The Eyes of the Queen

by Oliver Clements

  He tells him all he saw. Walsingham writes down all he says.

  “What did you make of Margaret?”

  “She is very unsettled.”

  Walsingham is pleased. He senses a stress point. A possible fracture.

  That night Walsingham sends Beale to the castle to relieve Wilkins in Queen Mary’s tower. Wilkins open the door.

  “Just in time,” he says.

  Her Majesty’s chamber pot is still warm and in its puddle of purple urine is a sizable turd.

  “What do you want me to do with that?” Beale asks.

  “You have to go through it,” Wilkins tells him.

  “Why?”

  “Two years ago we found a note tied in a length of sheep’s gut. They’d paid the dong farmer to tip it to one side.”

  Christ.

  “It is the only way she can get anything out,” he goes on. “So. We do what we must. I’ve got everything ready.”

  There’s a bucket of water and a block of black soap. There’s also a spoon.

  “You have to kind of…”

  Wilkins mimes a pressing action with the spoon.

  Beale gets to work. He gags constantly.

  After a moment there’s a thick paste and a little knot of what could be anything.

  “Give it a wash,” Wilkins tells him when he shows him.

  He picks it out with the tip of the spoon. Into the bucket of water and then vigorous stirring. Then he fishes it out and puts it on the table.

  He still doesn’t want to touch it.

  “She’s a queen for Christ’s sake.” Wilkins laughs. “It’s an honor to touch her shit.”

  Eventually he teases the knot apart. A thin strip of silk, that’s all. Wilkins whistles.

  “So what?” Beale asks.

  “Maybe nothing,” Wilkins admits, “but how did it get there?”

  “She must have eaten it,” Beale supposes.

  Wilkins agrees. “But why, eh? That’s the question.”

  “We’ll have to show it to Master Walsingham,” he says. “He’ll be pleased.”

  Beale goes to stand outside, to get some air.

  Above, in Cassiopeia, the new star shines as bright as ever.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  Sheffield Castle, September 25, 1572

  There is not a single thing—ewer, candlestick, book, sample of embroidery, pot of dried flower heads—left atop any surface. All have been swept to the floor, and Margaret Formby has never seen the queen in so foul a fit of rage. Mary Seton strokes the queen’s back, whispering to her in French, while the queen stands leaning straight-armed against the window, legs apart and breathing very heavily. It is, Margaret thinks, as if she were giving birth.

  She wishes she had never come here. She wishes she had never entered Mistress Seton’s service. It had seemed perfect at the time, but as soon as they came south and found the bonds of captivity tightening around the queen’s household, something dark and ungodly had entered her life like a canker in a rosebud.

  When Margaret was first asked to perform the strange procedures for Queen Mary, she was told they were on the orders of Mary’s French physician. It was a way of isolating the malign humors they told her. Margaret had been flattered to be so trusted to tie the knots in just such a way—tight, tight, really tight, but not too tight—but when, afterward, when they would summon her back to untie the ropes, she was always shocked to see the queen’s body dissected by the welts the cords left in her soft, soft flesh, and the patchy rashes left from the beeswax they melted over her naked body. There were often puckered pinch marks too: once she saw Mary Seton rubbing down the queen with a linen cloth, and her pale, blue-veined breasts were crowned with green bruises.

  Soon after that Mistress Seton told Margaret that Her Majesty’s health was not improving, despite the time spent in the cords, and the French physicians had sent further instructions that involved more strenuous efforts at soothing Queen Mary, and of removing the malignant humors manually.

  “No one must know that Her Majesty is ill,” Mary Seton said. “Nobody.”

  And so it had begun, an almost daily regimen of stroking the queen’s nether parts until she shuddered.

  “That is good,” Mary Seton said. “You are good at this.”

  Margaret was surprised this was good for the queen’s health. She had done it to herself more than once, and afterward always felt drained and a little depressed. Queen Mary seemed to seek what she called “translation” and yet the very moment it was over, she found it repellent, every aspect and even the idea of it. But soon she would demand it once more, as if this time it would end her miseries. It never did. She never felt better.

