“She could jump from that oriel window in the round tower,” said Willie. “It is only about eight feet from the ground.”
But when Mary Seton tried it as an experiment, she injured her leg. There were boulders underneath the window, with crevices and gaping cracks that afforded no safe footing.
Then, as George was sitting on the landing dock one day in late February, he watched the boat with the laundresses approaching. They were making their weekly visit, and the vessel carried hampers of clean linen in the middle. Four boatmen rowed, straining at the oars in the choppy grey water.
The laundresses! There were three of them, and they wore shapeless dark mantles; their faces were plain and almost colourless. Underneath the mantles George could see their heavy, stained wooden clog-shoes. They looked monumental, dark, foreboding, like the Three Fates, as they trudged slowly up the path to the castle, balancing their hampers with great slow dignity. George found himself hurrying after them, compelled to glimpse their faces, to see if—oh, strange thought!—they actually resembled Clotho, Lachesis, and Atropos. Was there a Clotho there—she who spun the bright threads of youth? For she surely might hold the Queen’s in her power.
The women turned and glared at him, and he felt foolish. Once again he had imbued an ordinary person or situation with mythic grandeur. He merely nodded at them and turned away.
But his heart was racing. This was the way! Mary could disguise herself and simply walk out with them, keeping her face hidden. That should be easy, as they were enveloped in those voluminous mantles. It would have to be arranged while it was still cold.
* * *
He bribed the laundresses, and the Three Fates took the money in an all-too-human fashion. On Mary’s instructions, he sent messages to John Beaton, a relative of Mary Beaton’s from a staunchly loyal family who had served Mary at Holyrood, to Lord Seton, and to the Laird of Riccarton, one of Bothwell’s loyalists. They were to gather with men-at-arms in a mountain glen near Kinross and wait for the signal that the escape had been successful. Then they would make off for a Hamilton stronghold.
“All depends on your being able to walk unobserved that hundred feet from the tower, through the gate, and then to the boat,” said George. “Make sure you evade my sisters.”
The two youngest Douglas girls, aged fourteen and fifteen, had been assigned to “keep Mary company,” and in rebellion against their parents had conceived a worship of her; as a result, they watched her every movement, to Mary’s secret despair.
Mary laughed. “That will be the most difficult part. I have noticed them watching me even when they think I am asleep.”
“I cannot blame them,” said George.
She felt a tremor of warning pass through her. She did not dare look at him, lest she encourage him in his burgeoning affection. Yet she was touched—and flattered.
“It is tiring to be regarded as a goddess,” she finally said. “It is not nearly as enjoyable as one would imagine.” There, she thought. I have warned him.
“As the laundresses leave by three o’clock, I will try to distract my sisters or give them some task, like … like sorting the threads and darning, about that time,” George said quickly, and then she knew it was now safe to look at him.
He was very handsome, so handsome he was known as “Pretty Geordie” to his family. She wondered why he did not already have a wife, or even a betrothed. Certainly he came from a wealthy family, high in standing, ambitious. He himself was well spoken, learned, and athletic. Was he religious? Saving himself for God? But no, the Protestants did not do that. Look at Knox!
“What are you smiling at?” He watched her as intently as his sisters.
“I was wondering if you had a secret desire to be a monk,” she said teasingly.
“Do you mean, am I religious? Or do you mean, am I abstinent?”
He was so serious, as only the very young can be, she thought. She waited to answer. “Either,” she finally said.
“I am not saving myself for religious reasons, if that is what you think.” He sounded insulted. “Nor for any reason, other than that there has never been anyone worthy of my love.” His intense blue eyes seemed to glow in his face, incandescent.
“Ah, then you do seek to worship,” she said, smiling gently. “Beware of that in love.”
“As I suppose you know only too well!” he said with hurt in his voice, then immediately fell to apologizing.
She stopped him. “Yes, as I know only too well,” she said. “You have spoken true.”
* * *
The day was fixed for March twenty-fifth. Mary prayed that a storm would not arise, or one of the girls take sick, or she herself take sick. Let nothing happen to spoil it! she begged God.
As if in answer to her prayer, March twenty-fifth was exactly the sort of day she desired: it was dull and overcast, so that people would not want to linger outside, and would grow drowsy and sleep in midday, but not so unpleasant that the laundresses would have to postpone their journey.
All day she had to force herself to walk slowly, eat slowly, seem to have no reason to hurry or step lightly. Of her own attendants, only Mary Seton was allowed to know. Time enough later for them to know if the plan worked; until then, she had learned, every person who knew had the potential to betray her inadvertently.
To be free! This time tomorrow, would she be riding, a free Queen, among her subjects? It was now two years since Riccio’s murder, and since then she had been kept as someone’s captive three times, not to mention the vague captivity of threats and murmurs and illness. Let this be the end of it!
They dined quietly at midday, and Mary forced herself to eat the boiled trout. She was weary of the Lochleven specialty, and associated it with her imprisonment. I will never eat trout again, she vowed, if only I am freed.
Under her bed was the shabby mantle that she was to wrap herself in, with a long scarf which she would pull across her face. As the dishes were being cleared away, George appeared at the doorway and called to his sisters.
