'I was sent back, from Hailes. With a half-troop as escort. To fetch the Queen,' he explained, jerkily. 'Crossing the Gled's Muir, this side of Haddington, we came on trouble. Fighting. Or the end of it. A bad place it is, for cut-purses and broken men – miles of it, wild and empty. These were robbers – some of Bothwell's own damned mosstroopers, I shouldn't wonder, running loose. Lacking employment. Six of them. They had waylaid and cut down two men. Travellers. They were ransacking their bags. One was opening these letters when they saw us. They bolted as we came up. We were too many for them. They threw down the letters as they went. No doubt they got the purses. Other things, maybe.'
Mary's eyes were on that topmost letter. 'I know that handwriting,' she said tight-voiced. 'And those seals, broken as they are.'
'Aye. As do I. They are the Master of Gray's,' the other agreed grimly. 'One of the travellers was dead. The other died as we sought to put him on a horse. His blood, this is. Run through again and again. The one better dressed I recognised. He was a creature of Sir Richard Bowes, the English envoy. I have seen him about the palace here. The other would be guard and servant. Couriers, clearly. Heading south. For England. With letters and dispatches for the English Court. For my lord of Burleigh and Sir Edward Wotton.'
Mary shook her head. 'How cruel! How wicked a deed! God rest their souls. But…' Stepping forward she picked up the top letter. 'This, of Patrick's, was with them?'
Hay nodded. 'It was within an outer paper. Both opened. The outer was in a different writing. And with plain seals. Addressed to the Lady Diana Woodstock. In care of the Lord Burleigh, Lord Treasurer, at the Palace of Saint James, London. This other was within it. I knew the hand. I have seen many letters from the Master to the Duke. It was sealed with the Gray seals. They had been broken, also.' He paused. 'I can well guess to whom it is written!'
'Yes.'
'Read it.'
Troubled, the young woman searched the other's face, before, clearly reluctantly, she conned the letter. It read:
'Dearest and Fairest Lady,
I acknowledge, with devotion and gratitude, the last sum of?500 remitted by the usual source. I have put it, like that which went before, to good and effective use. I think that you will not deny it. Unlike certain other doles which of your kind heart you see fit to dispense, these remittances are put to excellent purpose, for your causes as for mine. As I take no doubt but that your good Master Bowes, newly knighted, will sufficiently inform you. Now I hasten to acquaint you that all is well, very well, in the great matter which we planned. The ineffable Bothwell fell most sweetly into the trap, and now struts the stage, calling himself Lieutenant of Scotland, no less. Believing that all the event was his own doing, he now works mightily and happily his own doom. Meanwhile, as foreseen, he works also our ends for us, most obligingly. The Papists are put down. Parliament may no longer be packed with mock bishops and prelates. The Hamiltons are in fullest flight. It will rejoice you to know that the unmentionable Maitland is at last unseated, and I have plans to keep him so. Cockburn, his lumpish good-son, likewise. Your siller is well spent, Lady?
As for your esteemed young coz, he is, I promise you, learning his lesson. I am in a position to know, for he places his fullest confidence in your unworthy servant, privily informing me of his secret mind, little knowing who was the architect, with your aid, Fairest Dian, of his present humbled estate. He will flirt no more with Huntly and Spain, of that rest assured. Nor will he again allow any lord to dominate your mutual borders, once Bothwell is down. So your peace is buttressed on two fronts. I continue with his instruction, and shall not spare the rod, like a good tutor, should need arise. As advised.'
Thus ended the first sheet of paper. Mary looked up, to meet the other's gaze. Her dark eyes were clouded, as though with pain. She said nothing.
'Read on,' Hay urged, handing her a second sheet. 'This was within the first.'
Almost as though it might burn her, Mary took it. This read:
'I used the threat of Hamilton's desire for second place in this kingdom, with the ire at Moray's death, to unite the Stewarts and bring all this about, Madam. Alackaday, perhaps I something wronged poor Hamilton, who has insufficient wit I fear to desire anything thus vigorously, other than a wench and a flagon. But the fact is that our friend the young Duke is more truly smitten with that same sickness. He supported the enterprise the more readily in that he desires to see the Hamiltons laid low and his own claim to second place and heir established. Indeed, it goes further than this. I have reason to know that, once his claim is accepted – Parliament has remitted it to the next sitting – he plans to have your poor coz proclaimed insane and crazed, and unfit to reign. Himself then as Regent. Then, later, King in his stead, no less. I fear that the lad has grown over-ambitious. Can you, great Diana, contemplate Esme D'Aubigny's son as heir to England? But fear you not. I shall deal with Master Vicky in due course. I have my plans prepared.
