Philip of Spain has retaliated against Elizabeth’s hostile policy by seizing all the English ships and goods in the Netherlands, and so Elizabeth in turn has arrested all the Spaniards in England. This means that the Spanish ambassador is under house arrest in London, and, from my point of view, makes it all the more difficult to get and receive messages. A certain Florentine banker, Roberto Ridolfi, has served to deliver letters between the ambassador and Leslie, for me.
The French have proved less helpful than I had hoped, because Elizabeth has been negotiating with them to marry Charles IX—who is seventeen years younger than she! Is there no limit to her posturing? Next she will go after little Henri, or even the baby, who is twenty-two years younger!
The word is that the north is stirring, and my hopes of rescue are not without foundation. Now, ye spirits of war, infuse them to action!
Norfolk and I have at last found a safe channel of communication. I have sent him the pillow, which proclaims my message. He has sent me a diamond, which I wear around my neck, hidden under my clothes, as I promised him. I write him letters and even sign them, “Your own, faithful unto death.”
God forgive me.
IV
The horses halted in front of the huge studded doors of Durham Cathedral. Westmoreland turned and shouted, “Dismount! We will not ride into the house of God like barbarians!”
Behind him three hundred men climbed down, their saddles creaking. Northumberland clasped his arm and said, “This is the day we have long awaited, brother!” His eyes were shining.
Together they each took hold of one bronze door pull—each as large as a serving platter—and hauled the doors open. Before them the long nave stretched, beckoning. Morning light was streaming in through the window over the altar. Like a mighty and silent forest, the massive stone pillars made a tunnel to that light. They were thick sentinels, standing guard as they had for hundreds of years.
“Reverently, my friends!” called Westmoreland. He turned his face toward that light and marched toward it, his army behind him. He and Northumberland walked down the aisle, over three hundred feet long.
Where the high altar had been, now was only a bare communion table. Rising high behind it was the delicate, cream-coloured, wrought stone altar screen, its niches empty, like blind eye sockets.
“Dry your tears, my Blessed Lady,” cried Northumberland. “We will restore your sight!” He stood at one side of the communion table, and Westmoreland took the other. “Heave!” he ordered, and together they tipped the table over. It fell heavily, its wide feet sticking up like a tumbled child’s. “Now!” he directed the men. “Chop it!”
With wild cries, the north-country men dashed toward it, swords raised, and began hacking at it. The thuds of their swords and hatchets resounded dully in the stone emptiness of the cathedral.
“And here’s this abomination, the Protestant Bible, and the Book of Common Prayer! Gather them up, my lads, wherever you find them, take them outside, and burn them!” cried Northumberland. “Let us cleanse this place!”
“And when you’re done, we’ll rededicate it, and have a mass!” said Westmoreland. “Father Wright here will gladly officiate!” He twisted his fingers into the shoulder of a captive priest. “But not just for us! Let us bring in the townspeople! Yea, round them up!”
* * *
In front of a makeshift altar, Father Wright raised the host and celebrated the first mass there in ten years, to a packed cathedral. People fell to their knees, asking to be absolved of their sin of tolerating heresy, and local Anglican priests joined them, praying for forgiveness in going against their consciences. Incense rose, banned rosary beads clicked, and the sound of sung Latin carried sweetly in the air.
“And let us pray for our Holy Father, the Pope, and for all his Church, and for our Sovereign Lady, Mary Stuart of Scotland, France, and England,” concluded Northumberland. “God bless her and bring her to reign over us!”
“Amen!” cried the people.
* * *
Elizabeth grabbed Robert Dudley’s shoulders the second he stepped into her privy chamber at Windsor. Her sudden attack almost caused him to lose his balance.
“What news? Where are they now?” she barked.
“Madam, the last news I received, they had celebrated mass in Durham Cathedral, after turning out the Protestant fittings. They built a big bonfire in front of the cathedral and threw the offending things into it. Northumberland and Westmoreland whipped the townsmen into a fury by telling them that the bishop’s wife there had taken the ancient baptismal font and used it for a sink in her kitchen, and used monks’ tombstones to pave the floor of her town house.” He brushed off his shoulders where she had injured the velvet.
