior David, dæmonic familiar of Monsieur de -Châtelard. - -[1] Lord Robert Dudley, later the too-famous Lord of Leicester. - - - - -CHAPTER IX - -AIR OF ST. ANDREW: ADONIS AND THE SCAPEGOAT - - -At Saint Andrews the Queen lodged in a plain house, where simplicity was -the rule, and she kept no state. The ladies wore short kirtles and hoods -for their heads; gossiped with fishwives on the shore, shot at butts, -rode out with hawks over the dunes, coursed hares, walked the sands of -the bay when the sea was down. The long evenings were spent in needlework -and books; or one sang, or told a tale of France—of _Garin de Montglane_ -or the _Enfances Vivien_. Looking back each upon his life in after years, -Adam Gordon was sure that he had loved her best in her bodice of snow and -grey petticoat; Des-Essars when, with hair blown back and eyes alight, -she had led the chase over the marsh and looked behind her, laughing, -to call him nearer. She was never mistress of herself on horseback, but -stung always by some divine tenant to be—or to seem—the most beautiful, -most baleful, most merciless of women. And although her hues varied -in the house, so did not her powers. She was tender there to a fault, -sensitive to change as a filmy wing, with quick little touches, little -sighs, lowering of eyelids, smiles half-seen, provoking cool lips, long -searching looks. She meant no harm—but consider Monsieur de Châtelard, -drawn in as a pigeon to the lure!—she must always bewitch something, girl -or boy, poet or little dog; and indeed, there was not one of these youths -now about her who was not crazy with love. She chose at this time to be -more with them than with the maids; a boy at heart herself, she was just -now as blowsed as a boy. She used to sit whispering with them; told them -much, and promised more than she told. - -Monsieur de Châtelard—having ventured to present himself—expanded in the -sun of that Peace of Saint Andrew until he resembled some gay prismatic -bubble, which may be puffed up to the ceiling and bob there until it -bursts. The Queen had forgiven him his trespass and forgotten it. She -resumed him on the old footing, sang with him, let him whisper in her -ear, dared greatly, and supposed all danger averted by laughter. Having -high spirits and high health, she was in the mood to romp. So they played -country games by the light of the fire: blind man’s buff, hot codlings, -Queen o’ the Bean. You come to close quarters at such times. You venture: -it’s in the bargain. If a Queen runs to hide she shall not blame a poet -who runs to seek—or she should not. When, in the early spring, Mr. -Secretary was gone to Edinburgh to see the Earl of Lennox about that suit -of his—lawsuit or other—the Queen went further in her frolics. In the -garden one day she found a dry peascod intact, nine peas in it. There is -a country augury in this. Nothing would content her but she must put it -on the lintel like a dairymaid, and sit conscious in the dusk until her -fate crossed the threshold. Anon there stepped in Monsieur de Châtelard -with a song. When the joke was made clear to him he took it gravely. An -omen, an omen! - -The sense of freedom which you have when you have made your election took -her fancies a-romping as well as her humours. They strayed with Lord -Bothwell on the Castle rock, they visited Lord Gordon at Dunbar. _Allez_, -all’s safe now! Let us eat and drink, for to-morrow we die; let us take -pity on our lovers, since to-morrow we are to wed. And—so we juggle with -ourselves!—she wrote an unnecessary letter to the one in order that she -might write an imprudent letter to the other. - -‘Monsieur de Gordon,’ ran the first—and Adam carried it to Dunbar in -his bosom—‘I am content to believe that your constancy in affliction -proceedeth from a heart well-affected towards me at this last. You will -find me always mindful of my friends, among whom I look to reckon -yourself in time to come. Attachment to the prince floweth only from good -faith towards God. Holding to the one, needs must it follow that you find -the other. Your brother Adam will tell you the same.—Your good mistress, -Marie R.’ - -Then she wrote this—for Des-Essars to deliver or perish; and you may -catch the throb of the pulse in the lines of the pen:— - -‘Monsieur de Bothwell, they tell me you deal more temperately in these -days, having more space for a little thought the less your person is -enlarged. They report you to me as well in body, the which I must not -grieve for; but repining in mind. Can I be sorry, or wonder at it, seeing -to what gusty airs your phrenzy drove you? This glove, which I send, is -for one plain purpose. You see, my lord, that the fingers are stiff where -water hath wetted them of late. You offended your Queen, who had always -wished you very well: the tears were for sorrow that a heart so bold -should prompt a deed so outrageous.’ - -Lord Bothwell, when he had this letter, sat looking at it and its guest -for a long while, in a stare. His mouth smiled, but his eyes did not; -and he sang softly to himself, _La-la-la_, and a _la-la-laido_! A night -or two later, by means of the seal upon it and his uncle’s influence, -he walked out of the Castle, and was presently in the Hermitage with -Des-Essars. Hence he wrote to the Queen: ‘O Lady, O Sovereign! I shall -carry a token upon my helm, and break lances under its whisper until I -die,’—but neither signed nor dated the letter. - -‘Say to your mistress, boy, that I gave you this; but breathe not a word -of whence I wrote it. Disobey me, you who know me of old, and when I come -again I will make of your skin but a leaky bottle of blood.’ - -Des-Essars gave his pledge, and kept it for some time. - -If the Queen said nothing about all this to her maids, it is no wonder. -She had done foolishly, and knew it in part, and took secret glory in -it. At certain still hours of the day, when she could afford herself the -luxury of lonely thought, she would go over what she had done, phrase -after phrase of her letter; recover the trembling with which she had put -in the glove; picture its receipt, read and re-read his words. And then, -as she thought, the heat of her cheeks burnt up all thought; and, as she -stayed to feel her heart beat, it drummed in her ears like nuptial music. -But they frightened her, these signs and wonders; she ran away from -herself—into the maids’ closet, into the hall among the lounging men, -into the windy weather—and cooled her cheeks with the salt sea-spray, and -drowned the clamour of her heart in the rude welcome of March. - -Monsieur de Châtelard, with the lover’s keen eye, saw that she was -fluttered, watched her everywhere. About this time also he consulted his -friend. - -‘Monsieur de Riccio,’ he said, ‘there are signs of the rising of sap. The -birds pair, the festival of Saint Valentine the Bishop is come and gone. -Why do I linger?’ - -‘_Peste!_’ said the Italian, who had other things to think of: ‘how -should I know?’ - -‘By sympathy,’ his friend reproached him: ‘by the stricken heart. For you -also have loved.’ - -‘Dear sir,’ replied the other, stretching his long legs to the full, ‘I -have love and to spare at this time. Or put it, I am beloved. Monsieur de -Moray, her Majesty’s brother, loves me dearly, or so he says; Monsieur de -Lennox is his rival for my favours. Ha, they kiss my hands! I am touched; -I have to decide—like a girl. To you, then, I must briefly say, The times -are ripe. Go you and anoint for the bridal. I tell you that this very -night—if you so choose it—you may be the happiest of men.’ - -Monsieur de Châtelard lifted high his head. ‘Be sure of my friendship for -ever, Signior David.’ - -He threw his cloak over one shoulder and went out. - -‘Pig and pig’s son!’ said Signior David, returning to his love-letters. - -He had two letters under his hand. One told him that he might consider -himself fortunate to have been chosen an instrument to further the -designs of Providence in this kingdom. The Lord of Lethington (it said) -was possessed of the writer’s full mind upon a momentous step taken of -late towards the highest seat, under God, of any in the land. ‘I cannot -answer,’ it continued, ‘for what Mr. Secretary may discover to you upon -your approaching him with the words “Kirk and Realm” upon your lips, -saving that, whatever it be, it will be coloured with my friendship, -which hopes for yours again.’ There was no name at the foot. - -‘_Aut Moray aut diabolus!_’ however, said the Italian to himself; ‘and -why the devil my Lord of Moray desires his sister to wed the heir of -Lennox, I have no particle of understanding. Maybe that he hopes to ruin -her with the English; maybe with the Scots. Certainly he hopes to ruin -her somewhere.’ - -The other letter was signed ‘freely by its author—‘Matho Levenaxe’—and -besought Signior David’s furtherance of his son’s, the Lord Darnley’s, -interests; who had come post into Scotland upon affairs connected with -his lands, and was prompted by duty and conscience ‘to lay homage at the -feet of her who is, and ever must be, the Cynosure of his obedient eyes.’ -There was much about merit, the Phœnix, the surcharged heart of a father, -ties of blood—common properties of such letters; and the unequivocal -suggestion that favour would meet favour half-way. - -These documents were vastly agreeable to the Italian. They invited him to -be benevolent and lose nothing by it. - -One of these honourable persons desired to ruin the bride, the other to -prosper the bridegroom. Well and good. And he, Signior David? What was -his desire? To prosper alike with bride, bridegroom, and the exalted -pair, his correspondents. _Va bene, va bene._ His business was therefore -simple. He must engage the bride to contract herself—but with enthusiasm; -for without that she would never budge. And how should that be done? -Plainly, by the way of disgust. She must be disgusted with amours before -she could be enamoured of marriage. And how? And how? Ha! there was -Monsieur de Châtelard. - -In some such chop-logic fashion his mind went to work: I do not pretend -to report his words. - -He lost no time in accosting Mr. Secretary, on an early day after his -return to Saint Andrews, with his master-word of ‘Kirk and Realm.’ The -Secretary had not much taste for Signior David. ‘I see that you have a -key to my lips,’ he said. ‘You may rifle by leave, if you will let the -householder know just what you are taking out of his cupboard.’ - -‘Eh, dear sir,’ cried the other, ‘how you reprove me beforehand! Your -cupboard is safe for me. I wish to know how I can serve Milord of Moray; -no more.’ - -The Secretary narrowed his eyes and whistled a little tune. ‘You can -serve him very simply. You write our mistress’s letters? Now, the pen is -in touch with the heart. There flows a tide through the pen; but after a -flowing tide comes the ebb. The ebb, the ebb, Signior Davy!’ - -‘True, dear sir——’ - -‘Why, then, consider the wonders of the pen! It forms loving words, -maybe, to the Queen our good sister, to the Most Christian King our -brother-in-law, to our uncle the Cardinal, to our cousin Guise, to our -loving cousin Henry Darnley; and by the very love it imparts, by tender -stroke upon stroke, the ebb, Signior Davy, carries tenderness back; in -smaller waves,’tis true, but oh, Signior Davy, they reach the heart! And -how widely they spread out! To suffuse the great sea! Is it not so?’ - -‘The image is ingenious and poetical,’ said the Italian. ‘I confess that -I have a feeling for poetry. I am a musician.’ - -The Secretary put a hand upon his shoulder. ‘Set my words to music, my -man. You shall hear them sung at a marriage door. All Scotland shall sing -them.’ - -‘Do you think Monsieur de Moray will sing them?’ - -The Secretary touched his mouth. ‘Our present music,’ he said, ‘should -be chamber-music, not brayed from the housetops out of brass. But I am -no musician. Let us talk of other things. I have May in my mood, do you -know. This day, Signior David, May hath shone upon December. Do you see a -chaplet on my silver pow?’ - -‘Ah! La Fiamminga has been kind?’ asked the Italian, knowing with whom he -had to deal. - -‘You are pleased to say so,’ said the Secretary. ‘Know then, my dear -sir, since there are to be no secrets to keep us apart, that I am a happy -man. For, sitting with our mistress upon that great needlework of theirs, -I found a certain fair lady very busy over a skewered heart. “Come -hither, Mr. Secretary,” saith our mistress, with that look aslant which -you know as well as I do, “Come hither,” saith she, “and judge whether -Fleming hath well tinct this heart.” I overlooked the piece. “Oh, madam,” -say I, “the organ should be more gules: this tincture is false heraldry. -And the wound goes deeper.” My fair one, in a flutter, curtsied and left -the presence. Then saith our Queen, with one pretty finger admonishing, -“Fie, Mr. Secretary, if you read so well now, before the letter is in -your hand, what will you do when you have it in your bosom to con at your -leisure?” I had no answer for her but the true one, which was and shall -ever be, “Why, then, madam, I shall have it _by heart_, and your Majesty -two lovers in the room of one.” I put it fairly, I think; at least, she -thanked me. Now, am I a happy man, Master David, think you? With the -kindness of my prince and the heart of my dear! Sir, sir, serve the Queen -in this matter of the young Lord of Darnley. He is in Scotland now; I -believe at Glasgow. But we expect him here, and——Oh, sir, serve the -Queen!’ - -The Italian, who was fatigued by a rhapsody which did not at all interest -him, wagged his hands about, up and down, like a rope-dancer that paddles -the air for his balance. - -‘_Va bene, va bene, va bene!_’ he cried fretfully. ‘Understood, my good -sir. But will this serve the Queen?’ - -‘If I did not think so,’ returned the Secretary—and really believed this -was the answer—‘if I did not think so, would my Lord of Moray, should I, -press it upon you?’ - -Signior David shrugged—but you could not have seen it. ‘What is this -young man?’ he asked. - -‘It is impossible that you know so little. He is of the blood royal by -the mother’s side. He is next in title to this throne, and to the other -after my mistress.’ - -The Italian waved all this away. ‘Understood! Understood already! Do you -think I am a dunce? Why am I here, or why are you here, if I am dunce? -I ask you again, What is he? Is he a man? or is he a minion—a half, a -quarter man? Do you know, Mr. Secretary, that he has got to serve Dame -Venus? Do you know that he may drown in the Honeypot? Pooh, sir! I -ask you, can he swim? He will need the faculty. I could tell you, for -example, of one lord——But no! I will not.’ He hushed his voice to an awed -whisper, seeming to reason with himself: ‘Here, upon my conscience, is a -woman all clear flame, who has never yet—never yet—met with a man. Here -is a Cup of the spirit of honey and wine. Who is going to set the match -to kindle this quick essence! Who is about to dare? Why, why, why,—all -your drabbled Scotland may go roaring out in such a blaze! _Corpo di -sangue e sanguinaccio!_’ His excitement carried him far; but soon he was -beaming upon Lethington, reasonable again. ‘Let us change the figure, and -come down. Dame Venus is asleep as yet, but uneasy in her sleep, stirring -to the dawn. She dreams—ha! And maids belated can dream, I assure you. Is -this young man a Man? Lo, now! There is my question of you.’ - -Mr. Secretary was alarmed. His teeth showed, and his eyes did not. - -‘You go too near, you go too near.’ - -But the Italian was now calm. - -‘My friend,’ he said, ‘I am not of your race—sniffing about, nosing for -ever, wondering if you dare venture. I am at least a man in this, that I -dare anything with my mind.’ - -Mr. Secretary agreed with him. ‘I assure you, Signior Davy,’ he said, -‘that my Lord of Darnley is a fine young man.’ - -The Italian threw up his hands. ‘Eh—_allora!_ All is said, and I go to -work. Sir, I salute you. _Addio._’ - -And to work he went, in the manner already indicated:—‘To draw the Queen -into the net of this fine young man but one thing is needful: she must -run there for shelter. She is a quail at this hour, grouting at ease in -the dusty furrow. If we are to help this favoured fowler we must send -over her a kite.’ - -Alas for friendship! His kite of election was Monsieur de Châtelard. It -will not be denied that the poet did his share; but there were two kites -sent up. Sir James Melvill came back from England. - -Meantime it should be said that there was truth in the report. The -young Lord Darnley was actually in Scotland. Some held that he was in -Lord Seton’s house in the Canongate, others that Glasgow had him. There -was some doubt; but all the Court knew of his presence, and talked of -little else. The Queen maintained her air of tutored virgin, while -Mary Livingstone openly thanked God that Scotland owned a man in it at -last. This honest girl had worked herself into a fevered suspicion of -everything breeched at Court. - - * * * * * - -Sir James Melvill, when he sent up his name for an audience, had to run -the cross-fire of the maids’ anteroom first. Few could bear the brunt -better than he. - -‘H’m, h’m, fair ladies, what am I to tell you? He’s a likely lad enough -for a valentine; for a kiss-and-blush, jog-o’-my-knee, nobody’s-coming, -pert jessamy. Oh, ay! He can lead a dance more than a little—Pavane, -Galliard, what you will of the kind: advance a leg, turn a maid about, -require a little favour, and ken what to do wi’t. He hath a seat for a -horse, and a rough tongue for a groom. Ay, ay! young Adonis ardent for -the chase, he is; and as smooth on the chin as a mistress.’ - -They laughed at him, while Master Adam of Gordon, page at the door, -rubbed his own sharp chin, and could have sworn there was a hair. The -usher came for Sir James, and cut pretty Seton short in her clamour for -more. - -He found his mistress and the Italian in the cabinet, their heads -together over a chapter of _Machiavel_. He knew the book well, and could -have sworn to the look of the close page. They sprang apart; at least -Riccio sprang; the Queen looked up at the wall and did not face about -for a while, but sat pondering the book, over which she had clasped her -two hands. She was turning a ring about and about, round and round; and -it seemed to Sir James, who saw most things, that this had been upon the -book while the two heads were bent over it. They had been trying the -_Sortes_, then!—the _Sors Machiavelliana_, eh? - -When, after a time of suspense, she turned, to lift him a careless hand, -limp to the touch and cold to kiss, he knew that she had been schooling -herself. She was extremely composed—too much so, he judged; he had no -belief in her languid manner. She asked him a few questions about her -‘good sister’; nothing of anybody else. What did her sister think of the -marriage? Sir James lurked in the fastnesses of platitude. Her English -Majesty had deeply at heart this Queen’s welfare; he turned it many -ways, but always came back to that. As he had been sure she would, after -a little of it, Queen Mary grew irritable, and drew out into the open. -‘Peace to your empty professions, Master Melvill. They are little to my -liking. Did my sister send the Lord Darnley into Scotland?’ - -Here he had it. ‘Madam,’ quoth Sir James, ‘I will not affirm it. And yet -I believe that she was glad for him to go.’ - -‘Why so? why so?’ - -‘I nail my judgment, madam, to this solid beam of truth, that my lord got -his _congé_ after but two refusals of it.’ - -‘Why should he be refused?’ - -‘Madam, for your Grace’s sake; because her English Majesty thinks meanly -of him beside yourself.’ - -‘He is of royal blood—but let that be as it may. If he was first refused -upon that account, why then was he afterwards allowed?’ - -Sir James twinkled. I have said that he, as well as the Italian, had a -kite to send up, to drive this quail into the net of marriage. He now had -his opportunity to fly it. ‘Oh, madam,’ he replied, ‘this young Lord of -Darnley was not the only courtier anxious to travel the North road: there -was another, as your Majesty knows. And if the English Queen let one go -at the last it was in regard for the other. It was for fear lest you -should win my Lord Robert Dudley.’ - -The Queen grew red. ‘_Win? Win?_ This is a strange word to use, Mr. -Legate. Am I hunting husbands, then?’ - -‘It is not my word, madam. I can assure your Majesty that both the word -and the suspicion are the English Queen’s. It is thus she herself thinks -of my Lord Robert—as of a prize to be sought. But my Lord Darnley she -calls “that long lad.”’ - -‘He is my cousin, and her own. He shall be welcome here when he comes—if -he comes. But it mislikes me greatly to suppose him sent out from -England, a scapegoat into the wilderness.’ She frowned, and bit her lip; -she looked haggard, rather cruel. ‘A scapegoat into the wilderness! -Robert Dudley’s scapegoat!’ - -You may cheapen a man by a phrase; but sometimes the same phrase will -cheapen you. Hateful thought to her, that she was casting a net for -Robert Dudley! And not she only; there were two panting Queens after him; -and this high-descended Harry Stuart—a decoy to call one off! Sir James, -greatly tickled, was about to speak again; his mouth was open already -when he caught the Italian’s wary eye. That said, ‘For Jesu’s sake no -more, or you spoil a fine shot.’ So Sir James held his peace. She sent -away the pair of them, and sat alone. - -Something bitter had been stirred, which staled all her hopes and made -sour all her dreams. To ‘win’ Robert Dudley! Oh, abhorred hunt, abhorred -huntress! Quick as thought came the counter query: Was it worse to hunt -one man than seek to be hunted by another—to seek it, do you mind? to -love the pursuit, ah, and to entreat it? There came up a vision to flood -her with shame—the old vision of the laughing red mouth, the jutting -beard, the two ribald eyes. These were not a hunter’s, O God; these cared -not to move unless they were enticed! These belonged to a man who waited, -sure of himself and sure of his comforts, while she (like a hen-sparrow) -trailed her wing to call him on. Panic seized her—her heart stood still. -What had she done, wanton decoy that she was? And what had _he_ done—with -her glove? Where had he put it? Anywhere! Let it lie! Oh, but she must -have it again at all costs. She must send for it. Oh, unworthy huntress, -abhorred hunt! - -She must have a new messenger. Adam Gordon must ride into Edinburgh, show -a ring to the Earl of Bothwell, and ask for a packet of hers. He was not -to speak of his journey to a soul about the Court—on his life, not a word -to Des-Essars: he was not to return without the packet. ‘Go now, Adam, -and haste, haste, haste!’ She lashed herself ill over this melancholy -business, and went to bed early. - -This was the night—when she had congealed herself by remorse into the -semblance of a nun—this was the night of all in the year chosen by -Monsieur de Châtelard for his great second essay. Rather, the Italian -sought him out and urged him to it. ‘Hail, sublime adventurer!’ the -kite-flyer had cried, the moment he met with him. - -‘I accept the title,’ replied Monsieur de Châtelard, ‘but deprecate it as -prematurely bestowed.’ - -‘Not so, my friend,’ says the Italian; ‘but if I know anything of women, -there may be this night a very pretty mating—as of turtles in March. A -word in your ear. Her Majesty has retired. So early! cry you? Even so. -And why? Ah, but you shall ask me nothing more. To-morrow I shall not -even inquire how you do. Your face will proclaim you.’ - -Monsieur de Châtelard embraced his friend. ‘Be sure of my remembrance, -immortal Italian.’ - -‘I am perfectly sure of it,’ answered Signior Davy; and the moment after -shrugged him out of his mind. This is what your politician should always -do: remember a friend just so long as he is like to be useful. - -He never had speech with him again. The miserable young man, detected in -a moment in filthy intention, perhaps washed out the stain by a certain -dignity of carriage, whose difficulty alone may have made it noble. -This fool’s Queen—his peascod, melting beauty of a few weeks since—was -certainly a splendour to behold, though the eyes that looked on her were -dying eyes. A white splendour of chastity, moon-chilled, sharp as a -sleet-storm on a frozen moor,—she had burned him before—now she struck -ice into his very marrow. The caught thief, knowing his fate, admired -while he dared this Queen of Snow and the North. For dare her he did. - -‘What have you to say, twice a dog?’ - -‘Nothing, madam.’ - -‘Judge yourself. Lay your soiled hands upon yourself.’ - -‘Kill me, madam.’ - -‘Never! But you shall die.’ - -He died at the Market Cross after a fortnight’s preparation, as he had -not lived, a gentleman at last. For, by some late access of grace which -is hard to understand, she accorded him the axe instead of the rope. He -sent many times for his friend the Italian, and at his latest hour, when -he knew he would not come, asked the headsman to present him with his -rosary. The headsman would not touch the accursed idol. - -‘If you touch me, you touch a thing far more accursed,’ said the -condemned man, ‘to whom a death resembling that of his Saviour’s -companions in torment would be infinite honour.’ He made his -preparations, and said his prayers. There were people at every window. - -It had happened that my Lord of Darnley, with a fine train of horsemen, -having sent in his humble suit to the Queen and received an answer, -witnessed the ceremony: or so they say. He divided attention with the -departing guest. All observed him, that he sat his horse well—easily, -with a light hand ever ready at the rein to get back the fretful head. -He watched every detail of the execution, looking on as at a match of -football among sweating apprentices, with half-shut, sulky eyes. He spoke -a few words to his attendants. - -‘Who is our man?’ - -‘They say a Frenchman, my lord. Chatler by name.’ - -‘To whom is he speaking, then? Watch his hand at his heart. Now ’tis at -his lips! He makes a bow,—will they never finish with him? How are we to -break through! They should truss him.’ - -A young man behind him laughed; but my lord continued: ‘But—now look, -look! Will he never have done? There are women at all the windows. See -that French hood up there.’ - -‘’Tis a woman’s business, my lord. They say that this fellow——’ The young -man whispered in his ear. - -My lord made no sign, except to say, ‘My cousin is hard upon a forward -lover.’ - -‘Nay, sir. Say, rather, on a lover too backward.’ - -He got no answer from his prince. All looked, as there fell on all a -dead hush. The crowd thrilled and surged: utter silence—then a heavy -stroke—all the voices began again together, swelling to one shrill cry. -Châtelard, poor kite, flew a loftier course. - -The cavalcade began to drive through the maze of people, pikemen going -before with pikes not idle. ‘Room for the prince! Room, rogues, room!’ - - - - -CHAPTER X - -THEY LOOK AND LIKE - - -He was rather stiff in the garden; rather too tall for the raftered rooms -of the burgess’ house. He did not lend himself readily to the snug cheer -which was the rule at Saint Andrews. Des-Essars has recorded the fancy -that he was like that boy who comes home from school, and straightens -himself in his mother’s embrace; ‘not because he loves her the less, but -that he knows himself to be more than when, six months ago, he parted -from her with tears.’ This lordly youth cropped his English words, and -stammered and blushed when he tried the French. He laughed gaily to hear -the Italian _staccato_ run its flight—like a finch that dips and rises as -he wings across the meadow. ‘Monkey-speech,’ my young lord called it. - -In all respects he was on the threshold. None of the deeper, inner -speech of their daily commerce came near him; he ignored, because he -did not see, the little tricks and chances, the colour, significance, -allusiveness of it. What was the poor youth to do? He had never journeyed -with the stored gallants of the _Heptameron_, nor whispered to the ladies -of Boccaccio’s glades. He thought Bradamante a good name for a horse, -and Margutte something to eat. The Queen rallied him, the maids looked -out of window; Mr. Secretary exchanged glances with his Fleming, Signior -David bowed and bowed. But this Italian was comfortable, seeing his ships -homeward bound. In rapid vernacular, as he lay late in his bed, he told -himself that the French poet could not have chosen a better night for -his extinguishing. - -‘That was a night, one sees, when she suddenly sickened of low company, -having suddenly viewed it and been shocked: of me, and the fat Bothwell, -and all these cuddling nymphs and boys. Our Châtelard was the last -loathly morsel, the surfeit after the Ambassador’s bolus. Certainly, -certainly! I saw her go white at his “winning” of the English favourite: -how a word may stick in a gizzard! Then comes my late friend, hiding for -favours under the bed. “_Dio mio_,” she cries, “do I live in a lupanar? O -Santo Padre, let me henceforward mate only with eagles!”’ - -He expressed himself coarsely, being what he was; but no doubt he was -perfectly right. - - * * * * * - -My Lord of Darnley, then—this eagle—was a very handsome youth, clean, -buxom, and vividly prosperous. He had the most beautiful slim body you -ever saw on a young man; and long legs, in whose shape he evidently—and -reasonably—took delight. He had that trick of standing with his feet -apart—grooms induce their horses to it with the tickling of a whip—and -arms akimbo, which, with its blended savour of the Colossus of Rhodes and -a French dancer, gives a man the air of jaunty readiness for all comers, -and always a hint of gallantry. His head was small and well set-on, his -colour fresh; his eyes were bright and roving. Yet no one could look more -profoundly stupid than he when he chose to be displeased with what was -saying. His lips were red, and like a woman’s; he had a strong, straight -nose, and strong hair, short and curling, in colour a hot yellow. -Good-natured he looked, and vain, and courageous. Mary Seton considered -him a dunce, but Mary Beaton denied it. She said he was English. - -The day of his coming, the Queen received him in the Long Parlour, -dressed mostly in white, with a little black here and there. She stood -about mid-floor, with her women, pages, and gentlemen of the household, -and tried in vain to control her excitement. Those who knew her best, -either by opportunity or keen study, considered that she had made up her -mind already. This was a marriage, this meeting of cousins: here in -her white and faint rose, shivering like the dawn on the brink of new -day, with fixed eyes and quick breath—here among her maidens stood the -bride. Appearances favoured the guess—which yet remained a guess. She had -travelled far and awfully; but had told no one, spoken no whispers of her -journeyings since that day of shame and a burning face, when she had sent -Adam Gordon to Edinburgh Castle, heard Melvill’s message, and scared away -Châtelard to his dog’s death. Not a soul knew where her soul had been, or -whither it had now flown for refuge: but two guessed, and one other had -an inkling—the judging Italian. - -They used very little ceremony at Saint Andrews. The Queen hated it. An -usher at the stair’s foot called up the Prince’s style, and could be -heard plainly in the parlour; yet Mr. Erskine, Captain of the Guard, -repeated it at the door. There followed the clatter of a few men-at-arms, -a trampling, one or two hasty voices—Lethington’s whisper among them (he -always shrilled his _s_‘s); then the anxious face of the Secretary showed -itself. The young lord, dressed in white satin, with a white velvet -cloak on one shoulder, and the collar of SS round his neck, stooped his -head at the door, and went down stiffly on one knee. Behind him, in the -entry, you could count heads and shoulders, see the hues of red, crimson, -claret—feathers, a beam of light on a steel breastplate. He had come well -squired. ‘Welcome, cousin,’ said the Queen shyly, in a low and calling -tone. My young lord rose; two steps brought him before her. He knelt -again, and would have received her hand upon his own; but she looked down -brightly at his bent and golden head—looked down like a considering bird; -and then (it was a pretty act)—‘Welcome, cousin Henry,’ she said again, -and gave him both her hands. He was afoot in a moment, and above her. To -meet his look downwards she must lift hers up. ‘Welcome, cousin,’ once -more; and then she offered him her cheek. He kissed her, grew hot as -fire, looked very foolish, and dropped her hands as if they burnt him. - -But he led her—she not unwilling—to her chair, and sat beside her the -moment she invited him. She was bashful at first, blushed freely and -talked fast; he was stiff, soldierly, blunt: when she was beyond him he -made no attempt to catch her up. Those bold eyes of his were as blank as -the windows of an empty house. They did not at all disconcert her: on the -contrary, she seemed to see in his inertia the princely phlegm, and to -take delight in lowering the key of her speech to the droning formalities -of an audience. The difficulty of it, to her quick, well-charged mind, -was a spur to her whole being. You could see her activities at drill; -the more stupid she strove to be, the more spiritual she showed. She -took enormous pains to set him at his ease, and so far succeeded that -(though she could not clarify his brains) she loosened his tongue and -eye-strings. He was soon at his favourite trick of looking about him; -passed all the maids in review, and preferred Livingstone to any: next to -her Seton—‘a pretty, soft rogue.’ He saw and knew, but did not choose to -recognise, Lady Argyll. - -Certain presentations followed. Englishmen were brought up to kiss -hands—tall, well-set-up, flaxen young men: a Standen, a Curzon of -Derbyshire, a Throckmorton, nephew of an old acquaintance in France, -a Gresham, etc., etc. After these came one Scot. ‘Madam, my kinsman -Douglas.’ - -There came stooping before her a certain Archie Douglas of Whittinghame, -remotely of the prince’s blood, but more nearly of the red Chancellor -Morton’s. He was a young man, exceedingly thin, with a burnt red face, -shifty eyes, a smile, and grey hair which did not make him look old. -Black was his wear, with a plain white ruff. - -‘I have heard of you, Master Douglas,’ says the Queen, measuring her -words. ‘You are a priest in Israel after the order of Mr. Knox.’ - -‘An humble minister, madam, so please your Majesty.’ - -‘Ah, my _pleasure, sir_!’ She would not look at him any more, either then -or ever after. She used to call him the Little Grey Wolf. Now, whether -is it better for a man to be spoken by his sovereign in discomfortable -riddles, than not at all? This was the question which Archie Douglas put -to himself many times the day. - -The Queen would have honours nearly royal paid to the young prince. -The officers of the household, the ladies, were all presented; and all -must kiss his hand. But all did not. Lord Lindsay did not; Mr. Erskine -did not, but saluted him stiffly and withdrew behind the throne. Mr. -Secretary did it; Lord Ruthven did it elaborately; Lady Argyll changed -her mind midway, and did it. The Italian secretary, last of all, went -down on both his knees, and, looking him straight in the face, cried out, -‘Salut, O mon prince!’ which, under the circumstances, was too much. But -the Queen was to be pleased with everything that day, it seemed, for it -delighted her. - -As he went home to his lodging Signior David talked to himself. ‘As well -expect to weld butter and a knife, or Madonna and a fish-headed god of -Egypt as the Queen with this absorbed self-lover. If she wed him not in a -month she will kill him sooner than take him.’ - -And Des-Essars records in his _Memoirs_: ‘The prince pleased on -horseback, whence he should never have descended. I suspect that he knew -that himself; for he straddled his legs in the house as if to keep up the -illusion and strengthen himself by it. He was a fine rider. But women are -not mares.’ - -Nevertheless, Mary Livingstone had guessed, Des-Essars had guessed, the -truth or near it. This ceremony of meeting was as good as a betrothal; -though why it was so, was not for them to understand. The explanation is -to be sought in the chasing, flying, starting life of the soul, hunting -(or being hunted) apart in its secret, shadowy world. There come moments -in that wild life when the ardours of the chase slacken and tire; when, -falling down to rest, the soul catches sight of itself, as mirrored -in still water. That is the time when enchantment may go to work to -disenchant, and show the horrible reality. ‘What!’ might cry this girl’s -soul: ‘this rumpled baggage a maid royal! This highway-huntress, panting -after one man or the other, thrilling like a cook-wench because that -man or this has cast an eye on you! Oh, whither are fled the ensigns of -the great blood? Where hides the Right Divine? Where are the emblems of -Scotland, England, and France? Not in these scratched hands, not behind -these filmy eyes: these are the signs of Myrrha and Pasiphaë, and sick -Phædra.’ Melvill had held up the glass, and she had seen herself toiling -after Robert Dudley; Châtelard had wiped it, and behold her, trapped and -netted, the game of any saucy master. So, in a passion of amendment, -she lent to Harry Darnley all that she feared to have lost. He shared -the blood she had made common: let him re-endow her. He was the prince -she ought to have been. He came a-courting with the rest; but as royal -suitors come—solemnly, with embassies, with treaties to be signed, and -trumpets to proclaim the high alliance. To think of Bothwell’s beside -this courtly wooing was an impossibility. Hardy mercenary, to what had -she dared stoop? To a man—God forgive her!—who would hug a burgess-wife -one day, and her—‘the French widow,’ as he would call her—the next. Ah, -horrible! So horrible, so nearly her fate, she could speak to no one of -it. Simply, she dared not think of it. She must hide it, bury it, and go -about her business by day. But at night, when Fleming was asleep, she -would lie staring into the dusk, her two hands at grip in her bosom, and -see shadows grow monstrous on the wall: Bothwell and the wife of the -High Street, and herself—Dowager of France, Queen of Scots, heiress of -England—at play. She could have shrieked aloud, and whined for mercy: she -seemed to be padding, like a fox in a cage, up and down, up and down, -to find an issue. Harry Darnley was the issue—O Ark of Salvation! Why, -she had known that the very night that Melvill came back. Afterwards, as -night succeeded night, and her eyes ached with staring at the wall—she -knew it was all the hope she had. - -Then from her window, watching the shivering-out of Châtelard, she had -seen the prince, before his credentials were presented—his beauty and -strength and calm _manège_ of his horse. Had he been pock-marked, like -Francis of Alençon, his lineage would have enamelled him for her eyes. -But he was a most proper man, tall and slim, high-coloured, disdainful of -his company. He seemed not to know that there was a world about him to be -seen. _Securus judicat_: Jesu-Maria! here was a tower of defence to a -smitten princess who saw all the world like a fever-dream! Her own blood, -her own name, age for age with her. - -You see that she had her own vein of romantic poetry, that she could -make heroic scenes in her head, and play in them, too, wonderful parts. -She sat up in her bed one night, and shook her loose hair back, and -lifted up her bare arms to the rafters. ‘My lord, I am not worthy. Yet -come, brother and spouse! We two upon the throne—Scotland at our feet!’ -Then, in the scene, he came to her, stooping his stiff golden head. -Jove himself came not more royally into the Tower. She lay all Danaë -to the gold. Trickery here. Thus body lords it over soul, and soul—the -wretch—takes his hire. She knew pure ecstasy that night; for this was -a mating of eagles, you must recollect. She bathed in fire, but it was -clean flame. Bothwell, at any rate, seemed burnt out—him and his fierce -arm, only one to spare for ‘the little French widow.’ - -So much explanation seems necessary of how she stood, in virginal tremor -and flying cloudy blushes, white and red among her maids—to be chosen by -her prince. She intended him to choose: for she had chosen already. - - * * * * * - -The prince sat at supper, late in the evening of his reception, with his -light-haired Englishmen and grey-haired Archie Douglas. Forrest, his -chamber-boy, with burning cheeks and eyes glassy with sleep, leaned at -the door. His little round head kept nodding even as he stood. The young -lord laughed and fed his greyhounds, which sat up high on their lean -haunches and intently watched his fingers. - -‘I shall take those horses of the Earl’s,’ he said. ‘I shall need them -now. I shall have a stud, and breed great horses for my sons. See to it, -Archie.’ - -‘By God, sir,’ said an Englishman, with hiccoughs, ‘your word may be the -law and the prophets in this country, and yet no bond in England. They -will ask you for sureties. Well! I say, Get your sureties first.’ - -My lord was not listening. He pulled a hound’s ear, screwed it, and -smiled as he screwed. Presently he resumed. ‘Did you mark the greeting of -Argyll’s wife, Archie Douglas? How she tried “Sir and my cousin,” and -thought better of it? I made her dip, hey? A black-browed, saucy quean! -What kindred to me are her father’s misfortunes?’ - -Archie Douglas drained his glass. ‘You hold them, Harry Darnley—the -women. Yet remember you of what I told you concerning the men. Steer wide -of this’—he caressed the jug—‘and fee the Italian.’ - -But my Lord Darnley got on to his feet, and remained there by the aid of -his fists on the board. Very red in the face, and scowling, he talked -with his eyes shut. ‘I shall fee the Italian with the flat blade, you’ll -see. Greasy cushion of lard! A capon, a capon! And there’s your red -cousin Morton for you!’ - -‘He is your cousin too, sir,’ says Archie, blinking. - -‘What of that, man, what of that? Let him beware how he cozens me, I say. -Boy, I go to bed. Good-night to you, gentlemen.’ - -They all rose as he went solemnly away with the boy; then looked at one -another to see who had marked him reach out for the door-jamb and pull -himself through by it. Archie Douglas crowed like a cock and flapped his -arms; but when the rest began to laugh he slammed the table. ‘Pass the -jug, you fools. There shall be japes in Scotland before long—but, by God, -we’ll not laugh until we’re through the wood!’ - - * * * * * - -News of the Court for the rest of the month was this. The Master -of Sempill pled his own cause with the Queen, and was to have Mary -Livingstone. He had chosen his time well; her Majesty was not for -refusals just now. - -‘My dear, my dear, I shall need women soon, not maids,’ she had said, -stroking the honest face. ‘You shall come back to me when you are a wife, -and as like as not find me one too. Your Master is a brave gentleman. He -spoke up for you finely.’ - -‘Ay, madam, he hath a tongue of his own,’ says Livingstone. - -The Queen threw herself into her friend’s arms. ‘No Madams to me, child, -while we are in the pretty bonds together, fellow cage-birds, you and I. -Come now, shall I tell you a secret? Shall I?’ - -Livingstone, caught in those dear arms, would not look into the witching -eyes. ‘Your secret, my dear? What can you tell me? Finely I know your -secret.’ - -The Queen sat, and drew the great girl down to her lap. ‘Listen—but -listen! Last night the prince ...’: and then some wonderful tale of ‘he’ -and ‘him.’ ‘Ruthven says that his ring of runes hath magic in it. Some -old wife, that hides at Duddingstone, and can only be seen under the -three-quarter moon by the Crags, she hath charmed it. With that ring, -rightly worn, she saith, a man would swim the Solway at the flood after -the boat that held you. Ruthven knows the truth of it, and swears that no -man can resist the power it hath. There was a case, which I will tell you -some day. There is one stronger yet—most infallible: a spell which you -weave at dawn. But for that there are certain things to be done—strange, -strange.’ - -‘No more of them,’ says Livingstone; ‘you have too much charm of your -own. What need of old bedeswomen have you and your likes? Ah, yes, too -much charm! Tell me now, Marie; tell me the truth. Have you your glove -back?’ - -The Queen started violently, winced as if whipped in the face and turned -flame-red. Livingstone was off her lap: both stood. - -‘What do you speak of? How do you dare. Who has betrayed——?’ - -‘Nobody. I saw that it was gone. And lately you sent Adam to the Castle.’ - -The Queen walked away to the window, but presently came back. ‘I think it -right that you should understand the very truth. That lord has angered -me. Monstrous presumption! for which, most rightly, he suffered. Believe -me, I saw to it. But—but—he has a conscience, I think. Something was told -me—made me suppose it. I considered—I gave long thought to the case. A -queen, in my judgment, should not be harsh, for she needs friends. I -took a temperate method, therefore; considering that, if he knew of my -pain, perchance he would repent. So I sent Adam Gordon to Edinburgh, and -believe that I did well.’ She paused there, but getting no answer, asked -impatiently, ‘Am I clear to you, Livingstone?’ - -‘You will never clear yourself that way,’ says Livingstone. ‘You could as -well expect the Rock to thaw into tears as get Bothwell to repent. That -is a vile thief, that man.’ - -The Queen ran forward and fell upon her bosom. ‘Oh, I have been -ashamed—ashamed—ashamed! The devil was within me—touching, moving, -stirring me. I thought of him night and day. Wicked! I am very wicked. -But I have paid the price. It is all done with long ago. I told Father -Roche everything—everything, I promise you. He absolved me the day before -my prince came, or I should never have received him as I did. And can -you, Mary, withhold from me what the Church allows?’ - -Livingstone was crying freely. ‘God knows, God knows, I am none to deny -thee, sweetheart!’ she murmured as she kissed her. - -Second absolution for Queen Mary. - -The Court was to go to Callander House for the wedding of this fond -Livingstone; but before that there was a bad moment to be endured—when -Adam Gordon came back, without the glove. They had told him in Edinburgh -that the Earl of Bothwell had broken bars and was away. He had gone to -his country, they said, and had been heard of there, hunting with the -Black Laird and others of his friends—hunting men mostly, and Englishmen -too, over the border. He had sent word to George Gordon that, if he was -willing, he would ‘raise his lambs, and pull him out of Dunbar for a bout -with Hell’; but, said the boy, ‘Madam, my brother refused him.’ - -Adam had ridden into Liddesdale to find Bothwell, into the Lammermuirs, -into Clydesdale: but the Earl was in none of his castles. Then he went -the English road towards Berwick: got news at Eyemouth. The Earl was -away. Two yawls had shipped him and his servants; had stood for the -south—for France, it was thought. The glove was in his bosom, no doubt. - -The Queen sent Adam away rewarded, and had in Des-Essars. ‘Jean-Marie,’ -she said, ‘my Lord Bothwell hath gone oversea. Do you suppose, to France?’ - -‘No, madam; I suppose to Flanders.’ - -He seemed troubled to reply—evaded her looks. - -‘Why there?’ - -‘Madam, there was a woman at Dunkirk——’ - -‘Enough, enough! Go, boy.’ - -She had appointed to ride that day to the hawking. The prince was to be -there, with new peregrines from Zealand. Now—she would not go. Instead, -she crept into her oratory alone, and, having locked the doors, went -through secret rites. She stripped herself to the shift, unbound her -hair, took off shoes and stockings. With two lit candles, one in either -hand, she stood stock-still before the crucifix for an hour. Chilled to -the bones, with teeth chattering and fingers too stiff to find the hooks -for the eyes, she dressed herself then in some fashion, and slipped -quietly out. This was her third absolution. Thus she froze out of her -heart the last filament of tainted flesh; and then, bright-eyed and -wholesome, set her face towards the future. - - - - -CHAPTER XI - -PROTHALAMIUM: VENUS WINS FAIR ADONIS - - -Mr. Thomas Randolph, Ambassador of England to the Scottish Queen, -told himself more than once that in seeking the lady of his heart he -did not swerve the breadth of a hair from loyalty to the sovereign of -his destinies. Yet he found it necessary to protest his wisdom in the -letters he wrote to his patron, the Earl of Leicester. Mary Beaton was -the Nut-brown Maid of his ballatry. ‘I do assure your lordship, better -friend hath no man than this worthy Mistress Beaton, who vows herself to -me, by what sweet rites you shall not ask me, the humble servant of your -lordship.’ - -All this as it might be: Mary Beaton used to smile when twitted by her -mates about the Englishman’s formalised passion, and ask to be let alone. - -‘He’s not for ever at the sonnets,’ she said; ‘we discourse of England -between bouts; and it may be I shall learn something worth a rhyme or -two.’ - -They played piquet, the new game, together, and each used it as a -vantage-ground. He could not keep his desires, nor she her curiosity, out -of the hands. - -‘Is four cards good?’ he would ask her; and when she looked (or he -thought she looked) quizzingly at his frosted hair: ‘Is one-and-forty -good?’ - -Then she must laugh and shake her head: ‘One-and-forty’s too many for me, -sir.’ - -‘I’ve a terce to my Queen, mistress.’ - -But she crowed over that. ‘And I’ve a quint to a knave, Mr. Randolph; -and three kings I have in my hand!’ - -She found out that they were not best pleased in England at the turn of -affairs in Fife. - -‘My Queen, Mistress Beaton,’ said the enamoured Randolph, ‘cannot view -with comfort the unqueening of a sister. Nay, but it is so. Your mistress -courts the young lord with too open a face. To sit like one forsworn when -he is away; or when he is present, to crouch at his feet! To beg his -gauntlet for a plaything—to fondle his hunter’s whip! To be meek, to cast -down the eyes; to falter and breathe low, “At your will, my lord”! Thus -does not my Queen go to work.’ - -Mary Beaton looked wise. ‘Sir James Melvill hath reported her manner of -working, sir. We are well advertised how she disports.’ - -‘I take your leave to say,’ replied the ambassador, ‘her plan is at once -more queenly and more satisfying. For why? She charges men upon their -obedience to love her. And they do—and they do! No, no, I am troubled: I -own to it. If you find me backward, sweet Beaton, you shall not be harsh. -How or whence I am to get temper to bear much longer with this toss-pot -boy, I know not. He is the subject of my Queen; he is—I say it stoutly—my -own subject in this realm. But what does he? How comports himself? “Ha, -Randolph, you are here yet?” This, as he parades my Lord Ruthven before -me, with a hand on his shoulder, my faith! I tell you, a dangerous -friend for the young man. And one day it was thus, when we passed in the -tennis-court. “Stay, Randolph, my man”—his man! “I had something for your -ear; but it’s gone.” It’s gone, saith he! Oh, mistress, this is unhappy -work. He doth not use the like at Greenwich, I promise you.’ - -‘He is not now at Greenwich,’ says Beaton. ‘He is come back to his own.’ - -Mr. Randolph jumped about. ‘His own? Have at you on that! How if his own -receive him not? He may prove a very fish-bone in some fine throats here. -Well, we shall see, we shall see. To-day or to-morrow comes my Lord of -Moray into the lists. The Black Knight, we may call him. Then let the -Green Knight look to himself—ho, ho! We shall see some jousting then.’ - -Mary Beaton shuffled the cards. - -These joustings occurred, not at Callander, where Livingstone had been -wedded to her Sempill and the Queen had danced all the night after, but -at Wemyss, in the midst of a full court, kept and made splendid in the -prince’s honour. The place pleased its mistress in its young spring -dress, attuned itself with her thoughts and desires. Blue, white, and -green was all this world: a gentle, April sky; not far off, the sea; -white lambs in the pastures, and the trees in the forest studded with -golden buds. Wemyss had for her an air of France, with its great winged -house of stone, its _tourelles_, balustrades, ordered avenues raying -out from the terrace, each tapering to a sunny point; its marble nymphs -and sea-gods with shells; its bowers, and the music of lutes in hidden -grass-walks, not too loud to quell the music in her heart. It was a pity -that the prince knew so little of the tongue, or it had been pleasant to -read with him— - - Filz de Venus, voz deux yeux despendez, - Et mes ecrits lisez et entendez, - Pour voir comment - D’un desloyal service me rendez: - Las, punissez-le, ou bien luy commandez - Vivre autrement— - -and see his fine blushes over the words. But although he had never -heard of Maître Clément, he was in love without him, and could take an -Englishman’s reasonable pleasure in hearing himself called ‘Venus’ boy,’ -or Rose-cheekt Adonis.’ - -Certainly he must have been in love. He told Antony Standen so every -night over their cups; and little Forrest, a pert child who slept (like -a little dog) at the foot of his great bed—he knew it too; for it had -thrust a new duty upon him and many stripes. All the Court knew that when -Forrest had red eyes the prince had overslept himself. - -It was the Queen’s romantic device: she was full of them at this time. -From her wing of the house you could see the prince’s; her bedchamber -windows gave right across the grass-plat to his. Now, at an early hour, -she—who woke still earlier, and lay long, thinking—stirred Mary Fleming -from her side by biting her shoulder, not hard. Sleepy Fleming, when she -had learned the rules, slipped out of bed and pulled aside the curtains -to let in the day; then robed the Queen in a bedgown of blue, with white -fur, her furred slippers, and a hood. Armed thus for the amorous fray, -as Mr. Randolph put it—at any rate, with shining eyes and auroral hues, -Queen Mary went to watch at the window; and so intent did she stand -there, looking out over the wet grass, that she heeded neither the rooks -drifting in the high wind, nor the guards of the door who were spying at -her, nor the guard by the privy-postern, who beckoned to his fellow to -come out of the guard-house and witness what he saw. Not only was she -heedless, but she would have been indifferent had she heeded. - -After a time of motionless attention, this always occurred. She raised -her hand with a handkerchief in it, and signalled once—then twice—then -three times—then four times. Then she dropped her hand and stood -stone-still again; and then Fleming came to take her away, if she would -go. The guards, greatly diverted, were some time before they found out -that the appearance of the prince at his window was the thing signalised, -and that he duly answered every dip of the handkerchief. It was, in fact, -a flag-language, planned by the Queen soon after she came to Wemyss. -_One_ meant, ‘Oh, happy day!’ _two_, ‘I am well.—And you?’ _three_, ‘I -love you’; _four_, ‘I would kiss you if I were near’; and _five_, which -was a later addition, and not always given, ‘I am kissing you in my -heart.’ To this one was generally added a gesture of the knuckles to -the lips. Now, it was the business of young Forrest to awaken his lord -in time for this ceremony: obviously, her Majesty could not be left to -a solitary vigil for long. The prince was a heavy sleeper, to bed late, -and lamentably unsober. Forrest, then, must needs suffer; for my lord -was furious when disturbed in his morning sleep. But the lad found that -he suffered more when, by a dire mischance, one day he did not wake him -at all. For that he was beaten with a great stick; nor is it wonderful. -There had been wild work in the corridors the morn: maids half-dressed -with messages for men half-tipsy; and the Queen in her chamber, sobbing -in Mary Fleming’s arms. - -I think that the young man is to be excused for believing himself -overweeningly loved. I think he was at first flattered by the attention, -and believed that he returned ardour for ardour. But either he was cold -by nature, or (as the Italian held) assotted of himself: there is little -doubt but he soon tired of the lovers’ food. Clearer facts are these: -that he was not touched by the Queen’s generous surrender, and did not -see that it was generous. ‘You may say, if you choose,’ writes he of _Le -Secret des Secrets_, ‘that a vain man is a gross feeder, to whom flattery -is but a snack; but the old half-truth takes me nearer, which says that -every man is dog or cat. If you stroke your dog, he adores the stooping -godhead in you. The cat sees you a fool for your pains. So for every -testimony of the submiss heart given him by my lady, my lord added one -cubit to his stature. I myself, Jean-Marie Des-Essars, heard him speak of -her to my Lord Ruthven, and other friends of his, as “the fond Queen.” -Encouraged by their applause, he was tardy to respond. He danced with her -at her desire, and might not, of course, ask her in return: that is, by -strict custom. But my mistress was no stickler for Court rules; and if he -had asked her I know she would have been moved. However, he never did. He -danced with Mary Seton when he could; and as for Madame de Sempill, when -she returned after her marriage, if ever a young lord was at the mercy of -a young woman, that was his case. Handsome, black-eyed lady! his knees -were running water before her; but she chose not to look at him. Failing -her, therefore, he sought lower for his pleasures; how much lower, it is -not convenient to declare.’ - -Mary Sempill resumed her duties in mid-April, having been wedded at -the end of March, and came to Wemyss but a few days in advance of two -great men—my Lord of Moray, to wit, the Queen’s base-brother, and my -Lord of Morton, Chancellor and cousin of the prince. Before she saw her -mistress, she was put into the state of affairs by Mary Seton. - -‘_Ma mye_,’ said that shrewd little beauty to her comrade, ‘in a good -hour you come back, but a week syne had been a better. She is fond, -fond, fond! She is all melted with love—just a phial of sweet liquor -for his broth. I blame Fleming; I’ve been at her night and morning—but -a fine work! The lass is as bad as the Queen, being handmaid to her -withered Lethington, so much clay for that dry-fingered potter. But -our mistress—oh, she goes too fast! She is eating love up: there’ll be -satiety, you shall see. Our young princekin is so set up that he’ll lie -back in his chair and whistle for her before long—you’ll see, you’ll -see! If he were to whistle to-day she’d come running like a spaniel dog, -holding out her hands to him, saying, “Dear my heart, pity me, not blame, -that I am so slow!” Oh, Livingstone, I am sore to see it! So high a head, -lowered to this flushing loon! Presumptuous, glorious boy! Now, do you -hear this. He raised his hand against Ruthven the other Tuesday, a loose -glove in it, to flack him on the mouth. And so he handles all alike. -’Twas at the butts they had words: there was our lady and Lindsay shot -against Beaton and him. Lindsay scored the main—every man knew it; but -the other makes an outcry, red in the face, puffed like a cock-sparrow. -Ruthven stands by scowling, chattering to himself, “The Queen’s main, the -Queen’s main.” “You lie, Ruthven,” says the Young Fool (so we all call -him); and Ruthven, “That’s an ill word, my Lord Darnley.” “You make it -a worse when you say it in my face,” cries he; “and I have a mind——” He -has his glove in his hand, swinging. “Have you a mind indeed?” says black -Ruthven; “’tis the first time I have heard it.” Lindsay was listening, -but not caring to look. I was by Beaton—you never saw Lethington so -scared: his eyebrows in his hair! But we were all affrighted, save -one: ’twas the Queen stepped lightly between them. “Dear cousin,” she -says, “we two will shoot a main, and win it.” And to Ruthven, “My Lord -Ruthven,” says she, “you have done too much for me to call down a cloud -on this my spring-time.” He melted, the bitten man, he melted, and bent -over her hand. My young gentleman shot with her and lost her the match—in -such a rage that he had not a word to say. Now I must tell you ...’; and -then she gave the history of the love-signals at the window. - -Mary Sempill listened with sombre cheer. ‘I see that it’s done. The -bird’s in the net. Jesu Christ, why was I not here—or Thyself?’ - -She did what she could that very night: divorced the Master of Sempill -and shared her mistress’s chamber. In the morning there was a great -to-do—a love-sick lady coaxing her Livingstone, stroking her cheeks; but -no flagwork could be allowed. - -‘No, no, my bonny queen, that is no sport for thee. That is a wench’s -trick.’ - -The truth was not to be denied; yet not Dido on her pyre anguished more -sharply than this burning queen. And little good was done, more’s the -pity: measures had been taken too late. For she made humble access to her -prince afterwards and sued out a forgiveness, which to have got easily -would have distressed her. You may compare wenches and queens as much -as you will—it’s not a surface affair: but the fact is, the heavier a -crown weighs upon a girl in love, the more thankfully will she cast it to -ground. Are you to be reminded that Queen Mary was not the first generous -lover in history? There was Queen Venus before her. - - * * * * * - -My Lord of Moray, most respectable of men, rode orderly from Edinburgh to -Wemyss, with a train of some thirty persons, six of whom were ministers -of the Word. He had not asked Mr. Knox to come along with him, for the -reason that the uncompromising prophet had lately married a cousin of -the Queen’s, a Stuart and very young girl—fifteen years old, they say. -Whether this was done, as the light-minded averred, out of pique that her -Majesty would not be kind to him, or on some motion even less agreeable -to imagine—my Lord of Moray was hurt at the levity of the deed, and -suspected that the Queen would be more than hurt. But I believe that she -knew Mr. Knox better than her base-brother did. However, failing Mr. -Knox, he had six divines behind him, men of great acceptance. The Earl of -Morton was waiting for him at Burntisland: side by side the two weighty -lords traversed the woods of Fife. It might have been astonishing how -little they had to say to each other. - -‘Likely we shall have wet before morn.’ - -‘Ay, belike,’ said the Earl of Moray. - -‘These lands will be none the worse of it.’ - -‘So I believe.’ - -‘There was a French pink in the basin. Did your lordship see her?’ - -‘Ay, I saw her.’ - -‘Ha! And they say there shall come a new ambassador from the Pope.’ - -‘Is that so?’ - -‘By way of France, he must travel.’ - -‘Ay?’ - -‘Bothwell will be in France the now, I doubt.’ - -‘I’m thinking so, my lord, indeed,’ says the Earl of Moray. - -There was more, but not much more. A man tires of picking at granite with -a needle. - -They reached Wemyss before nightfall; but already torches were flaming -here and there, and men running made smoky comets of them, low-flying -over the park. The Queen was at supper in her closet; there would be -no dancing to-night, because her Majesty was tired with hunting. ‘No -doubt,’ said Lethington, ‘my Lord of Moray would be received.’ Chambers -were prepared for both their lordships. Mr. Archibald Douglas would have -charge of his noble kinsman’s comfort, while by the Queen’s desire he, -Lethington, would wait upon my lord. Bowing, and quickly turning about, -the Secretary bent his learned head as he announced these news. - -Something, one knows not what, had invited urbanity into the dark Earl of -Moray. He was all for abnegation in favour of the Chancellor. - -‘See, Mr. Secretar,’ he said, ‘see to the Chancellor’s bestowing, I beg -of you. Lead my lord the Chancellor to his lodging; trust me to myself -the while. My lord will be weary from his journey—nay, my good lord, but -I know what a long road must bring upon a charged statesman: grievous -burden indeed! Pray, Mr. Secretar, my lord the Chancellor!’ and the like. - -‘Now, the devil fly away with black Jamie if I can bottom him,’ muttered -the Chancellor to himself as—burly man—he stamped up the house. Mr. -Archie Douglas, his kinsman, at the top of the staircase, bowed his grey -head till his nose was pointing between his knees. - -‘Man, Archie, ye’ll split yoursel’,’ says the Chancellor. ‘You may leave -me, Mr. Secretar, to my wicked cousin,’ says he. - -Lethington sped back to his master, and found him still obstinately -gracious. - -‘Hurry not, Mr. Secretar, hurry not for me!’ - -‘Nay, my good lord, but my devotion is a jealous god.’ - -The Earl waved his hand about. ‘Ill work to pervert the Scriptures and -serve a quip,’ he said ruefully,—‘but in this house!’ - -Mr. Secretary, knowing his Earl of Moray, said no more, but led him in -silence to the chambers, and silently served him—that is, he stood by, -alert and watchful, while his people served him. The Earl’s condescension -increased; he was determined to please and be pleased. He talked freely -of Edinburgh, of the Assembly, of Mr. Knox’s unhappy backsliding and of -Mr. Wood’s stirring reminders. Incidents of travel, too: he was concerned -for some poor foreign-looking thief whom he had seen on the gibbet at -Aberdour. - -‘Justice, Mr. Secretar, Justice wears a woful face on a blithe spring -morning. And you may well think, as I did, that upon yonder twisting -wretch had once dropped the waters of baptism. Man, there had been a -hoping soul in him once! Sad work on the bonny braeside; woful work in -the realm of a glad young queen!’ - -‘Woful indeed, my lord,’ said Mr. Secretary, ‘and woe would she be to -hear of it. But in these days—in these days especially—we keep such -miserable knowledge from her. She strays, my lord, at this present, in a -garden of enchantment.’ - -‘And you do well, Mr. Secretar, you do well—if the Queen my sister does -well. There is the hinge of the argument. What says my young friend Mr. -Bonnar to that?’ - -Mr. Bonnar, my lord’s chaplain, a lean, solemn young man, was not -immediately ready. The Earl replied for him. - -‘Mr. Bonnar will allow for the season, and Mr. Bonnar will be wise. What -saith the old poet?— - - Ac neque jam stabulis gaudet pecus, aut aratror igni: - Nec prata canis albicant pruinis—— - -Eh, man, how does he pursue? Eh, Mr. Bonnar, what saith he next? - - Jam Cytherea choros ducit Venus, imminente luna!’ - -‘The moon is overhead, indeed, my lord,’ says the Secretary, ‘and her -glamour all about us.’ - -But his master jumped away, and was soon sighing. - -‘There is always a grain of sadness in the cup for us elders, Mr. -Secretar; _amari aliquid_, alas! But I am served.’ He was supping in his -room. ‘Master Bonnar will call down a blessing from on high.’ Master -Bonnar was now ready. - -The game went on through the meal. Lethington seemed to be standing on -razors, the Earl not disapproving. The great man ate sparingly, and drank -cold water; but his talk was incessant—of nothing at all—ever skirting -realities, leading his hearers on, then skipping away. Not until the -table was cleared and young Mr. Bonnar released from his blinking duties -was the Secretary also delivered from torments. The scene shifted, the -Earl suddenly chilled, and Lethington knew his ground. They got to -work over letters from England, a new tone in which had troubled the -Secretary’s dreams. He expounded them—some being in cypher—then summed up -his difficulties. - -‘It stands thus, my lord, as I take it. Here came over to us this young -prince from England, _with a free hand_. We took what seemed fairly -proffered; and why indeed should we be backward? We were as free to take -him as her English Majesty was free to send him. Oh, there have been -freedoms! I will not say we could have done no better, in all ways. No -matter! We opened our arms to what came, as we thought, sped lovingly -towards us. Mr. Randolph himself could not deny that we had reason; and I -shall make bold to say that never did lady show such kindness to a match, -not of her own providing, as our mistress showed to this. But now, my -lord, now, when the sun hath swelled the buds, there is a change in the -wind from England—a nip, a hint of malice. These letters exhibit it, to -my sense. I think Mr. Randolph may be recalled: I am not sure, but I do -think it. I know that he desires it; I know that he suffers discomfort, -that he does not see his way. “Is this young man our subject or yours?” -he asketh. “Is he subject at all, or Regent rather? And if Regent, whom -is he to rule?” No, my lord, Mr. Randolph, whether instructed or not, -is itching to be off. And that is pity, because he is bond-slave of the -Beaton, and would lavish all his counsel at her feet if she desired him. -Briefly, my lord, I jalouse the despatch of Throckmorton to our Court, -not upon a friendly mission.’ - -The Earl listened, but moved not a muscle. He looked like an image of old -wax, when the pigment is all faded out, and the wan smooth stuff presents -no lines to be read. - -‘You are right,’ he said presently: ‘Mr. Throckmorton comes, but Mr. -Randolph remains. The Queen of England——’ He stopped. - -‘She is against us, my lord? She grudges us the heir of both crowns!’ - -‘I say not. She thinks him unworthy: but I must not believe it, nor must -you. Mr. Secretar, you shall go to England. Presently—presently—we must -be very patient. Now of my sister, how doth she?’ - -‘The Queen dotes, my lord,’ said Lethington, and angered the Earl, it -seemed. - -‘Shame, sir! Shame, Mr. Secretar! Fie! Queens must not dote.’ - -It was characteristic of the relation between this pair that the master -was always leading the man into admissions and professing to be cut to -the soul by them. But Mr. Secretary had the habit of allowing for it. ‘I -withdraw the word, my lord. Maybe I know nothing. Who am I, when all’s -said, to judge?’ - -The Earl lowered his eyelids until they fluttered over his eyes like two -white moths. ‘How stand you with the Fleming, Lethington? How stand you -there? Can she make no judge of you?’ - -It was the stroke too much. The stricken creature flinched; and then -something real came out of him. ‘Ah, my good lord,’ he said, with dignity -in arms for his secret honour, ‘you shall please to consider me there as -the suitor of an honest lady, and very sensible of the privilege.’ - -Lord Moray opened his eyes, stood up and held out his hands. ‘I ask -your pardon, Mr. Secretar—freely I ask it of you. Come—enough of weary -business. Crave an audience for me. I will go to the Queen.’ - -Mr. Secretary kissed his patron’s hand. ‘My prince shall forgive his -servant——’ - -‘Oh, man, say no more!’ - -‘——and accept his humble duty. I will carry your lordship to the Queen. -Will you first see the Italian?’ - -Quickly his lordship changed his face. ‘Why should I see the Italian? -What have I to do with him? Mr. Secretar, Mr. Secretar, let every man do -cheerfully his own office, so shall the state thrive.’ - -He had the air of quoting Scripture. - -The Queen saw her brother for a few moments, and he in her what he -desired to be sure of: eyes like dancing water, and about her a glow such -as the sun casts early on a dewy glade. He had never known her so gentle, -or so without wit; nor had she ever before kissed him of her own accord. -Lady Argyll, his own sister, was with her, the swarthy, handsome, large -woman. - -‘You are welcome, brother James,’ Queen Mary said; ‘and now we’ll all be -happy together.’ - -‘I shall believe it, having it from your Majesty’s lips,’ said he. - -She touched her lips, as if she were caressing what had been blessed to -her. ‘I think my lips will never dare be false.’ - -He said warmly, ‘There speaketh a queen in her own right!’ What need had -he to see the Italian? - -Now, for the sake of contrast, look for one moment upon that other great -man, the Chancellor Morton, in his privacy. Booted and spurred, he -plumped himself down in a chair, clapped his big hands to his thighs and -stuck out his elbows. He stared up open-mouthed at his kinsman Archie, -twinkling his eyes, all prepared to guffaw. Humour was working through -the heavy face. ‘Well, man? Well, man? How is it with Cousin Adonis?’ - -Archie Douglas, scared at first, peered about him into all corners of -the room before he could meet the naughty eyes. Catching them at last -expectant, he made a grimace and flipped finger and thumb in the air. -‘Adonis! Hoots! a prancing pie!’ - -The Earl of Morton rubbed his hands together. ‘Plenty of rope, man, -Archie! Plenty of rope for the likes of him!’ - - * * * * * - -Des-Essars has a long piece concerning the official presentation of the -two earls to the prince, which seems to have been done with as much state -as the Scottish Court could achieve. - -‘My Lord of Darnley’s mistake,’ he says, ‘was to be stiff with the wrong -man. He was civil to the Chancellor, his cousin—where a certain insolence -would have been salutary; he made him a French bow, and gave him his -hand afterwards, English fashion. But to my Lord of Moray, a cruelly -proud man, he chose to show the true blood’s consciousness of the base; -and in so doing, the hurt he may have inflicted at the moment was as -nothing to what he laid up for himself. It was late in the day to insist -upon the Lord James’s bastardy. Yet——“Ah, my Lord of Moray! Servant of -your lordship, I protest.” And then: “Standen, my gloves. I have the -headache.” He used scented gloves as a febrifuge. “A prancing pie!” said -Monsieur de Douglas in my hearing. Nevertheless, my Lord of Moray spoke -his oration; very fine, but marred by a too level, monotonous delivery—a -blank wall of sound—to which, for all that, one must needs listen. He was -not a personable man; for his jaw was too spare and his mouth too tight. -His flat brows, also, had that air of strain which makes intercourse -uncomfortable. But he was a great man, and a deliberate man, and the most -patient man I ever knew or heard of, except Job the Patriarch. So he -spoke his oration, and left everybody as wise as they were before.’ - -I myself suspect that the good Lord James was gaining time to look round -and consider what he should do. And although he had scouted the notion -that he could have anything to say to the Italian, the fact is noteworthy -that to seek him out privately was one of the first things he did with -his time. Signior David told him frankly two things: first, that if the -Queen did not marry her prince soon she would come to loathing the sight -of him; secondly, he said that if she did marry him the lords would get -him murdered. ‘These two considerations,’ said Davy in effect, ‘really -hang together. The lords, your lordship’s colleagues, are not in love -with the young man, and so are quite ready to be at him. But she at -present is so, and in full cry. When she slackens, and has time to open -her eyes and see him as he is——Hoo! let him then say his _Confiteor_!’ - -It is not to be supposed that such perilous topics were discussed with -this brevity and point—certainly not where the Earl of Moray was one of -the discutants; this, however, is the sum, confirmed to the Earl by what -he observed of the Court. There was no doubt but that the two things did -indeed hang together. - -The Queen, his sister, as he saw very soon, did not go half-heartedly to -work in this marriage project. And the louder grew the murmurs of Mr. -Randolph, handing on English threats, the more loyally she clung—not to -her prince, perhaps, but to what she had convinced herself her prince -was. He studied that young man minutely upon every occasion, spent smiles -and civilities upon him, received rebuffs in return, and (with an air of -saying ‘I like your spirit’) came next day for more. He saw him hector -Signior Davy, tempt Lord Ruthven to _rabies_, run after Mary Sempill, -allow the Queen to run after him, get drunk. He saw him ride with his -hounds, break in a colt, thrash a gentleman, kiss two women, lose money -at a tennis match, and draw his dagger on the Master of Lindsay who had -won it. A very little conversation with the Court circle, and two words -with his sister of Argyll, sufficed him. - -‘Ill blood,’ said that stern lady. ‘The little bloat frog will swell till -he burst unless we prick him beforehand. Not all Scots lords have your -fortitude, brother James.’ - -‘Hush, sister, hush! I think better of poor Scotland than you do. Who are -we—unhappy pensioners—to judge her Majesty’s choice?’ - -He walked away, being a most respectable man, lest his fierce sister -should lead him farther than it was convenient to go; and after a week’s -reflection sent Mr. Secretary Lethington into England, with sealed -letters for Mr. Cecil and open letters for the Queen. In these he echoed -English sentiments, that the marriage was deplorable from every view, -to be opposed by every lover of peace and true religion. He should do -what could be done to serve her English Majesty, being convinced that -no better way of serving his own Queen was open to him. The bearer was -in possession of his full mind; the Lord of Lethington would convince -his friends by lively testimonies, etc. etc. This done, even then (so -slow-dealing was he) he took another week to deliberate before he -selected his plan of action and his hour. He could afford so much time, -but not much more. - -It was an hour of a night when there was dancing and mumchance: torches, -musicians in the gallery, a mask of satyrs, an ode of Mr. Buchanan’s -declaimed, and some French singing, in which Des-Essars eclipsed his -former self and won the spleen of Adam Gordon. For if her Majesty had -sent Adam into the Lothians and rewarded him for it with a pat of the -cheek, now she called the other up to the daïs, publicly kissed him, and -gave him a little purse worked in roses by herself. There were broad -pieces in it too. - -‘I shall pay you for that, Baptist my man; see you to it,’ says Adam. - -But Jean-Marie flourished his purse before he put it into his bosom and -hooked his doublet upon it. ‘Draw upon me, Monsieur de Gordon, and let it -be for blood if you choose. I can well afford it.’ - -For the first time since her entry into Scotland the Queen wore colours. -She appeared in a broad-skirted, much-quilted, tagged and spangled gown -of yellow satin; netted over with lace-work done in pearls. The bodice -was long and pointed, low in the neck; but a ruff edged with pearls ran -up from either shoulder, like two great petals, within which her neck and -feathered head were as the stamen of the flower. It did not suit her to -be so sumptuous, because that involved stiffness; and she was too slim to -carry the gear, and too active, too supple and humoursome to be anything -but miserable in it. But she chose to shine that night, so that she might -honour her prince in her brother’s cold eyes. - -After supper, when there was general dancing, the Earl of Moray surprised -everybody by walking across the hall to where Lord Darnley stood. A dozen -or more heard his exact words: ‘Come, my lord,’ he said, ‘I am spokesman -for us all; and here is my humble suit, that you will lead the Queen in a -measure. It would be her own choice, so you cannot deny me. Come, I will -lead you to her Majesty.’ - -He spoke more loudly but no less deliberately than usual; there was quite -a little commotion. Even the young prince himself knew that this was an -extraordinary civility. One may add, perhaps, that even he received it -graciously. Bowing, blushing a little, he said: ‘My lord, I shall always -serve the Queen’s grace, and, I hope, content her. I take it thankfully -from your lordship that in this yours is the common voice.’ - -The Earl took him by the hand up the hall. The Queen had starry eyes when -she saw them coming. - -‘Madam,’ said her half-brother, ‘here I bring a partner for your Majesty -whom I am persuaded you will not refuse. If you think him more backward -than he should be and myself more forward, you shall reflect, madam, that -by these means my zeal is enabled to join hands with his modesty.’ - -‘We thank you, brother,’ replied the Queen, in a voice scarcely audible. -She was certainly touched, as she looked up at her prince with quivering -lips. But he laughed a brave answer back, and held out his hand to take -hers. The musicians in the gallery, who had been primed beforehand, -struck into a galliard. - -This dance is really a formal comedy, what we call a ballet, with grave, -high-handed turns to left and right, curtseyings, bowings, retreats and -pursuits. It quickens or dies according to the air. You make your first -stately steps, you bow and separate; you dance apart, upon signal you -return. The theme of every galliard is Difference and Reconciliation. -It is a Roman thing, and has five airs to it. The air chosen here was, -‘_Baisons-nous, ma belle_.’ - -The prince was a stilted dancer, Queen Mary the best of her day—the -exercise was a passion of hers. As for him, he could never be any better, -for, doubting his own dignity, he was extremely jealous of it. It seemed -to him that to be limber would be to exhibit weakness. The result of this -disparity between the partners was, to the spectators, that the Queen had -the air of drawing him on, of enticing him, of inspiring all this parade -of tiffs and sweet accord. It was she who, at the curtsey, showed herself -saucy and _maline_—she who, like a rustic beauty, glanced and shook her -head, hunched her white shoulder and tossed his presence away. So it was -she who came tripping back, held off, invited pursuit, suffered capture, -melted suddenly to kindness. He regained her hand, as it appeared, by -right and without effort; she let it rest, they thought, in thankful -duty. It was make-believe, of course; but she lived her part, and he did -not. So blockish was he that, Mary Seton said, the Queen seemed like a -girl hanging garlands round a garden god. All watched and all passed -judgment, but were prejudiced by the knowledge that, as she danced, so -she would choose to be. In the midst, and unperceived, the Earl of Moray -went out of the hall, and sought the Italian in his writing cabinet. - -Signior Davy was at work there by the light of a tallow candle. His hair -was disordered, his bonnet awry; he had unfastened his doublet, and his -shirt had overflowed his breeches. He wrote fast, but like an artist, -with his head well away from his hand. It went now to one side, now to -another, as he estimated the shapes of his thin lettering. ‘Eh! probiamo! -Ma sì, ma sì—così va meglio.’ So he chattered to himself at his happy -craft. - -The Earl of Moray stepped quietly into the room and closed the door -behind him. The scribe lifted up his head without ceasing to write. ‘Ah, -Monsieur de Moray! Qu’il soit le bienvenu!’ He finished the foliation of -a word, jumped up, snatched at his patron’s hand, briskly kissed it, and -said, ‘Commandi!’ - -They talked in French, in which the Earl was an exact, if formal, -practitioner. There was no fencing between them. My lord did not affect -to be shocked at hearing what he desired to know, nor the Italian to mean -what he did not say. - -‘I have been witness of great doings this night, Signior David.’ - -‘The night is the time for doings, I consider,’ replied the Italian. - -This general reflection the Earl passed over for the moment. ‘They dance -the galliard in hall—the Queen and the Prince. You can hear the rebecks -from here.’ - -‘I know the tune, sir!’ cried Davy. ‘I set it. I scored it for her long -ago. It is _Baisons-nous, ma belle_. But they murder it by clinging to -the fall. It needs passion if it is to breed passion. That music should -hurt you.’ - -‘Passion is not wanting, Signior David,’ said my lord, with narrowed, -ever narrowing eyes. ‘And passion is much. But opportunity is more.’ - -The Italian started. ‘You think it is a good hour?’ - -‘Judge you of the hour,’ said the Earl of Moray. - -The Italian frowned, as he drummed with his fingers on the table. He -sang a little air: _Belle, qui tiens ma vie!_ My lord took a ring from -his finger and laid it down: a thin ring with a flat-cut single diamond -in it, of great size and water. Singing still, the Italian picked it up, -looked lazily at it. He embodied his criticism in his song—‘Non c’è male, -Signore! No-o-o-o-on c’è-è male!’ All at once he clapped it down upon -the desk and jumped round—fire-fraught, quivering, a changed man. - -‘You wish your opportunity—you think the hour is struck! You observe—you -judge—you make your plans—you wait—you watch—and—ah! You come to me—you -say, Passion is not wanting, but opportunity is all. And my music lends -it: _Baisons-nous, ma belle_, hey? Good, sir! good, sir! I thank you, and -I meet you half-way. In a little moment—ha! here is the moment. Listen.’ -A bell in the tower began to toll. - -‘Midnight, sir!’ cried the Italian, leaping about and waving his arms. -‘That is the midnight bell!’ He struck a great pose—head thrown back, one -hand in his breast. ‘_Era già l’ ora che volge il disio!_ Come, come, my -lord, we will put the point to the pyramid. Wait for me.’ - -He ran out, cloaking head and shoulders as he went; the Earl awaited -him massively. In a little while he was back again, cheerful, almost -riotously cheerful, accompanied by a blue-chinned young man, a priest of -the old religion, whose eyes looked beady with fright to see the grim -Protestant lord. - -‘No, no, my reverend, have no fears at all,’ said the Italian; ‘see -nobody, hear nothing; but go to the chapel and vest yourself for midnight -mass. Quick, my dear, quick!—off with you!’ - -My lord had contrived to freeze himself out of sight or conscience of -this part of the business. It was droll to see how abstractedly he looked -at the wall. The priest had disappeared before the Italian touched his -arm, beckoning him to follow. - -They descended from the turret upon the long corridor which connected -the two wings of the house; they went down a little stair, and came to -the Queen’s door, which led from the hall to her own side. This door was -closed, but not locked. Pushing it gently open, Signior Davy saw young -Gordon looking at the crowd in the dusty hall, his elbows on his knees. -The hum and buzz of talk came eddying up the stair—little cries, manly -assurance, protestations, and so on. ‘Hist, Monsieur de Gordon, hist!’ -Adam looked up, Des-Essars peeped round the corner: those two were never -far apart. - -The Italian whispered, ‘I must have a word with the Queen as she comes -up. It is serious. Warn her of it.’ Adam coloured up; he was flustered. -It was Des-Essars who, looking sharply at the incisive man, nodded his -head. Signior David drew back, and drew his companion back. They waited -at the head of the stair in the shadow, listening to the rumours of the -hall. - -There came presently a lull in the talk, a hushing-down; some sort -of preparation, expectancy; they heard the Queen say, quite clearly, -‘To-morrow, to-morrow I will consider it. I cannot hear you now.’ A voice -pleaded, ‘Ah, madam, in pity——!’ and hers again: ‘No, no, no! Come, -ladies.’ - -‘Room there, sirs! Give room there, my ladies!’ cried the usher. -Good-nights followed, laughing and confused speech, shuffling of feet, -and some rustling—kissing of hands, no doubt. Then, as one knows what one -cannot see, they felt her coming. - -Arthur Erskine, Captain of the Guard, marched up first, solemnly, with -two great torches; Bastien the valet, some more servants. Margaret -Carwood, bedchamber-woman, appeared at the stair-head. Some of the maids -of honour passed up—Mary Beaton and a young French girl, hand-in-hand, -Mary Sempill, and others. Des-Essars stepped from his place at the foot -of the stairs and was no more seen. - -He was the next to reach the upper floor: Des-Essars himself, white and -tense. ‘She will speak to you here,’ he told the Italian. ‘Show yourself -to her.’ - -‘Altro!’ said Davy. Immediately after, they heard the Queen coming. - -She paused on the landing and looked about her. Then she saw the Italian. -‘You wait for me, David? Go in, _mes belles_,’ she said to Fleming and -Seton, who were with her; ‘and you too, Carwood. I am coming.’ - -They left her, and she stood alone, waiting, but not beckoning. She -looked very tired. - -The Italian approached her on tiptoe, and began to talk. He talked -in whispers, with his hasty voice, with his darting, inspired hands, -with every nerve of his body. She was startled at first—but he flooded -her with words: she had turned her face quickly towards him, with an -‘Oh! Oh!’ and then had looked as if she would run. But he held out his -imploring hands; he talked faster and faster; he pointed to heaven, -extended his arms, patted his breast, jerked his head, sobbed, dashed -away real tears. She was trembling; he saw her trembling. He folded arms -over breast, flung them desperately apart, clasped his hands, seemed to -be praying. Godlike clemency seemed to sit in him as he talked on; he -looked at her with calm, pitying, far-searching eyes. His words came more -slowly, as if he was now announcing the inevitable sum of his frenzy. She -considered, hanging her head; but when he named her brother she started -violently, could not control her shaking-fit, nor bring herself to look -into the shadow. The Italian beckoned to his patron, who then came softly -forward out of the dark. - -‘Dear madam, dear sister——’ he began; but she stopped him by a look. - -‘Brother, are you leading me?’ - -He denied it with an oath. - -‘Brother,’ she said again, ‘I do think it.’ - -Then he changed, saying: ‘Why, then, sister, if I am, it is whither your -heart has cried to go.’ - -‘I believe that is the very truth,’ she owned, and looked wistfully into -his face. Signior Davy went downstairs. - -She pleaded for a little time. She had not confessed for five days—she -was not ready—there should be more form observed in the mating of -princes—what was the English use? In France—but this was not France. - -He admitted everything. And yet, he said, the heart was an instant -lover, happiest in simplicity. A prince was a prince from birth, before -the solemn anointing. So a bride might be a wife before the Queen had a -Consort. - -‘True,’ she said, ‘but a sovereign should consult his subjects.’ - -‘Ah, sister,’ says he, ‘what woman could be denied her heart’s choice?’ - -She hid her face. ‘God knoweth, God knoweth I do well!’ - -‘Why, then, courage!’ said he. ‘Content your God, madam, and follow -conscience. It lies not in woman born to do better.’ - -At this point the Italian came back, leading my lord. The prince was -flushed, as always at night, but sober, and undoubtedly moved. He -knelt before her Majesty unaffectedly, bowing his head. ‘Oh, madam, my -sovereign——’ he began to say; but then she gave a little sharp cry, and -took him up. Tenderly she looked at him, searching his face. - -‘Oh, I am here, my lord. Do you seek me?’ - -In return, after a moment’s regard of her beauty, he choked a sob in his -breath, shook his head and lifted it. - -‘Now God judge me, if I seek thee not, my Mary!’ - -‘Come then,’ said the Queen—yet stood timorously still. - -The Earl of Moray stepped forward with his arms uplifted. His face was -deadly white, but his eyes were fires. ‘Go in—go in——!’ he said with -fierce breath, and seemed to beat them before him into the open doorway. - - * * * * * - -When he had his royal pair safe in the chapel, the candles lit and the -priest at his secret prayers before the altar[2]—then, and not before, -did Signior Davy call in the maids, Arthur Erskine, and Des-Essars. They -came trooping in together—nine, of them, all told—saw the lit altar, the -priest in yellow and white, the server, and those two who knelt at the -rail in their tumbled finery. Mary Sempill gasped and would have cried -out, Mary Seton blinked her eyes, as if to give herself courage; but Davy -pointed awfully to the priest, who had made his introit and opened the -missal, and now stood rapt, with his hands stuck out. If Arthur Erskine -had moved, if Des-Essars had started for the door, these fluttered -women might have——But Erskine stood like a stone Crusader, and little -Jean-Marie was saying his prayers. The Earl of Moray was without the -door, having refused to come in. - -Thus the deed was done. The Italian himself shut the chamber door upon -them and warned off the scared maids. - -Outside that door, Adam Gordon and Des-Essars whispered their quarrel out. - -‘She gave me a ring when I came back from Liddesdale and hunting -Bothwell,’ says Adam. - -‘Pooh, man: that she would have thrown to a groom. Bastien has had the -like. And what matters it now whether she gave thee anything, or me -anything? _Ah!_’ - -‘Let me hold that purse, Baptist, or I’ll scrag ye. ’Tis my right.’ - -‘How your right, my fine sir?’ - -‘You swore that we should share her. The plan was yours. You swore it on -the cross. And you’ve held my ring twice in your hands, and had it on -your finger the length of the Sentinel’s Walk. You disgrace yourself by -this avarice.’ - -‘You shall not hold my purse, Adam; but you may feel it.’ - -‘Let me feel it, then. For how long?’ - -‘Till the bell goes the hour.’ - -‘That is only a minute or two.’ - -‘It will be ten minutes, I tell you. Now then, if you care.’ - -Master Gordon put his hand into the bosom of Master Des-Essars and -solemnly pinched the purse. - -‘She’ll be sleeping now,’ said Adam. - -‘I doubt it,’ said Jean-Marie. - -[2] She had asked for Father Roche the moment she saw the celebrant -come in; but was told that he was not at Wemyss. This we learn from -Des-Essars. - - - - -CHAPTER XII - -EPITHALAMIUM: END OF ALL MAIDS’ ADVENTURE - - -He fell ill of measles, the young prince, before they could leave -Wemyss—measles followed by much weakness, sweating, and ague; and though -all her whispering world—but the few—might wonder, nothing could keep her -from the proud uses of wifehood. She took her place by his bed early—pale -with care, yet composed—and kept it till past midnight. It was beautiful -to see her, with rank and kingship cast aside, more dignified by her -little private fortune, more a queen for her enclosed realm. For now she -swayed a sick-room, and was absolute there: let seditious murmurings and -alarms toss their pikes beyond the border. - -And indeed they did. Her secret marriage had been so well kept, the -Court fairly hummed with scandal; and the simple truth was given a dog’s -death that romantic tales might thrive. It was commonly said that if she -married him now it would only be because shame would drive her. The Earl -of Morton went about with this clacking on his tongue; plain men like -Atholl and Herries looked all ways for a pardon upon the doting Queen. In -their company the Earl of Moray lifted up deprecating hands; he agreed -with the Earl of Morton, advised Atholl and Herries to pray without -ceasing. The winds were blowing as he required them; but this sickness -was vexatious, with the delays it brought. Time is of the essence of the -contract, even if that be only between a vainglorious youth and a rope. -Mr. Secretary wrote from England that the Queen of that country was -implacably against the marriage; it was possible even now that it might -be stopped. But it must on no account be stopped. - -This was, in early May, the plain view of the Earl of Moray: that the -thing must be publicly done, and soon done, in order that his schemes -should bear fruit. It is an odd, almost inexplicable fact that he was to -change his whole mind in the course of a few weeks, and for no deeper -reason than a word lightly let fall by the Queen, his half-sister. But -what a word that was to the bastard of a king! It was the word _King_. - -There came to Wemyss, in the midst of these measles and scandalous -whisperings, a certain Murray of Tullibardine, a friend of Bothwell’s—him -and one Pringle. They came together, and yet separately: Pringle with -griefs to be healed—that he, being a servant of my Lord Bothwell’s, had -been summarily dismissed with kicks on a sensitive part; Tullibardine as -a friend, frankly to sue his friend’s pardon. My Lord Moray refused to -help him, having neither love nor use for a Bothwell, but he got to the -Queen by the back stairs and put his client’s case. However, she scarcely -listened to him. Busy as she was, it was strange to see how far away from -her ken the dread Hepburn had drifted. - -‘From the Earl of Bothwell—you? What has he to report of himself—and by -you?’ - -Tullibardine spoke of duty, forgiveness, the clemency of the prince, -while the Queen stirred the broth in her hand. - -‘I never sent him to France,’ she said, ‘but to the Castle of Edinburgh -rather. He set me at nought when he fled this country. Let him return to -the place I put him in, and we will think about duty, forgiveness, and -the prince’s clemency. I bear him no more ill-will than he has put in me, -and he can take it out when he pleases.’ - -‘I thank your Majesty,’ said Tullibardine, ‘and my noble friend will -thank you.’ - -‘He has only himself to thank, so far as I see,’ she replied, and -dismissed him before the broth could get cold. - -Meantime the Earl of Moray had held a godly conversation with afflicted -Pringle. Pringle had much to say: as that, of all men living, the Lord -Bothwell hated two—his good lordship of Moray and Mr. Secretary. He had -sworn to be the death of each when he returned. - -The Earl of Moray compressed his lips, straightened himself, and cleared -his throat. - -‘I fear for him, Pringle,’ he said, ‘the wild, misgoverned, glorious -young man. I cannot charge myself with any offence against him, and yet I -remember that when I was in France he girded at me more than once. But I -am accustomed in such variancy to hold my plain course. Pringle, that was -a desperate gentleman. He had to be forbid the Court.’ - -‘True, my lord,’ says Pringle, ‘and your lordship knows to what -abominable usages he hath——’ - -‘Pray, Pringle, pray, no more!’ - -Pringle was now in the painful position of having staked out a short road -and finding it denied him. ‘I must whisper in your lordship’s ear. I must -make so bold.’ - -‘Man, I refuse you. Heinous living be far from me!’ - -‘My lord, I have heard the Lord Bothwell speak of the Queen’s grace in a -manner——’ - -‘Ay, it is like enough, poor Pringle. The wicked man seeth wickedness all -over.’ - -‘He spake of the Queen, my lord—in your ear——’ - -He breathed it low, a vile accusation concerning the Cardinal of Lorraine -and the Queen—his niece, and then a girl of eighteen. - -The Earl cowed him with a look. ‘Go, Pringle, go! This talk should never -have been held between us. You have misused my charity. Go, I say.’ - -Pringle shivered out. - -In his time the Earl of Moray saw the Queen, and, after due preparation, -chose to tarnish her ears with the tale. - -But she was not at all tarnished. From her safe seat, with but a -party-wall between her husband and her, she received it brightly. - -‘Why, what a ragged tongue he hath! The poor, proud Cardinal! Did he not -love me? I believe he always did.’ - -‘Madam,’ said her brother, ‘you interpret gently. This makes the -slanderer’s damnation the deeper.’ - -She laughed. ‘It is plain, brother, that you know little of France. In -France the truth goes for nothing, but the jest is all. My Lord Bothwell -has been much in France.’ - -‘A jest, madam? This a jest?’ - -‘It is quite in their manner. I remember the old King——’ She broke off -suddenly. ‘Oh, brother, my King is more at ease! This morning his fever -left him, and there broke a great sweat.’ - -‘I rejoice,’ said he—‘I rejoice. But touching this horrible railer—if he -should crave leave to return——’ - -‘He has craved it already,’ replied the Queen. ‘I answered that if he -choose to come back to his prison he may do it. But not otherwise. -Brother, I must go to the King.’ - - * * * * * - -The King! We were there, then; and it galled him like a rowel. Although -she used it warily, and only with the nine persons who were privy, he -could not bear the word; for every time he heard it he was stung into -remembering that he ought to have foreseen it and had not. It is to be -admitted that it had never once crossed his mind—neither the word nor the -thing; astute, large-minded, wide-ranging as he was, he was also that -unimaginative, prim-thinking man who has pigeon-holes for the categories, -knows nothing of passion that breaks all rules, nor can conceive how -loyalty is like meat to women in love, and humility like wine. Lethington -could have told him these things, the Italian could have told him, any of -the maids; and he never to have guessed at them! Dangerously mortified at -the discovery, his disgust with himself and the fact worked together into -one great distemper. This it was which threw him out of his balance, and -led him presently to the greatest length he ever went; but at present it -was only gathering in him. It made him doubtful, distrustful of himself -and all; and when he looked about for supports he could find none to his -taste. One folly after another! How he had cut away his friends! There -was Lethington in England. There was the Italian, who knew so much. He -sickened at the thought of that capable ruffian who had helped him hasten -the crowning of ‘the King.’ Very possibly—very certainly, it seemed -to him now, brooding over it in stillness and the dark—very possibly -the ruin of his life had been laid that night when he had sought out -the creature in his den and bought him with a diamond. Argyll was here, -Rothes, Glencairn, and their like, and Morton the Chancellor, whom he -only half trusted. Besides, Morton was cousin of this flagrant ‘King,’ -and would rise as he rose. On the whole, and for want of better, he -consorted with Argyll and his friends, and dared go so far as this, to -tell them that he had fears of the marriage. - -‘I could have wished,’ he said to Argyll, ‘a livelier sense of favours -done in so young a man; also that my sister might have judged more -soberly how far to meet him. If men of age and known probity had been -consulted!’ - -Glencairn, a passably honest man, and undoubtedly a pious man, said -tentatively here, that no lord of the Council could be found to support -the Prince. As for the Queen’s grace—— - -‘She has been unhappily rash,’ says Moray; ‘I cannot think more. Maidenly -lengths would have become her, a queenly regard, but surely no more.’ He -turned to Argyll. ‘Frankly, brother-in-law, Mr. Knox should not hear of -these late doings—of these bedside ministrations, these transports, these -fits of self-communing, this paltering with the tempter, this doffing of -regalities. I pray, I pray for Scotland!’ - -‘The gowk’s a papist,’ says Argyll, a plain man. - -‘He is young, brother-in-law; that we remember always.’ - -‘He stinks of pride,’ says Argyll,—‘sinful, lusty pride of blood. If this -marriage be made we shall all rue it.’ - -The Earl of Moray clapped a hand to each of his shoulders. - -‘Brother-in-law, pray for Scotland!’ - -‘Oh, ay,’ says Argyll, ‘and put an edge to my Andrew Ferrara.’ - - * * * * * - -How she lingered over him, prayed over him, watched every petulant -twitching of his limbs, no one could know altogether save Mary Sempill, -and she had affairs of her own to consider—a wife who knew she was going -to be a mother. But for this proud preoccupation, she might have seen -how touchingly the Queen made the most of her treasure, and how all the -ardour which had hurried her into wedlock was now whipped up again to -prove it bliss. Was he fretful—and was he not? It was the fever in his -dear bones. Was he gross-mannered? Nay, but one must be tender of young -blood. Did he choose to have his Englishmen about him, his Archie Douglas -to tell him salt tales, while she sat with her maids and waited? Well, -well, a man must have men with him now and again, and is never the better -husband for cosseting. When they urged her to be a queen, she lowered her -eyes and said she was a wife. This raised an outcry. - -‘He is, he can only be, your consort, madam.’ - -‘I am his, you mean,’ said she. ‘The man chooses the woman. There are no -crowns in the bridal bed, and none in heaven. Naked go we to both.’ - -Mary Sempill wrung her hands over talk of the sort. ‘Out, alas! My -foolish, fond, sweet lass!’ - -But Mary Fleming considered, nursing her cheek in the way she had. ‘The -strength of a man overrides all your politics, my dear,’ she said gently. -‘The Salic Law is the law of nature, I have heard men say.’ - -‘God smite this youth if he try it!’ said Sempill fiercely. ‘He’ll set -the heather afire and burn us all in our beds. And you, Fleming, will -have need of mercy in your turn, if you hearken to your grey-faced -Lethington.’ - -‘Mr. Secretary has a very noble heart, Mary. I hope I may say the same of -your Master.’ - -Mary Sempill sniffed. ‘My Master, as you call him, has a head for -figures. He can cipher you two and two. And he says of your Lethington -that he is working mischief in England.’ - -Mary Fleming rose with spirit to this challenge. ‘I cannot believe it. -You are angry with me because you are vexed with the King.’ - -Then it was Mary Sempill to bounce away. ‘The King! Never use that word -to me, woman. There shall be no King in Scotland till my mistress bears -him.’ - -But she was talking without her book. - -They moved to Stirling as soon as the young lord was mended; and thither -came the Earl of Lennox, in a high taking—foxy, close-eyed, crop-bearded, -fussy and foolish—to pay his respects to the Prince his son. Never was a -more disastrous combination made: they cut the Court in half, as shears -a length of cloth. The garrulity of the old man set everybody on edge; -then came the insolent son, to prove the truth even worse than they had -feared. His father egged him on to preposterous lengths, intolerable -behaviour; so the ‘pretty cockerel,’ as they called him in France, made -wild work in the hill-town. He quarrelled so fiercely with my Lord Rothes -that Davy had to pull him off by main force, and then he drew his dagger -on the Lord Justice Clerk, who came to his lodging with a message from -the Queen. - -‘Tell your mistress,’ he had cried out to that astonished officer, ‘that -I pay honour to none but the honourable. You have come here with lies in -your throat. She sent me no such message. You are a very dirty fellow.’ - -Archie Douglas put in his oar. ‘No, no, sir. You jest with the Lord -Justice Clerk—but your jest is too broad.’ - -‘By God, man,’ says the Prince, ‘this jest of mine is narrow at the -point. Let him come on and taste the forky tongue of it.’ - -The Lord Justice Clerk was too flustered to be offended at the moment; -but when he had gained the calm of the street he shuddered to recall -the scene. Her Majesty must be informed of every circumstance: flesh -and blood could not endure such affronts. It needed all her Majesty’s -cajolery to salve the wounded man, and more than she had over to comfort -herself when he had gone away mollified. - -Lord Ruthven was one of the Prince’s intimates at this time, a malign -influence; and the everlasting Italian was another. Signior Davy, at home -in all the chambers of the house, used to sit on the edge of the young -man’s bed and pare his nails while he talked philosophy and statecraft. -It was he who tempered the storm which had nearly maddened the Lord -Justice Clerk. - -‘Your lordship is in a fair way to the haven,’ he said. ‘I tell you -honestly you will get on no quicker for this choler. You must needs be -aware that her Majesty will have no rest until you and she are publicly -wedded. She is fretting herself to strings under that desire. What then -is my advice to your lordship? Why, to sit very still, and to insist with -your respectable father that he hold his tongue. I speak plainly; but it -is to my friend and patron.’ - -The Prince was not offended—but he was obstinate. - -‘Speak as plain as you please, Davy, and deal for me as warily as you -can. The patent should be sealed.’ - -That was the root of the quarrel—his patent of creation to be Duke of -Rothesay. The Queen had promised it to him, but there had been vexed -debate over it in the Council. It was a title for kings’ sons, and had -always been so. The Earl of Moray vehemently opposed; the Argylls, -Glencairns, and others of his friends followed him; they had hopes also -of the Chancellor. At the minute, therefore, although the Queen had -insisted even unto tears, she had not been able to get her way. So she -pretended to give over the effort, meaning, of course, to work round -about for it. She had seen the Chancellor’s wavering: if she could gain -him she would have much. All she wanted for herself was time, all from -the Prince was patience. But the furious fool had none to lend her. - -When the Italian had done his work upon his nails—the rough with the -knife, the rounding-off with his teeth—he resumed his spoken thoughts. - -‘Your patent,’ he said, ‘is as good as sealed. The Queen is at work -upon it in ways which are past your lordship’s finding out. For the -love of mercy, be patient: you little know what you are risking by this -intemperance. Why, with patience you will gain what no patent of her -Majesty’s can give you: that little matter of kingship, which, in such a -case as yours, goes only by proclamation and——’ - -My lord pricked up his ears to this royal word. ‘Ha! In a good hour, -Master David!’ - -‘Good enough, when it comes,’ says Davy; ‘but you did not allow me to -finish. Proclamation—and acclamation, I was about to add; for one is as -needed as the other.’ - -This was a fidgety addition. - -‘Pooh!’ cried the Prince, ‘the pack follows the horn.’ - -He set the Italian’s shoulders to work. ‘I advise you not to count upon -it, my lord. In this country there is no pack of hounds, but a flock—many -flocks—of sheep. And they follow the shepherd, you must know. Therefore -you must be prudent; let me say, more prudent. The Queen comes to you too -much; you go to her too little. It is she that pays the court, where it -should be you. _Dio mio!_ It is not decent. It is madness.’ - -‘She is fond of me, Davy. The truth is, she is over-fond of me.’ - -Signior Davy stopped himself just in time. He buried his exclamation in a -prodigious shrug. - -The doings of the Lennoxes, father and son, which scared the Court so -finely, were the Earl of Moray’s only hope. He, in truth, was very near -finding himself in the position of a man who should have lit a fire to -keep wolves from his door. The flames catch the eaves and burn his house -down: behold him without shelter, and the wolves coming on! This is -exactly his own case. Kingship for the young man, by whose entangling he -had hoped to entangle his sister, was a noose round his own neck—the mere -threat of it was a noose. If he furthered it he was ruined; if he opposed -it—at this hour of the day—he might equally be ruined. All his hope lay -in England. Let the Queen of England send for her runaway subjects, and -then—why, he could begin again. As day succeeded to day, and favour to -favour—the dukedom conferred, the match in every one’s mouth, the Court -at Edinburgh, the Chapel Royal in fair view—he worked incessantly. He -dared not try the Italian again, lest the impudent dog should grin in his -face; but he secured Argyll and his friends, the Duke of Châtelherault -and his; he wrote to Lethington, to Mr. Cecil, to the Earl of Leicester, -to Queen Elizabeth. And so it befel that, one certain morning, English -Mr. Randolph faced the Lennoxes with his mistress’s clear commands. -Father and son were to return to England, or—— - -_Quos ego_—in fact; much too late for the fair. They took the -uncompromising message each after his kind: Lennox, white-haired, -ape-faced and fussy, sitting in his deep leather chair, rolling his -palms over the knobs of it, swinging his feet free of the ground; the -Prince his son stiff as a rod, standing, with one hand to his padded -hip—blockish and surly as a rogue mule. - -Lennox spoke first. ‘Hey, Master Randolph!’—his little naked eyes were -like pin-pricks—‘Hey, Master Randolph, I dare not do it. No, no. It’s not -in the power of man living to do the like of it.’ - -Randolph shifted his scrutiny. The Prince was angry, therefore bold; -assured, therefore haughty. - -‘And I, Randolph,’ he said, ‘tell you fairly that go I will not.’ - -Randolph became dry. ‘I hope my lord, for a better answer to the Queen -your sovereign. Will and Shall are bad travelling companions for a -legate. I urge once more your duty upon you.’ - -‘Duty!’ cried the flushed youth: ‘I own to no duty but Queen Mary’s, and -I never will. As to the other Queen, your mistress, who grudges me my -fortune, it is no wonder that she needs me. You will understand wherefore -in a few days’ time. I do not intend to return: there is your answer. I -am very well where I am, and likely to be better yet anon. So I purpose -to remain. There is your answer, which seems to me a good one.’ - -Randolph turned his back and left them. When he saw the Earl of Moray -he said that he had done his best to serve him; and that, although he -had no hope of staying the marriage, his lordship might count upon the -friendship of England in all enterprises he might think well to engage in -‘for the welfare of both realms.’ This was cold comfort. - -Shortly after this disappointment the careworn lord got into a wrangle -with the Prince in a public place—not a difficult thing to do. It began -with the young man’s loud rebuke of Mr. Knox, who (said he) had called -him ‘a covetous clawback,’ and whose ears he threatened to crop with a -pair of shears. Beginning in the vestibule of the Council-chamber, it was -continued on the open cawsey in everybody’s hearing. There was heat; the -younger may have raised his hand against the elder, or he may not. The -Earl, at any rate, declared that he went in fear of his life. Then came -the hour, most memorable, when he saw the Queen alone. - -He was sent for, and he came, as he told her at once, ‘with his life in -his hand.’ - -She asked him who would touch his hand, except to take it and shake it? - -‘One, madam,’ he replied darkly, ‘who is too near your Majesty for my -honour or——’ and there he stopped. - -‘Or mine, would you say?’ she flashed back at him—one of her penetrative -flashes, following a quick turn of the head. Remember, she knew nothing -of his brawl with the Prince. - -He disregarded her _riposte_, and pursued his suspicions. ‘Madam, madam, -I very well know—for I still have friends in Scotland—in what danger -I stand. I very well know who talked together against me behind the -back-gallery at Perth, and can guess at what was said, and how this late -discreditable scene was laid——’ - -‘Oh, you guess this, brother! you guess that!’ the Queen snapped at him; -‘I am weary of your guesses against my friends. There was the Earl of -Bothwell, whom you guessed your mortal enemy; now I suppose it is the -Prince, my husband. Do you think all Scotland finds you in the way? It is -easy for you to remove the suspicion.’ - -His looks reproached her. ‘Did you send for me, madam, to wound me?’ - -‘No, no. You have served me well. I am not unmindful.’ Her eyes grew -gentle as she remembered Wemyss and the hasty mysteries of the night—the -hurry, the whispered urgings, the wild-beating heart. She held out her -hand, shyly, as befitted recognition of a blushful service. ‘I can never -quarrel with you, brother, knowing what you know, remembering what you -have seen.’ - -Whither was fled the finer sense of the man? He misunderstood her -grossly, believing that she feared his knowledge. He did not take her -proffered hand—she drew it back after a while, slowly. - -‘You say well, sister,’ he answered, with cold reserve. ‘There should be -no quarrel, nor need there be, while you remember me—and yourself.’ - -‘It was not at all in my mind, I assure you,’ she told him, with an air -of dismissing the foolish thing; and went on, in the same breath, to -speak of the vexatious news from England—as if he and she were of the -same opinion about that! Her ‘good sister,’ she said, was holding strange -language, requiring the return of ‘subjects in contumacy,’ showing -herself offended at unfriendly dealing, and what not—letters, said Queen -Mary, which required speedy answer, and could have but one answer. The -Contract of Matrimony, in short, had been prepared by my Lord Morton, was -ready to be signed; the high parties were more than ready. Should she -send for the treaty? She wished her brother to see it. That was why she -had summoned him. - -He was seldom at a loss, for when direction failed him he had a store of -phrases ready to eke out the time. But now that he was plumply face to -face with what he had come both to hate and to fear, he stammered and -looked all about. - -She rang her hand-bell, and bade the page call Signior Davy ‘and the -parchment-writing’; then, while she waited in matronly calm, sedately -seated, hands in lap, he wrestled with his alarms, suspicions, -grievances, disgusts; saw them flare before him like shapes—lewd, satyr -shapes with their tongues out; lost control of himself, and broke out. - -‘The marriage-band, you speak of? Ah—ah—but there is much to say anent -such a thing—a tedious inquiry! Madam—madam—I should have exhibited to -you before—the fault is in me that I did not——There is a common sense -abroad—no man can fight a nation—it is thought that the case is altered. -Yes, yes! Monarchs—you that be set in authority over men—are to be -warned by them that stand about your thrones, monished and exhorted. ’Tis -your duty to listen, theirs to impart: duty to God and the conscience. I -am sore at a loss for words——’ - -Probably she had not been listening very closely, or heeding his -agitation. She stopped him with a little short laugh. - -‘Nay, ’tis not words you lack. Find courage, brother.’ - -‘Why, madam,’ said he, ‘and so I must. “It is expedient,” saith the Book, -“that one man die——”! What a whole nation dreads, there must be some one -to declare—even though, in so doing, he should seem to stultify himself. -Oh, madam, is not the case altered from what it promised at first? Alas, -what hope can we now have—seeing what we have seen—that this young man -will prove a setter-forth of Christ’s religion? Or how can we suppose -that he will ensue what we most desire—I mean the peace of God upon -true believers? Do they know him in England and suppose that of him? -Then how can we suppose it? Why, what token hath he showed towards the -faithful but that of rancour? What professions hath he made, save them of -mass-mongering, false prophecy, idolatry, loving darkness, shunning the -light? Oh, madam, I am sore to say these things——’ - -The Italian entered with his parchments before he could hurry to a close -or she stop him with an outcry. - -It needed not so quick an eye to sense the brewing of a storm. The Queen -sat back in her chair, cowering in the depths of it. Her eyes were -fastened upon a little glass bowl which stood on the table—in a broody -stare which saw nothing but midnight. The Earl, white to the edge of his -lips, was waving his hands in the air. Bright and confident, the Italian -stood at the door; but my lord, in his agitation, turned upon him. ‘Man, -you’re a trespasser. Off with you! The Queen is in council—off!’ - -‘_Scusì_,’ says Davy, ‘I am summoned. _Eccomi._’ - -He was dramatically quiet; he woke the Queen. - -She started from her chair and ran to him. ‘Oh, David, David, he denies -me! Perjury! Perjury!’ - -‘Sovereign lady,’ said the Italian, ‘here is one who will never deny you -anything.’ - -As he knelt my lord recovered his dignity. ‘It is not convenient, madam——’ - -Ah, but she faced about. ‘Convenient! convenient! To end what you have -begun? You! that led me to him! You that drove us in with your breath -like a sheet of flame!’ - -He put up his hand, driven to defend himself. ‘Nay, madam, nay! It cannot -be said. My design was never adopted—it was misunderstood. I bowed to no -idols—that be far from me. I was outside the door. I neither know what -was done within your chapel, nor afterwards within any chambers of the -house. My only office was——’ - -She held herself by the throat—all gathered together, as if she would -spring at him. - -Signior Davy looked mildly from one to the other. ‘_Scusì_,’ he said, his -voice soft as milk, ‘but your lordship was not outside _all_ doors. I -know to a point how much your lordship knows.’ - -The Earl gasped for breath. - -At this point the Queen seemed to have got strength through the hands. -She let them down from her neck, as if the spasm had passed. Her heart -spoke—a lyric cry. ‘He brought me to the chamber door, and kissed my -cheek, and wished me joy!’ She spoke like one enrapt, a disembodied -sprite, as if the soul could have seen the body in act, and now rehearse -the tale. ‘He led me to the chamber door, and kissed my cheek! “Sweet -night,” says he, “sweet sister! See how your dreams come true.” And -“Burning cheek!” says he; and “Fie, fie, the wild blood of a lass!” I -think my cheek did prophesy, and burn for the shame to come.’ She turned -them a tragic shape—drawn mouth, great eyes, expository hands. ‘Why, -sirs, if a groom trick a poor wench and deny her her lines, you put her -up in a sheet, and freeze the vice out of her with your prying eyes! Get -you a white sheet for Queen Mary and stare the devil out of her! Go you: -why do you wait? Ah, pardon, I had forgot!’ She exhibited one to the -other. ‘This man has no time to spare that he may chastise the naughty. -The throned is made shameful that the throne may be emptied. Give him a -leg, David; he will stand your friend for it.’ - -‘Dear madam! sweet madam!’ murmured the Italian. - -But she had left him now for the white skulker by the door. ‘Oh you, you, -you, in your hurry!’ she mocked him, ‘deny me not my shroud and candle. -For if you are to sit in my seat I will stand at the kirk gate and cry -into all hearts that go by, “See me here as I stand in my shroud. I am -the threshold he trod upon. He reached his degree o’er the spoils of -a girl.”’ She came closer to him, peering and whispering. ‘And I will -be nearer, my lord, whenas you are dead. I will flit over the graves -of the kings my ancestors till I find the greenest, and there shall I -sit o’ nights, chattering your tale to the men that be there with their -true-born about them. “Ho, you that were lawful kings of Scotland, listen -now to me!” I shall say. And they will lift their heads in their vaults -and lean upon their bony elbows at ease and hear of your shameful birth -and life of lies and treasons, and most miserable death. And you in your -cerements will lie close, I think, my brother, lest the very dead turn -their backs on you.’ - -She stopped, struggling for breath. The dangerous ecstasy held her still, -like a _rigor_; but he, who with shut eyes and fending arms had been -avoiding, now lifted his head. - -‘You misjudge me—you are too hasty——’ - -As a woman remote from him and his affairs she answered him, ‘Not so. But -I have been too slow.’ - -‘Your Majesty should see——’ - -She sprang into vehemence, transfigured once more by fierce and terrible -beauty. - -‘I do see. You are a liar. I see you through and through, and the lies, -like snakes, in your heart. I will never willingly see you again.’ - -Still he tried to reason with her. ‘If accommodation of joint griefs——’ - -‘None! There can be none. Where do we join, sir? Tell me, and I will burn -the part.’ - -‘Dear sir,’ said the Italian, as she paced the room, gathering more -eloquence—‘dear sir, I advise you to depart.’ - -The Earl was stung by the familiarity. ‘Be silent, fellow. Madam, suffer -me one more word.’ - -‘You drown in your words. Therefore, yes.’ - -He gathered his wits together for this poor opportunity. ‘I have been -misjudged,’ he said, ‘and know very well to whom I stand debtor for that. -Nevertheless, I would still serve your Grace in chamber and in hall, so -far as my conscience will suffer me. I say, that is my desire. But if you -drive me from you; if I am turned from my father’s birthright——I beseech -you to consider with what painful knowledge I depart. If I have witnessed -unprincely dealing in high places——’ - -She openly scorned him. ‘Drown, sir, drown! No, stay. I will throw you a -plank.’ - -She rang the bell. Des-Essars answered. ‘If my lord the Chancellor is in -hall, or in the precincts in any part, I desire his presence here. If he -is abroad, send Mr. Erskine—and with speed.’ - -The boy withdrew. She sat, staring at nothing. The two men stood. -Absolute silence. - - * * * * * - -The Chancellor happened to be by. He was found in the tennis-court, -calling the game. Much he pondered the summons, and scratched in his red -beard. - -‘Who is with the Queen, laddie?’ - -He was told, the Italian and my Lord of Moray. Making nothing of it, he -whistled for his servant, who lounged with others at the door. - -‘Hurry, Jock Scott! my cloak, sword, and bonnet. At what hour is the -Council?’ - -‘My lord, at noon.’ - -He went off, muttering, ‘What’s in the wind just now?’ and as he went -by the great entry saw the guard running, and heard a shout: ‘Room for -the Prince’s grace!’ He could see the plumes of the riders and the press -about them. ‘It’ll be a new cry before long, I’m thinking,’ he said to -himself, and went upstairs. - -Entering that silent room, he bent his knee to the Queen. She did not -notice his reverence, but said at once: ‘My Lord Chancellor, I shall -not sit at the Council to-day. You will direct the clerk to add a -_postill_[3] to the name of my Lord of Moray here.’ - -‘Madam, with good will. What shall his _postill_ be?’ - -‘You shall write against his name, _Last time he sits_. I know that your -business is heavy. Farewell, my lords.’ - -Morton and Moray went out together. At the end of the corridor and head -of the stair, Morton stopped. - -‘Man, my Lord of Moray, what is this?’ - -For answer, the Earl of Moray looked steadily at him for a moment: then, -‘Come, come,’ he said, ‘we must go to our work, you and I.’ - -They said no more; but went through the hall, and heard the Prince’s -ringing voice, high above all the others, calling for ‘that black thief -Ruthven.’ They saluted a few and received many salutations. Lord John -Stuart passed them, his arm round the neck of his Spanish page, and -stared at his brother without greeting. These two hated each other, as -all the world knew. That same night the Earl of Moray left Edinburgh, and -went into Argyll, where all his friends were. It was to be nine months -before he could lay his head down in his own house again. - - * * * * * - -Very little passed between the Queen and her Secretary. She sat quite -still, staring and glooming; he moved about, touching a thing here and -there, like a house-servant who, by habit, dusts the clean furniture. -This brought him by degrees close to her chair. Then he said quickly, -‘Madam, let me speak.’ - -‘Ay, speak, David.’ - -‘Madam,’ he said, ‘this is not likely to be work for fair ladies, though -they be brave as they are fair. I have seen it growing—this disturbance—a -many days. He is not alone by any means, my lord your brother. Madam, -send a messenger into France. Send your little Jean-Marie.’ - -She looked up. ‘Into France?’ - -‘Madam, yes. Send a messenger into France. Let him fetch home the Earl of -Bothwell.’ - -She started. ‘Him?’ - -Riccio nodded his head quickly. - -Whereupon she said, ‘He is not in France.’ - -‘Send for him, madam,’ said Riccio, ‘wheresoever he may be—him and no -other. Remember also—but no hurry for that—that you have my Lord Gordon -under your hand. At need, remember him. A fine young man! But the other! -Oh, send quickly for him! Eh, eh, what a captain against rebels!’ He -could not see her face; her hand covered it. - -‘I will think of this,’ she said. ‘Go now. Send me Carwood: I am mortally -tired.’ Carwood was her bedchamber-woman. - - * * * * * - -There was a riot on the night following the proclamation of King Henry, -begun by some foaming fool in the Luckenbooths. Men caught him with a -candle in his hand, burning straw against a shop door. ‘What are ye for? -What are ye for?’ they cried at him, and up he jumped with the fired -wisp in his hand, and laughed, calling out, ‘I am the muckle devil! Come -for the popish King!’ The words fired more than the brand, for people -ran hither and thither carrying their fierce relish, feeding each other. -The howling and tussling of men and women alike raged in and out of -the wynds. It was noticed that nearly all the women took the Queen’s -part, and fought against the men—a thing seldom seen in Edinburgh. In a -desultory way, with one or two bad outbreaks, of which the worst was in -the Grassmarket, where they stoned a man and a girl to death, it lasted -all night. The Lord Lyon had his windows broken. Mr. Knox quelled the -infuriates of the High Street. - -This was on the night of July 28th, very hot weather. On the morning -of the 30th she was married in her black weeds—for so she chose it, -saying that she had been married already in colour, and as her lord was -possessed of the living, so now he should own the dead part of her. She -heard mass alone, for the Prince would not go to that again; but the -Earl of Atholl stood by her, while Lennox waited in the antechapel with -his son. Mass over, the words were spoken, rings put on. He had one and -she three. They knelt side by side and heard the prayers; she bowed -herself to the pavement, but he was very stiff. They rose; he gave her -a kiss. When her women came about her he went away to her cabinet and -waited for her there, quiet and self-possessed, not answering any of his -father’s speeches. - -Presently they bring him in the Queen, with coaxings and entreaties. - -‘Now, madam, now! Do off your blacks. Come, never refuse us!’ - -She laughed and shook her head, looking sidelong at her husband. - -‘Yes, yes,’ they cry, ‘we will ask the King, madam, since you are so -perverse. Sir, give us leave.’ - -‘Ay, ay, ladies, unpin her,’ he says. - -Mary Sempill cried, ‘Come, my ladies! Come, sirs! Help her shed her -weeds.’ She took out a shoulder-pin, and the black shroud fell away -from her bosom. Mary Fleming let loose her arms; Mary Seton, kneeling, -was busy about her waist; Mary Beaton flacked off the great hood. -Atholl, Livingstone, Lennox, all came about her, spoiling her of her old -defences. When the black was all slipped off, she stood displayed in -figured ivory damask, with a bashful, rosy, hopeful face. Atholl took a -hand, Lennox the other. - -‘By your leave, sweet madam.’ They led her to the young man. - -‘She is yours, sir, by her own free will. God bless the mating!’ - -Then, when they had all gone tumbling out of the room, and you could have -heard their laughter in the passages, she stood before him with her hands -clasped. ‘Yes, my lord, I am here. Use me well.’ - -He gave a toss of the head; laughed aloud as he took her. - -‘Ay, my Mary, I have thee now!’ - -He held her close, looking keenly into her hazel eyes. He kissed her -mouth and neck, held up his head, and cheered like a hunter. ‘The mort o’ -the deer! The mort o’ the deer! ‘Ware hounds, ‘ware! Let the chief take -assay.’ - - * * * * * - -The head of the Hamiltons, the head of the Campbells, the head of the -Leslies, were all in Argyll with the Earl of Moray. Mr. Knox was with -his young wife; Mr. Randolph kept his lodging; the Earl of Bothwell was -at sea, beating up north; and my Lord Gordon, new released from prison, -was with his mother and handsome sister Jean. None of these were at the -marriage, nor bidden to the marriage supper. But there came a decent -man, Mr. George Buchanan, affording himself an epithalamy, and received -in recompense the Queen’s and King’s picture set in brilliants. This did -not prevent him from casting up his hands in private before Mr. Knox. The -great elder watched him grimly. - -‘So the wilful lass has got her master! And a pranking rider for a bitter -jade! Man, George,’ he said, looking critically through him, ‘in my -opinion you are a thin, truckling body.’ - -[3] _Postill_, a marginal note. - - -END OF MAIDS’ ADVENTURE - - - - -BOOK THE SECOND - -MEN’S BUSINESS - - - - -CHAPTER I - -OPINIONS OF FRENCH PARIS UPON SOME LATE EVENTS - - -Nicholas the lacquey, whom they call ‘French Paris,’ can neither read -nor write, nor cipher save with notches in a wand; but he has travelled -much, and in shrewd company; and has seen things—whatever men may do—of -interest moral and otherwise. And whether he work his sum by aid of -his not over-orderly notches, or upon his not over-scrupulous fingers, -the dog can infer; he will get the quotient just, and present it you -in divers tongues, with divers analogies drawn from his knowledge of -affairs: France, England, the Low Countries, Upper Italy, the Debateable -Land—from one, any, or all, French Paris can pick his case in point. -Therefore, his thoughts upon events in Scotland, both those which led -to his coming thither in the train of my Lord Bothwell, his master, and -those which followed hard upon it, should be worth having, if by means of -a joke and a crown-piece one could get at them. - -You may see the man, if you will, lounging any afternoon away with his -fellows on the cawsey—by the Market Cross, in the parvise of Saint -Giles’s, by the big house at the head of Peebles Wynd (‘late my Lord -of Moray’s,’ he will tell you with a wink), or, best of all, in the -forecourt of Holyrood—holding his master’s cloak upon his arm. He is -to be known at once by the clove carnation or sprig of rosemary in his -mouth, and by his way of looking Scotchwomen in their faces with that -mixture of impudence and _naïveté_ which his nation lends her sons. -Being whose son he is, he will be a smooth-chinned, lithe young man, -passably vicious, and pale with it; grey in the eye, dressed finely in -a good shirt, good jacket and breeches. But for certain these two last -will not meet; the snowy lawn will force itself between, and, like a -vow of continence, sunder two loves. Paris will be tender of his waist. -He will look at all women as they pass, not with reverence (as if they -were a holier kind of flesh), but rather, like his namesake, as if he -held the apple weighing in his hand. Seems to have no eye for men—will -tell you, if you ask him of them, that there are none in Scotland but -his master and Mr. Knox; and yet can judge them quicker than any one. It -was he who said of the King, having seen him but once, after supper, at -Stirling: ‘This young man fuddles himself to brave out his failure. He is -frigid—wants a sex.’ And of the Queen, on the same short acquaintance, -but helped by hearsay: ‘She had been so long the pet of women that she -thought herself safe with any man. But now she knows that it takes more -than a cod-piece to make a man. Trust Paris.’ Trust Paris! A crown will -purchase the rogue, and yet he has a kind of faithfulness. He will endure -enormously for his master’s sake, shun no fatigues, wince at no pain, -consider no shame—to be sure, he has none—blink at few perils. Talk to -him, having slipped in your crown, he will be frank. He will tell you of -his master. - -A quick word of thanks, whistled off into the air, will introduce him to -the broad piece. He will give it a flick in the air, catch it as it comes -down, rattle it in his hollowed palm, with a grin into your face. ‘This -is the upright servant, this pretty knave,’ he will say of his coin. -‘For, look you, sir, this white-faced, thin courtier is the one in all -the world whom you need not buy for more than his value. God of Gods, if -my master thought fully of it he would be just such another. Because it -is as plain as a monk’s lullaby that, if you need not give more for him -than he is worth, you cannot give less!’ - -His master, you have been told, is the great Earl of Bothwell, now Lord -Admiral of Scotland, Lieutenant-General of the East, West, and Middle -Marches, and right hand of the Queen’s Majesty. How is the story of so -high a man involved in your crown-piece? Why, thus. - -French Paris displays the coin. ‘Do you see these two children’s faces, -these sharp and tender chins, these slim necks, these perching crowns? -What says the circumscription? MARIA ET HENRICUS D. G. SCOTORUM REGINA ET -REX. How! the mare before the sire? You have touched, sir!’ For observe, -Paris’ master came into Scotland, a pardoned rebel, because this legend -at first had run HENRICUS ET MARIA REX ET REGINA, and there was outcry -raised, flat rebellion. And so surely, says Paris, as he had come, and -been received, him with his friends, and had given that quick shake of -the head (which so well becomes him), and lifted his war-shout of ‘Hoo! -hoo! A Hepburn, hoo!’—so surely they struck a new coinage, at this very -Christmas past—and here we are over Candlemas—with MARIA ET HENRICUS, and -the mare before the sire. ‘That is how my master came back to Scotland, -sir, and here upon the face of your bounty you see the _prémices_. But -there will be a more abundant harvest, if I mistake not the husbandman.’ - -‘That is a droll reflection for me,’ he will add, ‘who have been with my -master as near beggary as a swan in the winter, and nearer to death than -the Devil can have understood. I have served him here and there for many -years—Flanders, Brabant, Gueldres, Picardy, Savoy, England. Do you happen -to know the port of Yarmouth? They can drink in Yarmouth. I have hidden -with him in the hills of this country: that was when he had broken out of -prison in this town, and before he hanged Pringle with his own hands. I -have skulked there, I say, until the fog rotted my bones. I have sailed -the seas in roaring weather, and upon my word, sir, have had experiences -enough to make the fortune of a preacher. There was a pirate of Brill -in our company, Oudekirk by name, who denied the existence of God in a -tempest, and perished by a thunderbolt. Pam! It clove him. “There is no -God!” cried he, and with the last word there was a blare of white light, -a crackling, hissing, tearing noise, a crash; and when we looked at -Oudekirk one side of him was coal-black from the hair to the midriff, -and his jaws clamped together! But I could not tell you all—some is not -very convenient, I must allow. - -‘We were at Lille when the Queen’s messenger—the little smutty-eyed -Brabanter—found us. He brought two letters: the Queen’s very short, a -stiff letter of recall, promising pardon “as you behave yourself towards -us.” The other was from that large Italian, who sprawls where he ought -not, in his own tongue; as much as may be, like this:— - -‘“Most serene, cultivable lord, it is very certain that if you come -to this country you will be well received; the more so, seeing that -certain of your unfriends (he meant Monsieur de Moray) have been treated -lately as they well deserve. The Queen weds Prince Henry Stuart, of whom -I will only write that I wish he were older and more resembled your -magnificence.” - -‘All Italians lie, sir; yet so it is that their lies always please you. -You may be sure my master needed no more encouragement to make his -preparation of travel. It was soon after this that he showed me a glove -he had, and an old letter of the Queen’s. We were in his bedchamber, he -in his bed. He has many such pledges, many and many, but he was sure of -this glove because it was stiff in two fingers. When he told me that he -intended for Scotland and must take the glove with him, I said, “Master, -be careful what you are about. It is certain that the Queen will know her -own glove again, and should this prove the wrong one it will be worse for -you than not to show it at all.” - -‘“Pooh, man,” says he, “the glove is right enough. There are no others -stiff from a wetting. But look and see. Let’s be sure.” - -‘It was true there were no others quite so stiff in the fingers. Tears -had done it, the letter said: but who knows, with women?’ French Paris, -here, would give a hoist to his breeches. - -‘In September last we made land, after a chase in furious weather. An -English ship sighted us off Holy Island: we ran near to be aground on -that pious territory, but our Lady or Saint Denis, or a holy partnership -between them, saved us. They sent out a long boat to head us into shoal -water; we slipped in between. My master had the helm and rammed it down -with his heel; we came about to the wind, we flew, with the water hissing -along the gunwale. We saw them in the breakers as we gained the deeps. -“There goes some beef into the pickle-tub!” cried he, and stood up and -hailed them with mockery. “Sooner you than me, ye drowning swine!” he -roars against the tempest. Such a man is my master. - -‘We found anchorage at Eyemouth, and pricked up the coast-road to this -place. The war—if you can call it war, which was a chasing of rats in -a rickyard—was as good as over, but by no means the cause of war. The -Queen was home from the field, where they tell me she had shown the -most intrepid front of any of her company. Not much to say, perhaps. -Yet remember that she had Monsieur de Huntly with her, that had been -Gordon—a fine stark man, like a hawk, whom she had set free from prison -and restored to his Earldom before the rebellion broke out; and he is -passably courageous. But it was a valet of his, Forbes, “red Sandy -Forbes,” they call him, who told me that he had never in his life seen -anything like the Queen of Scots upon that hunting of outlaws. Think -of this, dear sir! The King in a gilt corslet, casque of feathers, red -cloak and all, greatly attended by his Englishmen—his pavilion, his bed, -his cooks and scullions; his pampered, prying boys, his little Forrest, -his little Ross, his Jack and his Dick; with that greyhead, bowing, -soft-handed cousin of his, Monsieur Archibald, for secretary—hey? Very -good: you picture the young man And she!’ French Paris threatens you with -one finger, presented like a pistol at your eyes. ‘She had one lady of -company, upon my soul, one only, the fair Seton; that one and no other -with her in a camp full of half-naked, cannibal men—for what else are -they, these Scots? She wore breastplate and gorget of leather, a leather -cap for her head, a short red petticoat, the boots of a man. As for her -hair, it streamed behind her like a pennon in the wind. It was hell’s -weather, said Sandy Forbes; rain and gusty wind, freshening now and -again to tempest; there were quags to be crossed, torrents to be forded; -the rain drove like sleet across the hills. Well, she throve upon it, her -eyes like stars. There was no tarrying because of her; she raced like a -coursing dog, and nearly caught the Bastard of Scotland. He was the root -of all mischance, as always in a kingdom; for a bastard, do you see? -means fire somewhere. Have you ever heard tell of my Lord Don John of -Austria? Ah, if we are to talk of fire, look out for him. - -‘It was in the flats below Stirling that she felt the scent hot in her -face. The Bastard had had six hours’ start; but if spurring could have -brought horses to face that weather, she had had him in jail at this -hour, or in Purgatory. “Half my kingdom,” cries she, “sooner than lose -him now!” But he got clear away, he and Monsieur le Duc, and the old Earl -of Argyll, and Milord Rothes and the rest of them. They crossed the March -into England, and she dared not follow them against advice. My master, -when he came, confirmed it: he would not have her venture, knowing -England as well as he did; and I need not tell you, sir, that—for that -once—he had the support of the King. He was out of breath, that King! -But, of course! If you drink to get courage you must pay for it. Your -wind goes, and then where is your courage? In the bottle, in the bottle! -You drink again—and so you go the vicious round.’ French Paris flips his -finger and thumb, extinguishing the King of Scots. ‘The King, sir? Pouf! -Perished, gone out, snuffered out, finished, done with—adieu!’ He kisses -his hand to the sky. This is treason: let us shift our ground. - -‘I did not see my master’s reception, down there in the palace: that was -not for a lacquey. Very fine, very curious, knowing what I know. They -met him in the hall, a number of the lords—none too friendly as yet, but -each waiting on the other to get a line: my Lord of Atholl, a grave, -honest man, my Lord of Ruthven, pallid, mad and struggling with his -madness, my Lord of Lindsay, who ought to be a hackbutter, or a drawer in -a tavern; there were many others, men of no account. My master entered -on the arm of the new Earl of Huntly, just restored, the fine young -man, to the honours of his late father. In this country, you must know, -a certain number of the lords are always in rebellion against the King. -He imprisons, not executes, them; for he knows very well that before long -another faction will be out against him; and then it is very convenient -to release the doers in the former. For by that act of grace you convert -them into friends, who will beat your new foes for you. They in their -turn go to prison. You know the fate of M. de Huntly’s father, for -instance—how he rebelled and died, and was dug out of the grave that they -might spit upon his old body? The Bastard’s doing, but the Queen allowed -it. And now, here is the Bastard hiding in the rocks, and old Huntly’s -son hunting him high and low. _Drôle de pays!_ But, I was about to tell -you, rebels though we have been, they received us well—crowded about -us—clapped our shoulders—cheered, laughed, talked all at once. My master -was nearly off his feet as they bore him down the hall towards the fire. -Now, there by the fire, warming himself, stood a nobleman, very broad in -the back, very pursy, with short-fingered, fat hands, and well-cushioned -little eyes in his face. So soon as he saw us coming he grew red and -walked away. - -‘“Ho, ho, my Lord of Morton, whither away so fast?” cried out my master. - -‘And my Lord of Livingstone said: “To sit on the Great Seal, lest Davy -get it from him”; and they all burst out laughing like a pack of boys. -I suppose he is still sitting close, for he has not been seen this long -time. - -‘We sent up our names and waited—but we waited an hour! Then came my Lord -of Traquair and took up my master alone. He had his glove and letter with -him, I knew. He was determined to risk them. - -‘The Queen had nobody with her; and he told me that the first thing she -said to him was this:—“My lord, you have things of mine which I need. -Will you not give them to me?” - -‘He took them out of his bosom—if you know him you will see his twinkling -eyes, never off her—and held them up. “They have been well cared for, -madam. I trust that your Majesty will be as gentle with them.” - -‘“They are safe with me,” says the Queen. So then, after a fine -reverence, he gave them up, and she thanked him, and put them in her -bosom; and I would give forty crowns to know where they are now. I know -where they will be before long. - -‘Now what do you think of that? It shows you, first, that he was right -and I wrong; for she never looked at the thing, and any woman’s glove -would have done, with a little sea-water on the fingers. My master, -let me tell you, is a wise man, even at his wildest. He did more good -to himself by that little act than by any foolish play of the constant -lover. He showed her that she might trust him. True. But much more than -that, he showed her that he did not need her tokens; and that was the -master-stroke. - -‘The same line he has followed ever since—he alone, like the singling -hound in a pack. He has held her at arm’s length. She has trusted him, -and shown it; he has served her well, but at arm’s length. That Italian -fiddler, rolling about in her chamber, too much aware of his value, takes -another way. Lord forgive him! he is beginning to play the patron. That -can only lead him to one place, in my opinion. Hated! that is a thin word -to use in his respect. He makes the lords sick with fear and loathing. -They see a toad in the Queen’s lap, as in the nursery tale, and no one -dare touch the warty thing, to dash it to the wall. My master would dare, -for sure; but he does not choose. For all that, he says that Monsieur -David is a fool. - -‘It is when I am trussing him in the mornings, kneeling before him, that -he speaks his mind most freely. He is like that—you must be beneath his -notice to get his familiarity. Do you know the course he takes here in -this world of rats and women? To laugh, and laugh, and laugh again: -_voilà!_ He varies his derision, of course. He will not rally the King -or put him to shame, but listens, rather, and watches, and nods his head -at his prancings, and says, “Ha, a fine bold game, now!”; or, if he is -appealed to directly, will ask, “Sir, what am I to say to you? the same -as Brutus said to Cæsar?” “And what said Brutus?” cries the King. “Why, -sir,” replies my master, “he said, Sooner you than me, Cæsar.” That is -his favourite adage. And so he plays with the King, his eyes twinkling -and his mouth broad, but no teeth showing. He shows neither his teeth nor -his hand. He is a good card-player; and so he should be, who has been at -the table with the Queen-Mother Catherine, daughter of Mischief and the -Apothecary. - -‘The King hates my master without understanding; the Queen leans on him -to gain understanding; but she has not gained it yet. You may trust my -lord for that. Did you hear of the mass on Candlemas Day, a week past -to-day? How she thought this a fine occasion to restore the ancient use: -her enemies beaten over the border, all her friends should carry tapers, -so that the Queen of Heaven might be purified again of her spotless -act? She required it personally of all the lords, one by one, herself -beseeching them with soft eyes and motions of the hands hard to be -denied. Moreover, she is to have need of purification herself if all goes -well. For she is ... but you can judge for yourself. Many promised her -on whom she had not counted; my master, on whom she did count, refused -her point-blank. The strangest part of the business is, however, that his -credit is higher now than it was before. So much so that she has made -him a fine marriage. Monsieur de Huntly’s sister is the lady; I have -seen her, but reserve my judgment. I think that she will not like me—I -feel it in the ridges of my ears, a very sensitive part with me. She was -in the Queen’s circle one day—the day on which I saw her—a statue of a -woman, upon whom the Queen cast the eyes of that lover who goes to church -to view his mistress afar off, and has no regard for any but her, and -waits and hopes, and counts every little turn of her head—as patient as -a watching dog. Curious! curious government of women! Hey—pardon! The -Council is up. I must be forward. Sir, I thank you, and humbly salute -you.’ - -French Paris pushes through the huddle of servants, the rosemary sprig in -his mouth. - -My Lord Admiral the Earl of Bothwell comes out one of the first, between -the Lords Seton and Caithness. He talks fast, you notice, with a good -deal of wrist and finger-work, acknowledges no salutations though he is -offered many. My Lord Seton takes them all upon himself, misses not one. -The Earl of Caithness is an oldish man, rather hard of hearing. Heeding -nobody, speaking as he feels, laughing at his own jokes, capping one with -another, the burly admiral stands barehead in the raw drizzle, swinging -his feathered hat in his hand. There seems much to say, if he could only -remember it, and no hurry. Horses are brought up, gentlemen mount by the -post and spur away. Three ushers come running, waving their wands. ‘Sirs, -the King!’ The crowd gathers; the Lord Admiral continues his conversation. - -The King comes out, taller by a head than most, exceedingly magnificent, -light-haired, hot in the face. Hats and bonnets are doffed, but in -silence. The great grey stallion with red trappings is his; and he can -hold it though two grooms cannot well. He stands for a while, pulling -on his gauntlet, scowling and screwing his mouth as he tussles with it. -But the scowls, you gather, are less for the glove than for a calm-eyed, -fleshy, pink man with a light red beard, who has emerged but just now; -whose furred cloak is over-fringed, whose bonnet sags too much over one -eye, the jewel in it too broad. This is Signior Davy, too cool and too -much master to please one who is hot and not master of himself. You can -see the King’s mood grow furious to the point of unreason, while my Lord -Bothwell continues his tales, and the Italian, secure in a crowd, seems -to be daring an attack. - -The King is mounted, the King is away. The crowd drives back to right and -left. He goes swinging down the steep street, his gentlemen after him. -The Earl of Bothwell calls out, ‘Paris, my cloak.’ - -Paris turns the rosemary sprig. ‘Le voici, monseigneur.’ - -He walks away to his lodging like any plain burgess of the town, and -Paris trips jauntily after him, looking Scotchwomen in the face. - - - - -CHAPTER II - -GRIEFS AND CONSOLATIONS OF ADONIS - - -In these dark February days the King was prone to regard his troubles -as the consequence, and not the verification, of certain words spoken -by Archie Douglas on the braeside by Falkirk—that being a trick of the -unreasonable, to date their misfortunes from the time when they first -find them out. And yet it was an odd thing that Archie should have spoken -in his private ear shortly after Michaelmas, and that here was Candlemas -come and gone, with everything turning to prove Archie right. Now, which -of the three was the grey-polled youth—prophet, philosopher, or bird of -boding? - -Consider his Majesty’s affairs in order. The Queen, before marriage and -at the time of it, had been as meek as a girl newly parted from her -mother, newly launched from that familiar shore to be seethed in the -deep, secret waters of matrimony. Something of that exquisite docility -he had discerned when he experienced, for instance, the prerogatives of -a man. One name before another is a very small matter; but it had given -him a magnanimous thrill to read HENRICUS ET MARIA upon the white money, -and to feel the confidence that HENRICUS ET MARIA, in very fact, it was -now and was to be. Little things of the sort swelled his comfort up: the -style royal, the chief seat, the gravity of the Council (attendant upon -his), the awe of the mob, the Italian’s punctilio, his father’s unfeigned -reverence. Even Mr. Randolph’s remarked abstention was flattering, for -it must have cost the ambassador more to ignore the King than the King -could ever have to pay for the slight. Now, a man needs time to get the -flavours of such toothsome tribute; he must roll it on his tongue, dally -over it with his intimates. Little Forrest, the chamber-child, could -have told a thing or two: how the King used to wear his gold circlet in -private, and walk the room in his crimson mantle. Antony Standen knew -something. Yes, yes, a man needs time; and such time was denied him—and -(by Heaven!) denied him by the Queen herself. - -By the Queen! From the hour when she heard the news from Argyll, that -the rebels, her brother at their head, had called out the clans of the -west—Campbells, Leslies, Hamiltons—against her authority, she was a -creature whom her King had never conceived of. He was told by Archie -Douglas then, and partly believed, that she was slighting him; but the -plain truth is, of course, that all her keen love for him was running now -in a narrow channel—that of strenuous loyalty to the young man she had -chosen to set beside her. These hounds to deny his kingly right! Let them -learn then what a King he was, for what a King she held him! She strained -every nerve, put edge to every wit in his vindication. While he lay abed, -stretching, dreaming—sometimes of her, more often of her love for him, -most often of what he should do when he was fairly roused: ‘Let them not -try me too far, little Forrest! I say, they had best not!’ etc.—at these -times she was in her cabinet with the Italian, writing to her brother -of France, her father of Rome, her uncles and cousins of Lorraine, -promising, wheedling, threatening, imploring. Or she was in audience, -say, with George Gordon, winning back his devotion with smiles and tender -looks, with a hand to the chin, or two clasping her knee—with all the -girlish wiles she knew so well and so divinely used. For his sake—that -slug-abed—she dared see Bothwell again; and greater pride hath no woman -than this, to brave the old love for the sake of the new. Finally, when -cajolery and bravado had done their best for her, she sprang starry-eyed -into battle, headed her ragged musters in a short petticoat, and dragged -him after her in gilded armour. That is what a man—by the mass, a -King!—may fairly call being docked of his time to get the flavours. - -He went out unwillingly to war, with sulky English eyes for all the petty -detriments. He sniffed at her array, her redshanks armed with bills, her -Jeddart bowmen, haggard hillmen from Badenoch and Gowrie. Where were -the broad pavilions, the camp-furniture, the pennons and pensels, the -siege-train, the led horses, the Prince’s cloth of estate? Was he to -huddle with reivers under a pent of green boughs, and with packed cowdung -keep the wind from his anointed person? King of kings, Ruler of princes! -was _she_ to do the like? How she laughed, tossed back her hair, to hear -him! - -‘Hey, dear heart, you are in wild Scotland, where all fare alike. O King -of Scots, forget your smug England, and teach me, the Queen, to laugh at -stately France! Battle, my prince, battle! The great game!’ - -She galloped down the line, looking back for him to follow. Line! it was -no line, but a jostling horde of market-drovers clumped upon a knowe. -There were no formation, no livery, no standard—unless that scarecrow -scarf were one. Why should he follow her to review a pack of thieves? - -Hark, hark, how the rascals cheered her! They ran all about her, tossing -up their bonnets on pikes. They were insulting her. - -‘By God!’ he cried out, ‘who was to teach them behaviour? Was this the -King’s office?’ - -‘It is the Queen’s, my good lord; she will teach them,’ said the Italian -at his elbow. ‘And what her Majesty omits the enemy will teach them, at -his own charges. I know your countrymen by now. Manners? Out of place in -the field. Courage? They have never wanted for that.’ - -The King grew red, as he tried in vain to stare down this confident -knave; then turned to his Archie Douglas. ‘A company of my Lord Essex’s -horse,’ he said, ‘would drill these rabble like a maggoty cheese.’ - -Archie excused his nation. ‘They will trot the haggs all day, sir, on a -crust of rye-bread, and engage at the close for a skirl of the pipes. -Hearken! they are at it now. ’Tis the Gordons coming in.’ The thin youth -drew himself up. ‘Eh, sirs, my heart warms to it!’ he said, honestly -moved by an honest pride. - -But the King sulked. ‘Filthy work! Where are my people? Ho, you! my -cloak!’ - -‘Ay, there comes a spit o’ rain,’ said Archie Douglas, nosing the -weather. This was no way for a man to get the flavours of kingship. - -In the chase that followed—forced marches on Glasgow after old -Châtelherault, the scouring of the Forth valley, the view-halloo at -Falkirk, and much more—the Queen had to leave him alone, for so he chose -it; and there was no time to humour him, had there been inclination. -But truly there was none. She had the sting of weather and the scurry -in her blood; she was in perfect health, great spirits, loving the -work. Hunter’s work! the happy oblivion of the short night’s rest, -the privations, the relish of simple fare, the spying and hoping, the -searching of hillsides and descents into sombre valleys, your heart in -your mouth; all the trick and veer of mountain warfare, the freedoms, the -easy talk, the laughing, the horseplay; she found nothing amiss, kept no -state, and never felt the lack of it. The Italian and his letter-case, -Lethington and his dockets, were behind. Atholl watched Edinburgh Castle -for her, Bothwell was coming home; she had none with her but Mary Seton -for countenance, Carwood for use, one page (Adam Gordon), one esquire -(Erskine), and Father Roche. For the rest, her cousin and councillor and -open-air comrade was George Gordon, late in bonds. So sometimes a whole -day would pass without word to the King; later, as at Falkirk, where the -scent had been so hot, three or four days; and she never missed him! - -This was the occasion when Archie Douglas, riding with his kinsman, had -pointed to the head of the valley, saying, ‘There goes a man in good -company, who lately was glad of any.’ The King scowled, which encouraged -him. ‘Ay,’ he went on—‘ay, the favour of the prince can lift up and cast -down. Who’d ha’ thought, sirs, that yon Geordie Gordon should be son of a -disgraced old body, that must be dug free from the worms before he could -be punished enough? And now Geordie’s in a fair way for favours, and hath -his bonny earldom almost under his hand. Eh, sirs, that put your trust in -princes, go warily your ways!’ - -Ruthven, by his side, nudged him to be done with it. - -‘No, no, my lord,’ cries Archie, ‘I’ll not be silenced when I see my -kinsman slighted; him and his high rights passed over for an outlaw!’ - -These words were used, ‘slighted,’ ‘passed over.’ The words rankled, the -things signified came to pass, as surprisingly they will when once you -begin to look for them. - -First sign:—Early in the winter, so soon as the war was over and Scotland -ridded for a time of declared enemies, the Earl of Bothwell came home -whilst the King was at Linlithgow, was received by her Majesty, and (it -seems) made welcome. No doubt but he made use of her kindness to line his -own nest; at any rate, one of the first things asked of the returning -monarch was to appoint this Bothwell Lieutenant-General of the South -and Lord Admiral of Scotland. The parchments came before him for the -sign-manual. O prophet Archibald! he found the Queen’s name already upon -them. - -He raised an outcry. ‘The Earl of Bothwell! The Earl of Bothwell! How -much more grace for this outlaw? Is it not enough that he return with his -head on his shoulders?’ - -She replied that he had deserved well of both of them. He had scared her -shameful brother out of Scotland, who would have gone for no other body. -He had a stout heart, had promised her that Moray should die an alien or -a felon, and would keep his word. - -‘But this office is a promise to my father, madam,’ says the King. ‘I -promised him that Lieutenancy six months since, and may no more go back -upon my word than my Lord Bothwell upon his.’ - -Rather red in the face, she urged her reasons. ‘That is not convenient, -dear friend. They do not love my Lord of Lennox in the West. There are -other reasons—good reasons. Had you been here you would have heard them -all. You must not vex me in this, now—of all times in my life.’ - -He looked her up and down curiously, without manners, without enthusiasm. -Perhaps he did not understand her—he had a thick head. Then he signed the -dockets and went out, not having seen that she had shut her eyes and was -blushing. - -Dreadfully jealous of his ‘prerogatives,’ he interposed in everything -after this, had all state correspondence before him and saw all the -replies, whether they were of home or abroad. Here the Italian angered -him, whose habit had always been to converse with her Majesty in French: -no frowns nor furious pacing of the closet could break him off it. The -Queen, very gentle towards him, insisted that the secretary should -paraphrase his letters into a kind of Scots; but the King, who was stupid -at business, boggled over the halting translation, did not understand -any more than at first, and suspected the Italian of deliberate -mystification. He told the Queen that she should speak the vernacular -with this hireling. She said, and truly, that she thought in French and -spoke it better; when, nevertheless, she tried to gratify him, even he -saw that it was absurd. Absurd or not, he loved David none the better for -that. - -He suspected everybody about her person, but chiefly this fat Italian; to -whose score he laid his next rebuff, the very palpable hit that it was. -The old Duke of Châtelherault, exiled for the late rebellion, was pining -in England, it seems, and beginning to ail. Shallow old trickster as he -might be, he loved his country and his kindred, and was (as the Queen -could never forget) head of the Hamiltons, of the blood royal. He crept -back in December over the Solway, and from one of his coast-castles sent -humble messengers forward to her for pardon and remission of forfeiture. -To these she inclined, on more grounds than one. She had some pity for -the old hag-ridden man, haunted ever with the shadow of madness as he -was; she remembered his white hair and flushing, delicate face. Then her -new Earl of Huntly had married into that family; and she wished to keep -a hold on the Gordons. And then, again, the blood royal! She forgot -that if she could comfortably admit Châtelherault his share in that, her -husband could never admit it without impeaching his own rights. So she -inclined to the piteous letters, and allowed herself to be pitiful. - -The King, on the first hint of this clemency, was moved beyond her -experience. No sulking, brooding, knitting of brows; he fairly stormed at -her before her circle. ‘What am I, madam? What silly tavern-sign do you -make of me? You exalt my chief enemy, my hereditary enemy, enemy of my -title to be here—and ask me to record it! King Henry is to declare his -esteem for the Hamiltons, who desire to unking him! This is paltry work, -the design too gross. I see foreign fingers at work in this. But I will -never consent, never! Ask me no more.’ - -The Italian surveyed his august company at large, lifted his eyebrows, -and blandly, patently, deliberately shrugged. My Lord of Bothwell himself -had little stomach for this; but the King strangled a cry and turned upon -his insolent critic. ‘White-blooded, creeping, fingering dog!’ He drew -his dagger on the man, and for the moment scared the life out of him. - -Lord Bothwell stepped in between, a broad-shouldered easy gentleman; the -next step was the Queen’s, flame-hued now, and at her fiercest. ‘Put up -your weapon, my lord, and learn to be the companion of your prince. Until -this may be, the Council is dissolved. Farewell, sirs. David, stay you -here. I have need of you.’ - -Bothwell and Huntly, they say, fairly led him out of the presence. Good -lack, here was Proof the Second! The companion of his prince! He would -certainly have killed the Italian had not the Queen taken care that he -should not. - -Once more he went away, and stayed away. He would wait until she felt -the need of him, he said to his friends Archie Douglas and Ruthven, who -never left him now. On this occasion the Master of Lindsay was of the -party, which rode into the Carse of Gowrie, hunting the fox. Hacked son -of a fighting father, worse companion he could not have had—saving the -presence of the other two—than Lindsay of the burnt face and bloodshot -eye. ‘The King with many friends!’ said Bothwell when he heard how -they set out. ‘Smarthering Archie to stroke him tender, Ruthven to -scrape him raw, and now Lindsay with his fire-hot breath to inflame the -part! Geordie, we must fend for the Queen.’ Huntly, sublimely in love, -conscious of his growth in grace, said that he was ready. - -With the aid of these two advancing noblemen her Majesty’s government -went on. She gave the Hamiltons hard terms, which they took abjectly -enough; she pardoned Argyll, because he must be separated from his former -friends; the rest of the rebels were summoned to surrender to her mercy -at the Market Cross; failing that, forfeiture of lands and goods for my -Lord of Moray. The day fixed for him was the 12th March. Huntly was sure -he would not come, but Bothwell shook his head. ‘Keep your eye on Mr. -Secretary’s letter-bag, madam, and let him know that you do it. I shall -feel more restful o’ nights when we are over the 12th March. Another -thing you may do: throw him into the company of your brown-eyed Fleming. -Does your Majesty know that property of a dish of clear water—to take up -the smell of the room you set it in? Your Lethington has that property, -therefore let him absorb your little Fleming; you will have him as -dovelike as herself.’ The advice was taken, and Mr. Secretary rendered -harmless for the present. - -Then came news of the King’s return; but not the King. He was certainly -at Inchkeith, said gossip—Inchkeith, an island in the Firth; but when she -asked what he did there, she got confused replies. Bothwell said that he -was learning to govern. ‘He has been told, madam, do you see? that if -he can rule Lindsay and Ruthven in three roods of land he will have no -trouble with Scotland afterwards.’ - -The Queen, although she suffered this light-hearted kind of criticism -without rebuke, did not reply to it, nor did she let Bothwell see that -she was anxious. The Italian saw it, however, whether she would or no, -and took care to give her every scrap of news. She learned from him that -the King was drinking there, fuddling himself. He was holding a Court, -where (as Bothwell had guessed) he was easily King, throned on a table, -with a ‘lovely Joy’ on either hand. She had the names of his intimates, -with exact particulars of their comings and goings. The Earl of Morton -was not above suspicion; he went there by night always, cloaked and in -a mask. The Queen, more conscious of her power since the rebellion, -conscious now of her matronly estate, grew sick to have such nasty news -about her—it was as if the air was stuck with flies. Presently she fell -sick in good truth, with faintings, pains in her side, back-soreness, -breast-soreness, heart-soreness. It did not help her to remember that she -must be at Linlithgow at Christmas, and meet the King there. - -Lying in her bed, smothered in furs, shivering, tossing herself about—for -she never could bear the least physical discomfort—she chewed a bitter -cud in these dark days, and her thoughts took a morbid habit. She -fretted over the Court at Inchkeith, imagined treasons festering there -and spreading out like fungus to meet the rebels in England; distrusted -Bothwell because he did not choose to come to her, Huntly because he did -not dare; she distrusted, in fact, every Scot in Scotland, and found -herself thereby clinging solely to the Italian; and of him—since she -must speak to somebody—she consequently saw too much. The man was very -dextrous, very cheerful, very willing; but he had a gross mind, and she -had spoiled him. To be kind to a servant, nine times in ten, means that -you make him rich at your own charges, and then he holds cheap what his -own welfare has diminished. So it was here: Davy was not the tenth case. -She had been bountiful in friendship, confidence, familiarity—of the sort -which friends may use and get no harm of. He had always amused her, and -now he soothed and strengthened her at once by sousing her hot fancies in -the cold water of his common-sense. She had learned to fear the workings -of her own mind, informed as it was by a passionate heart; she would -lean upon this honest fellow, who never looked for noonday at eleven -o’clock, and considered that a purge or a cupping was the infallible -remedy for all ailments, including broken hearts. It is not for you or -me, perhaps, to complain where she did not. Queen Mary was no precisian, -to expect more than she asked. If she loved she must be loved back; if -she commanded she must be obeyed; if she was hipped she must be amused. -I believe Signior Davy gave himself airs and made himself comfortable. -She found the first ridiculous and the second racial. She knew that -chivalry was not a virtue of that land where bargaining is at its best, -and that where her Italian saw a gate open he would reasonably go in. -The odds are that he presumed insufferably; certain it is that, though -she never saw it, others saw nothing else, and, gross-minded themselves, -misread it grossly. The tale was all about the town that Signior Davy -was the Queen’s favourite, and where he was always to be found, and what -one might look for, and who was to be pitied, etc. etc. The revellers at -Inchkeith advised each other to mark the end, and some were for telling -the King. But Archie Douglas was against that. ‘Tell him now,’ he said, -‘and see your salmon slip through the net. Wait till Davy’s in the boat, -man, and club him then.’ - -Nevertheless, the deft Italian, by his cold douches, his playing the -fool, his graceless reminiscences and unending novels, cured the -Queen. Late in December she astonished the Court by holding a council -in person—in a person, moreover, as sharp and salient as a snow-peak -glittering through the haze of frost, and as incisive to the touch. There -were proclamations to be approved: ‘The King’s and Queen’s Majesties -considering,’ etc., the common form. These must be altered, she said. -‘The Queen’s Majesty by the advice of her dearest husband’: she would -have it thus for the future. Tonic wit of the Italian! for to whom else, -pray, could you ascribe it? The word went flying about that the style was -changed, and was not long in coming to Inchkeith. ‘The Queen’s husband!’ -Ill news for Inchkeith here. - -Yet, the night he had it, he gloomed over it—being in his cups—with a -kind of slumberous gaiety stirring under his rage. - -‘The Queen’s husband! By the Lord, and I am the Queen’s husband. Who -denies it is a liar. Archie Douglas, Archie Douglas, if you say I am not -the Queen’s husband you lie, man.’ - -‘I, sir?’ says Archie, very brisk. ‘No, sir, I am very sure of it. By my -head, sir, and her Majesty knows it.’ - -‘She ought to know it. She shall know it. I’m a rider, my lords; I ride -with the spur.’ - -‘’Tis the curb you lack,’ says Ruthven, with a harsh laugh. - -The blinking youth pondered him and his words. ‘I’m for the spur and a -loose rein, Ruthven. I get the paces out of my nags. I have the seat.’ - -‘Half of it, say, my lord!’ - -Everybody heard that except the King, who went grumbling on. ‘You shall -not teach me how to sit a horse. I say you shall not, man.’ - -‘My lord,’ cried Lindsay, who never would call him ‘sir,’ ‘the talk -is not of horse-riding. If we use that similitude for the Queen’s -government, I tell your lordship it is unhappy. For on that horse of -government there be two riders, I think; and of what advantage is the -loose rein of your lordship when your fellow uses the curb?’ - -‘Ay my good lord, you hit the mark. Two riders, two riders, by God’s fay!’ - -The same voice as before—heard this time by the King. No one knew who -had spoken, nor were the words more explicitly offensive than Lindsay’s; -but the pothouse tone of them caught the muzzy ear, hit some quick spot -in the cloudy brain, and stung like fire. The King lifted up his head to -listen; he opened his mouth and stared, as if he saw something revealed -beyond the window, some warning or leering face. Then he rose and held -by his chair. ‘Two riders? Two riders? Two! Who said that? By heaven and -hell, bring me that man!’ - -The pain, the horror he had, the helpless rage, made a dead hush all -over; nobody stirred. Ridiculous he may have been, as he raised his voice -yet higher and mouthed his words—worthless he was known to be—and yet he -was tragic for the moment. ‘I say it is damnable lying,’ he said, swaying -about. ‘I say that man shall go to deep hell.’ He stared round the hall, -at his wits’ end. His wits made a pounce. ‘Archie, thou black thief, -’twas thou!’ - -‘No, sir; no, upon my soul.’ - -‘Ruthven, if you have dared—Lindsay—Fleming! Oh, mercy and truth!’ - -The rest was hideous. - -They got him to bed between them, while little Forrest cried and made a -fuss, praying them to kill him sooner than leave him with his master in -the raving dark. No one took any notice of the anguish of a boy. - - * * * * * - -With time came counsel, and friends very free with it. Even prudence made -herself heard in that brawling house. The King should meet his consort at -Linlithgow, do his duty by her, observe the Christmas feast. - -‘You will do well, sir—though I am sore to say it—to hear the popish -mass,’ he was advised: ‘with reservation of conscience, the stroke would -be politic.’ - -He agreed with all such advice; he intended to be wise. But the grand -stroke of all was the Earl of Morton’s, to devise a way by which the -injured husband could point the King’s demands with that undoubted -right of his. The Crown-Matrimonial, resounding phrase! let him ask -her to give him that. Nobody was prepared to say what was or was not -this Crown-Matrimonial, or whether there was such a crown. The term was -unknown to the law, that must be owned; and yet it had a flavour of law. -It was double-armed, yet it was hyphenated; you could not deny part of it -in any event. Why, no, indeed! cried Inchkeith at large, highly approving. - -Archie Douglas cheered his noble kinsman: ‘Hail, King-Matrimonial of -Scotland!’ - -Ruthven grinned, it was thought, approvingly; but Lord Morton, -remembering that he was still the Queen’s Chancellor and should not go -too far, made haste to advise the utmost delicacy. Above all things, let -no breath of _his_ dealings be heard. - -‘I need not affirm my earnest hope,’ he said, ‘that peace and good accord -may come out of this. The wish must find acceptance in every Christian -heart. As such I utter it. I am not in place to do more. I cannot -admonish; I serve the State.’ - -The King nodded sagely. - -‘Good, cousin, good. I take your meaning. It is a fair intent, for which -I am much beholden to you.’ Adonis, the proud rider, was chastened just -now. - -They met, therefore, at Linlithgow, heard mass together, made their -offerings, and to all the world were friends again. The Crown-Matrimonial -lay hidden until the spring of the year. Not even the new coinage—MARIA -ET HENRICUS, ‘the dam before the sire’—tempted it out; but there were -reasons for that. A week after the Epiphany, as they were in the Queen’s -closet with a small company, she took his hand and said: ‘My lord, -you shall hereafter give me what worship you can; for now I know of a -certainty that I have deserved well of you and Scotland.’ Her pride in -the fact and something of pity for herself made her voice quiver. - -He started and flushed quickly. ‘Is it true, madam? Is that the case? Oh, -I thank God for it!’ - -He would not let go of her hand, but waited impatiently until those -present took the hint and retired; then took her, kissed her, and called -her his Mary again. - -She cried contentedly enough, her cheek against his heart; and he, at -once triumphant and generous, father and lover, stayed by her for a whole -day and night. - -There was much talk, as you may suppose. The maids went about with their -heads in the air, as if they had achieved something. But apart from -them, all the talk was not of this complacent kind. Mr. Randolph, for -instance, wrote to his patron, Mr. Cecil, of England: ‘The Queen is with -child beyond a doubt. She informed the King in my hearing. Now, woe is -me for you when David’s son shall be King in England!’ And there is no -doubt that what Mr. Randolph took leave to report was no news to the late -revellers of Inchkeith. - - - - -CHAPTER III - -DIVERS USES OF A HARDY MAN - - -In all her late perplexities of disordered mind, unsteady hand, chagrin, -disenchantment, and what not, it is strange to observe with what tenacity -the Queen kept a daily glance of her eyes for one private affair. It was -an affair of the heart, however. - -Those who know her best explain that she suffered from a malady of the -affections. ‘The Queen my mistress,’ says Des-Essars in _Le Secret des -Secrets_, ‘when she had once seen—even for a few moments only—man, -woman, or child in whom lay, somewhere, some little attractive quality -or action, could never rest until she had him subject utterly to her -will. Subject, do I say? The word is weak. The devotion which she must -have was so absolute that she never got it, could hardly ever deceive -herself that she had got it; and would have spurned it at once if she -had, as a grovelling thing not worth a thought. But, just because she -never could get it, she never tired of the pursuit of it. To get it she -would humble herself, lower herself, make herself ridiculous, cheapen -herself; to hold what she had (or thought she had) she would play any -part, tell most fibs, do much injustice to herself and the unfortunate -capture; to lose after all was to suffer torments of baffled hope and -endeavour; and then—to begin again upon some similar panting quest. -Sometimes she sickened, but of possession, never of pursuit; and if -she did, it was an infallible sign that the thing she had had been too -easily caught. Thus she sickened of “Adonis,” not because he had been -restive at first, but because he had not been restive until after he was -won. She had longed for him, wooed him, wed him in secret. All was going -well. If ever her cup of joy had brimmed over, it had been on that night -of sudden consummation at Wemyss. That golden, beaded cup! there had -seemed a well-spring in it, a feast to be enjoyed for ever in secret, by -delicious, hasty snatches. But when they ordered the affair in public, it -was stale after the event; and when he—the fool—cried over her the mort -o’ the deer (as I know he did, for Sir Adam Gordon heard him), it had -been his own death, not hers, that he proclaimed. Sated too soon, she had -time to see herself and to shudder at the wry image she made. - -‘I know very well,’ he adds, in an afterthought, ‘that, in saying this, -I may be taken as an example to point my own thesis; but even if I were, -the reflections are just. And the fact is that, although she knew that I -loved her, and might, indeed, have loved me, she learned of my manhood -too late. I can add also, with a hand on my heart, that she would never -have had to pursue me. For I was always at her feet.’ - -But to return to my matter—this affair of the heart. It most curiously -bears out Des-Essars’ analysis to remember that when she released George -Gordon from his bonds, and had him once more spilling love at her feet, -she was by no means touched. The sanguine young man loved her, she knew -it well; but she always felt a little leap of scorn for a man who could -own to loving her. It made him seem womanish in her eyes, like Châtelard. -And in the very act—when he was below her footstool, ready to kiss her -foot—she remembered that there was one Gordon whom she had not yet won. -She remembered Jean Gordon, who, on that day of Gordon’s Bane, had looked -at her fixedly, with grave dislike—had had the nerve to survey her Queen -and judge and pick out what parts to despise. She had rarely seen her -since, but had never forgotten her. Deep in her burning heart she had -cherished the hope of winning that frozen heart; and here—with George -Gordon kissing her foot—sat she, curiously pondering how far she could -use the brother to lure the sister into the net. - -There was nothing unholy about this desire of hers to subdue a girl’s -heart. It was coloured by impulses which were warm and rich and -chivalrous. Had it been that of a youth there would not be a word to -say; there was much of the quality of a youth about Queen Mary. She -certainly had his chivalry—for chivalry is really pity, with a relish—a -noble emotion which reacts by exalting the percipient. She saw herself -protector of this friendless girl, felt kindly the very kindly kiss which -she would bestow: it should fall like dew upon the upturned, stony face. -At its fall the cold and dread would thaw, tears would well in those -judging eyes, the hardened lips would quiver, the congealed bosom would -surge; sobbing, grieving, murmuring her thankful love, Jeannie Gordon -would hasten into forgiving arms. O mercy of the forgiven! O grace of -the forgiving! The picture was pure, the desire (I repeat) honest—but -there was glory to be gained too, a vision to be made good of the Queen -playing the lover’s part, worth every shift of the quick head, and all -the cajolery of the sidelong eyes. Ah me! Here was a chase-royal. - -Giving George Gordon kind words, and hope of kinder, she had his mother -and sister to Court, and to them was sincerity, princely magnanimity -itself. The old Countess was soon won over: there came a day when she -would not hear a word against her Majesty, and would judge her dead -husband’s actions sooner than allow her patroness to be condemned in -their defence. Her two sons stood by her—both lovers of this divine -huntress; so that the house of Huntly was in ascension, and Des-Essars, -feeling that his nose was (as they say) out of joint, showed that he felt -it by patronising his comrade Adam. - -But Adam disarmed him. ‘My brother is to be Earl again, Baptist, and -therefore I am Sir Adam. You do wrong to refuse me the salute. But let -be. To you I shall always be plain Adam Gordon, because we share the -same adventure. Now let me tell you. She kissed me yestere’en—here.’ -He touched his forehead. ‘I owe you nothing for civility, yet I’ll not -go back upon my bond. You shall take your joy of the place: it is your -right.’ Then they made it up; Adam pursued his family up the hill of -fame. ‘It is all in a fair way; look now, I’ll tell you a secret. The -Bastard is out in arms; but if we win he will lose his head, and then -Moray shall be ours again! Who knows what may come of that? Be sure, -however, that I shall not forget you, Baptist. No, no. What I win of _you -know what_ shall be yours to the full half.’ He owned that he was vexed -with his sister. ‘What! she sulks in the presence—she holds back—like a -child fighting a blown fire! ’Tis unmaidenly of Jeannie; I doubt her a -true Gordon. And talks of the Béguines of Bruges, doth she? Let her go, -say I.’ All this judgment of Jeannie’s case, as the reader perceives, was -before the chasing of the Earl of Moray, and before the Earl of Bothwell -came home with French Paris, his candid valet. A word now of him. - -He arrived in Scotland, you will remember, when her war with rebels was -as good as over. She was keen; flushed with one triumph, and sanguine -of another. Scotland at her feet, and all the Gordons hers but one: how -was stubborn Jeannie to hold out against her? She was wedded, she was -safe, she was victorious, she was happy: everything combined to make the -redoubtable Bothwell welcome to her. It was possible, she found, to meet -him without quickening of the breath; it was possible to look coolly -at him, and (O marvel!) to ask herself what under heaven she had once -dreaded in him. His eyes? Had they seemed audacious? They were small and -twinkling. His throat, jaw, and snarling mouth—had they seemed purposeful -and cruel? The one was forward and the other curved, just ready to laugh. -Well, is a laughing man dangerous to women? When she considered that, -less than a year ago, she had written secretly to the man, sent him a -glove, and with that a fib, she could contemplate herself in the act, as -one may a pale old picture of oneself (in curls and a pinafore) at some -childish game—with humorous self-pity, and with some anxious regrets too. -The thing was well done with—over and done with; but heigho! the world -had been more ventureful then. He gave her back her faded tokens; they -came from his bosom and went into hers—no thrills! They were quite cold -when she laid them by. - -He joined the field with her, or what was left of it, and brought -with him the Border clans—Elliots, Armstrongs, Turnbulls, and his own -Hepburns—ragged and shoeless, less breeched than the Highlanders, if -that were possible; but men of dignity and worth, as she saw them, -square-bearded, broad-headed men, tawny as foxes, blunt, unmannerly, -inspecting her and her two women without awe or curiosity. They were -like their chief, she thought, and, with him to lead them, never lagged -in the chase. Huntly had his Gordons; and there were Forbeses, Grants, -Ogilvies. Breechless were they—some at least—but of great manners; they -had poets among them, and her beauty was the theme of harp-strings as -well as eye-strings. The pipes swelled and screamed in her daily praise; -fine music, great air! But those glum, ruminating Borderers, to whom -she was just a ‘long bit lassock’! She turned to them again directly -the piping was stopped—to them and their chief, who was of them, blood -and bone. Twice she traversed Scotland in their midst, watching them by -day, dreaming of them by night. Just as little could she do without this -bracing, railing Bothwell as without proud Jeannie Gordon, whom she loved -in vain. - -And thus the combination came, as in a flash, the old beloved scheme of -unity—north and south to awe the middle parts of Scotland. Old Huntly had -proposed it and failed—it had been the death of him; but now she would -try it and succeed. Into the north she would put a new Huntly; out of -the south she would call a new Bothwell. A match, a match! The thought -came to her with a ringing sound of hopeful music, ‘Now I have thee mine, -proud Jeannie Gordon!’ Strange, ardent, wilful creature—half perverse, -half unsexed! Because a man did not love her she would trust him, because -a girl would have nothing to say to her she could never let her alone! -But Master Des-Essars was right. She was a born huntress. - -The preliminaries of the hopeful match were easily made: Huntly was -grateful, the dowager profuse; Bothwell chuckled when he was sounded -about it, but declined to discuss so simple a matter. - -‘You’ll never find me backward, my friend,’ he told Huntly (as -George Gordon now was called); ‘many indeed have complained that I am -not backward enough. I’m a bull in a pasture—I’m an invading host—I -devastate, I come burning. But there! have it as you will.’ - -Nobody else was consulted, for nobody else was worth it in the Queen’s -eyes. When time had been given for all to sink in, she sent for Jean -Gordon; who was brought by her mother to the door of the cabinet, put -through it, and left there face to face with her careful Majesty. The -time of year was mid-January. - - * * * * * - -The Queen sat upon a heap of cushions by the fire, leaning back a -little to ease herself. Her chin was in her hand—a sign that she was -considering. She wore a rich gown of murrey-coloured satin, showed her -red stockings and long, narrow slippers. Her condition was not hid, and -her face would have told it in any case—pinched, peaked, and pettish. Her -eyes were like a cat’s, shifty and ranging, now golden-red, now a mask -of green, now all black, according as she glanced them to the light; her -thin, amorous lips looked like a scarlet wound in her pale face. By her -side stood Mary Fleming, a gentle creature in pale rose, as if set there -that by her very humanity she might enhance the elfin spell of the other. -This Queen was like a young witch, rather new to the dangerous delight, -but much in earnest. - -She looked up sideways at the girl by the door—a girl to the full as tall -as she, and much more sumptuous: deep-breasted, beautiful, composed, a -figure of a nun in her black and ivory. For her hair was perfect black -and her face without a tinge; and all her gown was black, with a crucifix -of silver hung from her waist. She clasped her hands over it as she stood -waiting. - -‘Come, my girl,’ said the Queen. - -Jean took a few steps forward and knelt down. It seems that she might -have pleased if she had done it sooner. - -‘Very well: it’s very well,’ the Queen began; and then, ‘No! it is not at -all well! You seek my hand to kiss it. You shall not have it!’ - -She put one hand below the other, and watched for the effect. There was -none. Provoking! - -‘Why should I give my hand to a little rebel,’ she went on again, ‘who -says in her heart, “My mother is beguiled, my brothers are beguiled, but -I will never be”? who says again, “If she gives me her hand, and I kiss -it, ’twill be because I dare not bite it”? Why then should I give my hand -to you?’ - -‘You should not, madam,’ says Jean. - -The Queen bit her lip. - -‘Oh, the guarded, darkened heart of you, Jean! Why, if I bore a grudge as -hardly as you, whom should I not drive out of Scotland?’ - -As Jean made no answer, Fleming was brought into play. - -‘Answer for her, Fleming. Tell her I should drive them all out. Should my -brother have stayed? He is too happy in England, I think. Shall I keep -your Lethington at home?’ - -Poor Fleming coloured with pain. - -‘Nay, child, nay—I am teasing thee. I know that if he will not kiss my -hand ’tis because he hopes for thine. And belike he can have it for -the asking! Alack, this Lethington with his two wicked hands! One he -will hold out to England, and my false brother Moray will take it; one -to Scotland, and pretty Fleming hath it. A chain, a chain! to pen the -naughty Queen, who will not let traitors kiss her hands, and must be -taught better respect for liars, lick-spittles, and time-servers!’ - -She was working herself to be dangerous. Good Fleming’s whisper in her -ear, ‘Dear, sweet madam, deal not too harshly!’ might have been heard, -had not Jean Gordon been kneeling there, stinging her to worse. - -‘Harshly, harshly, my girl?’ the Queen snapped at Fleming. ‘I am water -heaving against that rock—torn ragged by its fret, and scattered to the -wind—to drop down as tears—as salt tears, Mary Fleming! Ah, the sea will -drink up my tears, and the sea have me at last, and lap me to soft sleep, -and soothe me that I forget!’ She changed her mood, looked proudly at the -kneeling girl. ‘You, that will not kiss my hand—nor shall not—you are -to forget what you choose and remember what you choose; but of me you -expect—what, O heaven! My memory is to lie in your lap and obey you. Oh, -it is very well! I am to forget that your father was a traitor——’ - -The girl’s eyes met hers directly. - -‘He was none, madam.’ - -‘I say I am to forget that, and remember that I dealt sternly with an old -man.’ - -Jean grew fiercely white. ‘Barbarously, madam!’ she said; ‘when you -dragged a dead old man from the grave and spat upon his winding-sheet.’ - -‘Hush, hush!’ said Mary Fleming; and Jean looked at her, but said no -more. The Queen was very pale, lying on her side, crouched among the -cushions. - -‘He defied me,’ she said, ‘but I forgave him that. He tampered with -my enemies, he boasted and lied and cheated. He died in arms against -his prince, and I shed tears in pity of myself. For then I was new in -Scotland, and thought that the love of a man was something worth, and -shivered when I lost it, as one left bare to the gales. Now I know -wiselier concerning mannish love; and I know how to draw it since I hold -it cheap. I would as soon draw that of dogs and apes, I think.’ She -looked over her shoulder, then quickly pillowed her cheek again, but held -up her hand. Mary Fleming took it. ‘Dogs, and apes, and tigers are men, -Mary Fleming!’ the complaining voice resumed; ‘and I Dame Circe at her -spells! And here before me, look you, poor faithful, chaste Penelope, -that will not touch my hand!’ - -She gave a little moan, and sat up, shaking her head. ‘No, no, no, my -girl, you have the wrong of me. I weave no spells, I want no dogs and -apes—no man’s desire. Love!’ she clasped her hands at the stretch of -her arms, ‘Love! I want love—and have it from all women but you. I am -the queen of women’s hearts, and you are my only rebel. Love me, Jean! -Forgiveness, _ma mie_!’ - -There was no answer. The Queen started forward, almost frenzied, and -threw herself upon the girl—encircled her, clung, and began to kiss her. -She kissed her lips, cheeks, eyes, and hair; she stroked her face, she -begged and prayed. ‘Love me, Jeannie: I have done you no wrong. I had -no hand in it—I could not move alone. I cried, but could not move. They -would have it so. Oh, love me, my dear, for the sake of what I have -bought and paid for!’ - -A flint-stone would have thawed under such a lava-stream. Jean Gordon -took a softer tinge, but tried to free herself. - -‘I thank your Majesty—I would not seem too hard. Maybe I have been stiff, -maybe I have brooded. There has been too much thinking time, sitting at -work for ever in our dark house. I thank your Majesty—I thank your Grace.’ - -The Queen lay back again, smiling through her tears. Mary Fleming, deeply -moved, took her hand and lifted it, holding it out—by look and gesture -commanding the other to do it reverence. So it was done at last. - -The Queen said softly: ‘I thank you, child; I thank you, Jeannie. You -make me happier. Trust me now, and sit beside me. I have a matter for -your ears, and for your heart too, as I hope.’ - -So Jean sat staidly by her on the cushions and heard the marriage-plan. -All she could find to say was that she hoped it would give satisfaction -to her Majesty. - - * * * * * - -The Earl of Bothwell, then, was married upon the Lady Jean Gordon on 24th -February, at Holyrood, by the Protestant rite. The Queen and Court were -there, she very scornful and full of mockery of what was done. She said, -and loudly, ‘If the bride is content with this munchance, why should I be -discontent?’ meaning, of course, that there was every reason in the world -why she should be. But the truth was that the bride, who professed the -old religion, had no choice; for the Earl had insisted upon the minister -and his sermon at the price of marriage whatsoever, and the lady’s -brother Huntly shared his opinion. Whereupon the bride had shrugged her -shoulders. - -‘I am bought and sold already,’ she said; ‘therefore what matter to me -whether the market is out of the statute?’ - -The Queen laughed. ‘Tu as rayson, ma belle,’ she said. ‘Le vray mariage -s’est faict ailleurs.’ - -And Lady Jeannie replied in a low voice, ‘Nous verrons, madame.’ - -All things accomplished, and the Queen gone out by her private door, -the Earl handed his Countess through the press to the great entry. Many -people came surging about them; the courtyard seemed chockablock, with -vexed cries tossed here and there, both ‘God bless the Queen!’ and ‘God -damn the Paip!’ In the midst of all the Countess makes as if to falter, -cries out, ‘Oh, my foot hurts me!’ gets free her hand and stoops. What -was she about? - -The Earl, who was quickly put out when he was playing a part (as he -surely was just now), stood by for a little, twitching his cheek-bones. -Anything would have vexed him at such a time, and at any time he scorned -a mob. So he pushed forward to clear more space, crying roughly, with -his arms abroad, ‘Out, out, ye tups!’ He made himself an open way to the -doors, and stood on the threshold of the chapel, very fierce, plucking at -his beard, his hat over his brows. There was room behind and before him: -in front were the grooms and servants with their masters’ swords. ‘I dare -ye to move, ye babbling thieves,’ he seemed to be threatening them, and -kept them mute by the power of the eye. - -Meantime the Countess rises from her foot, puts her hand on a young man’s -shoulder near by, and says, ‘Take you me.’ This young man, grave and -personable, is Mr. Alexander Ogilvy of Boyne, whom I hope you remember -to have seen last fighting with her brother, John of Findlater, in the -Luckenbooths, that day when the Gordons came swelling into Edinburgh to -see the new Queen. He was an old sweetheart of hers, and might have had -her but for that unlucky encounter. And since he was here—was it for his -sake that the Countess Jeannie had hurt her foot? It is uncertain. - -However—‘Fear not, lady, but I’ll take you where you please,’ he assures -her; and walks out of church, her hand upon his shoulder. - -Thus they come level with the Earl, and pass him. - -‘How now, wife?’ he cries: ‘so soon!’ - -‘Even so, my lord, since you are so tardy,’ says she, without a look his -way. - -This Mr. Ogilvy walks directly into the crowd, which makes a way for him, -hugely tickled by his spirit, and closes in upon him after. The Earl lets -fly a sounding oath, and starts after them. ‘By——and——, but I’m for you!’ - -They let him through; they cry, ‘Earl Bothwell is after his lady! The -hunt is up—toho!’ There was much laughter, driving, flacking of hands; -and the women were the worst. - - * * * * * - -After dinner, dancing: the Queen in wild spirits, handed about from man -to man, and (not content with that) dancing with the women when men -flagged. Her zest carried her far out of politics; wary in the chamber, -she was like one drunk at a feast. So she saw nothing of the comedy -enacting under her very eyelids: how, while she was led out by my lord, -Mr. Ogilvy made play with my lady; and my lord, very much aware of it, -fumed. The minute he was dismissed, down he strode through the thick of -the frolic, maddening at the courtiers bowing about him, and quarrelled -and talked loud, and drank and talked louder; but yet could not get near -his handsome new wife. He roundly told his brother-in-law at last that if -her ladyship would not come, he should go alone. - -‘Whither, my lord?’ asks Huntly. - -‘Why, to bed,’ says he. - -‘It is yet early,’ says Huntly. - -‘It is none so early for the bed I intend for,’ he was told. ‘My bed is -at Hermitage. I am master there, I’d let you know, and shall be here some -day, God damn me.’ He was in a high rage at the way things were going, -and always impatient of the least restraint. One or two bystanders, -however, shrewd men, suspected that he had met his match. - -Lord Huntly did not believe him—could not believe that he would ride, -and ask his young Countess to ride, fifty miles through the marriage -night. Nevertheless, towards six o’clock, the Earl came into the lower -hall with his great boots on and riding-cloak over his shoulder, and -confronted his lady standing with Mr. Ogilvy, my Lord Livingstone, Mary -Sempill, her Master, and some more. - -‘My lady,’ he said with a reverence, ‘I am a bird of the bough. ’Tis -after my hour—I’m for my bed.’ - -Lady Bothwell gave him a short look. ‘If that is your night-gear, my -lord, you sleep alone.’ - -Harshly he laughed. ‘It seems I am to do that. But, mistress, when you -want me you will find me at Hermitage, whither I now go. And the same -direction I give to you, Mr. Ogilvy,’ says he with meaning. ‘If you come -into my country, or any country but this cursed town, you shall find me -ready for you, Mr. Ogilvy of Boyne.’ - -Ogilvy wagged his head. ‘La la la! We shall meet again, never fear, my -Lord Bothwell,’ says he. - -The Countess gave him her hand to kiss. ‘I wish you good-night, Boyne,’ -she said: ‘I am going to my bed’: then, looking her Earl in the face, -‘Pray you send your page for my women, my lord. I lack my riding-gear.’ - -Lord Huntly, who was up with them by now, cries out: ‘What wild folly is -this? Do you rave? You will never go to Liddesdale this hell-black night! -Are you mad, Lord Bothwell, or a villain?’ - -‘I’m a bird of the bough, brother-in-law, a bird of the bough.’ - -The Countess turned to her brother. ‘Should I be afraid of the dark, -Huntly, with this nobleman by my side?’ - -‘God’s death, my child,’ says Bothwell, admiring her cool blood, ‘I would -be more at your side if you suffered me.’ - -Lord Huntly turned on his heel. - -She went to take leave of the Queen, and found her on an unworthy arm. -‘My leave, madam. I crave liberty to follow my lord.’ - -‘It should be the other way, child,’ said the Queen, ‘for a little while, -at least. But we will come and put you to bed—and he shall come after.’ - -‘Your Majesty’s pardon, but this may hardly be. My lord chooses for -Hermitage, and I must follow him—as my duty is.’ - -It made the Queen grow red; but she did not let go the arm she had. ‘As -you will, mistress,’ she said stiffly, and added something in Italian to -her companion, who raised his eyebrows and gave a little jerk of the head. - -‘You ride a long way for your joy,’ she resumed, with a hard ring in -her voice. ‘It’s to be hoped you are well accompanied. Yonder is a wild -country: Turnbulls in the Lammermuirs, Elliots in Liddesdale. But you -have a wild mate.’ - -The Countess then looked her full in the face. ‘Your Majesty forgets,’ -she said. ‘It is not men that I and mine have reason to fear.’ - -After a short and quick recoil the Queen went straight up to her and took -her face in her two hands. Speaking between clenched teeth, she said: -‘You shall not quarrel with me, Jeannie Bothwell. Or I will not quarrel -with you. I wish you well wherever you go. Remember that: and now give me -a kiss.’ - -She had to take it, for it was not offered her; and then she pushed the -girl away with a little angry sob. ‘Ah, how you hate me! You are the only -woman in Scotland that hates me.’ She felt the prick of tears, and shook -her head to be so fretted. ‘If I were to tell you of your Earl—as I could -if I cared——’ The Italian touched her arm, and brought her sharply round. -‘Well? Why should I not? Am I such a happy wife that my wedding-ring is a -gag? Shall she have of me the bravest man in Scotland, and not know the -price?’ Gulping down her anger, she put her hand on her bosom to keep it -quiet. ‘No, no, I am not so base. Let her have what comfort she can. All -wives need that. God be with you, Jeannie Bothwell.’ - -‘And with your Majesty, at all times.’ - -The Countess curtsied, kissed hands, and went away backwards. She had not -taken the smallest notice of the Italian. - -‘If I could hate like that, David,’ said the Mistress, ‘I should be Queen -of France at this hour.’ - -‘Oh, oh! And so you can, madam, and so you shall,’ replied the man. - -The Queen sent for more lights, and drink for the fiddlers. She did more. -To please the French Ambassador and his suite, she and her maids put on -men’s clothes, and flashed golden hangers from their belts before the -courtly circle. The dancing grew the looser as the lights flared to their -end. Many a man and many a maid slept by the wall; but there was high -revelry in the midst. - -Very late, the tumble and rioting at its top, in came the King, with Lord -Ruthven, Archie Douglas, and some more of his friends. He stared, brushed -his hot eyes. ‘What a witches’ Sabbath! Where’s my——? Where’s the Queen?’ - -‘Yonder, sir. Masked, and talking with my Lady Argyll—and——’ - -‘God help us, I see.’ He pushed squarely through the crowd, and stood -before her, not steadily. - -‘Good-morrow to your Majesty,’ he said. ‘The hour is late—or early, as -you take it. But I am here—ready for bed.’ - -She held her head up, looking away from him, and spoke as if she were -talking to her people. - -‘I’ll not come,’ she said. ‘I am going to cards. Come, ladies. Come, -sirs.’ Turning, she left him. - -He looked after her owlishly, blinking as if he was about to cry. He -caught Ruthven by the arm. ‘Oh, man,’ he said, ‘oh, Ruthven, do you see -that? Do you see whom she has there?’ - -‘Hush, sir,’ says Ruthven. ‘’Tis the same as yesterday, and all the -yesterdays, and as many morrows as you choose to stomach. Come you to -your bed. You cannot mend it this way.’ - -The King still blinked and looked after his wife. He began to tremble. -‘Oh, man,’ he said, ‘when shall I do it?’ - -Ruthven, after a flashing look at him, ran after the Queen’s party. She -was a little in front, cloaked now and walking with her ladies. Ruthven -caught up the Italian and said some words. The man stopped, and looked -at him guardedly. Ruthven came closer, and put his hand on his shoulder, -talking copiously. As he talked, and went on talking, his hand slipped -gently down the Italian’s back to his middle, opened itself wide, and -stayed there open. - -They parted with laughter on both sides, and a bow from David. Ruthven -came back. - -‘You may do it when you please, sir,’ he said to the King. - - - - -CHAPTER IV - -MANY DOGS - - -When, on 6th March, the expected stroke fell upon my Lord Chancellor -Morton, and he was required to hand over the seals of his high office -to the Queen’s messengers, he did so with a certain heavy dignity. As I -imply, he had had time for preparation. He had not seen his sovereign for -some weeks, knew that Lethington had not, knew also that his alliance -(even his kinship) with the King had worked against him, and suspected -finally, that what that had not done for his prospects had been managed -by the Italian. So he bowed his head to Erskine and Traquair when they -waited upon him, and, pointing to the Great Seal on the table, said -simply, ‘Let her Majesty take back what her Majesty gave. Gentlemen, good -night.’ Truly, we may say that nothing in his life became him like the -leaving it: but that is the rule. - -The same evening—nine o’clock and a snowy night—Archie Douglas came -to his house in the Cowgate and found him writing letters—not easily, -but with grunts, his tongue curling about his upper lip. The disgraced -Chancellor looked up, saw his cousin, and went on writing. Archie waited. -So presently, ‘_Moriturus te salutat_,’ says the Earl, without ceasing to -labour. - -‘Pshaw, cousin,’ says Archie, ‘I have come to you with a better cry nor -that.’ - -‘Have you indeed?’ scoffed my lord. ‘Man, I would be fain to know it.’ - -‘’Tis _Habet_,’ says Archie, ‘and down with your thumb.’ - -Lord Morton leaned back in his chair and raked his beard with the pen’s -end. The quip struck his fancy as a pleasant one. - -‘I take your meaning,’ he said. ‘I had thought of it myself. But, to say -nothing of his place by her side, I doubt he wears a steel shirt.’ - -Archie said shortly: ‘He does not. The King felt him last night as he sat -at the cards. And Ruthven felt him well on Bothwell’s marriage night.’ - -‘The King! He did that!’ - -‘He did just that.’ - -Morton gazed at him for a minute. ‘Why,’ he marvelled, ‘why, then he -stands in wi’ the rest? Archie, are ye very sure?’ - -Archie the wise snapped his fingers at such elementary knowledge. ‘A -month gone, come Friday, he began to open to Ruthven about it.’ - -The Earl rapped the table smartly with his fingers. ‘And I am the last to -know it! I thank you, cousin, for your good conceit of me. By the mass, -man, you treat me like a boy.’ - -‘It’s no doing of mine,’ says Archie. ‘I was for making you privy to it -a week syne; but Ruthven, he said, “No.” You were still Chancellor, d’ye -see? And, says Ruthven, your lordship was a tappit hen, that would sit -till they took the last egg from under ye.’ - -‘Damn his black tongue!’ growled my lord, and looked at his letters. ‘But -he’s in the right of it,’ he added. ‘Cold, cold is my nest the now.’ - -Archie moistened his lips. ‘They took the seals from you this morn, -cousin?’ - -‘It is not three hours since they had them.’ - -‘Do you guess what did it?’ - -Morton laughed shortly. ‘Ay! It was my Crown-Matrimonial, I doubt.’ - -‘And do you guess who did it?’ - -He did not laugh now. ‘Have done with your idle questioning. Who should -do it but the fiddler?’ - -‘One more question,’ says Archie, ‘by your leave. Do you guess who sits -in your seat?’ - -‘Ay, I think it, I think it. She will give it to one of her familiars—her -Huntly, or her fine Bothwell.’ - -Archie once more snapped his fingers. ‘Nor one, nor t’other. There’s a -man more familiar than the pair. Cousin, the fiddler seals the briefs! -The Italian is to be Chancellor. Now what d’ye say?’ - -Lord Morton said nothing at all. He looked up, he looked down; he screwed -his hands together, rolled one softly over the other. - -Archie watched his heavy face grow darker as the tide of rage crept up. -Presently he tried to move him. - -‘Are you for England, cousin?’ he asked. - -‘Ay,’ said Morton, ‘that is my road.’ - -Archie then touched him on the shoulder. ‘Bide a while, my lord. We shall -all be friends here before many days. Argyll is here.’ - -‘Argyll? The fine man!’ - -‘A finer follows him hard.’ - -‘Who then? Your sage Lethington?’ - -‘Lethington! Hoots! no; but the black Earl of Moray, my good lord.’ - -The Earl of Morton stopped in the act of whistling. - -‘Moray comes home?’ - -‘Ay. His forfeiture is set for the 12th. He is coming home to meet it. -All’s ready.’ - -Morton was greatly interested. To gain time he asked an idle question. -‘Who has written him to come? Lethington?’ - -‘Ay, Michael Wylie.’ - -This was the name they gave him. Machiavelli may be intended—if so, an -injustice to each. - -‘Who returns with my lord?’ Morton asked him next; and Archie held up his -fingers. - -‘All of them that are now in England. Rothes, Pitarrow, Grange—all of -them. Stout men, cousin.’ - -Stout indeed! One of them had been enough for Master Davy. My Lord -Morton, his head sunk into his portly chest, considered this news. Moray -was an assurance—for how did Moray strike? In the dark—quickly—when no -one was by. Well, then, if Moray were coming to strike one’s enemy, why -should one meddle? He was never at his ease in that great man’s company, -because he could never be sure of his own aims while he doubted those -of his colleague. You could not tell—you never could tell—what James -Stuart intended. He would cut at one for the sake of hitting another at a -distance. If he were coming back to cut at the Italian, for instance—at -what other did he hope to reach? Morton drove his slow wits to work as -he sat staring at his papers, trying vainly to bottom the designs of a -man whom he admired and distrusted profoundly. Why so much force to scrag -a wretched Italian? The King, Archie, Moray, Grange, Pitarrow, Argyll! -And now himself, Morton! At whom was Moray aiming? Was he entangling the -King, whom he hated? Could he be working against the Queen, his sister? -They used to say he coveted the throne. Could this be his intent? - -Such possibilities disturbed him. Let me do Lord Morton the justice to -say that his very grossness saved him from any more curious villainy -than a quick blow at an enemy. The Italian had galled his dignity: damn -the dog! he would kill him for it. But to intend otherwise than loyalty -to the King, his kinsman—no, no! And as for the Queen’s Majesty—why, -she was a lass, and a pretty lass too, though a wilful. She would never -have stood in his way but for that beastly foreign whisperer. Yet—if -the King had been dishonoured by the fiddler, and Moray (knowing that) -meant honestly ... Eh, sirs! So he pondered in his dull, muddled way—his -poor wits, like yoked oxen, heavily plodding the fields of speculation, -turning furrow after furrow! Guess how he vexed the nimble Archie. - -‘Well, cousin, well?’ cries that youth at last: ‘I must be going where my -friends await me.’ - -‘Man,’ said Morton, and stopped him, ‘where are ye for?’ - -Archie replied: ‘Mum’s the word. But if you are the man I believe you, -you shall come along with me this night.’ - -Morton had made up his mind. ‘I am with you—for good or ill,’ he said. - -Cloaked and booted, the two kinsmen went out into the dark. The wind had -got up, bringing a scurry of dry snow: they had to pull the door hard to -get it home. - -‘Rough work at sea the night,’ said Archie. - -‘You’ll be brewing it rougher on land, I doubt,’ was Lord Morton’s -commentary. - - * * * * * - -In a little crow-stepped house by the shore of the Nor’ Loch the Earl -of Morton was required to set his hand to certain papers, upon which -they showed him the names of Argyll, Rothes, Ruthven, Archie Douglas, -Lethington, and others. He asked at once to see Lord Moray’s name: they -told him Lethington had it to a letter, which bound him as fast as any -bond. - -‘It should be here,’ he said seriously. - -But Ruthven cried out, How could it be there when his lordship was over -the Border? - -Morton shook his head. ‘It should be here, gentlemen. ’Twere better to -wait for it. What hurry is there?’ - -Ruthven said that the game was begun and ought to go on now. ‘Judge you, -my lord,’ he appealed, ‘if I should put my head into a noose unless I -held the cord in my own hand.’ - -In his private mind Morton believed Ruthven a madman. But he did not see -how he could draw out now. - -He read through the two papers—bands, they called them. It was required -of those who signed that they should assist the King their sovereign lord -to get the Crown-Matrimonial—no harm in that!—and that they should stand -enemies to his enemies, friends to his friends. On his side the King -engaged to remove the forfeiture from the exiled lords, to put back the -Earl of Morton into his office, and to establish the Protestant religion. -Not a word of the Italian, not a word of the Queen. The things were well -worded, evidently by Lethington. - -‘When are we to be at it?’ he asked. - -Ruthven told him, ‘Saturday coming, at night.’ It was now Thursday. - -‘How shall you deal?’ This was Morton again. - -He was told, In the small hours of the night——and there he stopped them -at once. ‘Oh, Ruthven! Oh, Lindsay! Never on the Sabbath morn! Sirs, ye -should not——’ - -But Ruthven waved him off. The exact hour, he said, must depend upon -events. This, however, was the plan proposed. When the Queen was set -down to cards or a late supper, Lord Morton with his men was to hold the -entry, doors, stairheads, passages, forecourt of the palace. Traquair -would be off duty, Erskine could be dealt with. Bothwell, Huntly, Atholl, -and all the rest of the Queen’s friends would be abed; and Lindsay was to -answer for keeping them there. The King was to go into the Queen’s closet -and look over her shoulder at the game. At a moment agreed upon he would -lift up her chin, say certain words, kiss her, and repeat the words. That -was to be the signal: then Ruthven, Archie Douglas, and Fawdonsyde—Ker of -Fawdonsyde, a notorious ruffian—would do their work. - -Morton listened to all this intently, with slow-travelling eyes which -followed the rafters from their spring in one wall to their cobwebbed end -in the other. He could find no flaw at first, nor put his finger upon the -damnable blot there must be in it; but after a time, as he figured it -over and over, he missed somebody. ‘Stop there! stop there, you Ruthven!’ -he thundered. ‘Tell me this: Where will Lethington be the while?’ - -He was told, ‘Gone to meet the Earl of Moray.’ Moray!—his jaw fell. - -‘What! will Moray no be with me?’ - -They said, it was much hoped. But the roads were heavy; there was a -possibility—— - -He jeered at them. Did they not know Moray yet? ‘Man,’ he said, turning -to Archie, ‘it’s not a possibility, it’s as certain as the Day of Doom.’ - -Then they all talked at once. Moray’s name was fast to a letter; the -letter was fast in Lethington’s poke; Lethington was fast to the band. -What more could be done? Would Lethington endanger his neck? His safety -was Moray’s, and theirs was Lethington’s. And the King? What of the King? - -‘You talk of Doomsday, my lord!’ shouts Ruthven, with the slaver of his -rage upon his mouth: ‘there’s but one doom impending, and we’ll see to -it.’ - -Perorations had no effect upon Morton, who was still bothered. He went -over the whole again, clawing down his fingers as he numbered the -points. There was himself to keep the palace, there was Lindsay to hold -back Bothwell; the King to go into the closet—the kiss—the words of -signal—then Ruthven and——Here he stopped, and his eyes grew small. - -‘Oh, sirs,’ he said, ‘the poor lassie! Sold with a kiss! She’s big, sirs; -you’ll likely kill mother and bairn.’ - -Ruthven, squinting fearfully, slammed the table. ‘Whose bairn, by the -Lord? Tell me whose?’ - -Morton shook his head. ‘Yon’s hell-work,’ he said. ‘I’ll have nothing -to do wi’t. I guess who’s had the devising of it. ’Tis Lethington—a -grey-faced thief.’ - -Here Archie Douglas, after looking to Ruthven, intervened, and talked for -nearly half an hour to his cousin. Morton, very gloomy, heard him out; -then made his own proposition. He would stand by the King, he said; he -would hold the palace. No man should come in or out without the password. -But he would not go upstairs, nor know who went up or what went on. This -also he would have them all promise before he touched the band with a -pen:—Whatever was done to the Italian should be done in the passage. -There should be no filthy butchery of a girl and her child, either -directly or by implication, where he had a hand at a job. Such was his -firm stipulation. Archie swore to observe it; Fawdonsyde, Lindsay, swore; -Ruthven said nothing. - -‘Archie,’ said his cousin, ‘go you and fetch me the Scriptures. I shall -fasten down Ruthven with the keys of God.’ Ruthven put his hand upon the -book and swore. Then the Earl of Morton signed the band. - - - - -CHAPTER V - -MIDNIGHT EXPERIENCES OF JEAN-MARIE-BAPTISTE DES-ESSARS - - -On that appointed night of Saturday, the 9th of March—a blowy, snowy -night, harrowing for men at sea, with a mort of vessels pitching at their -cables in Leith Roads—Des-Essars was late for his service. He should have -come on to the door at ten o’clock, and it wanted but two minutes to that -when he was beating down the Castle hill in the teeth of the wind. - -Never mind his errand, and expect fibs if you ask what had kept him. -Remember that he was older at this time than when you first saw him, -a French boy ‘with smut-rimmed eyes,’ crop-headed, pale, shrewd, and -reticent. That was a matter of three years ago: the Queen was but -nineteen and he four years younger. He was eighteen now, and may have -had evening affairs like other people, no concern of yours or mine. -Whatever they may have been, they had kept him unduly; he had two minutes -and wanted seven. He drew his bonnet close, his short cape about him, -and went scudding down the hill as fast as the snow would let him in -shoes dangerously thin for the weather, but useful for tiptoe purposes. -The snow had been heaped upon the cawsey, but in the street trodden, -thawed, and then frozen again to a surface of ice. From it came enough -light to show that few people were abroad, and none lawfully, and that -otherwise it was infernally dark. A strangely diffused, essential light -it was, that of the snow. It put to shame three dying candles left in the -Luckenbooths and the sick flame of an oil lamp above the Netherbow Port. -After passing that, there was no sign of man or man’s comforts until you -were in the Abbey precincts. - -Des-Essars knew—being as sharp as a needle—that something was changed -the moment he reached those precincts; knew by the pricking of his skin, -as they say. A double guard set; knots of men-at-arms; some horses led -about; low voices talking in strange accents,—something was altered. -Worse than all this, he found the word of the night unavailing: no manner -of entry for him. - -‘My service is the Queen’s, honourable sir,’ he pleaded to an unknown -sentry, who wore (he observed) a steel cap of unusual shape. - -The square hackbutter shook his head. ‘No way in this night, Frenchman.’ - -‘By whose orders, if you please?’ - -‘By mine, Frenchman.’ - -Here was misfortune! No help for it, but he must brave what he had hoped -to avoid—his superior officer, to wit. - -‘If it please you, sir,’ he said, ‘I will speak with Mr. Erskine in the -guardroom.’ - -‘Mr. Airrskin!’ was the shocking answer—and how the man spoke it!—‘Mr. -Airrskin! He’s no here. He’s awa’. So now off with ye, Johnny Frenchman.’ -The man obviously had orders: but whose orders? - -Des-Essars shrugged. He shivered also, as he always did when refused -anything—as if the world had proved suddenly a chill place. But really -the affair was serious. Inside the house he must be, and that early. -Driven to his last resource, he walked back far enough for the dark to -swallow him up, returned upon his tracks a little way so soon as the -hackbutter had resumed his stamping up and down; branched off to the -right, slipping through a ruinous stable, blown to pieces in former -days by the English; crossed a frozen cabbage garden which, having been -flooded, was now a sheet of cat-ice; and so came hard upon the Abbey -wall. In this wall, as he very well knew, there were certain cavities, -used as steps by the household when the gateways were either not -convenient or likely to be denied: indeed, he would not, perhaps, have -cared to reckon how many times he had used them himself. Having chipped -the ice out of them with his hanger, he was triumphantly within the pale, -hopping over the Queen’s privy garden with high-lifted feet, like a dog -in turnips. To win the palace itself was easy. It was mighty little use -having friends in the kitchen if they could not do you services of that -kind. - -He had to find the Queen, though, and face what she might give him, but -of that he had little fear. He knew that she would be at cards, and too -full of her troubles and pains to seek for a new one. It is a queer -reflection that he makes in his Memoirs—that although he romantically -loved the Queen, he had no scruples about deceiving her and few fears -of being found out, so only that she did not take the scrape to heart. -‘She was a goddess to me,’ he says, ‘in those days, a remote point of my -adoration. A young man, however, is compact of two parts, an earthly and -a spiritual. If I had exhibited to her the frailties of my earthly part -it would have been by a very natural impulse. However, I never did.’ This -is a digression: he knew that she would not fret herself about him and -his affairs just now, because she was ill, and miserable about the King. -Throwing a kiss of his hand, then, to the yawning scullery-wench, who had -had to get out of her bed to open the window for him, he skimmed down the -corridors on a light foot, and reached the great hall. He hoped to go -tiptoe up the privy stair and gain the door of the cabinet without being -heard. When she came out she would find him there, and all would be well. -This was his plan. - -It was almost dark in the hall, but not quite. A tree-bole on the hearth -was in the article of death; a few thin flames about the shell of it -showed him a company of men in the corner by the privy stair. Vexatious! -They were leaning to the wall, some sitting against it; some were on the -steps asleep, their heads nodding to their knees. He was cut off his -sure access, and must go by the main staircase—if he could. He tried it, -sidling along by the farther wall; but they spied him, two of them, and -one went to cut him off. A tall enemy this, for the little Frenchman; but -luckily for him it was a case of boots against no boots where silence -was of the essence of the contract. Des-Essars, his shoes in his hand, -darted out into the open and raced straight for the stair. The enemy -began his pursuit—in riding-boots. Heavens! the crash and clatter on the -flags, the echo from the roof! It would never do: hushed voices called -the man back; he went tender-footed, finally stopped. By that time the -page was up the stair, pausing at the top to wipe his brows and neck of -cold sweat, and to wonder as he wiped what all this might mean. Double -guard in the court—strange voices—the word changed—Mr. Erskine away! No -sentry in the hall, but, instead, a cluster of waiting, whispering men—in -riding-boots—by the privy stair! The vivacious young man was imaginative -to a fault; he could construct a whole tragedy of life and death out of a -change in the weather. And here was a fateful climax to the tragedy of a -stormy night! First, the stress of the driving snow—whirling, solitary, -forlorn stuff!—the apprehension of wild work by every dark entry. Passing -the Tolbooth, a shriek out of the blackness had sent his heart into -his mouth. There had been fighting, too, in Sim’s Close. He had seen a -torch flare and dip, men and women huddled about two on the ground; one -grunting, ‘Tak’ it! Tak’ it!’ and the other, with a strangled wail, ‘Oh, -Jesus!’ Bad hearing all this—evil preparation. Atop of these apparitions, -lo! their fulfilment: stroke after stroke of doom. Cloaked men by the -privy stair—_Dieu de Dieu!_ His heart was thumping at his ribs when he -peeped through the curtain of the Queen’s cabinet and saw his mistress -there with Lady Argyll and the Italian. ‘Blessed Mother!’ he thought, -‘here’s an escape for me. I had no notion the hour was so late.’ What he -meant was, that the rest of the company had gone. He had heard that Lord -Robert Stuart and the Laird of Criech were to sup that night. Well, they -had supped and were gone! It must be on the stroke of midnight. - - * * * * * - -The Queen, as he could see, lay back in her elbow-chair, obviously -suffering, picking at some food before her, but not eating any. Her lips -were chapped and dry; she moistened them continually, then bit them. Lady -Argyll, handsome, strong-featured, and swarthy, sat bolt upright and -stared at the sconce on the wall; and as for the Italian, he did as he -always did, lounged opposite his Queen, his head against the wainscot. -Reflective after food, he used his toothpick, but no other ceremony -whatsoever. He wore his cap on his head, ignored Lady Argyll—half-sister -to the throne—and when he looked at her Majesty, as he often did, it was -as a man might look at his wife. She, although she seemed too weary or -too indifferent to lift her heavy eyelids, knew perfectly well that both -her companions were watching her: Des-Essars was sure of that. He watched -her himself intensely, and only once saw her meet Davy’s eye, when she -passed her cup to him to be filled with drink, and he, as if thankful to -be active, poured the wine with a flourish and smiled in her face as he -served her. She observed both act and actor, and made no sign, neither -drank from the cup now she had it; but sank back to her wretchedness and -the contemplation of it, being in that pettish, brooding habit of mind -which would rather run on in a groove of pain than brace itself to some -new shift. As he watched what was a familiar scene to him, Des-Essars was -wondering whether he should dare go in and report what he had observed in -the hall. No! on the whole he would not do that. Signior Davy, who was a -weasel in such a field as a young man’s mind, would assuredly fasten upon -him at some false turn or other, never let go, and show no mercy. Like -all the underlings of Holyrood he went in mortal fear of the Italian, -though, unlike any of them, he admired him. - -The little cabinet was very dim. There were candles on the table, but -none alight in the sconces. From beyond, through a half-open door, came -the drowsy voices of the Queen’s women, murmuring their way through two -more hours’ vigil. Interminable nights! Cards would follow supper, you -must know, and Signior Davy would try to outsit Lady Argyll. He always -tried, and generally succeeded. - -The Queen shifted, sighed, and played hasty tunes with her fingers on -the table: she was never still. It was evident that she was at once -very wretched and very irritable. Her dark-red gown was cut low and -square, Venetian mode: Des-Essars could see quite well how short her -breath was, and how quick. Yet she said nothing. Once she and Lady Argyll -exchanged glances; the Mistress of the Robes inquired with her eyebrows, -the Queen fretfully shook the question away. It was an unhappy supper -for all but the graceless Italian, who was much at his ease now that he -had unfastened some of the hooks of his jacket. The French lad, who had -always been in love with his mistress and yet able to criticise her—as a -Protestant may adore the Virgin Mary—admits that at this moment of her -life, in this bitter mood, he found her extremely piquant. ‘This pale, -helpless, angry, pretty woman!’ he exclaims upon his page. He would -seldom allow that she was more than just a pretty woman; and now she -was a good deal less. Her charms for him had never been of the face—she -had an allure of her own. ‘Mistress Seton was lovely, I consider, my -Lady Bothwell most beautiful, and Mistress Fleming not far short of -that: but the Queen’s Majesty—ah! the coin from Mr. Knox’s mint rang -true. Honeypot! Honeypot! There you had her essence: sleepy, slow, soft -sweetness—with a sharp aftertaste, for all that, to prick the tongue and -set it longing.’ - -More than nice considerations, these, which the stealthy opening of -a door and a step in the passage disturbed. Des-Essars would have -straightened himself on that signal, to stand as a page should stand -in the view of any one entering. Then he saw, out of the corner of his -eye, the King go down the little stair. It must be the King, because—to -say nothing of the tall figure, small-headed as it was,—he had seen -the long white gown. The King wore a white quilted-silk bedgown, lined -with ermine. At the turning of the stair Des-Essars saw him just glance -backwards over his shoulder towards the cabinet, but, being stiff within -the shadow of the curtain, was not himself seen. After that furtive look -he saw him go down the privy stair, his hand on the rope. Obviously he -had an assignation with some woman below. - -Before he had time to correct this conclusion by the memory of the -cloaked men in the hall, he heard returning steps—somebody, this time, -coming up the steps; no! there were more than one—two or three at least. -He was sure of this—his ears had never deceived him—and yet it was the -King alone who appeared at the stair-head with a lighted taper in his -hand, which he must have got from the hall. He stood there for a moment, -his face showing white and strained in the light, his mouth open, too; -then, blowing out his taper, he came directly to the curtain of the -Queen’s cabinet, pulled it aside and went in. He had actually covered -Des-Essars with the curtain without a notion that he was there; but the -youth had had time to observe that he was fully dressed beneath his -gown, and to get a hot whiff of the strong waters in his breath as he -passed in. Urgent to see what all this might mean, he peeped through the -hangings. - -Lady Argyll rose up slowly when she saw the King, but made no reverence. -Very few did in these days. The Italian followed her example, perfectly -composed. The Queen took no notice of him. She rested as she had been, -her head on the droop, eyebrows raised, eyes fixed on the disordered -platter. The King, whose colour was very high, came behind her chair, -stooped, and put his arm round her. His hand covered her bosom. She did -not avoid, though she did not relish this. - -‘Madam, it is very late,’ he said, and spoke breathlessly. - -‘It is not I who detain you,’ said she. - -‘No, madam, no. But you do detain these good servants of yours. Here is -your sister of Argyll; next door are your women. And so it is night after -night. I think not of myself.’ - -She lifted her head a little to look up sideways—but not at him. ‘You -think of very little else, to my understanding. Having brought me to the -state where now I am, you are inclined to leave me alone. Rather, you -were inclined; for this is a new humour, little to my taste.’ - -‘I should be oftener here, believe me,’ says the King, still embracing -her, ‘if I could feel more sure of a welcome—if all might be again as it -was once between you and me.’ - -She laughed, without mirth; then asked, ‘And how was it—once?’ - -The King stooped down and kissed her forehead, by the same act gently -pushing back her head till it rested on his shoulder. - -‘Thus it was once, my Mary,’ he said; and as she looked up into his face, -wondering over it, searching it, he kissed her again. ‘Thus it was once,’ -he repeated in a louder voice; and then, louder yet, ‘Thus, O Queen of -Scots!’ - -Once more he kissed her, and once more cried out, ‘O Queen of Scots!’ -Then Des-Essars heard the footsteps begin again on the privy stair, and -saw men come into the passage—many men. - -Three of them, in cloaks and steel bonnets, came quickly to the door, and -passed him. They went through the curtain. These three were Lord Ruthven, -Ker of Fawdonsyde, and Mr. Archibald Douglas. Rigid in his shadow, -Des-Essars watched all. - -Seeing events in the Italian’s eyes, rather than with her own—for Signior -Davy had narrowed his to two threads of blue—the Queen lifted her head -from her husband’s arm and looked curiously round. The three stood -hesitant within the door; Ruthven had his cap on his head, Fawdonsyde -his, but Archie showed his grey poll. Little things like these angered -her quickly; she shook free from the King and sat upright. - -‘What is this, my Lord Ruthven? You forget yourself.’ - -‘Madam——’ he began; but Douglas nudged him furiously. - -‘Your bonnet, man, your bonnet!’ - -The Queen had risen, and the fixed direction of her eyes gave him -understanding. - -‘Ah, my knapscall! I do as others do, madam,’ he said, with a meaning -look at the Italian. ‘What is pleasant to your Majesty in yonder servant -should not be an offence in a councillor.’ - -‘No, no, ma’am, nor it should not,’ muttered Fawdonsyde, who, -nevertheless, doffed his bonnet. - -The King was holding her again, she staring still at the scowling man in -steel. ‘What do you want with me, Ruthven?’ she said. She had very dry -lips. - -He made a clumsy bow. ‘May it please your Majesty,’ he said, ‘we are come -to rid you of this fellow Davy, who has been overlong familiar here, and -overmuch—for your Majesty’s honour.’ - -She turned her face to the King, whose arm still held her—a white, strong -face. - -‘You,’ she said fiercely, ‘what have you to do in this? What have you to -say?’ - -‘I think with Ruthven—with all of them—my friends and well-wishers. ’Tis -the common voice: they say I am betrayed, upon my soul! I cannot endure—I -entreat you to trust me——’ He was incoherent. - -She broke away from his arm, took a step forward and put herself between -him and the three. She was so angry that she could not find words. She -stammered, began to speak, rejected what words came. The Italian took off -his cap and watched Ruthven intently. The moment of pause that ensued -was broken by Ruthven’s raising his hand, for the Queen flashed out, -‘Put down your hand, sir!’ and seemed as if she would have struck him. -Fawdonsyde here cocked his pistol and deliberately raised it against the -Queen’s person. ‘Treason! treason!’ shrieked Des-Essars from the curtain, -and blundered forward to the villain. - -But the Queen had been before him; at last she had found words, and -deeds. She drew herself up, quivering, went directly towards Fawdonsyde, -and beat down the point of the pistol with her flat hand. ‘Do you dare -so much? Then I dare more. What shameless thing do you here? If I had a -sword in my hand——’ Here she stopped, tongue-tied at what was done to her. - -For Ruthven, regardless of majesty, had got her round the middle. He -pushed her back into the King’s arms; and, ‘Take your wife, my lord,’ -says he; ‘take your good-wife in your arms and cherish her, while we do -what must be done.’ - -The King held her fast in spite of her struggles. At that moment the -Italian made a rattling sound in his throat and backed from the table. -Archie Douglas stepped behind the King, to get round the little room; -Ruthven approached his victim from the other side; the Italian pulled at -the table, got it between himself and the enemy, and overset it: then -Lady Argyll screamed, and snatched at a candlestick as all went down. It -was the only light left in the room, held up in her hand like a beacon -above a tossing sea. Where was Des-Essars? Cuffed aside to the wall, like -a rag doll. The maids were packed in the door of the bedchamber, and one -of them had pulled him into safety among them. - -All that followed he marked: how the frenzied Italian, hedged in between -Douglas and Ruthven, vaulted the table, knocked over Fawdonsyde, and -then, whimpering like a woman, crouched by the Queen, his fingers in the -pleats of her gown. He saw the King’s light eyelashes blink, and heard -his breath come whistling through his nose; and that pale, disfigured -girl, held up closely against her husband, moaning and hiding her face -in his breast. And now Ruthven, grinning horribly, swearing to himself, -and Douglas, whining like a dog at a rat-hole, were at their man’s hands, -trying to drag him off. Fawdonsyde hovered about, hopeful to help. Lady -Argyll held up the candle. - -Douglas wrenched open one hand, Ruthven got his head down and bit the -other till it parted. - -‘_O Dio! O Dio!_’ long shuddering cries went up from the Italian as they -dragged him out into the passage, where the others waited. - -It was dark there, and one knew not how full of men; but Des-Essars heard -them snarling and mauling like a pack of wolves; heard the scuffling, the -panting, the short oaths—and then a piercing scream. At that there was -silence; then some one said, as he struck, ‘There! there! Hog of Turin!’ -and another (Lindsay), ‘He’s done.’ - -The King put the Queen among her maids in a hurry, and went running -out into the passage as they were shuffling the body down the stair. -Des-Essars just noticed, and remembered afterwards, his naked dagger -in his hand as he went out helter-skelter after his friends. Upon some -instinct or other, he followed him as far as the head of the stair. From -the bottom came up a great clamour—howls of execration, one or two cries -for the King, a round of welcome when he appeared. The page ran back to -the cabinet, and found it dark. - -It was bad to hear the Queen’s laughter in the bedchamber—worse when -that shuddered out into moaning, and she began to wail as if she were -keening her dead. He could not bear it, so crept out again to spy about -the passages and listen to the shouting from the hall. ‘A Douglas! a -Douglas!’ was the most common cry. Peeping through a window which gave -on to the front, he saw the snowy court ablaze with torches, alive with -men, and against the glare the snowflakes whirling by, like smuts from a -burning chimney. It was clear enough now that the palace was held, all -its inmates prisoners. But what seemed more terrifying than that was the -emptiness of the upper corridors, the sudden hush after so much riot—and -the Queen’s moan, haunting all the dark like a lost soul. - - * * * * * - -It was so bad up there that the lad, his brain on fire, felt the need of -any company—even that of gaolers. No one hindering, he crept down the -privy stair,—horribly slippery it was, and he knew why,—hoping to spy -into the hall; and this also he was free to do, since the stair-foot was -now unguarded. He found the hall crowded with men; great torches smoking -to the rafters; a glow of light on shields and blazonry, the banners and -achievements of dead kings. In the stir of business the arras surged like -the waves of the sea. A furious draught blew in from the open doors, to -which all faces were turned. Men craned over each others’ backs to look -there. Des-Essars could not see the King; but there at the entry was the -Earl of Morton in his armour, two linkmen by him. He was reading from a -bill: in front of him was a clear way; across it stood the Masters of -Lindsay and Ruthven, and men in their liveries, halberds in their hands. - -‘Pass out, Earl of Atholl,’ he heard Lord Morton say; ‘Pass out, Lord of -Tullibardine’: and then, after a while of looking and pointing, he saw -the grizzled head and square shoulders of my Lord Atholl moving down the -lane of men, young Tullibardine uncovered beside him. - -‘Pass out, Pitcur; pass out, Mr. James Balfour; pass out, the Lord -Herries.’ The same elbowing in the crowd: three men file out into the -scurrying snow—all the Queen’s friends, observe. - -Near to Des-Essars a man asked of his neighbour, ‘Will they let by my -Lord Huntly, think you?’ - -The other shook his head. ‘Never! He’ll keep company with the Reiver of -Liddesdale, be sure.’ - -The Reiver was Lord Bothwell, of course, whom Des-Essars knew to be in -the house. ‘Good fellow-prisoners for us,’ he thought. - -‘Pass out, Mr. Secretary, on a fair errand.’ - -There was some murmuring at this; but the man went out unmolested, with -a sweep of the bonnet to my Lord Morton as he passed. Des-Essars saw -him stop at the first taste of the weather and cover his mouth with his -cloak—but he waited for no more. A thought had struck him. He slipped -back up the puddled stair, gained the first corridor, and, knowing his -way by heart, went in and out of the passages until he came to a barred -door. Here he put his ear to the crack and listened intently. - -For a long time he could hear nothing on either side the door; but by and -by somebody with a light—a man—came to the farther end of the passage and -looked about, raising and dipping his lantern. That was an ugly moment! -Crouched against the wall, he saw the lamp now high now low, and marked -with a leaping heart how nearly the beams reached to where he lay. He -heard a movement behind the door, too, but had to let it go. Not for full -three minutes after the disappearance of the watchman did he dare put -his knuckles to the door, and tap, very softly, at the panel. He tapped -and tapped. A board creaked; there was breathing at the door. A voice, -shamming boldness, cried, ‘Qui est?’ - -Des-Essars smiled. ‘C’est toi, Paris?’ - -His question was answered by another. ‘Tiens, qui est ce drôle?’ - -Paris, for a thousand pound! Knocking again, he declared himself. ‘It is -I, Paris—M. Des-Essars.’ - -‘Monsieur Baptiste, your servant,’ then said Paris through the door. - -‘My lord is a prisoner, Paris?’ - -‘Not for the first time, my dear sir.’ - -‘How many are you there?’ - -‘Four. My lord, and Monsieur de Huntly, myself, Jock Gordon.’ - -‘Well, you should get out—but quickly, before they have finished in the -hall. They are passing men out. Be quick, Paris—tell my lord.’ - -‘Bravo!’ says Paris. ‘We should get out—and quickly! By the chimney, sir? -There is no chimney. By the window? There is but one death for every man, -and one neck to be broke.’ - -‘You will break no necks at all, you fool. Below these windows is the -lions’ house.’ - -Paris thought. ‘Are you sure of that?’ - -‘Sure! Oh, Paris, make haste!’ - -Again Paris appeared to reflect; and then he said, ‘If you are betraying -a countryman of yours, M. Des-Essars, and your old patron also, you shall -never see God.’ - -Des-Essars wrung his hands. ‘You fool! you fool! Are you mad? Call my -lord.’ - -‘Wait,’ said Paris. In a short time, the sound of heavy steps. Ah, here -was my lord! - -‘’Tis yourself, Baptist?’ - -‘Yes, yes, my lord.’ - -‘Have they finished with Davy?’ - -‘My God, sir!’ - -‘What of the Queen?’ - -‘Her women have her.’ - -‘Now, Baptist. You say the lion-house is below these windows. Which -windows? There are four.’ - -‘The two in the midst, my lord. My lord, across the Little Garden—in a -straight line—there are holes in the wall.’ - -‘Oho! You are a brave lad. Go to your bed.’ - -Jean-Marie-Baptiste Des-Essars went back to the Queen’s side. At the -door of the cabinet he found Adam Gordon in a fit of sobs. ‘Oh, my fine -man,’ says the French lad, stirring him with his foot, ‘leave tears to -the women. This is men’s business.’ - -Adam lifted up his stricken face. ‘Where have you been cowering, traitor?’ - -Jean-Marie laughed grimly. ‘I have been saving Scotland,’ he said, -‘whilst you were blubbering here.’ - -Adam Gordon, being up by now, knocked Jean-Marie down. - -‘I excused him readily, however,’ he writes in his Memoirs, ‘considering -the agitation we all suffered at the time. And where he felled me there I -lay, and slept like a child.’ - - - - -CHAPTER VI - -VENUS IN THE TOILS - - -Sir James Melvill, whom readers must remember at Saint Andrews as -a shrewd, elderly courtier, expert in diplomacy and not otherwise -without humours of a dry sort, plumed himself upon habit—‘Dear Mother -Use-and-Wont,’ as he used to say. A man is sane at thirty, rich at forty, -wise at fifty, or never; and what health exacts, wealth secures, and -wisdom requires, is the orderly, punctual performance of the customary. -You may have him now putting his theory into severest practice: for -though he had seen what was to be seen during that night of murder and -alarm, though he had lain down to sleep in his cloak no earlier than five -o’clock in the small hours, by seven, which was his Sunday time, he was -up and about, stamping his booted feet to get the blood down, flacking -his arms, and talking encouragement to himself—as, ‘Hey, my bonny man, -how’s a’ with you the morn?’ Very soon after you might have seen him over -the ashes of the fire, raking for red embers and blowing some life into -them with his frosted breath. All about lay his snoring fellows, though -it was too dark to see them. Every man lay that night where he could find -his length, and slept like the dead in their graves. There seemed no soul -left in a body but in his own. - -He went presently to the doors, thinking to open them unhindered. But no! -a sitting sentry barred the way with a halberd. ‘May one not look at the -weather, my fine young man?’ says Sir James. - -‘’Tis as foul as the grave, master, and a black black frost. No way out -the now.’ - -Sir James, who intended to get out, threw his cloak over his shoulder and -gravely paced the hall until the chances should mend. One has not warred -with the Margrave, held a hand at cards with the Emperor Charles at -Innspruck, loitered at Greenwich in attendance upon Queen Elizabeth, or -endured the King of France in one of his foaming rages, without learning -patience. He proposed to walk steadily up and down the hall until nine -o’clock. Then he would get out. - - * * * * * - -The women said afterwards that the Queen had quieted down very soon, -dried her eyes, gone to bed, and slept almost immediately ‘as calm as a -babe new-born.’ However that may be, she awoke as early as Sir James, -and, finding herself in Mary Fleming’s arms, awoke her too in her -ordinary manner by biting her shoulder, not hard. ‘My lamb, my lamb!’ -cooed the maid; but the Queen in a brisk voice said, ‘What’s o’clock?’ -The lamp showed it to be gone seven. - -The Queen said: ‘Get up, child, and find me the page who was in the -cabinet last night. I saw him try the entry, and he ran in when—when.... -It was Baptist, I think.’ - -She spoke in an even voice, as if the occasion had been a card party. -This frightened Mary Fleming, who began to quiver, and to say, ‘Oh, -ma’am, did Baptist see all? ’Twill have scared away his wits.’ And then -she tried coaxing. ‘Nay, _ma Reinette_, but you must rest awhile. Come, -let me stroke your cheek’—a common way with them of inviting sleep to her. - -But the Queen said, ‘I have had too much stroking—too much. Now do as I -bid you.’ So the maid clothed herself in haste and went out with a lamp. - -Outside the door she found the two youths asleep—Des-Essars on the floor, -Gordon by the table—and awoke them both. ‘Which of you was on the door -last night?’ - -‘It was I, Mistress Fleming,’ said the foreigner. ‘All the time I was -there.’ - -‘Come with me, then. You are sent for.’ - -He followed her in high excitement into the Queen’s bedchamber. There -he saw Margaret Carwood asleep on her back, lying on the floor; and the -Queen propped up with pillows, a white silk shift upon her—or half upon -her, for one shoulder was out of it. She looked sharper, more like Circe, -than she had done since her discomforts began: very intense, very pale, -very black in the eyes. And she smiled at him in a curiously secret way—a -beckoning, fluttering of the lips, as if she shared intelligence with -him, and told him so by signs. ‘She was as sharp and hard and bright as -a cut diamond,’ he writes of this appearance; ‘nor do I suppose that -any lady in the storied world could have turned her face away from a -night of terror and blood, towards a day-to-come of insult, chains and -degradation, as she turned hers now before my very eyes.’ - -She did not say anything for a while, but considered him absorbingly, -with those fever-bright eyes and that cautious smile, until she had made -up her mind. He, of course, was down on his knee; Mary Fleming, beside -him, stood—her hand just touching his shoulder. - -‘Come hither, Jean-Marie.’ - -Approaching, he knelt by the bed. - -‘No,’ said she, ‘stand up—closer. Now give me your hand.’ - -He held it out, and she took it in her own, and put it against her side. -He simply gazed at her in wonder. - -‘Tell me now if you feel my heart beating.’ - -He waited. ‘No, madam,’ said he then, whispering. - -‘Think again.’ - -He did. ‘No, madam. Ah! pardon. Yes, I feel it.’ - -‘That will do.’ - -He whipped back his hand and put it behind him. It had been the right -hand. The Queen watched all, still smiling in that wise new way of hers. - -‘Now,’ she said, ‘I think you will serve me, since you have assured -yourself that I am not so disturbed as you are. I wish you to find out -where they have put him.’ - -He felt Mary Fleming start and catch at her breath; but to him the -question seemed very natural. - -‘I will go now, madam.’ - -‘Yes. Go now. Be secret and speedy, and come back to me.’ - -He bowed, rose up, and went tiptoe out of that chamber of mystery and -sharp sweetness. Just beyond the door Adam Gordon pounced on him and -caught him by the neck. He struggled fiercely, tried to bite. - -‘Let me go, let me go, you silly fool, and worse! I’m on service. Oh, my -God, let me go!’ - -‘How does she? Speak it, you French thief.’ - -‘_Dieu de Dieu!_’ he panted, ‘I shall stab you.’ - -At once his hands were pinned to the wall, and he crucified. He told his -errand—since time was all in all—with tears of rage. - -‘I shall go with you,’ says Adam. ‘We will go together.’ - -In the entry of the Chapel Royal, near the kings’ tombs, they found -what seemed to be a new grave. A loose flagstone—scatter of gravel -all about—the stone not level: one end, in fact, projected its whole -thickness above the floor. - -‘There he lies,’ says Adam. ‘What more do you want?’ - -Des-Essars was tugging at the stone. ‘It moves, it moves!’ He was crimson -in the face. - -They both tussled together: it gave to this extent, that they got the -lower edge clear of the floor. - -‘Hold on! Keep it so!’ snapped Des-Essars suddenly. - -He dropped on to his stomach and thrust his arm into the crack, up to the -elbow. - -‘What are you at? Be sharp, man, or I shall drop it!’ cried Adam in -distress. - -He _was_ sharp. In a moment he had withdrawn his hand, jumped up and -away, and was pelting to the stairs. Adam let the great stone down -with a thud and was after him. He was stopped at the Queen’s door by a -maid—Seton. - -‘Less haste, Mr. Adam. You cannot enter. Her Majesty is busy.’ - -Des-Essars had found the Queen waiting for him—nobody else in the room. - -‘Well? You saw it?’ - -‘I have seen a grave, madam.’ - -‘Well?’ - -‘It is a new grave.’ - -‘There’s nothing in that, boy.’ - -‘Monsieur David is in there, ma’am.’ - -Her quick eyes narrowed. How she peered at him! ‘How do you know?’ - -‘Madam, I lifted up the stone. No one was about.’ - -‘Well?’ - -‘I found something under it. I have it. I am therefore quite sure.’ - -‘What did you find? Let me see it.’ - -He plucked out of his breast a glittering thing and laid it on the bed. - -‘Behold it, madam!’ Folding his arms, he watched it where it lay. - -The Queen stared down at a naked dagger. A longish, lean, fluted blade; -and upon the bevelled edge a thick smear, half its length. - -She did not touch it, but moved her lips as if she were talking to it. -‘Do I know you, dagger? Have we been friends, dagger, old friends—and now -you play me a trick?’ She turned to Des-Essars. ‘You know that dagger?’ - -‘Yes, ma’am.’ He had seen it often, and no later than last night, and -then in hand. - -‘That will do,’ said she. ‘Leave me now. Send Fleming and Seton—and -Carwood also. I shall rise.’ - -When he was gone her face changed—grew softer, more thoughtful. Now she -held out her hand daintily, the little finger high above the others, -and with the tips of two daintily touched the dagger. She was rather -horrible—like a creature of the woods at night, an elf or a young witch, -playing with a corpse. She laughed quietly to herself as she fingered the -stained witness of so much terror; but then, when she heard them at the -door, picked it up by the handle and put it under the bedclothes. No one -was to know what she meant to do. - -The women came in. ‘Dress me, Carwood, and quickly. Dolet, have you my -bath ready?’ ‘Mais, c’est sûr, Majesté.’ They poured out for her a bath -of hot red wine. No day of her life passed but she dipped herself in that. - - * * * * * - -At nine o’clock, braced into fine fettle by his exercise, Sir James -Melvill went again to the hall doors. A few shiverers were about by this -time, for sluggard dawn was gaping at the windows; some knelt by the -fire which his forethought had saved for them, some hugged themselves -in corners; one man was praying aloud in an outlandish tongue, praying -deeply and striking his forehead with his palm. Sir James, not to be -deterred by prayers or spies, stepped up to the sentry, a new man, and -tapped him on the breast. ‘Now, my honest friend,’ he said pleasantly, -‘I have waited my two hours, and am prepared to wait other two. But he -to whom my pressing errand is must wait no longer. I speak of my lord of -Morton—your master and mine, as things have turned out.’ - -‘My lord will be here by the ten o’clock, sir,’ says the man. - -‘I had promised him exact tidings by eight,’ replied Sir James; and spoke -so serenely that he was allowed to pass the doors, which were shut upon -him. Nobody could have regretted more than himself that he had lied: he -had no mortal errand to the Earl of Morton. But seeing that he had not -failed of Sabbath sermon for a matter of fifteen years, it was not to be -expected that the murder of an Italian was to stay him now. Sermon in -Saint Giles’s was at nine. He was late. - -The fates were adverse: there was to be no sermon for him that Sabbath. -As he walked gingerly across the Outer Close—a staid, respectable, Sunday -gentleman—he heard a casement open behind him, and turning sharply saw -the Queen at her chamber window, dressed in grey with a white ruff, and -holding a kerchief against her neck. After a hasty glance about, which -revealed no prying eyes, he made a low reverence to her Majesty. - -Sparkling and eager as she looked, she nodded her head and leaned far -out of the window. ‘Sir James Melvill,’ she called down, in a clear, -carrying voice, ‘you shall do me a service if you please.’ - -‘God save your Majesty, and I do please,’ says Sir James. - -‘Then help me from this prison where now I am,’ she said. ‘Go presently -to the Provost, bid him convene the town and come to my rescue. Go -presently, I say; but run fast, good sir, for they will stay you if they -can.’ - -‘Madam, with my best will and legs.’ He saluted, and walked briskly on -over the frozen snow. - -Out of doors after him came a long-legged man in black, a chain about his -neck, a staff in hand; following him, three or four lacqueys in a dark -livery. - -‘Ho, Sir James Melvill! Ho, Sir James!’ - -He was by this time at the Outer Bailey, which stood open for him—three -paces more and he had done it. But there were a few archers lounging -about the door of the Guard House, and two who crossed and recrossed each -other before the gates. ‘Gently doth it,’ quoth he, and stayed to answer -his name to the long-legged Chamberlain. - -‘What would you, Mr. Wishart, sir?’ - -‘Sir James, my lord of Ruthven hath required me——’ But he got no further. - -‘Your lord of Ruthven?’ cried Sir James. ‘Hath he required you to require -of me, Mr. Wishart?’ - -‘Why, yes, sir. My lord would be pleased to know whither you are bound so -fast. He is, sir, in a manner of speaking, deputy to the King’s Majesty -at this time.’ - -Sir James blinked. He could see the Queen behind her window, watching -him. ‘I am bound, sir,’ he said deliberately, ‘whither I shall hope to -see my lord of Ruthven tending anon. The sermon, Mr. Wishart, the sermon -calls me; the which I have not foregone these fifteen years, nor will not -to-day unless you and your requirements keep me unduly.’ - -‘I told my lord you would be for the preaching, Sir James. I was sure -o’t. But he’s a canny nobleman, ye ken; and the King’s business is before -a’.’ - -‘I have never heard, Mr. Wishart, that it was before that of the King of -kings,’ said Sir James. - -‘Ou, fie, Sir James! To think that I should say so!’—Mr. Wishart was -really concerned—‘Nor my lord neither, whose acceptance of the rock of -doctrine is well known. I shall just pop in and inform my lord.’ - -‘Do so. And I wish you a good day, Mr. Wishart,’ says Sir James in a -stately manner, and struck out of the gates and up the hill. - -He went directly to the Provost’s house, and what he learned there seemed -to him so serious, that he overstepped his commission by a little way. -‘Mr. Provost,’ he said, ‘you tell me that you have orders from the King. -I counsel you to disregard them. I counsel you to serve and obey your -sanctified anointed Queen. The King, Mr. Provost, is her Majesty’s right -hand, not a doubt of it; but when the right hand knoweth not what the -left hand is about, it is safer to wait until the pair are in agreement -again. What the King may have done yesterday he may not do to-day—he may -not wish it, or he may not be capable of it. I am a simple gentleman, Mr. -Provost, and you are a high officer, steward of this good town. I counsel -not the officer in you, but the sober burgess, when I repeat that what -may have been open to the King yesterday may be shut against him to-day.’ - -‘Good guide us, Sir James, this is dangerous work!’ cried the Provost. -‘Who’s your informant in the matter?’ - -‘I have told you that I am a simple gentleman,’ said Sir James, ‘but -I lied to you. I am a Queen’s messenger: I go from you to meet her -Majesty’s dearest brother, the good Earl of Moray, who should be home -to-day.’ - -It must be owned that, if he was an unwilling liar, he was a good -one. He lied like truth, and the stroke was masterly. The Provost set -about convening the town; and when Sir James Melvill walked back to -Holyrood—after sermon—all the gates were held in the Queen’s name. - -He did not see her, for the King was with her at the time; but Mary -Beaton received him, heard his news and reported it. She returned shortly -with a message: ‘The Queen’s thanks to Sir James Melvill. Let him ride -the English road and meet the Earl of Moray by her Majesty’s desire.’ -He was pleased with the errand, proud to serve the Queen. His greatest -satisfaction, however, was to reflect that he had not, after all, lied to -the Provost of Edinburgh. - - * * * * * - -Now we go back to Queen Mary. Bathed and powdered, dressed and coifed, -her head full of schemes and heart high in courage, she waited for the -King, being very sure in her own mind that he would come if she made no -sign. Certainly, certainly he would come: she had reasoned it all out -as she lay half in bed, smiling and whispering to the dagger. ‘He has -been talked into this, by whom I am not sure, but I think by Ruthven and -his friends. They will never stop where now they are, but will urge him -further than he cares to go. I believe he will wait to see what I do. He -is not bold by nature, but by surges of heat which drive him. Fast they -drive him—yet they leave him soon! When he held me last night he was -trembling—I felt him shake. And yet—he has strong arms, and the savour of -a man is upon him!’ - -She sat up, with her hands to clasp her knee, and let her thought go -galloping through the wild business. ‘I felt the child leap as I lay on -his breast! Did he urge towards the King his father, glad of his manhood? -So, once upon a day, urged I towards the King my lord!’ - -She began to blush, but would be honest with herself. ‘And if he came -again to me now, and took me so again in his arms—and again I sensed the -man in him—what should I do?’ - -She looked wise, as she smiled to feel her eyes grow dim. But then she -shook her head. ‘He will come, he will come—but not so. I know him: oh, I -know him like a thumbed old book! And when I bring out that which I have -here’—her hand caressed the dagger—‘I know what he will do. Yes, yes, -like an old book! He will rail against his betrayer, and in turn betray -him. Ah, my King, my King, do I read you aright? We shall see very soon.’ - -She looked out upon the snowy close, the black walls and dun pall of air; -she saw Sir James Melvill set forward upon his pious errand, and changed -it, as you know. Then she resumed her judging and weighing of men. - -Odd! She gave no thought to the wretched Italian, her mind was -upon the quick, and not the dead. Ruthven, a black, dangerous -man—scolding-tongued, impious in mind, thinking in oaths—yes: but a man! -Archie Douglas, supple as a snake, Fawdonsyde and his foolish pistols, -she considered not at all; but her mind harped upon Ruthven and the King, -who had each laid rough hands upon her—and thus, it seems, earned her -approbation. Ruthven had taken her about the middle and pushed her back, -helpless, into the other’s arms; and she had felt those taut arms, and -not struggled; but leaned there, her face in his doublet. _Pardieu_, each -had played the man that night! And Ruthven would play it again, and the -King would not. No, no; not he! - -Ruthven, by rights, should be won over. Should she try him? No, he -would refuse her; she was sure of it. He was as bluff, as flinty-cored -as——Ranging here and there, searching Scotland for his parallel, her -heart jumped as she found him. Bothwell, Bothwell! Ha, if he had been -there! It all began to re-enact itself—the scuffling, grunting, squealing -business, with Bothwell’s broad shoulders steady in the midst of it. Man -against man: Bothwell and Ruthven face to face, and the daggers agleam -in the candle-light:—hey, how she saw it all doing! Ruthven would stoop -and glide by the wall: his bent knees, his mad, twitching brows! Bothwell -would stand his ground in mid-floor, and his little eyes would twinkle. -‘Play fairly with the candle, my Lady Argyll!’ and he would laugh—yes, -she could hear his ‘Ho, ho, ho!’ But she jumped up as she came to that, -she panted and felt her cheeks burn. She held her fine throat with both -hands until she had calmed herself. So doing, a thought struck her. She -rang her hand-bell and sent for Des-Essars once more. - -When he came to her she made a fuss over him, stroked his hair, put -her hand on his shoulder, said he was her young knight who should ride -out to her rescue. He was to take a message from her to the Earl of -Bothwell—that he was on no account to stir out of town until he heard -from her again. He should rather get in touch with all of her friends and -be ready for instant affairs. Des-Essars went eagerly but discreetly to -work. She then had just time to leave a direction for Melvill, that he -should be first with her brother Moray, when they told her that the King -was coming in. - -‘Of course he is coming,’ she said. ‘What else can he do?’ - -Her courage rose to meet him more than half-way. If Des-Essars had been -allowed to feel her heart again he would have found it as steady as a -man’s. - -‘I will see the King in the red closet,’ she said. ‘Seton, Fleming, come -you with me.’ - -When he was announced he found her thus in company, sitting at her -needlework on a low coffer by the window. - -The young man had thickened rims to his eyes, but else looked pinched and -drawn. He kept a napkin in his hand, with which he was for ever dabbing -his mouth: seeming to search for signs of blood upon it, he inspected it -curiously whenever it had touched him. As he entered the Queen glanced -up, bowed her head to him and resumed her stitch-work. The two maids, -after their curtseys, remained standing—to his visible perturbation. -It was plain that he had expected to find her alone; also that he had -strung himself up for a momentous interview—and that she had not. He grew -more and more nervous, the napkin hovered incessantly near his mouth; -half-turning to call his man Standen into the room, he thought better of -it, and came on a little way, saying, ‘Madam, how does your Majesty?’ - -She looked amused at the question, as she went on sewing. - -‘As well, my lord,’ she told him, ‘as I can look to be these many months -more. But women must learn such lessons, which men have only to teach.’ - -He knew that he was outmatched. ‘I am thankful, madam——’ - -‘My lord, you have every reason.’ - -‘I say, I am thankful; for I had a fear——’ - -She gave him a sharp look. ‘Do you fear, my lord? What have you to fear? -Your friends are about you, your wife a prisoner. What have you to fear?’ - -‘The tongue, madam.’ - -She had goaded him to this, and could have had him at her mercy had she -so willed it. But she was silent, husbanding her best weapon against good -time. - -He went headlong on. ‘I had words for your private ear. I had hoped that -by a little intimacy, such as may be looked for between——But it’s all -one.’ - -She affected not to understand, pored over his fretful scraps with the -pure pondering of a child. ‘But——! Converse, intimacy between us! Who is -to prevent it? Ah, my poor maids afflict you! What may be done before -matrons must be guarded from the maids. Indeed, my lord, and that is -my opinion. Go, my dears. The King is about to discuss the affairs of -marriage.’ - -They went out. The King immediately came to her, stooped and took her -hand up from her lap. She kept the other hidden. - -‘My Mary,’ he said—‘My Mary! let all be new-born between us.’ - -She heard the falter in his voice, but considered rather his fine white -hand as it held her own, and judged it with a cool brain. A frail hand -for a man! So white, so thinly boned, the veins so blue! Could such hands -ever hold her again? And how hot and dry! A fever must be eating him. Her -own hands were cold. New-born love—for this hectic youth! - -‘New-born, my lord?’ she echoed him, sighing. ‘Alas, that which must be -born should be paid for first. And what the reckoning of that may be now, -you know as well as I. May not one new birth be as much as I can hope -for, or desire? I do think so.’ - -Fully as well as she he knew the peril she had been in, she and the load -she carried. He went down on his knee beside her, and, holding her one -hand, sought after the other, which she hid. - -‘My dear,’ he said earnestly, ‘oh, my dear, judge me not hardly. I -endeavoured to shield you last night—I held you fast—they dared not -touch you! Remember it, my Mary. As for my faults, I own them fairly. -I was provoked—anger moved me—bitter anger. I am young. I am not -even-tempered: remember this and forgive me. And, I pray you, give me -your hand.—No, the other, the other! For I need it, my heart—indeed and -indeed.’ That hand was gripped about a cold thing in her lap, under her -needlework. He could not have it without that which it held; and now she -knew that he should not. For now she scorned him—that a man who had laid -his own hands to man’s work should now be on his knees, pleading for his -wife’s hands instead of snatching them—why, she herself was the better -man! Womanlike, she played with what she could have killed in a flash. - -‘My other hand, my lord? Do you ask for it? You had it once, when you put -rings upon it, but let it go. Do you ask for it again? It can give you no -joy.’ - -‘I need it, I need it! You should not deny me.’ He craved it abjectly. -‘Oh, my soul, my soul, I kiss the one—let me kiss the other, lest it be -jealous.’ - -Unhappy conceit! Her eyes paled, and you might have thought her tongue a -snake’s, darting, forked, flickering out and in as she struck hard. - -‘Traitor!’ thus she stabbed him—‘Traitor, son of a traitor, take and kiss -it if you dare.’ She laid above her caught hand that other, cool and -firm, and opened it to show him the handle of his own dagger. She took -the blade by the point and held the thing up, swinging before his shocked -eyes. ‘Lick that, hound!’ she said: ‘you should know the taste of it -better than I.’ - -He dropped her one hand, stared stupidly at the other: but as his gaze -concentrated upon the long smear on the blade you could have seen the -sweat rising on his temples. - -She had read him exquisitely. After the first brunt of terror, rage -was what he felt—furious rage against the man whom he supposed to have -betrayed him. ‘Oh, horrible traitor!’ he muttered by the window, whither -he had betaken himself for refuge,—‘Oh, Archie Douglas, if I could be -even with thee for this! Oh, man, man, man, what a curious, beastly -villain!’ He was much too angry now to be tender of his wife—either of -her pity or revenge; he turned upon her, threatening her from his window. - -‘You shall not intimidate me. I am no baby in your hands. This man is a -villain, I tell you, whom I shall pursue till he is below my heel. He has -laid this, look you for a trap. This was got by theft, and displayed by -malice—devilish craft of a traitor. And do you suppose I shall let it go -by? You mistake me, by God, if you do. Foul thief!—black, foul theft!’ - -She pointed to the smear on the blade. ‘And this?’ she asked him: ‘what -of this? Was this got by theft, my lord? Was this dry blood thieved from -a dead man? Or do I mistake, as you suppose? Nay, wretch, but you know -that I do not. The man was dead long before you dared touch him. Dead -and in rags—and then the King drove in his blade!’ Her face—Hecate in -the winter—withered him more than her words. Though these contained a -dreadful truth, the other chilled his blood. He crept aimlessly about the -room, feeling his heart fritter to water, and all the remains of his heat -congested in his head. He tried to straighten his back, his knees: there -seemed no sap in his bones. And she sat on, with cold critical eyes, and -her lips hard together. - -‘My Mary,’ he began to stammer, ‘this is all a plot against my -life—surely, surely you see it. I have enemies, the worse in that they -are concealed—I see now that all the past has been but a plot—why, yes, -it is plain as the daylight! I entreat you to hear me: this is most -dangerous villainy—I can prove it. They swore to stand my friends—fast, -fast they swore it. And here—to your hand—is proof positive. Surely, -surely, you see how I am trapped by these shameful traffickers!’ - -Her eyes never left his face, but followed him about the room on his -aimless tour; and whether he turned from the window or the wall, so -sure as he looked up he saw them on him. They drove him into speech. -‘I meant honestly,’ he began again, shifting away from those watchful -lights; ‘I meant honestly indeed. I have lived amiss—oh, I know it well! -A man is led into sin, and one sin leads to another. But I am punished, -threatened, in peril. Let me escape these nets and snares, I may do well -yet. My Mary, all may be well! Let us stand together—you and I’—he came -towards her with his hands out, stopped, started back. ‘Look away—look -away; take your eyes from off me—they burn!’ He covered his own. ‘O God, -my God, how miserable I am!’ - -‘You are a prisoner as I am,’ said the Queen. ‘We stand together because -we are tied together. And as for my eyes, what you abhor in them is what -you have put there. But since we are fellow-prisoners, methinks——’ - -He looked wildly. ‘Who says I am prisoner? If I am—if I am—why, I -am betrayed on all hands. My kinsmen—my father—no, no, no! That is -foolishness. Madam,’ he asked her, being desperate, ‘who told you that I -was a prisoner?’ - -She glanced at the dagger. ‘This tells me. Why, think you, should Archie -Douglas have laid that in the grave, except for me to find it there?’ - -It was, or it might have been, ludicrous to see his dismay. He stared, -with dots where his eyes should have been; he puffed his cheeks and blew -them empty; in his words he lost all sense of proportion. - -‘Beastly villain! Why, it is a plot against me! Why, they may murder me! -Why, this may have been their whole intent! Lord God, a plot!’ - -He pondered this dreadfully, seeing no way of escape, struggling with -the injury of it and the pity of it. Consideration that she was in the -same plight, that he had plotted against her, and now himself was plotted -against: there was food for humour in such a thought, but no food for -him. Of the two feelings he had, resentment prevailed, and brought his -cunning into play. ‘By heaven and hell,’ he said, ‘but I can counter -shrewdly on these knaves. Just wait a little.’ He cheered as he fumbled -in his bosom. ‘You shall see, you shall see—now you shall see whether or -no I can foin and parry with these night-stabbers. Oh, the treachery, the -treachery! But wait a little—now, now, now!’ - -He produced papers in a gush—bonds, schedules, signatures, seals—all -tumbled pell-mell into her lap. She read there what she had guessed -beforehand: Morton, Ruthven, Lindsay, Douglas, Lethington—ah, she had -forgotten this lover of Mary Fleming’s!—Boyd—yes, yes, and the stout -Kirkcaldy of Grange. Not her brothers? No: but she suspected that -Lethington’s name implied Moray’s. Well, Sir James would win her back -Moray, she hoped. She did not trouble with any more. ‘Yes, yes, your -friends, my lord. Your friends,’ she repeated, lingering on the pleasant -word, ‘who have made use of you to injure me, and now have dropped you -out of window. Well! And now what will you do, fellow-prisoner?’ - -At her knees now, his wretched head in her lap, his wretched tears -staining her, he confessed the whole business, sparing nobody, not even -himself; and as his miserable manhood lay spilling there it staled—like -sour milk in sweet—any remnants of attraction his tall person may have -had for her. She could calculate as she listened—and so she did—to what -extent she might serve herself yet of this watery fool. But she could -not for the life of her have expressed her contempt for him. The thing -had come to pass too exactly after her calculation. If he had been a boy -she might have pitied him, or if, on entering her presence, he had laid -sudden hands upon her, exulting in his force and using it mannishly; had -he been greedy, overbearing, insolent, snatching—and a man!—she might, -once more and for ever, have given him all her heart. But a blubbering, -truth-telling oaf—heaven and earth! could she have wedded _this_? Well, -he would serve to get her out of Holyrood; and meantime she was tired and -must forgive, to get rid of him. - -This was not so easy as it sounds, because at the first word of human -toleration she uttered he pricked up his pampered ears. As she went on -to speak of the lesson he had learned, of the wisdom of trusting her for -the future and of being ruled by her experience and judgment, he brushed -his eyes and began to encroach. His tears had done him good, and her -recollected air gave him courage; he felt shriven, more at ease. So he -enriched himself of her hand again, he edged up to share her seat; very -soon she felt his arm stealing about her waist. She allowed these things -because she had decided that she must. - -He now became very confidential, owning freely to his jealousy of -the Italian—surely pardonable in a lover!—talking somewhat of his -abilities with women, his high-handed ways (which he admitted that -he had in excess: ‘a fault, that!‘), his ambitions towards kingship, -crowns-matrimonial, and the like trappings of manhood. She listened -patiently, saying little, judging and planning incessantly. This he -took for favour, advanced from stronghold to stronghold, growing as he -climbed. The unborn child—pledge of their love: he spoke of that. He was -sly, used double meanings; he took her presently by the chin and kissed -her cheek. Unresisted, he kissed her again and again. ‘_Redintegratio -amoris!_’ he cried, really believing it at the moment. This very night he -would prove to her his amendment. Journeys end in lovers’ meeting! If she -would have patience she should be a happy wife yet. Would she—might he -hope? Should this day be a second wedding day? Her heart was as still as -freezing water, but her head prompted her to sigh and half smile. - -‘You consent! You consent! Oh, happy fortune!’ he cried, and kissed her -mouth and eyes, and possessed as much as he could. - -‘Enough, my lord, enough!’ said she. ‘You forget, I think, that I am a -wife.’ - -He cursed himself for having for one moment forgotten it, threw himself -at her knees and kissed her held hands over and over, then jumped to his -feet, all his courage restored. ‘Farewell, lady! Farewell, sweet Queen! I -go to count the hours.’ He went out humming a tavern catch about Moll and -Peg. She called her women in, to wash her face and hands. - - * * * * * - -By riding long and changing often Sir James Melvill had been able to -salute the Earl of Moray on the home side of Dunbar. The great man -travelled, _primus inter pares_, a little apart from his companions -in exile—and without Mr. Secretary Lethington. The fact is that Mr. -Secretary was as much distrusted by his friends as by Lord Moray himself, -and had been required at the last moment to stay in town. Sir James, -thanks to that, was not long in coming to close quarters with the Earl, -and frankly told him that he had been sent by the Queen’s Majesty to -welcome him home. Lord Moray was bound to confess to himself that, -certainly, he had not looked for that. He had expected to come back a -personage to be feared, but not one to be desired. The notion was not -displeasing—for if you are desired it may very well be because you are -feared. So all the advantage at starting lay with Sir James. - -He went on to say how much need her Majesty felt in her heart to stand -well with her blood relations. As for old differences—ah, well, well, -they were happily over and done with. My lord would not look for the -Queen to confess to an error in judgment, nor would she, certainly, -ever reproach him with the past. There was no question of a treaty of -forgiveness between a sister and her brother. Urgency of the heart, -mutual needs, were all! And her needs were grievous, no question. Why, -the very desire she had for his help was proof that the past was past. -Did not his lordship think so? - -His lordship listened to this tolerant chatter as became a grave -statesman. Without a sign to betray his face he requested his civil -friend—‘worthy Sir James Melvill’—to rehearse the late occurrences—‘Of -the which,’ he said, ‘hearing somewhat at Berwick, I had a heavy heart, -misdoubting what part I might be called upon to play in the same.’ - -Whereupon Sir James, with the like gravity, related to his noble friend -all the details of a plot which nobody knew more exactly than the man who -heard him. It added zest to the comic interlude that Sir James also knew -quite well that my lord had been one of the conspirators. - -At the end his lordship said: ‘I thank you, Sir James Melvill, for your -tender recital of matters which may well cause heart-searching in us all. -Happy is that queen, I consider, who has such a diligent servant! And -happy also am I, who can be sure of one such colleague as yourself!’ - -‘All goes well,’ thinks Melvill. ‘I have my old sow by the lug.’ - -If he had one lug, the Queen got the other. For when my Lord of Moray -reached Edinburgh that night, he was told that her Majesty awaited him at -Holyroodhouse. Prisoner or not, she received him there, smiling and eager -to see him—and her gaolers standing by! And whenas he hesitated, darkly -bowing before her, she came forward in a pretty, shy way; and, ‘Oh, -brother, brother, I am glad you have come to me,’ she said, and gave him -her hands, and let him kiss her cheek. - -He murmured something proper,—his duty always remembered, and the rest of -the phrases,—but she, as if clinging to him, ran on in a homelier speech. -‘Indeed, there was need of you, brother James!’ she assured him, and went -on to tell him that which moved the stony man to tears. At least, it is -so reported, and I am glad to believe it. - -She walked with him afterwards in full hall, talking low and -quickly—candour itself. Her tones had a throbbing note, and a note of -confidence, which changed the whole scene as she recited it. I repeat, -the hall was full while she walked with him there, up and down in the -flickering firelight—full of the men whose plots he had shared, and hoped -to profit by. Fine spectacle for my lords of the Privy Council, for Mr. -Archie Douglas and his cousin Morton, fine for Mr. Secretary Lethington! -Before she kissed her brother good-night, before she went to bed, she -felt that she had done a good day’s work. And now, with her triumph as -good as won, she was ready for the crowning of it. - - * * * * * - -There she was out-generalled: there she was beaten. Match for all these -men’s wit, she was outwitted by one man’s sodden flesh. They undressed -her, prepared her for bed. She lay there in her pale, fragrant beauty, -solace for any lord’s desire, and conscious of it, and more fine for -the knowledge. She took deep breaths and draughts of ease; she assured -herself that she was very fair; she watched the glimmering taper and read -the shadows on the pictured wall as she waited for the crowning of her -toil. The day had been hers against all odds; the day is not always to -Venus, but the night is her demesne. So she waited and drowsed, smiling -her wise smile, secure, superb, and at ease. But King Harry Darnley, very -drunk, lay stertorous in his own bed; nor dared Forrest, nor Standen, nor -any man of his household, stir him out of that. The Queen of Wine and -Honey had digged a pit of sweetness and hidden a fine web all about it, -and was fallen into the midst of it herself. - -And so, it is like enough, if the boar had not timely rent the thigh of -Adonis, Dame Venus herself might have writhed, helpless in just such -toils. - - - - -CHAPTER VII - -AFTERTASTE - - -The Queen woke at eight o’clock in the morning and called for a cup of -cold water. She sat up to drink, and was told that Antony Standen had -been at the door at half-past six, the King himself at seven. Listening -to this news with her lips in the water, her eyes grew bitter-bright. ‘He -shall have old waiting at my chamber door,’ she said, ‘before he wins -it.’ Then she began to weep and fling herself about, to bite the coverlet -and to gloom among the pillows. ‘If I forget this past night may my God -forget me.’ O daughter of Babylon, wasted with misery! She lay down again -and shut her eyes, but fretted all the time, twitching her arms and legs, -making little angry noises, shifting from side to side. Mary Seton sat by -the bed, cool and discreet. - -The minutes passed, she enduring, until at last, unable to bear the -tripping of them, she started up so violently that a great pillow rolled -on to the floor. ‘I could kill myself, Seton,’ she said, grinding her -little teeth together, ‘I could kill myself for this late piece of work. -Verjuice in me!—I should die to drink my own milk. And all of you there, -whispering by the door, wagering, nudging one another—“He’ll never -come—never. Not he!” Oh, Jesu-Christ!’ she cried, straining up her bare -arms, ‘let this wound of mine keep green until the time!’ - -‘Hush, dear madam, oh, hush!’ says Seton, flushing to hear her; but the -Queen turned her a white, hardy face. - -‘Why should I be hushed? Let me cry out my shame to all the world, that -am the scorn of men and wedded women. Who heeds? What matter what I say? -Leave me alone—I’ll not be hushed down.’ - -Seton was undismayed. ‘No wedded woman am I. I love you, madam, and -therefore I shall speak with you. I say that, as he has proved his -unworthiness, so you must prove your pride. I say——’ - -There was hasty knocking at the door; the maid ran: ‘Who is it knocks?’ - -‘The King’s valet is without. The King asks if her Majesty is awake.’ - -‘Let him ask,’ said the Queen: ‘I will never see him again. Say that I am -at prayers.’ - -Seton called, ‘Reply that Her Majesty is unable to see the King at this -time. Her Majesty awoke early, and is now at prayers.’ She returned to -the bed, where the Queen lay on her elbow, picking her handkerchief to -pieces with her teeth. - -‘Sweet madam,’ she said, ‘bethink you now of what must be done this day. -You wish to be avenged of your enemies....’ - -The Queen looked keenly up. - -‘Well, well, of all your enemies. But for this you must first be free. -And it grows late.’ - -The Queen put her hair from her face and looked at the light coming in. -She sat up briskly. ‘You are right, _ma mie_. Come and kiss me. I have -been playing baby until my head aches.’ - -‘You will play differently now, I see,’ said Seton, ‘and other heads may -wish they had a chance to ache.’ - -The Queen took her maid’s face in her dry hands. ‘Oh, Seton,’ she said, -‘you are a cordial to me. They have taken my poor David, but have left me -you.’ - -‘Nay, madam,’ says Seton, ‘they might take me too, and you need none -of my strong waters. There is wine enough in your honey for all your -occasions.’ - -A shadow of her late gloom crossed over her. ‘My honey has been racked -with galls. ’Tis you that have cleared it. Give me my nightgown, and send -for Father Roche. I will say my prayers.’ - -With a spirit so responsive as hers, the will to move was a signal for -scheming to begin. Up and down her mind went the bobbing looms, across -and across the humming shuttles, spinning the fine threads together into -a fabric whose warp was vengeance and the woof escape from self-scorn. -She must be free from prison this coming night; but that was not the -half: she intended to leave her captors in the bonds she quitted. So -high-mettled was she that I doubt whether she would have accepted the -first at the price of giving up the second. Those being the ends of her -purpose, all her planning was to adjust the means; and the first thing -that she saw (and, with great courage, faced) was that the King—this -mutilated god, this botch, this travesty of lover and lord—must come out -with her. Long before demure Father Roche could answer his summons she -had admitted that, and strung herself to accept it. She must drag him -after her—a hobble on a donkey’s leg—because she dared not leave him -behind. He had betrayed his friends to her—true; but if she forsook him -he would run to them again and twice betray her. She shrugged him out of -mind. Bah! if she must take him she would take him. ’Twas to be hoped he -would get pleasure of it—and so much for that. But whom dared she leave? -She could think of no one as yet but her brother Moray. Overnight she -had separated him from the others, and she judged that he would remain -separate. Her thought was this:—‘He is a rogue among rogues, I grant. -But if you trust one rogue in a pack, all the others will distrust him. -Therefore he, being shunned by them, will cleave to me; and they, not -knowing how far I trust him, will falter and look doubtfully at one -another; and some of them will come over to him, and then the others -will be stranded.’ Superficial reasoning, rough-and-ready inference, all -this. She knew it quite well, but judged that it would meet the case of -Scotland. It was only, as it were, the scum of the vats she had seen -brewing in France.... But I keep Father Roche from his prayers. - - * * * * * - -Affairs in the palace and precincts kept their outward calm in the face -of the buzzing town. Train-bands paraded the street, the Castle was for -her Majesty, the gates were faithful. In the presence of such monitors -as these the burgesses and their wives kept their mouths shut as they -stood at shop-doors, and when they greeted at the close-ends they looked, -but did not ask, for news. But the Earl of Morton’s men still held the -palace, and he himself inspected the guard. There were no attempts to -dispute his hold, so far as he could learn, no blood-sheddings above the -ordinary, no libels on the Cross, no voices lifted against him in the -night. He held a morning audience in the Little Throne-room, with his -cousin Douglas for Chief Secretary; and to his suitors, speaking him -fair, gave fair replies. But it may be admitted he was very uneasy. - -That had not been a pleasant view for him overnight, when the great Earl -of Moray, newly returned, walked the hall with the Queen upon his arm. -His jaw had dropped to see it. Here was a turn given to our affairs! -Dreams troubled him, wakefulness, and flying fancies, which to pursue was -torment and not to pursue certain ruin. He slept late and rose late. At -a sort of levee, which he held as he dressed, he was peevish, snapped at -the faithful Archie, and almost quarrelled with Ruthven. - -‘Do you bite, my lord?’ had said that savage. ‘If I am to lose my head it -shall be in kinder company. I salute your lordship.’ And so he slammed -out. - -Morton knew that he must smooth him down before the day was over, but -just now there were more pressing needs. He told his cousin that he must -see the King at the earliest. - -Archie wagged his silvery head, looking as wise as an old stork. ‘Why, -that is very well,’ says he; ‘but how if he will not see you?’ - -‘What do you mean, man?’ cried the Earl upon him. - -‘Why, this, cousin,’ said Archie: ‘that the King is out of all hand the -morn. I went to his door betimes and listened for him, but could hear -nothing forby the snivelling of his boy, therefore made so bold as to -open. There I found the minion Forrest crying his heart out over the bed, -and could hear our kinsman within howling blasphemy in English.’ - -‘Pooh, man, ’tis his way of a morning,’ said Morton, heartening himself. -‘What did you then?’ - -Archie screwed his lips to the whistle, and cocked one eyebrow at the -expense of the other. - -‘What did I? I did the foolishest thing of all my days, when I sent in my -name by the boy. Strutting moorcock, call me, that hadna seen him all the -day before! Oh, cousin Morton, out comes our King like a blustering gale -o’ March, and takes me by the twa lugs, and wrenches at me thereby, and -shakes me to and fro as if I were a sieve for seeds. “Ye black-hearted, -poisonous beast!” he roars; “ye damned, nest-fouling chick of a drab and -a preacher!” says he—ah, and worse nor that, cousin, if I could lay my -tongue to sic filthy conversation. “I’ll teach ye,” says he thunderous, -“I’ll teach ye to play your games with your King!” He was fumbling for -his dagger the while, and would have stabbed me through and through but -for them that stood by and got him off me. Cousin, I fairly ran.’ - -The Earl looked sternly at him. ‘Tell me the truth, you Archie. What -devil’s trick had you played upon him?’ - -He looked so blankly, swore so earnestly, Nothing, upon his honour, that -he had to be believed. - -‘Well then,’ said Morton, ‘what may this betide?’ - -‘Woe can tell your lordship! Little good to you and me belike.’ - -Lord Morton said, ‘I doubt he’ll play us false. I doubt the knave was -working the courage into him.’ - -And there you see why he was uneasy in his ruling of the palace. Heavy, -ox-like, slow-footed man, thick-blooded, fond of thick pleasures, slow to -see, slow to follow, slow to give up—he felt now, without more rhyme or -reason to support him, that his peril was great. The King was about to -betray him. A hot mist of rage flooded his eyes at the thought; and then -his heart gave a surge upwards and he felt the thick water on his tongue. -‘If he betray me, may God help him if He cares!’ - -After his duties in the Little Throne-room, in this grave conjuncture, it -seemed good to him to get speech with Mr. Secretary, who had been let out -of the house, but had let himself in again when his master, my lord of -Moray, came home. - -‘Pray, Mr. Secretar,’ says he, ‘have you any tidings of my lord of Moray?’ - -Lethington became dry. ‘I had proposed to meet my lord, as your -lordship may recollect. It seemed good to your lordship that I should -not go, but that Sir James Melvill should—with results which I need -not particularise. I have not been sent for by my lord of Moray since -his home-coming, therefore I know no more of his lordship than your -lordship’s self knows.’ - -The Earl of Morton rumbled his lips. ‘Prutt! Prutt! I wonder now....’ He -began to feel sick of his authority. - -‘The King, Mr. Secretar,’ he began again, ‘is in some distemperature at -this present. I am in doubt—it is not yet plain to me—I regret the fact, -I say.’ - -‘One should see his Majesty,’ says Lethington. ‘No doubt but Mr. -Archibald here——’ - -‘By my soul, man,’ said Mr. Archibald with fervour, ‘I don’t go near him -again for a thousand pound—English.’ - -‘No, no, Mr. Secretar,’ says my lord; ‘but consider whether yourself -should not adventure my lord of Moray.’ - -‘My lord——’ - -Morton lifted his hand. ‘Man,’ he said, ‘you _must_ do it. I tell you, -the sooner the better.’ The hand fell upon the table with a thud. -Lethington started, then left the room without a word. - -Very little was said between the two gentlemen at this moment in charge -of Holyrood until the Secretary’s return. The Master of Lindsay intruded -upon them to report that the Earl of Lennox had left the palace, had left -Edinburgh, and had ridden hard to the west. Lord Morton nodded to signify -that his ears could do their duty. - -‘Like son, like father,’ said Archie when the Master had gone. - -Soon afterwards Lethington knocked at the door, entered, advanced to the -table, and stood there, looking at the ink-horn, which he moved gently -about. - -‘Well, sir! We are here to listen,’ cried Morton, in a fever. - -Lethington was slow to answer even then. - -‘I have been admitted to my lord of Moray,—so much there is to say. He -had his reader with him, but came out to me. When I began to speak he -regretted at once that he could not hear me at any length. He showed me -his table encumbered with business, and declined at the present to add -any more to the litter. I urged your lordship’s desire to have speech -with him as soon as might be; he replied that his own desire was always, -in all things, to serve your lordship. I said, “Serve his lordship then -in this”: upon the which he owned that he failed of strength. “I have -a traveller’s ache in my bones,” saith he. “Let my Lord Morton have -patience.”’ - -He stopped there. - -Lord Morton took a turn about the room. ‘No more than that said he, -Lethington? No more than that?’ - -‘His lordship said no more, my lord. And therefore, seeing that he -plainly wished it, I took my leave.’ - -The Earl looked at Archie Douglas: some secret intelligence passed -between them in which the Secretary had no share. - -‘I am going to speak with my lord of Ruthven in his chamber,’ then said -he. ‘And, cousin, do you come also.’ - -The guard presented arms to the great man as he went down the hall, and -a few underlings—women of the house, grooms of the closet and coffer—ran -after him with petitions; but he waved away all and sundry. They fell -back, herded into groups and whispered together. The Secretary came out -alone and paced the hall deep in thought. One or two eyed him anxiously. -How did he stand now? It was a parlous time for Scotland when nobody knew -to whom to cringe for a favour. - - * * * * * - -Then—two hours after dinner—word was brought down into the hall that the -Queen would receive the Earl of Morton and certain other named persons in -the Throne-room. Great debate over this. Lord Ruthven was for declining -to go. ‘We are masters here. ’Tis for us to receive.’ - -But Lord Lindsay shook his ragged head. ‘No, no, Ruthven,’ he says, -‘take counsel, my fine man. It is ill to go, but worse to stay away.’ - -‘How’s that, then?’ cries Ruthven, white and fierce. - -‘Why, thus,’ the elder replied. ‘If you go, you show that you are master. -If you go not, you betray that you doubt it.’ - -‘I see it precisely contrary,’ says Ruthven. - -‘Then,’ he was told, ‘you have a short vision. It is the strong man can -afford to unbar the door.’ - -The Earl of Morton was clearly for going. ‘I take it, my lord of Moray -is behind this message. Let us see what he will do. He is bound to us as -fast as man can be.’ - -They sent up Lethington, who came back with the answer that my lord of -Moray had been summoned in like wise, and would not fail of attendance -upon her Majesty. This settled the masters of Holyrood. ‘Where he goes -there must we needs be also.’ - -Archie Douglas and Lethington had not been required by the Queen; but -when Archie was for rubbing his hands over that, the other advised him to -take his time. - -‘You are not the less surely hanged because they let you see you are not -worth hanging,’ said the Secretary. Archie damned him for a black Genevan. - -At the time set the Earls of Morton, Argyll, and Glencairn, the Lords -Ruthven, Rothes, and Lindsay, and some few more, went upstairs with what -state they could muster. - -They found the Queen on the throne, pale, stiff in the set of her head, -but perfectly self-possessed. Three of her maids and Lady Argyll were -behind the throne. Upon her right hand stood the King in a long ermine -cloak, upon her left the Earl of Moray in black velvet. Lord John Stuart -and a sprinkling of young men held the inner door, and a secretary, in -poor Davy’s shoes, sat at a little table in the window. The six lords -filed in according to their degrees of ranking. Ruthven, behind Lindsay, -jogged his elbow: ‘See the pair of them there. Betrayed, man, betrayed!’ - -None of them was pleased to see that Moray had been admitted first, and -yet none of them in his heart had expected anything else. It was the -King who drew all their reproaches: in some sense or another Moray was -chartered in villainy. - -The Queen, looking straight before her, moistened her lips twice, and -spoke in a low voice, very slowly and distinctly. - -‘I have sent for you, my lords, that I may hear in the presence of the -King my consort, and of these my kindred and friends, what your wisdoms -may have to declare concerning some late doings of yours. As I ask -without heat, so I shall expect to be answered.’ Pausing here, she looked -down at her hands placid in her lap. So unconscious did she seem of -anything but her own dignity and sweet estate, you might have taken her -for a girl at her first Communion. - -The Earl of Morton moved out a step, and made the best speech he could -of it. He had the gift, permitted to slow-witted men, of appearing -more honest than he was; for tardiness of utterance is easily mistaken -for gravity, and gravity (in due season) for uprightness. One has got -into the idle habit of connecting roguery with fluency. But it must be -allowed to Morton that he did not attempt to disavow his colleagues. If -he urged his own great wrongs as an excuse for violence, he claimed that -the wrongs of Scotland had cried to him louder still. He now held the -palace, he said, for the prevention of mischief, and should be glad to -be relieved of the heavy duty. Then he talked roundabout—of requitals in -general—how violent griefs provoked violent medicines—how men will fight -tooth and nail for their consciences. Lastly he made bolder. ‘If I fear -not, madam, to invoke the holy eyes of my God upon my doings, it would -not become me to quail under your Majesty’s. And if that which I hold -dearest is enchained, I should be a recreant knight indeed if I failed -of a rescue.’ He glanced toward the King at this point; but the young -man might have been a carven effigy. His end therefore—for he knew now -that he had been betrayed—was a lame one: a plea for mutual recovery -of esteem, an act of oblivion, articles to be drawn up and signed, _et -cætera_. The Queen, placidly regarding her fingers, drew on the others -after him one by one. - -The Earl of Glencairn had nothing to say, as he proved by every word he -uttered; the Earl of Argyll began a speech, but caught his wife’s eye -and never finished it. Lord Lindsay, an honest, hot-gospel, rough sort -of man—who might have been a Knox in his way—said a great deal. But he -was long over it, and slow, and prolix; and the Queen none too patient. -At ‘Secondly, madam, you shall mark——’ she began to tap with her toe; -and then one yet more impatient broke in, feeling that he must shriek -under his irritation unless he could relieve it by speech. This was Lord -Ruthven, a monomaniac, with one cry for the world and one upon whom to -cry it. If he spoke his rages to the Queen in form, he aimed them at the -King in substance, and never once looked elsewhere, or threatened with -his finger any other than that stock-headed starer out of painted eyes. -He thrust away Lindsay with a pawing hand, and—‘Oh, madam, will you -listen to me now?’ says he. ‘We speak our pieces before ye like bairns on -a bench, who have acted not long since like men, and men wronged. And who -are we, when all’s said, to justify ourselves? Who was the most aggrieved -among us? Let that man speak. Who had most cause to cry out, Down with -the thief of my honour? Let him say it now. What was our injury compared -to that man’s? If we played in his scene, who gave out the parts? If we -laid hands upon our Queen, by whose command did we so? And into whose -hands did we commit her royal person? Let him answer, and beat us down -with his words, if to any hands but his own.’ Wrought up by his own -eloquence, driving home his terrible questions, he had advanced unawares -close to the man he threatened. The King jumped back with a short cry; -but the Queen, who had been straining forward to listen, like a racer at -his mark, interposed. - -‘I am listening,’ she said; ‘continue, Ruthven.’ - -Ruthven, at this check, began to cast about for his words. He had lost -his flow. ‘As for yon Davy, madam, I’ll not deny airt and pairt in his -taking——’ - -‘Why, how should you indeed?’ says the Queen, smiling rather sharply. - -‘I say I will not, madam,’ says Ruthven, flurried; then with a savage -snarl he turned short on the King and fleshed his tooth there. - -‘And you!’ he raved at him: ‘deny it you, if you dare!’ - -The King went white as a sheet. - -‘Man,’ said the Earl of Morton finely, ‘hold your peace. I lead this -company.’ - -Lord Ruthven said no more, and Morton took up anew his parable. What he -did was well done: he did not give ground, yet was conciliatory. It was -a case for terms, he said. Let articles be drawn up, lands be restored, -offices stand as before the slaughter, the old forfeitures be overlooked, -religion on either side be as it had been: in fact, let that come which -all hoped for, the Golden Age of Peace. - -The Queen consulted with her brother, ignored her husband, then accepted. -Lethington was to draw up articles and submit them. For Peace’s sake, -if it were possible, she would sign them. Rising from her throne, she -dismissed her gaolers. She took Moray’s arm, just touched the King’s with -two fingers, and walked through the lines made by her friends, a page -going before to clear the way. The moment she was in her room she sent -Des-Essars out with a letter, which she had ready-written, for the Earl -of Bothwell. - -Left with his fellow-tragedians, Ruthven for a time was ungovernable, -with no words but ‘black traitor—false, perjuring beast of a thief’—and -the like. Morton, to the full as bartered as himself, did not try to hold -him. He too was working into a steady resentment, and kindling a grudge -which would smoulder the longer but burn the more fiercely than the -madman’s spluttering bonfire. And he was against all sudden follies. When -Ruthven, foaming, howled that he would stab the King in the back, Morton -grumbled, ‘Too quick a death for him’; and Lindsay said drily, ‘No death -at all. Yon lad is wiser than Davy—wears a shirt that would turn any -blade.’ ‘Then I’ll have at him in his bed,’ says Ruthven. And Lindsay, to -clinch the matter, scoffs at him with, ‘Pooh, man, the Queen is his shirt -of mail. Are you blind?’ - -Into this yeasty flood, with courage truly remarkable, the Earl of Moray -steered his barque, coming sedately back from his escort of the Queen. At -first they were so curious about his visit that they forgot the vehement -suspicion there was of treachery from him also. The precision of his -steering was admirable, but he ran too close to the rocks when he spoke -of the Queen as ‘a young lady in delicate health, for whom, considering -her eager temper and frail body, the worst might have been feared in the -late violent doings.’ - -Here Morton cut in. ‘I call God to witness, my lord, and you, too, -Ruthven, shall answer for me, whether or not I forbade the slaughter of -that fellow before her face. For I feared, my lord, that very health of -hers.’ - -‘And you did well to fear it, my lord,’ said the Earl of Moray; and that -was the turn too much. - -Said Ruthven to him dangerously, ‘You make me sick of my work.’ He peered -with grinning malice into the inscrutable face. ‘Tell me, you, my lord of -Moray, what did _you_ look for in the business? What thought _you_ would -come of murder at the feet of a woman big? God in heaven, sir, what is it -you look for? what is it you think of day after day?’ - -Lord Moray blinked—but no more. ‘Hush, hush, Lord Ruthven, lest you utter -what would grieve all who love Scotland.’ - -Ruthven howled. ‘Man, do you talk of Scotland? Are we friends here? Are -we in the kirk? If we are in council, for God’s sake talk your mind. -Ah!—talk of that, my good lord——’ he pointed to the empty throne. ‘Man, -man, man! there’s your kirk and your altar—you prater about Scotland’s -love.’ For a moment he fairly withered the man; but then, as drowning in -a flood-tide of despair, he lifted up his hands and covered his tormented -eyes. ‘Oh, I am sick just,’ he said, ‘sick of your lying—sick, I tell -you, sick—sick to death!’ - -The Earl of Moray made a little sign with his eyebrows and closed eyes; -and they left him alone with Ruthven. It should never be denied of this -man that he had the courage of his father’s race. - -The ‘Articles of Peace and Oblivion’ were drawn up, tendered on knees, -and overlooked by her Majesty. - -‘I see your name here, Mr. Secretary, as in need of mercy,’ she said, -with a finger on the place. Of course she had known that he was up to the -chin in the plot, but she could rarely resist making the sensitive man -wriggle. - -He murmured something unusually fatuous, painfully conscious of his -standing. - -‘Oh, sir,’ she said, ‘if you seek for my pardon you shall have it. I am -contented with a few things. But go you now and sue for it in the maids’ -closet. You will find Fleming there. I cannot answer for her, I warn -you; for if you say to a maid, “Love me, love my dog,” it is possible -she may rejoin, “Serve me, serve my mistress.” That, at least, is the -old-fashioned pleading in the courts of love.’ - -He was greatly confused, the obsequious, fertile man, and she greatly -entertained. - -‘Go, Mr. Secretary, and pray you find some phrases as you go. Tongues -ring sharply in the closet.’ She signed the Articles, and he was backing -himself out when she stopped him with a seemingly careless word. ‘Ah, I -had almost forgot. These Articles breathe peace.’ She took them from him -and read the words. ‘“Peace, mutual forbearance and goodwill”: very fair -words, upon which we must hope for fair performance. The guard at the -doors and gates is removed no doubt? See to that, Mr. Secretary, before -you can hope for pardon in the maids’ closet. Your lady will not love you -the more because you keep her in a cage.’ - -This was kittle work, as they say. Unless the guard were off she could -never get out. Lethington, however, took the hint, acted upon his -own responsibility, and found none to stop him. The lords—masters of -Holyrood—were otherwise employed: Lord Ruthven spoke of hanging himself; -the Earl of Morton was inclining to think that Articles might, for this -once, make all safe. Alone, the Earl of Moray admonished his servant, not -for removing the guard, but for not having done so earlier. What peace he -made afterwards in the maids’ closet hath never been revealed. - -The Queen went to bed very early and slept like a child in arms. -Everything was in train. - - * * * * * - -At two o’clock in the morning the King was called, but answered the -summons himself, fully dressed, armed and cloaked. - -‘I am ready,’ he said, before the messenger could speak. ‘Fetch Standen. -I go to the Queen.’ - -He crept along the passage to the dimly lighted cabinet, where he had of -late seen murder, and had to wait there as best he could. He spent the -time in walking up and down—an exercise whereby a man, in fear already, -gains terror with every pace: so agitated was he that when, after an -age of squittering misery, the Queen came in deeply hooded, he forgot -everything and burst out with ‘O God, madam, make haste!’ - -She gave him no answer, but poured herself some wine, added water, and -drank. It was terrible to him to see how much at her ease she was, -sipping her drink, looking about the cabinet, recalling critically (if -the truth is to be told) the stasimons of the late tragic scene. - -Mary Seton came in, and Des-Essars, labouring with a portmantle and some -pistols. - -‘Drink, my children,’ she bade them in French, and they obeyed, taking -stay and leisure from her. - -The King bit his nails, fretted and fumed—had not had the nerve to drink, -even if he had had the invitation. - -Standen stood by the wall, stolid as his habit was—the flaxen, solemn -English youth, with but one cherubic face for a rape, a funeral, a -battle, a christening, or the sacrament. The Queen drew Seton’s attention -to him in a whisper, and made the girl laugh. - -Presently they heard a step, and then Stewart of Traquair was to be seen, -stalwart and watchful, in the doorway. - -‘Ready, Traquair?’—the Queen’s voice. - -‘All’s ready, ma’am.’ - -She fastened her hood, patting the bows flat. ‘Come, Seton, come, -Baptist,’ she said, and gave her hand into Traquair’s. - -He kissed it before he led her away. Des-Essars went first with a shaded -lantern. - -The great dark house was perfectly quiet as they went downstairs and -through the chapel by the tombs of the kings. Just here, however, the -Queen stopped and called back Des-Essars. ‘Where does he lie?’ she asked -him; and he pointed out the stone—she was standing almost upon it—and -for many a day remembered the curious regard she had for it: how she -hovered, as it were, over the place, looking at it, smiling quietly -towards it, as if it afforded her some quaint thought. Words have been -put into her mouth which, according to him, she never said—melodramatic -words they are, rough makeshifts of some kind of art embodying what was -to come. According to Des-Essars, she said nothing, neither resolved, nor -promised, nor predicted; nothing broke her smiling, considering silence -over this new grave. - -‘To see her there,’ he says, ‘in the lantern-light, so easy, so absorbed, -so _amused_, was terrible to more witnesses than one. It opened to me -secret doors never yet suspected. Was murder only curious to her? Was -horror a kind of joy?’ - -But it frightened Mary Seton out of her courage. ‘Oh, what do you see in -there, madam?’ she whispered. ‘What moves your mirth in his grave?’ - -The Queen turned her head as if shaken out of a stare. She met Mary -Seton’s eyes in the lantern-light, and laughed. - -‘Come away, madam, come away. Look no more. There’s a taint.’ - -‘Yes, yes,’ says the Queen; ‘I am ready. Where is the King?’ - -‘The King is gone, madam,’ said Stewart of Traquair; ‘and I think your -Majesty will do well to be after him.’ - -This was true. Arthur Erskine, holding the horses outside the town wall, -told her that the King had ridden forward at once, at a gallop, with his -man Standen. She was therefore left with but two—himself and Traquair—for -escort; but he assured her that every step had been taken, she would be -in no sort of danger. - -‘Danger!’ she said, laughing lightly. ‘No, no, Erskine, I do not fear it. -Ruthven’s dagger seeks not my back.’ - -They lifted her up, the rest mounted after her; they walked their horses -clear of the suburb. After some half-mile or more of steady trotting the -Queen reined up and stopped the party. She listened; they all did. Far -away you could hear the regular galloping of a horse, pulsing in the dark -like some muffled pendulum. Now and again another’s broke into it and -confused the rhythm. - -‘There rides in haste our sovereign lord,’ said the Queen. ‘Come, we must -follow him.’ - - * * * * * - -By Niddry House—under the lee of the wall—she found the Earls of Huntly -and Bothwell, Lord Seton, and a company of twenty horsemen waiting. The -hour had gone five. - -‘God save Scotland!’ had called Traquair, and Bothwell’s strident voice -had countercried, ‘God save the Queen of Scotland!’ - -‘That voice hath blithe assurance,’ said she when she heard it. She joyed -in adventure and adventurers. - -She asked for news of the King. ‘Where is my consort, Lord Bothwell? Rode -he this way?’ - -‘Madam, he did, and had a most mischievous scare of us. We knew him by -the way he damned us all. But he’s well away by now. You may hear him -yet.’ - -She gloomed at that. ‘Ay,’ said she, ‘I have heard him. I shall always -hear him, I think.’ Then she shivered. ‘Let us ride on, sirs; the night -is chill.’ - -Nobody spoke much. Lord Bothwell kept close to her right hand, Lord -Huntly to her left. They would change horses at Gladsmuir. - - * * * * * - -The tide was breaking over wet rocks, one pale streak of light burnished -the rim of the sea, as Lord Bothwell lifted down his Queen. Astounding to -feel how fresh and feat she was! The dark hull of a castle could just be -seen, suspended as it seemed above a cloud-bank, with sea-birds looming -suddenly large or fading to be small as they swept in and out of the -fog. Little tired waves broke and recoiled near by upon the weedy stones. - -‘Dunbar, madam,’ says Bothwell, his hands still holding her—‘and the good -grey guard of the water.’ - -The King, they told her, had been in bed those three hours. - - - - -CHAPTER VIII - -KING’S EVIL - - -Sir James Melvill, wise and mature, travelled gentleman, made nothing of -a ride to Dunbar in the slush of snow. He was careful to take it before -the dawn, and arrived late, to find the Queen not visible. They told him -she had come in some hours after daybreak, exhausted, but not nearly so -exhausted as her horse. It was hardly likely she would rise the day. - -‘You’ll let her Majesty know that I’m here, with my service to ye, Mr. -Erskine. And since ye’re so obliging I’ll take a mouthful just of your -spiced wine.’ Thus Sir James; who was sipping at this comfortable cup -when the Earl of Bothwell came in, stamping the winter from his boots, -and recalled him to his privileges. To see him make his bow to a lord -was to get a lesson in the niceties of precedence. He knew to the turn -of a hair how far to go, and unless the occasion were extraordinary, -never departed from the Decreet of Ranking. In the present case, however, -all things considered, he may have judged, ‘This Earl has merited the -salutation of a Prince-Bishop.’ That presupposed, the thing was well -done. Sir James’s heels went smartly together—but without a click, which -would have been too military for the day; the body was slightly bent, -with one hand across the breast. But his head fell far, and remained -down-hung in deepest reverence of the hero. It is exactly thus that a -devotional traveller in a foreign town might salute, but not adore, the -passing Host. ‘I will not bow the knee to Baal; no, but I will honour -this people’s God.’ And thus bowed Sir James. - -‘Now, who graces me so highly?’ cried Bothwell when he saw him; and -immediately, ‘Eh, sirs, it is honest Sir James! So the wind hath veered -in town already! Man, you’re my weathercock in this realm. Your hand, Sir -James, your hand, your hand. Never stoop that venerable pow to me.’ - -‘Always the servant of your lordship,’ murmured Sir James, much gratified. - -‘Havers, James!’ says Bothwell, and sat upon the table. He swung his leg -and looked at his sea boots as he talked, reflecting aloud, rather than -conversing. - -‘The Queen is sound asleep,’ he said, ‘as well enough she may be. Good -sakes, my man, what a proud and gladsome lady have we there! I tell -you, I have seen young men ride into action more tardily than she into -the perilous dark. She flung herself to the arms of foul weather like a -lammock to his dam’s dug. You’d have said’—he lowered his voice—‘you’d -have said she was at the hunting of a hare, if you’d seen her gallop—with -Adonis fleeting before her.’ - -Sir James nodded, as if to say—‘A hint is more than enough for me.’ - -‘Well!’ cried Bothwell, ‘well! What scared the gowk, then?’ - -‘My lord,’ said Sir James, ‘you must observe, he had been by when Lord -Ruthven’s knife was at work, slicing Davy. He knew the way of it, d’ye -see?’ - -Bothwell flung up his head. ‘Ay! he was all in a flutter of fear. The -bitter fools that they are! Every traitor of them betraying the other, -and a scamper who shall do mischief and be first away. But this one -here—he’s none too safe, ye ken. He’s dug his own grave, I doubt. Before -long time you and I, Melvill, shall see him by Davy’s side.’ - -‘Ah, my lord of Bothwell——’ Sir James was scandalised. - -‘Fear nothing, man—I must talk. Here, in this place, what is he? Who -heeds him, where he comes or whither he goes? Why, this skipjack of -Brabant is the better man!’ - -The skipjack of Brabant was Des-Essars, come down to call Lord Bothwell -to the Queen. She was about to hold a council, and Melvill was to abide -the upshot. - -‘Is the King to be there, do you know, Baptist?’ says my lord, his hand -on the lad’s shoulder. - -‘The King sleeps, my lord,’ he replied. ‘I heard her Majesty say that he -could not do better.’ - -‘Her Majesty has the rights of him by now,’ says Bothwell. ‘Well—we shall -work none the worse without him. Sir James, your servant. If I can help -you, you shall see her.’ - -‘So your lordship will bind me fast to your service,’ bowed Sir James, -and watched the pair depart. He observed that Des-Essars’ crown was level -with the Earl’s cheek-bone. - - * * * * * - -Let me deal with the fruit of this council while I may. Sir James took a -seed of it, as it were, back to Edinburgh, planted and watered it, and -saw an abundant harvest, of sweet and bitter mixed. As for instance,—to -the Earls of Moray and Argyll went full pardons of all offences; to -Glencairn and Rothes the hope of some such thing upon proof of good -disposition—just enough to separate men not quite dangerous from men -desperate. To them, those desperate men, came the last shock. Writs of -treason were out against the Earl of Morton, Lords Ruthven and Lindsay -and the Master of Lindsay, against Archibald Douglas of Whittingehame, -William Kirkcaldy of Grange, Ker of Fawdonsyde and their likes; also, -definitely and beyond doubt, against William Maitland, younger of -Lethington. The Secretary had to thank Lord Bothwell for that, for the -Queen would have spared him if she could for Mary Fleming’s sake. These -writs were served that very night and copies affixed to the Market-cross. -The smaller fry—men in Morton’s livery, jackals and foxes of the -doors—were to be taken as they fell in and hanged at conveniency. Many -were apprehended in their beds before Sir James could be snug in his own. - -One may look, too, for a moment at the last conference of them that of -late had been masters of Holyrood. It was had in Lord Morton’s big -house—a desultory colloquy broken by long glooms. - -‘If you are still for hanging yourself, Ruthven,’ said my Lord Morton, in -one of these pauses, ‘you’ve time.’ - -And Ruthven turned his eyes about with evident pain. Those thought, who -looked at him, that he had not so much time. He was horribly ill, with -fever in bones and blood. ‘I’m not for that now, my lord,’ he said, ‘I -have a better game than that in hand.’ - -‘I could name you one if you were needing it,’ said Morton again, with a -glance towards Archie Douglas. Listening and watching, the grey-headed -youth chuckled, and rubbed his dry hands together. - -‘Ay,’ said Ruthven, observing the action, and sickening of actor and it, -‘slough your skin, snake, and bite the better.’ - -‘Man, Ruthven,’ said Morton impatiently, ‘you talk too much of what you -will do, and spend too much of your spleen on them that would serve ye if -ye would let them. Body of me, we have time before us to scheme a great -propyne for this good town that spews us out like so much garbage.’ - -‘We have that, cousin,’ says Archie, ‘if but we accord together.’ - -‘Ah, traitors all, traitors all!’ Ruthven was muttering to himself; then -(as he thought of the chief of traitors) burst out—‘When we have done his -butcher’s work—he heels us out of doors! Sublime, he washes his hands and -goes to bed. We are the night-men, look you. Foh, we smell of our trade! -what king could endure us? Oh, lying, sleek, milky traitor!’ - -Lord Morton, whose rage lay much deeper, thought all this just wind and -vapour. ‘To fret and cry treachery, Ruthven! Pooh, a French trick, never -like to save your face. Why, poor splutterer, nothing will save that but -to mar another’s face.’ - -‘Your talk against my talk,’ cried Ruthven; ‘and will you do it any -better?’ - -Lord Morton flushed to a heavy crimson colour, and his eyes were almost -hidden. ‘Ay, mark me, that I will. I will score him deep with this -infamy.’ He went to the window and stood there alone. Nobody could draw -him into talk again. - -There was much bustle in Edinburgh during the week, and more suitors to -the Earl of Moray than he had time to see. Mr. Secretary got no joy out -of him; he was kind to the Earl of Morton and spoke him many hopeful -words; he shook his finger at Lord Ruthven. ‘Fie, my lord,’ he said, -‘you should wear a finer face. Turn you to your God, Lord Ruthven, and -store up grain against the lean years to come. Root up these darnels from -your garden-plot, lest they choke the good seed sowed in you. Let stout -Mr. Knox be your exemplar, then; behold how he can harden his brows. -Farewell, my lord: be sure of my friendship; take kindly to the soil of -England. There are stout hearts in Newcastle, a godly congregation, to -which I commend you.’ - -Ruthven turned away from him without a word to say, and never saw him -again. With Morton, Lindsay, and the rest, he took the English road. Mr. -Secretary Lethington went to my lord Atholl’s in the west; my lord of -Argyll became a Queen’s man. Within the bare week after the flight to -Dunbar the ragged corse of the Italian lay as untrodden by enemies as if -Jerusalem had been his sepulture. But we are out-running our matter: we -must be back at Dunbar with Queen Mary. - - * * * * * - -From that castle Lord Bothwell wrote to his wife, to this effect:— - - Attend me not these many days. The alders may bud by Hermitage - Water before I kiss the neck of my dear. For such business as - here we have was never done in the Debatable Land since Solway - Moss was reddened; such a riding in and forth of messengers, - such a sealing of dooms, rewards and forfeitures—no, nor such - a flocking of lords anxious to prove their wisdoms in their - loves.... She is hearted like a man. She rises early every - day, and sets to her blessing and banning of men’s lives with - as sharp an edge as I to my beef at noon. She has a care for - all who have served or dis-served her, and is no more frugal - of her embracing than of her spurning heel. One man only she - hath clean out of mind; for him she hath neither inclination - nor disgust. She asketh not his company, neither seeketh to - have him away. He is as though he were not—still air in the - chamber, for which you ope not the window, as needing more of - it, nor shut-to the window, for fear of more. Doth he enter her - presence—why not? the room is wide. Doth he go out—why not? the - world is wider. How this came about it were too long to tell - you; this only will I say, that it came late, for at her first - alighting here she feared him mortally, as if she viewed in him - the ghost of her old self. That was a sickness of the mind, not - against nature; now gone, and he with it. Needs must I admire - her for the banishment.... - - But to return. Business ended—more sharply than you would - believe by any young head but your own—she wins to the open - weather. She walks abroad, she takes my arm. Yes, and indeed, I - am grown to be somewhat in this realm. She rides o’er the brae; - your servant at her stirrup; she sails the sea, your lover - at the helm. You belie your own courage when you doubt this - princess’s, my dear heart. For, to say nothing of her trust in - me, which you will own to be bold in any lady (and most bold in - herself), she has the mettle of a blood-horse, whom to stroke - is to sting. She is far gone with child, and you may guess with - what zest, seeing her regard for her partner in it. In truth, - she hath a horror; because her aim is to forget what she can - never forgive, and so every drag upon her leaping spirit seems - to remind her of him and his deeds. Oh, but she suffers and is - strong!... I hear you say to me, ‘Fie, you are bewitched. A - spell! A spell!’—but I laugh at you. There is a still-faced, - raven-haired witch-wife in Liddesdale working upon me under the - moon. Aha, Mistress Sanctity, watch for me o’ nights. - - Yestreen the Q. spake of your Serenity. ‘She hates me,’ quoth - she, ‘for her father’s sake, in whose cruel disgrace I vow I - had no part; but I shall make her love me yet.’ And when I - laughed somewhat, she gave a thring of the shoulder. ‘I’ld have - you know, Lord Bothwell,’ saith she, ‘that there’s no wife nor - bairn in this land can refuse the kisses of my mouth.’ Thinks - I, ‘You are bold to say it. You may come to crave them.’ _Quant - à moy, ma doulce amye, je te bayse les mains._ - -You can see that he had been laughing at her in the old way, not -boisterously this time, but under the beard, in his little twinkling -eyes; and that, in the old way, she had been braced by his bravery. He -had guessed—you can see that too—that she had some need of him, and how -necessary it was that her loathing for her husband should pass into mere -indifference. But he had no notion at that time how pressing that need -was. Not she herself had realised the horror she had until the night -after reaching Dunbar, when the King, by Standen, had renewed certain -proposals, frustrate before by his laches. It may have been sudden panic, -it may have been a trick of memory—God knows what it was; but she had -flooded with scarlet, then turned dead white, had murmured some excuse, -and with bowed head and feeble, expostulating hands, had left the room. -She did not come back that night. She had called Des-Essars, fled with -him into the turret, found an empty chamber under the leads, had the door -locked, a great coffer jammed against it—and had stayed there so till -morning. The young man, writing a word or two upon it, says that she -was almost rigid at first, in a waking trance; and that she sat ‘pinned -to his side’ while the maids and valets hunted her high and low. ‘I did -what I could,’ he writes; ‘talked nonsense, told old tales, sang saucy -songs, which by that time of my life I had been glad to have forgotten, -and, affecting a nonchalance which I was far from feeling, recovered her -a little. She began to be curious whether they would find her, judged by -the ear how the scent lay, laughed to hear Mistress Seton panting on the -stair, and Carwood screaming—“There’s a great rat in my road!” Presently -she slept, with her head on my knees and my jacket over her shoulders. I -took her down to bed before morning, and in the daylight she had partly -recovered herself. She transacted business, ate a meal; but I remarked -that she trembled whenever the King entered the room, and faltered when -she was obliged to reply to him—faltered and turned up her eyes, as fowls -do when they are sleepy. Fortunately for her, he was sulky, and did not -renew his advances.’ - -I suspect that she found out—for she was rigid in self-probing—that -if she allowed herself to abhor him for an unspeakable affront, she -would have to scorn herself even more for having given him the means -of affronting her. Right punishment: she would admit that she had -deserved it. She had been the basest of women (she would say) when she -offered that which was to her a sacrament, in barter for mere political -advantage. Why, yes! she had prepared to sell herself to this wallowing -swine in order to escape her prison; and if he snored the bargain out of -his head it was because he was a hog,—but then, O God! what was she? So, -from not daring to think of that night of shame, she passed to fearing -to think of the shameful recreants in it; and as we ever peer at what we -dread, it came about that she could think of nothing else, and was in -torment. Des-Essars gives none of this; it was not in his power to get -at it; but he saw, what we can never see, that she suffered atrociously, -that her case grew desperate. Hear him. ‘One day I came with a message -to her chamber door, early; the door was half-open. I had a shocking -vision of her abed, lying there in a bed of torture, like one stung; -on her face, writhing and moaning, tossing her hands—short breath, -tearless sobbing, sharp cries to God; while Mary Seton read aloud out -of Saint-Augustin by the fog-bound cresset light. She read on through -everything—pausing only to put our Mistress back into the middle of the -bed, for fear lest she might fall out and hurt herself.’ - -If this is true—and we know that it is—why, then, out of such waking -delirium, out of anguish so dry, Queen Mary must have been delivered if -she were not to die of it. - - * * * * * - -The Earl of Bothwell was not a man of imagination, though he had a quick -fancy. He read his Queen in this state of hers with interest at first, -and some amusement, not then knowing how dire it was. He saw that she -would turn white and leave any room into which King Darnley entered; he -knew that she would ride far to avoid him, and sometimes, indeed, under -sudden stress, would use whip and spur and fly from him like a hunted -thief. When he found out something—not very much, for Des-Essars would -not speak—of the events of the night in the turret, moved by good-nature, -he put himself in the way to help her. He got more maids fetched from -Edinburgh—Fleming and Mary Sempill—and himself stayed with her as long -as he dared, and longer than he cared. And then, one day by chance, he -got a full view of her haunted mind—a field of broken lights indeed! and -saw how far he might travel there if he chose, and with what profit to -himself. - -He was with her afoot on the links behind the town—sandy hillocks of -dry bents, and a grey waste at such a season, abode of the wind and the -plovers; he with her, almost alone. Des-Essars, who walked behind them, -had strayed with the dogs after a hare; the wind, blowing in from the -sea, brought up wisps and patches of fog in which the boy was hidden. -Talking as she went, carelessly, of the things of France, he listening -more or less, she stopped of a sudden, choked a cry in the throat, and -caught at his arm. ‘Look, look, look!’ she said: ‘what comes this way?’ -He followed the direction of her fixed eyes, and saw a riderless horse -loom out of the vapour, come on doubtingly at a free trot, shaking his -head and snuffing about him as if he partly believed in his freedom. It -shaped as a great grey Flemish horse, assuredly one of the King’s. - -The Queen began to tremble, to mutter and moan. ‘Oh, oh, the great horse! -Free—it’s free! Oh, if it could be so! Oh, my lord, oh——I’m afraid!’ - -‘It is indeed the King’s horse, madam,’ he said. ‘I fear—some misfortune.’ - -But she stared at him. ‘Misfortune!’ she cried out. ‘Oh, are you blind? -Go and see—go and make sure. I must be assured—nothing is certain yet. -Run, my lord, run fast!’ - -He made to obey, and instantly she clung to his arm to stop him. She was -in wild fear. - -‘No—no—no—you must not leave me here! There are voices in the -sea-wind—too many voices. A clamour, a clamour! Those that cry at me -through the door, those that are out on the sea—a many, a many! I tell -you I am afraid.’ Her fear irritated her; she stamped her foot. ‘Do you -hear me? I am afraid. You shall not leave me.’ - -There was no doubt. She was beside herself—looking all about, her teeth -chattering, fingers griping his arm. - -‘Why, then, I will send the lad, ma’am,’ says Bothwell. ‘You need have -no fear with me. I hear no voices in the wind.’ - -She looked at him wonderfully. ‘Do you never hear them at night?’ Then -her eyes paled, and the pupils dwindled to little specks of black. ‘Come -with me,’ she said in whisper, ‘a-tiptoe; come softly with me. We must -find him—we can never be sure till we see him lying. There is one way: -you lift the eyelids. Better than a mirror to the nose. Come, come: I -must look at him, to be very sure.’ She stared into the white sky, and -gave a sudden gasp, pointing outwards while her eyes searched his face. -‘Look!’ she said: ‘the birds over there. They are about him already. -Come, we shall be too late.’ She led him away in a feverish hurry, -through bush and briar, talking all the time. ‘Blood on his face—on his -mouth and shut hands. He gripped his dagger by the blade, and it bit to -the bone. He comes and cries at my door—all foul from his work—and asks -me let him in. But I hold it—I am very strong. He always comes—but now!’ -She laughed insanely, and gave a skip in the air. ‘O come, my lord—hurry, -hurry!’ - -The loose horse had trotted gaily by them as the astonished Lord Bothwell -followed where he was haled. Presently, however, he heard another sound, -and pulled back to listen to it. ‘Hearken a moment,’ says he. ‘Yes, yes! -I thought as much. Here comes another horse—galloping like a fiend—a -ridden horse.’ - -She started, forced herself to listen, knew the truth. ‘He is hunting! -Take me—hide me—keep me safe! Bothwell, keep him off me!’ - -She knew not what she said or did; but he, full of pity now, drew her -behind a clump of whims and held her with his arm. - -‘There, there, madam, comfort yourself,’ he said. ‘None shall harm you -that harm not me first. How shall you be hurt if you are not to be seen? -Trust yourself to me.’ - -She shook in his arm like a man in an ague; uncontrollable fits of -shaking possessed her, under which, as they passed through her, she shut -her eyes, and with bent head endured them. So much she suffered that, if -he had not let his wits go to work, he would have hailed the King as he -went pounding by. He supposed that she had been shocked mad by that late -business of hasty blood. Of course he was wrong, but the guess was enough -to prevent him following his first purpose, and so killing her outright. - -The King came rocking down the brae, red and furious, intent upon the -truant horse; and as he went, Bothwell made bold to glance at the Queen. -What he saw in her hag-ridden face was curious enough to set him thinking -hard; curious, but yet, as he saw it, unmistakable. There was vacancy -there, the inability to reason which troubles the mentally afflicted; -there were despair and misery, natural enough if the poor lady was going -mad—and knew it. But—oh, there was no doubt of it!—there was in the drawn -lines of her face blank, undisguised disappointment. He saw it all now. -She had believed him dead, her heart had leaped; and now she had just -seen him alive, galloping his horse. Clang goes the cage door again upon -my lady! Now, here was a state of things! - -When the King was out of sight and hearing, swallowed in the growing -fog, and she a little recovered, and a little ashamed, he began to talk -with her; and in time she listened to what he had to say. He spoke well, -neither forgetting the respect due to her, which before he had been prone -to do, nor that due to himself as a man of the world. He did not disguise -from her that he thought very lightly of David’s killing. - -‘Saucy servants, in my opinion,’ he said, ‘must take what they deserve -if they expect more than they are worth. They demand equality—well, and -when they meet gentlemen with daggers, they get it.’ But he hastened to -add that to have killed the fellow before her face must have been the act -of beasts or madmen—‘and, saving his respect, madam, your consort was one -and your Ruthven the other.’ - -To his great surprise she then said quietly that she was of the same -mind, and not greatly afflicted by the deed, or the manner of it either. -She had seen men killed in France; queens should be blooded as well as -hounds. She also considered that Davy had been presumptuous. He had -known his aptitudes too well. But useful he had certainly been, and -she intended to have another out of the same nest—Joseph, his brother. -Singular lady! she had found time to write into Piedmont for him. - -‘Well then, madam,’ says Bothwell, with a shrug, ‘all this being your -true mind, I own myself at a loss how to take your extreme alarms.’ - -She bit her lip. ‘I am better. Maybe they were foolish. Who knows? I -cannot tell you any more than this. I had nearly forgot that wicked -deed. But there are other offences—women find—which cannot, can never be -forgotten.’ She grew impatient. ‘Ah, but it is not tolerable to discuss -such things.’ - -Even then he did not know what she meant. She had been mortally offended -by the King, and offended to the point of horror—but by something worse -than murder and strife in the chamber, by something which she could not -speak of! What under Heaven had that red-faced, stable-legged lad in him -which could terrify her? - -‘Madam,’ he said, ‘if you cannot talk of it, you cannot tell it me, and -there is an end. My counsel to you is this: put the young lord and his -sottishness out of your royal head. Look at him stoutly and aver that he -is naught. You have shown that you can face a rebel kingdom; face now -your rebel heart. For I say that your heart is a rebel against your head, -swerving and backing like a jade that needs the spur. Ride your heart, -madam! Ply whip to the flanks, bring it up to the boggart in the corn. -Thus only your heart shall nose out the empty truth. Why, good lack! -what is there to credit all your alarm but silly fed flesh and seething -liquor? Look at him, judge him, flick your fingers at him, and forget -him. Madam, I speak freely.’ - -She said faintly that he was very right. She had suffered much of late -in all ways: she spoke of pains in the side, in the head, of fancies at -night, etc. She owned that she desired his good opinion of her courage, -and promised she would try to earn it. Looking tired and ill, smiling as -if she knew only too well there was no smiling matter, she held out her -hand to him at the entry of the town. He bowed over and kissed it. Mildly -she thanked him and went her ways with Des-Essars. - -He wrote to the countess soon after:— - - Very strange matters chance here daily, of the which I write - not exactly for fear of misreading. One thing I plainly - understand, the K. shall never more prosper here. While he was - beloved he was something, and when he was dreaded he was much; - but now that he comes and goes unnoticed he is nothing at all. - And so he will remain, I suppose, until the lying-in, which - will be in June coming they say. Ill betide him then if, when - she is reminded of him in his son, he play her any trick. I - would not give a snap of the finger and thumb for his life. We - are for Edinburgh on Monday morn, whence look infallibly for my - tidings. - -The King, then, was nothing at all. Nerved by her brawny councillor, she -had faced her ‘boggart in the corn,’ and in two days’ time could curl -her fine lip to remember him. That is a proof that she was sane at the -root, needing no more than such bitter as his rough tongue could give to -restore her tone. And, having ridded her fears, she soon found that she -could rid her memory altogether. The King went out and in, as Bothwell -had written, unnoticed. He made no more attempts to come at her, spoke -to none but his own company, felt that he was in disgrace, and sulked. -Lord Bothwell scoffed at him by implication—by every keen shaft from -his eyes and every wag of his head; Lord Huntly kept at a distance; Sir -James altered his salutation. On the Sunday before they should move back -to town they were speaking of the rebel lords, whether they were now in -England or yet on the road; and Bothwell began to cry up Ruthven, his -madness, his knives, his friends’ knives. The King got up and left the -table. He told Standen afterwards that he should not go to Edinburgh. -Standen told Des-Essars, and he told the Queen. - -‘Oh, but he shall,’ she said at once, consulted her friends, and sent him -a verbal message that she should need him there. He felt this badly—but -obeyed it. - -For, much against her inclination, she had made up her mind that she -must drag the chain which had been forged upon her; she must keep the -King in her eye for fear he should work her a mischief. His father -Lennox was in Glasgow, an escaped enemy: it would never do for him to -go thither. Or suppose he were to return to England! No, no, she must -keep him in Edinburgh, keep him cowed, and yet not allow him to grow -desperate. Worse than that, the time was coming on when she must have him -by her side, in the house, perhaps nearer still. He was now ‘the Queen’s -dearest Consort,’ but soon he would be ‘the Prince’s dearest father’ and -a power in the land. The Earl of Bothwell, consulted, was precise about -that—awkwardly precise. - -‘Folk will talk, madam, about you and him. He’ll not want for a faction -to cry, “The King keeps aloof! Well he may, knowing what he knows.” Oh, -have him with you, ma’am, as near as may be. For hawks dinna pick out -hawks’ een, as they say; and if he owns to the child—why, he should know -his own.’ - -She flushed. ‘You speak too plainly, my lord.’ - -‘Not if I mean honestly, ma’am.’ - -‘I hope you mean so,’ said she, ‘but the sound of your phrase is -otherwise.’ - -‘I was speaking in character, ma’am. Mark that.’ - -She was looking down at her lap when next she spoke, carelessly at her -careless fingers. ‘Whose child do they allege it?’ - -The directness of the question and indirectness of its manner puzzled -him. He could not tell whether to be blunt or fine. - -‘Madam, I am no scandal-monger, I hope, and have little pleasure in the -grunting of hogs in a sty. But hogs will grunt, as your Majesty knows.’ - -She did not raise her eyes, but said: ‘It will be better that you answer -me in a few words. One will suffice.’ - -He tried—he began—but could not do it. ‘Madam,’ he said, ‘you must answer -for yourself. All I will ask is this: what, think you, drew the King to -the deed he did?’ - -She lifted her head and gave him one long look. Rather, it seemed long. -He knelt down quickly and kissed her knee. - -He rose and began to justify himself. ‘You forced me to say it—it may -have been my duty—make it not my offence. God knows I needed no such -royal answer as you have given me—not I! I think no evil of your Majesty, -nor have I ever.’ - -She flashed her eyes upon him—not angrily by any means. ‘Oh, my lord, may -I be sure of that? Come, I will tell you what I seem to remember. There -was a day when you enlarged yourself from my prison and rode, a free man, -to Haddington. What said you of me there among your friends?’ - -He puzzled over this. ‘I can charge myself with nothing. Your Grace knows -more of me than I do.’ - -‘Did you not speak in the hearing of one Pringle concerning me and my -uncle the Cardinal? Did you give me a name then? Come, come, my lord, be -plain. Did you not?’ - -He burst out laughing. ‘The voice is the voice of Queen Mary, but the -words are of Black James Stuart! Oho, madam, you will hear finer tales -than this concerning me, if you sound that thoughtful man.’ - -She pressed him, but he would neither deny nor affirm. ‘I shall not -defend myself, madam, before your Majesty. But I will meet the Earl of -Moray, and wager him in battle, if you give me leave: in battle of one -and one, or of a score, or of ten score. Let him repeat his charge in the -Grassmarket if he dare.’ - -Baffled here, she harped back upon the child. She said that she needed to -be sure of his good opinion of her. Then he made her heart beat fast, for -he came and put his hand upon the back of her chair and stood right over -her: she could feel the strength of his eyes, like beams from the sun, -driving down upon her. - -‘Madam, and my sovereign lady, as God is my judge, this is the truth. I -loved you once, and, at love’s bidding, staked all on a great design. My -plot was unmannerly, but so is love; you were offended with me, as your -right was. I loved you no less, but honoured you the more, because of -that. If now I thought evil of you—such evil as you suspect in me—I would -tell you so for the sake of that love I gave you before.’ - -She bowed her head and thanked him humbly; did not look up, nor stir from -her place below him. - -‘As meek as a mouse!’—he could not remember ever to have seen her so -before. What was in her heart? It sent him away thoughtful. Next day he -rode at her side to Edinburgh. - - * * * * * - -Established there more firmly than at any time since her reign began; -with a council packed with her friends, with Lord Huntly (her slave) -for Chancellor; with her open enemies ruined and in exile, her secret -enemies abject at her knees, her husband in disgrace, and her child near -its birth—in this comfortable state of her affairs, the Earl of Bothwell -suddenly asked leave to go into his own country. She was piqued, and -could not help showing it. - -‘You desire to—you will consort with—one who loves me little? Well, my -lord, well! How should I hinder your going, since I cannot quench your -desire?’ - -Thinks he, ‘Now, now, what root of grievance is this, sprouting here?’ -Aloud he said, ‘Madam, I am content—and more than content—to stay by your -Majesty so long as you find me of use. But the time is at hand, and you -have said it, when you will refuse me harbourage.’ - -‘Yes, yes,’ she said quickly, her face aflame: ‘you cannot be with me in -the castle.’ - -She had agreed to lie-in there, and had forbidden quarters to Lords -Bothwell and Huntly alike. Do you ask why? Mary Seton might have answered -you in part—but scornfully, since women have no need to ask such things. -They know them. ‘Lord Huntly! Lord Huntly!’ I can hear her say—a -pretty, vehement little creature—‘Lord Huntly! And he a known lover of -our mistress? How should he be there?’ Pass Lord Huntly: what of Lord -Bothwell? She would shake her head. ‘No, no,’ she would say, ‘it could -not be. He is a faithful friend.’ Well, then, what of that? She would -rise quickly and walk to the window. ‘I cannot tell you, sir, why he is -not to be there. But I am very clear that she would not suffer it. Oh, -for example——impossible!’ You would get no more from her. And what more -could you want? - -But the Queen was still frowning over his leave of absence, and pinching -her lip. Then she broke out, in the midst of her private thoughts: ‘But I -cannot refuse you! How can I? You having asked to go—what is the worth of -your staying, when your heart is——And yet—there is the King——’ She looked -slily up. ‘My lord, do you dare to trust your pupil alone?’ - -His face took a gay air. ‘If I am your tutor, madam——’ - -‘Why,’ said she, ‘what else can you be? My confessor? My cousin? My -brother? What else?’ - -He laughed, avoiding her inquiry. ‘To be your brother would be to own -kinship with my lord of Moray. A dangerous degree, ma’am, for one of the -pair.’ - -‘I would not have you for my brother,’ she said thoughtfully. - -Responsive thought struck fire in his eyes. ‘I will ask you this. Will -your Grace receive me into the castle? There I could be of service—maybe.’ - -He watched her intently now—watched until he saw the flag come fluttering -down. She lowered her eyes; he could hardly hear her words. - -‘No, no. You must not be there. Afterwards—come soon.’ She waited there, -hanging on the last word; then rose. ‘Yes,’ she said, ‘it is better that -you should go. I will not——’ She spoke wildly. ‘Go, my lord, go.’ - -He knelt to her before he obeyed; at the door she called him back. -Quickly he returned, but she would not look at him. - -‘I wish to tell you—as plainly as I can——’ So she began, speaking slowly, -feeling for her words. ‘The King shall be there with me—in the castle. -It is painful to me—I conceive that you must know it. But I shall do as -you advise—that scandal may be averted.’ She strained her arms down, -stiffening them, gave an impatient shake of the head. ‘Heaven watch over -me! And you, my lord, do you pray. Ah, but you use not prayer!’ She -seemed conscious that she was speaking double and he not understanding. -It made her angry enough to look at him. ‘Well, well, why are you here -still? Go quickly, I say—go.’ - -Go he did, a puzzling, excited man. - -Before he left the city he saw his brother-in-law, Lord Huntly, for a -moment. ‘Geordie,’ he said, ‘I’m for the Border. I’m going to my wife. -Are you for yours or do you stay here?’ - -‘I stay.’ - -‘You may be wise. I am going to my wife—and I may be wise. God knows that -I know not. I have not seen her for five months.’ - -Lord Huntly had no answer. He had not seen his for over a year. Presently -Bothwell makes another cast. - -‘I took leave of the Queen of late. She was greatly wrought -upon—distempered. Sent me off—called me back—sent me off again, after -some wild words. I know not what to make of it.’ - -‘Help her through it, God!’ said Huntly. - -‘I think it is a matter for Lucina,’ said Bothwell, and went his road. - -He travelled musingly by the hill-ways into Liddesdale, French Paris -behind him. At the top of the pass—Note o’ the Gate, they call it—whence -first you see the brown valley of the Liddel, and all the hills, quiet -guardians about the silver water, he reined up, and stood looking over -his lands. - -‘Yonder awaits me the fairest dark lady in Scotland, and (to my mind) the -fairest demesne: the open country and the good red deer. Oh, the bonny -holms, the green knowes, and the ledged rocks! Houp, man! We are free of -the scented chambers and all their whisperings here.’ - -‘It is most certain, my lord,’ said French Paris, ‘that we have left the -direction of those whisperings to Monsieur de Moray.’ - -Lord Bothwell was stung. ‘Monsieur de Moray! Monsieur de Moray! Pooh, -rascal, she has her husband with her now. And that may be even worse for -me.’ - -French Paris looked demurely at the reins sliding in his fingers. ‘True, -my lord, she has his Majesty. I have remarked that women in the Queen’s -condition have extraordinary inclination for their husbands. It is -reasonable.’ - -‘You are a fool, Paris,’ said the Earl. - -But when he was at Hermitage, his proud wife upon his knee, my lord swore -to himself over and over again that he was the happiest rogue not yet -hanged. And yet he could not but hear, beneath all his protestations, -that slow, wounded voice,—‘Afterwards—come soon.’ Good lord! what was the -meaning of the like of that? - - - - -CHAPTER IX - -THE WASHING OF HANDS - - -To a woman’s affair flocked matron and maid, till the castle seemed -a hive of rock-bees. Afar off, it was said, you could hear them -humming within; on sudden alarms out they came in a swarm, and ill -fared physician or priest, or discreet, wide-eared gentleman sent by -his wife to get a piece of news. June was in and well in, skies were -clean, the twilight long in coming and loth to go. Queen Mary lay idle -by her window, and watched the red roofs turn purple, the hills grow -black, the paling of the light from yellow to green, the night’s solemn -gathering-in, the star shine clear in a dark-blue bed out there over -Arthur’s Seat. Her time was short—but one could scarcely tell. She often -felt that she scarcely cared to tell when this crowning hour was to come. - -Quick-spirited, sanguine young woman, she bade fair to be weary of matron -and maid alike, with their everlasting talk of ‘the promise of Scotland,’ -their midwifery stories, their nods and winks, their portentous cares -over what she had supposed a pretty ordinary business. It was to be seen -that she was fretting, and the truth was that she was in much too good -health: bodily ease had never been pleasant to her, and never been safe. -Her mind grew arrogant and luxurious at once, felt itself free to range -in regions unlawful; and so did range, the lax flesh playing courier. So -while the humming and swarming of the household bees went on over and -about her listless head, while she snapped twice at the maids for every -once the matrons chafed her, in her mind she walked where she fain -would have had her body to be: and then, sick of this futility, she grew -peevish and wished she had never been born. Upon such a crisis, intending -for the best, Mary Beaton superinduced a stout, easily-flushed, gamesome -lady, her aunt Lady Forbes of Reres. - -Mary Beaton was now the wife of Mr. Ogilvy of Boyne; but this aunt of -hers was of the father’s side. A Beaton, she, niece of the great murdered -cardinal, sister of the witch-wife of Buccleuch, and in these, no less -than in her own respects, a lady to be aware of. She was in her days of -silver and russet now, who before may have been of dangerous beauty—of -that quickly-ripe, drowsy, blowsy, Venetian sort, disastrous to mankind. -Of it, indeed, the clear ravages remained, though cushioned deep in -comfortable flesh; traceable there, as in the velvety bosses of a green -hill you mark the contours of what was once a citadel of war. Her grey -hair she now wore over her ears, to conceal (as the Queen averred) -members which were so well stuffed with gallant lore as to be independent -for the rest of their lives. She had a pretty mouth—a little overhung—and -dimpled chin, light green eyes, fat, pleasurable hands, a merry voice -and a railing tongue. Thanks to the combination, she could be malicious -without ceasing to amuse. To those who know—and by this time I hope they -are many—it is good evidence of her abilities and merits alike that Mary -Livingstone could not abide the woman. - -It was not required that she should. The Queen, too languid to judge her, -listened to the savoury tales of this Reres by the hour together, neither -laughing nor chuckling, but for all that fully content. So one might -watch audacious archery, and admire the barbed flights, even when some -pricked oneself. Lady Reres was of that kind of woman who can never speak -of men without marking the gender of them. All the persons on her scene -wore transparent draperies; to hear her you would have supposed that the -one business of man were to pursue his helpmate, and of woman to stroke -her own beauties. She spared neither age nor sex from her categories: -all must be stuffed in somewhere; nor did the very throne exempt the -sitter from service. The throne of Scotland, for instance! She made -it sufficiently appear to Queen Mary that her royal father had been a -mighty hunter. She knew the romantic origin of all the by-blows—‘Cupid’s -trophies,’ as she called them (O my Lord of Moray!)—and did not scruple -to reveal them to the ears of Lady Argyll, herself the daughter of -Margaret Erskine, and quite aware of it. Then she must adventure Queen -Marie of Lorraine—the one saint whose lamp had never grown dim upon her -daughter’s altar—and hint that she had been consciously fair and not -unconsciously pursued. ‘And I speak as one who should know, sweet madam,’ -said this old Reres; ‘for the Cardinal, fine man, was of my own kindred, -and differed noways from the rest of the men. I mind very well—’twas at -Linlithgow, where you were born, my Queen—Queen Marie sat by the window -on a day, her hand at her side, at her foot a dropped rose. But oh! that -flower was wan beside the roses in her face. Your Majesty hath not her -hues—no, but you favour the Stuarts. “Dear sakes, madam,” say I, “you -have dropped your rose.” So faintly as she smiled, I heard her sigh, -and knew she could not answer me then. “Some one will pick up what I -have let fall,” saith she at last—and then, behind the curtain, I see a -red shoe. I touched my lips—they were as red as your own in those days, -madam—and slipped away, knowing my book. Hey! but red was the hue of the -Court at that tide—with the tall Cardinal, and the tall rosy Queen, and -the dropping, dropping roses.’ The Queen let her talk. She had a soft, -wheedling voice—a murmurous accompaniment to luxurious thought. - -No doubt, when the body is unstrung you pet your thought, and indulge it -in its wanton ways. There is no harm in dreaming. The Queen lay waiting -there, thrilled faintly with the sense of what was to come upon her, -softly served and softly lapped. And in soft guise came into ministry the -figures of her dreams, inviting, craving, imploring, grieving, clinging -about her. She communed again with all her lovers, the highest and the -lowest—from Charles of France, Most Christian King, a stormy boy, who -frowned his black brows upon her and kissed so hotly on that day she saw -him last, down to slim, grey-eyed Jean-Marie-Baptiste, whom by kindness -she had made man. Others there were, stored in her mind, a many and a -many—and any one of them would have died for her once. What of Mr. Knox, -of the great hands? What of John Gordon, fiercest of old Huntly’s sons? -What of George Gordon, romantic, speechless lover at this hour? To each -his own sweetness, to each the secret of his own desire: she savoured -each by each as she lay, turning and snuggling and dreaming among her -pillows. And when the cooing old Reres by the bed spoke of Lord Bothwell, -she listened, sharply intent; and wondered if there were light enough -left to betray her, and hoped not. Dangerous, desperate, hardy man! He -was a theme upon which Lady Reres descanted at large. Let his draperies -be as they would, his gender was never in doubt. - -Reres had known James Bothwell—so she always called him—for many -years; for although his only numbered thirty yet, and she confessed to -five-and-forty, he had come into blossom as quick as a pear-tree in a -mild Lent: at fifteen and a half James Bothwell——! She lifted up her -hands to end the sentence. - -‘They say—under the breath I speak it—that of late he hath cast his -eyes above him. Ah, and how high above him, and how saucily, let others -tell your Majesty.’ Queen Mary’s hot ears needed no telling. ‘They say -it drove my lord of Arran into raving fits. Fie then, and out upon you, -Bothwell, if Majesty cannot be a hedge about a lovely woman! But so it -hath ever been with all that disordered blood of Hepburn: thieves all, -all thieving greatly. I need not go back far—and yet they tell the tale -of the first Hepburn of them, and of Queen Joan, widow of our first -James. What did those two at Dunbar together?’ At Dunbar—a Hepburn and a -dead Queen of Scots—alack! and what had done this living Queen with her -Hepburn there? - -‘A pest upon them all!’ cries Reres; ‘for what did the son of that -Hepburn with a Queen? And the father of our James Bothwell, what did -he? For if James Bothwell’s father loved not your Majesty’s own mother, -and loved her not in vain—why should our man find himself a straitened -earl at this day? But so it is, they say, and so is like to be, that -every Hepburn of Bothwell dieth for love of a Queen of Scots. Foh, then! -and is our man to vary the tide of his race? Oh, madam, I could tell -your Majesty some deal of his prowess! Listen now: he loved my sister -Buccleuch, and me he loved. Greedy, greedy! Oh, there’s a many and many a -woman hath greeted sore for him to come back. But he never came, my Queen -of Honey, he never came! And let not her,’ she darkly said, ‘that hath -him now, think to keep him. No, no, the turtle hath mated too high. He is -like the king-eagle that sits lonely on his rock, and fears not look at -the sun: for why? he bideth the time when he may choose to fly upward. -Did he mate with my sister—a Hob to her Jill? Mated he with me? God knows -whom he will mate with or mate not. He has but to ask and have, I think.’ - -‘Pull the curtain, pull the curtain,’ says Queen Mary; ‘the light vexes -my eyes.’ - -‘And stings your fair cheek, my Honey-Queen,’ says wise Lady Reres, and -gives her a happy kiss. - -So it is that a woman of experience, who carries her outlay gallantly, -approves herself to her junior, who wishes to carry her own as gallantly -as may be. But Mary Livingstone—Mistress Sempill, as they called her -now—mother already and hoping to be mother again, used to bounce out of -the bedchamber whenever Lady Reres entered it with her James Bothwell on -the tip of her quick tongue. - - * * * * * - -In the drowsy days of mid-June the Queen suffered and bare a son. First -to know it outside the castle-hive was brisk Sir James Melvill, who had -it from Mary Beaton before they fired the guns on the platform; and that -same night, by the soaring lights of the bonfires, rode out of Lothian -to carry the great news into England. No man saw Queen Mary for four -days, though the castle was filled to overflowing and the Earl of Huntly -walked all night about the courtyards, telling himself that for the sake -of mother and child the vile father must be kept alive. The King was -lodged in the castle by now; and one good reason for Huntly’s vigil may -have been that his Majesty and his people had swamped the house-room. -The Earls of Moray, Argyll and Mar were there; Atholl also and Crawfurd -(to name no more)—the two last linked with Huntly against two of the -first, and all alike watching Lord Moray for a sign. It seemed, now this -child was come, no man knew just what line he should take. So each looked -doubtfully at his neighbour, and an eye of each was linked to Moray’s -eyes of mystery. At the end of her four days’ grace the Queen sent for -her brothers first among men—the three black Stuarts, James, John, and -Robert; and two of them obeyed her. - -In the dark, faint-smelling chamber, as they knelt about her bed, she -put her thin hand over the edge that they might kiss it, and seemed -touched that they should do it with such reverence. They could see her -fixed eyes—large now, and all black—upon them, seeking, wondering, -considering if their homage might be real. As if no answer was to be read -out of them, she sighed and turned away her head. She spoke faintly, in -the voice of a woman too tired to be disheartened. ‘You shall see your -Prince, my lords. Fetch me in the Prince.’ - -The child was brought in upon a cushion, a mouthing, pushing, red epitome -of our pretensions, with a blind pitiful face. Lady Mar and Lady Reres -held it between them, passed it elaborately under the review of the -lords; and as these looked upon it in the way men use, as if timid to -admit relationship with a thing so absurd—here is a James Stuart to be -taken, and that other left!—the Queen watched them with bitter relish, -turned to be a cynic now, for the emptiness of disenchantment was upon -her. To win this mock-reverence of theirs she had laboured and spent! -With this, O God, she had paid a price! Now let all go: for they looked -at her prize as at so much puling flesh, and had kissed her hand on the -same valuation. Pish! they would scheme and plot and lie over the son as -they had over the mother—and the only honest fellow in all Scotland was -Death, who had just made a fool of her! The child began to wail for its -nurse, and pricked her into a dry heat. For it is to be known that she -could not nurse her baby. ‘Take him, take him, good Reres. I cannot bear -the noise he makes, nor can ease him any. And you, my lords, shall come -again if you will. Come when the King is by.’ Here, as if suddenly urged -by some anxiety, she raised herself in the bed. They saw how white she -was, and how fearfully in earnest. ‘Fail me not, brothers, in this. I -desire you to be with me when the King is here.’ - -When they had both promised, they left her to sleep; but she could get -none for fretting and tossing about. - -Mary Livingstone said, How could she sleep? She was ‘woeful that she -could not nurse her baby.’ - -Hereat the Queen took her by the arm and hurt her by her vehemence. ‘What -honesty is left in this world but Death?’ she croaked in her misery. -‘When your blood-brothers compass your downfall, and your husband is a -liar declared, and your own breasts play churl to your new-born child—oh, -oh, oh, I would open my arms to bonny leman Death!’ - -Mary Livingstone, blind with tears, hung over her, but could not speak. -The Queen drove her away, and had in the reminiscent, the caustic, the -fertile Reres. - -At two in the afternoon of a later day a great company was admitted; and -the King, coming in last with an Englishman of his friends, stood for -the first time these long weeks by the Queen’s bed. She was prepared for -him, gave him her hand, but flinched evidently when he saluted it. The -Countess of Mar brought in the Prince, having settled this function of -honour with Reres as best she knew, and handed it about in the throng. - -‘Give it to me, my Lady Mar,’ says the Queen in that dry, whispering -voice of hers. All the spring seemed gone out of her, so much she dragged -her words. The moment she had it in bed with her it began its feeble -wailing. - -‘There, sir, there then! ’Tis your royal Mother has you!’ says Lady Mar; -and the Queen, bothered and sick of the business before she had begun -with it, grew deadly hot as she held it, rocking it about. The King -gazed solemnly at his offspring: he blinked, but no more foolishly than -any other man. The courtiers admired, happily not called upon to speak; -in fact, nobody spoke except the infant, and Lady Mar, who pleaded in -whispers. Nor did she whisper in vain, for presently the crying stopped, -the Queen held up the child in her arms and searched vaguely the King’s -face. I say, vaguely, because those who knew and loved her best could -not in the least understand that questioning look, nor connect it with -the words she spoke. She used no form of ceremony, neither sir’d nor -my-lorded him; but poring blankly in his face, ‘God hath given you and me -a son,’ she said. - -The King was observed to blush. ‘And I thank God for him, madam,’ was -his answer, as he stooped to kiss the child. He achieved his honourable -purpose, though the Queen drew back as his face came near. Who did not -see that? - -Again she said, ‘You have kissed your very son.’ There was a silence upon -all, and then she added in a voice aside—‘So much your son that I fear it -will be the worse for him hereafter.’ Coming at such a time, from such -a mouth, the words dropped upon that hushed assembly like an Oracle. No -Scot of them all durst say anything, nor could the French Ambassador find -phrases convenient. The King may or may not have heard her—he was slow. -But plain Sir William Stanley in his Lancashire voice cried out, ‘God -save your Majesties, and the Prince your son!’ She looked about to find -who spoke so heartily, and they told her the name and station of the man. -She observed him with interest, held up the child for him to see. - -‘Look upon him, sir, for whom you pray so stoutly. This is the prince I -hope shall first unite two realms.’ - -‘Why, madam,’ says Sir William, ‘shall he succeed before your Majesty and -his father?’ - -He meant well, but did unhappily. The Queen gave back the child to Lady -Mar before she replied. - -Then, ‘Yes,’ she said, ‘I think he shall, and for this reason. Because -his father has broken my heart.’ - -Not a soul dared to move. The King started—as one jerks in first -sleep—grew violently red, looked from face to face, found no friendliness -in any, and broke out desperately: ‘Is this your promise? Is this your -promise? To forget and forgive?’ - -She was as hard as flint. ‘I have forgiven,’ she said, ‘but I shall never -forget. Would that I could! But what if I had died that snowy night? Or -what if Fawdonsyde’s pistol had shot my babe in me?’ - -‘Madam,’ said the King, ‘these things are past.’ - -She threw herself back, face to the wall. ‘Ay, they are past. Well, let -them go.’ She shut her eyes resolutely until they were all gone out; and -when that, which seemed the only thing to be done, was well done, she -opened them again, with a new and sharp outlook upon affairs. She sent -one of the women for Des-Essars, another for the physician. - -To this latter, who found her sitting up in bed with very bright -eyes, she said, ‘Master Physician, I feel stronger, having done all -the disagreeable duties which seemed expected of me. I wish for your -consideration of this matter: when can I rise from this bed?’ - -He gravely pondered. ‘Madam, in these heats I dare not advise you to be -moved. Nourishment and repose should work wonders for your Majesty, as -indeed you tell me that they have.’ - -‘At least, they would if I could get them,’ she replied. - -‘All Scotland would give herself to provide them, madam, for your solace.’ - -‘They are the last things I should look for from Scotland,’ said the -Queen. ‘Nourishment and repose! I shall leave my bed to-morrow.’ - -‘Madam,’ said the doctor, ‘I have but done my duty.’ - -‘Ah, duty!’ she said. ‘And have I not done mine? Now, good sir, I intend -my pleasure.’ - -Dismissing him, she turned to Des-Essars, who stood erect by the door. ‘I -desire to wash my hands, Jean-Marie. Bring basin and towel.’ - -As he served her at the bed’s edge, she dipped and rinsed her -hands—carefully, formally, smiling to herself as at the good performance -of some secret rite. This might have been lustral water, Jordan’s, or -that sluggish flow of Lethe’s. She held up her wet hands before the lad’s -face. ‘Do you see any speck?’ - -‘Oh no, madam.’ - -‘Be very sure,’ she said; ‘look well again. These hands, mark you, have -been in Scotland four years.’ She rinsed again and wrung them of drops; -smelt them, and seemed pleased. ‘Roses they smell of now—not Scotland,’ -she said. ‘So I am free of Scotland.’ She dried her hands and sent him -away with the service—‘But come back soon,’ she said; ‘I have more for -you to do.’ - -Des-Essars returned. ‘Wait you there,’ said she, ‘while I write a -letter.’ She wrote, pausing here and there, looking wisely for a word -or two—sometimes at the prim-faced youth, as if she could find one -there—scoring out, underlining, smiling, biting the pen. She ended—did -not re-read. - -‘Bring taper and wax.’ She sealed her letter with her signet ring, and -held it out. ‘Take this incontinent to my lord of Bothwell. At Hermitage -in Liddesdale you shall find him. Be secret and sure. You have never -failed me yet, and I trust you more than most. I trusted you four years -ago, when you were a boy: now you are nearly a man, and shall prove to be -fully one if you do this errand faithfully. Ask for French Paris at your -first coming in—thus you will get at my lord privily. Now go, remembering -how much I entrust you with—my happiness, and hope, and honour.’ He -made to leave her, but she cried, ‘Stay. You love me, I think. Come -nearer—come very near. Nearer, nearer, foolish boy. What, are you so -timid? Now—stoop down and kiss me here.’ She touched her cheek, then -offered it. - -He flushed up to the roots of his hair and had nothing to say; but he was -never one to refuse chances. She said, ‘You have kissed a Queen. Now go, -and earn your wages.’ He marched from the room, grown man, and took the -way in half an hour. - -At his castle of Hermitage, deep in the hills, the Earl of Bothwell -frowned over his letter, and having read it many times, went on frowning -as he fingered it. ‘Now, if any faith might be given to a princess,’ -he thought to himself, ‘those two should never be together again man -and wife. The pledge is here, the written word.’ He chuckled low in his -throat, then shrugged like an Italian. ‘The word of a prince, the bond -of a weathercock! Let the words go for words—but the heart that devised, -the head that spun, the hand that set them here—ah, a man may count on -them!’ He sprang to his feet, went to the window and looked out far into -the sunny brown hills. He shook his fist at the blue sky. ‘Oh, Bastard -of Scotland, James misbegotten of James! Oh, my man, if these words are -true, there shall come a grapple between you and me such as the men of -the dales know not—and a backthrow for one of us, man James, which shall -not be for me.’ Leaning out of the window, he roared into the court for -his men. ‘Ho, Hob Elliott! Ho, Jock Scott! Armstrong, Willy Pringle, -Paris, you French thief! Boot and saddle, you dogs of war—I take the -North road this night.’ He strode a turn or more about the room, shaking -his letter in his hand. ‘Better than a charter, better than a sasine, -bond above bonds!’ - -But he went to his wife’s bower. ‘My heart,’ saith he, ‘I must leave thee -this night—I am called to town. God knoweth the end of the adventure. -Read, my soul, read, and then advise.’ - -She read the French slowly, he behind her, his face almost touching her -cheek, prompting her with a word or two; but so eager as he was, he was -always in front, and had to come back for her, mastering his impatience. -At the end she sat quietly, looking at her hands. His excitement was not -to be borne. - -‘Well, my girl, well?’ - -‘Go to her, my lord.’ - -‘You say that!’ - -She replied calmly, ‘No, it is she that says it—it is veiled in these -lines.’ - -He took her face between his hands. ‘But it is thou that sendest me—hey? -Be very sure now what thou art about. If I go, I go to the end. I stay -never when I ride out o’ nights until I have the cattle in byre.’ - -Her deep eyes met his without faltering. ‘Let her have of you what she -will. I have what I have.’ - -Now she had made him wary. He could not be sure what she was at—unless it -were one thing. - -‘Dost thou send me,’ he asked her, ‘to be her bane? art thou so still and -steadfast a hater?’ - -‘I send you not at all,’ she answered. ‘It is she that calls. Remember -that against the time when you have need to remember it.’ - -He caught her up and kissed her repeatedly. ‘Sit thou still, Jeannie, and -watch,’ says he; ‘keep my house and stuff, and have a prayer on thy lips -for me. Never doubt me, my dear. Doubt all the world to come, but doubt -not me.’ - -She said, ‘I am very sure of you—both of what you will do, and what you -will not do.’ - -He kissed her again, and left her. She did not come out to see him ride -away. - - * * * * * - -Cantering on grass through the hot starry night, he called Des-Essars to -his side and questioned him closely about the letter. How did she write -it? What did she say? Who was by? - -‘My lord,’ said Baptist, ‘I myself was by. No other at all. She bade me -take it straight to your lordship, surely and secretly. She wrote it -herself and sealed it with the ring on her forefinger. But she wrote -nothing until she had washed her hands.’ - -‘Why, my lad,’ says he, ‘were her hands so foul?’ - -‘My lord, they were the fairest, whitest hands in the world. But she -washed them many times, until, as she said, they smelt of roses, and not -of Scotland.’ - -‘The plot thickens, God strike me! What else, boy?’ - -‘Nothing more, my lord, save that she gave me the letter, as I have told -your lordship, and sent me directly away.’ - - - - -CHAPTER X - -EXTRACTS FROM THE DIURNALL OF THE MASTER OF SEMPILL - - -That sandy-haired, fresh-coloured, tall gentleman, John Sempill, Master -of Sempill, received his Mary Livingstone on her return from the Court -with more demonstration than was held seemly in Scotland; but they were -his own servants who saw him, and he was sincerely glad to have her back. -Not only the pattern housewife, but the ornament of his hearth, the most -buxom of the Maries, the highest-headed, greatest-hearted, the ruddiest -and the ripest—well might he say, as he fondled her, ‘My lammie, thou art -a salve for my sair een,’ and even more to the same effect. - -‘By your favour, Master,’ quoth she, ‘you shall give over your pawing. I -am travel-weary and heart-weary, and you trouble me.’ - -‘Heart-weary, dear love!’ cried the Master. ‘And you so new back to your -bairn and your man!’ - -‘I am full fain of you, Master, and fine you know it. And our bairn -is the pride of my eyes. But I grieve over what I’ve left behind me; -my heart is woe for her. And indeed, if you must have it, I am near -famishing for want of bite and sup.’ - -‘Come away, woman, come away,’ said the Master, justly shocked. ‘There’s -the best pasty on the board that ever you set your bonny teeth to, and -a brew of malt unmatched in Renfrew. Or would you have the Canary? Or -happen the French wine is to your liking? Give a name to it, wife, for -it’s a’ your ain, ye ken.’ He hovered about her, anxious to serve, while -she pulled at her gauntlets. - -‘The fiend is in the gloves, I think. There then, they’re off. Master, -I’ll take a cup of the red French wine. Maybe it will put heart into me.’ - -‘Take your victual, take your victual, my lady,’ says the Master, ‘I’ll -be back just now.’ He was his own cellarer, prudent man, and was apt to -excuse himself by saying that one lock was better than two. - -The wine brought back the colour to her cheeks and loosened the joints of -her tongue. All he had now to do was to listen to her troubles: and he -did listen. It is likely that, had she been less charged with them, she -had been warier; but she was indeed surcharged. He soon understood that -it was the coming of the Earl of Bothwell that had caused her return. - -‘Not that I would not have braved him out, you must know, -Master—bristling boar though he be, dangerous, boastful, glorious man. -It would take a dozen of Hepburns to scare me from my duty. But oh,’tis -herself that scares me now! So changed, so sore changed. You might lay it -to witchcraft and be no fool.’ - -‘’Twill be the lying-in, I doubt,’ says the sage Master. ‘You mind how -hardly my sister Menzies took her first. Ay, ’twill be that.’ - -Mary Livingstone would not have it. ‘There are many that say so, but I -am not one. No, no. I know very well where to look for it. Witchcraft it -is, night-spells. I mind the beginning o’t. Why, when I first saw her, -all dim as I was with my tears, her heart went out to me—held out to -me in her stretched hands. She took me to her sweet warm bosom, and I -could have swooned for joy of her, to be there again. “Oh, Livingstone, -my dear, my dear! Come back to me at last!” And so we weep and cling -together, and all’s as it had ever been. For you know very well we were -never long divided.’ - -‘Never long enough for me, Mary, in my courting time.’ - -‘She was expecting her wean from day to day, and I tell you she longed -for the hour. She was aye sewing his little clothes—embroidering -them—ciphers and crowns and the like. She worked him his guiding-strings -with her own hands, every stitch—gold knot-work, you never saw better. -And all her talk was of him.’ - -‘Likely, likely,’ murmured the Master. - -‘She never wavered but it was to be a prince, for all that we teased -her—spoke of the Princess Mary that was coming—or should it not be -Princess Margaret? She smiled in her steady way, as she uses when she -feels wise, knowing what others cannot know. “No other Mary in Scotland,” -she said. “There are five of us now, and Scotland can hold no more. My -Prince Jamie must wed with a Margaret if he needs one.” No, she never -doubted, and you see she was right. Oh, she was right and well before the -magic got to work! - -‘To me she used to talk, more nearly than to the others. Poor Fleming! -You’ll have heard of her sore disgrace—for favouring that lank Lethington -of hers. She is suspect, you must know, of seeking his recall, so hath no -privacy with our mistress. Beaton and Seton were never of such account; -so ’twas to me she spoke her secrets—over and over in the long still -forenoons, wondering and doubting and hoping, poor lamb. “Do you think -he’ll lippen to me, Livingstone?” she would say. “Did your own child -laugh to see his mother? I think ’twould break my heart,” she said, “if -he greeted in my arms.” She intended to be nurse to him herself: that I -will hold by before the Thronéd Three on Doomsday. Not a night went by -but, when I came to her in the morn, she bade me look, and try, and be -sure. I told her true, she could do it. And what hindered her, pray? What -drove away her milk? Eh, sir, I doubt I know too well. - -‘It was Beaton brought in that old quean, that liggar-lady of Bothwell’s, -that lickorish, ramping Reres. Mother’s sister of Beaton’s she is, own -sister to the wise wife of Buccleuch, with witchcraft in the marrow of -her. What made Beaton do it? Let God tell you if He care. I think the -Lord God may well have covered His face to hear her tales. Such a tainted -history I never listened to—_pourriture de France!_ Oh, Master, I’ve -heard the Count of Anjou and his minions, and Madame Marguerite and all -hers at their wicked talk. I’ve heard Bothwell blaspheme high Heaven in -three tongues, and had the bloat Italian scald my ears with a single -word. But the Reres beats all. Good guide us, where hath she not made -herself snug? Whose purchase hath she not been? Man, I cannot tell you -the tales she told, nor one-quarter the shamefulness she dared to report. -And the soft lingering tongue of the woman! And how she lets her scabrous -words drop from her like butter from a hot spoon! My poor lamb was weary -of bed and body, I’ll allow. I’ll own the old limmer made her laugh; -she never could refuse a jest, as you know, however salted it might be. -No: she must listen and must laugh, while I could have stabbed the old -speckled wife. But my Queen Mary kept her at the bedside; and there they -were, she and this Reres, for ever kuttering and whispering together. -’Twas then, in my belief, the cast was made, and the wax moulded and the -spells set working. - -‘For mark you this. The pains came on o’ the Wednesday morn, in the small -grey hours; and by nine o’clock the child was born alive. It wailed from -the first—never was such a fretful bairn; and she could hear him, and -grieved over it, and could not find rest when most she needed it. And -then—when they put it to her—she could not nurse it. Oh, Master, I could -have maimed my own breast to help her! She tried—sore, sore she tried; -she schooled herself to smile, though the sweat fairly bathed her; she -crooned to it, sang her French, her pretty stammering Scots; but all to -no purpose—no purpose at all. The child just labbered itself and her—my -bonny lamb—and got no meat. - -‘Master, it fairly broke her spirit. She did not fret, she did not -lament, but lay just, and stared at the wall; and not a maid nor woman -among us could rouse her. The old Reres tried her sculduddery and -night-house talk, but did no better than we with our coaxing and prayers. -She had no heart, no care, no pride in the world; but just let all go, -and thrung herself face to the wall. - -‘The lords came about her, and she showed them their prince: you could -see she scorned them on their knees, and herself to whom they knelt. -The craven King came in behind them, and she bade him kiss his own son. -She looked him over, with all the dry rage withering her face—you’ld -have said she had chalked herself!—and spoke him terrible words. “I may -forgive, but I shall never forget,” she said: and to an Englishman who -was with him—“He has broken my heart.” A King! He’s a spoiled toy in her -hands; and the like is all the glory of Scotland—a thing of no worth to -her. What hath changed her so but witchcraft? Ah, what else hath such a -wicked virtue? Soon after this she sent for Bothwell; and when he came -she was up and about—mad, mad, mad for her pastime; drinking of pleasure, -you may say, like a thirsty dog, that fairly bites the water. Oh, Master, -I am sick at the heart with all I’ve seen and heard!’ - -‘Let me comfort my Heart and Joy!’ said the really loving Master, and -applied himself to the marital privilege. Extracts from his _Diurnall_, -with which I have been favoured by a learned Pen, shall follow here—not -without their illustrative value in this narrative. I omit all reference -to the redding of the hay, the wool sales of each week, statistical -comparisons of the lands of Beltrees with other sheep-ground, Sandy -Graeme’s hen, the draining of Kelpie’s Moss, a famous hunting of rats on -Lammas Day, and other matters of a domestic or fleeting interest. - -It is not without pain, be it added, that I allow the Master to display -himself naked, as it were, and far from ashamed. It will be seen—I regret -to say it—that he was not above trafficking his good wife’s heart, or -sending her to grass—in pastoral figure!—when the milk ran dry. Commerce -and the Affections! Well, he was not alone in Scotland; there were -belted Earls in the trade with him—canny chafferers in the market-place, -or (in Knox’s phrase) Flies at the Honeypot. He was no better than his -neighbours; and you will hear the conclusion of their whole matter, from -a shrewd observer, at the end of this book. - -The first date in the _Diurnall_ of any moment to us is— - - _July the 22._—Yester-een my dear wife Mary Livingstone, - blessed be God, returned to her home. Being comforted and - stayed, she had much to rehearse of Court doings. Great tales: - Forbes of Reres’ lady, a very gamester; the Earl of Both., and - others. Harsh entreaty of the K—— before many witnesses. _Mem. - Not to forget own advantage in such news_, nor the Earl of - Bedf(ord) and Mr. C(ecil).[4] - - * * * * * - - _July the 24._—I wrote out my proffer fair for the Earl of - Bed(ford). John Leng rode with it, a sad [discreet] person. - Wool sales this week ... Sandy Graeme: havers anent his hen.... - M(ary) L(ivingstone) easier in mind, haler in body. Spake - freely of the Court. The Q—— sent a French youth for the Earl - of Both., and when he came saw him alone in her chamber. This - would be great news for Engl(and), but and if they would pay my - price. _Mem. To be stiff, not to abate. Æquam memento rebus in - arduis servare mentem._ - - * * * * * - - _July the 27._— ... M. L(ivingstone) saith that her mate - Fl(eming) would give _all lawful things_ to have back the - Sec(retary), _even to her allegiance as a subject_; so - intemperate is the passion of love in women. Saith that the - Earl of Both. desires the K—— to recall Mr. A(rchibald) - D(ouglas) in order that he may betray my Lo. of M(oray) to - the Q——. Maybe the K—— would do it, if he had enough credit - with her. The K—— hates my lord of Both. as mortally as ever - he did the late Italian, _but not with any more reason_; at - least M. L(ivingstone) will not admit any. Pressed her, but as - yet fruitlessly. She is clear that there will be open strife - between the Earls of Both. and Mo(ray): but the darker man hath - a sure hold on himself and his friends. _Mem. To write all this - fairly to-morrow in the new Spanish cipher. Mem. 2. She saith - that the Earl of H(untly) is now Chanc(ellor) and a declared - lover of the Q——. Harmless, because the Q—— hath little to give - but scorn to them that openly love her._ - - * * * * * - - _August the 3._—Letter from my lord of Bed(ford). His gross - English manners. He asks roundly what price is demanded. This - is shameful dealing—greatly offended. John Leng saw my lord - personally in Berw(ick), and was asked to devise secret means - to speak with me. Most certain that he hath writ to the Q—— - of Eng(land). I shall tell him _nothing_ as yet, and _write - but round about_.... News this day that the Q—— hath gone to - Alloa; _but mark in what manner_. The K—— was invited; and - offered himself to ride with her. _Refused._ Whereupon he set - out alone, only his English with him; and the Q—— embarked with - the lord of Both. in a little ship from Newhaven. Our informant - saith not who accompanied them, save that they were famous - _robbers and pirates_. Suspect Ormiston and Hay of Tala, known - to me for desperate men. M(ary) S(eton) went along with her. - Lady Re(res) took the Pr(ince). _Mem. M. L(ivingstone) should - go to Alloa, but it likes her not to leave her child. Her - shape too.... Mem. 2. To write, very shortly and finally, into - Eng(land)._ - - * * * * * - - _August the 7._—News this day from M. Fl(eming). Sir James - Mel(vill) gave the K—— a cocker spaniel of his own rearing, and - the K—— boasting of this (for they are rare who show him any - kindness in these days), it came to the Q——’s ears. Fl(eming) - writeth that she rated Sir James sharply for this in the - gallery at Alloa, saying, ‘I cannot trust one that loves them - that I love not.’ Sir James all pothered to reply; rare for - him. She flung away before the words were ready, and took my - lord of Both(well’s) arm.... - - The Earl of Mor(ton) writeth me from Northumberland with a fat - buck from Chillingham. Hopeth I will stand his friend for the - sake of my father, whom (saith he) he entirely loves. His heart - is woe for Scotland, and any news which may help him thither - he will be thankful of. _Mem. To write him civilly my thanks, - and tell him something, but not near all. Enough to let him see - that I know more...._ - - Sandy Graeme very resolute upon the hen; spake insolently to me - this day. He threatens to pursue.... - - * * * * * - - _August the 15._—The K——, we hear, flew into a great passion - of late, and threatened to have the life out of my Lord of - Mor(ay)—but not in my lord’s hearing. He is vexed to death that - the Q—— consorts with those two earls, his chief enemies (as he - thinks): I mean Both. and Mor(ay). The Q—— reported his threat - to her brother; and now the K—— is gone away, supposed to - Dunfermline; but he kept it very secret. The Q—— is to hunt the - deer in Meggatdale, we learn. I have at last prevailed upon M. - L(ivingstone) to seek the Court. She goes, but not willingly. - In my letter of this day to Eng(land) I plainly said that the - intelligence I had was worthy the Q—— of Eng(land’s) study. - ‘Let her write soon,’I said, ‘or——’ and so left it. _Quos ego - ...!_ a powerful construction, _aposiopesis_ hight. _Mem. To - see that John Leng renders just accounts of his spending on my - business._ - - * * * * * - - _August the 17._—My dear wife set out this day for the Court - at Stirling. Grievous charges of travel cheerfully borne by - me. She hath promised to write fully. Recommended her to have - circumspect dealing with my lord of Bothw., to be complaisant - _without laxity of principle_. ’Tis plain courtesy to salute - the Rising Sun, though savouring of idolatry _if carried to - wicked lengths_. She high-headed as ever.... - - A letter from the Earl of Mor(ton), which she desired to read - with me before she departed, wondering that he should honour - me. Lucky that the bay horse would not stand.... He writeth - plainly that he desires my service to win him home from his - exile: asketh me guiding lights, _how the land lies_, etc. - Promises much, but more to be regarded is his power to do harm. - Of all lords in this realm he hath the longest and deepest - memory. But whom can he hate of mine? Whom of any other body’s - but of _One_, and that one hated sorest of all men? Very rich - also is he, and covetous to have more. _Mem. To sleep upon the - letter I shall write him before returning his messenger._ He - saith that A. D(ouglas) is full of business of all sorts. I - fear, a shameful dealer. - - * * * * * - - _August the 23._—Letter from my wife, the first she hath writ; - full of juicy meat. The Q—— took the K—— into favour again - and suffered his company in Meggatdale. She fears what he may - do against her if he is alone, or with his father. The lords - of Bothw., Mor(ay), and Ma(r) present there; and M. S(eton) - and a few more. Cramalt would not hold near so many. Some lay - at Henderland, some with Scott of Tushielaw. Scott of Harden - offered and was refused—supposed for fear of the Douglas house - by-north of him. Afterwards they went to Traq(uair). The K——, - being disguised in drink, held monstrous open talk of the Q—— - there, calling her a brood mare of his, and other such filthy - boasting. Sharply rebuked by my lord Both., he had no reply - to make. Thus it is with him, I see. The least favour shown, - it flieth to his head. At heart he is a very craven. _He is a - rogue in grain...._ - - News that Ker of Cessford hath slain the Abbot of Kelso. Met - on the bridge, each with a company, and had words; from words - fell to blows. _Tu ne cede malis, sed contra audentior ito._ - True: but how if life be threatened? Is it not wiser _to bend - to the gale_? And where doth this Evil One lie, and how to be - discerned by simple man? Alas! the times are lawless! _Mem. - John Leng not home from Ber(wick). He may have with him that - which would make him worth the robbery. To enquire for him at - the post._ - - ... Sandy Graeme: his hen a rankling thorn, whereof, it seems, - I must die daily.... - - * * * * * - - _August the 28._—I learn that M. Fl(eming) hath won her suit. - The Earl of Ath(oll) wrought for her, and my lord of Mor(ay) - did not gainsay. Therefore Mr. S(ecretary) cometh back. The - Q——, it is said, pleaded with my lord of Bothw. to do the man - no harm—_very meekly, as a wife with her husband_. So it was - done, and he received at Sir W. Betts’ house in Stirling, - after dinner. Present, the Q——, Lady Ma(r), Earls of Ath(oll), - Mor(ay), and Bothw. Leth(ington) went down on his two knees, - they say, wept, kissed hands. Then, when he was on his feet - again, the Q—— took him by the one hand and gave her other to - the lords in turn. My lord of Bothw. could not refuse her. - Leth(ington) as proud as a cock, saith my dear wife, who saw - him afterwards at the _coucher_ by Fl(eming’s) side. I suppose - she will have him now. He is restored to all his offices and - is sent away to Edinburgh, whither the Q—— must go soon to - oversee her revenues. She will lodge in the Chequer House, I - hear. _Now, why doth she so?_ They establish the Pr(ince) at - Stirling: Lady Re(res) to be Mistress of his household, an evil - choice. My wife hateth her so sore she will not write her name, - lest, as she saith, the pen should stink. Scandalous doings at - Stirling abound. The Q—— in a short kirtle, loose hair, dancing - about the Cross with young men and maids: not possible to be - restrained in anything she is conceited of. _Mem. To consider - closely about the Chequer House._ I mind that one Master - Chalmers, a philosophic doubter of mysteries, is neighbour unto - it. A friend of my lord of Bothw. in old times. They say, his - pædagogue. _Sed quære...._ - - John Leng returned Monday last. I fear little to be done with - Engl(and). Mr. C(ecil), most indurate, crafty man, must needs - ‘see the goods before he can appraise them.’ A likely profit! - _Mem. To consider of the Earl of Mor(ton), if he knoweth of - Leth(ington) in new favour?_ A good stroke for him, well - worth some outlay. _But the charge of a messenger for such a - thing?..._ - - * * * * * - - _September the 24._—Strong matter from my wife—the - strongest—writ from Edinburgh. There came in a letter from - the K——’s father, my lord of Len(nox), long a stranger to the - Court (and with good reason of his own), which put the Q—— in - a flutter. She was taken ill and kept her bed. My wife saw - her. This lord, it seems, wrote to her Majesty that he could - no longer answer for the mind of the K—— his son; that _it - was not in his power_ to stay the K—— _from a voyage abroad_. - Much more; but this the first. The Q—— wept and tossed herself - about. _Note this well_: the Earl of Bothw. was at Hermitage in - Liddesdale. - -But of this, and its wild results, I prefer my own relation. No more as -yet of the Master. - -[4] The Earl of Bedford was English Commissioner at Berwick, a ready -purchaser from scandal-mongers. Mr. C. is, of course, the famous English -Secretary. - - - - -CHAPTER XI - -ARMIDA DOUBTFUL IN THE GARDEN - - -To the Chequer House at Edinburgh belonged a pleasant garden of yew -alleys, grass walks, nut-trees, and bowers cut out of box. You could pace -the round of it by the limiting wall, keeping on turf all the way, and -see the sky-line broken by the red gables and spires of the little clean -city, being nevertheless within boskage so generous that no man’s window -could spy upon you. Thus it was that orderly Mr. David Chalmers, in his -decent furred robe and skull-cap, was able to tread his own plot, his -hands coupled behind his back, and to meditate upon Philosophy, Gnomic -Poetry, and Moral Emblems, undisturbed by the wafts of song, rustling of -maids’ farthingales, flying feet of pages, or sound of kisses refused -or snatched, which those neighbour green recesses witnessed and kept to -themselves. In the Chequer Garden, this mellow end of September, the -Court took solace while the state revenues were under review, the Queen’s -custom being to work in the garden-room, a long covered loggia edging the -slopes of grass, from nine to eleven in the forenoon, then to walk for an -hour, and then to dine. Holyrood was wide, Holyrood was near, Holyrood -stood empty: this was a whim of hers—no more. - -Great days were these for Mr. Secretary Lethington: to feel the sun of -royal favour genially warm upon his back once more; to seek (and surely -find) assurance of good fortune in the brown eyes of the sweetest, most -modest, gentlest-hearted lady in Scotland. Did he not owe everything -to Mary Fleming? And was she not a sweet creditor? And next to her he -stood indebted to the weather. The man was sensitive to climate, and, -like all sensitive men, loved autumn best. ‘This slope sun, which will -neither scorch nor refuse his clemency, dearest lady,’ he said; ‘these -milky skies, which never seem to lose the freshness of dawn; the very -gentle death—most merciful!—which each Day suffers; the balm of Night’s -dipped fingers shed upon our brows: are not these things an augury (O my -true love!) of even life for you and me? Even life, a peaceful ending of -our days, with the angry solstice turned, the dry heat, the bared wrath -of the sun far from us! Indeed, indeed, I do believe it.’ Mary Fleming, -looking steadfastly into the pale sky, would be too sure of herself to -feel abashed by his fervour. ‘And I, sir,’ she would answer, ‘pray for it -daily.’ - -Mr. Secretary, at such times as these, felt purified, ennobled, a clean -man. Working with the Queen through mornings of golden mist and veiled -heat, he did his very best in her service, and laboured to respond to -all her moods with that alacrity, clear sight, and good-humour which he -saw very well his present state required. He was one of those men who, -like beasts of chase, take colour from their surroundings. If you stroke -your dormouse his coat will answer; he will burnish to a foxy brightness -under the hand. And so with Mr. Secretary. His lady-love was kind, his -sovereign trusted him again: he shone under such favour, dared to be in -charity with all men, and was most worthy of trust. He thought little -of bygone stresses, of the late months when he had lurked, gnawing his -cheek, in the hills of the west; it was impossible for the like of him -to believe that he had ever been otherwise than now he was. He fancied -himself a book opened at a clean page, and never turned back to regard -earlier chapters, blotted and ugly. Forward, rather, looked he—upon many -fair folios of untouched vellum. ‘Upon these we will print in golden -types, my heart, the _gestes_ of the twin-flight to the stars of William -Maitland of Lethington and Mary Fleming, his spouse: _deux cors, ung -coer!_’ And she, loving soul, believed the man. - -The Queen, since that summer’s day when, with ritual, she had washed -her hands in rose-water, had known many moods. Some were of dangerous -sweetness, as of treading a brink hand in hand; some of full joy in air -and weather, as when Lord Bothwell and his men steered her across the -dancing sea, and the little ship, plunging in blue waters, tossed up the -spray to kiss her cheeks, or sting unmannerly her happy eyes. There had -been days also of high revelry at Stirling—dancings, hawkings, romping -games, disguises; days of bravado, where Memory was dared to do her -worst. All of these, as Mary Livingstone told her husband, with Lord -Bothwell at her side and the King out of mind. Some days she had had of -doubtful questioning, of heart-probing, drawing-back; a sense (to be -nursed) of nothing yet lost, of all being yet well; and others—but then -she had been quite alone—when, upon her knees, with bent-down head and -hands crossed over the breast, she had whispered to herself the words of -fate: ‘Behold one stronger than I, who, coming, shall overshadow me. Take -me, lord, take me, take me, such as I am.’ After such times as these she -would walk among her women with a rapt, pure face, her soul sitting in -her eyes, or half-risen, quivering there, trembling in strength, sensing -the air, beating, ready to fly. Then, as they looked at her wondering, -she would sit with them and talk gently, in a low kind voice, about their -affairs; and Mary Livingstone, who knew her at her best when she was -quick and masterful, feared most for her then; and Mary Fleming, who had -but one thought in her heart, took courage—and at some such time pleaded -for, and won back, her banished lover. - -So it was with her during all that summer and early autumn, while the -Master of Sempill (healthy-faced man) was filling his _Diurnall_, and -doing his best to fill his pocket, by emptying his wife of confidences -and betraying her afterwards. But when she came back from Stirling, -enriched in divers ways, she had to find that the graceless King had not -lost his power of the spur. By degrees and degrees dark rumours gathered -about her, of which he was the nucleus. She heard of his quarrelling at -Dunfermline, of a night-fray at Cameron Brig in which he was suspected -of a share; of his man Standen with a wounded head, and the King swearing -he would burn the doer of it out of house and jacket. Now, who had -wounded Standen’s head? Nobody could tell her. - -Then there were threats sent about town and country by craped messengers: -‘The Earl of Moray should beware how he rides abroad’; or ‘Let the Lord -of Bothwell look to the inmates of his house’—and so forth. Worse than -these were the hints thrown out to Du Croc, the French Ambassador—hints -which pointed at the safety of the prince her son, and at the King as the -author of them. Flying words had been caught in galleries and corridors; -somebody saw the white face of Forrest, his chamber-child, frozen by -terror into silence. They had him in among them, and twisted his arm: he -would not deny, he would not affirm, but wept copiously and moaned for -his mother in Winchester. Mysteries and mischiefs were all about her; and -everything she could gather insisted on one fact—that the King intended -action of his own oversea or in England—she could not tell which. - -Loathing the task as much as the taskmaster, she looked her affairs in -the face. For one thing, they gave her back a distorted image of her -own face. She had washed her hands, she had been happy, thought herself -free,—why, why, what a purblind fool! She had been playing the May Day -queen, like any chimney-sweeper’s wench, in a torn petticoat. A rent -panoply to cover her, a mantle-royal full of old clouts! The discovery -threw her into despair: ‘Here am I, Mary of France and Scotland, a -crowned woman—bankrupt, at the mercy of a sot to whom I lent my honour -twice!’ Under the bite and rankle of this thought, grown fearfully -eager, she looked about all ways for escape. Divorce! No, no, that -would bastardise her son. The strong hand, then! Let her lay hands upon -the traitor to her throne and bed. There was ample proof against him; -the Riccio plot had been enough by itself—but what stayed her was the -question, whose hands should she set at him? Why, who was there in all -Scotland at this hour who would show him any mercy, once he had him? -She could not answer that; there was nobody. No. She stood—she was sure -of it—between the King and his murder. ‘But for me,’ she said bitterly, -‘but for me, whom he has dipped in shame, he is a dead man.’ For a long -time she stood pondering this, a bleak smile on her lips, and one finger -touching her breast. - -So might she remain standing; but she could not have him slain. Not -though he had sought to betray her, spurned her worth, made her a mock; -not though he would steal her child, tamper with her enemies, sell her -for a price. All this was true, and more. She grew scarlet to admit to -herself that more was true. She was his wedded wife, at his beck and -call: and now she loved a Man; and love (as always) made her pure virgin. -The shame of the truth flooded her with colour.—But no! She stood between -the King and his murderers. If he persisted in his misdeeds, she had -but to stand aside and they would kill him. Well, _she could not stand -aside_; therefore she must coax him back to decency—by the arts of women. - -Hateful necessity! And yet if you had seen her at her window as she -faced it, looking askance at the green sky, you would have thought her -just a love-sick girl spying for her lover: for that was her wont, to -smile, and peer, and turn her pretty head; pick with her fingers at the -pleats of her gown, and be most winning when at the verge of loss. And -even when she had decided upon bargaining with the man she abhorred, she -did not abhor the act. It would be a delicate exercise of the wits—most -delicate. For observe this well, you who desire to know her: although she -stood between the man and his murder, _while she stood there_ she was -absolutely at his mercy. He could do what he chose with her. Bargaining! -He could drive the most terrible bargain. If she decided that he must not -be killed, she must needs deal tenderly with him, and fib and cheat to -save him. For she knew very well that whatever compunction she had, he -would have none. In a word, she must prepare to save him alive, and pay -him dearly for the hateful privilege. - -Very well. These conclusions worked out, she deliberately sent word that -she would see him, and he came to her (as she had foreseen) in his worst -mood—the hectoring mood which knew her extremity and built upon it. - - * * * * * - -He had grown blotched, fatter in the face. His lower lip hung down; -there were creases underneath his angry eyes. Excess of all sorts, but -mostly of liquor, was responsible for the thickening of what had never -been fine, and made him his own parody. He still held up his head, still -straddled his legs and stuck out his elbows; he still had the arrogant -way with him, and still appeared a fool when he was most in danger of -becoming a man. He knew that his mere neighbourhood made her sick, and -what reason she had—cheapened by him as she had been, held for a thing -of nought, driven to feel herself vile. Knowing all this, and resenting -in her her knowledge of his degradation, he was blusterously sulky; but -knowing further that she had sent for him because she was afraid of what -he might do against her, he was ready to bully her. If there is one baser -than he who takes heart to do wrong from his wife’s tenderness, it is, -I suppose, the man who grows rich upon her dishonour. There is mighty -little to choose. - -After a constrained greeting and uncomfortable pause, she began the -struggle. Directly she touched upon the rumours, whose flying ends she -had caught, he flamed out, wagging his finger at her as if she had been -taken red-handed in some misdeed. Ah, if she considered that he could be -taken up and cast aside, lifted, carried about like a girl’s plaything, -it was a thing his honour could not brook. Let her reflect upon that. He -knew very well what his own position was—how near he stood to the two -thrones, how his child’s birth made his title stronger. He had had to -think for himself what he should do—with his friends, since those who -should naturally be about him chose to keep away, or could not dare be -near him. He had plans, thoughts, projects; had not made up his mind: but -let her take notice that he was about it. It was not to be thought that a -prince of any spirit could suffer as he suffered now. - -‘Ah, sir,’ she said here, putting up a hand, ‘and think you not whether -I have suffered, or whether I suffer now?’ - -He glared at her. - -‘You have friends, madam, a sufficiency—ah, a redundancy, in whose -commerce I cannot see you engage without suffering. You keep them from -me—perhaps wisely. There is my lord of Moray: with him I might have a -reckoning. But no! You hide him in your gown.’ - -‘How availed my gown to David?’ She was stung into this. - -He squared his shoulders. ‘The man paid dearly for what he had. He should -have counted the cost. So should others count. Let my lord of Bothwell -figure out his bill.’ - -‘No more of that, my lord,’ she cried in a rage. ‘You little know what my -gown hides, if not that it shelters yourself. Do you know, sir, from what -I am screening you?’ - -‘You screen me, madam! You! But I cannot suffer it. It is to abase me. -I cannot suffer it. But it’s all of a piece—I am shortened every way. -My friends are warned off me—my father a suspect—my means of living -straitened—I have no money, no credit. I, the King-Consort, the father -of the Prince! Oh, fie, madam, this is a scandal and crying shame. Where -are my rights—where is one of them? Where is my right to be by your side? -Where are my rights of a husband?’ - -‘They are where you put them—and as you have made them.’ - -He began to storm; but as she met every blast with the same words, he -took another course. ‘A truce,’ he said, ‘madam, to your taunts. These -may be my last words to you, or the first of many happier speeches. The -past is past and over. I have admitted the excesses of my youth and -temper; you have condoned them, or so professed. Now, madam, I say this: -You have sent for me—here I am. If you suffer me, I stay, and use you as -a loving man his wife. But if you will not, I go; and maybe you see me -not again.’ - -She fairly cowered at the choice. She covered her ears. ‘Ah, no, no! Ah, -but that is not possible!’ Why, was she to break her written promise, -make foul again her washen hands? She sat astare, beaten down and dumb; -and the words of her vow came up, as it were, fiery out of the floor, and -smote her in the face like a hot breath. - -But his courage rose at the glimpse of so much power in his hands. Not -possible, said she. Ah, but he said it was essential. He looked at her, -white and extended there; he felt and exulted in his strength. And then -it came surging into his mind that she must be his price to stay, and -that either to get her again or to lose her he would drown Scotland in -blood. - -There was a wild-beating pause, in the which she sat, catching at the -edge of the coffer, her face turned to the window. He could see her -strained throat, her short-rising breast, and knew that he could prevail. -For once in his foolish life he took the straight road to what he craved; -for he shook his hair back, strode directly to her, took her up and -caught her round the arms. So she was all a prisoner. ‘Aha, my wood-bird, -aha! Now, now I have you in a net. Not again do you escape.’ He began -to kiss her face; there was no escape indeed. Abashed, overwhelmed, -half-swooning, she gave up; and so made her bargain. To save him from -murder she murdered her own honour. So she would put it to herself. But -let us, for our part, record it in her honour. - - * * * * * - -If you will reason out his nature—which is that of the fed mule—you will -find his behaviour next day in the Council of a piece with all the rest. -Having been made master by her nobility, he supposed himself master by -the grace of God given to man. When he marched into the Council Chamber -and took her proffered hand, his pride swelled up into his eyes, and -made him see thickly. Ho! now for the manly part. Here, in the midst of -his enemies—before this black Moray, this dark-smiling Huntly, this lean -thief Lethington—here, too, he would play the man. - -Knowing him pledged to her, the Queen was gentle. ‘I beseech you, my -lord,’ she said, ‘if you have any grief against me—as now I think you -have not—or any cause which moves you to quit this realm (which I cannot -suppose), declare it before these lords. If I have denied you any right, -either of access to the prince our son, or any other right, pray you -rehearse it now.’ - -He would not speak out. He pursed his lips, frowned, raised his eyebrows, -tapped his heel on the floor. He said that he must be advised. He did -not see any of his friends here, with whom he must consult. There were -many things to consider, many calls upon him—from here, from there, from -elsewhere. He could not speak hastily, he said, or give pledges. - -Blankly dismayed, she began: ‘But, my good lord, your promise to me——’ -really forgetting for that moment what his promises were worth. There, -however, she stopped—the words seemed to choke her. - -Lethington rose and addressed him, speaking in French, and good French. -This was a courtesy to the Queen, one of those trifling, terrible things -which cost all Scotland dear. For the King blushed to the roots of his -hair, and there was no hiding blushes upon that blond face. He tried to -answer in English; but a look of comical dismay in Lethington warned him -that he had blundered the sense. He broke off short—furious, hot all -over, blind with mortification, and mad. - -‘You speak too much French for me, Mr. Secretary. My Scots, I doubt, -would not be to your liking, either of phrase or deed.’ His lip shook—he -was nearly sobbing. ‘Madam,’ he cried out, ‘madam, adieu. You will not -see my face for many days.’ He lifted that hot, passionate, boy’s face. -‘Gentlemen, adieu.’ - -Turning on his heel he walked directly from the room and pulled-to -the door after him. The Queen turned faint and had to be helped. They -fetched in women to see to her; and the Council broke up, with a common -intelligence passed silently from man to man. - -Mary Livingstone, half the night through, heard her miserable wail. -‘Thrice a traitor, who has taught treachery to me! Thrice a traitor—and -myself a lying woman!’ She heard her talking to herself—pattering the -words like a mad-woman. ‘I must do it—I must do it—no sleep for me until -I do it. All, all, all—nothing hid. Things shall go as they must. But he -will never believe in me again—and oh! he will be right.’ - -The very next day she sent for the Earl of Bothwell, who was at -Hermitage; and, when it was time, awaited him in that shady garden of -the Chequer House—she alone in the mirk of evening. Whenas she heard -his quick tread upon the grass she shivered a little and drew her hood -close about her face; so that all he could see—and that darkly—was her -tall figure, the thin white wrist and the hand holding the hood about -her chin. Prepared for any flight of her mind, grown so much the less -ceremonious as he was the more familiar, he saluted her with exaggerated -courtliness; the plumes of his hat brushed the grass as he swept them -round him. She did not move or speak. He looked for her eyes, but could -not see them. - -‘Madam, I am here. Always, in all places, at the service of my Sovereign.’ - -‘Hush!’ she said: ‘not so loud. I have to speak with you upon an urgent -affair. I can hardly bring myself to do it—and yet—I must.’ - -‘Madam, I fear that you suffer. Why should you speak?’ - -‘Because I must. You called me your Sovereign.’ - -‘And so, madam, you are, and shall be.’ - -‘That is why I choose to speak.’ She took a long deep breath. ‘The King -has been here,’ she said; ‘has been here and is gone.’ - -He replied nothing, but watched her swaying outline. There would be more -to come. - -‘I had reason to fear what he might contrive against my peace—against my -crown, and my son. Many things I feared. He came here because I sent for -him. And I saw him.’ - -No help came from the watcher. Still he could not see her face, hard as -he might look for it. She drove herself to her work. - -‘He required of me certain assurances, otherwise, he said, he would leave -the kingdom. I dared not allow him to depart, for I knew that he would -work against me in England or oversea. Moreover, leaving me, his life -would be in instant danger. He did not know that; therefore what he -proposed was dangerous to himself and to me. Do you understand? I feared -that he would steal my son and take him to England.’ - -Bothwell said, ‘I understand your fears.’ - -‘Therefore,’ said she, ‘I urged him to remain. This he promised to do’—it -was fine to see how her voice grew clear to the attack—‘if I would yield -him that which I had purposed never to give him again. Do you understand -me now?’ She almost wailed the question. - -He hastened to help her. ‘Yes, yes, madam. I beg you to say no more.’ - -But she threw back her hood, and showed him her tense white face. ‘I -shall say all. No man shall hinder me. He had once betrayed me and held -me up to the scorn of all women, and I promised you it should never be -again. Yet it was—the realm, my son, were in danger—and—oh, sir, he has -betrayed me now beyond repair! He has had all of me, and now is gone -I know not where—proud of his lies, laughing at my folly.’ A terrible -shuddering beset her—terrible to hear. - -‘Oh, madam,’ said Lord Bothwell, ‘let him laugh while he can. What else -hath a fool but his laughter?’ - -She stretched out her hands wide, and he drew nearer. - -‘And for me, Bothwell? What is left for me?’ - -‘Madam,’ he said earnestly, ‘all is left. All which that blasphemer was -not fit to give, since he was not fit to receive. Worship is left you, -service of true men.’ - -She grew very serious. He could see her eyes now; all black. - -‘Not from you, Bothwell. Never more from you, since I have lied.’ - -He took a step forward. ‘More from me, madam (if you care to have it), -than perhaps is fitting from a subject; and yet less than perhaps may be -reasonable from a man.’ - -‘No, no,’—she shook her head,—‘I have lied. Not from you now.’ - -He laughed aloud. ‘Madam, beseech you see what I see. A noble lady, -justly enraged, who yet can stoop to comfort her subject—who can humble -herself to prove her kindness. Is that not worshipful? Is not that -serviceworthy? Oh, most glorious humility! Oh, proudest pride of all! -That Queen Mary should make confession to James Hepburn! Why, Heaven -above us, madam, for what do you take me: a block of stone—a wooden stub? -Madam, Mistress, Queen—I am beaten to your feet—I am water——’ He heard -her sob, saw that she had covered her face with her hands: he ran towards -her. God of Gods, what was this? ‘Have I offended your Majesty? Am I so -unhappy?’ - -She shook her head. ‘No, no, no! I cannot talk—but I am not wretched. I -am happy, I think—comforted.’ - -He considered her. He considered intently, every muscle at a stretch. -He bit his moustache, pressing it into his teeth with his fingers—moved -forward—stopped, like a hawk poised in mid-air: he nodded his head -savagely, came up to her, and with gentle firmness took her by the -wrists, drew her hands from her face. ‘Look now at me,’ he said. - -She did not struggle to be free, but kept her face averted, strongly bent -downward. - -‘Look you at me.’ - -She shook her head. He felt her tears fall hot on his hands. - -‘But now,’ he said, ‘you must do as I bid you.’ - -Slowly she lifted then her head and faced him, looking up. He saw the -glittering tears; an honest tenderness gave honesty to his words. ‘My -heart!’ he said, ‘my heart!’ and kissed her where she stood. - -Then he turned and left her alone; went by her into the thicket and -climbed the wall into the neighbouring garden. For a long time she -stayed, with her two hands clasped at her neck, where his had put -them—for a long time, wondering and trembling and blushing in the dark. - - - - -CHAPTER XII - -SCOTCHMEN’S BUSINESS - - -When the Earl of Bothwell took off his boots that same night, he said, as -he threw them to his man Paris, ‘In the morning we go to business.’ - -‘Ha, in a good hour!’ says Paris, a boot in each hand. ‘And to what -business will your lordship be pleased to go?’ - -‘Man’s business, you fool,’ says the Earl; ‘carving and clearing -business; road-making business.’ - -Paris swung a boot. ‘I consider that there is no gentleman in this -deplorable country so apt for that business,’ he said. ‘Do you ask me -why? I will tell your lordship very willingly. It is because there is no -other gentleman in this country at all.’ - -‘Apt or not,’ says Lord Bothwell, scratching in his beard, ‘it is myself -who will do it.’ He stared at the floor, laughed, caught the word on his -lips and kept it suspended while he considered. Then he added, ‘And I -signed the contract, and sealed it, but an hour ago.’ He threw himself -naked on his bed, and Paris covered him with his blankets. - -‘Happy dreams to your lordship, of the contract!’ - -‘Go to the devil,’ says my lord: ‘I’m asleep.’ And by the next moment he -was snoring. - -Paris sat upon the floor, with a guttering candle beside him, and made -notches on a tally-stick. He told them over on his fingers and got them -pat before he lay down. - -In the morning he sat upon the edge of his master’s bed—a familiarity -which had long been allowed him—produced his tally, and enlarged upon it. - -‘Master,’ he said, ‘for your purpose these persons are the best, as I -shall shortly rehearse to you. I have chosen each and every for some -quality which is pre-eminently useful, in which I believe him to be -singular. The first is Monsieur Ker of Fawdonsyde, who, it is true, is -at the moment in disgrace for his part in the Italian’s affair. That can -be got over, I think; and if so, well so. He has the strongest wrist in -this kingdom, next to your lordship’s, and will do for a spare string to -our bow: for I take it yourself will be our first—not likely to fail, I -grant; but one must always be prepared in these cases for a sudden jerk -aside. Monsieur de Fawdonsyde may be trusted to stop that. They tell me -also of him that he can see in the dark, and I can well believe it—a -yellow-eyed man! Nothing could be more useful to us; for somebody is sure -to blow the lights out, and in the ensuing scramble the wrong man might -be hurt, and some happy household plunged into grief. Next, I certainly -think that you should have home Monsieur Archibald. He—if he do no -more—will be a comfortable stalking-horse. He is kinsman—he was greatly -beloved by _our man_ in the old days; and could make himself loved again, -for he has a supple mind. (Not so, however, his cousin, Monsieur de -Morton. He is too stiff a hater for our purpose, and could not conceal -it even if he would.) Now, I will tell you one other reason in favour of -Monsieur Archibald. I never knew a gentleman of birth who could feel for -chain mail in a more natural and loving manner, except perhaps Milord -Ruthven, unhappily deceased. His son does not take after him. But I saw -Monsieur Archibald take the late David, when there was a thought of -going to work upon him, round by the middle, and try his back in every -part—just as though he loved the very feel of him. And yet the two were -enemies! And yet David suspected nothing! It could not have been better -done: so I sincerely advise you to have him. Monsieur d’Ormiston you -will of course take with you. He has ears like a hare’s, and so nice a -valuation of his own skin that you may be sure the roads will be open for -you when the affair is happily ended. But my next choice will astonish -you. Be prepared—listen, my lord. It is Monsieur de Lennox! What! you -cry—the father to put away the son! With great respect, I hold to my -opinion. I believe Monsieur de Lennox could be persuaded—and evidently -you could have no more valuable colleague—for two little reasons of -cogency. He is miserable in the ill-favour of our Queen, and he ardently -desires to stand well again with the English Queen. This, then, would -be his opportunity of gratifying both. And it is by no means outside -experience that a father should assist at his son’s demise. There was a -well-known case at Parma, when we were in Italy; and if the Queen-Mother -did not contrive the exit of the late King Francis, then Maître Ambroise -Paré is a fool, and not a fine surgeon. Why did she have the funeral -oration prepared a week before that King’s death? Ah, the thing is -evident! Both of these are Italians, you will say? I confess it. But if -King Philip of Spain hath not an eye of the same cast upon Monseigneur -Don Carlos I shall be surprised—and mark this: Monsieur de Lennox is a -hungry man, out of favour and out of money. His lady, who has the purse, -is in the Tower of London; he himself dare not leave Glasgow, where he -starves. Moreover, he has another son. Now——’ - -But here the Earl of Bothwell sat up in his bed. - -‘What are you talking about, you fool?’ he asked, gaping. - -‘I am discussing the making of your lordship’s road,’ says Paris, ‘of -which you did me the honour to speak overnight.’ - -His master gave him a clout on the head, which knocked him sideways to -the floor. ‘You soiled cut-purse!’ he roared at him, ‘you famous pirate, -you jack-for-the-string, what are you about? Do you think you are at sea, -that you can talk bloody designs to the open sky? Do you think us all -thieves on a galley, and the redding of a realm as easy as to club the -warder of a bench? Astounding fool! with your blustering and botching, -you’ll bring me to a wooden bolster one of these days.’ He leaped from -his bed, and put his foot on the man’s neck. ‘If I don’t make you swallow -your infamous tally, call me a dunce!’ - -Paris lay still, pale but serious. ‘It is difficult to discuss matters of -moment in this posture,’ he said; ‘but I can assure your lordship that I -have given a great deal of thought to your business.’ - -‘And who under Heaven asked you for thought?’ cried his master. ‘Or who -in Heaven gave you the wit for it? Get up, you monkey-man, and fetch me -my clothes. We don’t go to work that way in Scotland.’ - -‘I am conscious of it, master,’ said Paris, ‘and pity it is. There is -a saying in Italy, which dates from a very old case of our kind, _Cosa -fatta capo ha_: _a thing done_, say they, _is done with_. Now here, a -thing is so long a-contriving that it is in danger of not being done at -all. Love of Heaven, sir! for what would you wait? What can your lordship -want beside the bounden gratitude of the Qu——.’ He stopped, because the -Earl struck him on the mouth with the back of his hand. - -‘No names, you damned parrot!’ - -Paris, ashamed of himself, wiped his lips. ‘I admit the indiscretion, my -lord, and regret it. But my question was pertinent.’ - -‘It was cursed nonsense,’ said the Earl, ‘and as impertinent as yourself. -Suppose I took this road of yours—what would old Sourface be about? -Where would his prim eyes be? Looking through his fingers—seeing and not -seeing—for sure! Why, you toss-pot, we must have him roped and gagged, or -he’ll have us roped, I can tell you—and as high as Haman. Bah! you make -me ashamed that ever I held words with such a gull. Peace now, mind your -business, and get me my drink. I am going abroad—then to the Council.’ - - * * * * * - -The first person of consequence he accosted that day was the Lord of -Lethington. The Secretary went in desperate fear of him, as you could -have told by the start he gave when he felt the heavy hand clap his -shoulder. - -‘What scares you, man?’ The bluff voice was heard all over the -quadrangle, and many paused to see the play. ‘What scares you, man? You -watch me like a hare—and me your good friend and all!’ - -‘I hope to serve your good lordship,’ says Mr. Secretary, ‘in the service -that holds us both.’ - -‘Yes, yes, we had best work together. Now see here, man—come apart.’ He -took the unwilling arm, and bent towards the timorous ear. Men on the -watch saw the Secretary’s interest grow as he listened: in the midst of -their pacing he stopped of his own accord, and pulled up his companion. - -‘Yes, my good lord, I could do that. There would be no harm.’ - -‘Let my lord of Moray understand,’ continues Lord Bothwell, ‘that signed -words cannot say all that they import. That is reasonable. But such as -they are, such as they bear, he himself must sign with the rest of us. I -shall not act without him, nor can the Queen be served. Very well. Go to -him presently, taking with you my lord of Atholl. I seek first my lord -of Argyll, next my brother Huntly. We shall have the Earl of Crawfurd -with us, Mar I doubt not also; the Lords Seton, Livingstone, Fleming, -Herries——’ - -‘These for certain,’ says Lethington; then hesitated. - -‘Well, man? Out wi’t.’ - -‘There is just this. Your lordship knows my lord of Moray—a most politic -nobleman.’ - -‘Politic! A pest!’ - -‘He is ever chary of putting hand to paper. I know of one band, never -signed by him. He wrote a letter, by which all thought——But it purported -nothing. However, that is happily past.’ - -‘He signed away Davy,’ says Bothwell very calmly. - -The Secretary turned quickly. ‘No, my lord, no! Upon my oath he never -did. Nothing would make him.’ - -Bothwell considered his twitching brows. ‘He signed the letter which you -now have, Lethington. By that you hold him, cunning rogue though he be. -Now, take me this way. If he signs not to me before the Council, to the -effect that what I sign there he signs also, I move no further.’ - -‘Your lordship will be wise. But——Oh, his fingers are stiff at the pen!’ - -‘Master Cecil in England can make them supple,’ says Bothwell, ‘working -at them through the palm. And so can you, my friend, if I make you.’ - -Mr. Secretary closed his eyes. - -‘You hold his letter,’ Bothwell went on, ‘wherein he implicates himself -in Davy’s killing. Now, if I go to him with the news?’ - -‘Ha, my lord! But he knows very well that I have it.’ - -‘Of course he knows. But the Queen does not know it.[5] Now, if I -tell him that you will use the letter against him with the Queen, Mr. -Secretary, you will be hanged.’ - -The Secretary flinched. ‘My lord,’ he said, ‘what is it that you want -from me?’ - -‘Your master’s sign-manual, hireling,’ says Bothwell. ‘Go and get it.’ - -He left him to scheme it out, of all wretches in Scotland at that hour -the one I could pity the most. Lethington was a man who saw every head an -empty pot compared with his own; and yet, by mere pusillanimity, he had -to empty himself to fill them. He was a coward, must have countenance if -he were to have courage. With a brain like his, a man might lord it over -half Europe; yet the water in his heart made him bond-slave of every old -Scots thief in turn. The only two he dared to best and betray were——Well! -we shall have to see him do it soon enough. And yet, I say, pity Mr. -Secretary! - -The Earl of Atholl, kindly, dull man, who was his friend through all, -went with him now to beard the Bastard of Scotland. Bolt upright in his -elbow-chair, his Bible on one hand, his sword and gloves on the other, my -lord of Moray listened to what was said without movement. His face was a -mask, his hands placid, his eyes fixed on the standish. Atholl talked, -Lethington talked, but not a word was said of Bothwell so long as the -first of these two was in the room. The moment he was out of it, the -question came sharp and short. - -‘Who stands in the dark of this, Lethington? Who is at your back?’ - -Lethington never lied to his master. ‘My lord, it was the Earl of -Bothwell came suddenly upon me this morning.’ - -‘You surprise me, sir. I had not thought you shared confidences with that -lord.’ - -‘Nor have I ever, my lord,’ says Lethington, with much truth; ‘nor did I -to-day. Such confidence as there was came from him.’ - -‘Did he confide in you indeed? And what had he for your ear?’ - -The Secretary narrowed his eyes. ‘Matters, my lord, of such intimacy that -I still marvel how they came to his knowledge.’ - -‘I do not share your wonder. He is greatly trusted by the Queen.’ - -‘True, my lord. But such things as he knoweth are not, as I conjecture, -fully known to her Majesty.’ - -Now it was that the Earl of Moray looked solemnly at his servant. ‘You -shall name these things to me, Lethington, if you please.’ - -‘He knoweth, my lord, for certain, the names of all who were privy to the -bond for Davy’s slaughter.’ - -‘Why, yes, yes,’ says Lord Moray, ‘no doubt but he does. For all of them -were confessed to by the King, who, indeed, showed her Majesty the bond.’ - -Mr. Secretary looked out of window. ‘I said, All who were privy, my lord. -I did not refer to the bond. He knows more than is known to her Majesty; -but considers now what may be his duty in her regard.’ - -My Lord Moray blinked like an owl that fears the light. He looked at his -hands, sighed, cleared his brow of seams. ‘It would be well that I should -confer with his lordship upon that matter, before the Council sits,’ -he said. ‘Pray you, ask him to favour me at his leisure—at his perfect -leisure, Lethington. And when he is here—if he thinks well to come—it -would be convenient that yourself were by, in case of need. The matter -is a high one, and we may be thankful of your experience. God speed you, -Lethington. God speed you well!’ - -Conference there then was between two acute intellects, which it would -be profitable to report, if one could translate it. But, where, in a -conversation, every other word is left out, the record must needs be -tedious. The Queen was not once mentioned, nor the King neither. The Earl -of Bothwell gave no hint that he knew his fellow-councillor dipped deep -in murder; the Earl of Moray did not let it appear that he knew the other -stripping for the same red bath. Each understood each; each was necessary -to the other; each knew how far he could go with his ally, and where -their roads must fork; above all, both were statesmen in conference, -to whom decency of debate was a tradition. Naming no names, fixing no -prices, they haggled, nevertheless, as acutely as old wives on the -quayside; and Mr. Secretary, nimble between them, reduced into writing -the incomprehensible. Thus it was that the Earl of Bothwell promised -under his hand to be the friend of the Earl of Moray, ‘so far as lay -within the Queen’s obedience’; the Earl of Moray signified by the same -tokens that he would attend the Council and further the Queen’s service -in the matters to be moved by the Earl of Bothwell, ‘so far as lay within -the province of a Christian.’ Then Lord Bothwell, apparently satisfied, -went away to his friend and brother-in-law, my Lord Huntly. - - * * * * * - -To the Council—it was the seventh of October—came the lords: the Queen -not present. It was a short and curious convocation, as silent as that -of Hamlet’s politic worms, busy upon the affairs of Polonius. The Earl -of Huntly, as Chancellor, produced a parchment writing, which was held -up, but not read. ‘My lords,’ he said, ‘you shall see in the act of my -hand at the pen a service tendered to our sovereign lady, the which, -seeing you are acquainted with its nature, I do not discuss with your -lordships. Active service of the prince, my lords, may be of two kinds: -open movement against enemies avowed, and secret defence against a -masked, ambushed enemy.’ He signed the writing, and passed to the Earl -of Moray. This one looked at it, read it through twice; took a pen, -inspected the point, dipped; detected a hair in the quill, removed it, -wiped his fingers, dipped again—and signed, ‘James.’ The parchment then -went briskly about. Last to sign it, far below the others, was the Lord -of Lethington. - -And what was in this famous bond? The Master of Sempill, eager for news, -got wind of it, and enshrined it in his Diurnall. He has— - - _October the 9._—At a council two days since—the Q—— not - present, but the Earl of Both. returned from the country—I hear - from my wife, who had it from her father (there present), there - was a band passed round the board, read silently and signed by - each lord present. _Its terms_: That the Q—— only should be - obeyed as natural sovereign, and the authority of her dearest - consort, and of all others whomsoever, of no force without her - pleasure first known. The Lords Both., Hun(tley), Mor(ay), - Arg(yll), Atholl, and the Secretary signed this, among others. - My father _not_ present. Thus goeth a King out of Scotland. - _Mem._ Great news for my lord of Mort(on) here.... - - The Q. will go to Jedburgh, I hear, to a Justice Court; my - wife with her. She took leave of the lord of Bothw. after the - Council. A long time together.... - -The Master was out in his dates. The very night after the Council Lord -Bothwell rode fast into Liddesdale; and next day the Queen, with her -brothers, Lord Huntly, and the Court, went over the hills to Jedburgh. -The King was believed to be in the West with his father, but no one knew -for certain where he was. - -[5] My lord was wrong there. She knew it perfectly well. - - -END OF MEN’S BUSINESS - - - - -BOOK THE THIRD - -MARKET OF WOMEN - - - - -CHAPTER I - -STORMY OPENING - - -It is rather better than five years since you first met with Des-Essars -in the sunny garden at Nancy, and as yet I have but dipped into the -curious little furtive book which, for my own part, although its -authenticity has been disputed, I attribute to him without hesitation—_Le -Secret des Secrets_, as it is called. For such neglect as this may -be I have the first-rate excuse that it contains nothing to what has -been my purpose; all that there is of it, prior to the October 1566 -where now we are, seeming to have been added by way of prologue to the -Revealed Mysteries he thought himself inspired to declare. Probably, no -secrets had, so far, come in his way, or none worth speaking of. ‘Boys’ -secrets,’ as he says somewhere, ‘are truly but a mode of communicating -news, which when it is particularly urgent to be spread, is called _a -secret_. The term ensures that it will be listened to with attention -and repeated instantly.’ You may gather, therefore, that _Le Secret des -Secrets_ was not of this order, more especially since he tells us himself -that it would never have been imparted at all but for the Queen’s, his -mistress’s, danger. Plainly, then, he compiled his book in Queen Mary’s -extreme hour of need, when her neck was beneath her ‘good Sister’s’ -heel—and only in the hope of withdrawing it. Those were hasty times for -all who loved the poor lady; the _Secret des Secrets_ bears signs of -haste. Its author scamped his prologue, took his title for granted, and -plunged off into the turmoil of his matter like the swimmer who goes to -save life. But you and I, who know something about him by this time, have -intelligence enough to determine whether he was worthy, or likely to be -judged worthy, of the keeping of a Queen’s heart. So much only I have -thought fit to declare concerning the origin of a curious little book: -for curious it is, partly in the facts it contains, and even more in the -facts it seems to search for—facts of mental process, as I may call them. - -He begins in this manner:— - -‘About ten of the clock on the night of the 6th-7th October’—that is, -the reader sees, on the night when Bothwell kissed her in the Chequer -Garden—‘the Queen’s Majesty, who had been supposed alone, meditating -in the garden, came stilly into the house, passed the hall, up the -stair, and through the anteroom where I, Mr. Erskine, Mistress Seton and -Mistress Fleming were playing at trumps; and on to her cabinet without -word said by any one of us. We stood up as she came in, but none spake, -for her looks and motions forbade it. She walked evenly and quickly, -in a rapt state of the soul, her head bent and hands clasped together -under her chin, just as a priest will go, carrying the Sacrament to the -bedridden or dying. But presently, after she was gone, Mistress Fleming -went to see whether she had need of anything; and returned, saying that -her Majesty had been made ready for bed and lain down in it, without -word, without prayers. Shortly afterwards the ladies went to their beds, -and I sat alone in the antechamber on my duty of the night; and so -sitting fell asleep with my face in my arm. - -‘I suppose that it was midnight or thereabout when I was awakened by a -touch on my head, and starting up, saw the Queen in her bedgown, her -hair all loose about her, standing above me. Being unable to sleep, she -said, she desired company. I asked her, should I read, sing, or tell her -a tale? But she, still smiling, being, as I thought, in a rapt condition -of trance, shook her head. “If you were to read I should not listen, -if you were to sing the household would wake. Stay as you are,” said -she, and began to walk about the chamber and to speak of a variety of -matters, but not at all connectedly. I replied as best I was able, which -was heavily and without wit—for I had been sound asleep a few moments -before. Something was presently said of my lord of Bothwell: I think that -she led the talk towards him. I said, I marvelled he should stay so long -in Liddesdale, with the Court here in town. She stopped her pacing and -crossed her arms at her neck, as I had seen her do when she came in from -the garden. Looking closely and strangely at me, she said, “He is not in -Liddesdale. He is here. I have seen him this night.” Then, as I wondered, -she sat down by the table, her face shaded from the candle by her hand, -and regarded me for some time without speaking. - -‘She then said that, although it might seem very extraordinary to me, -she had good reason for what she was about to do; that for the present -I must believe that, and be sure that she would not impart to me her -greatest secret had she not proved me worthy of the trust. She then told -me, without any more preface, that she should be called the happiest of -women, in that, being beloved, she loved truly again. She said that she -had been consecrated a lover that very night by a pledge not only sweet -in itself, but sweet as the assurance of all sweetness. She touched her -mouth; and “Yes,” she said, “all unworthy as I am, this great treasure -hath been bestowed into my keeping. See henceforward in me, most -faithful, proved friend, not your mistress so much as your sister, a -servant even as you are, devoted to the greatest service a woman can take -upon her—subjection, namely, to Love, that _puissant and terrible lord_.” - -‘While I wondered still more greatly, she grew largely eloquent. Her -soul, she said, was in two certain hands “like a caught bird”; but -such bondage was true freedom to the generous heart, being liberty to -give. She owned that she was telling me things known to no others but -herself and her beloved. “I am your sister and fellow-servant,” said -she, “whispering secrets in the dark. Marvel not at it; for women are so -made that if they cannot confide in one or another they must die of the -burning knowledge they have; and I, alas, am so placed that, with women -all about me, and loving women, there is none, no, not one, in whom I can -trust.” - -‘I knew already who her lover was, and could not but agree with her in -what she had to admit of her women. One and all they were against my lord -of Bothwell. Mistress Livingstone hated him so vehemently she could not -trust herself near him; Mistress Fleming was at the discretion of Mr. -Secretary Lethington, a declared enemy of his lordship’s; Mistress Beaton -was wife to a man who did not deny that he was still the servant of Lady -Bothwell; in Mistress Seton my mistress never had confided. So she had -some reasons for what she was pleased to do—another being that I, of all -her servants, had been most familiar with his lordship—and I was certain -that she had others, not yet declared. Indeed, she hinted as much when -she said that she had proved me upon a late occasion, that she loved me, -and knew of my love for her. “In time to come,” said she—“I cannot tell -how soon or in what sort, such matters being out of my hands—I may have -to ask you other service than this of listening to my confidence; I may -require of you to dare great deeds, and to do them. If you will be my -sworn brother, I shall see in you my champion-at-need, and be the happier -for the knowledge. What say you, then, Baptist?” she asked me. - -‘Kneeling before her, I promised that I would keep her secret and do all -her pleasure. I watched her throughout. She was quite composed, entirely -serious, did not seem to imagine that she was playing a love-sick -game—and was not, altogether. I am sure of that, watching her as I did. -She made me lift my right hand up, and stooped forward and kissed the -open palm before she went away. Here is the beginning of Mysteries, which -I, unworthy servant, was privileged to share.’ - -I am not, myself, prepared to say that there is more mystery in this than -the young man put into the telling of it. She trusted the youth, required -an outlet, and made, in the circumstances, the wisest choice. - - * * * * * - -Two days after the performance, at any rate, she set out for Jedburgh, -as you know, in a fine bold humour and with a fine company. She went -in state and wore her state manners; rode for the most part between her -brother Moray and the Earl of Huntly, seemed to avoid her women, and had -little to say to them when of necessity they were with her. She did her -bravest to be discreet, and there is no reason to suppose that anybody -about her had more than an inkling of the true state of her heart. Lord -Bothwell’s leave-taking had been done in public the day before, and -gallantly done. He had been at the pains to tell her that he was going to -his wife, she to smile as she commended him for his honest errand. She -had given him her hand and wished him well, and had not even followed -him with her looks to the door. The Earl of Moray, not an observant man -by nature, suspected nothing; what Lord Huntly may have guessed he kept -to himself. This poor speechless, enamoured nobleman! his trouble was -that he kept everything to himself and congested his heart as well as -his head-piece. So much so that the Queen once confessed to Adam Gordon, -his brother, that she had ‘forgotten he was a lover of hers’! She spent -the first night out at Borthwick, and next morning rode on to Jedburgh -in madcap spirits—which were destined to be rudely checked by what she -met there. A slap in the face, sharp enough to stop the breath, it was: -news with which the town was humming. It seemed that the Earl of Bothwell -had fought in the hills with Elliot of Park, had slain his man, and been -slain of him. - -My Lord Moray was the first to bear her this tale; and when he told -it—just as nakedly as I have put it up there—she turned upon him a tense, -malignant face, and said that he lied. ‘Madam, I grieve,’ says he—‘my -lord of Bothwell lies dead in Liddesdale.’ ‘O liar, you lie!’ she said, -‘or God lives not and reigns.’ Many persons heard her, and saw the proud -man flinch; and then Des-Essars, young Gordon, and Lethington all broke -into the room together, each with his version gathered out of gossip. My -lord was not killed, as had been feared at first, but sorely wounded, -lying at Hermitage, three doctors about him, and despaired of. ‘One -doctor! one doctor!’ cried Adam, correcting Lethington. - -‘I waited by him,’ says Des-Essars, ‘and then, while she looked wildly -from one face to another, I said that it was true there was but one -doctor, and that the case was none so desperate. She flew at me. “How do -you know this? How do you know it?” I replied that I had just got the -tale from French Paris. I think she would have fallen if I had not put -my hands out, which made her draw back in time. “French Paris!” cried -she; “why, then, my lord has sent word. Fly, fly, fly, Baptist: bring him -to me.” This I did, to the great discomfiture of one, at least, in her -company.’ - -Thus Des-Essars turns his honours to account. - -She saw the valet alone, and sent him away with his pockets lined: -afterwards her spirits rose so high that had Moray noticed nothing he -must have been the most careless of men. She made inordinately much of -Des-Essars, fondling him in all men’s sight; she gave him a gold chain to -hang round his neck, and said, in her brother’s presence, that she would -belt him an earl when he was older; ‘for thus should the prince reward -faithful service and the spoken truth.’ He affected not to have heard -her—but it was idle to talk of secrets after that. Here was a rent in the -bag big enough for the cat’s head. - -And it would appear that she herself was aware of it, for after a couple -of days, just enough time for the necessary ceremonial business of her -coming, she gave out publicly her intention to ride into Liddesdale, -and her pleasure that Moray, Huntly, and the Secretary should accompany -her. Others would she none, save grooms and a few archers. My Lord Moray -bowed his head in sign of obedience, but spoke his thoughts to no man. -He kept himself aloof from the Court as much as he could, in a house of -his own, received his suitors and friends there at all hours, maintained -considerable state—more grooms at his doors than at the Queen’s. Some -thought he was entrenching himself against the day when his place might -be required of him; some thought that day not far off. All were baffled -by the Queen’s choice of him and his acquiescence. - -Betimes in a morning which broke with gales and wild fits of weeping -from the sky, she set out, going by Bedrule, Hobkirk, and the shoulder -of Windburgh Hill. Nothing recked she, singing her snatches of French -songs, whether it blew or rained; and the weather had so little mercy on -her that she was wetted through before she had won to Stitchell—the most -southerly spur of a great clump of land from which, on a fair day, you -can look down upon all Liddesdale and the Vale of Hermitage. There, on -that windy edge, in a driving rain which blew her hair to cling about and -sheathe her face like jagged bronze, she stayed, and peered down through -the mist to see her trysting-place. But a dense shower blotted out the -valleys; and the castle of the Hermitage lies low, scowling in shade be -the sun never so high. Undaunted still, although she saw nothing but the -storm drowning the lowlands, it added to her zest that what she sought -so ardently lay down there in mystery. Singing, shaking her head—all her -colours up for this day of hide-and-seek—fine carmine, gleaming nut-brown -eyes, scarlet lips parted to show her white teeth—she looked a bacchante -drunk upon fierce draughts of weather, a creature of the secret places of -the earth, stung by some sly god. The bit in her teeth, fretting, shaking -her head—who now should rein her up? Two out of the three men with her -watched her closely as she stood on Stitchell, resolving this doubt; the -third, who was Huntly, would not look at her. Primly pried my lord of -Moray out of the corners of his eyes, and pursed his lips and ruled his -back more than common stiff. But gloomily looked Mr. Secretary, as he -chewed a sour root: he felt himself too old for such a headlong service -as hers must be, and too weary of schemes to work with Moray against -her. Yet he must choose—he knew it well. Finely he could read within the -chill outlines of that Master of his destiny all the sombre exhilaration -which he was so careful to hide. ‘He hath set his lures, this dark -fowler; he hath his hand upon the cords. The silly partridge wantons in -the furrow: nearly he hath his great desire. But what to me are he and -his desires, O my God, what are they to me?’ He thought of Mary Fleming -now at her prayers, thanking her Saviour for the glory of his love. His -love—Lethington’s love! Lord, Lord, if he dared to mingle in so fragrant -a pasture as hers, what should he do raking in the midden with an Earl of -Moray? Overdriven, fragile, self-wounding wretch—pity this Lethington. - -It is true that Lord Moray saw the partridge in the shadow of the net; it -is true that he was elated in his decent Scots way; but you would have -needed the trained eyesight of Lethington to detect the quiver of the -nerves. The Queen broke in upon all reflections, coming towards them at a -canter: ‘Set on, sirs, set on! The hours grow late, and we cannot see our -haven. Come with me, brother; come, my Lord Huntly.’ Down into the racing -mists they went, squelching through quag and moss. - -Hermitage made the best show it could in the Sovereign’s honour. Every -horse in the country was saddled and manned by some shag-haired Hepburn -or another. Where Hermitage Water joins Liddel they met her in a troop, -which broke at her advance and lined the way. - -No pleasant sight, this, for my lord of Moray. ‘The Hepburns!’ cried he, -when he saw them. ‘Caution, madam, caution here. What and if they compass -a treachery?’ - -‘La-la-la,’ says the Queen. ‘Methinks, I should know a traitor when I see -him. Come, my lord, come with me.’ But when he would not, she struck her -horse on the flank, and Huntly spurred to follow her close. Cantering -freely into the midst, she held out her hand, saying, ‘Sirs, you are well -met. Am I well come?’ - -They closed about her, howling their loyalty, and some leaned over the -saddle-peak to catch at her skirt to kiss it. She made them free of her -hand, let them jostle and mumble over that; they fought each other for -a touch of it, struck out at horses’ heads to fend them off while they -spurred on their own; they battled, cursed, and howled—for all the world -like schoolboys at a cake. To Moray’s eyes she was lost, swallowed up in -this horde of cattle-thieves; for he saw the whole party now in motion, -jingling and bickering into the white mist. He lifted up a protestant -hand. ‘Oh, Mr. Secretar, oh, sir, what cantrips are these?’ - -‘She is the Scythian Diana,’ says Lethington, grinning awry, ‘and these -are her true believers. We are dullards not to have known it.’ - -‘She is Diana of the Ephesians, I largely gather,’ his master replied. -‘Come, come, we must follow to the end.’ For his own part, he judged the -end not far. - - * * * * * - -Her dripping skirts so clung about her—to say nothing that she was rigid -with stiffness and shot all over with rheumatic pains—she had to be -helped from the saddle and supported by force into the house. A bound -victim of love, tied by the knees! upon Huntly’s arm and Ormiston’s -she shuffled into the hall, and stood in the midst, boldly claiming -hospitable entreaty. It was sorry to see her eager spirit hobbled to -a body so numbed. As from the trap some bright-eyed creature of the -wood looks out, so she, swaying there on two men’s arms, testified her -incurable hope by colour and quick breath. But calm and cold, as the moon -that rides above a winter night, stood the Countess of Bothwell with her -women, and stately curtsied. - -The Queen laughed as she swayed. ‘I am a mermaid, my child,’ says she, -‘sadly encumbered by my weeds. I have lost my golden comb, and my -witching song is gone in a croak. You need not fear to take me in.’ - -The young Countess said, ‘Suffer me conduct your Majesty to the chambers. -All the household stuff is at your service.’ - -She shook her head. ‘Witchcraft may come back with comfort! No, no, my -dear, I will not plunder you. I shall do very well as I am.’ Madness! She -was on pin-points till she saw her lover; but it was not that which made -her refuse warmth and dry clothes. It was a word of her own, which had -turned aside as she used it and given her a stab. Would she not ‘plunder’ -this lady, good lack? She had a scruple, you perceive. - -Tongue-tied Huntly was in great distress. ‘I would heartily urge you, -madam——’ and so forth; and his sister made the cold addition that all was -prepared. - -The Queen was now trembling. ‘You are kind—but I have no need. I am -very well, and cannot stay long. Let me fulfil my errand—see my wounded -councillor—and depart. Come, take me to him now. Will you do me this -kindness?’ She spoke like a child, with eagerness too simple to be -indecent. - -‘I will prepare my lord, madam, for the high honour you propose him,’ -says the Countess, after a moment’s pause. - -‘Yes, yes—go now.’ - -She went to the fire and held her shaking hands towards it. Do what she -could, there was no staying the shivering-fits, nor the clouds of steam -that came from her, nor the ring of water round her skirts. - -Huntly was miserable. ‘I beseech you, I beseech you, madam, dry yourself. -This is——Oh, but you run into grave peril. I would that I could make you -believe that all this house is yours, and all hearts in it——’ - -‘All hearts—all hearts—it may be,’ she said with a break in her voice; -‘but some there are here with no hearts. Ah, what heart is in a body that -would not find some pity for me?’ - -He was dreadfully moved, leaned ardently towards her. ‘Madam! madam! You -know my heart—I have never hid it from you. You talk of pity. Why, is not -the piteous heart acquaint with pitifulness? Ah, then pity me! Let me -serve you.’ - -Then her ague ceased, and she looked at him full, with brimming eyes. -‘Take me up to him, Huntly. I cannot bear myself.’ - -The fine colour flushed him. ‘Come, madam; I will take you.’ - -She followed him up the stair—and the Earl of Moray’s eyes followed her. - - * * * * * - -Here is one difference between imagination and fancy, that the first will -leap full-fledged into the life of the upper air from the egg of its -beginning, while the second crouches long callow in the nest, and must -be fostered into plumage before it can take its pretty flights. Here, of -these two who had been separate for a week, she had flown far beyond the -man’s wayfaring, and stood upon a height which he could scarcely hope -to see. To keep touch with her might call for all his wit. For what had -actually passed between them but a couple of snatched kisses in the dark? -No more, upon his honour, to his sense. For though he had built upon them -a fine castle—with the bricks of Spain—he would have been the first to -own himself a fool for so doing. But she! Not only had she reared a fair -solid house of chambers and courts, but she had lived with him in it, a -secret life. Here she had had him safe since the hour he left her in the -garden. In her thought he was bound to her, she to him, by sacraments; -they were, like all lovers, of eternal eld. No beginning and no end will -love own up to. It is necessary to remember this. - -Therefore, while he made an effort to get up from the bed on which he -lay strapped, she had prevented him by running forward and kneeling -lover-wise by his side. As she had hoped, she was now lower than he, -nearer the floor; thence she had looked searchingly in his face, but said -nothing, too full of love, too bashful to begin. The Countess stood at -the bed-head, her brother Huntly drooped at the foot. The Queen had no -eyes for them. - -‘Speak to me of your welfare—assure me. I have been in great grief.’ - -To this he could only stammer some words of thanks, not perceiving yet by -any means on what side to take her. But she would have none of his thanks. - -‘You must speak to me, for I have dreamed deeply of this hour. Ah, how -they have stricken you!’ She touched his bandages, lingering about that -one upon his head as if she could not leave it alone. ‘Oh, curious knife, -to search so deep! Oh, greedy Park, to take so much! But I think I should -have taken more—had I been wiser.’ - -‘Rise, madam, rise,’ he said, ‘or I must rise. I may not see you -kneeling.’ - -She laughed. ‘I shall tell you my wicked thought when I knew that I -should see you lying here,’ she said, ‘and then you will not grudge me my -knees. No, but you shall shrive me again as once before you did—if you -are merciful to poor women.’ - -As it was evident that she disregarded and would disregard any company in -the room, Huntly began to speak, with a good deal of dignity. ‘Madam, by -your leave——’ - -She looked about, and saw him ready to quit her. ‘Yes, yes,’ she said, -‘do what you will’; and turned to her absorbing service. - -‘Come, sister,’ says Huntly, and beckoned out the Countess, who swiftly -followed him. He shut the chamber door. - -The Countess had great self-command. ‘Will you tell me what this means, -Huntly?’ - -He looked at her, knitting his black brows. ‘I think you know very well, -sister.’ - -As she was walking away from him to her own chamber, he called her back. -She had her hand on the latch. ‘Well?’ she said, ‘what more?’ - -‘This much,’ said he. ‘You see how it is now with those two. What you -purpose to do in the likely flow of affairs I know not; but I know my -own part. I cannot forget that I stand debtor to her for my honour, my -mere life, and all my hope in the world. She has suffered, been very -friendless, forsaken oft, betrayed on all hands—mine among them. She may -suffer yet more; but not again by me, nor I hope by any of my kin. She -will be forsaken again; but I will never forsake her now. She will need -friends in time to come: well, she may reckon upon one. Long ago I prayed -her to trust Gordon, and at the time she had little cause to do it. Now -you shall see her answer my desire—and not in vain. So much, for all that -she hath forgiven in me, and for all that she hath redeemed for me—so -much, I tell you, I owe her.’ - -The Countess returned his gaze with no less steadfastness, from under -brows no less serried. ‘And I,’ she said, ‘a Gordon as much as you are, -do owe her more than you choose to acknowledge for your part.’ - -She went into her chamber; but Huntly remained in the gallery outside the -shut doors. - - - - -CHAPTER II - -THE BRAINSICK SONATA - - -Asked afterwards by his brother-in-law Argyll how he had survived that -long battle homewards through the howling dark, the Earl of Moray, citing -scripture, had replied, _Except the Lord had been on our side_—! How far -he strained the text, or how far hoped of it, he did not choose to say, -but in his private mind he thought he saw all the fruit ready to fall -to his hand whenever he should hold it out. No need to shake the tree. -The Queen’s white palfrey made a false step and went girth-deep into the -moss. None could see her, for she had spurred on alone into the jaws of -the weather, feeling already (it may be) the fret of the fever in her -bones which afterwards overcame her; nor could any hear her, for she let -no cry. And when the horse, struggling desperately, hinnied his alarms, -it had not been Lord Moray who had hastened to save. Huntly, rather, -it was who, shrieking her name into the wind, caught at last the faint -echo of her voice, and plunged into the clinging, spongy mess to her -rescue. Alas, then, was she mad? or drunk with love? ‘Here I am, Mary of -Scotland, clogged and trammelled, like a bird in a net.’ And then, O Lord -of Life! she had laughed snugly and stroked herself—there in the gulf -of death. Huntly, a man for omens, dated all misery to come from this -staring moment. - -After it he would not let go of her rein for the rest of the ride, but -braved (as never before) her coaxing, irony, rage—lastly her tears of -mortification. Longing to be alone with her lover, hating the very -shadow of any other man, she was scathing and unworthy. ‘If Bothwell were -here you would not dare what now you do. You hold me because there is no -man to stop you. It is a brave show you make of me here! Well, take your -joy of numb flesh—how are you likely to be served with it quick?’ and -so on mercilessly. Towards the end of an intolerable journey she became -drowsy through fatigue, and rather light-headed. The honest gentleman -put his arm round her and induced her head to his shoulder. She yawned -incessantly, her wits wandered; she spoke to him as if he were Bothwell, -and set his cheeks burning. For a few minutes at a time, now and again, -she slept, while he supported her as best he could, all his reverent love -for the exquisite, flashing, crowned creature of his memories swallowed -up now in pity for the draggled huntress in her need. - -She was too tired to sleep when, late at night, they had laid her abed. -She tossed, threw her head and arms about, was hot, was cold, shivered, -sweated, wailed to herself, chattered, sang, whined nonsense. At first -the women, having her to themselves, learned all that she had been -careful to hide from them; all that Huntly had shut within the chamber -door at Hermitage was enacted before them—or a kind of limping, tragic -travesty of it. So then they grew frightened, and lost their heads: Mary -Livingstone sent after Lord Moray; Mary Fleming called in Lethington; -Mary Seton, with presence of mind, fetched Des-Essars. Before a keen -audience, then, she harped monotonously and grotesquely upon the day’s -doings. She read scraps of her poems to Bothwell—and few had known that -she had writ any! She wooed him to stoop down his head, wreathed her -arms about a phantom of him, tortured and reproached herself. All was -done with that straining effort to rehearse which never fails in sickbed -delirium. - -‘Ah, wait—wait before you judge me, my lord. I have a better piece -yet—with more of my heart’s blood in the words. Now, now, how does it -go?’ She began to cry and wring her hands. ‘Oh, give me my coffer before -he leaves me! This one piece he must have. I wept when I wrote it—let -him see the stain.’ She was running still upon her poems. Fleming was to -give her the little coffer, of which the key was always round her neck. - -Lord Moray was earnest that it should be given her, but would not let it -be seen how earnest. ‘Maybe it will soothe her to have the coffer. Give -it her, mistress,’ he said. - -Des-Essars, seeing his drift, was against it, but of course could do -nothing. - -They gave the box into her wandering hands, and she was quiet for a -while, nursing it in her arms; neither seeking to open it nor trying her -memory without it. It was to be hoped, even now, that she would betray -herself no further. - -What need to deny that Lord Moray was curious? He shook with curiosity. -The thing was of the utmost moment; and it commands my admiration of -this patient man to know that he could be patient still, and sit by his -sick sister’s bed, his head on his hand—and all his hopes and schemes -trembling to be confirmed by a little gimcrack gilt box. The prize he -fought for he got—betraying nothing, he heard her betray all. When the -madness wrought in her again, she opened the coffer, and began to patter -her verses as she hunted in it, turning paper after paper (every scrap -her condemnation), incapable of reading any. - -Her mind seemed full of words. They came over her in clouds, flocking -about her—clambering, winged creatures, like the pigeons which crowd and -flicker round one who calls them down. They formed themselves in phrases, -in staves, in verses—laboriously drilled to them, no doubt—once coherent, -but now torn from their sequence, and, like sections of a broken -battle-line, absolutely, not relatively whole. Simple verse it was, -untrained, ill-measured; yet with a hurt note in it, a cry, a whimper -of love, infinitely touching to read now—but to have heard it then from -the dry lips, to have had it come moaning from the blind, breathless, -insatiable girl! Des-Essars says that he could scarcely endure it. - -‘Las!’ one snatch began— - - Las! n’est-il pas ja en possession - Du corps, du cœur qui ne refuse paine, - Ny dishonneur, en la vie incertaine, - Offense de parents, ni pire affliction? - -What a hearing for my Lord Moray! And again she broke out falteringly— - - Entre ses mains et en son plein pouvoir - Je metz mon filz, mon honneur et ma vie, - Mon pais, mes subjects, mon âme assubjectie - Est tout à luy, et n’ay autre vaulloir - Pour mon object que sans le decevoir - Suivre je veux malgré toute l’envoie - Qu’issir en peult.... - -Her voice broke here, and with it the thread: she could not continue, but -looked from one to another, tears streaming down her cheeks, nodded her -head at them, and ‘You know, you know,’ she whimpered, ‘this is the very -truth.’ Alas! they could not doubt it. - -And then, suddenly, as it were at the parting of a cloud, her soul looked -out of her eyes sanely; she came to herself, saw the disturbed faces of -her friends, and caught sight of her brother’s among them. She jumped -about as quickly as a caught child, and that lightning, sentinel wit of -hers sprang upon guard. But for a moment—when she saw Moray there—she -betrayed herself. ‘Oh, brother, you startled me!’ she said. - -He was careful. ‘Alas! I find you in grief, madam.’ - -‘Thoughts, brother, thoughts!’ - -‘Sad thoughts, I fear, madam. We are concerned to find your Majesty so -disturbed.’ - -She eyed him vaguely, being unable just then to realise how completely -she had yielded him her secret. Extreme fatigue swam over her; her head -nodded even as she watched him. When Mary Livingstone laid her down -gently and stroked her hair back she drowsed into a swooning sleep. Over -her unconscious form a hasty little drama was enacting, very curious. - -The Earl of Moray, seeing her hold relaxed, rose quietly from his chair -and stretched one of his hands towards the gilt coffer. Des-Essars, in a -flash of thought, nudged Huntly. ‘Quick,’ he whispered—‘take the coffer’; -and Huntly whipped his arm out and reached it first. Moray drew back, as -a cat his paw from a wetness, and shuddered slightly. Huntly says, in a -low voice: ‘Monsieur Des-Essars, I give this casket in your charge until -her Majesty shall give direction. It is open. Come with me and I will -seal it.’ - -Moray was not the man to forgive such a thing in the Queen’s page; nor -did he ever. - - * * * * * - -She was awake and fully conscious for a few hours of the next day. -Father Lesley, an old friend, was allowed to see her, and needed not the -evidence of physic, ticks of the pulse, heat of the blood: he could use -his senses. - -He warned her of her extremity. This was a grave matter, graver than -she might suppose. Her eyes turned upon him, black and serious; but -then, after a little, she smiled up saucily in his face. ‘Why, I hope,’ -she said, ‘there is no need to fear death—if death it be. I am sure my -friends will plead kindly for me, and as for my enemies, what can they -say worse than they have said?’ - -‘The Christian, ma’am,’ says Lesley, ‘has no concern with friend or foe -at such a time. The road he must travel, he will have no arm to bear -upon, save the proffered arm of the Cross.’ - -‘True,’ she said. ‘I hope I shall die a Christian, as I have tried to -live.’ - -Her mind must have been preternaturally sharp, for a chance word of the -admonition which he thought good to deliver set it to work. ‘Likewise it -behoveth the Christian, madam—so strict an account is required of the -highly favoured—to repent him of the mischances of sleep and dreams. -Unlawful, luxurious dreaming, the mutterings of sinful words when our -bodies lie bound in slumber are stumbling-blocks to the soul agog to meet -his Saviour at the gate.’ - -He rambled on and on, the godly ignoramus, the while her wits flew far. -Mutterings of dreams—had she betrayed herself? Then—to whom? It behoved -her to be certain. She bundled out the priest and had in the confidant. -From Des-Essars she learned the extent of her delirium; he brought her -the casket, unlocked, sealed by the Chancellor, from which, he told her, -she had read ‘certain sonnets.’ Love-laden lady! she stopped him here, -laughing as she fingered her coffer, lifting and snapping-to the lid. ‘My -sonnets? They are here, many and many. I shall read them to him some day. -And to you some. Shall I——?’ - -Positively, she was about to begin, but he implored her to lock up the -box of mischief and secrete it somewhere. - -‘Guard it for me, my dear,’ she said. ‘What else have I done in my fever?’ - -He told her, many hidden matters had been disclosed, as well of the King -as of others. It was not for him to say that nothing was left unrevealed; -only that he knew of nothing. She had spoken, for instance, of a token, -and had pointed to where it lay. Her eyes sparkled as she flashed out her -hand from under the bedclothes, holding forth a ring upon a chain. ‘Here -it is! He gave it me himself, and fastened it upon me with a kiss.’ - -‘Ha!’ He was frightened. ‘Let me keep it safe for you, madam, until——’ - -‘Safe? Will they cut it from my body, think you? Never, never. You shall -watch over my casket, but this is a part of me.’ - -He makes free to comment upon this episode. ‘And I confess,’ he says, -‘that I exulted in her constant noble courage, and found nothing amiss in -it, that she had stooped from her high estate. Rather I held it matter -for praise and excitation of the thought and sense. For, properly viewed, -there is nothing of beauty more divine than holy humility, nor hath there -ever been since once the Lord of Glory and Might bowed His sacred head.’ - -But when she would have had him devise with her fresh methods of -concealment, dust-throwing, head-burying, and the like, he told her -fairly that it was too late. - -‘I am bold to assure your Majesty that there is no man nor woman about -this Court that wots not throughly of your Majesty’s private affairs. -And, madam, if Dolet, if Carwood, if Mistress Fleming and Mistress Seton -talk to each other of them over the hearth, what think you can be hidden -from my lord of Moray—to say not that he hath been constant at your -bedside, and hath heard you cry verses?’ - -Pondering these fateful truths, suddenly she tired of shifts. ‘Well, -then, come what may of it,’ she cried out, ‘let them whisper their fill. -I have done with whispering.’ - -She said that she wished to sleep—had the maids in and composed herself -to that end. About midnight she awoke terribly in pain; shivering, crying -aloud that her hour was come, unable to turn. The doctors were called -to her, all the house was broad awake. She began after a time to vomit -blood, and so continued for a night, a day and a night, shaken to pieces -and at her last gasp. - -Under this new agony she weakened so fast that the crying aloud of -secrets stopped for mere weakness: all believed that she must die. The -Earl of Moray, who had kept aloof after his fierce little struggle with -Huntly, now assumed the direction of affairs, none staying him. He took -upon himself to send for the King, that being his duty, as he said, to -the State. The duty was not to be denied, though there was peril in it. - -‘I fear, my lord,’ said Lethington, ‘I fear the effect of the King’s -presence upon her Majesty’s frail habit.’ - -Lord Huntly roundly said that any ill effect from such a measure would -lie at his colleague’s door. ‘And I marvel much, my lord of Moray, that -you, who have heard her Majesty’s wandering speech and know the extremes -of her dislike, should have proposed to call hither the one person left -in Scotland whom she hath reason at once to reproach and fear.’ - -Moray waved his hand. ‘The Queen, my sister, is at death’s door. And will -you tell me who has so much right to lead her to it as her husband?’ - -‘To drive her to it, belike your lordship means!’ cried Huntly as he -flung out of the room. His counter-stroke was to send word over to the -Hermitage. Let Bothwell make haste. Adam Gordon took the message. - -But before either King or lover could be looked for there dawned a day -upon Jedburgh, upon the darkened grey house in the Wynd, which the Queen -herself believed to be her last. She was in that state of the body when -the ghostly tenant, all preened for departure, has clear dominion, and -earthly affections and earthly cares are ridded and done with. In other -words, she had forgotten Bothwell. - -She confessed to Father Roche and received the Sacrament; she kissed her -Maries—all there but Lady Boyne, who had been Beaton; called the lords -about her and looked gently in the face of each in turn—not asking of -them any more, but enjoining, rather, and as if requiring. ‘My lords, -under the wise hands of God I lie waiting here, and what I speak is -from the verge of the dark. Serve, I desire you, the prince my son, -remembering his tender helpless years, and dealing patiently with his -silly understanding. Be not harsh with them that are left of the old -religion: you cannot tax me with severity to your own. Let Scotland -serve God in peace, every man after his own conscience. I am too weak to -command, and have no breath to spare for beseeching. My lords, this is my -last desire. Is there any here who will refuse me?’ - -She looked about from one strong face to another; saw Huntly crying, -Argyll struggling to keep tears back, Lethington with his head bowed -down, as if he would pray. She saw her half-brother John Stuart watching -her from under his brows; lastly her half-brother Moray, whose face, -fixed and blanched, told her nothing. Sighing, she raised herself. Here -was one for her dying breath, for one last cajolery! She put up her hand -to touch his, and he started as if suddenly awakened, but commanded -himself. - -‘Brother,’ she said, in a whisper half audible, ‘oh, brother, vex none in -Scotland, for my sake.’ - -He stooped, took up and kissed her hand; and she let it fall with a -long sigh of content. Presently after, she straightened herself, as if -conscious of the near end, joined her palms together, and began the -Creed in a sharp, painful voice quite unlike her own, fantastic and -heart-piercing at once. In the middle she stopped. - -‘_Qui propter nos homines et propter—et propter_——I misremember the -rest——’ - -‘_Salutem_, madam, ’tis _nostram salutem_,’ says Father Lesley, with a -sob. - -‘God give it me, a sinner,’ she said, and turned her cheek to the pillow, -and lay caught and still. The physician put his hand to her heart, and -made a sign. Lesley tiptoed to the windows and set them open. - - * * * * * - -The Earl of Moray lifted up his head. ‘I fear, my lords, that the worst -is come upon us. The Queen, my sister—alas!’ He covered his eyes for -a moment, then, in a different tone and a changed aspect, began to -give order. ‘Mr. Secretary, cause messengers to ride to Glasgow to the -prince’s father. My Lord Chancellor, you should convene a council of the -estates. Doctor, I must have a word with you.’ - -By these sort of phrases he sent one and all flocking to the door like -sheep about a narrow entry. Des-Essars lingered about, but what could he -do? The Earl’s cold eye was upon him. - -‘You, sir—what do you here? I will deal with you anon. Meantime, avoid a -matter which is not for you.’ - -The lad went out, hanging his head. - -Last to go were the weeping maids and Father Roche, the Queen’s -Confessor, who, before he left her, placed his crucifix under her closed -hand. - -This too was observed. ‘Take up your idol, sir,’ said Lord Moray; ‘take -back your idol. Suchlike are vain things.’ - -But Father Roche took no notice of him, and went away without his -crucifix. - -The physician had remained, a little twinkle-eyed man, with white -eyebrows like cornices of snow. He curved and raised them before the -greatest man in Scotland. - -‘You need me, my lord?’ - -‘I do not at this present. Await my summons in the anteroom.’ - -He was alone with the passing soul, which even now might be adrift by the -window, streaming out to its long flight. - -He looked sharply and seriously about the room, omitting nothing from -his scrutiny. There stood the writing-desk in the window, covered in -geranium leather, with stamped ciphers in gold upon it, _F_ and _M_ -interlaced, the Crown-royal of France above them. He stole to it and -tried it: locked. He lifted it from the table, put it on the floor under -the vallance of the bed, then went on searching with his keen eyes. - -These winning him nothing, he moved softly about and tried one or two -likely coverts—the curtains, the vallance; moved a hand-mirror, disturbed -some books, a cloak upon a chair. He was puzzled, he put his hand to his -mouth, bit his finger, hesitating. Presently he crept up to the bed and -looked at her who lay there so still. He could see by the form she made -that she was crouched on her side with her knees bent, and judged it -extraordinary, and talked to himself about it. ‘They lie straighter—down -there. They prepare themselves——Who would die twisted? What if the -soul——?’ His heart gave him trouble. He stopped here and breathed hard. - -The hand that held the crucifix—it was the right hand—was out: it showed -a ring upon one finger, only one. The left hand he could not see—but it -was very necessary to be seen. Gingerly he drew back the bedclothes, -slowly, tentatively, then more boldly. They were away: and there lay -the casket, enclosed within the half-hoop of the body. That she should -have tricked him in her dying agony was a real shock to him, and, by -angering, gave him strength. He reached out his hand to take it—he -touched it—stopped, while his guilty glance sought her grey face. O King -Christ! he saw her glimmering eyes, all black, fixed upon him—with lazy -suspicion, without wink of eyelid or stir of the huddled body to tell -him whether she lived or was dead. His tongue clove to his palate—he -felt crimson with shame: to rob the dead, and the dead to see him! After -a pause of terrible gazing he stepped backwards, and back, and back. He -felt behind him, opened the door, and called hoarsely: ‘The Queen lives! -She lives! Come in—come in!’ - -The passages were alive in an instant, doors banged, feet scampered the -stairs. The first person to come in was Des-Essars, turned for the moment -from youth to Angel of Judgment. He dashed by Moray, threw himself upon -the Queen’s coffer, snatched it, and with it backed to the wall. There, -with his arms about it, he stood at bay, panting and watching the enemy. - -But the room was now full. Women, crowded together, were all about the -bed. In the midst knelt the doctor by the Queen. Huntly, Lethington, -Argyll, and Erskine stood grouped. - -‘What have you, Baptist, in your hands?’ says Huntly. - -‘It is her Majesty’s treasure, my lord, which you committed to my -keeping.’ - -‘Where gat you it, man?’ asked Argyll. - -But before he could be answered my Lord Moray lifted up hand and voice. -‘Let all them,’ he said, ‘that are of Christ’s true Church give thanks -with me unto God for this abounding mercy.’ - -Lethington, Argyll, some of the women, stood with covered faces while his -lordship prayed aloud. Huntly watched the Queen, and presently got his -great reward. Her eyes were turned upon him; she knew him, nodded her -head and smiled. He fell to his knees. - - * * * * * - -So quick her recovery, in two days’ time there was no more talk of the -piece of Scotland or of the Credo half-remembered. The earth and the men -of the earth resumed their places and re-pointed their goads; as she -grew stronger so grew her anxieties. Lord Bothwell sent, by Adam Gordon -(who had gone to fetch him) his humble duty to her Majesty, ‘thanking -God hourly for her recovery.’ His physicians, he said, would in no wise -suffer him attempt the journey as yet—no, not in a litter. The Queen -chafed, and wrote him querulous letters; but nothing would tempt him out. -She got very few and very guarded replies, so fell to her sonnets again. - -The truth is, that the Earl of Bothwell, having set his hand to a -business which, if temperately handled, promised most fair, kept rigidly -to the line he had thought out for himself; and thus affords the rare -example of a man who, by nature advancing upon gusts of passion, can -keep himself, by shrewd calculation, to an orderly gait. The means to -his end which he had appointed, and took, were of the most singular -ever used by expectant lover—to French Paris, for instance, they were -a cause of dismay—and yet they succeeded most exactly. They were, in -fact, _to do nothing at all_. He had found out by careful study of the -lady that the less he advanced the farther she would carry him, the less -he asked for the more she would lay at his feet, the less he said the -larger her interpretation of his hidden mind. She was a fine, sensitive -instrument—like a violin, now wounded, now caressed by the bow, shrieking -when he slashed at the strings, sobbing when he plucked them with callous -fingers, moaning when he was gentle, shrilling when he so chose it. In -a word, he had to deal with loyalty, extreme generosity, a magnanimity -which knew nothing of the sale and exchange of hearts. He had known this -for some years; he now based his calculations upon it without ruth—the -last person in the world to whom her magnificent largess could appeal; -and (as French Paris would say) of the last nation in the world. To a -man like him the gift only imports, not the giving. It is an actuary’s -question; while to her and her kind the act is the whole of the matter: -deepest shame were to know herself rich in one poor loincloth while he -had a bare patch whereon to hang it. She was that true Prodigal, most -glorious when most naked. - -Des-Essars, alone in her confidence during these hours of strain, makes -an acute deduction. ‘Her letters of this time will show very plainly,’ he -says, ‘that she was brought by his chill silence to that extreme point -of desire where _sacrifice and loss seem the top of bliss_. It was no -longer a man that she longed for, but an Act. Fasting for a Sacrament, -the bread and wine of her need was Surrender. I say that this fond -distress of hers, these absorbed eyes filled often with tears for no -reason, her suspense when waiting—and vainly—for a messenger’s return; -her abandonment before the altar, her cries in the night—such things, I -say, were reasonable to me, and to all who, in the Florentine’s phrase, -have “understanding of love.” But to the Court it seemed unreasonable.’ - -Unreasonable! It seemed perverse, unspeakable. The maids were dumb -with shame. The one thing which Mary Fleming would not discuss with -Lethington, or allow him to discuss in her hearing, was the Queen’s -disease. Mary Livingstone went about like one in a trance—sand-blind, -stumbling after some elfin light. She spoke to none, remembered none. -Judge the feelings of her Master of Sempill, who could tell his friends -in England nothing! Mary Seton, too, kept her pretty lips locked up. -Once, when Fleming pressed her,—what time they were abed—she said -shortly: ‘I am her servant, and shall be till I die. If you are her -judge, I know it not. You are none of mine.’ - -‘No, no, no!’ cried poor Fleming. ‘You wrong me. Who am I to judge?’ - -‘Who indeed?’ said Mary Seton, and turned over. - -The Court was divided in these harassing days, because the Earl of -Moray drew off a large proportion of it to his own house. Thither -resorted Argyll, Glencairn and Atholl, my lord of Mar when he could, and -Lethington when he dared; there also and always was the Lord Lindsay, -that blotched zealot, with his rumpled hair and starched frill. Huntly, -of course, held closely by the Queen, refusing to admit the second Court; -Lord Livingstone was faithful, as became the father of Mary Sempill. -He rubbed his chapped hands over the fire, and cried three times a day -that all was well: a folly so palpable that everybody laughed. Lesley -stayed by her, a tearful spectacle; Lord Herries too, very gloomy. Such -state as there was—and it was draggled state—Arthur Erskine and Traquair -maintained; but the Queen was quite unconscious of state. Royal dignity -had never been a virtue of hers; she was always either too keen or too -dejected to have time for it. Whether old Lord Livingstone treated her -jocosely, or old Lord Mar with implied reproof in every grating search -for a word—if Bothwell had written she did not heed them; and if he had -not, she sat watching for French Paris at the window, and still did not -heed them. - -And undoubtedly old Lord Livingstone was jocose—abounded in nods and -winks. ‘Just a fond wife,’ he described her to his friends, and so -treated her to her face. It is to be believed, had she heard it, that she -would have been proud of the title. So, during the misty short days and -long wet nights of October she cheapened herself in Love’s honour, and -was held cheap by Scotch thickwits. - - * * * * * - -On the night of the 28th of the month the King came to see her. He -arrived very late, and departed in a fury within the twenty-four hours. -His clatter, his guards, his horses and himself filled the town; he took -up lodging in the Abbey, and caused himself to be announced by heralds at -the lowly door of the Queen’s House. - -Perhaps she was worn out by watching for another comer; perhaps she was -ill, perhaps angry—it is not to be known. She would hardly notice him -when he came in; spoke languidly, dragging her words, and would not -on any account be alone with him. He demanded, as his right, that her -women should leave her; she raised her eyebrows, not her eyes, until he -repeated his desire in a louder voice. - -Then she said, ‘What right have you kept, what right have you ever done, -that you should have any rights left you here?’ - -‘Madam, I have every right—that of a father, that of a consort—’ - -‘You have waived it—refused it—denied it—and betrayed it.’ - -‘Ah, never, never!’ - -‘Twice, sir, to my bitter cost.’ - -He laughed harshly to hear such words. ‘Sirs,’ he said to those with him, -‘I see how it is. Rumour for once is no fibster.’ - -‘Come away, my lord, come your ways,’ said old Livingstone. ‘You will do -harm to yourself.’ - -He cried out, ‘None shall dictate to me in this realm.’ - -And then Moray said, ‘Sir, I would seriously advise you—for your good——’ - -The King stared at him, gibed at him. ‘If you seek my good, my lord, God -judge me, ’tis for the first time.’ - -‘It is the good of us all,’ said Moray. ‘Her Grace is overwrought. Let me -entreat your patience. This coming is something sudden, though so long -attended. In the morning maybe——’ - -The King threatened. ‘And what is this but the morn? The morn! The morn’s -morn I depart with the light, and for long time—be you sure of that.’ - -He kept his word; and she, proud of her loyalty, wrote to her lover how -constant she had been. ‘He would have stayed did I but nod. Guess you -how stiff I kept my head.’ That touching sentence brought Lord Bothwell -hot-foot to Jedburgh—to find her waiting for him at the head of the stair. - -She could hardly suffer him to come into the room: her longing seemed to -choke her. ‘You have come to praise me—O generous lover! You can trust me -now! Oh, tell me that I have been faithful!’ - -He turned shortly and shut the door. Then, ‘Madam,’ he said bluntly, ‘I -cannot praise you at all, though I must not presume to do otherwise.’ - -She paled at that, and smiled faintly, as if to show him that the pain -could be borne. - -‘I am very dull, my lord. Speak plainly to me.’ - -So indeed he did. ‘You should at all costs have kept him by you. At all -costs, madam, at all costs. Here we could have dealt with him—but now——!’ -He stopped an exclamation of fury, just in time. ‘And who can tell -whether he will try you again?... Oh, it was ill judged. I regret it.’ - -She pored upon his face, wonder fanning her eyes. ‘You regret my faith! -Regret my honour, saved for you! Strange griefs, my lord.’ - -‘I regret ill policy. The man is treasonable up to the ears: there were -many ways of doing. Now there are none at all. Gone, all gone! What have -I dared to pray for—what you have deigned to offer me; what my ears have -heard and my eyes seen—all that my senses have lured me to believe: -this one act of your Majesty’s has belied! Ah!’ He dug his heel into -the carpet. He folded his arms. ‘Well, it is not for me to reproach my -Sovereign, or to complain that her realm holds one fool the more. The -Lord gives and takes away—pshaw! and why not the Lady?’ - -She stretched out her arms to him, there being none to stay her. ‘Oh, -what are you saying? Is it possible?’ She came close, she crept, touched -his face. ‘If you doubt me I must die. Prove me—behold me here. Take me—I -am yours.’ - -‘No, madam,’ he snarled like a dog, ‘a pest upon it! You are not mine: -you are his.’ - -She sank down, kneeling by the table, and hid her face. Murmuring some -excuse, that she was overwrought, that he would fetch women, he left her -and went directly to Lord Moray’s house. There he found Lethington. - -‘The Queen is very ill, as it seems to me,’ he said, ‘nor is it hard to -see where is the core of her malady. If that loon from Glasgow comes -ruffling before her again, I shall not be able to answer for what I may -do. Tell you that to my lord, I care not; nay, I desire you to tell him. -We should be friends, he and I, for we now have one aim and one service, -and as sworn servants should do our duty without flinching. I commit -these thoughts to you, Lethington, that you and I, with your patron here, -may take counsel together how best to serve the Queen with a cure for -her disease. It is indurate, mark you; we may need to cut deep; but it -becomes not men to falter. You and I have had our differences, which I -believe to be sunk in this common trouble. We may be happy yet—God knows. -Devise something, devise anything, and you shall not find me behindhand. -Let there be an end of our factions. Why, man, there are but two when -all’s said—the Queen’s and that other’s. Count me your friend in any -occasion you may have. Farewell. You will find me at Hermitage.’ - -Lethington was greatly moved. ‘Stay, my lord, stay,’ he said, coming -forward with propitiatory hands. ‘My lord of Moray will receive you.’ - -‘I can’t stay. There are good reasons for going, and none for staying—now -that that fellow is safe in Glasgow again. Let my lord do his part and -call upon me for mine. When do you wed, Lethington?’ - -The Secretary blushed. ‘It stands with the Queen’s pleasure, my lord. My -mistress would never fail hers, and so I must be patient.’ - -‘Hearken, my good friend,’ said Bothwell, with a hand on his shoulder. ‘I -am pretty well in her Majesty’s favour, I believe. Now, if a word from -me——’ - -‘Upon my soul, I am greatly obliged to your lordship.’ - -‘Say no more, man. You shall be sped to church. Farewell.’ - -He rode fast to Hermitage that day, and threw himself upon his bed. They -told him that the Countess was asleep. - -‘Why, then,’ says he, ‘she shall have her sleep while she can.’ - -As he had expected, he got a letter next noon, with tears upon it, had he -cared to look for them, and in every stiff clause a cry of the heart.... - - I submit myself henceforward wholly unto you.... In you is all - my hope, my only friend, without whom I cannot endure.... Prove - me again: I shall not fail you. All this night I have kept - watch while the world is asleep. Now I am very sure I shall not - fail again. Sir, if I think apart, it is because I dwell apart; - but if I may trust you that shall be amended. I pray it be. - But I hear you say, It is for yourself to deal in it. Again I - beseech your patience if I am slow to learn how best to please - you. My tutors and governors praised me as a child for aptness - to learn. Now the lessons grow sharper and I the more dull.... - - My brother came to visit me this few hours since. He spake - kindly of you, and of him[6] as the sole mischief-worker here. - I answered as I thought myself free to do, but now misdoubt me, - fearful of your displeasure. You used harsh punishment towards - me: I feel sore beaten, as with rods. If I sleep I shall be the - stronger for it; but that is easy said. Now if I write Alas! - you may scorn me; and yet I feel directed to no other word, - save Welladay! Sir, if it should stand within your pleasure to - give pleasure to your friend, you will reply by this bearer; in - whom you may trust as much as I ask you to trust - - Your discomfited, perfect friend - - M. R. - -He answered coldly, but with great respect, and only kept the messenger -back two days. - -[6] King Henry Darnley. - - - - -CHAPTER III - -DESCANT UPON A THEME AS OLD AS JASON - - -It is from Des-Essars that I borrowed that similitude of Lord Bothwell -to a violin-player. The young man pictures him as such, at this very -time, sitting deep in his chair at the Hermitage, his instrument upon his -crossed knee—his lovely, sensitive instrument! He screws at the keys, in -his leisurely, strong way, and now and again plucks out a chord, ‘until, -under the throbbing notes, he judges that he hath wrung up his music to -the tragic pitch.’ The figure is adroit in its fitness to the persons -involved, but puzzling in this respect—that with executant so deliberate -and instrument so fine the pitch should be so slow of attainment. - -Face the facts, as she herself did (with a shiver of self-pity), and ask -yourself what on earth he was about. Consider his fury at her dismissal -of the King, his coldness through her appeals for mercy: what could they -point to but one thing? ‘Over and over again,’ says Des-Essars, ‘my -mistress told me that his lordship would do nothing overt while the King -her husband was alive; and I acquiesced in silence. It was too evident. -She added, immediately, “And I, Baptist—what can I do? What will become -of me? I cannot live without my Beloved—nay, I cannot discern life or -death under the canopy of Heaven unless he is there moving and directing -it. As well ask me to behold a vista of days in which the sun should -never shine. This is a thing which forbids thought, for it denies the -wish to live.” To such effect she expressed herself often, and then -would remain silent, as to be sure did I, each of us, no doubt, pondering -the next question (or its answer)—What stood in the way of her happiness? -What kept the King alive? The answer lay on the tip of the tongue. She! -She only preserved the worthless life; she only stood in her own light. -Ah, she knew that well enough, and so did I, and so did every man in -Scotland save one—the blind upstart himself. - -‘A dangerous knowledge, truly: dangerous by reason of the ease with -which she could provide remedy for her pain. Let her move a finger, -let her wink an eyelid, shrug a shoulder, and from one side or another -would come on a king’s executioner, clothed in the livery of Justice, -Proper Resentment, Vengeance, Envy, Greed or Malice—for under one and -all of these ensigns he was threatened by death. And I will answer for -it that the question flickered hourly in flame-red letters before her -eyes, Why standeth the Queen of Scots in the way of Justice? O specious -enemy! O reasonable Satan! What! this fellow, a drunkard, a vile thing, -treacherous, a liar, a craven—this, whom to kill were to serve God, alone -to shut her out from good days? I know that her hand must have itched to -give the signal; I know that the Devil prevailed; but not yet, not yet -awhile—not till she was reeling, faint, caught up, swirled, overwhelmed -by misery and terror. At this time, though suffering made her eyes gaunt -and her mouth to grin, she kept her hands rigidly from any sign. - -‘It is, withal, a curious thing, not to be disregarded by the judicious, -that the Countess of Bothwell, and her claims and pretentions, never -entered her thoughts. In her opinion, women—other women—were the toys of -men. This world of ours she saw as a garden, a flowery desert place in -which stood two persons, the Lover and the Beloved. Observe this, you who -read the tale; for presently after my Lord Bothwell observed it, and, by -playing upon it, attuned her to his tragic pitch.’ - - * * * * * - -She left Jedburgh on 10th November, her terrible beleaguering question -not yet answered. She went a kind of progress by the Tweed valley, by -Kelso, Wark, Hume, Langton, Berwick, stayed in the gaunt houses which -are still to be seen fretting the ramparts of that lonely road—towers -reared upon woody bluffs to command all ways of danger, square, turreted -fortresses looking keenly out upon the bare lands which they scarcely -called their own and had grown lean in defending. All about her as she -went were the lords, every man of them with his own game in his head, -watching the moves of every other. Argyll and Glencairn were shadows -of Moray; Crawfurd and Atholl for the moment held with Huntly and -the throne. Lethington was the dog of whoso would throw him a task; -Livingstone, jocular still, kept mostly with the women. - -The Queen’s moods, as she journeyed slowly through that wintering -country, changed as the weather does in late autumn. Winds blow hot -and winds blow cold, tempests are never far off; frost follows, when -the sun glitters but is chill, and the ice-splinters lie late, like -poniards in the ridged ways. She rode sometimes for a whole day in bitter -silence, her face as bleak as the upland bents, and sometimes she spurred -furiously in front, her hair blown back and face on fire with her mad -thoughts. Unseen of any, she clenched her fists, she clenched her teeth. -‘I am a queen, a queen! I choose to do it. It is my right, it is my need.’ - -She had fits of uncontrollable weeping; they caught her unawares now and -then, her face all blurred with tears. This was when she had been pitying -herself as victim of a new torment—new at least to her. ‘He sits alone -with a woman who hates me. He pinches her chin—they laugh together over -my letters. Fool! I will write no more.’ The more a fool in that she -wrote within the next hour. - -When she grew frightened to find how solitary she was, she turned in the -saddle more than once, and hunted all faces for a friendly one. Wearisome -quest, foredoomed to failure! Moray, with his straight rock of brow, sat -like a cliff, looking steadfastly before him; Argyll counted the sheep -on the hillside; Livingstone, a ruddy old fool, hummed a tune, or said, -‘H’m, h’m! All’s for the best in this braw world, come rain come sun.’ - -And the maids, the Maries, once her bosom familiars! There Livingstone -bites her prudish lip, here Fleming peers askance at Lethington; Seton -says something sharply witty to Lady Argyll, and makes the grim lady -hinny like a mare. - -Far behind, in the ruck of the cavalcade, she may catch sight of a youth -on a jennet, a pale-faced youth with a widish nose and smut-rimmed light -eyes. He has a French soul; he loves her. There, at least, is one that -judges nothing, condemns nothing, approves nothing. She is she, and he -her slave. Is she angry?—The sun’s hidden then. Does she smile?—The -sun rises. Does she kiss him?—Ho! the sun atop of summer. Suppose that -she were Medea: suppose for a moment that she slew—no, no, the term is -inexact—suppose that she stood aside, and men justly offended came in and -slew King Jason? This slave of hers would say, ‘The sun, shining, hath -struck one to earth.’ - -Yes, here was a trusty friend who would as soon blame the sun for his -sunstroke, or the lightning for his flash of murder, as blame her. She -would call him to her, then, and make him ride by her for half a day. -She would take his hand, lean aside to kiss him, to rest her head on his -shoulder, to stroke his cheek; she would call him her lover, her fere, -her true and perfect knight—fool him, in fine, to the top of his bent. -And to all that she said or did, Des-Essars, if we may believe him, -decently replied: ‘Yes, it is quite true that I love your Majesty. I have -no other thought but that, nor have I ever had.’ - -Thus she rode progress towards her soul’s peril, changing from fierce -heat to shrivelling cold as fast as the autumn weather. - -It was at Kelso that she got letters from the King, foolish and -blusterous letters in the _Quos ego ...!_ style which the Master of -Sempill admired. Let her Majesty understand his mind was made up. Let -her Majesty receive him in Edinburgh, or ... this was their tenor; with -them in her hand and one from Bothwell burning in her bosom she showed -Mr. Secretary a disturbed, dangerous face. Pale as she was nowadays, and -thin, he was shocked to see her hungry lines. He thought her like some -queen of old, Jocasta or Althæa, with whom the Furies held midnight -traffic. ‘Do you see this? Is it never to end?’ - -He did not stay to peruse the letters. ‘Madam,’ he said, ‘let us take -order in these painful matters. Leave them to your faithful friends, and -all shall be to your contentation.’ - -She turned away; her staring eyes saw nothing but misery. ‘Take order, -say you? If you fear so much as to speak above a whisper, how shall -you dare do anything? Friends! what friend have I but one? Death is my -patient, waiting friend; and so I shall prove him before many more days.’ - -‘Alas, madam, speak not so wildly.’ - -She looked fiercely, wrinkling up her eyes at him. ‘But I tell you, sir, -that if this load be not lifted from me, I shall end it my own way.’ - -That night a plan was laid before the Earls of Moray and Argyll. -Lethington spoke it, but Huntly stood over him as stiffly imminent as a -pine, or he had never found a word to say. - -After a great deal of elliptic talk he came to terms, by saying, ‘The -business can be done promptly and without scandalous parade of force. -When her Majesty is at Craigmillar making ready for the Prince’s baptism, -he will certainly come, for he would never endure to be passed over at -such a time, when the ambassadors of France and England may be brought to -acknowledge him. Well, then, my lords, if we confront him with our proofs -of his oft-meditated treason he will deny them. If we essay to apprehend -him he will resist us; and resistance, doubtless, might provoke our men -to—to——’ Here he looked about him. - -‘You have said enough, Lethington,’ Huntly broke in. ‘We shall be ready, -those of us who are true men.’ He watched Moray darkly as he spoke, but -drew forth no reply. It was Argyll who took up the talk—took it up to the -rafters as it were, since he leaned back in his chair and cast up his -eyes. - -‘Look at him for a Lennox Stuart, God help us! Lennox Stuart and rank -Papist he is. To leave at large the like of that is to have a collie -turned rogue ranging your hillside. Why, gentlemen,’ and he looked from -man to man, ‘shall we leave him to raven the flock?’ - -‘I adhere to the plan,’ said Huntly. ‘Count upon me and mine. I take it -you stand in with us, my Lord of Argyll. What says my Lord of Moray?’ - -The great man became judicial. He gave them the feeling, as he intended, -that he had been surveying a far wider field than they could scan. Under -that arching sky, which he was able to range in, and from whose study -they had called him down, their little schemes took up that just inch -which was their proper scope. If he had not remarked them earlier, not -his the all-seeing eye; but he was obliged to his friends for drawing him -to the care of matters so curious, so well-deserving of a quiet hour. - -‘We must talk at large of these somewhat serious concerns, my lords. -We must take our time, hasten so far as we may, but with a temperate -spur—ay, a temperate spur. We must consult, discriminate those who stand -our friends from those who are unfriendly; from those who cry, not -without reason, for recognition. We must not omit those who are afar off, -nor those who will come about us asking questions—what is to be lost, -what gained? Many considerations rise up on the instant, others will -crowd upon us. Where are my lords of Crawfurd and Atholl? Are they behind -you? I cannot see them. What says my lord of Lindsay, that very steadfast -Christian? Where, alas, is my lord of Morton’s honour?’ - -‘Sir,’ cried Huntly, fuming, ‘we can resolve your many questions when -you have answered our one. We asked you not, what says one or what says -another? but, rather, what says your lordship?’ - -Lord Moray smiled. ‘Ah, my Lord Chancellor, if your lordship had not been -so long a stranger to my poor house, your question had hardly been put -to me. Those who know me best, my lord, do not need to confirm by vain -assurances my love of country, or desire to serve the throne of my dear -sister. Forgive me if I say that, with older eyes than your lordship’s, I -take a wider range. I see your distresses—perhaps I see a remedy. Perhaps -your proposal is one, perhaps it is a danger worse than the disease. It -may be——’ - -He threatened to become interminable, so Huntly, with no patience at -command, left him in the midst. With disapproval in every prim line of -his face Lord Moray watched him go. He said nothing more; and why should -he say anything, when all was forwarding as he wished? He did repeat -to the Secretary, afterwards and in private, that it was sore pity -to have the Earl of Morton still in exile—a saying which that worthy -misapprehended. But here the Councils stopped, though the Queen did not, -but pushed on to Berwick, and reached Edinburgh by mid-November. At -Craigmillar, where she chose to stay, they were resumed under the more -hopeful auspices of Lord Bothwell, whom at last she summoned to her side -out of Liddesdale. - -This is because jealousy, that canker in the green-wood, was groping in -her now, though not, even yet, of that sordid kind which is concerned -with its own wound. She no longer wrote to Bothwell save on details of -business, because she conceived her letters distasteful to him; and -she would not have recalled him had not Lethington assured her of the -common need of his counsel. The sort of jealousy she suffered filled -her, rather, with a kind of noble zeal to do him honour. Although she -would not write to him, she could never rest without news of his daily -doings. So when she heard that he and his Countess were reading Petrarch -together, many hurt lines, but no vulgar splenetic lines, were committed -to the casket. - - Elle pour son honneur vous doibt obeyssance, - Moy vous obeyssant j’en puis recevoir blasme, - N’estant, à mon regret, comme elle, vostre femme. - -She wrote, and believed, that she grudged Lady Bothwell nothing: - - Je ne la playns d’aymer done ardamment - Celuy qui n’a en sens, ny en vaillance, - En beauté, en bonté, ny en constance - Point de seconde. Je vis en ceste foy. - -‘God pity this poor lady!’ Des-Essars bursts forth, having been imparted -these outrageous lines. ‘She who could believe that my Lord Bothwell was -without peer in beauty, kindness, and constancy, might very well believe -that she herself was not jealous of his wife.’ - -Jealous or no, it was jealousy of a strange kind. When her beloved -answered his summons by attending her at Craigmillar, she received him -with a dewy gratefulness which went near to touch him. ‘You have come, -then! Oh, but you are good to your friend,’—a speech which for the -moment bereft him of speech. She asked after the Countess, spoke of her -as her sister, pitied her sitting alone at Hermitage, and inspired the -gross-minded man with enthusiasm for her exalted mood. - -He threw himself into the plotting and whispering with which the Court -was rife, talked long hours with Lethington, was civil to Moray and his -‘flock,’ as he called Argyll and the rest. Nothing much came of it all. -Moray went so far as to suggest divorce. Lethington thought much of it, -and carried it to Bothwell, who thought nothing of it. He declined to -discuss it with her Majesty. - -‘Take your proposal to her if you choose,’ he said; ‘lay it before her. I -know what she will say, and agree with her beforehand. This is no way of -doing for men, or for crowned women.’ - -He had the rights of it. ‘What!’ she cried, ‘and make my son a bastard! -And he to be King of England! I think they have had bastards enough on -that throne. Your plan is foolish.’ - -Lethington was upon his mettle. He was to be married come Christmas, and, -indebted for this prospect to the Queen and Bothwell, was desirous to owe -her as much more as she would lend him. ‘Madam,’ he said, ‘I cannot admit -my plan to be so dangerous to the Prince’s highness; but I will content -you yet. Give me leave to devise yet once more.’ - -‘Devise as you will, sir,’ said she, ‘but be quick, or I shall begin -with devices of my own. You know that a foumart in a trap scruples not -to use tooth and claw. And he is wise, since soft glances are never -likely to help him.’ Almost immediately she began to cry at the thought -of herself in a trap, ‘to cry and torment herself,’ says the annalist. -And one night, at supper with a few of them, she lashed out in a fury at -her impotence. ‘Ah, it is too much, what I suffer among you all! I have -borne him a son, and he would steal him from my breast. He would tip that -innocent tongue with poison that he may envenom his mother. If I am not -soon quit of this there is but one end to it.’ - -Patience, they counselled. ‘Ay, madam,’ said foolish old Livingstone, -‘patience, and shuffle the cards.’ - -‘Shuffle you yours, my lord,’ she said, looking lofty, ‘if you think them -worthy of Fortune’s second thoughts. For me, I know a shorter way to end -the game.’ - -In private, she and Bothwell were in full accord. She was to obey him, -and leave him alone. ‘No questions, my soul!’ he was for ever saying to -her, half jocularly, half with meaning that she was to be blind, deaf, -and dumb. She shut her eyes and mouth and put her fingers to her ears; -and in time this became a habit. ‘My prince, my master,’ she said once, -and gave him both her hands, ‘I am your servant, and submit to you in all -things. Use me well.’ He kissed her fondly as he swore that so he would. - -It was after the King had visited her and gone again, whither no one -knew, that Lethington produced his second plan. As before, he was careful -to submit it to Bothwell. What did his good lordship think of this? -The King was to meet her Majesty at Stirling for the Prince’s baptism; -he would be ill received by the ambassadors, and therefore mutinous, -probably with outcry. Let one then, with all proofs in his hands, -indict him of treason. Let him be summoned to answer, and upon refusal, -arrested. He would certainly resist, with violence. The end was sure. -Now, what did his good lordship think? - -His good lordship spoke his plain mind, as he always did to Lethington, -whom he scorned. ‘You don’t kill a sheep with hounds and horn. Pray, my -friend, where will be my lord of Moray all this while? Will he wind the -horn? I do not remember that that is his way. Or will he find occasions -to be in his lands? Or turn his coat and cry, God bless our King-Consort -and the True Kirk?’ - -Lethington had a late autumnal smile, with teeth showing through like the -first frost. ‘I will tell your lordship what he will do. He will see and -not see. He will look on and not behold.’ - -‘You mean, I gather, that he will be at his prayers, looking through his -fingers while we foul ours?’ - -‘Your lordship is most precise.’ - -However, his plan went before the Queen, who gave it a gloomy approval. -‘He is so clogged with treason, he will never run. You will have an easy -capture. Let nothing be done till my son be christened.’ - -Immediately afterwards she was instructed by Bothwell that the project -was as vain as wind, because it depended upon two unstable things. First, -if he allowed himself to be taken, what on earth was to be done with him? -There must be an assize. And to which side in that would Moray lean? - -She could not answer him. - -‘No,’ said he, ‘you cannot; nor can any man in Scotland.’ - -‘I am of your mind,’ she said—superfluous assurance! - -‘Well, then,’ he went on, ‘let them stir their broth of grouts. They are -all greedy knaves together: perchance one or another will tumble into the -stew and we be quit of him.’ - -‘But if we leave them,’ she hesitated, ‘they may attempt to take him—and -then——’ - -Bothwell laughed. ‘Nay, I will see to it that they do not. Oh, madam, -trust your honest lover, and all shall go greatly for you and me.’ - -She threw herself into his arms. Trust him! O God, had she not found a -man at last? - - * * * * * - -When they all met at Stirling to christen the Prince, the King was so -ill received that, as Lethington had expected, he refused to leave his -lodging even for the ceremony. He was literally alone, without his -father, without any Scots lord to his name; sitting for the most part in -a small room, drinking and playing cards. He used to ride out at night -so that he need not tempt the discourtesy of the wayfarers; and once, -when the guard at the gate hesitated about passing him in, he flew into -a tempest of rage, drew, and killed the man on the spot. Lethington flew -from lord to lord. What better opportunity than this? - -Everything was prepared, all the proofs gathered in. There were letters -of his to the Queen-Mother of France, to his own mother, Lady Lennox, to -the English Catholics, to the Duke of Norfolk, to certain Jesuits in the -West. One Highgate brought intercepted papers—a chart of Scilly, a plan -of Scarborough Castle: and some other fellow was fished up, a bladder -full of whispers of a plot to steal the Prince. Lastly, to crown the -image of a perfect traitor, there was a draft proclamation of himself as -Regent of Scotland. Enough here to hang a better man! - -‘Well,’ said Huntly, when Lethington showed him the whole budget, ‘take -your measures, show me my place, and meet me at your own time. I’ll not -fail you.’ - -That night Lord Bothwell came into the Queen’s chamber while she was at -her prayers. She saw him, but pretended that she did not, finished her -rosary, and bowed her head over it; then got up and kissed him before all -her circle. Very soon they were alone together. - -‘I disturbed you,’ he said; ‘I regret it.’ - -‘Regret it not—it was sweet disturbance. My heart flew faster than my -beads.’ - -He took her hand up. ‘Why do you tell me such things? Do you know what -disorder they work in me?’ - -She pretended that she must disengage her hand, but he would not allow it. - -‘Alas, sir,’ she said, ‘we whip each other, you and I. Each is a torment -to the other. One runs, the other chases,—but whither?’ - -‘Quick, quick to the goal!’ - -‘Take me thither in your arms, my Bothwell. Carry me, lest I faint by the -way.’ - -‘No fainting now. The hour is come, and I with it. I have counsel for -you.’ - -‘Counsel me—I will be faithful.’ - -‘I recommend, then, to your clemency the Earl of Morton, his kinsman -Douglas of Whittinghame, and all their factions.’ - -She pondered the saying, not discerning at first what it purported, yet -fearing to ask him lest he should be impatient of her stupidity. No man -had ever made her feel stupid but this one. - -‘Do you wish it?’ she asked him. - -‘I advise it.’ - -‘They are no friends of yours?’ - -‘They may become so.’ - -‘And you remember that they greatly offended me?’ - -‘Oh, madam,’ he cried out irritably, ‘who has not offended you in this -wicked land? Did not your sour brother offend you? Has not Lethington -offended? Have not Huntly and I? Believe me, this Morton has himself been -offended, and by the very man who has offended you more vilely than any -other. There was one who betrayed you to the Douglases, but that same man -betrayed the Douglases to you. Therefore I say, if you wish to redeem -your honour, let Morton redeem his, and your affair is done. You force me -to speak plainly.’ - -She saw his meaning now, and her eyes grew blank with fear. ‘Hush,’ she -said, ‘speak no plainer. Those two will kill him.’ - -He shrugged. ‘You speak plainer than I. In advising you, however, to send -open letters of pardon to Morton and his cousin, I have but done my duty, -as we had agreed it should be. But it is for your Majesty to follow or to -leave, as you will. I am still the servant.’ - -She went slowly to him, took up his hands and put them on her shoulders. -He let her have the weight. ‘Now I feel your strong hands, Bothwell.’ - -‘It is you that put them there.’ - -‘It is where they should be. Servants use not so their hands, but only -masters. And good servants soon grow to love the yoke.’ Suddenly she -dropped to his feet and embraced his knees. ‘I am yours, I am yours! Do -as you will with me and all.’ - -Open letters were despatched to Lord Morton and Mr. Archie Douglas, -that, on certain terms, they and their factions might gain pardon and -remission of forfeitures. On the evening of the same day the King left -Stirling without any farewells and sped to Glasgow. - -Lethington, completely fooled, ran open-mouthed to Bothwell. ‘Here is a -discomfiture, my lord! I am dumbfounded. Just when we were sure of him.’ - -‘Maybe you were too sure. There will be a vent-hole in your body politic.’ - -‘My lord, I can answer for the entirety of it. Tush, my credit is gone! I -am vexed to death.’ - -‘I see that it puts you out. But courage, man! you will find a way yet.’ - -‘If I find one now, after this rebuff, it will be owing to your -lordship’s good opinion,’ said the guileless Lethington: ‘a sharp spur to -me, I do assure you.’ - -Bothwell took him by the arm. ‘Do you feel so sure,’ he asked him, ‘that -our man hath not had a fright?’ - -‘What fright? Not possible—or I am not up with your lordship.’ - -Bothwell half-closed his eyes. ‘How do you suppose he would look upon the -return of Morton and the Douglases?’ - -Lethington started, then stared at the floor. ‘Ay,’ he said—‘ay! I had -not given that a thought. Man, Lord Bothwell,’ he whispered, ‘yon’s his -death-warrant, and he knows it.’ - -Lord Bothwell clacked his tongue. - - - - -CHAPTER IV - -SHE LOOKS BACK ONCE - - -Just at this point in the story Des-Essars confesses to the desire having -been hot within him to assassinate the Earl of Bothwell; and writing -it down when the opportunity had come and was gone, he may well say, -‘What would have been the pain and loss of dear blood, had I done it, -in comparison to present anguish?’ He is, however, forced to admit that -he did not meditate so violent a deed for the sake of avoiding future -disaster, but rather to make the present more tolerable. It was his lot -to be much with the Queen and her chosen lover; he owns that he found -the constant fret of their intercourse almost impossible to be borne. ‘I -declare before God and the angels,’ he says, ‘that her dreadful lavishing -of herself during these weeks of waste and desire caused my heart to -bleed. She stripped herself bare of every grace of mind, spirit, and -person, and strewed it in his way, heaping one upon another until he -seemed to be wading knee-deep in her charms. Nay, but he wallowed in -them like a brute-beast, unrecognising and unthankful—a state of affairs -unparalleled since Galahad (who was a good knight) lay abed and was -nourished upon the blood of a king’s virgin daughter. How different this -knight from that, let these pages declare; and my mistress’s high mind, -how similar to that spending martyr’s. For it is most certain that all -her acts towards the Lord Bothwell were moved by magnanimity. Stripping -herself nobly, she stood the more noble for her nakedness. She suffered -horribly: his the horrible sin. Love—in the great manner of it—should -be a conflict of generosity; either lover should be emulous of pain and -loss. But here she gave and this accursed butcher took; she spent and he -got. - -‘I saw them together at their various houses of sojourn during -this winter: at Drymen in Perth, a house of my Lord Drummond’s; at -Tullibardine, at Callander, and again in Edinburgh. Little joy had -they of each other, God wot! There are two kinds of lovers’ joys, as I -think—the mellow and the sharp. The one is rooted in the heart and the -other in the sense, but both alike need leisure of mind if they are to -bear fruit; for in the contemplation of our happiness lies the greatest -happiness of all. Now, these two were never at rest; they could never -look upon each other and let the eyes dwell there with the thought, _My -Beloved is mine and I am his, and as it is now so it shall be._ No, -but they looked beyond each other through a tangle of sin and error, -searching until their eyeballs ached if haply they might discover a gleam -beyond of that windless garden of the Hesperides wherein was put their -hope. Fond searching, fond hope! they could never win the garden. Her -desires were boundless, unappeasable, and so were his; for she sought -to be perfect slave and he to be absolute master. And how was she to be -his servant, who was born a queen? and how he the master he sought to -be, when no empire the world ever saw would have contented him? But the -greatest bar of severance between them was this: there was no community -of interest possible between them. For, to her, this Bothwell was the -only End; and to him this fair sweet Queen was only a Means. This is a -pregnant oracle of mine, worth your travail. Perpend it, you who read.’ - -Des-Essars did not believe that Lord Bothwell loved the Queen. He had -been often at Hermitage, you must remember, and seen the Earl and -Countess together. My lord was not regardful of bystanders when he chose -to fondle his handsome wife. When the two were separated, as now they -were, the observant young man was aware that they wrote frequently to -each other: French Paris was for ever coming and going between Liddesdale -and his master’s lodging, wherever that might chance to be. He was -certain, too, that the Queen knew it. ‘Paris used to deliver to my lord -his wife’s letters, and he read them in the Queen’s very presence, with -scarce a “By your leave, ma’am”; and at such times I have seen her -Majesty pace about the garden in great misery, pull at the rowan berries -until she scattered them, pluck at the branches of trees and send the dry -leaves flying; and once—as I shall never forget—she thrust her hand and -bare arm into a thicket of nettles, and when she drew it out it was all -red to the elbow, with sore white blotches upon it where the poison had -boiled the blood. Her arm went stiff afterwards, but she never let him -know the reason.’ - - * * * * * - -After the christening, about Christmas-time, the Earl of Morton and his -friends came home to Scotland, were introduced into the Queen’s presence -by the Earls of Bothwell and Huntly, and upon submission (and their -knees) restored to their former estates. She had nothing to say to them, -but sat like one entranced, looking fixedly at the floor while Bothwell -made his speech, and Morton after him, in his bluff way, expressed his -contrition and desire to be of service in the future. Mr. Archie Douglas, -one of a crowd of repentant rebels, contented himself with cheering. ‘God -save your Majesty!’ was his cry, and ‘Confusion to all your enemies!’ -whereupon my Lord Morton bethought him of the real occasion of his -recall, and added to his speech a few words more. - -‘Oh, ay!’ he said: ‘by our fruits you shall judge us, madam, whether -we be gratefully replanted in this dear soil or no. Try us, madam, -upon whomsoever hath aggrieved you, or endangered your throne, or the -thrones of them that are to follow you—try us, I say, and see whether our -appetites to serve you are not whetted by our long absence.’ - -She had started and looked hastily at Bothwell,—evidently she was -frightened. Her lips moved for some time before any sound came forth from -them, but presently she said that she should not fail to call for service -in the field when she required it. ‘But the realm is now at peace,’ she -added, ‘and I hope will remain so.’ - -Morton said: ‘Amen to that. Yet be prepared, madam, as the sailors are, -when they lie becalmed upon a sea like oil, but see a brown haze hang -where sky and water meet. And, madam, trust yourself to them that are -weatherwise in this country.’ - -She stammered. ‘I know not what you need fear for me—I hardly understand. -I am very well served—very well advised—but I thank you for your friendly -warning....’ She forced herself to speak, but could not make a coherent -sentence. Bothwell intervened, and presently took away his new friends. - -Lord Morton went to the Douglas house of Whittingehame, a leafy place in -Haddington, not far from the sea. Thither in the first days of January -repaired Bothwell and Huntly, while the Queen stayed in Edinburgh, -friendless, except for Des-Essars and Mary Seton. She passed her days -like one in a dream, speaking seldom, kneeling at altars but not praying, -negligent of her surroundings, sometimes of her person, only alert when -a messenger might be looked for with a letter. Often found in tears, -either she could not or she would not account for them. One day she bade -Des-Essars go with her letter-carriers to Whittingehame. ‘What would you -have me do there, madam?’ he asked. - -She played drearily with his sword-strap. ‘Do? What do spies in general? -See—judge for yourself—look through my eyes if you can.’ - -He turned to go, and she caught at his arm. ‘Baptist,’ she said, ‘I am in -the dark, and horribly afraid. Look you, I know not what they are doing -there together. They whisper and wink and nod at each other; they say -little and mean much. I cannot divine what they intend—or what they will -presently ask me to do. I saw Archie Douglas grin like a wolf that day he -was here—I know not what he grinned at. They tell me nothing—nothing! Do -not suppose but that I trust my lord; but, Baptist, find out something. I -need courage.’ She lay back exhausted, and when he came to her waved him -off, whispering that he was to be quick and go. - -He departed, reached Whittingehame within the day, saw what he -could—which was precisely nothing, for Lord Bothwell was away and Lord -Morton not visible—and on his road home again heard that the King lay -dangerously ill at Glasgow, of smallpox or worse. He took that news in -his pocket, and none that he could have gleaned from the whispers of -Whittingehame could have had effect so surprising. For the first time -for many a month he saw his Queen sane, sweet, crying woman. She fell on -her knees, hiding her face in his sleeve, and gave thanks to God. When -she rose up and went back to her chair he saw the tears in her eyes. -She asked him no further of Bothwell and Morton at their secrets, or of -Archie’s grins. When he came and knelt before her she took his face in -her hands and kissed it. ‘God hath saved me, my dear, and by you,’ she -said. ‘He hath heard my prayers. I am sure now that I shall find mercy. O -fortunate messenger! O happy soul, whom thou hast redeemed!’ - -‘Madam,’ he said eagerly, seeing now why she was so thankful, ‘let me go -to Glasgow. You cannot otherwise be sure of this report. The King may be -ill, and yet not mortally. Let us be sure before we give thanks.’ - -She was crying freely. ‘I have not deserved so great a mercy, God -knoweth. I have been near to deadly sin. Yes, yes—go, Baptist. Go at -once, and return with speed.’ It was settled that he should take with him -her physician and a message of excuse that business kept her from him. -He went to prepare himself; she to write to Bothwell a brave and hopeful -letter concerning this streak of blue in her storm-packed sky. Before -dark Des-Essars was away on a fresh horse. - - * * * * * - -Up from Whittingehame in a day or two came Mr. Secretary Lethington, -very busy; and had private speech with the Queen, reporting the councils -of her friends down there. She listened idly to his urgings of this and -that. What interest had she now in plots woven under yew trees or in -panelled chambers, when high Heaven itself had declared for her quarrel? -Did Archie grin like a wolf, Morton flush and handle his dagger? Let -them—let them! An angel with a flaming sword stood on the house-roof at -Glasgow, and their little rages were nought. - -At the end of his circuitous oration—‘Well, have you ended?’ she asked -him. - -‘Madam, I have no more to say.’ - -She took a scrap of paper and scribbled on it with a pen. ‘Read that, if -you please, and take it with you back again.’ - -‘_Show to the Earl of Morton_,’ he read, ‘_that the Queen will hear no -speech of the matter arranged with him_.’ - -Bothwell laughed to see the dropped jaws, aghast at this rebuff. But she, -confident in the help of high Heaven—which had plucked her, as she said, -from the brink of the pit—had recovered all her audacity. And so she -waited, almost happy again, for the return of her messenger. - - * * * * * - -Des-Essars was gone for more than a week; it was not until the ninth -day from his departure that he brought back his report. I know not what -she had expected—some miraculous dealing or another by which God was to -signify that she was set free to follow her desires; but whatever it was, -the young Brabanter could not end her suspense. So far as the doctors -could judge, the King’s illness might be sweated out of him: they were -trying that when he left. The fever must run its course; no one could -say that it must needs end fatally. Her Majesty was to hope, said the -doctors; and so said Des-Essars, giving the word a twist round. To hope! -She was worn thin with hoping. - -The King was horrible, he told her, and wore a taffeta mask. He was -peevish, but not furious; had not enough strength left him for that. -He lay and snapped at all who came near him, harmlessly, like a snake -robbed of its fang. The light hurt his eyes, so he lay in the dark; but, -being extremely curious about himself, he had a candle burning constantly -beside him, and a hand-glass on the bed, in which he was always looking -at his face: a sign of morbid affection of the brain, the doctors -considered. The Queen said carelessly, ‘Why, what else hath he ever cared -for in life but his own person?’ - -She asked what he had replied to her message of excuse. Des-Essars, who -had not been allowed to talk with him, and had only seen what he did see -when the sick man slept, had delivered it by Standen. Through Standen -also came the answer. The King’s words were, ‘This much you shall say to -the Queen: that I wish Stirling were Jedburgh, and Glasgow the Hermitage, -and I the Earl of Bothwell as I lie here; and then I doubt not but she -would be quickly with me undesired.’ - -She flushed, but not with shame. ‘Doth he think me at Stirling? He is out -there; but otherwise, my dear, he is right enough.’ She turned away with -a sigh. ‘Well, what can I do but wait?’ She was not allowed to wait long. - -Bothwell came to see her, and stayed till near midnight in secret talk. -It was wild and snowy, much like that night, as Des-Essars remembered, in -which Davy had been slain, near a year ago; one of those nights when the -mind, unhappy and querulous, calls up every nerve to the extreme point -of tension. The young man, apprehensive of any and every evil, kept the -watch. He heard the door shut, Bothwell’s step in the corridor; he flew -to the antechamber, hoping that she might send for him. But though he -waited there an hour or more in miserable suspense, neither daring to -show himself nor to leave the place, he heard nothing. Between two and -three o’clock in the morning he fell asleep over the table, wrapped in -his cloak. As once before, she came in, a candle in her hand, and awoke -him by touching his head. - -He sprang up, broad awake in an instant; he saw her. ‘Oh, your face!’ he -cried out. ‘Haunted! haunted!’ It was a face all grey, and as still as -marble save for the looming eyes. - -‘You sleep,’ she said, ‘but I keep vigil. Bid me good-bye. I am going -away.’ - -He said, ‘Where you go, I go. I dare not leave you as now you are.’ - -She was in a stare. ‘I am going to the King.’ - -‘To the King!’ It horrified him. ‘You—alone?’ - -‘I am sent: I must go.’ - -‘I go with you.’ - -She shook her head. ‘You cannot. What I do I must do myself. Now bid me -good speed upon my journey.’ - -He folded his arms. ‘I think I will not. I think the best wish I could -make for you would be that you should die.’ - -This she did not deny; but said she: ‘Vain wishing! I know that I shall -not die until my lord has made me his. After that it had better be soon.’ - -He asked her, with trembling voice, what she wanted with the King; for -he verily thought that she was going there for one dreadful purpose. She -avoided the question. The King had been asking for her, she said, and it -was her duty to obey him. ‘He is mending fast, they tell me; and with his -health his strength will return. I had rather’—she said it with a sick -shudder—‘I had rather see him before he is able to move.’ - -‘Madam,’ urged the young man, much agitated, ‘I entreat you, for -the love of Christ! You must not touch him, or allow.... He is one -sore—hideous—poisoned through and through. On my knees I beg of you. Nay, -before you go you shall kill me.’ - -She looked beside and beyond him in her set, pinched way; he saw the -doom written plain on her face. In an agony, not knowing what he did, he -confronted her boldly. ‘I shall prevent you. You shall not go.’ - -She said, looking at him now with softened eyes: ‘Oh, if it were possible -even now that I might be as once I was, even now I would say to thee, my -friend, Take me, O true heart, for I would be true like thee! Ah, if it -were possible! Ah, if it were possible!’ Her great eyes seemed homes of -mournful light; so longingly did she look that, for a moment, he thought -he had conquered her. She gave a shake of the head, and when she looked -at him again the kindly hue had gone. ‘But it is not possible—and I am -a soiled woman, wounded in the side and defiled by my own blood; for my -desire is not as thine.’ - -‘Oh,’ cried he, ‘what are you saying? Do you condemn yourself?’ - -She shook her head. ‘I neither condemn nor condone: I speak the truth. I -ache for my lover; I must work my fingers to the bone for him.’ - -‘Not while I have mine—to work for you—to sin for you.’ - -‘You cannot. Your fingers are too tender.’ - -This angered him. ‘How can you say that, madam? How can you hurt me so? -You know that I love you. Is it nothing to you? Less than nothing?’ - -She said, ‘It is much. Come, you and I will kiss together for the last -time.’ She smiled a welcome, held out her arms; sobbing, he put them down -and took her in his own instead, and held her close. There for a while -she was content to be. But when he began to take more than his due, she -gently disengaged herself, having won her object, which was to depart -without him. ‘Adieu, dear faithful friend,’ she said—‘pray for me’; and -as he knelt before her, she stooped down and lifted up his head by the -chin, and kissed him on the forehead, and was gone. After that, she was -inaccessible to him, her door denied. - -In three days’ time—on the 23rd of January—she started for Glasgow with -Lords Livingstone, Herries, and Traquair. Bothwell went part of her way, -to where the roads divide. Her last public act had been to allow of the -marriage between Fleming and Lethington. ‘And now,’ she said, ‘I shall -have but one Mary left, who came hither with four. So endeth our Maids’ -Adventure.’ But if I am right, it had ended long before. Now she was but -a beast driven by the herdsmen to the market, there to be cheapened by -the butcher. - - * * * * * - -Of his own moving adventure of the night when, for one moment, she -assuredly looked back over her shoulder, Des-Essars writes what I -consider his most fatuous page. ‘There was,’ he says, ‘a kind of very -passion in that close embrace; and I knew, _by the way she returned my -kisses_, that she was strongly inclined to me. Indeed, she said as much -when she told me that it would have been possible, at an earlier day, for -her to love me as she had once loved the King; with ardour, namely, like -a fanciful child, in the secret mind, with the body but little concerned -in the matter.[7] But it was too late. She owned herself tainted; he had -taught her vice. She could be child no more, girl in love no more; alas, -no, but a thirsty nymph stung by an evil spirit, ever restless, ever -craving, never to be appeased....’ - -There is more in the same strain, which I say is fatuous. Whether she -had a tenderness for him or not—and no doubt she had one—she was not -revealing it then. Far from it, she wanted to escape, and this was her -readiest way. She was at her old cajolery when she let him embrace and -kiss her; and maybe she did kiss back. It is to be observed that she got -her way immediately afterwards. - -[7] His own report stultifies him here. According to him, she did not say -it would have been possible, but oh, that it had been possible. - - - - -CHAPTER V - -MEDEA IN THE BEDCHAMBER - - -Women, in the experience of French Paris, as he once informed a select -company of his acquaintance, could only be trusted to do a thing, and -never to cause a thing to be done. ‘They will always find a thousand -reasons why it should not be done, or why it should be done another -way—their way, an older way, a newer way, any way in the world but yours. -Burn the boats, burn the boats, dear sirs, when you need a woman to -help you, as you constantly do in delicate affairs.’ He instanced, as a -case in point, his own confidence in Queen Mary, and his master’s want -of confidence, when the pair of them rode with her part of her way to -Glasgow; and how he was entirely justified by her subsequent behaviour. -It made little difference in the end, to be sure; but no doubt she -would have been saved a good deal of distress if Bothwell had been as -instructed as his lacquey. As it is, it is to be feared that he fretted -her sadly. It was not only heartless to play upon her jealousy, to put -her so sharply upon her honour, but it was bad policy on his part; for if -the creature of your use starts a-quivering at the touch of your hand, -how are you served if by your whip and spurs you set her plunging madly -into the dark, shying and swerving and cracking her heart? You wear out -your tool before the time. That is just what Bothwell did. - -The fact is that, as aforesaid, she was too sensitive an instrument for -his coarse fingers. As well give Blind Jack a fiddle of Cremona for his -tap-room jiggeries. If my lord wanted work from her which Moll Bawd -or Kate Cutsheet would have done better, he should have known wiselier -how to get it than by using the only stimulus such hacks could feel. -This tremulous, starting, docile creature to be pricked on by jealousy, -forsooth! Why, that had been King Darnley’s silly way. ‘I would that -Glasgow might be the Hermitage and myself the Earl of Bothwell as I lie -here,’ he had said; and it made her laugh and admit the truth. But this -Bothwell was no finer. ‘Ohè! a many weary leagues before I win my home! -Well, I am sure of a welcome there.’ And then, when she bent her head to -the way, ‘Ay, Queens and Kings, and all gudemen and wives are in the like -case. Bed and board—it comes down e’en to that. Love is just a flaunty -scarf to draw the eye with. You see it purfling at a window, and, think -you, that should be a dainty white hand a-working there!’ - -She lifted her face to meet the driving snow, looked into the dun sky -and saw it speckled with black—her own colours henceforward! Thus would -she be from her soul outwards—sodden grey, and speckled with black. The -burden of her heart was so heavy that she groaned aloud. ‘You falter, you -fear!’ cried that fidgety brute. ‘Mercy, mercy,’ she stammered; ‘I shall -fail if you speak to me.’ - -The snow was falling fast, but there was no wind, when she said farewell -to her lover at Callander gate. He would not go in; purposed to ride -southward into Liddesdale with but one change of horses, fearing that -the wind would get up after dark and make the hill-roads impossible. The -Black Laird of Ormiston, Tala, and Bowton were to go with him; he left -Paris behind to be her messenger if she should need to send one. There -was no time to spare. ‘Set on, gentlemen,’ he said, ‘I will overtake you.’ - -He shook the snow from his cloak, set it flying from eyelashes and beard, -drew near to the sombre lady where she stood in the midst of her little -company, and put his hand upon her saddle-bow. ‘God speed your Grace upon -your goodly errand,’ he said—whereat she gave a little moan of the voice, -but did not otherwise respond—‘and send us soon a happy meeting—Amen!’ - -She looked at him piercingly for a second of time, and then resumed -her staring and glooming. He cried her farewell once more, saluted the -lords, and pounded over the frozen marsh. One could hear him talking and -laughing for a long way, and the barking answers of Ormiston. - -The Queen rode up the avenue to the doors, and was taken to bed by Mary -Seton and Carwood. She kept her chamber all that evening and night, but -sent for Paris early in the morning. He saw her in bed, thin and drawn -in the face, very narrow-eyed, and with a short cough. She handed him a -great sack, sealed and tied, and a letter. - -‘Take these to your master at the Hermitage. You shall have what horses -you need. In that pack are four hundred crowns. You see how much trust I -have in you.’ - -Paris assured her that her trust was well bestowed, as she should find -out by his quick return to her. - -She laughed, not happily. ‘I hope so. I came from France, and to France I -go in my need.’ - -‘Why, madam,’ says Paris, ‘does your Majesty intend for my country?’ - -‘No, no. I shall see the land of France no more. I spoke of Frenchmen, -who are tender towards women.’ - -Paris felt inspired to say that none loved her Majesty more entirely than -the men of his nation, who had delicate sensibility for the perfections -of ladies. And he modestly adduced as another example Monsieur -Des-Essars, lately advanced to be one of her esquires. - -She coloured faintly. ‘Yes,’ she said, ‘I believe he loves me well. Him -also I trust—you, Paris, and Monsieur Des-Essars.’ - -Paris fell upon his knees. She changed her mood instantly, bade him -begone with the treasure, and rejoin her at Glasgow with letters from my -lord. - -Paris faithfully performed his errand, in spite of the snow with which -the country was blanketed as deeply as in a fleece. - -‘My lord was glad of the money,’ he tells us, ‘and sent Monsieur de Tala -away with it immediately. Before I left him to go to the Queen at Glasgow -he told me of his plot, which was to blow the King up with gunpowder as -he lay in a lodging at Edinburgh. I said, the King was not at Edinburgh -yet. “No, fool,” says he, “but he soon will be.” He showed me papers -of association whereon I was to believe stood the names of my lord -himself, of my Lords Morton, Argyll, Huntly, Ruthven, and Lindsay, of Mr. -Douglas, Mr. James Balfour, and others. He pointed to one name far below -the others. “That,” he said, “is of our friend the White Rat,”—my own -name for Mr. Secretary. He asked me what I thought of it; I told him, I -thought no good of it. “Why not, you fool?” he jeered at me. I replied, -“Because, my lord, you do not show me the name of names.” - -‘Although he knew entirely well what name I meant, he forced me to -mention Monsieur de Moray, and then was angry that I did so. He said that -lord would not meddle. I said, “He is wise.” Then he began to jump about -the chamber, hopping from board to board like a crow with his wing cut. -“My lord of Moray! My lord of Moray!” cried he out. “He will neither help -nor hinder; but it is all one. It is late now to change advice—as why -should we change for a fool’s word such as thine? If we have Lethington, -blockhead, have we not his master?” - -‘I said, No; for those gentlemen who interested themselves in the late -David had Mr. Secretary, and thought they had the Earl of Moray also. -But they found out their mistake the next day, when he came back and, -rounding upon them, turned every one of them out. - -‘“Well,” he cried—“Well! What then? What is all that to the purpose? Did -he not sign my bond at the Council of October?” That bond was what we -used to call “Of the Scotchmen’s Business,” because all present signed a -paper in favour of the Queen, which was not read aloud. I admitted that -he had signed it; but I was not convinced by that. I considered that it -pledged him to nothing. I thought it my duty to add, “You are my master, -my lord. If you command me in this I shall serve you, because in my -opinion it is the business of servants to obey, not to advise. But I say, -for the last time, Beware the Earl of Moray.” My master began to rail and -swear at his lordship—a natural but vain thing to do. I was silent. - -‘The next day after, he told me that he had revealed his plan to Monsieur -Hob of Ormiston and to his brother-in-law, my lord of Huntly. If I had -dared I should have asked him whether my lady the Countess had been -informed; and I did ask it of her woman Torles, who was a friend of mine. -But Torles said that, so far as she knew, the Countess never spoke with -my lord about the Queen’s affairs. - -‘I was curious about another thing, exceedingly curious. “Tell me, my -dear Torles,” I said, “our lord and lady—are they still good friends?” -From the way that she looked at me, her sly way, and grinned, I knew the -answer. “They are better friends, my fine man, than you and I are ever -likely to be.” I said something gallant, to the effect that there might -be better reasons, and played some little foolishness or other, which -pleased her very much. Next morning I started to go to Glasgow with -letters for the Queen’s Majesty.’ - -That was on the 26th January, the very day when Mr. Secretary Lethington -was married to his Fleming. Paris heard that he took her to his house -of Lethington, but (as he truly adds) the affair is of no moment, where -he took her, or whether he took her at all. ‘It was long since she had -been of the Queen’s party; indeed, I always understood that it was a -love-match between them, entered into at first sight; and that Mistress -Fleming had been alienated from her allegiance from the beginning.’ Paris -was sorry. ‘She was a pretty and a modest lady, in a Court where those -two graces were seldom in partnership.’ - - * * * * * - -He learned at Glasgow that the King was still very sick, and the Queen -in a low condition of body. It seems that when she had reached the house -she would not have the patient informed of the fact, and would not go -to him that same night. Some of the Hamiltons had met her on the road, -and returned with her into the town. There was a full house, quite a -Court, and a great company about her at supper. Lady Reres was there, -an old friend of her Majesty’s, and of Lord Bothwell’s too, and Lord -Livingstone, full of his pranks. He, it seems, had rallied the Queen -finely about her despondency and long silences; said in a loud whisper -that he was ready for a toast to an absentee if she would promise to -drink to the name he would cry; and although she would not do it, but -shook her head and looked away, his broad tongue was always hovering -about Bothwell’s name. It is to be supposed that he drank to many distant -friends, for Bastien, the Queen’s valet, told Paris that his lordship -grew very blithe after supper. ‘If you will believe me, Paris,’ he said, -‘as her Majesty was warming her foot at the fire, leaning upon this -Monsieur de Livingstone’s shoulder, his jolly lordship took her round -the middle as if she had been his wench, and cried out upon her doleful -visage. “Be merry,” says he, “and leave the dumps to him you have left -behind you.” She flung away from him as if he teased her, but allowed his -arm to be where it was, and his hardy hand too.’ - -Great dealings for the Parises and Bastiens to snigger at. I suppose -it is no wonder that they unqueened her, since, however fast they went -to work, it was never so fast as she did it to herself. They tell me -it was always the way with her family, to choose rather to be easy in -low company than stiff with the great folk about them. The common sort, -therefore, loved the race of Stuart, and the lords detested it. But we -must follow Paris if we are to see the Queen. - -Though he delivered his letters as soon as he arrived, he was not sent -for until late at night. The King’s man, Joachim, took him upstairs, -saying as they went, ‘I hope thou hast a stout stomach; for take it from -me, all is not very savoury up here.’ - -Paris replied that he had been so long in the service of gentlemen that -their savour meant little to him, even that of diseased gentlemen. - -‘Right,’ says Joachim; ‘right for thee, my little game-cock. But thou -shalt not find the Queen in too merry pin, be assured.’ - -Carwood, her finger to her lip, met him in the corridor, passed him in -through the anteroom, and pulled aside the heavy curtain. ‘Go in softly,’ -she said, ‘and be careful of your feet. It is very dark, and the King -sleeps. In with you.’ - -She drew back and let the curtain drive him forward. Certainly it was -plaguey dark. He saw the Queen at the far end of the chamber writing a -letter, haloed in the light of a single taper. She looked up when she -heard him, but did not beckon him nearer; so he stayed where he was, and, -as his eyes grew used to the gloom, looked about him. - -It was a spacious room, but low in the ceiling, and raftered, with heavy -curtains across the windows, which were embayed. A great bed was in the -midst of the wall, canopied and crowned, with plumes at the corners and -hangings on all sides but one—the door side. He could not see the King -lying there, though he could hear his short breaths, ‘like a dog’s with -its tongue out’; but presently, to his huge discomfort, he made out a -sitting figure close to the pillow on the farther side, and not six paces -from him across the bed—man or woman he never knew. It might have been a -dead person, he said, for all the motion that it made. ‘It sat deep in -the shadow, hooded, so that you could not see its face, or whether it had -a face; and one white hand supported the hood. It did not stir when the -sufferer needed assistance, such as water, or the turning of a pillow, or -a handkerchief. It was a silent witness of everything done and to be gone -through with; gave me lead in the bowels, as they say, the horrors in the -hair.’ - -It may have been Mary Seton, or a priest, or a watching nun; at any rate, -it terrified Paris, his head already weakened by the burden of that fetid -chamber. The air was overpowering, tainted to sourness, seeming to clog -the eyelids and stifle the light. - -By and by the Queen beckoned him forward, putting up her finger to enjoin -a soft tread. He came on like a cat, and stood within touching distance -of her, and saw that she was kneeling at a table, writing with extreme -rapidity, tears running down her face. There was a silver crucifix in -front of her, to which she turned her eyes from time to time, as if -referring to it the words which cost her so much to put down. Once, after -a frenzy of penmanship, she held out her hands to it in protest; then -reverently took it up and kissed it, to sanctify so the words she was -writing: ‘The good year send us that God knit us together for ever for -the most faithful couple that ever He did knit together.’ Paris knew very -well to whom she wrote so fully, who was to read this stained, passionate -letter, ill scrawled on scraps of old paper, scored with guilt, blotted -with shameful tears, loving, repentant, wilful, petulant, unspeakably -loyal and tender, all by turns. At this moment the King called to her. - -He lay, you must know, with a handkerchief over his face. Paris had -believed him asleep, for his breathing, though short, was regular, and -his moaning and the working of his tongue counted for little in a sick -man’s slumber. But while she was in the thick of her work at the table he -coughed and called out to her in distress, ‘Mary, O Mary! where are you -gone?’ And when she did not answer, but went on with the unspinning of -the thought in her mind, and let him call ‘Mary, O Mary!’ Paris, looking -from one to the other—and awfully on that shrouded third—found blame for -her in his heart. - -She finished her line, got up, and went to the foot of the bed. ‘You call -me? What is your pleasure?’ - -‘His pleasure! Faith of a Christian!’ thinks Paris. - -The King whispered, ‘Water, in Christ’s name’; and Paris heard the -clicking of his dry tongue. Nevertheless he said, ‘Let me fetch you the -water, madam.’ - -‘Yes,’ she said, ‘fetch it you. And I would that one of us could be -drowned in the water.’ - -He poured some into a cup and took it to her. - -‘Give it him,’ says she, ‘give it him. I dare not go nearer.’ - -The King heard that, and became sadly agitated. He wriggled his legs, -tossed about, and began to wail feebly. In the end she had to take it, -but you could see that she was nearly sick with loathing of him, natural -and otherwise. For to say nothing that she had to lift the handkerchief, -that he was hideous, his breath like poison, she was so made that only -one could possess her at a time. If she loved a man she could not abide -that any other should claim a right of her—least of all one who had a -title to claim it. - -The water cooled his fever for a time and brought him vitality. He -talked, babbled, in the random way of the very sick, plunging headlong -into the heart of a trouble and flying out before one can help with -a hand. But he was quick enough to see that she did not respond -readily, and sly enough to try her upon themes which he judged would be -stimulating. He confessed with facile tears the faults of his youth and -temper, begged her pardon times and again for his offences against her. -‘Oh, I have done wickedly by you, my love, but all’s over now. You shall -see how well we will do together.’ - -Said she, ‘It will be better to wait a while. Talk not too much, lest you -tax yourself.’ - -He rolled about, blinking his sightless eyes. ‘Do not be hard upon me! I -repent—I tell you that I do. Pardon me, my Mary, pardon my faults. Let us -be as we were once—lovers—wedded lovers—all in all!’ Paris saw her sway, -with shut eyes, as she listened to him. ‘I would have you sleep now, my -lord. It will be best for you. You tire yourself by talking.’ - -He begged for a kiss, and, when she affected not to hear him, grew very -wild. It was a curious thing that she did then, watched by Paris with -wonder. She dipped the tips of her two forefingers in the cup of water, -and, putting them together, touched the back of his hand with them. ‘Ah, -the balm of your cool sweet lips!’ he cried out, and was satisfied. But -when he asked her to kiss his forehead she, in turn, became agitated, -laughing and crying at once, and rocked herself about before she could -repeat the touch of her two wet fingers on so foul a place. Again he -sighed his content, and lay quiet, and presently dozed again. - -She left him instantly and went back to her writing. She wrote fast; the -fierce pen screamed over the paper: ‘You make me dissemble so much that -I am afraid thereof with horror.... You almost make me play the part of -a traitor.... If it were not for obeying I had rather be dead. My heart -bleedeth at it....’ And again, ‘Alas! I never deceived anybody, but I -remit myself wholly to your will. Send me word what I shall do, and -whatsoever happen unto me I will obey you.... Think also if you will -not find some invention more secret by physic; for he is to take physic -at Craigmillar and the baths also, and shall not come forth for a long -time.... - -... ‘It is very late; and although I should never be tired in writing to -you, yet I will end after kissing your hands. Excuse my evil writing and -read this over twice.... Pray remember your friend and write to her, and -often. Love me always as I shall love you.’ - -She put a bracelet of twisted hair in between the sheets, made a packet -of the whole, and beckoned Paris to follow her into the next room. -‘Take you this,’ she said, ‘whither you know well, and tell my lord all -that you have seen and heard. He will learn so that I am a faithful and -obedient lover. And if he should be jealous, and ask you in what manner -I have behaved myself here, you may show him.’ So speaking, she joined -her two forefingers, as he had seen her do before, and touched the table -with them. He was not likely to forget that, however. It struck him as an -ingenious and quaint device. - -‘If my lord need me,’ she went on, ‘he can send you to Linlithgow, where -I shall lie one night. Thence I shall go directly to Craigmillar with the -King’s litter. It is late, and I must go to bed, if not to sleep. Other -women lie abed, comforted, or to be comforted before daylight; but that -cannot I be as yet. Now go, Paris.’ - -He said, ‘Madam, be of good heart. All things come by waiting.’ - -She sighed, but said nothing. He made his reverence, and away. - - - - -CHAPTER VI - -KIRK O’ FIELD - - -The Earl of Bothwell returned to Edinburgh the day before the Queen -was to leave Glasgow, and sent for Des-Essars to come to his lodging. -‘Baptist,’ he said, ‘I understand that her Majesty will be at Linlithgow -this night, with the King in his litter. She will look to see me there, -but I cannot go, with all my affairs in this town out of train and no -one to overlook them but myself. I desire you, therefore, to go with the -escort that is to meet her, and to give her this message from me: “It -has not been found possible to accommodate the King at Craigmillar, but -a house has been got for him near Saint-Mary-in-the-Field, and properly -furnished. Please your Majesty, therefore, direct his bearers thither.”’ - -He made him repeat the words two or three times until he was sure of -them; then added, ‘If the Queen ask you more concerning this house, _with -intent to know more_, and not for mere curiosity, you shall tell her that -it is near the great house of the Hamiltons, in the which the Archbishop -now lodges. She will be satisfied with that, you will find, and ask you -no more.’ - -Des-Essars understood him perfectly; but in case the reader do not, I -shall remind him that this Archbishop Hamilton of Saint Andrews was -brother of the old Duke of Châtelherault, of whom he used to hear in -the beginning of this book—one of the clan, then, which disputed the -Succession with the Lennox Stuarts and was regarded by the King as an -hereditary enemy, with a blood-feud neither quenched nor quenchable. That -same Archbishop, when the Queen was at Stirling for the baptism, scaring -of the King, recall of Morton and the rest of the deeds done there, had -been restored to his consistorial powers, and put at liberty to bind and -loose according to his discretion and that of Saint Peter his master. -There had been some talk at the time as to why he had been so highly -favoured, and the opinion commonly held that he was to divorce the Queen -from the King. That was not French Paris’s opinion, for one. In Edinburgh -now, at any rate, was this Archbishop Hamilton with the keys of binding -and loosing in his hands, not as yet making any use of them, and lodging -in the great family house without the city wall. - -Well, the escort departed for Linlithgow, Des-Essars with it. This is -what he says of his adored mistress: - -‘I think she was glad to see me, as certainly was I to see her looking -so hale and fresh. Her eyes were like wet stars; she kissed me twice at -meeting, with lips which had regained their vivid scarlet, were cool but -not dry. I hastened to excuse my Lord Bothwell on the score of affairs. -“Yes, yes, I know how pressed he is,” she replied. “I know he would have -come if it had been possible. He has sent me the best proxy by you.” -I told her that my Lord Huntly would be here momently, but she made a -pouting mouth and a little grimace—then looked slily at me and laughed. - -‘I rehearsed faithfully my Lord Bothwell’s message, and could not see -that she was particularly interested in the King’s actual lodging—though -that is by no means to imply that she was _not_ interested. It is due -to say that I never knew any person in all my experience of Courts -and policy so quick as she not only to conceal her thoughts, but also -to foresee when it would behove her to conceal them. It was next to -impossible to surprise her heart out of her. - -‘She asked me eagerly for Edinburgh news. I told her that the Hamiltons -were in their own house; the Archbishop there already, and my Lord of -Arbroath expected every day. She said in a simple, wondering kind of -a way, “Why, the Hamilton house is next neighbour unto the King’s, I -suppose?” - -‘“Madam,” I said, “it is. And so my Lord Bothwell bid me remind your -Majesty.” - -‘She laughed; a little confusedly. “Better the King should not know of -it,” she said. “He hates that family, and fears them, too. But that is -not extraordinary, for he always hates those whom he fears.” - -‘She asked, was my lord of Morton in town? I replied that he was, with -a strong guard about his doors and a goodly company within them, as Mr. -Archibald Douglas of Whittingehame and his brother, Captain Cullen, Mr. -Balfour of Fliske, and others like him, and also the laird of Grange. -To him resorted most of the lords of the new religion; they, namely, of -Lindsay, Ruthven, Glencairn, and Argyll. My lord of Bothwell, however, -lodging in the Huntly house, had a larger following than the Douglases; -for all the Hamiltons paid him court as well as his own friends. She did -not ask me, but I told her that her brother, my Lord Moray, kept much to -himself, and saw few but ministers of his religion, such as Mr. Wood and -Mr. Craig, and Mr. Secretary Lethington, who (with his wife) was lodged -in his lordship’s house, and worked with him every day. - -‘She stopped me here by looking long at me, and then asking shortly, -“Have you heard anything of my Lady Bothwell?” which confused me very -much. I could only reply that I had heard she had been indisposed. “I am -sorry to hear it,” said she in quite an ordinary tone, “and am sorry also -for her, when she finds out that her sickness is not what she hopes it -is. You have not seen her, I suppose?” I had not. - -‘“I have seen her in illness,” she pursued. “It does not become -white-faced women to be so, for to be pale is one thing, but to be pallid -another. When the transparency departs from a complexion of ivory, the -residuum is paste. I myself have not a high colour by nature: yet when I -am ill, as I am now, I always have fever, and look better than when my -health is better. Did you not think, when you saw me first this morning, -that I looked well?” - -‘I had thought she looked both beautiful and well, and told her so. She -was pleased. - -‘“I love you, Baptist, when you look at me like that, and your words find -echo in your eyes. Now I will tell you that the joy of seeing you again -had much to say to my good looks. But I think that women would always -rather look well than be well.” - -‘As soon as my Lord Huntly had come in and dined, we departed from -Linlithgow. Her Majesty rode on with that lord, Lord Livingstone and the -others, leaving me behind with Mr. Erskine and the ladies, to conduct -the King’s litter safely to the house prepared for him. I did not see -his face nor hear him speak, but understood that he was greatly better. -His hand, which was often outside the curtains, waving about, looked -that of a clean man. He kept it out there, my Lady Reres told me, in the -hope that her Majesty would see and touch it. Once, when it had been -signalling about for some while, her ladyship said, “’Tis a black shame -there should be a man’s hand wagging and no woman’s to slip into it.” So -then she let him get hold of hers; and he, thinking he had the Queen’s, -squeezed and fondled it until she was tired. We got him by nightfall -into a mean little house, set in a garden the most disconsolate and -weed-grown that ever you saw. It was a wild, wet evening, and as we went -down Thieves’ Row the deplorable inhabitants of that street of stews and -wicked dens were at their doors watching us. As we came by they pointed -to the gable of the house, and uttered harsh and jeering cries. Lady -Reres screamed and covered her face. There was perched an old raven on -the gable-end, that croaked like any philosopher in the dumps; and as we -set down the litter in the roadway, he flapped his ragged wings twice or -thrice, and flew off into the dark, trailing his legs behind him. The -people thought it an ill-omen....’ - - * * * * * - -Here, for the time being, I forsake Des-Essars, and that for two reasons: -the first, that I have a man to hand who knew more; the second, that -what little the Brabanter did know he did not care to tell. A more than -common acquaintance with his work assures me that his secret preoccupied -him from hereabouts to the end—that _Secret des Secrets_ of his which he -thought so important as to have written his book for nothing else but to -hold it. We shall come upon it all in good time, and see more evidently -than now we do another, and what we may call supererogatory secret, which -is that he grew bolder in his passion for the Queen, and she, perhaps, a -little inclined to humour it. But for the present we leave him, and turn -to the brisk narrative of one who knew nearly everything that was to be -known, and could hazard a sharp guess at things which, it almost seems, -could never perfectly be known. I mean, of course, our assured friend -French Paris—bought, once for all, with a crown piece. - -French Paris asks, in his bright way, ‘Do you know that lane that runs -straight from the Cowgate to the old house by the Blackfriars—the -Blackfriars’ Wynd, as they call it?’ You nod your head, and he continues. -‘Well, towards the end of that same lane, if you wish to reach the -convent house, you pass through the ancient wall of the city by a gate -in it which is called the Kirk o’ Field Port. This will lead you to the -Blackfriars’ Church, but not until you have turned the angle of the wall -and followed the road round it towards the left hand. Within that angle -stands another church, Saint Mary-of-the-Field, which has nothing to do -with what I have to tell you. But mark what I say now. You go through -the Kirk o’ Field Port; you turn to the left round by the wall; on your -right hand, at no great distance along, you behold a row of poor hovels -at right angles to your present direction—doorless cabins, windowless, -without chimneys, swarming with pigs, fowls, and filthy children; between -them a very vile road full of holes and quags and broken potsherds. That -is called Thieves’ Row, and for the best of good reasons. Nevertheless, -behind those little pigs’ houses, on either hand, there are gardens very -fair; and if you venture up, above the thatch of the roofs you will see -the tops of fine trees waving in a cleaner air than you would believe -possible, and find in the full middle of this Thieves’ Row, again on -either hand, a garden gate right in among the mean tenements. That -which is on the right hand leads into the old Blackfriars’ Garden, a -great tangled place of trees and greensward with thickets interspersed; -the other, on the left hand, belongs to the garden of the house wherein -they lodged the King when they had brought him from Glasgow. Above the -gate could once be seen the gable-end of the house itself; but you will -not see it now if you look for it. And if you stood in the garden of his -house and looked out over the boskage, you could see the hotel of the -Lord Archbishop of Saint Andrews, the Hamilton House. Usefully enough, -as it turned out, there let a little door from the corner of the King’s -garden right upon the Archbishop’s house. - -‘To tell you of the King’s lodging, it was as mean as you please, built -of rough-cast work upon arches of rubble and plaster, with a flight of -stairs from the ground-level reaching to the first floor—the _piano -nobile_, save the mark! Upon that floor was a fair hall, and a chamber -in which the Queen might lie when she chose, wardrobe, maids’ chamber, -cabinet, and such like. The King lay on the floor above, having his own -chamber for his great bed, with a little dressing-room near by. His -servants, of whom he had not more than three or four, slept some in the -passage and some in the hall; except his chamber-child, who lay in the -bedchamber itself, on or below the foot of the King’s great bed. Now -those stairs of which I told you just now led directly from the garden to -the hall upon the first floor; but out of the Queen’s chamber there was a -door giving on to a flight of wooden steps, very convenient, as thereby -she could come in and out of the house without being disturbed. All this -I observed for myself, as my master desired me, when Nelson, the King’s -man, was showing me how ill-furnished and meanly found it was to be the -lodging of so great a gentleman. - -‘To say nothing of the garden, which, in that winter season, was -miserable indeed, I was bound to agree that the house wanted repair. -Nelson showed me where the roof let in water; he showed me the holes of -rats, the track of their runs across the floors, and the places where -they had gnawed the edges of the doors. “And, if you will believe me, -Paris,” said he, “there is not so much as a key to a lock in the whole -crazy cabin.” This was a thing which I was glad to have learned, and to -bring to my master’s knowledge when, at the last moment, he thought fit -to acquaint me with his pleasure. I had heard, in outline, what it was, -on the day before I went to the Queen at Glasgow; but I will ask you -to believe that he told me no more until the morning of the day when I -received his commands to go to work. This is entirely true; though it is -equally true that I found out a good deal for myself. My master, you must -understand, had not a fool under his authority. No, no! - -‘I did not myself see the Queen for two or three days after the King’s -coming in, though I took many letters to her and bore back her replies. -When I say I did not see her, that is a lie: I did—but never to speak -with her, merely as one may pass in the street. I was struck with her -fine looks and the shrill sound of her laughter: she talked more than -ordinarily, and never spared herself in the dance. Once, or maybe twice, -she visited the King in his lodging—not to sleep there herself, though -her bed stood always ready, but going down to supper and remaining till -late in the evening: never alone; once with the Lords Moray and Argyll, -and once with (among other company) her brother, the Lord Robert, and -a Spanish youth very much in his confidence. As to this second visit, -Monsieur Des-Essars, who was there, told me a singular thing,[8] namely, -that this Lord Robert had been moved to impart to the King the danger -he lay in—that is, close to the Hamiltons, and with my Lord Morton at -large and in favour in Edinburgh. Now, for some reason or another, it -seems that his Majesty repeated the confidence to the Queen herself just -as I have told it to you. Whereupon, said Monsieur Des-Essars, she flew -into a passion, commanded the Lord Robert into her presence, and when -he was before her, the King lying on his bed, bade him repeat the story -if he dare. My Lord Robert laughed it off as done by way of a jest, and -the Queen, more and more angry, sent him away. Now, here comes what I -call the cream of the jest. “You may judge from this, Paris,” said M. -Des-Essars to me, “how monstrous foolish it is to suppose that the Queen -devises some mischief against her consort, or shares the counsels of any -of his enemies. For certainly, if she did, she would not provoke them -into betraying her in his own presence.” - -‘I thanked his honour, but when he had gone I burst out laughing to -myself. Do you ask why? First of all, none knew better than M. Des-Essars -how the Queen stood with regard to her husband, and why my lord of Morton -had been suffered to come home. None knew better than he, except it were -the Queen herself, that the King was to be removed, she standing aside. -Very well: then why did M. Des-Essars try to hoodwink me, except in the -hope to gather testimony on all sides against what he feared must take -place? But why did the Queen bring my Lord Robert face to face with -the King, she knowing too well that his warning had bones and blood -in it? Ah! that is more delicate webbery: she was a better politician -than her young friend. To begin with, there was no real danger; for the -Lord Robert knew nothing, and was nothing but a windbag. His confusion, -therefore (he was at heart a coward), would give the King confidence. -But, secondly, I am sure she still hoped that his Majesty might be -removed without my master’s aid. I think she said to herself, “The King -gains his health”—as indeed he did, with his natural skin coming back -again, and the clear colour to his eyes—“and with health,” she would -reason it, “his choler will return. To confront these two, with a lie -between them, may provoke a quarrel. The daggers are handy: who can say -what the end of this may be? One of two mishaps: the King will kill Lord -Robert, or Lord Robert the King; either way will be good.” Observe, I -know nothing; but that is how I read the story. - - * * * * * - -‘Now, all this while my master was very busy, very brisk and happy, -singing at the top of his voice as he went about his business—as he -always did on the verge of a great enterprise; but the first precise -information I had that our work was close at hand was upon 9th February, -being a Sunday. My master lodging at the Lord Huntly’s house in the -Cowgate, I was standing at the door at, maybe, seven o’clock in the -morning; black as Hell it was, but the cold not extraordinary. There came -some woman down the street with a lantern swinging, and stopped quite -close to me. She swung her lantern-light into my face, and, the moment -she saw that I was I, began to speak in an urgent way. She was Margaret -Carwood, one of the Queen’s women. - -‘“Oh, Paris,” she says, “I have been sent express to you! You are to go -down to the King’s lodging and fetch away the quilt which lies on the -Queen’s bed there.” - -‘I knew this quilt well—a handsome piece of work, of Genoa velvet, much -overlaid with gold thread, which they say had belonged to the old Queen. - -‘I asked, “By whose order come you, my good Carwood?” for I was not -everybody’s man. - -‘She replied, “By the Queen’s own, given to me by word of mouth, not an -hour since. Go now, go, Paris. She is in a rare fluster, and will not -rest.” - -‘“Toho!” I say, “she disquieteth herself about this quilt.” - -‘And Carwood said, “Ay, for it belonged to her lady mother, and is -therefore worth rubies in her sight. She hath not slept a wink since she -woke dreaming of it.” - -‘To be short, this gave me, as they say, food for thoughts. Then, -about the eleven o’clock, as the people were coming out from their -sermon, I had more of the same provender—and a full meal of it. Judge -for yourselves when I tell you with what the vomiting church doors -were buzzing. My lord of Moray had left Edinburgh overnight and gone -northward, to Lochleven, to see his mother, the Lady Douglas. He had -taken secret leave of the Queen, and immediately after was away. Oh, -Monsieur de Moray, Monsieur de Moray! is not your lordship the archetype -and everlasting pattern of all rats that are and shall be in the world? - -‘Now, putting the one thing on the top of the other, you may believe -that I was not at all surprised to get my master’s orders the same -day, to convey certain gunpowder from Hamilton House through the King’s -garden into the Queen’s chamber so soon as it was quite dark. There you -have the reason why the quilt had been saved. Powrie, Dalgleish, and -Patrick Wilson were to help me; Monsieur Hob d’Ormiston would show us -how to dispose of our loads and spread the train for the slow match. In -Hamilton House it lay, mark you well! I will make the figs in the face of -anybody who tells me that the Hamiltons were not up to the chin in the -affair. How should we use their house without their leave? There were the -Archbishop and Monsieur d’Arbroath involved. But enough! It is obvious. -And I can tell you of another gentleman heavily involved, no one more -certainly than I. It was my lord of Huntly: yes, gentlemen, no less a man. - -‘It fell out about the five o’clock that, judging it dark enough for far -more delicate work than this of powder-laying, I was setting out to join -my colleagues by Hamilton House, when my Lord Huntly sends down a valet -for me to go to his cabinet. I had had very few dealings with this young -nobleman, whom (to say truth) I had always considered something of a -dunce. He was as silent as his sister, my master’s lady, and, after his -fashion, as good to look upon. You never saw a straighter-legged man, nor -a straighter-looking, nor one who carried, as I had thought, an empty -head higher in the air. That was my mistake. He was an old lover of the -Queen’s, whom she fancied less than his brother Sir Adam. He, that Sir -Adam, had been bosom-friend of Monsieur Des-Essars when the pair of them -were boys, and had shared the Queen’s favours together, which very likely -were not so bountiful as common rumour would have them. He certainly was -a fiery youth, who may one day do greatly. But I admit that I had held my -Lord Huntly for a want-wit—and that I was very much mistaken. - -‘I went up and into his cabinet, and found him standing before the fire, -with his legs spread out. - -‘“Paris,” says he, “you are off on an errand of your master’s, I -jealouse; one that might take you not a hundred miles from the -Blackfriars’ Garden.” - -‘I admitted all this. “I might tell you,” he says, “that I know that -errand of yours, and share in the enterprise which directs it. Maybe you -have been shown my name upon a parchment writing: I know that you are in -your master’s confidence.” - -‘I replied that I had understood his lordship had been made privy to my -master’s thoughts in many matters, as was only reasonable, seeing the -relationship between both their lordships: upon which he said, “You are a -sly little devil, Paris, but have a kind of honesty, too.” I thanked him -for his good opinion; and then he says, looking very hard at me, “Your -master is now abroad upon this weighty business, and has left me to order -matters at home. Now mark me well, Paris, and fail not in any particular, -at your extreme peril. _The train is to be put to proof at two o’clock -of the morning by the bell of Saint Giles’, but not a moment before._ -You are to tell this to Mr. Hobbie Ormiston, who will report it to your -master. Do you swear upon your mother’s soul in Paradise that you will -deliver this message?” he says. I promised, and, what is more, I kept my -promise; but at the time I thought it very odd that my master, generally -so careful in these nice undertakings, should have left the all-important -direction of _time when_ to so dull-minded a person as my Lord Huntly. To -add to my bewilderment, Monsieur Hob also, when I gave him the message, -told me that he had had it already from his lordship, and had repeated -it to my master. Immediately afterwards we set to work at our little -preliminaries, and were soon sweating and black as negroes. - -‘That night there was a supper in the hall of the King’s lodging, the -Queen being there, my master, the Earls of Huntly and Argyll, the Lord -Livingstone and others, with the King lying on a couch that he might -have their company. They were merry enough at their meal, for I was -working close by and heard them; and I could not help reflecting upon the -drollery of it—for it was droll—that here were executioners and patient -all laughing together, and I behind the party wall laying the table (as -it were) for an ambrosial banquet for one at least of the company. It is -impossible to avoid these humorous images, or I find it so. - -‘Bastien the Breton had that very morning been married to Dolet—both -Queen’s servants. She had been at their mass, and (loving them fondly, as -she was prone to love her servants) intended to be present at the masque -of the night and to put the bride to bed. She, my master, Monsieur de -Huntly, and Mistress Seton were all to go; they were at this supper in -their masquing gear. My master’s was very rich, being of a black satin -doublet slashed with cloth of silver, black velvet trunks trussed and -tagged with the same. My lord of Huntly was all in white. I did not -fairly see the Queen’s gown, which was of a dark colour, I think of -claret, and her neck and bosom bare. I remember that she had a small -crown of daisies and pearls, and a collar of the same things. - -‘At eleven o’clock, or perhaps a little after, the Queen’s linkmen and -carriers were called for. Nelson told me that she kissed the King very -affectionately, and promised to see him the next day. He was positive -about that, for (being curious) I asked him if he had certainly heard her -say that. - -‘“Oh, yes,” he said, “and I’ll tell you why. The King caught her by the -little finger and held her. ‘Next day, say you?’ he asked her. ‘And when -will you say, “This night,” Mary?‘ - -‘“She laughed and swung her hand to and fro, and his with it that held -it. ‘Soon,’ she said, ‘soon.’” - -‘This is what Nelson told me: he was never the man to have conceived that -charming scene of comedy. Well, to continue, my master was to escort -her Majesty out of the house, the grooms going before with torches. Her -litter was in Thieves’ Row, as you may believe when you reflect that our -train of gunpowder extended down her private flight of steps, across the -garden to the door which gives on to Hamilton House. All my work lay -on that side, and there I should have been; but by some extraordinary -mischance it happened that I was just outside the door when my master led -her Majesty out, and so—in a full light of torches—she came plump upon me. - -‘That was a very unfortunate incident, for I was as black as a -charcoal-burner. But there it was: I came full tilt upon her and my -lord, and saw her face in the light of the torches as fair and delicate -as a flower, and her eyes exceedingly bright and luminous, like stars -in midsummer. She was whispering and laughing on my master’s arm, and -he (somewhat distracted) saying, “Ay, ay,” in the way he has when he is -bothered and wishes to be quiet. - -‘But at the sight of me flat against the wall she gave a short cry, and -crushed her bosom with her free hand. “O God! O God! who is this?” - -‘She caught at my master’s arm. By my head, I had given her a fright—just -as the colliers of old gave that Count of Tuscany who thought they -were devils come to require his soul, and was converted to God, and -built seven fine abbeys before he died. Her mouth was open; she did not -breathe; her face was all white, and her eyes were all black. - -‘“Pardon, madam, it is I, your servant, poor French Paris,” I said; and -my master in a hurry, “There, ma’am, there; you see, it is a friend of -ours.” - -‘When she got her breath again, it came back in a flood, like to -suffocate her. She struggled and fought for it so, I made sure she would -faint. So did my master, who put his hand behind to catch her and save -the noise of her fall. She shut her eyes, she tottered. Oh, it was a bad -affair! But she recovered herself by some means, and did her bravest to -carry it off. “Jesu, Paris, how begrimed you are!” she said, panting and -swallowing; and my master damned me for a blackguardly spy, and bade me -go wash myself. - -‘It is true I was behind the door, but most false that I was spying. God -knows, I had enough secrets to keep without smelling for more. But that -was not a time to be justifying myself. My master took the Queen away -immediately, Mistress Seton with her. Afterwards I heard my Lords Argyll -and Livingstone depart—but not M. de Huntly. I saw him again before I -went out myself. - -‘I waited about until I heard the King helped up to bed by his servants; -I waited a long time. They sang a psalm in his chamber, and talked -afterwards, laughing and humming airs. They had the boy to amuse them -with fooleries: Heaven knows what they did or did not. I thought they -would never finish. Finally, I heard the King call, “Good-night all,” saw -the lights put out, and made a move at my best pace to get home, clean -myself, and be ready for the others. Going through the garden along the -edge of my powder-train, I met somebody, who called out, “It is I, the -Earl of Huntly,” and then said, “Remember you of my words? It is now past -midnight. Fire nothing until you hear the strokes of two. More depends -upon that than you can understand. Now be off.” I wished his lordship a -good-night, and he replied, “Go you to the devil with your nights.” So -off I went. - -‘We all made ready, and assembled in good time at the door of our house -in the Cowgate: my master, M. Hob Ormiston, M. de Tala, M. de Bowton, -myself, Powrie, Dalgleish, and Patrick Wilson. There may have been -more—it seemed to me that one or another joined us as we went—in which -case I know not their names. We went down by the Blackfriars’ Wynd, -meeting nobody, through the Kirk o’ Field Port, and round by the wall to -Hamilton House. A light was burning in the upper window of that mansion, -and was not extinguished so long as I was there (though they tell me it -was blown out after the explosion); but no man came out to join us at the -appointed place. Half the company was stopped at the corner of the town -wall by my master’s orders: he himself, M. d’Ormiston, and I went into -the garden; and just as we entered, so well had all been timed, I heard -Saint Giles’ toll the hour of two. I lighted the train; and then we all -went back, joined the others (who had seen nothing dangerous outside the -wall), and returned by the way we had come—no one saying anything. We -may have been half of the way to the Gate—I cannot say—when the darkness -was, as it were, split asunder as by a flare of lightning, one of those -sheeted flames that illumines a whole quarter of the sky, and shows in -the midst a jagged core of intenser light. And whilst we reeled before it -came the crash and volley of the noise, as if all Hell were loosed about -us. What became of our betters I know not, nor what became of any. For -myself, I tell you fairly that I stooped and ran as if the air above me -were full of flying devils. - -‘By some fate or other I ran, not to the city, but along the wall of the -Blackfriars’ Garden, a long way past the Gate, and lay down in a sort of -kennel there was while I fetched up my breath again. Then, not daring -to go back to the Wynd, for I was sure the whole town would be awake, -I considered that the best thing for me to do was to climb that garden -wall, and lie hidden within it until the citizens had wondered themselves -to sleep. So I did, without difficulty, and felt my way through brakes -and shrubberies into what seemed to be an open space. I lit my lantern, -and found myself in a kind of trained arbour, oval or circular in shape, -made all of clipped box. In the middle of it were a broad platt of -grass and a dial: a snug enough place which would suit me very well. It -appeared to me, too, that there was a settle on the far side, on which I -could repose myself. Good! I would lie there. - -‘The path of light made by my lantern showed me now another thing—that I -was not the only tenant of this garden. There lay a man in white midway -of the grass. “Oho,” thinks I, “I will have a close look at you, my -friend, before I settle down.” Peering at him from my safe distance, I -saw that he had another beside him; and made sure that I was on the edge -of an indiscretion. If here I was in a bower of bliss, it became me on -all counts to withdraw. But first I must be sure: too much depended upon -it. I drew nearer: the light fell upon those two who lay so still. My -heart ceased to beat. Stretched out upon that secret grass, with his eyes -staring horribly into the dark, lay the King whom I had gone forth to -slay—stark and dead there, and the dead boy by his side. By God and his -Mother! I am a man of experience, with no call to be on punctilio with -dead men. But that dead man, I am not ashamed to say, made me weep, after -I had recovered myself a little. - -‘God has shown me great mercy. I am not guilty of the King’s death, nor -is my master. I should have supposed that my Lord Huntly killed him, -to save the Queen from deadly sin, and could then have understood his -urgent instructions to me not to go to work before a certain hour. If -that had been so, all honour to him. I say, so I should have supposed; -but one little circumstance made me hesitate. Near by, on the same grass -platt, I found a velvet shoe, which I took back with me into town. It -was purchased of me afterwards by Monsieur Archibald Douglas, that -grey-headed young man, for six hundred crowns; and I believe I might have -had double. That, mind you, told me a tale! - -‘The King had been smothered, I consider. There were no wounds upon him -of any sort, nor any clothes but his shirt. Taylor, the boy, was naked. - -‘There, gentlemen, you have a relation of my share in these dark facts, -told you by a man whose position (as you may say) between one world and -another is likely to sober his fancy and incline him to the very truth.’ - -French Paris, a jaunty dog—with a kind of brisk, dog’s fidelity upon him -which is a better quality in a rascal than no fidelity, or perhaps than -dull fidelity—has very little more to say to you and me. - -[8] Des-Essars himself, it is to be observed, omits this story -altogether. - - - - -CHAPTER VII - -THE RED BRIDEGROOM - - -Margaret Carwood, the Queen’s woman, had a tale to tell, if she could be -got to repeat it. She had undressed her mistress, who came in exceedingly -late from Bastien’s masque, and put the bedgown upon her: then was the -time for Father Roche to come in for prayers—if any time were left, which -Carwood could not think was the case. Would her Majesty, considering the -lateness of the hour, excuse his Reverence? - -But her Majesty looked wildly at Carwood and began to rave. ‘Do you think -me leprous, Carwood? Am I not to be prayed with? Why, this is treason!’ -And she continued to shiver and mutter, ‘Treason! Treason!’ until the -woman, terrified, called up the Chaplain, and he came in with the rest -of the household and began the accustomed prayers. Gradually the Queen -composed herself, and you could hear her voice—as usual—above all the -others, leading the responses. - -In the midst of the psalms of the hour, Carwood said, there struck on -all ears a dull thud, like the booming of water upon a rock in the sea; -the windows of the house shook, and litter was heard to fall behind the -wainscot. Then complete silence—and out of that, far off in the city, -rose a low and long wailing cry, ‘as of one hurt to death and desolate.’ -Father Roche, who had stopped his _Gloria Patri_ at the first shock, when -he heard that cry, said sharply, ‘O King of Glory, what’s that?’ and -stared at the window, trembling like a very old man; and nobody else was -much bolder than he. But the Queen, stiff as a stone, went on where he -had left off, driving the words out of herself, higher and higher, faster -and faster, until she finished on a shrill, fierce note:—‘_Sicut erat in -principio, et nunc, et semper, et in sæcula sæculorum. Amen_‘; and only -stopped there because it was not her part to begin the next psalm. - -A strange midnight picture! There was Father Roche, the old Dominican, -looking all ways for danger, twittering before the candles and cross; -there Des-Essars on his knees, with his white face peaked and taut; there -poor Carwood, her apron over her head, swaying about; there old Mother -Reres spying wickedly out of the corners of her eyes at Mary Livingstone, -stern as thunder. Erskine with his white staff stood at the door, two -clinging pages about him; in the midst, at her faldstool, the slim, -fever-bright Queen in her furred gown, praying aloud, she alone, like -a nun in ecstasy. With Father Roche _in extremis_, Des-Essars was the -first to relieve the strain by boldly intoning the versicle; but there -were no more prayers. Carwood and Livingstone took the Queen to bed, and -Livingstone stayed with her. Carwood says that she herself slept ‘like -drowned weed.’ When Livingstone woke her next morning, she heard the -great bell tolling at Saint Giles’. She asked first of the Queen, and was -told she was ‘quiet.’ She did not dare any more questions, and remained -until midday inmate of the only house in town which did not know the news. - -Mary Livingstone would say nothing to any one: in fact, so grim were her -looks that no one cared to question her. Lady Reres kept her chamber. -At nine o’clock the Earl of Huntly came up, with a very fixed face, and -was taken to the Queen’s bedchamber door by Des-Essars, who went no -farther himself, but hung about the corridor and anteroom in case he -might be sent for. Before long he heard the Queen in distress, crying -and talking at once, a flood of broken words; and, whiles, Lord Huntly’s -voice, sombre and restrained, ill calculated to calm her. Presently Mary -Livingstone opened the door, and he heard the Queen calling for him: -‘Baptist, O Baptist, come—quick, quick!’ - -‘Go to her,’ says Livingstone drily; ‘this is beyond my powers.’ - -He ran into the room, and saw her lying half-naked on her bed, face -downwards, her hair all over her eyes. She looked like one in mortal -agony. - -‘O madam, O sweet madam——’ he began, being on his knees before her. - -She lifted her head. ‘Who calls me?’ - -She sat up, and parted her hair from her face with her finger-tips. He -saw her transfigured, flushed like one with a heat-rash, and her eyes -cloudy black, glazed and undiscerning. She was in a transport of feeling, -far beyond his scope; but she knew him, and cleared in his sight. - -‘Baptist, the King is dead.’ - -‘Dead, madam! Oh, alas!’ - -She gripped him by the arm and steadied herself by it. She read his very -soul; her eyes seemed to bite him. And she answered a question which he -had not asked. - -‘How should I know who slew him? How should I? I know not—I do not -ask—nor need you—nor should you. But there is one who had no hand in -it—be you sure of that. Let none call him murderer—he did nothing amiss. -Do you hear? Do you understand? He is clean as new snow—and I—and I—clean -as the snow, Baptist. O God! O God!’ - -She loosed his arm and flung herself down, shaken to pieces by her hard -sobbing. Her face had been dry, her eyes tearless. If she could not weep, -he thought, it must go hard with her. Livingstone came into the room -and went to her help. She used no ceremony, got into the bed, and drew -the poor distraught creature to her bosom, whispered to her, kissed and -stroked her, mothered her as if it were one of her own children she was -tending. The Queen clung to her. Lord Huntly drew Des-Essars aside, into -the embrasure of the window. - -‘Listen to me, Monsieur Des-Essars,’ he said: ‘I speak to you because -I know that you are in her Majesty’s confidence. It is very necessary -that her friends should understand what I am going to tell you. My Lord -Bothwell had no part in the King’s death. It is true he intended it—I do -not attempt to conceal that from you—and even that he went farther than -intent; but the King was dead before he came. He had his own plans, and -laid them well. But there were other plans of which he had no suspicion.’ -Des-Essars would have spoken; Lord Huntly put a hand over his mouth. ‘Say -nothing. Ask me not who did it. I was there, and saw it done. I believe -that it was just, and will answer for my part when it is required of me.’ - -‘My lord,’ said Des-Essars, ‘your secret is safe with me. I will only say -this: If that person of whom you spake had no part in the deed, then she -is free.’ - -‘She is free,’ said Huntly. ‘I saw to that.’ - -‘You saw to it—you?’ - -‘I saw to it. It was I who deceived—that person—and delayed his plans. -There was a time, long ago, when I played her false. She trusted me, -believing in my honesty, and I forsook her. I have never been able to -forgive myself or ceased to call myself traitor until now. And this time, -when she has trusted me but little, I have served her.’ - -‘I hope you may have served her, my lord, but——’ - -‘Man,’ said Huntly sternly, ‘what are your hopes or mine to the purpose -in a case of the sort? Do you not know her better? She would have had -him, had he been soaked in blood. Well! now she can have him clean.’ - -Des-Essars knelt down and kissed the other’s hand. ‘My lord, you have -given me a schooling in great love. If the time comes when there shall be -need of me, I hope to prove myself your good pupil.’ - -‘Get up,’ said Huntly, not pleased with this tribute; ‘they serve best -who talk least. But you may be sure that the time is at hand when there -will be need of more than you and me.’ He looked sadly out of window, -across the red roofs, out into the slowly brightening sky. Des-Essars was -silent. - -They announced the Earl of Bothwell. The Queen put back her hair and -wiped her eyes—for Mary Livingstone had thawed her hard grief. She -covered herself up to the neck. Bothwell came in, with a low reverence -at the door, and made room for Livingstone to go out. She swept by him -like a Queen-mother. Queen Mary beckoned him to the bedside, and gave -him both her hands to hold. ‘Oh, you have come to me! Oh, you have come -to me!’ was all she could say. She could not speak coherently for her -full heart. He bent over and kissed her; and for a time they remained so, -whispering brokenly to each other and kissing. ‘Have you heard Huntly’s -tale?’ she asked him aloud. - -He was now sitting composedly by her bed, one leg over the other. - -‘Yes, yes, long ago! We have had our talk together.’ - -She fingered the counterpane. ‘Belike he told you more than I could win -of him. He will name no names.’ - -Bothwell laughed shortly. - -‘He is wise. Names make mischief. I could wish his own were as well out -of that as mine is. Heard you of Archie’s shoe?’ - -She had not. He told her of Paris’s discovery in the garden; they both -laughed at Archie’s mishap. Bothwell supposed it would cost him five -hundred crowns to redeem. We know from Paris that it cost him six. - -My Lord Bothwell’s opinion, which he expressed with great freedom, was -that Morton and the Douglases had killed the King soon after he had been -put to bed. The body had been cold when Paris found it—cold and stiff. -Then there was a woman, who had been talking with her neighbours, and -found herself under examination in the Tolbooth before she could end -her tale. She lived in Thieves’ Row. She declared, and nothing so far -had shaken her, that a tick or two after midnight she had heard the -scuffling of many feet in the road, and a voice which cried aloud, ‘Pity -me, kinsmen, for the love of Him who pitied all the world!’ She heard it -distinctly; but, being in bed, and accustomed to hear such petitions, did -not get up, and soon after fell asleep. Also there had been heard a boy -crying, ‘Enough to break your heart,’ she said. But it had not broken her -rest, for all that. This was the story, and——‘Well, now,’ says my Lord -Bothwell, ‘what else are you to make of that?’ - -Des-Essars, watching the Queen’s face under this recital, saw the clouds -gather for a storm. Lord Huntly had listened to it with unmoved face. At -the end he said gravely, ‘He was long dying’; and no one spoke or moved -for some minutes until the Queen suddenly hid her face and sobbed, and -cried out that she wished she herself were dead. Lord Bothwell, at that, -put his arms about her with rough familiarity, lifted her half out of -bed to his own breast, kissed her lax lips, and said, ‘That wilt thou -unwish within these few days. What! when thou art thine own mistress -and all? No, but thou wilt desire to live rather, to be my dear comfort -and delight. For now, look thou, my honey-Queen, thou and I are to get -our bliss of one another.’ She, not responding by word or sign, but -struggling and striving to be free of his arms, presently he put her -down again, and left her. Huntly followed him; and they went up to the -Council, which was set for noon. - -‘I remained kneeling by her,’ says Des-Essars, ‘while she lay without -motion, until presently I found that she was in a heavy sleep. When I -went downstairs I heard that Mistress Livingstone had left the Court and -gone to her husband, Sempill, at Beltrees.’ - - * * * * * - -The silence of the town during those first few days of doubt was a -terrifying thing, enough to try the nerves of the stoutest man; it drove -the Queen to such dangerous excesses of exaltation and despondency that -all her friends were on tenterhooks to get her away before the storm -(which all knew must be brooding) should burst. For what could it portend -but a storm, this fatal silence, this unearthly suspense of clamour -and judgment? It was not that the citizens merely held their tongues -from rumour: it was more literally silence; they talked not at all. If -you walked up the Netherbow or round the porch of Saint Giles’; if you -hung about the Luckenbooths at noon or ventured any of the Wynds at -sun-setting—wheresoever you went about Edinburgh, you heard the padding -of feet sparsely on the flagstones; but no voices, no hawkers’ cries, no -women calling their children out of the gutters, nor bickering of men -in the ale-shops, nor laughter, nor bewailing. The great houses were -closely shut and guarded; the Lords of the Privy Council transacted their -business behind close doors; messengers came and went, none questioning; -the post came galloping down the hill with a clatter which you would -have thought enough to open every window in the High Street and show you -every pretty girl at her best. But no! So long as the King remained above -ground, Death kept his wrinkled hand upon Edinburgh and made the place -seem like a burying-ground, whose people were the mourners, crouched, -whispering, against the walls—and all together huddled under the cold -spell of the graves. - -This continued until the day of the funeral, by which time it was -absolutely necessary that the Queen should be got away. She agreed—was -eager to go; and, before she went, saw the body of the King, which lay -in the Chapel Royal, upon a tressle bed, dressed up in the gilt cuirass -and white mantle which in life it had worn so bravely. Mary Seton and -Des-Essars, who took her in, were so relieved to find their anxieties -vain that they had no thought to be surprised. ‘Not only did she stand -and look upon the corpse without change of countenance or any sign of -distress, but she had her wits all at command. The first thing she said -was, “He looks nobly lying there so still: in life he was ever fidgeting -with his person,”—which was quite true. And the next thing was, “Look -you, look you, he lies just over Davy’s grave!” And then she remembered -that we were within one month of the anniversary of that poor wretch’s -undoing by this very dead; she reminded us of it. Without any more words, -she remained there standing, looking earnestly at him and round about -him; and bade one of the priests who watched go fetch a new candle, for -one was nearly spent. So far as I could ascertain, she did not kneel -or offer any prayer; and after a time she walked slowly away, without -reverence to the altar—a strange omission in her—or any looking back. Nor -did I ever hear her, of her own motion, speak of him again; but he became -to her as though he had never been—which, in a sense that means he had -touched or moved her, he never had. Before the funeral celebrations she -went to my Lord Seton’s house, and there remained waiting until the Earl -of Bothwell could find time to visit her, full of projects, very sanguine -and contented. She said to me one day, “You think my maids have forsaken -me; you grieve over Livingstone and Fleming. Of the last I say nothing; -but I can fetch Livingstone back to me whenever I choose. You shall see.” -And she did it before very long.’ - -On the night following the funeral the profound silence of Edinburgh -was broken by a long shrill cry, as of a wandering man. Several people -heard him, and shivered in their beds; only one, bolder than the rest, -saw him in a broad patch of moonlight. He came slowly down the midst of -the Canongate, flap-hatted and cloaked; and as he went, now and again -he threw up his head towards the moon, and cried, like one calling the -news, ‘Vengeance on those who caused me to shed innocent blood! O Lord, -open the heavens and pour down vengeance on those that have destroyed -the innocent!’ Upon the hushed city the effect was terrible, as you may -judge by this, that no windows were opened and no watchman ventured to -stop the man. But next morning there was found a bill upon the Cross -which accused Bothwell by name of the deed. It drew a crowd, and then, as -by one consent, all tongues were loosened and all pens set free to rail. -The Queen was not spared; pictures of her as the Siren, fish-tailed, -ogling, naked, malign, made the walls shameful. The preachers took up -the text and shrieked her name; and every night the shrouded crier went -his rounds. The Red Bridegroom was on all tongues, the Pale Bride in all -men’s thoughts. - -The Earl of Bothwell, strongly guarded as he was, took, or affected to -take, no notice of the clamour; but Archie Douglas became very uneasy, -and induced his cousin Morton to have the nightly brawler apprehended. He -was therefore taken on the fourth night, and shut up in a pestilential -prison called the Thief’s Pit, where no doubt he shortly died. But his -words lived after him, and he testified through all men’s tongues. -Among the many thousand rumours that got about was one, intolerable to -Bothwell, that the Earl of Moray was about to return to Edinburgh, and, -_in the absence of the Queen_, act for the general good of the realm. -It was said also that Morton was in correspondence with him, and that -it was by his orders that Mr. James Balfour, parson of Fliske, was to -be arrested and confined to his own house. Adding to these things the -daily letters of the Earl of Lennox to the Privy Council, appealing, in a -father’s name, to the honour of Scotland; adding also the Queen’s letters -to himself, my Lord Bothwell judged it wise to depart the town; so went -down to her Majesty in the country, to Lord Seton’s house, where she -still lay. And as he rode out of town, close hemmed in the ranks of his -own spearmen, he heard for the first time that name which had been his -ever since tongues began to wag: ‘Ay, there he goes for his wages, the -Red Bridegroom.’ - -The night of his coming, old Lady Reres made mischief, if any were left -to be made; for after supper, fiddlers being in the gallery, what must -she to do but clap her hands to them and call for a tune. ‘Fiddlers,’ -says she, ‘I call for “Well is me since I am free”‘; and she got it too. -Lord Bothwell gave one of his great guffaws, and held out his hand at the -signal; the Queen laughed as she took it and was pleased. They danced -long and late. But next morning my Lord Seton made some kind of excuse, -and left his own house, nor would he come back to it until the Court had -removed. With him went the Earl of Argyll. - -These departures were the signal for the most insensate revelry—led by -the Queen, insisted upon by her, satisfying neither herself nor her -lover, nor any of her friends. Des-Essars and the few faithful of the old -stock looked on as best they could, always in silence. Not one of them -would talk to another, for fear he should hear something with which he -would be forced to agree. _Le Secret des Secrets_ is extremely reticent -over this insane ten days, in which the Queen—it must be said—was to be -seen (by those who had the heart to observe) wooing a man to sin; and -when he would not, after torments of deferred desire, of mortification, -and of that reproach which never fails a baffled sinner, springing -hot-eyed to the chase next day, following him about, wreathing her -arms, kissing and whispering, beckoning, inviting, trying all ways to -lure him on; heart-rending spectacle for any modest young man, but, to -a worshipper-at-a-distance like our chronicler, an almost irremediable -disaster, since it kept an open sore in the fair image he had made, -and showed him horrible people, with eyesight as good as his own, -leering at it. Yes! French Paris, Bastien, Carwood, Joachim, the baser -sort—grooms, valets, chamber-women, scullions of the kitchen, saw his -flame-proud Queen craving, and craving in vain. He ground his teeth over -the squalid comedy. His pen is as secret as death; but it is said that, -on one occasion, when he had seen Bothwell stalk into the labyrinth, and -soon afterwards the Queen, her head hooded, steal lightly after him, the -comments of other beholders roused him to vehement action. It is said -that he heard chuckling from the base court, and a ‘Did you mark that? -She is close on his heels—a good hound she!’ and saw two greasy heads -hobnobbing. He waited, blinking his eyes, until one began to whistle the -ramping tune of ‘O, gin Jocky wad but steal me!’ then flashed into the -court and drubbed a grinning cook-boy within a few inches of his life. -What satisfaction this just exercise may have been was spoiled by the -reflection that the flogged rascal knew why he had been made to smart: -enough to make our young knight cut off the avenging hand. - -These things weighed and considered, I think that what little he does say -is curiously judicial. He remarks that the Queen his mistress, restless -and miserable as she was, invited oblivion by eating and drinking too -much, by dancing too much, by riding too hard; that she suffered from -want of sleep; that, as for her love-affair, it was no joy to her. ‘Hers -was a plain case of mental love. But I say, _Hum!_—where the Lover -makes an _eidolon_ of the Beloved, and is happiest contemplating that, -adorning it with flowers of fancy, and planning delights which can only -be realised in solitude,—then the bodily presence of the adored creature -effectually destroys the image: a seeming paradox. - -‘Thus, however, it was with my mistress. Never was man less suited to -lady than this burly lord; never did lady contrive out of material so -clumsy master of her bosom so divine. But his presence marred all, -because it led her to indulge the monstrous reality instead of the idea. -She was generous to a fault (all her faults, indeed, were due to excess -of nobility), and most injudicious. Her submission to him tempted him all -ways—to domineer, to be overbearing, insolent, a brute; to treat her -on occasion as I am very sure my Lady Bothwell would never have allowed -herself to be treated. But the Queen bowed her head for still greater -ignominy, although more than once I saw her flinch and look away, as if, -poor soul, she turned quickly, to comfort herself, from the hateful, real -Bothwell of fed flesh to that shining Bothwell of her heart and mind. In -all this she was her own enemy; but (by a misfortune two-edged) in other -ways she contrived enemies for him. Thus it was an act of madness to make -him presents of the late king’s stud, of his dogs and horse-furniture. -She added—O doting, most unhappy prodigal!—the gilt armour and great -golden casque with crimson plumes, by which the dolt king had been best -known. Nothing that she could have done could have been worse judged. -_Quem Deus vult perdere!_ Alas and alas! - -‘Yet, I must say, it is due to my Lord Bothwell to remember that he -was now what he had always been—not consciously cruel, not wilful to -torment her, and by no means withholding from her what she so sorely -needed of him by any scruples of conscience. Coarse in grain he was, and -candidly appetent, but as continent as Joseph when his cautionary side -was alert; and, true to his nation, he was at once greedy and cautious. -He was never one to refuse gratification to a woman who loved him, if -by granting it he could afford any real gratification to himself. It -was a question of the scales with him. Now, in the present state of his -ventures everything must wait upon security: and security was the last -thing he had gained. He would have pleased her if he could, for he was -by no means an ill-tempered man, nor a cruel man, unless his necessities -drove him that way. And just now they did drive him. His position in -Scotland was full of peril: he was universally credited with the King’s -death, had few friends, and could not count upon keeping those he had. -In fine, everything that he had consistently striven after from the hour -when he first saw the Queen at Nancy was just within his grasp. He had -climbed the tree inch by inch, bruised himself, scratched himself, torn -his clothes to rags; and now it seemed that he hung by a thread—and -the fruit could not be plucked yet. The fruit was dropping ripe, but he -dared not stretch out his hand for it, lest it should fall by his shaking -of the branch, or he by moving too soon. If either fell, he was a dead -man. What wonder if he were fretful, gloomy, suspicious, full of harsh -mockery? What wonder, again, if he seemed cruel in refusing to ease her -smart until his neck were safe? No, I do not blame him. But I curse the -hour in which his mother bore him—to be the bane of his country and his -Queen. No more.’ - - * * * * * - -The Court returned to Edinburgh upon the news that an Ambassador -Extraordinary was come from England. Although there could be no doubt of -the matter of his errand, Bothwell insisted upon his reception. In other -respects the Queen was glad to go. Her malady kept her from any rest; the -emptiness of the days aggravated it until it devoured the substance of -her flesh. She had grown painfully thin; she had a constant cough—could -not sleep, and was not nourished by meat and drink. Her eyes burned like -sunken fires, her lips were as bright as blood, but all the rest of her -was a dead, unwholesome white. She said that there was a rat gnawing at -her heart. In such a desperate case it seemed to her friends that the -murmurs and mutterings of Edinburgh could bring her no further harm: so -she went, entered in semi-state, and got a fright. - -Her reception was bad: not cold, but accompanied by the murmurs of a -great and suspicious crowd. She heard the name they had for Bothwell—‘The -Red Bridegroom’—half-voiced with a grim snarl of humour in the tone. -Nothing was actually said against herself, but she was acutely sensitive -to shades of difference; and after riding rigidly down to Holyrood, the -moment she had alighted she caught Des-Essars by the arm, and, ‘You see! -You see! They hate me!’ - -But Mr. Killigrew, from England, and the Earl of Morton, when she -summoned him, soon assured her that what Scotland felt towards her was as -nothing compared to the common abhorrence of her lover. - -Bothwell went away to Liddesdale to see his wife. It is supposed that -there was an understanding between him and the Queen, because she made -no objection to his going, and did not fret in his absence. She saw -Mr. Killigrew alone, in a darkened room, saying: ‘The first thing his -mistress, my sister, will ask him, is of my favour in affliction; and I -know,’—she put her hand on her bosom—‘I know how thin I am become, and -how the tears have worn themselves caves in my cheeks; and would not for -all the world that they in England should know.’ The audience lasted -half-an-hour; and when Mr. Killigrew left Holyrood, he went to Lord -Morton’s house. Thence, it was afterwards found out, he made a journey -to Dunkeld, and paid a two days’ visit to the Earl of Moray. There is no -doubt he went back full charged to England. - -Des-Essars gleaned all the news he could. He told the whole to Huntly, -to the Queen what he must. The town was full of dangerous ferment, which -at any moment might burst out. Most of the lords were in the country; -most of them were, or had been, at Dunkeld: Seton, Argyll, Atholl, -Lindsay, Morton, Mar had all conferred with Moray. What had they to say -to him? What, above all, had Morton to say to him—Morton, who had killed -the King? When Huntly had this question put, and could find no answer -to it, he went directly to the Queen and advised her to send for her -brother. She hated the necessity, but allowed it. Meanwhile, the King’s -father, old Lennox, wrote daily letters to her and to the Council, crying -vengeance on the murder. He did not hesitate, in writing to the lords, -to name Bothwell, Tala, and Ormiston as the murderers; and they did not -hesitate to repeat his charges to the Queen. Old Lady Reres, delighting -in mischief, underscored the names in red whenever she could. The Queen -was furious. - -‘He is innocent of all—I know it for a truth. Who accuses my Lord of -Bothwell accuses me. It is rank treason.’ - -These sort of speeches cannot acquit a man, and may convict their speaker. - -Then my Lord Moray, in a courteous letter, excused himself from -attendance upon his sovereign at this conjuncture. His health, he -regretted to say, was far from good, or he should not have failed to obey -her Majesty. The Queen was much put about. Send a peremptory summons to -the Earl of Morton, says Huntly; she did it without question. Morton -came on the night of 8th March, and Des-Essars, who saw him ride into -the courtyard at the head of a troop in his livery, remembered that on -the same night a year ago he and these pikemen of his had been masters -of Holyrood. What a whirligig! Masters of Holyrood; then outwitted, -ruined, and banished; now back in favour, and, by the look of them, in -a fair way to be masters again. The bluff lord had the masterful air; -the way in which he announced himself seemed to say, ‘Oh, she’ll see me -quick enough! She hath need of me, look you!’ He was very much at his -ease—cracked his jokes with Erskine all the way upstairs, and, meeting -Lethington at the head of them, asked after his new wife, with a gross -and somewhat premature rider to the general question. - -She sent for her young confidant when the audience was over, and greeted -him with, ‘Now, foolish boy, you shall be contented. He is fast for -us—will say nothing if we say nothing.’ - -‘Oh, madam, did he seek to bargain with your Majesty?’ - -She laughed. ‘No, no! Nor did I cross his palm with earnest-money. But -there would have been no harm.’ - -‘Madam,’ he said, ‘you shall forgive me for saying that there would have -been much. It is not for the prince to compound with treason, nor for a -noble, innocent lady to traffic with the guilty.’ - -She stopped his mouth, her hand upon it. ‘Hush, thou foolish boy! What -treason did he do? To set me free—is this treason? To rid me of my -tyrant—was this guilt?’ - -He hung his head, and she watched his confusion; then, repenting, stroked -his face, murmuring, ‘Foolish boy! Fond boy! Fond and foolish both—to -love a lover!’ - -She told him a secret. She had heard two women talking beyond the garden -wall. They spoke laughingly together of the Red Bridegroom—‘and of me, -Baptist, they spake somewhat.’ - -‘I know, I know! Tell me no more.’ - -‘Of me they spake,’ she went on. ‘“Bothwell’s wench,” they said, -“Bothwell’s——”’ - -He caught at her wrist. ‘Stop! I will not hear you! I shall kill myself -if you say that word!’ - -She swung her hand to and fro, and his with it, which held her so fast. -‘The word,’ she said, ‘is nothing without the thing—and the thing is not -true. I would that it were! Do you set so much store by names and framed -breaths and idle ceremonies, and call yourself my lover? Do you tell me -to my face that if I called you to come to me, to stretch open your two -arms and clasp me within them, and to fly with me this world of garniture -and bending backs and wicked scheming heads, and abide night and morning, -through noon-heat and evening glow and the secrets of long nights under -the watching stars, fast by my side, with our mouths together and our -hearts kissing, and our two souls molten to one—do you tell me now that -you would deny me? Answer you.’ - -He faced her steadfastly. ‘I do say so. I should deny you. I serve God, -and honour you. How should I dare do you dishonour?’ - -She was very angry—shook him off. ‘Leave my wrist. How do you presume to -hold your Queen? Leave me alone! You insult me by look and word.’ - -He left her at once, but she sent for him early next morning and easily -made amends. - -Driven to it at last, on the 24th of the month she wrote to old Lennox -that Bothwell should be tried by his peers. She did it partly because -Huntly advised it as the only possible way to stop the growing clamour, -but much more because she wanted Bothwell back. He had been with his wife -all the month; Huntly also had been there more than once—Adam Gordon, old -Lady Huntly. A family council was, perhaps, in the nature of the case; -but all the members of that had returned a week ago, and why should he -remain? Why, indeed, if (as all Scotland believed) he had gone to urge -divorce upon his Countess? So the excuse was made to serve: he was -formally summoned; returned to town on the 28th; made public entry with -an imposing force of his friends and adherents; kissed the Queen’s hand -in all men’s sight, and on the same day sat at the Council board, and -discussed with the others, who were to try him, the precedents for his -own trial. This was no way to satisfy Lennox or Edinburgh. - -The assize was fixed for 12th April. On the 7th of that month the Earl -of Moray left Scotland without leave asked or leave-taking of the Queen. -He stayed a day at Berwick, and had a long conference with the English -Warden, then took ship and sailed for France. This should have given -her pause, and did for a day or two; but to a craving nymph, stalking -gauntly the waste places, what matters but the one thing? It made -Des-Essars serious enough, and put French Paris in a dreadful fright. His -master, he said, ‘was fool enough to be glad at his going; but the Queen -knew better. M. Des-Essars told me that she wept, and would have sent -messengers after him to get him back if she could. Ah, and she was right! -For when yet did that lord’s departure betoken her anything but harm? -Never, never, never!’ says French Paris. - -The trial itself was a form from beginning to end, with the Queen a -declared partisan, and the assize packed with her friends or his. My -lord rode down to it as to a wedding; he rode one of the dead king’s -horses—rode it gaily; and as he departed he looked up at the window -and waved his hat, and all men saw the flutter of the Queen’s white -handkerchief; and some say that she herself was to be seen smiling and -nodding to him. Certain it is that when he was cleared—a matter of a few -hours—and came out into the light of day and the face of a huge crowd, -which blocked the street from side to side, he was met by Lethington, -bareheaded, and by Melvill, bowing to the earth, and by the concourse -with a chill and rather terrible silence. One shrill cry went up in all -that quiet, and one alone. ‘Burn the hure!’ was shrieked by a woman, but -instantly hushed down, and nothing was heard after it but the trampling -of horses as Bothwell’s troop went by. When the Queen met him at the foot -of the palace stairs, he went down on his knees; but many saw the smile -that looped up his mouth. She was very much moved, could not say more -than, ‘Get up—come—I must speak with you.’ - -He went upstairs with her—they two alone. The courts and yards of -Holyrood were like a camp. - -Such a state of things might not last for long. Bothwell could not go -out of doors alone. Even in company his hand was always at his dagger, -his eye for ever casting round, probing corners for ambushes, searching -men’s faces for signs of wavering or fixed purpose. Strong man as he was, -circumstances were too many for him: he told Paris one day that he was -‘near done.’ - -‘Sir,’ says Paris, ‘and so, I take leave to say, is the Queen’s majesty. -If your lordship is for the seas——’ - -‘Damn you, I am not!’ said Bothwell. - -He considered the case as closely as ever anything in his life, for -he was engaged in a great game. He consulted one or two men—Melvill, -Lord Livingstone, his leering old uncle of Orkney. He sounded Morton, -Argyll, Bishop Lesley (as he now was become); and then he gave a supper -at Ainslie’s, opened his plans, and got their promises to stand by him. -He wrote these out and made them sign. This was on 19th April, and that -night he certainly saw the Queen. I say ‘certainly’ because Des-Essars, -who was with her afterwards, was told by her that ‘her lord’ had gone -into Liddesdale to harry the reivers. Something in her tone—he could not -see her eyes—made him doubt her: a little something made him suspect that -she intended him to doubt. - -So, ‘Reivers, ma’am!’ he cried. ‘Is this a time to consider the lifting -of cattle, when yourself and him are in danger, and no man knows when the -town may rise?’ - -Her answer was an odd one. She was sitting in a low chair by the wood -fire, leaning back, looking at the red embers through her fingers. Before -she spoke she lowered her head, as if to put her face in shadow, and -looked up at him sideways. He saw the gleam of one eye, the edge of her -cheek where the light caught it. As he read her, she was laughing at him. - -‘More may be lifted than cattle by these wild men of the Border. I am -going to Stirling in two days’ time, and maybe we shall meet, my lord and -I.’ - -He asked her calmly—accustomed to her way of declaring certainties as -possibilities—was such a meeting arranged for? ‘Come to me, child,’ she -said (though he was not a child), and when he obeyed, ‘Kneel by my side.’ -She put her arm round his neck in a sisterly fashion, and said, ‘You -shall be with me to Stirling, and again when we depart from Stirling. -You forget not that you are my brother? Well, then, brother, I say to -you, Leave me not now, for the time is at hand when I shall need you. I -believe I am to be made the happiest woman in the world, and need you to -share my joy as much as ever you did my sorrow. Hereafter, for many days, -I may have no time to speak privately with you. Kiss me, therefore, and -wish me happy days and nights.’ - -He kissed her, wondering and fearing. ‘Oh,’ he said, ‘bethink you what -you are about! I beg of you to speak with my lord of Huntly in this -business of Stirling.’ - -She said, ‘It is done. I have spoken with him: he was here but an hour -gone. And I have Lethington on my side, and Mary Livingstone and Fleming -will both be with me.’ She laughed at her thoughts; not for a long time -had her old malicious gaiety been upon her. ‘I knew that I could win back -Livingstone. Guess you how I did it.’ And when he could not, or would -not, she whispered in his ear, ‘She believes I am with child by the King.’ - -Des-Essars had nothing to say, but she kept him by her, talking of her -life about to begin, her joy and pride, love, duty, privilege, in a way -so innocent and candid, she might have been a child at play. The hours -were small when he bade her good-night, and she said laughingly, ‘Yes, go -now. I shall be wise to sleep while I may.’ - -As he went he stretched out his arms, let them fall, and shrugged his -young shoulders—gestures all of despair. - -Where all was prepared beforehand it was not hard to forecast the turn of -events. It fell out much as Des-Essars had reasoned it over to himself. -Upon a fresh spring morning of flitting clouds and dancing grasses, the -Queen’s party, rounding the shoulder of a green hill, was suddenly -advised of a company of horsemen, advancing at a leisurely trot, at some -quarter mile’s distance. One could look upon what followed as at a play; -for it may be taken for truth that not a man, soldier or other, so much -as swept the uplands with his eye, so conscious was he that a play indeed -it was! The oncoming troop was observed in silence; in silence, without -word of command or lifted hand, each halted at a spear’s throw. The Earl -of Bothwell, with two lieutenants, rode forward, baring his head as he -came. Nobody of the Queen’s men went out to meet him; nobody hailed him; -nobody moved to safeguard the Queen, who herself sat motionless upon her -little white jennet, in the forefront of her escort, Mary Livingstone on -one side of her and Mary Fleming on the other. The Earl came to her side, -reining up short as his stirrup clicked against hers. - -‘Madam, for your Grace’s protection and honour I am come to lead you to -a safe hold. I beseech your Majesty take it not amiss in one who desires -above all things to serve you.’ - -The Queen, in a very low voice, replied, ‘Lead me, sir, according to your -good judgment.’ - -He took up the rein of her horse, wheeled, and led her away to his -own troop, no one staying him. Mary Livingstone whipped after her, -Mary Fleming followed. Then the Earl of Huntly, looking round upon the -remnant, free there and armed upon the road, said in measured tones, -‘Follow, sirs, since it seems we are prisoners.’ - -If play it was, it was not even played properly, but had been reduced to -a spiritless rite. Yet, as Des-Essars has the wit to remark, to the Queen -the whole had been an act of very beautiful symbolism. He had noticed, as -no one else did, the gesture with which she gave herself up—her opened -palms, bowed head, good eyes, at once trusting and thankful. Ah! she -had been immodest once in her dire need, panting, blowsed, scratched, -dishevelled by her ardent chase. He had seen her so, and shuddered. But -now she was modest, but now she had regained virginity. A folded maid -sought in marriage by a man, she had bowed her head. ‘Lead me, sir, -according to your good judgment!’ Thus Des-Essars, fond lover! It is -safe to assert that he was alone in discerning these fine things, as the -lining of a very vulgar business. - - * * * * * - -The moment he had the Queen at Dunbar, which was reached by nightfall, my -lord dismounted her and took her away. Led by his hand, she went without -a word to her women, without any looking back. The rest of the company -was left to shift as best it could. There were meat and drink on the -spread tables; there may have been beds or there may not. The Queen was -no more seen. - -Sir James Melvill made an effort, let off a quip or two, ruminated -aloud in an anecdotic vein, rallied Lethington, flattered Huntly, felt -himself snubbed and knew that he deserved it, but waived off the feeling -with his ‘H’m, h’m!’ and recovered his dignity. Huntly gloomed upright; -Des-Essars was bent double, head in hands; Lethington walked up and down -the hall, marking with his eye flagstones upon which he must alight at -every step, or be ruined. To watch his mad athletics made his gentle -wife grieve and Mary Sempill rage. Most of Bothwell’s men were asleep; -Ormiston was drunk; Hob, his brother, was both. Gradually silence, which -had been fitful, became universal; and then they heard the wind moaning -round the great house and the sea beating at the black rock on which -it stands. The casements shook, doors far off slammed again and again, -gulls and kittiwakes screamed as they swept to and fro over the strand; -and as the doomed company sat on in the dark listening to all this, and -some thinking with horror of what could be doing between those two in the -vast wind-possessed house, and some with pity welling like blood, and -some shamefully, and some with wisely nodding heads—presently, when the -shrilling of the birds grew piercingly loud, one of these banged against -the window, and fought there at the glass, battling with wings of panic. - -Mary Sempill rose with a shriek. ‘O God, save her! O God, save her!’ She -was thinking of her Queen. - -Nobody moved except Mary Fleming, who felt out the way to her and put -arms about her. - -Thus the night went on. - -In the morning Paris came down and said that her Majesty desired to see -Mistress Sempill. She was taken up, and found the Queen in bed in a -darkened room. She walked to the edge of the bed and looked down, seeing -little. The Queen lay still, one of her bare arms out of bed; this arm -she slowly raised and touched her Livingstone’s cheek, then dropped it -again heavily. - -But her Livingstone had now recovered herself, and could afford to be -cynical. - -‘Well—Honeypot?’ said she. - -‘Empty,’ said the Queen. - -Then her Livingstone kissed her. - - - - -CHAPTER VIII - -THE BRIDE’S PRELUDE - - -French Paris took a letter to Lady Bothwell from Dunbar, as he thinks, -on the day after the ravishing: he fixes his date from the fact that Sir -James Melvill happened to tell him that it was his birthday, the 25th of -April. - -‘Not the first I have spent in durance, my good fellow,’ the genial -gentleman had added, ‘although I tell you candidly that it is the first -wedding-night—so to call it—at which I have assisted in such a place.’ - -Paris would have prolonged so interesting a conversation if his master -had not been waiting to be dressed. As it was, he excused himself and -hurried up to his duties; which done, my lord handed him a letter, -saying, ‘Deliver this safely, at your peril; and remember also that -whatsoever my lady shall ask you, she is to have a full answer.’ - -‘Your lordship may count upon me,’ says the valet, hoping with all his -heart that she would not tax his countenance too far. Leaving the room, -he was recalled. - -‘One thing more, Paris. Your mistress will give you a coffer for me. -Guard it well, as you value your neck; for, trust me, if you come not -home with that intact, I will run you down though you were in the bury of -Hell.’ - -‘Rest easy, my lord,’ said Paris superbly, ‘rest easy here, and disport -yourself as seems good to your wisdom; for certainly I shall never fail -you. Nor have I ever,’ added the poor complacent rogue, and took the -thought with him up the gallows ladder. - -It is a singular thing that Bothwell knew his wife so little as to -provide against a line of conduct which she could never have taken. -According to Paris, she asked him no awkward questions at all, but read -her letter calmly, dipping a toast in white wine and whey as she read. At -the end, after musing a while, looking extremely handsome, she said: ‘My -lord, I see, makes no mention how long he remains at Dunbar. Knowest thou -anything to the purpose?’ - -Nothing awkward here; but Paris blundered it. ‘Oh, my lady,’ he says, -conscious of his red face, ‘I suppose his lordship will stay out the -moon.’ - -‘What hath he to do with the moon, or the moon with him, fool?’ said the -Countess; and soon afterwards sent him away, as without any value for her. - -One can picture him then in the kitchen quarters—jaunty, abounding in -winks and becks; or with the grooms in the stables—what conversations! -The play, dragged by the weary, high players, must have quickened when -the clowns tumbled through it. - -Next day my lady had him up again to her chamber and gave him letters -for Edinburgh: a large packet for a notary, one Balnaves or Balneaves, -another for the Archbishop’s Grace of Saint Andrews at Hamilton House. - -‘Deliver these with speed, Paris, and come back to me—but not here. I -shall be at Crichton expecting you—and give you a packet for my lord.’ - -This is how Paris learned that process of divorce was begun. He dates it -the 26th-27th April. - -Demure, wide-eared scamp! he was not idle in town, I assure you; but -ran from cawsey to cawsey, from tavern-parlour to still-room, into all -churches, chapels, brothels, about the quays of Leith, up and down the -tenement stairs, spying, watching, judging, and remembering. He was most -amazed at the preachers, whose licence to talk exceeded all bounds of -belief. There was one Cragg, well named for a rock-faced, square-hewn -man, colleague of Mr. Knox’s: to listen only to this firebrand! This -Cragg—Paris heard him—rocked screaming and sweating over the brink of his -pulpit, and hailed his Queen a Jezebel, a Potiphar’s wife, a strumpet of -the Apocalypse. ‘And I could have wrung his brazen neck for him,’ said -Paris, ‘but that all the people stood packed about him murmuring their -agreement. It would have been my death to have declared myself—and I was -vowed to return to my lord.’ - -The city seemed to be in the governance of the Earl of Morton, -unsuspected of any hand in the late crime, and of Lord Lindsay, whom -all hot gospellers loved. Close in with them was Grange—Kirkcaldy of -Grange—a very busy man, Marshal of the City, Captain of the Guard, who -kept surveillance of Holyrood and the lower town. Paris perceived that -he was lieutenant to Lord Morton, a cultivable person if willing to be -cultivated. About his doors, every day and at all hours of the day, he -saw messengers stand with horses ready. Now and again one would come out -with his despatches bound upon him, mount and ride off—south, north, -west. Similarly, others came in, white with dust, and delivered up -their charges to the porter at the door. Paris, never without resource, -inquired into the matter, and found out with whom Grange corresponded. -With my Lord of Atholl at Perth! With my Lord of Moray in Paris! With -Mr. Secretary Cecil in London! Why, this was treasonable stuff, hanging -stuff, as he told his informant—Gavin Douglass, body-servant to Mr. -Archie of the name—who knew it as well as he did. - -‘Oh, ay, you make up your mind to the treason o’t, Paris,’ says Gavin; -‘but I recommend you let not my master catch you in this town. You have -had six hundred gold crowns of his for the price of an old shoe—he has -never ceased to talk of it, believe me. No later than yesterday he was -at it, saying that pretty soon he could afford to give all his clothing -to the world and stand up mother-naked as he was born, and be none the -worse. “And to think,” says he, “to think I could be such a custard-faced -loon as to buy back my slipper from a rogue I shall be hanging in a -week.”’ - -Paris was indignant and hurt. ‘I can see,’ he said, ‘that the lords -of Scotland are at their favourite game of beggar-my-neighbour. _Dieu -de Dieu!_ what else could we have expected? Your Scotch way: roguery -upon roguery, thieves on thieves’ backs, traitors who betray their -co-traitors—hogs and rats, one and all!’ - -He left Edinburgh much alarmed at the state of its affairs, determined to -be done with the Countess at Crichton and back again in Dunbar as soon as -might be; but, greatly to his annoyance, her ladyship, being busy with -her law business, kept him four or five days kicking his heels: it was -the 4th of May before she delivered him her packet. That was a coffer, -strongly bound and clamped with iron, locked and sealed. - -At the moment of his going Lady Bothwell said to him, ‘Tell my lord, -Paris, that this day he and I are free of each other; tell him that here -I am and here remain.’ - -Paris, always the servant of a fine woman, knelt upon one knee. ‘My -lady,’ he said, ‘your ladyship has never loved me, but I take God to -witness that I have ever honoured your ladyship. Albeit I am a poor devil -of a lacquey, madam, I have wit enough to know a great lady when I see -her.’ - -Said the Countess: ‘If you think that I have a disliking for you, Paris, -you are mistaken. I neither love nor hate you. I have never thought about -you.’ - -‘Madam,’ said he, ‘why should your ladyship? I shall venture, none the -less, to pray God give you all health, fame, and happiness.’ - -Lady Bothwell sat bolt upright, one firm hand on the table. ‘Health I -have from God already. Fame, if you mean good fame, I have kept for -myself. Happiness, if that lies in the satisfaction of abiding desire, I -intend to have before long. Now begone with your charge.’ - -He went out shaking his head, muttering to himself: ‘Terrible lady! fine, -carven, deep-eyed lady! What is her abiding desire?’ - -He found out afterwards. - -The coffer and he came safe to Dunbar and into the presence of their -master. The Queen was in the room: red eyes, hot patches in her cheeks, a -swinging foot, fingers a-tap on the table——‘Ho! a tiff,’ thinks Paris. - -My Lord Bothwell hands over the coffer, or rather puts it on the table by -the Queen’s elbow. ‘Here is your testimony, _ma mie_. By my advice you -burn every scrap of it.’ - -‘Shall I burn what has cost me so much, and you, it seems, so little?’ -she asked bitterly. ‘Is it nothing to you that I have written with my -blood and sealed with my tears?’ - -‘I had not analysed the ink,’ said my lord; ‘and if I had I should -value your honour more. However, you must do what you will.’ She left -him without answer; and by and by Des-Essars presented himself, saying -that he had her Majesty’s command to take charge of the coffer for her. -Something in message or messenger seemed to anger the Earl. ‘Damn you, -French monkey, you take too much in charge. Must her Majesty always have -an ear to pull or a cheek to pinch? Man, Baptist, for two pence I’d have -both your lugs off and a hot iron at your cheeks: with a broad C branded -there, my man: ay, by God, and a double C! Chamberer Convict, man, -Baptist!’ - -He worked himself crimson in the face, his eyes savage and red. ‘Mind -your ways, young sir, mind your ways’—he threatened with his fist,—‘I -warn ye mind your ways just now—lest you come into the deep mire, man, -where no ground is.’ - -Des-Essars drilled his slim body to attention, and fixed his eyes on -the opposite wall. The Earl glared at him open-mouthed, and fingered -his dagger as though he itched to be at it. But presently he scoffed at -himself—‘A white-faced boy to stand by side o’ me!’ He turned: ‘Take your -coffer, master, and be out of this. A little more and I might colour you -finely.’ - -Des-Essars removed both coffer and himself. Paris was trembling: he knew -that what he had to report of Edinburgh’s doings would not make matters -any better. Nor did they—though it may be doubted whether they could have -made matters any worse. - - * * * * * - -The joys of love—love’s moment of victory, love’s rest, and possession of -the spoils—are gossamer things: an adverse breath may shred them away. -As for Love himself, you may call him a Lord or a Beast, give him his -roseate wings or his cloven hoofs and tail: certainly there never was in -the world so refined a glutton. Perfection is what he claims, no less; -perfection of leisure to obtain, perfection of content, and all according -to that standard of mind which, in a field without limit, grudges the -stirring of a filament as a hindrance to the enormous calm he covets, -and sees in a speck of sand a blemish upon his prize. ‘Alas! no man, no -kingdom of this world, no ordering attainable by mortal minister could -have appeased Queen Mary. She was made to hunt for happiness and never -to find it. She had risked all upon this cast of hers, had made it, at -her last gasp had fallen upon the quarry. And now, clutching it, eyeing -the coverts fearfully to right and left, starting at a whisper, cowering -at the lightest shadow—like a beast of prey, she had no time to taste -what she had so hardly won. O miserably stung by the rankling arrow! Poor -Io, spurred by the gad-fly, what rest for thee? Come, ye calm-browed -beneficent goddesses of the night! Handmaids of Death, come in! and with -cool finger-tips close down these aching lids, and on these burning -cheeks lay the balm of the last kiss; so the mutinous, famishing heart -shall contend with Heaven no more!’ The dithyrambic cry of Des-Essars -does not indicate a comfortable state of things at Dunbar. - -The Queen was madly in love, aching to be possessed, but knowing herself -insecurely possessed. Her tyrant, master, beloved—whatever Bothwell may -have desired to be—was harassed by events, and could not play the great -lover even if he would. Rebellion gathered outside his stronghold, and -he knew every surge of it; he was not safe from disaffection within -doors, and had to watch for it like a cat at a mousehole. If the Queen -had sinned to get a lover, he had risked his head to wive a queen. -Well, and he had not got her yet, though she asked for nothing better -all day and night. Queens and what they carry are not got by highway -robbery: it’s not only a question of kissing. You may steal a Queen for -the bedchamber—but there’s the Antechamber to be quieted, there’s the -Presence Chamber to be awed, there’s the Throne Room to be shocked into -obsequiousness: ah, and the Citadel to be taught to fly your banner. -Brooding on these things—all to do except one—his lordship had no time -for transports, and no temper neither. When the Queen wept he swore, when -she pleaded he refused her, when she sulked he showed his satisfaction -at being let alone, and when she stormed he stormed loudlier. He was not -a man of fine perceptions: that was his strength, he knew. By the Lord, -said he, let others, let her, know it too! And the sooner the better. - -She would not discuss politics. Dunbar, which was to have been her -bride-bower, should be so still, in defiance of beastly fact. She -refused to hear what Paris had to say of Edinburgh pulpits, of Morton’s -men-at-arms, Grange’s flying messengers. When Bothwell spoke of the -Prince at Stirling she promised him a new prince at Dunbar; when he cried -out threats against Archie Douglas she stopped his mouth with kisses; -when he summoned Liddesdale to arms she pouted because her arms were -not enough for him. It was mad, it was unreasonable, it fretted him to -feverish rages. He gnashed his teeth. Lethington kept rigidly out of his -way: he was really in danger, and knew it; not a day passed but he made -some plan of escape. Melvill spoke in whispers, could not have stood -on more ceremony with his Maker. Huntly was always on the verge of a -quarrel; and as for poor little Des-Essars, you know how he stood. - -There came anon swift confirmation of Paris’ fears: a letter from Hob -Ormiston, now in Edinburgh, to his brother the Black Laird. Both worthies -had been, as we know, with Bothwell on the night of Kirk o’ Field. Hob -wrote that Kirkcaldy of Grange had met him after sermon in a company of -people, taxed him with the King’s murder and threatened him with arrest -‘in the Queen’s name and for her honour.’ He went in fear, did Hob; -his life was in it. Now, might he not clear himself? Let his lordship -of Bothwell be sounded upon that, who knew that he was as guiltless of -that blood as his lordship’s self. It would be black injustice that an -innocent Hob should suffer while a blood-guttered Archie went scot-free, -and a crowning indignity that he should perish under the actual guilty -hands. For well he knew that my L—d of M——n stood behind Grange. -Ormiston, with this crying letter in hand, sought out his master, and -found him on the terrace overlooking the sea, walking up and down with -the Queen and Lord Huntly. As he approached he saw her Majesty cover her -mouth and strangle a yawn at birth. - -Bothwell read the letter through, and handed it to the Queen. She also -read it hastily. ‘Innocent!’ she mocked, with a curling, sulky lip, ‘the -innocent Hob—a good word! But this letter concerns you, Huntly, more than -me.’ - -In turn the dark young lord read it. He was much longer at it, -slower-witted; and before he was half-way through for the second time the -Queen was out of patience. - -‘Well! well! What do you make of it, you who know the very truth and do -not choose to declare it? Are our friends to be cleared, or will you see -them all butchered for the Douglases’ sake?’ - -He did not answer for a while, but looked far oversea with those -hawk-eyes of his, which seemed able to rend the garniture of Heaven and -descry the veiled secrets of God. When he turned his face towards her it -was a far nobler than the soured face he looked upon. - -‘But to clear them, madam—Hob and the like of Hob—am I to betray them -that trusted me?’ - -She gave a thring of the shoulder, a fierce flash of her eye, and turned -shortly, and went away by herself. There was a hot wrangle between the -three men afterwards—in which Bothwell did not scruple to curse his -brother-in-law for ‘meddling in what concerned him not,’ or (if he must -meddle) for not meddling well[9]; but Huntly could not be moved. - -Things like these drove Bothwell into action—to go through with his -business, possess himself of Edinburgh and the Prince, and marry the -Queen? Why not? He was free, he had her in the crook of his arm; he had -but to go up to blow away the fog of dissidence: _afflavit ventus_, etc.! -He urged her Majesty, lectured Lethington, conferred with Huntly, and got -agreement, more or less. Well then, advance banners, and let the wind -blow! - -At the first tidings of the Queen’s approach, the Earl of Morton and his -belongings—his Archie Douglas, his Captain Cullen, his Grange—departed -the city and repaired to Stirling. This gave fair promise; and even the -greeting she got when, pacing matronly by Bothwell’s side, surrounded by -a live hedge of Bothwell’s spears, she entered the gates and went down -to Holyrood, was so far good that it was orderly. No salutations, no -waving of bonnets; but close observation, a great concourse in a great -quiet. She did not like that, though Bothwell took no notice. He had not -expected to be welcome; and besides, he had other things to think of. - -I extract the following from Des-Essars:— - -‘The Queen had a way of touching what she was pleased with. She was like -a child in that, had eyes in her fingers, could not keep her hands away, -never had been able. To stroke, fondle, kiss, was as natural to her as -to laugh aloud when she was pleased, or to speak urgently through tears -when she was eager. I remember that, as we rode that day into the suburb -of Edinburgh, she, being tired (for the way had been hot and long), put -her hand on my shoulder; and that my lord looked furiously; and that she -either could not, or would not see him. I had had reason only lately to -suspect him of jealousy, though she as yet had never had any. But for -this very innocent act of hers he rated her without stint or decorum when -we were at Holyroodhouse; and as for me, I may say candidly that I walked -with death as my shadow, and never lay down in my bed expecting to get -out of it on the morrow. - -‘The effect of his unreason upon her, when she could be brought to -believe in it, was of the unhappiest. It lay not in her nobility to -subserve ignoble suspicions. Our intercourse, far from ceasing out of -deference to him, was therefore made secret, and what was wholly innocent -stood vested in the garb of a dear-bought sin—an added zest which she -had been much better without. I was removed from all direct service of -her—for he saw to that; but she found means of communicating with me -every day; waited for me at windows, followed me with her eyes, had -little speedy, foolish signals of her own—a finger in her mouth, a hand -to her side, her bosom touched, her head held askew, her head hung, a -smile let to flutter—all of which were to be so much intelligence between -us. She excelled in work of the kind, was boundlessly fertile, though I -was a sad bungler. But, God forgive me! I soon learned in that blissful -school, and became, I believe, something of a master. - -‘I was not the only man of whom he was jealous, by any means. There was -my Lord Livingstone, a free-living, easy man of advanced age, who had -been accustomed to fondle her Majesty as his own daughter, and saw no -reason to desist, being given none by herself. But one day my lord came -in and found him with his hand on her shoulder. Out he flung again, -with an oath; and there was a high quarrel, with daggers drawn. The -Queen, who could never be curbed in this kind of way by any one, lover -or beloved, dared his lordship to lay a finger on Livingstone; and he -did not. There was also my lord of Arbroath, who had pretensions and a -mind of his own; to whom she gave a horse, and induced more high words. -There was my Lord Lindsay, who admired her hugely and said so: but to -follow all the wandering of unreason in a gentleman once his own master, -were unprofitable. All that I need add (for the sake of what ensued -upon it) is that one day Mr. Secretary Lethington came into the Cabinet -all grey-faced and shaking as with a palsy, and laid his hands upon the -Queen’s chair, saying fearfully: “Sanctuary, madam, sanctuary! I stand -in peril of my life.” It appeared that my lord, who abhorred him, had -drawn on him in full hall. So then once more she grew angry and forbade -his lordship to touch a hair of Lethington’s head: “For so sure as you -do it,” she said, “I banish you the realm.” For the moment he was quite -unnerved, and began to babble of obedience and his duty; and I say, let -God record of our lady in that time of her disgrace that she had not -forgotten how to stand as His vicegerent in Scotland. - -‘Affairs went from bad to worse with her. We learned every day by -our informers how the lords were gaining strength in the west, and -stood almost in a state of war against us. They were close about the -Prince—the chiefs of their faction being the Earls of Mar, Atholl, -Argyll, Glencairn, and Morton. With them was Grange, the best soldier in -the kingdom; and Lord Lindsay would have gone over, but that he grossly -loved the Queen and could not keep his eyes off her. Letters intercepted -from and to England made it certain that the Queen of that country was -supporting our enemies and preparing for our ruin—nor was it without -reason, as I am bound to confess, for the safety of our young prince -imported the welfare of her country as well as ours; and it may well -have been distasteful to her English Majesty to have the fingers of the -Earl of Bothwell so near to dipping in her dish. As if these troubles -were not enough, we were presently to hear of flat rebellion under the -Queen’s very eyes, when we were told that Mr. Cragg, the preacher, would -not read out the banns of marriage. That same was a stout man, after Mr. -Knox’s pattern. It is true they forced him by a writ to publish them, but -neither summons before the council nor imminent peril of worse would keep -his tongue quiet. He daily railed against those he was about to join in -wedlock, and had to be banished the realm. - -‘Hard-faced was the Queen through these disastrous days, and all stony -within; bearing alike, with weary, proud looks, the indifference of -her trusted friends, the insolent suspicions of my lord of Bothwell, -the constant rumours, even the shameful reports, put about concerning -herself, as if she was ignorant of them. She was not, she could not -be ignorant, but she was utterly negligent. To her but one thing was -of concern—his love; and until she was sure of that all else might go -as it would. True, he was jealous: at one time she had thought that a -hopeful sign. But when she found out that in spite of her kindness he -remained indifferent; when he abstained from her company and bed, when -he absented himself for two days together—and was still jealous—she -was bound to doubt the symptom. It wanted but one thing, in truth, to -break down her pride and trail her lovely honour in the dust: and she -had it sharp and stinging. O unutterable Secret of Secrets, never to -be divulged but in this dying hour when she must ask for _pity_, since -honest dealing is denied to her! She was stung—down fell she—and I saw -her fall—heart-broken, and was never more the high Huntress, the Queen -“delighting in arrows.” My pen falters, my tears blind me; but write it -I must: her fame, her birthright, nay, her gracious head, are in dire -peril.[10] - -‘It was commonly suspected that Lethington was desirous of escaping to -the lords at Stirling, among whom he could count upon one firm friend in -the Earl of Atholl. To say nothing that he went hourly in fear of my lord -of Bothwell, and believed that the Queen distrusted him, he had been too -long in the Earl of Moray’s pocket—kept there as a man keeps a ferret—to -be happy out of it. Nominally at large, a pretty shrewd watch was kept -upon him, since it would not have been at all convenient to have him at -large among her Majesty’s enemies. He knew too much, and his wife, that -had been Mistress Fleming, more than he. Therefore it was not intended -that he should leave us. Yet I am certain that no day passed in which he -did not make some plan of escape. - -‘It was for a step in one of such schemes, I suppose, though I cannot see -how it should have helped him, that on the day before my lord of Bothwell -was created Duke of Orkney, and three days before the marriage, he gave -the Queen a thought which very soon possessed her altogether. - -‘My lord was away, but expected back that night; Lethington, being with -some others in the Queen’s Cabinet when the talk fell upon the Countess -of Bothwell, told her Majesty that the lady was dwelling at Crichton. He -said it very skilfully—_quasi_ negligently and by the way—but instantly -she caught at it, and took it amiss. “She has cast him off—let him cast -her off. Crichton! Crichton! Why, he holds it of me! How then should -Jean Gordon be there? _Or do we share, she and I?_” She spoke in her -petulant, random way of hit or miss, meaning (it is likely) no more than -that she was weary of Lethington. But he coughed behind his hand, and -rising up suddenly, went to the window. The Queen marked the action, and -called him back. - -‘“Come hither, Mr. Secretary,” said she quietly; and he returned at once -to her side. - -‘“You will please to explain yourself,” she said. Very quiet she was, and -so were we all. - -‘He began vast excuses, floundering and gasping like a man in deep water. -The more he prevaricated the more steadfast she became in pursuit; and so -remained until she had dragged out of him what he knew or had intended -to imply. The sum and substance was that Paris (a valet of my lord’s) -had of late taken letters to and from Crichton: common knowledge, said -Lethington. And then, after a good deal, not to the purpose, he declared -that my lord had spent two several nights there since the Court had -returned to Edinburgh from Dunbar. - -‘The Queen, being white even to the lips, said faintly at the end that -she did not believe him. Lethington replied that nothing but his duty -to her would have induced him to relate facts so curious; the which, -he added, must needs concern her Majesty, the Fountain of Honour, who, -unsullied herself, could not brook defilement in any of the tributaries -of her splendour. She dismissed us all with a wave of her hand—all but -Mistress Sempill (who had been Mistress Livingstone), who stayed behind, -and whose ringing voice I heard, as I shut the door, leap forward to be -at grips with the calumny. - -‘She had recovered her gallantry by the evening. Incredible as it may -seem, it is true that she publicly taxed my lord with the facts charged -against him, when he returned. He did not start or change colour—looked -sharply at her for an instant, no more. - -‘“Jealous, my Queen?” he asked her, laughing. - -‘“And if I am, my lord, I have an example before me,” said she. “Have you -not been pleased to condemn me in regard to this poor boy?” - -‘I bore that with what face I could: he regarded me with the look of a -wild hog that grates his tooth. Anon he said: “Master Baptist and I know -each other of old. I believe I can give as good account of the reckonings -between my staff and his back as——Well, this is unprofitable jesting. -Now, let me understand. Your Grace charges me with—what in particular?” - -‘“Oh, my lord,” cried she, with a bold face, “I make no charges. I did -but put you a question: whether you had visited your Castle of Crichton -these late days—your Castle of Crichton which you hold of me in chief?” - -‘He shrugged his shoulders; and “_Chi lo sa?