  Meanwhile further orders came from the French physicians—though how, Margaret never knew—to rub harder, faster, and to push her fingers more deeply. The physician said she must bite the queen’s breasts, not so hard to draw blood, but to leave the nipples raw.

  And then the suppression of the airway started, and she went to Mistress Seton, who had by this time passed onto her all these medical duties, and Margaret told her it frightened her to be half strangling the queen, and of her fears of misjudging it.

  “You must do as she commands,” Mistress Seton had told her.

  “But it feels—against God’s command,” she’d said.

  “You must do as she commands.”

  And so she had.

  Time and time again, until now she has become an almost constant companion and knows the queen’s body—not just its outer appearance, but its inner workings—better than her own.

  But she is not happy. The queen’s morbid neediness for this stimulation sickens her and she has come to dread the summons: “Margaret.”

  But what is she to do? She was plucked from her family in Scotland and is risen above all other maids, high, yet not so high as Mary Seton, and so there is no one with whom she can talk, share fellowship, or find relief for herself. She finds she craves fresh air, silence, a cool wind in her face, spring sunshine, the chatter of children, anything but this oppressive shared captivity. She could scream.

  “Margaret.”

  Oh God.

  This time the queen wishes for rapture for the wrong reasons. She is fixated, almost mad with desire for it, yet is not at all desirous, and is so tense and burningly miserable that rose oil needs to be used, and her breath is hot and foul, and she never relaxes, and so it is almost impossible. No. It is impossible. It is dangerous. Margaret panics and loses her touch. The queen will not be delivered.

  “Get off me! Get off me! Get out!”

  Margaret leaps away as if scalded.

  “Mary! Mary!” the queen shouts and Mary Seton comes swiftly to her side to correct her dress. The queen is clench fisted, weeping hot tears of anguish. Mary Seton soothes her as she would a child, and Margaret hurries away, likewise in tears. She cannot stand it. She cannot stand being cooped up all day in this foul atmosphere, performing all these wicked tasks.

  She runs down the steps and out into the castle bailey.

  Guards in Shrewsbury’s colors watch her impassively. She walks and walks, and only occasionally does she glance up at the top floor of the tower, where she sees a face, briefly, like a smear at the window, but what is she to them?

  At length Mary Seton sends John Kennedy to fetch her in. He is a boy of about fifteen winters, someone’s son, obviously. He runs errands and fetches bottles and so forth. Most of the time he sits by the door of the bailey, whittling spoons and leaving piles of splinters. Ordinarily they hardly speak to each other, though they might be five years apart in age, and from similar families, though his are from Edinburgh, she knows, while hers are of York. He is very pale skinned, with cheeks that flare whenever he speaks to a woman.

  “Mistress Seton is after you,” he tells her.

  Margaret hardly knows what to expect. Will she be sent packing? If she is honest, she does not care.

  In fact, it is an errand: to walk with John Kennedy into town and rent
him a horse at the White Hart, in Mary Seton’s name.

  “Her Majesty is very upset, Margaret,” Mary Seton tells her in a very low voice. Like Queen Mary she has eyes the color of polished hazelnuts. “And needs this done as it is a matter of grave import, but we are much observed by the Queen’s enemies, so keep this close, and make certain you are not seen going to, or coming back from the inn.”

  It is easier said than done, of course, but Talbot’s guards are oafish and care only for Queen Mary’s whereabouts.

  John Kennedy wears a traveling cloak and carries a bag in which is some awkward shape.

  When they are on the street, out of sight of the castle, Margaret asks him what it is.

  “Can’t tell you,” he says.

  “Go on.”

  “A candlestick,” he tells her with a shrug.

  “Where are you taking it?”

  “Back home,” he says. “I’ve got a message writ here for a man, but—”

  Another shrug.

  She cannot read either. “Will you come back?”

  He looks very uncertain.

  “I am told I must,” he says, “though by God I do not wish it.”