“How many are they?”
“In Durham, about three hundred.”
“Pish!” she said. “Three hundred!”
“But altogether, perhaps a thousand on foot, poorly armed—you know, with pitchforks and shovels—and then another fifteen hundred, mounted, armed and dangerous. There is another group in Hartlepool, you know.”
“Twenty-five hundred, then.” Her voice was sharp. “And Sussex is awaiting reinforcements. He dare not rely on local people; we are unsure of their loyalty. Hunsdon must march north with his troops.”
“I am ready to march!” he said.
“Yes, I know, Robin. But I want you here with me, in this—this prison!” She gestured round the room. “I hate being forced to retreat here to Windsor, like a coward! Hiding behind stone walls!”
“You are no coward, but have the heart of a lion.”
“Yes, Robin. I know that, and you know that, but do they know that? Does she know that?” She looked around, her eyes narrowing. “How close have they come to Tutbury?”
“The farthest south they managed to get was Tadcaster. They did not cross the River Ouse. That was still seventy miles north of Tutbury. Now they are back up at Durham, a hundred and thirty miles north. They have retreated.”
“I want her moved farther south!” she snapped. “They mustn’t lay hands on her!”
“My dearest lady, there is no chance of that! You needn’t be so concerned.” He tried to catch her eyes and make her smile.
“They mean to rescue her! It was part of their plan!” Her mouth was so tightly clamped, no smile could be coaxed out of it. “Do not attempt to tell me what to do!”
“No, Madam. Never.” He inclined his head in acquiescence.
“They issued a proclamation from Durham as they marched through the first time, saying they meant to determine ‘to whom of mere right the true succession of the crown appertaineth.’ Do not belittle it! Of course they mean to free her!”
“Their support is melting away. They did not find large numbers joining them as they tried to march south; it seems the Catholics are better Englishmen than they are Catholics, at least south of the Ouse. You need have no worry on that account.”
“And what about the Spanish? Walsingham has discovered that they tried to arrange with Philip’s general in the Netherlands, that brute Alva, to bring his troops over.” She gave him a nervous, triumphant look.
“Yes, and the rebels even captured Hartlepool to give him a landing place. But he has done nothing. And will not. He is an intelligent, crafty man who does not conjure up support and sympathy where none exists.” He tried to take her hands once more. “The Spanish are a phantom threat.”
She snorted. “With ten thousand men sitting in the Netherlands, just on our doorstep?”
“There is water between us.”
“Ah, yes. Water. The English Channel.” She sighed and tried to smile. “Perhaps you are right, Robert. I tremble over nothing. After all, Norfolk is safe in the Tower.”
Robert laughed. “Mary’s plighted knight. Some showing—he cowered in his house on his estates. May all your enemies have such bold champions!”
Elizabeth shook her head. “To think my enemies are my cousins!”
* * *
The
rebels waited in vain for their ranks to swell with perturbed Catholics. But the English Catholics were curiously inert; they stood and watched, but did nothing. Lord Dacre, Norfolk’s son-in-law, led an attack on Elizabeth’s troops under Lord Hunsdon, but was soundly defeated. As winter closed in, the rebels fled northward, beyond the old Roman wall and then up into Scotland to the wilds of Liddesdale.
The Lord James, eager to have an opportunity to impress Elizabeth, hunted them down and tried to round them up. But the old Border tradition of harbouring fugitives made it difficult to find them, and he succeeded only in capturing the Earl of Northumberland. The Earl of Westmoreland and Northumberland’s wife, who was more warlike than the men, escaped abroad to the Netherlands. Left behind to face Elizabeth’s wrath were the citizens of Northumbria and Yorkshire, who had nowhere to flee.
They were executed by the hundreds in their towns and villages to the cry of “Thus perish all the Queen’s enemies!” and left hanging from gibbets as a warning. A thousand corpses swung in the icy winds of January, creaking in their chains, seeming to whisper, “Betrayed … we were betrayed,” from their fleshless mouths.