A further dispensation of your liberality would much aid me, I would mention.
Meanwhile, may the good God prosper all your affairs, as they now prosper here, and grant you health and well-being to match your wit and beauty. Until these poor eyes feast upon your loveliness again,
I remain, sweet lady, your humblest and most devoted servant and adorer,
P.'
'Well?' Hay demanded, when he saw that she had finished reading.
Mary moistened her lips, but for once had no words.
'You see what he says? What it means? It is lies – all lies. You know it, as do I. He knows it also – the Master of Gray. But it could mean my Duke's head, nevertheless.'
'It… is… ill… done,' the girl said slowly, each word standing alone.
'It is worse than that, by God!' the young man cried. 'This is as good as an assassination! Written to Elizabeth of England, who hates the house of Lennox. She will inform the King. Nothing is more sure. Higher treason than this could scarce be thought of. And all lies. My master no more desires the throne than, than…'
'I know it,' Mary said quietly. 'This shall not be.'
Something about her voice calmed him. 'What can we do?' he asked.
'I shall do what I should have done, long since,' she told him, levelly. 'God forgive me that I have waited this long.' Doubtfully he eyed her.
'Patrick is still at Hailes, with the King?' she asked.
'Yes.'
'I shall see him, then, tonight. You said that you escort the Queen there, forthwith? This afternoon?' 'Yes. But what can you do?'
She did not seem to hear him. 'Peter,' she went on, 'take these letters to Sir Richard Bowes. All save this of Patrick's. Tell him what happened.' She leafed through the other letters. 'These are no concern of ours. Do not tell him of this one. If he knew aught of it, and asks you, you know nothing. The robbers must have taken it. You understand?'
'Aye. You will keep it?'
'Meantime, yes. And, Peter – when you have taken us to Hailes, I think that I may have a further task for you. If you will do it? Weary as you will be…?'
'Anything, Mistress Mary,' he assured her.
'My thanks. Now, to the Queen. And then, while she prepares to ride, to Sir Richard Bowes' lodging.'
'Aye. You know what you will do?'
'God granting me the resolution, I do,' she said. 'Come.'
In a stone garden-house of the pleasance of Hailes Castle, in the gorge of Tyne, the only place it seemed in that crowded establishment where she could be assured to privacy, Mary Gray turned to face her father, pale, set-faced.
This will serve I think, Patrick,' she said.
'I should hope so!' Patrick, although he laughed, considered her shrewdly. 'I warrant half the Court is watching this so secret assignment! And debating the wherefore of it. As I do also, moppet, I confess. Rejoice as I do in your company therefore, my dear, I bid you be discreetly brief. In here. Lest your reputation suffers – and I, I am labelled even worse than I am! A man who would corrupt his own daughter!'
'Would that was all that you could be labelled!' she told him flatly.
'Eh…?' Startled now, he stared. 'What a plague do you mean by that?'
'I mean, Patrick, that I have come to know you for what you are. At last. I can no longer blind myself.' Still-faced, he waited, unspeaking.
'Davy warned me,' she went on, in a curious, unemphatic, factual voice. 'Others also, to be sure. Times a-many. But I believed that they wronged you. Deep down, they wronged you. I believed that I knew you better – because I knew myself. And loved you. We were out of the same mould, you and I. So that I understood you, as others did not. I saw the gold beneath the tarnish. But it was I who was wrong. There is no gold there. Only… corruption!'
Taut-featured now as she was herself, he stood motionless, scarcely seeming to breathe. Only his delicate nostrils flared, as a spirited horse's will flare. As did her own, indeed. Never had they seemed more alike, those two. 'Yes?' he said.
'You betray all with whom you have dealings,' she told him, and the unemotional, level, almost weary certainty of her utterance made the indictment the more terrible. 'You betray always, for love of betrayal. Davy said that you were a destroyer. I know now that you are worse than that. A destroyer can at the least be honestly so. A lion, a boar, a wolf – these have their parts. But you – you seek men's trust and love, in order to destroy them. You charm before you betray. You, Patrick, are not even a wolf. You are a snake!'