  * * *

  Queen Mary watches the flickering shape of Margaret Formby returning across the castle’s bailey through the lumpen glass in her windows. The girl has a tendency to stoop, she thinks. It is an unattractive habit.

  “The new man was making himself agreeable to her,” Queen Mary tells Mary Seton.

  “Oh yes?” Mary Seton smiles.

  Queen Mary laughs softly. “And do you trust the boy?” she asks.

  “I do, Your Majesty.”

  She is still trying to be soothing. She might stroke her hair were she not wearing a veil.

  The queen is still unable to believe what she read in the message received today. Quesada has diverted his fleet, and the prospect of her release is stillborn. She is now stuck here in this miserable castle as a prisoner for all eternity. It would have been better for her if he had not sailed at all! At least then she might still be at Tutbury, or taking the waters at Buxton, which allowed her some freedom. Some air. Here in Sheffield she is overwatched constantly. Not just by the Earl of Shrewsbury, and all his many men and servants, but by Burghley and Walsingham’s mice downstairs too. Even if she could not sometimes smell them, she would know they were there, know she was being subjected to this close watch. She has acquired the sense in her years at various courts, first in France, and then in Scotland. There is a tight airlessness to the world about her, as if there are no gaps in anything, no sense of space beyond the walls.

  Still, she thinks, she is not done yet.

  She watches Margaret Formby until she disappears below, out of sight, and then there is a gentle thud of a door being closed.

  How long will it take? she wonders.

  A day? Two? A week at the most. Or will they wait until the boy reaches Edinburgh?

  But what if it doesn’t happen at all?

  She has nothing else to do but wait anyway.

  She turns away from the window.

  “Margaret,” she calls.

  * * *

  Wilkins sends word: “Something’s afoot.”

  He saw them coming out of the tower with their heads bowed, Margaret Formby and the boy, John Kennedy. Nothing very odd about that, “save,” Wilkins says, “you could just tell.”

  “She is no good at this kind of thing.”

  Also, Kennedy had a pack and a riding cloak.

  But by then Walsingham already knows. Ill luck—for Margaret and the boy—had sent them to the White Hart, where Mary Seton was well known enough to be trusted to hire a horse. They told the ostler the boy was bound for Doncaster, where he would leave the horse at the Seven Stars.

  “After that, who knows?”

  Margaret Formby and the boy had walked awhile together, talking, and then he had set off eastward, down the valley toward Doncaster.

  Doncaster means the Great North Road, along which the boy will either ride south, toward London, or north, toward, well, God knows where.

  Margaret Formby had returned to the castle.

  “Not looking too happy,” Wilkins told them.

  Beale laughs to see how quickly Walsingham’s plan has borne fruit: Queen Mary has received word that Quesada is not coming to her aid this season, and lashing out in disappointment, has contacted one of her allies to set some other plan in play. To discover the identity of this unknown ally, all they now need do is follow the boy.

  It is genius, and Walsingham looks more hawkish than ever.

  “Here we go,” he says, rubbing his hands. “Here we go.”

  But their swift success leaves them with a dilemma: they have only enough men to keep watch on either the boy, or Queen Mary. Which is it to be?

  “The queen’s not going anywhere, is she?” Wilkins suggests.

  Walsingham agrees.

  “Get after him, Robert,” Walsingham tells him. “Now. This instant. Leave word of which way he’s gone at the post station, and I will follow along this night with Wilkins and Gregory.”

  They find Beale the best horse left in the White Hart’s stable and Beale is up in the saddle before the hour is out. Walsingham thrusts a pie in his hand.

  “God speed, Robert.”

  Beale thanks his master and sets off along the road to Doncaster. Twenty miles perhaps.

  * * *

  Francis Walsingham has much to do, much to think about. He must in all haste send word to Lord Burghley: tell him he is in need of more men. Until then he must pull Wilkins and Gregory from the tower and set off after Beale and the boy. Note must be made of where he goes, and of whom he meets, and Queen Mary will not have abandoned all precautions, however distressed she is, so the boy will have been instructed to see at least two decoys before he meets the person he has really come for. Or perhaps not. Either way, all eventualities must be covered, and that takes time, people, and money.