* * *
March 15, 1570. It is all over. Northumberland and Westmoreland rose and attempted to raise the people to proclaim the old religion, but they were cruelly put down. I had foolish hopes of being rescued, and waited every day to see if this was my day of deliverance. But no. There is no deliverance.
Today Shrewsbury came to see me, his long face even longer. He said, almost in a whisper, “There is sad news. Your brother is dead.”
“My brother?” I said. Did he mean the Lord James? Surely he did, not knowing of my other brothers. And yet—surely not.
“He was shot in Linlithgow,” said Shrewsbury. “It seems that some enemy of his, a Hamilton loyalist, waited in an upstairs room overlooking the main street, and shot the Regent as he was riding through.”
“James—dead?” I felt a terrible tremor pass through me. James was the one who was always safe, the one who directed killings. If James could be assassinated, then—
“He died within a few hours,” said Shrewsbury. “There was no hope.” He paused. “It is a sad day for Scotland.”
“Always killings! Will they never stop?” I cried. “And who rules now?”
Suddenly I realized that all things had changed in that instant in Scotland. Who would rule?
“Queen Elizabeth is attempting to persuade them to elect the Earl of Lennox as Regent in Lord James’s place.”
Lennox! That was unlikely. “That will take much persuasion,” I said.
“And the other sad news—although perhaps it is not sad for you!—is that the Pope has issued a bull formally excommunicating Queen Elizabeth. Evidently the stupid, ill-informed man thinks it will help the English Catholics, put heart into them to make another attempt on Elizabeth’s throne!” With a snort of disgust, he handed me a paper. “Read it for yourself!”
I looked at Regnans in Excelsis. It deprived that “servant of wickedness” of her pretended title to the throne of England and absolved all her Catholic subjects from their allegiance to her:
“Peers, subjects, and people of the said kingdom, and all others upon what terms soever bound unto her, are freed from their oath and all manner of duty, fidelity, and obedience. We direct these people, commanding moreover and enjoining all and every, the nobles, subjects, people and others whatsoever that they shall not once dare to obey her or any of her laws, directions, or commands, binding under the same curse those who do anything to the contrary.”
“This is not wise,” is all I cautiously allowed myself to say. And indeed it is not. I realize that His Holiness Pius V is anxious to draw the battle lines between the two religions, but he dwells already in the heavenly realm in his mind, and pays too little attention to earthly considerations. Had this bull been published before the Northern Rising, then it might have had some effect. Now all it will do is subject all Catholics to more hardship and suspicion. Years ago, his predecessor, Paul IV, declared Elizabeth a heretic and recognized me as the rightful occupant of the throne, but he did not so blatantly call upon her subjects to depose her. This is a slap in Elizabeth’s face; the other was just a gentle finger-shaking.
“Wisdom does not reside at Rome!” Shrewsbury said righteously.
After he left, I prayed before my crucifix a long while, praying for James—although I knew it was not a form of prayer he liked! But we must pray each in our own way. I closed my eyes and thought of my brother as he had been long ago, drawing a veil across the present.
“Eternal rest grant him,” I asked.
But now that the shock is over, and I have had a few hours to recover, I cannot help wondering—is the way perhaps cleared now for my return to Scotland? Might the Lords now call me home? Without Lord James at their head, they might prove kinder. And perhaps they will discover, as they did before, that they need their Queen.
V
Mary held the reins as tightly as her stiff fingers would permit as she directed her horse to trot out of the gates of Chatsworth and onto the path leading to her next residence of incarceration, Sheffield Castle. During the Northern Rebellion, she had been moved thirty-five miles south from Tutbury to Coventry for safekeeping. After the flight of the earls and the collapse of their rebellion, she had then been hauled over fifty miles north again to one of Shrewsbury’s mansions, Chatsworth. Now, in November of 1570, a year since the rebellion, she and her entourage were to be moved yet another fourteen miles to Sheffield, where the Earl had two residences: the castle and a manor house about a mile away. That way she could be transferred back and forth between the two whenever one of them needed cleaning.