'God's passion!' Blazing-eyed the Master took a step towards her, fists clenched, knuckles white. Almost it seemed that he would strike her. Only with a tremendous and very apparent effort of will did he hold himself back. Pandng, his words came pouring out, his voice no longer musical and pleasingly modulated but harsh, strident, staccato. 'How dare you! You young fool! What do you know? In your insufferable ignorance! None speaks me so – you, nor any. Do you hear? Christ – you, of all!'
She stood, head up, unflinching, meeting his furious gaze, not challenging or defiant, but with a calm resolution, sorrowful but sure. She actually nodded her head. 'I know – because this time you have betrayed yourself,' she told him. 'This time it is your own words that condemn you. Written testimony.'
That gave him pause. He drew a deep quivering breath. 'What mean you by that?' he asked thickly.
'I mean that you have gone too far in betrayal. Even for my indulgence, Patrick. I did not believe that you had betrayed Mary the Queen, to her death. Now I do. For I have proof that you have betrayed the King. And intend to do so further. You betrayed Moray, again to his death. Bothwell here, also. The Hamiltons. Even Huntly, and your Catholics. For money. For power. For revenge. For amusement, sport, no less! And now, God forgive you if He can, you have betrayed Vicky.' 'A-a-ah!'
'I warned you,' she went on inexorably. 'At Dunfermline. I warned you to cast down no more men. If you touched Vicky, I said, I would no longer forget my duty.'
'Vicky!' He spat out the name. 'That young blockhead! For him you speak me so! For that ducal dolt you would discard me? Me, your father! He has turned your silly head.'
'Not my head, Patrick,' she corrected. 'My heart, perhaps, but not my head. The head that I heired from you. The heart, I pray God, I heired from my mother!'
'You insolent jade! You interfering hussy! Foul fall you -are you out of your mind? Are you, girl…?' The man's words faltered, however, as something of the quality of his daughter's strange certainty tempered the heat of his fury. 'What is it? Out with it! What lies has Lennox been spilling into your foolish ears?' he demanded.
'None,' she told him. 'I have not seen Vicky for three days. The lies, Patrick, are all your own! Written lies. In your letter to Queen Elizabeth.'
His lips parted, and he drew a long breath, but spoke no word.
'That evil letter will not reach Elizabeth,' she went on. 'It was… intercepted. I have read it…'
'Great God! Who…? Who intercepted it? Who has seen it?' Patrick grasped her arm in his sudden urgency. 'Where is it, Mary? Not… not Bothwell? Or the King…?'
'Would you be here, a free man, this night, had either of these seen it?'
He moistened his lips. 'Who then? I warn you, girl – do not seek to cozen me!'
'Who intercepted it matters not, Patrick. Only one other, and myself, have seen it… as yet.'
'Where is it, then? Who holds it?'
'I hold part of it.'
'Part? Only part?'
'There were two sheets, you will recollect. Within the plain outer paper. Written with your own hand, and sealed with your seal. That in which you betray Vicky, I hold. The other is… elsewhere.'
'Elsewhere…?' He swallowed. 'Damnation – where?'
Mary shook her head. 'Where you cannot reach it.' Her voice quivered now. 'Patrick. I have brought you here to say goodbye.'
He stared at her. 'What nonsense is this? You mean that you are leaving Court? Going back to Castle Huntly? I' faith, it is not before time, I think! It was my folly ever to have brought you.'
'My going is of no matter. It is yours that is important. You are leaving Court, Patrick. Leaving Scotland. Forthwith.'
'Christ – are you crazed? What a plague means this? Have you clean lost your senses, girl?'
'It is my sorrow that I have been lacking my senses for so long, Patrick. That I forbore to put a halt to your evils long ere this. As I could and should have done. Because I loved you. Because I believed that there was good in you – that there must be good in you. How wrong I was! It is…'
With an impatient gesture of his hand he interrupted her. 'Enough of this puling folly! Think you I must stand and listen to your childish insults?'
'You must do more than that, Patrick. You must go. Leave all.' Almost without expression she spoke. 'I warned you. If you touched Vicky, I told you, with your, your poison, I would set my hand against you.'