  And meanwhile there is that little knot of silk to fret about: What was it? How did it get in to her rooms, and why was it swallowed?

  Still there is no time. He will have to come back to that.

  Wilkins and Gregory are delighted to be summoned from their tower. They have been incarcerated so long with the queen, and it is not good for a man to sit within all day. They borrow horses from Talbot and set off after Beale and the boy, leaving Sheffield Castle with some relief.

  * * *

  “Ha.”

  It is not an expression of surprise, nor even of much pleasure. Queen Mary is back at the window. The panes are so thick and watered she cannot be sure, but there is a general rustling in the secret parts of the tower, as if the mice were on the move, as indeed they are.

  She feels less hemmed in. The air is clearer, and this morning her breath comes more easily.

  “Ha,” she says again. This time: slight pleasure.

  Her own scheme is likewise beginning to bear fruit.

  She will ask George Talbot if she may take a walk in the castle bailey.

  * * *

  The boy John Kennedy passes the night with his bag as a pillow on the floor of the hall of the Seven Stars in Doncaster and is up on his feet well before cockcrow. He drains his ale and finishes his soup while his horse is saddled and fettled and he is already on the dew-soaked road by the time its stones are visible.

  Robert Beale watches him from behind the stables, where he spent the night. The boy turns north, toward the estates of all those northern lords who have been ever ready to rise up in favor of a Catholic majesty.

  He leaves word of his direction with the innkeeper, climbs back up into his own saddle, and sets out after the boy again. Crows caw in the elms, and he feels the first onset of the autumn to come. Excitement too. The snare is tightening. If Walsingham is right, they will have Queen Mary and perhaps even someone like the assassin Hamilton in their bag by the end of it.

  * * *

  George Talbot wakes and thinks that he
cannot see why he should deny Queen Mary her request for the pleasure of a walk within his castle bailey.

  * * *

  Francis Walsingham wakes with a start in the attic of the White Hart and listens to the rain. He thinks of Isobel Cochet, and of Dr. John Dee, and he thinks of Willem van Treslong. He thinks of his queen, Elizabeth, and James Hamilton.

  Most of all he thinks of Mary, Queen of Scots.

  He gets up very quickly and is at the stables before gray dawn.

  * * *

  Queen Mary is transported on a tide of seething pleasure.

  Later, she dismisses Margaret Formby, and the rest of her servants, and Mary Seton, too, and sitting alone in her chamber, she lights a candle, even though it is day. She takes up her Bible, her pen, and the second of the small jars of face powder. She opens her Bible on the book of Lamentations. The date of the month and the day of the week matter. She dips the feathers of her pen into the blue-tinged face powder and strokes it across the face of a small piece of paper she has cut from Margaret Formby’s flimsy Bible, which she then covers with the piece of paper on which she has already encrypted her message.

  Her hands are shaking and the blue powder scatters across her lectern. Using the blunted point of her fattest needle she goes over the letters and numbers, pressing only hard enough so that the blue powder is transferred to the cheap paper, but not so hard that she indents it. When that is done, she inspects it: blank. She rolls it into a tiny scroll no bigger than a lady’s fingernail and places it in the lid of the pot of face powder. She tips the candle so that the wax drips into it, and while it fills and seals the note, she tears all her other writings into shreds, half of which she chews fifty times before swallowing, half of which she will force Margaret Formby to swallow.

  When the scrap of paper is submerged in the wax, she straightens the candle, and takes up the soft fat disc of wax. She rolls it into a ball the size of a chickpea, and before it cools too much, she inserts this into a small hole cut in a piece of wood that she had the boy John Kennedy carve for her especially. He had been pleased to be asked and has come up with something that is almost the size of a duck’s egg, in pinewood, with a plug to stopper the hole, which can then be sealed in candle wax.