Royal Road to Fotheringhay

by Виктория Холт

  Chastelard, furious at his own folly in allowing himself to be discovered, furious with Livy for discovering him, overcome by pent-up emotions, did not attempt to apologize. Clumsily and without warning, he sprang at the Queen, seized her and, to her horror and that of the two women, began to kiss her passionately.

  Mary cried out: “How dare you!”

  Livy and Flem fell upon Chastelard and tried to free their mistress, but his mad desire and determination seemed to lend him the strength of two men. He succeeded in forcing the Queen onto the bed where all four of them wrestled together.

  “Help!” cried Mary, really alarmed. “Quickly!”

  Flem broke away and ran to the door calling: “Help! Save the Queen!”

  There was a great bustle in the apartment as guards came rushing in.

  “Take this man!” commanded the Queen.

  Chastelard was seized, as Moray, the Queen’s brother, came into the apartment.

  “What means this?” he demanded.

  “He was under the bed!” gasped Flem. “Hiding!”

  “Take this man’s sword and dagger,” said Moray to the guards. “Put him under close arrest.”

  Chastelard appealed to the Queen. “Madame, you know my intentions …”

  “They were clear,” said Mary.

  “The love I bear you …”

  “Take him away!” roared Moray.

  Chastelard was dragged, struggling, from the apartment.

  Moray turned sternly to his sister. “Madam,” he said, “he shall lose his life for this outrage.”

  Mary had grown pale but Moray went on quickly: “I doubt not that he is the tool of your enemies.” He waved his hand to all those who had come into the apartment. “Your presence is no longer needed,” he added. “Fortunately the Queen’s life has been saved.”

  Moray was not slow to note that among those who had come into the Queen’s apartment was Thomas Randolph, and his delight in what he was planning to write to his mistress was betrayed by his expression. A nice tidbit to send to his mistress in England—the heroine of many a similar story—and one which would naturally be told and retold against the Queen of Scots. There were several firm supporters of Knox who had witnessed this scene; they had good noses for smelling out the scandals. The fact that Chastelard had been found in the Queens bedchamber would be all over Edinburgh by the morning. They would have it in the Highlands and on the Border within a few hours; and as soon as Master Thomas Randolph could arrange it, Madam Elizabeth would be chuckling over it with her paramour Robert Dudley.

  As soon as Moray was alone with the three women he said: “I must have the truth.”

  “Livy found him under the bed,” declared Mary. “He came out and sprang at me.”

  “I fear Your Majesty has given him some encouragement to behave thus.”

  “By my appreciation of his poems?” said Mary angrily.

  “There has been talk of dances,” growled her brother.

  “In France we always danced the latest dances, and none thought the worse of us for that.”

  “But Your Majesty is now in Scotland.”

  “Jamie… what do you propose to do to Chastelard? You spoke of his losing his life. I could not consent to that… merely because of a momentary madness, a prank, you might say.”

  “He was wearing his sword and dagger. That seems to me significant.”

  “What do you mean, Jamie?”

  “You must surely know that as Queen of Scotland you have many enemies.”

  “Chastelard is no enemy!”

  “It would be better for your honor if it could be proved that he is. Get your mistress to bed,” he ordered the Marys. “Madam,” he went on, turning to Mary, “we must speak of this matter in the morning.”

  When he had gone, Mary said: “I am sorry we called James in.”

  “Madam,” said Flem, “we had to call for help.”

  “Yet…” She looked round the room at the shadows cast by the flickering candlelight. “Well… nothing can be done till morning. One of you stay with me. You, Flem… sleep in my bed this night.”

  “Yes, dearest Majesty.”

  “I do not know why I am afraid, my darlings, but I am. See! I am shivering.”

  “He upset you, dear Madam,” said Livy. “Come, let us get you warm, and Flem shall stay the night.”

  So Flem and Mary lay in the big bed while Livy drew the curtains and tiptoed away.

  Flem noticed that the Queen continued to shiver, and it was dawn before they fell asleep.