'So! You esteem Vicky Stuart higher than you do me, your father?'
The word was long in coming. She raised her head until her small chin was held high. 'Yes,' she said at last, simply.
Something seemed to crumple in the man, then. He turned away from her, to gaze out of that little summer-house to the towering bulk of the great castle, stained with the reflection of the sunset, his beautiful features working spasmodically.
In her turn, Mary's own hard-won resolution cracked a little. 'Oh, Patrick,' she cried, her voice breaking, 'why, oh why did you do it? How could you? To Vicky, who was like a son to you. Or a brother. Whom you brought to this land, from France. Who worshipped you. Who used to esteem you little less than a god. How could you so turn on him? To write those lies about him to Elizabeth. Knowing that she hates and fears the house of Lennox, which is too near to her own throne. Knowing what she would do. That she would be certain to tell King James.'
'Vicky has been riding too high,' the Master jerked, thickly, still not looking at her. 'He presumes. He interferes. Since Moray's death he has set himself against me…'
'With cause, has he not? Did not you kill the Earl of Moray, Patrick – even though it was Huntly's hand that struck the blow? You planned his death?'
'Not his death. Only his fall.' The Master sighed. 'Moray had to go. For the sake of the realm. He had stolen the Queen's affections. The greatest evil could come of that. For Scotland, Even for England. Can you not perceive it? For doubts as to the father of James's heir could keep him out of Elizabeth's throne. Many in England are against his accession, in any case. Elizabeth herself is hesitant. Moray had to go.'
'His death was ordered by Elizabeth? And paid for with her gold?'
'Not his death. His fall and disgrace. Banishment, perhaps. Until James should have an undoubted heir. Huntly went too far.'
'So you betrayed Huntly, through Bothwell? You plotted Bothwell's attack on the King. Now you are betraying Both-well. Again with Elizabeth's money. He is working his own doom, you wrote. You released him from Edinburgh Castle for this! And the Lord Hamilton. He is broken and disgraced, put to the horn, for no other reason than
that you could use his name to unite the Stewarts to aid Bothwell's attempt against the King…'
'Lassie! Lassie!' Patrick Gray interposed, almost wearily. 'Can you not see? Can you not understand? The rule and governance of this unhappy realm is balanced as on a sword's edge. The throne is insecure, and has no power, no strength. Any blustering lord can command more men than can King James. The country is at the lords' mercy, torn with strife and jealousy and hatred. Catholics and Protestants are at each others' throats. War is ever around the corner – civil war, bloody and terrible. Then thousands would die – innocent, poor folk. That is what I struggle and scheme to save this land from, always. Better that an arrogant lord or two should die, than that. Can you not see…?'
'I see only betrayal and bad faith, deceit and lies. Even though you name it statecraft.'
'Aye, statecraft! What else? The ship of state is an ill craft to steer when its master is a weakly buffoon and its crew pirates with every man's hand against another. For the sake of the realm, of our people, I have set my hand to steer this ship, Mary – for want of a better man, or a surer hand. Can you name any that could do it better? So I am a Catholic one day and a Protestant the next. One day I support Bothwell, the next Huntly – when either gets too strong. I cherish the Kirk -and when it becomes overbearing and would weaken the throne, I bring in the Jesuits and Spain. Elizabeth's gold I use, yes – but for Scotland's weal. The throne must be supported, buttressed, always. Somehow. For only it stands between the lords and the people. How may a king like James be sustained, save by setting his enemies against each other? How think you that James has kept his crown all these months? By my wits, girl – my wits!'
'Yet you betray James also, to Elizabeth!'
'Betray! What fool word is this that you prate like a parrot? One day, Mary, with God's help and these wits of mine, Scotland and England shall be one realm, with one monarch. Strange fate that it should be drooling Jamie Stewart! Then there shall be an end to wars and hatred and fighting. That united realm shall be great and powerful enough to hold all Europe in check. Spain shall no longer threaten it. Nor the Pope. Nor even France. Law and justice shall rule it, from a strong and wealthy throne, with nobles tamed and a church less harsh. To that end I work. For that I plot and scheme, raise men up and bring them low – that James's throne may survive until then. I would have thought, Mary, that you, of all people, would have had the head to see it! For that greater good, we must suffer the lesser evils…'
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