Gradually her company had achieved some semblance of permanence. She had her physician Bourgoing, a surgeon, an apothecary, an embroiderer, her tailor Balthazzar, grooms of the chamber, ladies of the chamber like the faithful Mary Seton and Madame Rallay, with Jane Kennedy and Marie Courcelles to replace the lost Marys, and secretaries like Claud Nau, all under the supervision of John Beaton, her Master of the Household. She had her secret priest. She had Bastian Pages to provide whatever entertainment was possible under the circumstances. She had a kitchen staff of eight, a coachman, and three grooms of the stable. Unfortunately she was not allowed to travel anywhere. Some of her partisans, like Lord Boyd and Lord Claud Hamilton, had returned to Scotland, but she still had Willie Douglas, John Leslie, and the Livingstons.
She and the Shrewsburys were settling into the strange semi-friendship of the keeper and the hostage; they exchanged gifts and pleasantries, shared confidences and news of neutral personalities, became involved in the minutiae of each other’s everyday lives. Bess and Mary worked together on the decorating and furnishing of Bess’s estates, Mary even writing to France for patterns and embroidery thread, but Shrewsbury having to read the letters before sending them on. Mary had not succeeded in finding any partisans within Shrewsbury’s household such as she had at Lochleven; the only stalwarts she had in her service were those she had brought herself.
They were watched, but nonetheless Mary had managed to find ways to get and receive correspondence. Norfolk had been released from the Tower and put under house arrest in the summer, having made a written oath to cease and desist from any communication with Mary or any marriage schemes. But he had immediately disobeyed, and once again secret letters between them were passing in packets of sewing silks and foodstuffs, written in orange juice that was invisible until it was held up to the heat of a flame.
But the failure of the native uprising in England meant that there could be no deliverance for her without outside help—either French or Spanish. All the rebels in England had been so harshly punished that for all intents and purposes there was no longer any local hope of deliverance. Therefore she had been forced to begin negotiations with the Spanish through a papal agent, the banker Roberto Ridolfi. The Pope’s excommunication of Elizabeth and his bull depriving her of her throne had whipped E
nglishmen across the board into a frenzy of Pope-and-foreigner-hating. Ridolfi, who had originally come to England with Philip, and as something of a financial wonder child, had remained as a court adviser to the likes of Cecil himself, had been investigated by Walsingham after the Northern Uprising, but had passed muster. Still, the times were chancy for any foreign involvement.
In the meantime, her party in Scotland was dwindling. Dumbarton Castle, under Lord Fleming and the Hamiltons, still held out, and in a surprise move, a repentant Maitland—he was not called “the Chameleon” for nothing, Mary thought—had converted Kirkcaldy from the party of the Lords and they both had taken over Edinburgh Castle, which they were now, in an about-face, holding for Mary. But the assassination of Lord James had done nothing to facilitate Mary’s return.
Oh, I thought perhaps they would relent, the Lords, she lamented. I thought that Lord James was my chief enemy in Scotland. But no, there are many lesser ones. And Elizabeth—Elizabeth convinced them to accept the Earl of Lennox as their Regent! She is determined to keep me pent up here—why?
Lennox as Regent. Fate would not be Fate if she did not hold surprises. But Lennox!
Sad as Mary was, there was one good aspect of it: for the first time, little James would be in the everyday company of a relative. The poor boy, four years old now, had been treated as an orphan by everyone. Pray that Lennox does not poison his grandson’s mind against me, Mary thought. I know he cannot say good things of me, for he hates me, but if God will have mercy on me, He will restrain Lennox from mouthing evil about me.
Little James. She had sent him a gift of a pony and a little saddle, with a letter telling him how she loved him, but she had had no reply. Had he ever received her gift and letter? Would she ever know?
* * *
They plodded along in the mists of late November, along Baslow Edge and then across Totley Moor, where gold and green lay in interspersed patches. A patina of purple heather softened the colours and blended with the grey that was swirling everywhere. The sky was also grey, but comforting, like an encircling arm. It looked enough like the moors of Scotland to call the memories forth, but it was tamer, kinder. A man would not be able to ride far enough here to hide himself.
Mary Queen of Scotland and the Isles Page 99