“Arabella! Meggie! You are wanted in the sewing room!”
It was the signal! Reluctantly the girls rose and left the room, saying to Mary, “Remember, afterwards you promised to help us sketch the next part of our pattern.”
Mary looked out the window and saw the three laundresses making their way toward the castle. She knew they took only about a half hour to deliver their goods and to collect next week’s washing. She had to hide her hands to keep others from seeing them tremble. How could she endure the next fifteen minutes?
She excused herself and went and sat on her bed, clasping her hands to calm herself. She said a rosary, then recited several prayers in Latin. Then she knew it must be time. Dropping to her knees, she drew out the cloak and put it on. Then, as quietly as she could, she passed through the main room and down the stairs. She did not pause or give anyone a chance to notice her.
Out she went, from the base of the tower and then across the grass, dull brown and matted now. The soldiers were leaning against the wall, too bored to talk to each other. Some even slept, cradling their heads on their arms. Some were cleaning their guns.
The gate stood open. Two of the laundresses were already near the boat. What luck that the third was evidently lingering behind. Mary made her way to the boat, carrying her bundle of bedsheets. Quietly they took their places in the boat. Mary nodded slightly to the other two, but kept her face down and the hood well forward so that she was hidden. She pulled the scarf up to muffle her mouth.
Now the boatmen were ready to cast off. Where was the fourth woman? George must have paid her to stay behind—of course!—lest the men notice their extra passenger.
Achingly slowly, the men untied the boat and pushed off. There was one foot between them and the dock, then two, then three … then the gap of water widened, and they shot forward as the men rowed.
Free! Free! The hateful island was now fifty feet away, seventy. The walls of the castle grew smaller, dwarfed by the trees
around them. The boat rocked and made its way across the water.
“Oh, look!” one of the men was saying. “Is this a new one?”
“Looky here!”
Mary kept her eyes on the bottom of the boat and hunched her shoulders, ignoring them.
“Let’s see!” another voice said, and suddenly the boat lurched. One of the men had left off rowing and leaned forward, trying to pull off her scarf.
“I’ll warrant she’s a bonny one, maybe wants a man—” He tugged at her scarf. “Come here, sweeting, I just want to see!”
Mary jerked the scarf out of his hand and fumbled with it, trying to readjust it. In the wind, her fingers got entwined with it and she had to disentangle them.
Suddenly she heard a low, startled sound from the man.
“It’s—you’re not a washerwoman, look at those hands!” he cried, grabbing them. He turned them over and inspected them as if they were exotic jewels. “So white, and slender-fingered, and the skin is too soft, it’s never been in water.”
She started fighting with him to get her hands away, and stood up. The boat rocked madly. She pulled away from him, but as she did so, the wind ripped the hood from her face. The men stopped rowing and stared.
“Yes, I am the Queen!” she said. “And I command you to continue rowing. Row me to the shore!”
The men sat there. Finally one said, “Madam, we dare not.”
“I am the Queen!” she cried. “You dare not disobey! Row, I tell you!”
“We may not,” the same man said. “The Laird would punish us dreadfully, us and our families.”
“I will reward you!”
“Madam, here is our home. We would not be in disgrace here.” The man—clearly the boat’s owner—turned to the other men. “Turn around,” he said. “Return to the island.”
“No! No!” Could she not stop them? Was there nothing she could do to persuade them? “Good sirs, please have pity on me! You are my only hope!”
“We have served the Laird and his family for generations, and we will do nothing to imperil him,” the man insisted. “He has been good to us, and deserves our loyalty.”
Mary burst into tears as the boat swung around and the island began growing bigger again. “Please, please!” she cried. She could not bear to return there.
“It is not our wish to cause you sorrow,” said the man. “We will not reveal this to the Laird. No one shall ever know. When we land, go inside quietly and send out the woman left behind. We will pretend that she forgot something.”
Mary watched as the boat approached the island and tied up once more. Rearing up in front of her was the ugly wall and its gate. Numbly she got out of the boat and walked slowly back into her prison. The yawning guards barely even looked up. It had indeed been a perfectly executed escape. That made it all the more painful.
As she was walking back across the green, wadding up her mantle so that it would not arouse questions, George came out of the attached building where the soldiers dined. He stopped stock-still and stared at her. His face grew even whiter than usual. She walked past him, ignoring him, the tears welling up in her eyes.
Making her way back into the privacy of her quarters, she flung herself down on the bed. She would pretend to be asleep; she could not bear to talk to anyone or try to keep her tears at bay. If she kept her face down in the pillow and let her hair fall over her face, she would have privacy for her sorrow.
Failed! She could scarcely credit it. Never had she failed in any of these escape attempts, and it had seemed natural that this one would be as successful as the rest. What had Bothwell said? No prison can hold us. And so it had seemed. Yet now he was in custody of the King of Denmark, and she was shut up on the island. Forever? Did they mean it to be forever? The Lords had not said anything to indicate their ultimate plans for her.