_” quoth he, with a happy -laugh. “Let your Majesty and me confer upon these and other high matters -of state when my head is on better terms with my stomach. I am a fasting -man, no match for your Majesty. Your Majesty knows the Spanish saw, _When -the belly is full it saith to the head, Sing, you rascal_? I crave your -leave, then, to get my singing voice again.” He took it with bravery, as -you perceive; and, having his liberty, went away singing to supper. - -‘He stayed below stairs for the rest of the night, drinking and talking -with Sir James Melvill and my lord of Livingstone—ribald and dangerous -talk, for he had a lewd mind, and neither discretion nor charm in the -uses to which he put his tongue. The Queen sat miserably in the dark far -into the night, and went to bed without prayers. I heard her cry out to -Mistress Sempill that she wished she lay where the King was, and Sempill -answered, “Damn him, damn him!” Next day, with what grace she could -muster, she created my lord Duke of Orkney. That was done before noon; by -five o’clock of the evening he was ridden away for Borthwick and Dunbar, -as he said, upon State business. In three days’ time she was to marry -him, O Heaven! - -‘Early in the morning—the morrow after his going—she sent for me to come -up to her bedchamber; and so I did, and found her very worn in the face, -her hand hot and dry to the touch. Commanding herself with great effort, -speaking slowly, she told me that she could not continue to live unless -she could deny once and for all the truth of Lethington’s tale. My lord -would not help her. “You know his way of mockery,” says she. “He laughs -to tease me: but to me this is no laughing matter. Mary Sempill has been -at me ever since——” Here she fretted, muttering to herself, “I do not -believe it—I do not—I do not,” fidgeting her hands under the bedclothes; -then, breaking off short, she said that she wished me to ride to Crichton -with her that very day. She would take Mary Sempill—because she would not -remain behind—Erskine would bring an escort; there would be no danger. I -said that I was ready to live or die for her, and that all my care was -to save her from unhappiness. I asked her, Would she suffer Erskine and -myself to go? - -‘She stared at me. “Are you mad?” she asked. “Have you found me so -patient, to sit at home in suspense? or so tame, to shirk my enemies? -Nay, my child, nay, but I will prove Lethington a liar with my own eyes.” -To be short, go she would and did; and we with her, as she had already -contrived it. - -‘The weather was hot—as hot as summer—and very still; riding as fast as -we did, our bodily distresses saved our minds’. We had, as I reckon, some -fifteen miles to go, by intricate roads, woodland ways, by the side of -streams overhung with boughs, encumbered with boulders. The Queen was -always in front, riding with Mistress Sempill: she set the pace, said -nothing, and showed herself vexed by such little delays as were caused by -Erskine sounding the banks for good fording-ground, or losing the road, -as he once did, and trying a many before he could make up his mind. “Oh, -you weary me with your _Maybe yeas_ and _Maybe nays_!” she railed at him. -“Why, man, I could smell my way to Crichton.” I believe her; for now I am -sure that she had steeled herself for what she was to find there. I knew -it not then: she allowed nothing of her mind to be seen. Nobody could be -more secret than she when she saw fit. - -‘That Castle of Crichton stands, as do most of them in these parts, on -a woody bluff over a deep glen, out of the which, when you are in it, -you can never see how near you may be to your journey’s end. Thus we -wound our way at a foot’s pace along the banks of a small stream, in -and out of the densest woodland—beautiful as a summer’s dream just then, -with birds making vocal all the thickets, wild flowers at our feet, and -blooming trees, wild cherry and hawthorn and the like, clouds come to -earth and caught in the branches—and found a steep path to our right -hand, and climbed it for half an hour: and lo! gaining the crest first, -I saw before me, quite close, the place we sought—a fair tower of grey -stone, with a battlemented house beside it, having an open gate in a -barbican. Before the barbican was a lawn snowed with daisies, and upon -that two white greyhounds, which sat up when they first saw us, and then -crouched, their muzzles between their paws. But as we advanced, jumping -up and barking together, they raced together over the turf, met us, and -leapt upwards to the Queen’s hand. All beasts loved her, and she loved -them. - -‘There was neither guard nor porter at the gates. They stood open upon an -empty court, beyond which we could see the hall doors: open, they, also. -In the air all about us was the sound of bees, and of doves hidden in the -woody slopes; but no noises of humankind were to be heard: we all sat -there on our horses, and watched, and listened, like errant adventurers -of old time come upon an enchanted lodging, a castle and hermitage in a -forest glade. - -‘Mistress Sempill broke silence. “’Tis not for us to enter—this still -place,” she said. “Come your ways, madam; you have seen what there is to -be seen.” - -‘The Queen, as one suddenly awakened, called to me. “Baptist, dismount -and help me down. I am going in.” - -‘I obeyed, and helped Mistress Sempill after. Erskine would stay with the -guard. We three went through the gateway, crossed the inner court, and -passed the doors into the hall—a long dusky chamber with windows full of -escutcheons and achievements, and between them broad sheets of ancient -arras which flapped gently in a little breeze. The sunlight, coming -aslant, broke the gloom with radiant blue bars—to every window a bar. -As we peered about us, presently Sempill gave a short little cry, then -called to me, “Baptist, Baptist, have a care for her.” - -‘It was an old woman come out of a door in the panel to look at us—old, -grey and wrinkled. I asked her, Was any other within? She shook her head, -pointing at the same time to her mouth, within which, when she opened -it wide, I saw the seared stump of her tongue, and perceived that she -had been maimed of that organ. Sempill remarked it also, and was afraid. -“Oh, come away, for God’s love!” said she: “there is witchcraft here”; -and signed herself many times. But the Queen laughed, and went up to -the mutilated hag, and, patting her shoulder, went by her through the -door by which she had come in, and turned to beckon us after her. So we -climbed a narrow stair, built in the thickness of the wall round and -round a pillar. In the gallery above were doors to left and right, some -open upon empty, fragrant chambers, some shut and locked. I believe that -I tried them all the length of the gallery on one side; and so came at -the farther end to a short passage on my right hand: at the end of that -a low-pitched door ajar. Thither I went on tiptoe, with a strong sense -that that room was occupied. I know not what had certified me, save some -prescience which men have at times. So certain was I, at least, that when -I was at the door I knocked. I was answered, “Enter.” - -‘I entered not. I dared not do it. I sped back to the Queen, who now -stood with Sempill at the head of this short passage. For the moment -my nerve was clean gone: “Some one there—let us go away!”—Who knows -what hissed foolishness I let fly?—“I urge you: let us go away.” But -the Queen, rose-bright, keen as fire in the wind, threw up her head and -flashed her eyes full upon me. “Stand aside, sir—I will go in.” She -pushed by me and went into the room without ceremony. We had followed her -with beating hearts. - -‘She had not gone far—was not a yard from the door; nor do I marvel at -it, nor need you. For by the open window sat the Countess of Bothwell at -needlework, making, as I saw in a moment, a child’s shift. If God the -Father of all, who framed women nobly and urged them cast their hearts in -the dust to make soft the ways of men—if He, I say, pausing in His vast -survey, might have discerned this dear woman now, with the wound upon her -still raw and bleeding whence she had torn that generous heart—naked, -emptied, betrayed; ah, and face to face with that other woman also, not -less injured, not less the vessel of a man’s beastly convenience—I dare -swear He would repent Him of His high benevolence, and say, “Tush, I have -planned amiss. The waste is divine, the waster shall be crowned with the -glory of the Magdalene, that Mary whom I would no more condemn. But what -shall be done with him for whom these women spent so vainly?” Thus, it -might well be, would God reason with Himself. Yet who am I, poor bastard -of a dead mother (spending she, too, with little avail) to interpret the -reproaches of the Almighty? - -‘For an age of suspense, as it seemed to me, the Queen stood where we -had found her—a yard from the door, perfectly still, but not rigid. No, -but she was like a panther, all lithe and rippling, prest for a pounce, -and had her eyes set fast upon the other. I was in a muck of fear, and -Sempill muttering fast to herself her “O Christ, keep us all! O Christ, -save her!” and the like, what time the Countess, affecting to be unaware, -crossed one knee over the other and bent diligently to her needlework. -The time seemed a slow hour, though I know not how long it may have been, -before the Queen began to move about the room. - -‘I know what made her restless: it was curiosity. At first she had only -had eyes for the lady; now she had seen what she was at work upon. Yes, -and she had been at the same proud task herself not long since. I am -certain that she was just then more curious than enraged. At least, -instead of attacking as she was wont, with her arrows of speech leaping -forward as she went, she said nothing, and began to walk the room -restlessly, roaming about; never going near the window, but looking -sidelong towards it as she passed to and fro: bright spots in her cheeks, -her hands doubled, biting her lips, longing, but not yet resolved, to -know all. The storm, which was not far off, gathered strength as she -walked: I saw her shake her head, I saw a tear gleam and settle on her -shoulder. And so at last she clenched her teeth, and stood before Lady -Bothwell, grinning with misery. - -‘“O woman,” she said, snarling, “what are you making there?” - -‘The Countess looked up, then down: the far-searching eyes she had! “I am -making,” said she, “a shift for my fair son that is to be—my lord’s and -mine.” - -‘“You make for a bastard, woman,” said the Queen; and the Countess smiled -wisely. - -‘“Maybe I do, maybe. But this child of mine, look you, in my country we -call a love-child.” - -‘The Queen reeled as if she were sick-faint, and had Sempill beside her -in a moment, flaring with indignation. - -‘“Come you with me, madam,” cried she; “come you with me. Will you bandy -words with a——?” - -‘She was not suffered to get out her word. The Queen put her away gently, -saying, “No, no, you shall not call her that, lest she may ask you some -home questions.” - -‘But the Countess was not offended. “Why should she not? What harm in a -name? Call me as you will, ma’am, I shall never forbid you.” - -‘“Have you no shame?” cried Sempill. “And you divorced on your own -motion?” - -‘The Countess replied to the Queen, as if it had been she that spoke. “O, -madam, if divorce stands not in your way, shall it stand in mine? You -have given him your body, as I did mine; and the Church cannot gainsay me -that. But I’ll have you remember that when I got my child I was a wife; -and when you get yours you’ll be none, I doubt.” - -‘At this spiteful speech the Queen, in her turn, smiled. She was far -from that sort of recrimination. Presently she began in a new and colder -tone—remembering her errand. “Why are you here?” she asked the Countess. - -‘She was answered, “It is my lord’s pleasure.” - -‘“He is very clement, I think,” said the Queen. - -‘The Countess made no reply; and Sempill, who knew whether clemency had -moved my lord or not, did all she could to prevent the Queen from knowing -it also. Unfortunate lady! She gave her new suspicions. - -‘“You do not answer me, mistress,” she said, in her high peremptory way. -“I said that my lord is clement, and you make no reply. You will tell me -these are your jointure-lands, I suppose? Let be for that. Tell me now -this—How are you here?” - -‘The Countess hereupon, and for the first time, looked her in the face, -her own being venomous beyond a man’s belief. - -‘“How am I here? Just as you may have been at Dunbar, madam—as his kept -woman, just.” - -‘“You lie! You lie!” cried the Queen. “Dear God, she is a liar! Take back -your lies—they hurt me.” - -‘She pressed her side with all her might. I thought that Sempill would -have struck the cruel devil. But she never flinched. - -‘“No, no, I am no liar, madam,” she answered. “You are his woman, and so -am I. Eh, there’s been a many and a many of us—a brave company!” - -‘The Queen was tussling with her breast, but could get no breath. I -thought she was frightened at the sudden revelation, or confirmation, of -how she stood: she faltered—she cast about—and then she said: - -‘“I know that you lie, and I know why you lie. You hate me bitterly. This -is mere malice.” - -‘“It is not malice,” says the Countess; “it is the bare truth. Why should -I spare you the truth—you of all women?” - -‘“You hate too much, you hate too much! I have accorded with you—we have -kissed each other. I tried to serve you. It is not my fault if my lord—if -my lord——O Jeannie!” she said, with a pitiful gesture of stretched-out -arms—“O Jeannie, have mercy upon me—have a thought for my sorrow!” - -‘She came nearer as she spoke, so near that the two could have touched; -and then the Countess, who had sat so still, turned her head a little -back, and (like a white cat) laid her ears flat and struck at last. - -‘“Woman,” she said, “when you raked my father out of his grave, and spat -upon his dead corse, what thought had you for his flesh and blood? What -mercy upon their sorrow?” - -‘The Queen, when she had understood her, wiped her eyes, and grew calmer. -“I had no thought for you then, nor durst I have any. Princes must do -justice without ruth; and he was a rebel, and so were you all. Your -brothers Huntly and Adam have read me better.” - -‘“Ay,” said the Countess, “the greedy loons! They put your fingers in -their mouths and suck sweetness and solace—like enough they will read you -well. But I am not of their fashion, you must know.” Stiffening herself, -she spoke swiftly: “And if you could dishonour a dead old man whom you -vow you had once loved, what wonder if I dishonour you whom I have always -hated?” - -‘The Queen smiled in a sweet, tired way, as if she was sorry for this -woman. “Do you so hate me, Jeannie?” - -‘And the Countess answered her: “Ay, worse than hell-fire for my dead -father’s sake, and for my brother John’s, whom you slew. And so I am -well content to be here, that you should see me unashamed, owner without -asking of what you long for but can never have; and that I should see you -at my feet, deeply abased.” - -‘If her tongue had been a blade and her will behind it as the hand of -one who lived for cruelty, she could not have got her dear desire more -utterly than by these slow-stabbing words. Content to be here! Yea, -lascivious devil that she was, I could see that she was rolling in her -filthy comfort. But, by heaven, she was redeemed by the fading breath of -the most unhappy lady that ever moaned about the world. - -‘The Queen, I tell you, went directly to her—went close to her, without -thought of fear or sickening of disgust. And she took the wicked white -face between her hands and kissed the poisonous lips. And she said: “Hate -me no more, Jeannie Gordon, for now I know that we are sisters in great -sorrow, you and I. If we are not loved we must needs be unhappy; but in -that we have loved, and do still love, we are not without recompense. So -we must never rend each other; but you, poor lover, must kiss me, your -sister, as now I do you.” - -‘I ask myself here—and others have asked me—was this sudden alteration -in her Majesty that old sweet guile of hers, inveterate still and at -work? Was it possible that, even now, she could stay and stoop to cajole -this indurate woman, to woo her with kisses, kill her with kindness? I -like not to consider: many there be, I know, who do believe it, Mistress -Sempill being one. Who am I to judge that deep, working heart more -narrowly than by what appears? Such questions are too nice; they are -not for my answering. Candour compels me to record them; but I can only -report what I saw and heard. - -‘I heard the Countess give a throttled cry, as she struggled like one -caught in a fire; but the Queen kissed her again before she could free -herself. When at last she had flung away, with crying and a blenched -face—she who had been so hard before was now in a state of wild alarm, -warning off our lady with her fighting hands. “No, no, no! Touch me -not—defile not yourself. Oh, never that—I dare not suffer you!” - -‘“What, am I so vile?” says the poor Queen, misunderstanding her in this -new mood. The Countess burst out into passionate weeping, which hurt her -so much (for she was no tearful woman by nature) that she writhed under -the affliction as if the grief within was tearing at her vitals. She -shrieked, “Ah, no! Not you—not you—but I. Oh, you torture me, brand me -with fire!” I could not guess what she meant, save that she was beaten, -and her wicked passion with her. - -‘She sat up and stared at our Mistress, her face all writhen with grief. -“Listen, listen—this is the truth as God knows it. That man who stands -between us two and Heaven is your ruin and mine. For I love him not at -all, and have consented to him now, degrading myself for hatred’s sake. -And for you, who have loved him so well, he has no care at all—but only -for your crown and royal seat; for he loves me only—and so it has always -been.” - -‘The Queen could only nod her head. Mary Sempill said sternly: “Woman, -you do well to lash yourself at last; for none can hurt you beside -yourself. Now, may God forgive you, for I never will.” - -‘“Oh, Mary,” says the Queen, “what have you or I to do with forgiveness -of sins? Alas, we need it for ourselves. And she is in as bad a case as -I am.” Then, “Come to me now, Jeannie,” she said; and most humbly that -wicked, beaten woman crept up to her late enemy. The Queen embraced and -comforted her. “Farewell, Jeannie,” said she, “and think as well of me -as you can. For I go on to I know not what—only I do think it will be -unhappiness—and we shall never meet again.” With sublime calm she turned -to us, weeping behind her. “Come, my children, let us go our ways.” - -‘This is the most terrible secret sorrow which broke her heart, and ends -my plea for pity upon her who loved so fondly. My breath and strength are -done; for I had them from her alone, and with her high heart’s death dies -my book.’ - -Honest, ingenuous, loyal Des-Essars! seeing, maybe, but in a glass -darkly; seeing, certainly, not more than half—thou wert right there. If -thy mistress beat the woman at last, it was with her fading breath. She -knew herself beaten to the dust by the man. - -[9] Here I am bound to agree with Bothwell; for if Huntly wished to keep -him from blood-guiltiness and knew that he could, why not have kept him -and his kegs away altogether? One answer may be, of course, that Morton -and his friends would never have stood in had Bothwell and his been ruled -out. - -[10] Des-Essars, plainly, was at work during the Queen’s captivity in -England; and, as I judge, while the inquiry was being held in Westminster -Hall in 1568. - - - - -CHAPTER IX - -THE BRIDE’S TRAGEDY - - -The heart being an organ of which we have opinions more gallant than -practical, Des-Essars should perhaps have judged wiselier that his Secret -of Secrets was what broke the Queen’s _spirit_. There he had been right, -for from this day onwards to the end of her throned life the tragedy is -pure pity: she drifts, she suffers, but she scarcely acts—unless the -struggles of birds in nets can be called acts. After her spirit went -rapidly her animal courage; after that her womanly habit. She was like to -become a mere tortured beast. And as I have no taste for vivisection, nor -can credit you with any, I shall be as short as I can. - -Silent all the long way home from wooded Crichton to the sea, it might -seem as if she had been hardening herself by silent meditation for what -she knew must take place. She saw nothing of Bothwell that night—she was -not yet ready for him; but she did what had to be done with Mary Sempill. - -When that loyal soul came late into the bedchamber to bid her good-night, -she found her mistress in bed, calm and clear in mind. Forewarned in some -measure, as she stooped over to kiss her, the Queen did not as usual -put out her arms to draw her friend nearer, but lay waiting for the -kiss, which hovered, as it were, above her; and before it could come she -said, ‘Do you kiss me, Mary? Wait while I tell you something. I am to be -married to my lord come the day after to-morrow.’ - -Sempill, prepared or not, started back, on fire. ‘You’ll never do it. -You’ll never dare to do it.’ - -‘I shall dare to do it, if I dare avouch it.’ - -Sempill was trembling. ‘I cannot endure it, cannot face it—most wicked! -Oh, my dear love and my friend, you that have been all the world to me in -times bygone, never go so far from me that I cannot follow you!’ - -The Queen bit her lip, and wrinkled her eyes where the tears were -brimming, drowning her sight. ‘I must, I must—I cannot go back. Oh, have -mercy upon me! Oh, Mary——’ - -Sempill hid her face. ‘I cannot see it done. I cannot know of it. I am—I -do my best to be—an honest woman. These things be far from me—unholy -things. As Christ is my Saviour, I believe He will pardon you and me all -our sins of the hot blood. But not of the cold blood—not of the dry!’ She -changed suddenly, as if struck chill. ‘Why, you will be an harlot!’ she -said. - -The Queen turned over in her bed and faced the wall. - -Sempill went down on her knees. ‘I conjure you—I beseech you! Madam, I -implore you! By your mother’s bliss and your father’s crown imperial, by -the great calling of your birth! By Christ’s dear blood shed for you and -all, by the sorrows of Our Lady—the swords in her heart—the tears that -she shed; by her swooning at the Cross—I implore, I implore!—make not all -these woes to be in vain. By your young child I conjure you—by my own -upon earth and the other in my womb—by all calm and innocent things—oh, -put it from you: suffer all things—even death, even death!’ - -There was no response. She rose and stood over the bed. ‘We have loved -much, and had sweet commerce, you and I. Many have had sweetness of you -and left you: Beaton is gone, Fleming is alienate. You drive me to go -their way, you drive me from you. For if you do this, go I must. Honour -is above all—and yon man, by my soul, is as foul as hell. Turn to me, my -Mary, look at me once, and I shall never leave you till I die.’ - -She did not stir nor utter a sound; she lay like a log. Mary Sempill, -with a sob that shook her to pieces, and a gesture of drowning hands, -went out of the room, and at midnight left the palace. Those two, who had -been lovers once and friends always, never met again in this world. - -What the Queen’s motives may have been I know not, whether of desperate -conviction that retreat was not possible, or of desperate effort to -entice the man to her even at this last hour: let them go.[11] She held -to her resolve next day; she faced the remnant of her friends, all she -had left; lastly, she faced the strong man himself, and like a doll -in his arms suffered his lying kisses upon her lips. And she never -reproached him, being paralysed by the knowledge of what he would have -done if she had. To see him throw up the head, expose the hairy throat, -to see him laugh! She could not bear that. - -On this day, the eve of her wedding, she found out that her courage had -ebbed. Things frightened her now which before she would have scoffed at. -A May marriage—hers was to be that: and they who feared ill-luck from -such gave her fears. A Highland woman became possessed in the street, -and prophesied to a crowd of people. She said that the Queen would be a -famous wife, for she would have five husbands, and in the time of the -fifth would be burned. ‘Name them, mother—name them!’ they cried; and the -mad creature peered about with her sly eyes. ‘I dinna see him here, but -the third is in this town, and the fourth likewise!’ ‘The fourth! Who is -he?’ ‘He’s a Hamilton, I ken that fine, and dwells by Arbroath. I doubt -his name will be Jock.’ - -Lord John! The Lord of Arbroath—why, yes, she had given him a great -horse. They rehearse this tale at dinner, and see Bothwell grow red, and -hear the Queen talk to herself: ‘Will they burn me? Yes, yes, that is the -punishment of light women. Poor souls, they burn for ever!’ - -She carried the thought about with her all day, and at dusk was much -agitated when they lit the candles. About supper-time Father Roche, -asking to speak with her, was admitted. He told her that his conscience -would not permit him to be any longer in her service. Bothwell had -refused to be married with the mass: in Father Roche’s eyes this would be -no marriage at all. She was angry for a second in her old royal way—her -Tudor way; moved towards him swiftly as if she would have quelled him -with a forked word; but stopped mid-road and let her hands unclench -themselves. ‘Yes, yes, go your ways—you will find a well-trodden road. -Why should you stop? I need you no more.’ He would have kissed her hands, -but she put them behind her and stood still till he had gone. Then to -bed, without prayers. - -At ten o’clock of the morning she was married to him without state, -without religion. There was no banquet: the city acted as if unaware of -anything done; and after dinner she rode away with him to Borthwick. -Melvill, Des-Essars, Lethington went with her, Mary Seton and Carwood. -Bothwell had his own friends, the Ormistons and others of mean degree. - -With tears they put her to bed; but she had none. ‘I would that I might -die within the next hour,’ she said to Des-Essars; and he, grown older -and drier suddenly—‘By my soul, ma’am, it should be within less time, to -do you service.’ - -She shook her head. ‘No, you are wrong. He needs me not. You will see.’ -She sent him away to his misery, and remained alone in hers. - -It cannot be known when the Earl went up. He stayed on in the parlour -below, drinking with his friends so long as they remained above-board, -talking loudly, boasting of what he had done and of what he should do -yet. He took her back to Edinburgh within a few days, moved thereto by -the urgency of public affairs. - -Those who had not seen her go, but now saw her return, did not like her -looks—so leaden-coloured, so listless and dejected, so thin she seemed. -The French Ambassador—Du Croc, an old friend and a sage—waiting for -audience, heard a quarrel in her cabinet, heard Bothwell mock and gibe, -depart with little ceremony; and then the Queen in hysterics, calling -for friends who had gone—for Livingstone, for Fleming. - -Carwood came in. ‘O madam, what do you lack?’ - -‘My courage, my courage.’ - -Carwood, with a scream—‘God’s sake, ma’am, put down that knife!’ - -‘The knife is well enough,’ says she, ‘but the hand is numb. Feel me, -Carwood: I am dead in the hand.’ - -Du Croc heard Carwood grunt as she tussled. ‘Leave it—leave it—give it -me! But you shall. You are Queen, but my God to me. Leave it, I say——’ -The Queen began to whimper and coax for the knife—called it her lover. -Carwood flung open the window and threw it on to the grass. - - * * * * * - -No doubt the worst was to be feared, no doubt Bothwell had reason to be -nervous. At the council-board, to which he ordered her to come, he told -her what was before her. The lords were in league, clustered about the -Prince: he was not ashamed to tell her in the hearing of all that she was -useless without the child. Dejected, almost abject as she was become, she -quailed—shrinking back, with wide eyes upon him—at this monstrous insult, -as if she herself had been a child struck to the soul by something -more brutish than your whips. Lord Herries rose in his place—‘By the -living God, my lord, I cannot hear such talk——’ Bothwell was driven to -extenuate. ‘My meaning, madam, is that your Majesty can have no force in -your arm, nor can your loyal friends have any force, without the Prince -your son be with you. You know very well how your late consort desired to -have him; and no man can say he was not wise. Believe me, madam—and these -lords will bear me out—he is every whit as necessary to your Majesty and -me.’ - -Huntly, on the Queen’s left, leaned behind her chair and spoke in a -fierce whisper: ‘You forget, I think, that you speak to the Queen, and of -the Queen. The Prince hath nothing but through her.’ - -‘By God, Geordie,’ he said, whispering back, but heard everywhere, ‘and -what have I but through her? I tell you fairly we have lost the main -unless we can put up that cockerel.’ - -The Queen tried to justify herself to her tyrant. ‘You know that I have -tried—you know that my brother worked against me——’ - -‘And he was wise. But now he is from home; we must try again.’ - -She let her head sink. ‘I am weary—I am weary. Whom have we to send? Do -you trust Lethington?’ - -This was not heard; but Lethington saw Bothwell’s eye gleam red upon him. - -‘Him? I would as soon go myself. If he wormed in there, do you suppose we -could ever draw him out again?’ - -‘No,’ she said aloud, ‘I am of your mind. Send we Melvill, then.’ - -He would not have Melvill: he chose Herries. - -They sent out Lord Herries on a fruitless errand; fruitless in the main -sense, but fruitful in another, since he brought back a waverer. This -was the Earl of Argyll, head of a great name, but with no head of his -own worth speaking about. He might have been welcome but for the news -that came with him. All access to the Prince had been refused to Herries -the moment it was known on whose behalf he asked it. The Countess of -Mar mounted guard over the door, and would not leave until the Queen’s -emissary was out of the house. There was more than statecraft here, as -Herries had to confess: witchcraft from the Queen was in question, from -the mother upon the child. The last time she had been to see him, they -said, she had given him an apple, which he played with and presently cast -down. A dog picked it up, ran under the table with it and began to mumble -it. The dog, foaming and snaping, jerked away its life. ‘Treason and -lies!’ roared Bothwell, who was present; ‘treason heaped on lies! Why, -when was your Majesty last at Stirling?’ He had forgotten, though she had -not. - -‘It was the night before you took me at Almond Brig,’ she said; and, when -he chuckled, broke out with vehemence of pain, ‘You laugh at it! You -laugh still, O Christ! Will you laugh at my graveside, Bothwell?’ She hid -her head in her arm and wept miserably. It was grievous to see her and -not weep too. Yet these were no times in which to weep. - - * * * * * - -On the same day in which Lord Lindsay departed, to join the Lords at -Stirling, Huntly also, most unhappily, asked leave to go to his lands. -The Queen used him bitterly. She could be gentle with any other and move -their pity: with him she must always be girding. ‘Do you turn traitor -like your father? Have you too kept a dagger for my last hours?’ He did -not break into reproaches, nor seek to justify himself, as he might have -done—for no one had tried to serve her at more peril to himself. He said, -‘Madam, I have tried to repair my faults committed against you,’ and -turned away with a black look of despair. He went north, as she thought, -lost to her: it was Bothwell who afterwards told her that he had gone to -summon his kindred against the war which he saw could not be far off. So -scornful are women to those who love them in vain—that should surely have -touched her, but did not. Lord John Hamilton took Huntly’s empty place, -too powerful an ally to be despised. - -The Earl of Argyll came and went between Stirling and Edinburgh, very -diligent to accommodate the two cities, if that might be. He dared—or was -fool enough—to tell the Queen that all would be well if she would give up -the King’s murderers. She replied: ‘Go back to Stirling, then, and take -them. I do give them up. It is there you shall find them.’ Whether he -knew this to be truth or not, for certain he did not report the message -to the Earl of Morton. It would have fared ill with him if he had. - -Before he could come back, a baffled but honest intermediary, Lethington -had fled the Court and taken his wife with him. He went out, as he said, -to ride in the meadows; he did ride there, but did not return. His wife -slipt away separately, and joined her man at Callander; thence, when Lord -Livingstone sent them word that he could not harbour the Queen’s enemies, -they went on to Lord Fleming’s, Mary’s father’s house, and finally to -Stirling. It was a bad sign that the gentle girl, flying like a thief at -her husband’s bidding, should write no word, nor send any message to the -Queen; it was a worse to the last few faithful that the Queen took no -notice. All she was heard to say was that Fleming could not be blamed for -paying her merchet. - -_Mercheta Mulicrum_, Market of Women—the money-fee exacted by the lord -of the soil before a girl could be wed, clean, to the man who chose her! -Livingstone had paid it, Beaton had paid it; she, Queen Mary, God knows! -had paid it deep. She shook her head—and was Fleming to escape? ‘No! but -Love—that exorbitant lord—will have it of all of us women. And now’s for -you, Seton!’ - -She looked strangely at the glowing, golden-haired girl before her; the -green-eyed, the sharp-tongued Mary Seton, last of her co-adventurers of -six years agone. Fair Seton made no promises; but all the world knows -that she alone stayed by her lady to the long and very end. - -Returned from Stirling, my Lord of Argyll, with perturbed face, -disorderly dress, and entire absence of manners, broke in upon the -Queen’s privacy, claiming secret words. The lords were prepared for the -field. They intended an attack upon the lower town by land and water; -they would surround Holyroodhouse, seize her person. - -She flamed. ‘You mean my husband’s. It is him they seek.’ - -He did not affect to deny it. She sent for Bothwell and told him all. - -Bothwell said: ‘You are right. They want me. Well, they shall not have me -so easily. You and I will away this night to Borthwick. Arbroath will be -half way to us by now, and the Gordons not far behind. Let Adam go and -hasten his brother. Madam, we should be speedy.’ - -She took Seton with her—having no other left; she took Des-Essars. Arthur -Erskine was to captain Holyroodhouse. Bothwell had, perhaps, half a dozen -of his dependents. They went after dark, but in safety. - -There, at Borthwick, they stayed quietly through the 8th and 9th of June: -close weather, with thunder brewing. - -No news of Huntly, none of the Hamiltons. Bothwell was out each day for -long spells, spying and judging. He opened communication with Dunbar, -got in touch with his own country. At home sat the Queen with her two -friends, very silent. - -What was there to say? Who could nurse her broken heart save this one -man, who had no thought to do it, nor any heart of his own, either, to -spare for her? Spited had he been by Fortune, without doubt. He had had -the Crown and Mantle of Scotland in his pair of hands; having schemed for -six years to get them, he had had them, and felt their goodly weight: and -here he was now in hiding, trusting for bare life to the help of men who -had no reason to love him. Where, then, were his friends? He had none, -nor ever had but one—this fair, frail woman, whom he had desired for her -store, and had emptied, and would now be rid of. - -If his was a sorry case, what was hers? Alas, the heart sickens to think -of it. With how high a head came she in, she and her cohort of maids, to -win wild Scotland! Where were they? They had received their crowns, but -she had besoiled and bedrabbled hers. They had lovers, they had children, -they had troops of friends; but she, who had sought with panting mouth -for very love, had had husbands who made love stink, and a child denied -her, and no friend in Scotland but a girl and a poor boy. You say she had -sought wrongly. I say she had overmastering need to seek. Love she must; -and if she loved amiss it was that she loved too well. You say that she -misused her friends. I deny that a girl set up where she was could have -any friends at all. She was a well of sweet profit—the Honeypot; and they -swarmed about her for their meat like house-flies; and when that was got, -and she drained dry, they departed by the window in clouds, to settle -and fasten about the nearest provand they could meet with: carrion or -honeycomb, man’s flesh, dog’s flesh or maid’s flesh, what was it to them? -In those days of dreadful silent waiting at Borthwick, less than a month -after marriage, I tell you very plainly that she was beggared of all she -had in the world, and knew it. The glutted flies had gone by the window, -the gorged rats had scampered by the doors. So she remained alone with -the man she had risked all to get, who was scheming to be rid of her. Her -heart was broken, her love was murdered, her spirit was gone: what more -could she suffer? One more thing—bodily terror, bodily fear. - -[11] I am unwilling to intrude myself and my opinions, but feel drawn to -suggest that the latter was her motive. If she had beaten the Countess at -the eleventh hour, could she not beat the Earl? Was she not Huntress to -the utterance? Let God (Who made her) pity her: I do believe it. - - - - -CHAPTER X - -THE KNOCKING AT BORTHWICK - - -The 10th of June had been a thunderous day, and was followed by a -stifling night. In the lower parlour where the Queen lay the candles -seemed to be clogged, the air charged with steam. Mary Seton sat on the -floor by the couch, Des-Essars, bathed in sweat, leaned against the -window-sill. In the hall beyond could be heard Bothwell’s voice, grating -querulously to young Crookstone and Paris about his ruined chances. He -was not laughing any more—was not one, it was found, to bear misfortunes -gaily. His tongue had mastered him of late, and his hand too. He had -nearly killed Paris that morning with one smashing blow. - -There came a puff of wind, with branches sweeping the window, the -pattering, swishing sound as of heavy rain. ‘Thank God for rain! Baptist, -the window, lest I suffocate. The rain will cool the air.’ He set it -wide open, and leaned out. There was no rain at all; but the sky was a -vaporous vault, through which, in every part, the veiled moon diffused -her light. He saw a man standing on the grass as plainly as you see this -paper, who presently, after considering him, went away towards the woods. -It might have been one of their own sentries, it might have been any one: -but why did it make his heart beat? He stayed where he was, watching -intently, considering with himself whether he should tell the Queen, or -by some ruse let my lord have warning without her knowledge. Then, while -he was hammering it out, she got up and came to the window, and leaned -over him, her hand on his shoulder. - -‘Poor prisoners, you and I, my Baptist.’ - -He turned to her with burning eyes. ‘Madam, there can be no prison for me -where you are; but my heart walks with yours through all space.’ - -‘My heart,’ she said, ‘limps, and soon will be bedridden; and then yours -will stop. You are tied to me, and I to him. The world has gone awry with -us, my dear.’ - -Very nervous, on account of what he had seen, he had no answer ready. -Thought, feeling, passion, desire, were all boiling and stirring together -in his brain. The blood drummed at his ears, like a call to arms. - -Suddenly—it all came with a leap—there was hasty knocking at the hall -doors, and at the same instant a bench was overturned out there, and -Bothwell went trampling towards the sound. Des-Essars, tensely moved, -shut the windows and barred the shutters over them. The Queen watched -him—her hands held her bosom. ‘What is it? Oh, what is it?’ - -‘Hush, for God’s sake! Let me listen.’ - -Mary Seton opened the parlour door, as calm as she had ever been. They -listened all. - -They heard a clamour of voices outside. ‘Bothwell! Bothwell! Let us in.’ - -‘Who are ye?’ - -‘We are hunted men—friends. We are here for our lives.’ - -Bothwell put his ear close to the door; his mouth worked fearfully, all -his features were distorted. Heavens! how he listened. - -‘Who are ye? Tell me that.’ - -‘Friends—friends—friends!’ - -He laughed horribly—with a hollow, barking noise, like a leopard’s cough. -‘By my God, Lindsay, I know ye now for a fine false friend. You shall -never take me here.’ - -For answer, the knocking was doubled; men rained blows upon the door; -and some ran round to the windows and jumped up at them, crying, ‘Let us -in—let us in!’ Some glass was broken; but the shutter held. Mary Seton -held the Queen close in her arms, Des-Essars stood in the doorway with a -drawn sword. Bothwell came up to him for a moment. ‘By God, man, we’re -rats in a drain—damned rats, by my soul! Ha!’ he turned as Paris came -down from the turret, where he had been sent to spy. - -The house, Paris said, was certainly surrounded. The torches made it -plain that these were enemies. He had seen my lord of Morton on a white -horse, my Lords Hume and Sempill and some more. - -They all looked at each other, a poor ten that they were. - -‘Hark to them now, master,’ says Paris. ‘They have a new cry.’ - -Bothwell listened, biting his tongue. - -‘Murderer, murderer, come out! Come out, adulterous thief!’ This was -Lindsay again. There was no sound of Morton’s voice, the thick, the rich -and mellow note he had. But who was Morton, to call for the murderer? - -Paris, after spying again, said that they were going to fire the doors; -and added, ‘Master, it is hot enough without a fire. We had best be off.’ - -Bothwell looked at the Queen. ‘My dear, I must go.’ - -She barely turned her eyes upon him; but she said, ‘Do you leave me -here?’ Scathing question from a bride, had a man been able to observe -such things. - -He said, ‘Ay, I do. It is me they want, these dogs. You will be safe if -they know that I am away—and I will take care they do know it. I go to -Dunbar, whence you shall hear from me by some means. Crookstone, come you -with me, and come you, Hobbie. Paris, you stay here.’ - -‘Pardon, master,’ says Paris, ‘I go with your lordship.’ - -Pale Paris was measured with his eye. ‘I’ll kill you if you do, my fine -man.’ - -‘That is your lordship’s affair,’ says Paris with deference; ‘but first I -will show you the way out. There are horses in the undercroft.’ - -Bothwell lifted up his wife, held her in his arms and kissed her twice. -‘Fie, you are cold!’ he said, and put her down. She had lain listless -against him, without kissing. - -He turned at once and followed Paris; young Crookstone followed him. -It seems that he got clear off in the way he intended, for the noises -outside the house ceased; and in the grey of the morning, before three -o’clock, all was quiet about the policies. They must have been within an -ace of capturing him: in fact, Paris admitted afterwards that they were -but a bowshot away at one time. - - * * * * * - -The Queen sent Seton for Des-Essars at about four o’clock in the morning. -Neither mistress nor maid had been to bed. - -He found her in a high fever; her eyes glowing like jet, her face white -and pinched; the stroke of her certain fate drawing down her mouth. She -said, ‘I have been a false woman, a coward, and a shame to my race.’ - -‘God knows your Majesty is none of these.’ - -‘Baptist, I am going to my lord.’ - -‘Oh, madam, God forbid you!’ - -‘God will forbid me presently if I do not. It should have been last -night—I may be too late. But make haste.’ - -They procured a guide of a sort, a wretched poltroon of a fellow, who -twice tried to run for it and leave them in Yester woods. Des-Essars, -after the second attempt, rode beside him with a cocked pistol in -his hand. From Yester they went north by Haddington, for fear of -Whittingehame and the Douglases. As it was, they had to skirt Lethington, -and the Secretary’s fine grey house there in the park; but the place -was close-barred—nothing hindered them. They passed unknown through -Haddington, the Queen desperately tired. Sixteen hours in the saddle, a -cold welcome at the end. - -Bothwell received them without cheer. ‘You would have been wiser to have -stayed. Here you are in the midst of war.’ - -‘My place was by your side.’ - -The mockery of the thing struck him all at once. This schemed-for life of -his—a vast, empty shell of a house! - -‘Oh, God, I sicken of this folly!’ He turned from her. - -She had nothing to say, could hardly stand on her feet. Seton took her to -bed. - -A message next day from Huntly in Edinburgh. Balfour held the castle; -all the rest of the town was Grange’s. Morton, Atholl, and Lethington -were rulers. Atholl had Holyroodhouse; Lethington and his wife were with -Morton. He himself, said Huntly, would move out in a day or two and join -the Hamiltons at Dalkeith. Let Bothwell raise the Merse and meet them. He -named Gladsmuir for rendezvous, on the straight road from Haddington to -the city, five miles by west of Haddington. - -Bothwell read all this to the Queen, who said nothing. She was thinking -of a business of her own, as appeared when she was alone. She beckoned up -Baptist. - -‘There’s not a moment to be lost. Find me a messenger, a trusty one, who -will get speech with Mary Fleming.’ - -‘Madam,’ says Baptist, ‘let me go.’ - -‘No, no: I need you. Try Paris—no! my lord would never spare him. And he -would deny me again. Do you choose somebody.’ - -‘What is he to say to her, ma’am?’ - -‘He shall speak to her in private. She knows where my coffer is—my -casket.’ - -Ah! this was a grave affair. Des-Essars made up his mind at once. -‘Madam,’ he said, ‘let me advise your Majesty. Either send me, or send no -one. If you send me I will bring the casket back. That I promise. If you -send no one—if you do not remind her—it will slip her memory.’ - -The Queen’s eyes showed her fears. ‘Remember you, Baptist, of my casket. -If Fleming were to betray me to Lethington——’ No need to end. - -‘Again I say, madam, send me.’ - -She thought; but even so her eyes filled with tears, which began to fall -fast. - -‘Dearest madam, do you weep?’ - -‘I cannot let you go. Do not ask me—I need you here.’ - -He leaned to her. ‘Alas, what can I do to help your Majesty?’ - -She took his hand. ‘Stay. You are my only friend. The end is not far. -Have a little patience—stay.’ - -‘But your casket——’ - -She shook her head. ‘Let all go now. Stay you with me.’ - -‘Certainly I will stay with you,’ he said. ‘It will be to see you triumph -over your enemies.’ - -And again she shook her head. ‘Not with a broken heart!’ Then in a -frightened whisper she began to tell him her fears. ‘Do you know what -they make ready for me? The stake, and the faggot, and the fire! Fire for -the wife that slew her husband. Baptist, you will never forsake me now! -This is my secret knowledge. Never forsake me!’ She hid her face on his -shoulder and cried there, as one lost. - -Bothwell burst into the room: they sprang apart. He was eager, flush with -news. ‘We march to-morrow with the light. My men are coming in—in good -order. Be of good cheer, madam, for with God’s help we shall pound these -knaves properly.’ - -‘How shall God help us, my lord,’ said she, ‘who have helped not Him?’ - -‘Why, then, my dear,’ cries he with a laugh, ‘why, then, we will help -ourselves.’ - - - - -CHAPTER XI - -APPASSIONATA - - -Grange, that fine commander, got his back to the sun and gave the lords -the morning advantage. ‘We shall want no more than that,’ he told Morton; -‘by ten o’clock they will be here, and by noon we shall be through with -it.’ - -‘Shall we out banner, think you?’ says Morton. - -‘Nay, my lord, nay. Keep her back the now.’ Grange was fighting with his -head, disposing his host according to the lie of the ground, and his -reserves also. He took the field before dawn, and had every man at his -post by seven o’clock. There was a ground mist, and the sea all blotted -out: everything promised great heat. - -They were to be seen, a waiting host, when the Queen crested Carbery -Hill and watched her men creep round about; with Erskine beside her she -could make them out—arquebusiers, pikemen, and Murrays from Atholl on -the lowest ground (Tillibardine leading them), on either wing horsemen -with spears. They had a couple of brass field-pieces in front. One could -see the chiefs walking their horses up and down the lines, or pricking -forward to confer, or clustering together, looking to where one pointed -with his staff. There was Morton on his white horse, himself, portly -man, in black with a steel breastplate—white sash across it—in his steel -bonnet a favour of white. White was their badge, then; for, looking at -them in the mass, the host was seen to be spattered with it, as if in -a neglected field of poppies and corncockles there grew white daisies -interspersed. The stout square man in leather jerkin and buff boots -was Grange—on a chestnut horse; with him to their right rode Atholl on -a black—Atholl in a red surtout, and the end of his fine beard lost in -the white sash which he too had. Who is the slim rider in black—haunting -Atholl like a shadow? Who but careful Mr. Secretary Lethington could have -those obsequious shoulders, that attentive cock of the head? Lethington -was there, then! Ah! and there, by one’s soul, was Archie Douglas’s grey -young head, and his white minister’s ruff, where a red thread of blood -ought to be. Glencairn was there, Lindsay, Sempill, Rothes—all those -strong tradesmen, who had lied for their profit, and were now come to -claim wages: all of them but the trader of traders, the white-handed -prayerful man, the good Earl of Moray, safe in France, waiting his turn. - -So prompt as they stood down there in the grey haze, all rippling in the -heat; without sound of trumpet or any noise but the whinnying of a horse; -without any motion save now and then, when some trooper plunged out of -line and must pull back—that thing of all significant things about them -was marked by the Queen, who stood shading her eyes from the sun atop -of Carbery Hill. ‘Oh, Erskine!’ she said, ‘oh, Bothwell! they have no -standard. Against whom, then, do we fight?’ - -Bothwell, exasperated by anxiety, made short answer: ‘It is plain enough -to see what and who they are. They are men—desperate men. They are men -for whom loss means infamous death. For, mark you well, madam, if Morton -lose this day he loses his head.’ - -‘Ay,’ she gloomed, ‘and many more shall lose theirs. I will have -Lindsay’s and Archie’s—and you shall have Lethington’s.’ - -‘I would have had that long ago, if you had listened to me. And now you -see whether I was right or wrong. But when women take to ruling men——’ - -She touched his arm. ‘Dear friend, for whom I have suffered many things, -do not reproach me at this hour.’ The tears were in her eyes—she was -always quick at self-pity. - -But he had turned his head. ‘Ha! they need me, I see. Forgive me, madam, -I must have a word with Ormiston.’ He saluted and rode down to meet his -allies. Monsieur Du Croc, the French Ambassador, approached her, hat in -hand. He was full of sympathy; but, with his own theories of how to end -this business, could not give advice. - -Sir James Melvill, watching the men come up, shook his head at the look -of them. ‘No heart in their chance—no heart at all,’ he was heard to say. - -The Queen’s forces deployed across the eastern face of Carbery Hill in a -long line which, it was clear, was not of equal strength with the lords’. -It became less so as the day wore; for had you looked to its right you -would have seen a continual trickle of stooping, running men crossing -over to the enemy. These were deserters at the eleventh hour; Bothwell -rode one of them down, chased him, and when he fell drove his horse over -him and over in a blind fury of rage, trampling him out of semblance to -his kind. It stayed the leak for a while; but it began again, and he -had neither heart nor time to deal with it. Where were the Hamiltons -who should have been with her? Where, alas, were the Gordons? In place -of them the Borderers and Foresters looked shaggy thieves—gypsies, -hill-robbers, savage men, red-haired, glum-faced, many without shoes -and some without breeches. The tressured Lion of Scotland was in Arthur -Erskine’s hold: at near ten o’clock Bothwell bade him display it. It -unfurled itself lazily its full length; but there was no breath of air. -It clung about the staff like so much water-weed; and they never saw the -Lion. No matter; it would be a sign to that watchful host in the plain: -now let us see what flag they dare to fly. They waited tensely for it, a -group of them together—the Queen with her wild tawny hair fallen loose, -her bare thin neck, her short red petticoat and blue scarf; Bothwell -biting his tongue; Ormiston, Des-Essars, sage Monsieur Du Croc. - -They saw two men come out of the line bearing two spears close together. -At a word they separated, backing from each other: a great white sheet -was displayed, having some picture upon it—green, a blot like blood, -a wavy legend above. One could make out a tree; but what was the red -stain? They talked—the Queen very fast and excitedly. She must know -what this was—she would go down and find out—it was some insult, she -expected. Was that red a fire? Who would go? Des-Essars offered, but she -refused him. She chose Lord Livingstone for the service, and he went, -gallantly enough—and returned, a scared old optimist indeed. However, she -would have it, so she learned that they had the King lying dead under -a tree, and the Prince his son praying at his feet—with the legend, -‘Judge and avenge my cause, O Lord!’ The red was not a fire, but the -Prince’s robe. The Queen cried out: ‘Infamy! Infamy! They carry their own -condemnation—do you not see it?’ If anybody did, he did not say so. - - * * * * * - -Monsieur Du Croc had his way at last, and was allowed to carry messages -between the hosts. The burden of all that he brought back was that the -lords would obey the Queen if she would give up the murderers, whom they -named. The offer was ludicrous, coming from Morton—but when she ordered -Du Croc back to expose it, he fairly told her to read below the words. -They had come for Lord Bothwell. ‘I will die sooner than let him be -touched,’ said she. ‘Let some one—Hob Ormiston, go you—fetch Grange to -speak with me.’ Hob went off, with a white scarf in his held-up hand; and -the Queen rode half-way down the hill for the parley. The great banner -dazzled her: it was noticed that she bent her head down, as one rides -against the sun. - -Grange came leisurely up towards her—a rusty man of war, shrewd, terse, -and weathered. He could only report what his masters bade him: they -called for the surrender of the murderers. She flamed and faced him with -her royal anger. ‘And I, your sovereign lady, bid you, Grange, go over -there and bring the murderers to me. Look, there goes one on his white -horse! And there shirk two after him, hiding behind him—the one with a -grey head, and the other with a grey face. Fetch you me those.’ - -‘Bah!’ snarled Bothwell, ‘we talk for ever. Let me shoot down this dog.’ -A Hepburn—quiet and sinewy—stepped out of the ranks with a horse-pistol. -Grange watched him without moving a muscle; but ‘Oh!’ cried the Queen, -‘what villainy are you about?’ She struck down the pistol-arm,—as once -before she had struck down Fawdonsyde’s. - -Bothwell, red in the face, said, ‘Let us end this folly. Let him who -calls for me come and fetch me. I will fight with him here and now. Go -you, Grange, and bring my Lord Morton hither.’ - -‘No need for his lordship, if I will serve your turn, Earl of Bothwell,’ -says Grange. - -But Bothwell said, ‘Damn your soul, I fight with my equals. None knows -it better than you.’ He would have no one below an Earl’s rank—himself -being now, you must recollect, Duke of Orkney and Zetland—and it should -be Morton for choice. - -Grange, instructed by the Queen, rode back. They saw Morton accost -him, listen, look over the valley. He called a conference—they talked -vehemently: then Morton and Lindsay pricked forward up the hill, and -stopped within hailing distance. - -‘You, Bothwell,’ cried Morton, ‘come you down, then; and have at you -here.’ - -The Queen’s high voice called clearly back. ‘He shall never fight with -you, murderer.’ - -Lindsay bared his head. ‘Then let him take me, madam; for I am nothing of -that sort.’ - -‘No, no, Lindsay,’ said Bothwell; ‘I have no quarrel with you.’ - -The Earl of Morton had been looking at Bothwell in his heavy, ruminating -way, as if making up his mind. While the others were bandying their -cries, the Queen’s voice flashing and shrieking above the rest, he still -looked and turned his thoughts over. Presently—in his time—he gave -Lindsay his sword and walked his horse up the hill to the Queen’s party. -He saluted her gravely. ‘With your gracious leave, madam, I seek to put -two words into my Lord Bothwell’s ear. You see I have no sword.’ - -The Queen looked at once to her husband. He nodded, gave his sword to -Huntly, and said, ‘I am ready for you.’ They moved ten yards apart; -Morton talked and the other listened. - -‘Bothwell, my man,’ he said, ‘there’s no a muckle to pick between us, I -doubt—I played one card and you another; but I have the advantage of ye -just now, and am no that minded to take it up. Man!’ he chuckled, ‘ye -stumbled sorely when ye let them find for the powder!’ - -‘Get on, get on,’ says Bothwell, drawing a great breath. - -‘I will,’ Morton said. ‘I am here to advise ye to make off while you -can. Go your ways to Dunbar, and avoid the country for a while. I’ll -warrant you you’ll not be followed oversea. All my people will serve the -Queen—have no fear for her. Now, take my advice; ’tis fairly given. I’ve -no wish to work you a mischief—though, mind you, I have the power—for -you and I have been open dealers with each other this long time. And you -brought me home—I’m not one to forget it. But—Lord of Hosts! what chance -have you against Grange?’ He waited. ‘Come now, come! what say you?’ - -Lord Bothwell considered it, working his strong jaw from side to side: -a fair proffer, an honourable proffer. He looked at the forces against -him—though he had no need; he knew them better men than his, because -Grange was a better man than he. That banner of murder—the cry behind -it—the Prince behind the cry, up on the rock of Stirling: in his heart he -knew that he had lost the game. No way to Stirling—no way! But the other -way was the sea-way—the old free life, the chances of the open water. Eh, -damn them, he was not to be King of Scots, then! But he had known that -for a week. He turned his head and saw the sea like molten gold, and far -off, dipped in it, a little ship with still sails—Ho! the sea-way! - -‘By God, Morton,’ he said, ‘you may be serving me. I’ll do it.’ - -‘Go and tell her,’ says Morton; and they both went back to the Queen. - -Both took off their bonnets. Bothwell said: ‘Madam, we must avoid -blood-shedding if we may, and I have talked with my lord of Morton. He -makes an offer of fair dealing, which I have taken. I have a clear road -to Dunbar, thence where I will. All these hosts will follow you if I am -not there. They pay me the compliment of high distrust, you perceive. -After a little, I doubt not but you shall see me back again where I would -always be. Madam, get the Prince in your own hands: all depends upon him. -And now, kiss me, sweetheart, for I must be away.’ - -She heard him—she understood him—she believed him. She was curious to -observe that she felt so little. Her voice when she answered him had no -spring in it—it was worn and thin, with a little grating rasp in it—an -older voice. - -‘It may be better so. I hate to shed good blood. Whither shall I write -to you? At Dunbar? In England? Flanders?’ There had been a woman in -Dunkirk—she remembered that. - -He was looking away, answering at random, searching whom he should take -with him, or on whom he could reckon to follow him if he asked. ‘I will -send you word. Yes, yes, you will write to me. You shall know full soon. -But now I cannot stay.’ - -Morton had returned to his friends. - -‘Paris, come you with me. Ormiston, are you for the sea? No? Stay and be -hanged, then. Hob? What, man, afraid? Where is Michael Elliott? Where -is Crookstone? What Hepburn have I?’ He collected six or eight—both the -Ormistons decided for him—Powrie and Wilson, Dalgleish, one or two more. - -He took the Queen’s hand gaily. ‘Farewell, fair Queen!’ he said; and -she, ‘Adieu, my lord.’ He leaned towards her: ‘One kiss, my wife!’ but -she drew back. ‘Your lips are foul—you have kissed too many—no, no.’ ‘I -must have it—you must kiss me’—he pressed against her. For a while she -was agitated, defending herself; but then, with a sob, ‘Ay, take what you -will of me,’ she said—‘it is little worth.’ He got his cold kiss, and -rode fast through his scattering host. This going of his was the Parthian -shot. He had beaten her. Desire was dead. - -The Queen sat still—with a face like a rock. ‘Has he gone?’ she asked -Des-Essars in a whisper. - -‘Yes, thank God,’ said he. - -She shook herself into action, gathered up the reins, and turned to -Erskine. ‘Come,’ she said, ‘we will go down to them now.’ - -She surrendered to the Earl of Atholl, who, with Sempill and Lindsay, -came up to fetch her. Followed by one or two of her friends—Des-Essars, -Melvill, Du Croc, and Livingstone—she rode down the hill from her host -and joined the other. Grange cantered up, bareheaded, to meet her, reined -up short, took her hand and kissed it. Many followed him—Glencairn, -Glamis, young Ruthven. Each had his kiss; but then came Archie Douglas -smelling and smiling for his—and got nothing. She drew back from him -shuddering: he might have been a snake, he said. Lethington was not to -be seen. The host stood at ease awaiting her; the white banner wagged -and dipped, as if mocking her presence. ‘Take that down,’ she said, -with a crack in her dry throat; but no one answered her. She had to go -close by the hateful thing—a daub of red and green and yellow—crowned -Darnley crudely lying under a tree, a crowned child kneeling at his feet, -spewing the legend out of his mouth. She averted her eyes and blinked as -she passed it: an ominous silence greeted her, sullen looks; one or two -steady starers showed scornful familiarity with ‘a woman in trouble’; one -said ‘Losh!’ and spat as she passed. - -She was led through the Murrays, Humes, and Lindsays; murmurs gathered -about her; all eyes were on her now, some passionate, some vindictive, -some fanatic. On a sudden a pikeman ran out of his ranks and pointed at -her—his face was burnt almost black, his eyes showed white upon it. ‘Burn -the hure!’ he raved, and when she caught her breath and gazed at him, he -was answered, ‘Ay, ay, man. Let her burn herself clean. To the fire with -her!’ - -Her fine heart stood still. ‘Oh!’ she said, shocked into childish -utterance, ‘oh, Baptist, they speak of me. They will burn me—did you hear -them?’ Her head was thrown back, her arm across her face. She broke into -wild sobbing—‘Not the fire! Not the fire! Oh, pity me! Oh, keep me from -them!’ - -‘Quick, man,’ said Atholl, ‘let us get her in.’ Orders were shortly -given, lieutenants galloped left and right to carry the words. The -companies formed; the monstrous banner turned about. Morton bade sound -the advance; between him and Atholl she was led towards Edinburgh. ‘If -Erskine is a man he will try a rescue,’ thought Des-Essars, and looked -over his shoulder to Carbery Hill—now a bare brae. The Queen’s army had -vanished like the smoke. - -So towards evening they came to town, heralded by scampering messengers, -and met by the creatures of the suburb, horrible women and the men who -lived upon them—dancing about her, mocking obscenely, hailing her as -a spectacle. She bowed her head, swaying about in the saddle. Way was -driven through; they passed under the gates, and began to climb the long -street, packed from wall to wall with raving, cursing people. They shook -their fists at her, threw their bonnets; stones flew about—she might have -been killed outright. The cries were terrible—‘Burn her, burn her! Nay, -let her drown, the witch!’ Dust, heat, turmoil, a brown fetid air, hatred -and clamour—the houses seemed to whirl and dizzy about her. The earth -rocked; the people, glued in masses of black and white, surged stiffly, -like great sea waves. Pale as death, with shut eyes and moving, dumb -lips, she wavered on her seat, held up on either side by a man’s arm. -Des-Essars prayed aloud that a stone might strike her dead. - -They took her to a house by the Tron Church, a house in the High Street, -and shut her in an upper room, setting a guard about the door. The white -banner was planted before the windows, and the crowd swarmed all about -it, shrieking her name, calling her to come out and dance before them. -Her dancing was notorious, poor soul; many a mad bout had she had in -her careless days. ‘Show your legs, my bonnie wife!’ cried some hoarse -shoemaker. ‘You had no shame to do it syne.’ This lasted till near -midnight—for when it grew dark torches were kindled from end to end of -the street, drums and pipes were set going, and many a couple danced. -The Queen during this hellish night was crouched upon the floor, hiding -her face upon Mary Seton’s bosom. Des-Essars knelt by her, screening her -from the windows. She neither spoke nor wept—seemed in a stupor. Food was -brought her, but she would not move to take it; nor would she open her -mouth when the cup was held at her lips. - -Next morning, having had a few hours’ peace, the tumult began betimes—by -six o’clock the din was deafening. She had had a sop in wine, and -was calmer; talked a little, even peeped through the curtain at the -gathering crowd. She watched it for, perhaps, an hour, until they brought -the mermaid picture into action—herself naked to the waist, with a -fish-tail—confronted it with the murder flag, and jigged it up against -it. This angered her; colour burned in her white cheeks. ‘Infamous! Swine -that they are! I will brave them all.’ - -Before they could stop her she had thrown open the window, and stood -outside on the balcony, proudly surveying and surveyed. - -At first there was a hush—‘Whisht! She will likely speak till us,’ they -told each other. But she said nothing, and gave them time to mark her -tumbled bodice and short kirtle, her wild hair and stained face. They -howled at her, mocking and gibing at her—the two banners flacked like -tailless kites. Presently a horseman came at a foot’s pace through the -press. The rider when he saw her pulled his hat down over his eyes—but -it was too late. She had seen Lethington. ‘Ha, traitor, whose rat-life I -saved once,’ she called out, in a voice desperately clear and cold, ‘are -you come to join your friends against me? Stay, Mr. Secretary, and greet -your Queen in the way they will teach you. Or go, fetch your wife, that -she may thank her benefactress with you. Do you go, Mr. Secretary?’ - -He was, in fact, going; for the crowd had turned against him and was -bidding him fetch his wife. ‘Give us the Popish Maries together, sir, and -we’ll redd Scotland of them a’.’ - -‘Rid Scotland of this fellow, good people,’ cried the Queen, ‘and there -will be room for one honest man.’ - -They jeered at her for her pains. ‘Who shall be honest where ye are, -woman? Hide yourself—pray to your idols—that they keep ye from the fire.’ - -‘Oh, men, you do me wrong,’ she began to moan. ‘Oh, sirs, be pitiful to a -woman. Have I ever harmed any?’ - -They shrieked her down, cursing her for a witch and a husband-killer. The -flags were jigged together again—a stone broke the window over her head. -Des-Essars then got her back by force. - -It is amazing that she could have a thought in such a riot of fiends—yet -the sight of Lethington had given her one. She feared his grey, rat’s -face. She whispered it to Des-Essars. ‘Baptist, you can save me. Quick, -for the love of Christ! The coffer! the coffer!’ - -He knew what she meant. That coffer contained her letters to Bothwell, -her sonnets—therefore, her life. He understood her, and went away without -a word. He took his sword, put a hood over his head, got out of the -backside of the house, over a wall, into the wynd. Hence, being perfectly -unknown, he entered the crowd in the High Street and worked his way down -the Canongate. He intended to get into Holyroodhouse by the wall and the -kitchen window, as he had done many a time, and notably on the night of -David’s slaughter.[12] - - * * * * * - -Des-Essars had gone to save her life; but whether he did it or no, he -did not come back. She wore herself to thread, padding up and down the -room, wondering and fretting about him. This new anxiety made her forget -the street; but towards evening, when her nerves were frayed and raw, -it began to infuriate her—as an incessant cry always will. She suddenly -began panting, and stood holding her breasts, staring, moving her lips, -her bosom heaving in spite of her hands. ‘God! Mother of God! Aid me: -I go mad,’ she cried, strangling, and ‘Air! I suffocate!’ and once more -threw open the windows and let in the hubbub. - -She was really tormented for air and breath. She tore at her bodice, -split it open and showed herself naked to the middle. - -‘Yes—yes—you shall look upon me as I was made. You shall see that I am a -woman—loved once—loved much. See, see, my flesh!’ Horrible scandal!—but -the poor soul was mad. - -Soon after this some of the lords came to her—Lindsay, Morton, and -Atholl. The windows, they said, must be closed at once; they feared a -riot. They would take her back to Holyroodhouse if she would be patient. -But she must be rendered decent: Atholl gave her his cloak. She had -quieted immediately they came, and thanked them meekly. - -They took her away at once. Mary Seton followed close, but was gently -pushed back by Lord Morton. ‘No, no: she must come alone. You shall see -her after a little. You cannot come now.’ For the first time in her life, -as I believe, Mary Seton shed tears. - -A very strong guard, with pikes presented, hedged her in. She reached -Holyrood on foot, and was shut into her own cabinet. It was empty and -dark but for the candle they had left with her. She snatched it up, and -began a mad, fruitless hunt for her casket. It was not in its place—it -was nowhere. She hunted until she dropped. She began to tear at herself -and to shriek. Doom! Doom! She must be burned. They had taken her coffer. -She was alone—condemned and alone. - -Then Des-Essars crawled out of the dark on his hands and one knee, -dragging a broken leg after him, and fell close beside her, and kissed -the hem of her petticoat. - -[12] The casket, which was not at Holyrood, is supposed to have been -secured by Bothwell in the Castle, where it was to be found in due time. -But Des-Essars did not know that. Nor is it clear to me how Bothwell had -found opportunity to get it there. - - - - -CHAPTER XII - -ADDOLORATA - - -She sat on the floor, and had his head at rest on her lap. Her hands were -upon him, and so he rested. The great tears fell fast and wetted his hair. - -Her grief was silent and altogether gentle. Still as she sat there, -looking before her with wide unwinking eyes and lips a little parted, -she was unconscious of what she was suffering or had suffered: all about -her was the blankness of dark, and without her knowledge the night fell; -the dusk like a vast cloak gathered round about her, fold over fold; and -still she sat and looked at nothing with her wide unwinking eyes. Slowly -they filled and brimmed, and slowly the great tears, as they ripened, -fell. There were no other forms of grief, none of grief’s high acts: only -their bitter symbol—lamentation embodied in tears, and nakedly there. - -‘Nay, move not your hands—nay, touch my brows: my head aches—I am blind.’ -The lad supine in her lap pleaded in whispers. - -Gentle-voiced she answered him. ‘There is no work left for my hands to do -but to tend thee, my dear.’ - -He lay dumb for a while; then said he: ‘You shall not blame me. It is not -here—not in the house. I know not where it is. They are seeking it now. -He came here with two archers. He snarled like a fox to find me.’ - -‘Who was this, Baptist? Was it Lethington?’ - -‘Lethington. He believed it was here. He forced that knowledge from his -wife——’ - -She said, ‘Fleming too?’ - -‘——I fought. They tried to make me tell them where I had hid it. They -lifted and threw me. I am hurt—cannot move. Oh, they will have it now.’ - -‘Rest, my dear, rest. Think no more of it. They have all but me.’ Out of -the heart of this poor nameless youth she was to learn good love; but to -learn it only to know its impossibility. Not for her now, not for her! -Not so could she ever have loved; no! but she could be kind. She stooped -her head over him and breathed softly through the dark—‘and I, Baptist, -am yours if you will.’ - -He sighed. ‘Oh, that it were possible! That night when you looked -back—that night——you let me take——remember you of that?’ - -She knew his thought and all his heart. Her own were at leagues of -distance: but she could not now refuse him kindness. She stooped her head -lower towards his, and whispered, ‘Baptist, can you hear me?’ - -‘Yes, yes.’ - -‘My last gift—all I have left: yours by right. Do you hear me? -Listen—understand. I am yours now—I am forsaken by all but you.’ - -He moved uneasily, sighed again. ‘Too late, too late: I lie dying here.’ - -She leaned down yet nearer; he felt her warm breath beat upon him—quick -and short and eager. ‘If I die this night, and if thou die, I will love -thee first.’ - -‘Ah!’ said he, ‘I know very well that you desire to love me now.’ - -‘How knowest thou, my love?’ - -‘By the way you lean to me, and by other things.’ - -She said, ‘You are well schooled in love.’ - -‘Not so well,’ he answered; ‘but I am well schooled in you, my Queen.’ - -‘Prove me, then—desire of me—ask—take. I shall never deny thee anything.’ - -Again he said, ‘Too late, too late. You cannot—and I lie dying. Yet, -since the dead can do you no wrong, let me lie here at rest, that I may -die loving you.’ - -She stooped to kiss him. She anointed him with her hot tears. ‘Rest, -rest, my only true lover!’ - -‘Peace,’ said he: ‘let me sleep. I am tired to death.’ - -She kissed his eyelids. He slept. - - * * * * * - -Men came about the door—more than one. She sprang from her mate and -kneeled to face that way, screening him where he lay short-breathing. -They knocked, then opened. The torchlight beat upon her, and showed her -dishevelled and undone. She covered her bosom with her crossed arms. -‘What is it? Who comes?’ - -‘Madam’—this was Lord Lindsay—‘it is I. I have horses beyond the wall. It -is time to be going. You and I must take the road.’ - -‘Whither, sir? Whither will you take me so late?’ - -‘To Lochleven, ma’am.’ - -‘You order me? By whose warrant?’ - -‘By the Council’s. In the name of the Prince.’ - -‘It is infamy that you do. I cannot go. I am alone here.’ - -‘Women, clothing, all, shall follow with good speed, madam. But we must -be speedier.’ - -‘If I refuse you—if I command——?’ - -‘I cannot consider with your Majesty the effect of that.’ - -‘Do you take me, Lindsay—you alone? No, but I will die here sooner.’ - -Lord Sempill spoke. ‘I offer myself to your Majesty, with the consent of -the Lords.’ - -She rose up then. ‘I thank you, Lord Sempill: I will go with you.’ - -She gave him her hand, which, having kissed, he held. He would have taken -her away then and there, but that she pulled against him. ‘I leave my -servant dead here. He loved me well, and I him. Let me pray a while; then -I will go.’ - -Des-Essars turned and rose to his arm’s length from the ground. He could -not move his legs. ‘I am a prisoner also—take me.’ - -‘You, my man?’ says Lindsay: ‘unlikely.’ - -She withdrew her hand from Sempill’s by leave, stooped over the fading -lad and kissed his eyes. ‘Adieu, my truest love and last friend—adieu, -adieu! I have been death to all who have had to do with me.’ She kissed -him once more. - -‘Sweet death,’ said Des-Essars. - -‘Come,’ she said to Lord Sempill, and gave him her hand again. He led her -away. - -Des-Essars fell his length upon the floor. She would have turned back to -him; they hurried her forward between them. - -The door shut upon Queen Mary. - - - - -EPILOGUE - -WHEREIN WE HAVE A GREAT MAN GREATLY MOVED - - -It is said that when the Earl of Moray, in France, received from the -messengers sent out to him the news that he was chosen Regent of -Scotland, he bowed his head in a very stately manner and said little more -than ‘Sirs, I shall strive in this as in all things to do the Lord’s -will.’ He added not one word which might enhance or impair so proper a -declaration; he remained invisible to his friends for the three or four -days he needed to be abroad; and when he set out for the north, travelled -in secret and mostly by night—and still chose to keep apart. As secret -in his hour of success as he had been in those of defeat, admirable as -his sobriety may be, we must make allowances for the mortification of -a learned man, Mr. George Buchanan, who, having laboured to be of the -heralding party, found himself and his baggage of odes of no more account -than any other body. Was the chilly piety of such a reception as my lord -had vouchsafed them all the acknowledgment he cared to admit of ancient -alliances, of sufferings shared, of hopes kept alive by mutual fostering? -Could a man look forward to any community of mind in the future between -a prince who would not recognise his old friends and those same tried -friends frozen by such a blank reply to their embassage? Mr. Buchanan -urged these questions upon his fellow-legate, Sir James Melvill of -Halhill—a traveller and fine philosopher, who, with less latinity than -the learned historian, had, I think, more phlegm. When Mr. Buchanan, -fretfully exclaiming upon the isolation of his new master, went on to -concern himself with poor Scotland’s case, and to muse aloud upon Kings -Log and Stork, Sir James twiddled his thumbs; when the humanist paused -for a reply, he got it. ‘Geordie, my man,’ said Sir James, ‘my counsel -to you is to bide your good time, and when that time comes to ca’ canny, -as we have it familiarly. Remember you, that when you sang your bit -epithalamy at the marriage-door of Log, our late King, although he never -stinted his largess (but rewarded you, in my opinion, abundantly), he had -no notion in the world what you were about, and (as I believe) paid you -the more that you might end the sooner. Late or soon you will be heard by -our new gracious lord, and late or soon recompensed. He too will desire -you to stop, my man: not because he does not understand you, but because -he understands you too well. Mark my words now.’ This was a curious -prophecy of Sir James’s, in one sense curiously fulfilled. In the very -middle of his oration the orator was desired to stop by the subject of it. - -Not until the Regent was in Edinburgh did a chance present itself to Mr. -Buchanan of declaiming any of his Latin. This, be it said, was no fault -of Mr. Buchanan’s, who, if abhorrence of the old order and acceptance of -the new, expressed with passion at all times of the day, can entitle a -man to notice, should certainly have had it before. Some, indeed, think -that he got it by insisting upon having it; others that he proved his -title by exhibiting the heads of a remarkable work which afterwards made -some stir in the world: he was, at any rate, summoned to the Castle, and -in the presence of the Lord Regent of Scotland, of the Lords Morton, -Crawfurd, Atholl, Argyll, and Lindsay, of the Lairds of Grange and -Lethington, and of others too numerous to mention, was allowed to deliver -himself of an oration, long meditated, in the Ciceronian manner. - -The occasion was weighty, the theme worthy, the orator equal. _Tantæ -molis erat_ was the burden of his discourse, wherein the late miseries -of God’s people were shown clearly to be, as it were, the travail-pangs -of the august mother of new-born Scotland. From these, by a series of -circuits which it would be long to follow, he passed to consider the -Hero of the hour; and you may be sure that the extraordinary dignity -and reserve which this personage had recently shown were not forgotten. -They were, said the orator, _reasonable_, not only as coming from a man -who had never failed of humility before God, but as crowning a life-long -trial of such qualities. The child is father of the man. Who that had -ever known this magnanimous prince had seen him otherwise than remote, -alone in contemplation, _unspotted from the world_? In a peroration which -was so finely eloquent that enthusiasm broke in upon it and prevented it -from ever being finished, he spoke to this effect:— - -‘It is furthermore,’ he said, ‘a singular merit of your lordship’s, in -these days of brawl and advertisement, that you have always approved, -and still do approve yourself one who, like the nightingale (that choice -bird), avoids the multitude, but enriches it, _quasi_ out of the dark. -For as the little songster in his plain suit of brown, hardly to be seen -in the twiggy brake, pours forth his notes upon the wayfarer; so has your -lordship, hiding from the painful dusty mart, ravished the traffickers -therein to better things by your most melodious, half-hidden deeds. O -coy benefactor of Scotland! O reluctantly a king! O hermit Hercules! O -thou doer-of-good-by-stealth!’ Here he turned to the Lords of the Privy -Council. ‘Conscript Fathers, we have prevailed upon our Cincinnatus to -quit his plough lest haply the State had perished; but with him have come -to succour us those virtues which are his peculiar—to which, no less than -to those which he hath in community with all saviours of Commonwealths, -our extreme tribute is due. Let us respect Austerity whenas we find it, -respect True Religion, respect Abnegation, respect, above all, the tender -feelings of Blood and Family, lacerated (alas!) of late in a princely -bosom. Great and altogether lovely are these things in any man: in a -statesman how much the more dear in that they are rare! But a greater -thing than austerity and the crown of true religion is this, Conscript -Fathers, that a man should live through blood-shedding, and _not see it_; -that he should converse with bloody men, and _keep clean hands_! For -King David said, “I will wash my hands in innocency,” and said well, -having some need of the ablution. Conscript Fathers! this man hath the -rather said, “But I will keep my hands innocently clean, lest at any time -lustral water fail me and I perish.” O wise and honourable resolve——’ - -Irrepressible applause broke in upon this peroration, and just here. The -Regent was observed to be deeply moved. He had covered his face with -his hand; he could not bear (it was thought) to hear himself so openly -praised. When silence was restored, in obedience to his lifted hand, -speaking with difficulty, he said, ‘I thank you, Mr. Buchanan, for your -honourable and earnest words; none the less honourable in yourself in -that the subject of your praise is unworthy of them. Alas! what can a -man do, set in the midst of so many and great dangers, but keep his eyes -fixed upon the hope of his calling? He may suffer grievous wounds in -the heart and affections, grievous bruises to the conscience, grievous -languors of the will and mind: but his hopes are fixed, his eyes are -set to look forward; he cannot altogether perish. Yourself, sir, whose -godly office it is to direct the motions of princes and governors that -way which is indeed the way, the truth, and the life, can but add to the -obligations which this young (as new-born) nation must feel towards you, -by continuing me steadfast in those things for which you praise me. I -am touched by many compunctious thorns—I cannot say all that I would. I -have suffered long and in private—I feel myself strangely—I am not strong -enough as yet. So do you, Mr. Buchanan, so do you to me-ward, that I may -run, sir; and that, running—please the Lord and Father of us all—that, -running, I may obtain.’ - - * * * * * - -It was felt on all hands that more would have been a superfluity. Mr. -Buchanan was very ready to have continued; but my Lord Regent had need of -repose; and my Lord of Morton moved the rest of their lordships that they -go to supper: which was agreed to, and so done. - - -THE END - - - - -New Canterbury Tales - -BY MAURICE HEWLETT - -AUTHOR OF “THE FOREST LOVERS,” ETC., ETC. - -Cloth. 12mo. $1.50 - - -“His style is always rich and sometimes of a texture of almost dazzling -beauty.... In the ‘New Canterbury Tales’ there are rare elements of -beauty. The stories are mediæval to the very core, and show extraordinary -power of imaginative perception of the inner life of a distant and alien -age.”—_The Outlook._ - -“Each strikes a different note, but each is faithful to the taste of his -time, which means a stout belief in the Saints, and perhaps as genuine -a fear of ‘Old Legion,’ a delight in chivalrous deeds, in mundane pomp -and might. And behind them is the author’s genius for the creation of -character and drama, so that these Old World fancies, full of the glamour -of ancient legend, in some cases all compact of a curious, mediæval -quaintness, seem somehow extraordinarily human and true.”—_New York -Tribune._ - -“With each successive volume there is added proof, if such proof were -needed, that for real fineness of touch and true artistic instinct Mr. -Hewlett stands quite by himself in his country and generation.”—_The -Commercial Advertiser_, New York. - -“In the key and style of the author’s ‘Little Novels of Italy,’ it shows -again the brilliant qualities of that remarkable book, ... daring but -successful.”—_New York Tribune._ - -“The whole is an intense and delightful surprise.”—_Chicago Tribune._ - - THE MACMILLAN COMPANY - 66 FIFTH AVENUE, NEW YORK - - - - -THE LIFE AND DEATH OF RICHARD YEA AND NAY - -By MAURICE HEWLETT - -_Author of “The Forest Lovers,” “Little Novels of Italy,” etc._ - -12mo. Cloth. $1.50 - - -“The hero of Mr. Hewlett’s latest novel is Richard Cœur de Lion, whose -character is peculiarly suited to the author’s style. It is on a much -wider plan than ‘The Forest Lovers,’ and while not historical in the -sense of attempting to follow events with utmost exactness, it will be -found to give an accurate portrayal of the life of the day, such as might -well be expected from the author’s previous work. There is a varied and -brilliant background, the scene shifting from France to England, and also -to Palestine. In a picturesque way, and a way that compels the sympathies -of his readers, Mr. Hewlett reads into the heart of King Richard Cœur de -Lion, showing how he was torn by two natures and how the title ‘Yea and -Nay’ was peculiarly significant of his character.”—_Boston Herald._ - -“The tale by itself is marvellously told; full of luminous poetry; -intensely human in its passion; its style, forceful and picturesque; -its background, a picture of beauty and mysterious loveliness; the -whole, radiant with the very spirit of romanticism as lofty in tone -and as serious in purpose as an epic poem. It is a book that stands -head and shoulders above the common herd of novels—the work of a master -hand.”—_Indianapolis News._ - -“Mr. Hewlett has done one of the most notable things in recent -literature, a thing to talk about with abated breath, as a bit -of master-craftsmanship touched by the splendid dignity of real -creation.”—_The Interior._ - - THE MACMILLAN COMPANY - 66 FIFTH AVENUE, NEW YORK - - - - -THE FOREST LOVERS - -BY MAURICE HEWLETT - -12mo. Cloth. $1.50 - - -“A series of adventures as original as they are romantic.... ‘The Forest -Lovers’ is a piece of ancient arras; a thing mysteriously beautiful, a -book that is real, and, at the same time, radiant with poetry and art. -‘The Forest Lovers’ will be read with admiration, and preserved with -something more than respect.”—_The Tribune_, New York. - -“A story compounded of many kinds of beauty. It has, to begin with, -enchanting beauty of background; or rather, it moves through a beautiful -world, the play of whose life upon it is subtle, beguiling, and -magical.... The story has a beautiful quality both of spirit and of -form.”—_The Outlook._ - -“The book is a joy to read and to remember, a source of clean and pure -delight to the spiritual sense, a triumph of romance reduced to the -essentials, and interpreted with a mastery of expression that is well -nigh beyond praise.”—_The Dial._ - -“There is a freshness, a vivacity about the narrative itself, as well -as about the style, that carries the reader more or less breathlessly -along from one thrilling scene to another, and leaves him at the end -with little disposition to lay down the book. We sincerely commiserate -the jaded reader who cannot find amusement in ‘The Forest Lovers.’”—_The -Critic._ - -JAMES LANE ALLEN says: - -“This work, for any one of several solid reasons, must be regarded -as of very unusual interest. In the matter of style alone, it is -an achievement, an extraordinary achievement ... in the matter of -interpreting nature there are passages in this book that I have never -seen surpassed in prose fiction.” - -HAMILTON W. MABIE says: - -“The plot is boldly conceived and strongly sustained; the characters -are vigorously drawn and are thrown into striking contrast.... It -leads the reader far from the dusty highway; it is touched with the -penetrating power of the imagination; it has human interest and idyllic -loveliness.”—_Book Reviews._ - - THE MACMILLAN COMPANY - 66 FIFTH AVENUE, NEW YORK - - - - -LITTLE NOVELS OF ITALY - -BY MAURICE HEWLETT - -12mo. Cloth. $1.50 - - -“Among the younger writers of fiction there are two men whose works -are of inspiration all compact. They are Rudyard Kipling and Maurice -Hewlett.... Both these writers are faithful to human nature, which is -at the bottom of all great art and literature. In Kipling the dominant -ideal seems to be that of truth, in Hewlett it is beauty (‘truth seen -from another side’).... In the writings of the former, truth emerges in -naked force; with the author of ‘Little Novels of Italy,’ it comes forth -adorned with the flowers of art and poetry, clad in the shimmering cloth -of gold of the Italian Renaissance.”—_The Tribune_, New York. - -“There is imagination luminous with poetry and art in this singularly -romantic collection of short stories. In the matter of style alone, -Mr. Hewlett accomplishes much that is wonderful in its delicacy and -loveliness; yet he deals with intensely human passions—passions that with -a less delicate perceptive touch or sensitiveness to the divine in human -suffering would be base and sordid.”—_Boston Herald._ - -“Mr. Hewlett is one of those rare and happy authors who can make niches -for themselves quite apart from the ordinary trend of literature, where -invidious comparisons cannot reach them. The quaint, mediæval quality -of his ‘Forest Lovers’ has cast its spell over countless readers, even -while they questioned wherein that spell could lie; and so it is with his -latest volume.”—_Commercial Advertiser._ - -“The style is forceful and picturesque, and the stories are so true to -their locality that they read almost like translations.”—_New York Times._ - - THE MACMILLAN COMPANY - 66 FIFTH AVENUE, NEW YORK - - - - -BY THE SAME AUTHOR - -EARTHWORK OUT OF TUSCANY - -Being Impressions and Translations of Maurice Hewlett, with Illustrations -by James Kerr Lawson - -Cloth. 12mo. $2.00 - -Also bound uniform with the Eversley Series, price $1.50 - - -CONTENTS - - Proem—Apologia pro libello. - - I. Eye of Italy. - - II. Little Flowers. - - III. A Sacrifice at Prato. - - IV. Of Poets and Needlework. - - V. Of Boils and the Ideal. - - VI. The Soul of a Fact. - - VII. Quattrocentisteria. - - VIII. The Burden of New Tyre. - - IX. Haria, Mariota, Bettina. - - X. Cats. - - XI. The Soul of a City. - - XII. With the Brown Bear. - - XIII. Dead Churches in Foligno. - - Envoy: To all you ladies. - -PAN AND THE YOUNG SHEPHERD - -A PASTORAL IN TWO ACTS - -Cloth. 12mo. $1.25 - -SONGS AND MEDITATIONS - -Cloth. 12mo. $1.25 - - THE MACMILLAN COMPANY - 66 FIFTH AVENUE, NEW YORK - - - - - -End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Queen's Quair, by Maurice Hewlett - -*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE QUEEN'S QUAIR *** - -***** This file should be named 61466-0.txt or 61466-0.zip ***** -This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: - http://www.gutenberg.org/6/1/4/6/61466/ - -Produced by Tim Lindell and the Online Distributed -Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was -produced from images generously made available by The -Internet Archive) - -Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will -be renamed. - -Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright -law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, -so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United -States without permission and without paying copyright -royalties. 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