She was so stunned by the very nearness of the escape that she felt weak. Everyone was so loyal to the Laird. Only George dared cross him. But George required accomplices, and they were evidently not easily found. Who was it that had betrayed their earlier plan to steal his boat?
She was truly frightened now. What if she could not escape? What then?
“My dearest sovereign.” George was kneeling near her bed. “What—what has happened?”
“Oh, George!” She sat up, throwing back her hair. “They saw my hands!” She held them out and he took one. “They knew I did no washing. Then they insisted on returning me here, even though I commanded them to row me to shore. It seems they are loyal to their Laird before their monarch.”
“Ah.” He sounded heartbroken. “And you were halfway there! I saw it.” He kept caressing her hand. She took it away.
“Never have I felt more bereft.”
“We will try again. There will have to be another plan. This time we will supply our own rowers.”
She could not help laughing a little. “And who will that be? The men of the garrison?”
“I will find someone,” he said stubbornly. “Perhaps your people—”
“George, I think I should give you something that can always serve as a signal between us, if perchance it becomes difficult for us to communicate, as well it may. It is a miracle there is no one here now.” She unfastened one of her pearl earrings. “Earrings are easily lost, easily found, and if ever you return this to me, I will know it means ‘I have received your message’ or ‘all is ready.’ In short, it will stand for ‘yes.’” She dropped it into his hand.
* * *
The next day, George was nowhere to be seen. Nor was he to be seen the next. At length, on the third day, she inquired of Lady Douglas about him.
“My son has been sent from the island, Madam, on account of his overfamiliarity with you. It has come to the attention of several persons that he has become—how shall I say it?—captive to the Stuart charm. I myself know how difficult it can be to resist.” She smirked.
“How fortunate for Scotland that you did not,” Mary said. “Else now, in her hour of need, there would be no Regent.” Had she managed to keep the sarcasm out of her voice? But what of George? “But history does not repeat itself. I do not know to what you refer, in regards to George.”
“He has fallen into a fantasy of love with you, and you have encouraged it,” said Lady Douglas, “a fact that has greatly distressed his half brother, Lord James. However, as a mother I must think of all my children and their futures.…” She arched her eyebrow in her aging face and gave that smirk again. “I only want what is best for George,” she said with mock humility.
“As do I, Lady Douglas. I am most fond of him”—she let the phrase dangle temptingly—“and find him most pleasant company. But I had no idea he might have entertained deeper feelings toward me. This bears some consideration, some reflection.… In the meantime, it is best that he not be here until a conclusion has been reached, some way found to … Hmmm … You are very wise!”
Lady Douglas smiled. The fortunes of the Douglases might rise higher yet.
* * *
March, with its ugly grey skies and constant fogs and rains, gave way to April. Mary and her household attempted to keep Lent, and in their dejected state of mind, it was easy for them to put away all merriment and wear long faces. Only Mary Seton knew about the failed escape attempt, but everyone knew about the banishment of George for his partiality to the Queen. It seemed that anyone suspected of showing interest or pity for Mary was to be removed. First Ruthven, now George.
Mary managed to get one letter out to France. She wrote to Catherine de Médicis:
It is with extreme difficulty I have been able to send a faithful servant to explain the extent of my misery, and to beseech you to have compassion on me, inasmuch as Lord James the Regent has caused me to be told, in confidence, that the King your son is going to make peace with the French Huguenots, and one of the conditions of the treaty is that he shall not give me any help. This I cannot believe, for, next to God, I place my whole reliance on the King and you, as this bearer can
tell you. I beg you to give credit to him as if it were myself, for I dare not write more, save to entreat God to have you in his holy care.
From my prison this last of March.
The disciples of Calvin! First they had converted and ruined Scotland, and now they were attempting to do the same to France. In Scotland they were called the Kirk, in France the Huguenots. It was said that in France they numbered in the thousands, and were organized like an army. Wave after wave of violence had washed over France as the Catholic Church and the Huguenots fought for supremacy. It was the Huguenots who had killed the Duc de Guise and the Constable Montmorency, and had become powerful enough that Catherine de Médicis sought to find an accommodation with them.
Everywhere the battle lines were being drawn. The Dutch—also Protestants—were rebelling against Spanish rule. In Spain, the Inquisition sought to exterminate any Protestants hidden in their midst. The earlier, softer Reformers and the easygoing Catholicism they had sparred against were replaced by intransigents on both sides. The Council of Trent, which had ended only five years earlier, had belligerently concluded that there could be no accommodation with the Protestants. Everything the Protestants had questioned—confession to a priest, praying to the saints, the supremacy of the Pope—was embraced and declared to be absolutely necessary to salvation. A Catholic could not even attend a Protestant service without endangering his soul. The battlefield was open, the trumpets sounding. On the Protestant side, like players in a village football game, were the Scandinavian countries, England, Scotland, the Netherlands. On the Catholic, Italy, Portugal, and Spain. Split down the middle, Germany and France.
And to think it is my misfortune to be trapped thus, thought Mary. My fate depends on the actions of religious zealots—I, who have always practised toleration!
Mary Queen of Scotland and the Isles Page 89