  MARY FACED her brother and wished that David were with her at Burntisland. She needed counsel now, because David had opened her eyes and she was beginning to distrust James.

  “Does Your Majesty realize,” said James sternly, “that this day they will be talking in Edinburgh of how your lover was discovered hiding beneath your bed?”

  “My lover! A young poet of the Court!”

  “All know Your Majesty’s fondness for poets.”

  “But surely we can simply say that he was not my lover. He is a poet and a good dancer.”

  “With whom Your Majesty danced in black silk breeches!”

  “I’ll not be spied on!” said Mary angrily.

  “Shall you not, sister? Alas! It is not for you to say whether you will be or not. You are spied on, and the whole of Knox’s congregation knows that, in black silk breeches, you danced with this man.”

  “It was for the purpose of the masque.”

  “The Lords of the Congregation have their own ideas as to the purpose.”

  “Am I responsible for their evil minds?”

  “No, but you must consider them.”

  “Chastelard was discovered; he was sent out; there the matter ends. It is no concern of anyone but myself.”

  “There again I must most humbly contradict you. It is the concern of Scotland, England, France, Spain, Rome…. You are a Queen and your actions are watched. Your chances of making an advantageous marriage will not be enhanced by a scandal such as this might well become.”

  “Oh, one day I may take it into my head to marry where I please, and it may not be one of these hesitant gentlemen who, with their governments, are calculating whether I shall bring them a big enough dowry.”

  “If Your Majesty will pardon my brotherly comment, I must say that you are not speaking with your usual good sense. This man Chastelard has upset you, and understandably so. He must be made an example. We must show the people what happens to those who dare insult the Queen. There is only one thing to be done. He must go to the block.”

  “The block! For hiding in a room!”

  “In the Queens bedchamber… under the Queen’s bed … his sword and dagger handy.”

  “I would never agree to that. Poor Chastelard! Why … I was fond of him.”

  “Too fond for his safety, Madam.”

  “I shall never consent.” She thought: I shall talk to David. Together we shall find a way to save poor Chastelard.

  Moray looked at her quickly. She had changed. He could almost believe there was some influence working against him. He must get her married to some powerful prince; then he would be free to take up the Regency. If she did not marry abroad she would be here forever; he would be pushed into the background; she must never be allowed to take another adviser. The matter of immediate moment was that there should be no scandal to disturb wedding plans. Nothing must stand in the way of a match with one of the European princes.

  “There is something I must tell Your Majesty,” he said. “You have been deceived in this man. When he played the lover he acted a part. He is a servant of the Montmorency’s, and the Montmorencys with the Bourbons are, as you know, the leading Huguenot faction in France. This, my dearest sister, was a plot on your life which your faithful Marys have foiled. There is only one way to deal with such an offense. I beg you to listen to reason.”

  “It can’t be true!” gasped Mary.

  “It is hard for your pride to accept this. It was
easy for him to play the role of lover, because so many love you. But I know that he came here to murder you. This I shall tell his judges… and I have no doubt of the verdict.”

  Mary covered her face with her hands. She remembered the uncontrollable passion of Chastelard when he came from under the bed.

  “But… its horrible,” she said. “Horrible!”

  “Mary, have one of your women sleep with you in your bed until we return to Holyrood. The others will be close by, but keep one … in your bed. My dear sister, only thus can I feel happy concerning your safety.”

  “Flem slept with me last night.”

  “Then let her sleep with you until we are in Holyrood once more. Will you do this?”

  “Yes, James.”

  “I am relieved. Now think no more of this unfortunate business.”

  James kissed her hand, and she sat thinking of Chastelard who she had thought had wished only to make love to her, and had come—or may have come—to murder her.

  A WEEK LATER in the marketplace of St. Andrews, Pierre de Chastelard laid his head on the block. He looked very handsome, and many who watched his last moments shed tears. There were few in that crowd of spectators who really believed that he had conspired against the Queen.

  “It is clear,” they said to each other, “why he was in her bedchamber. She had not meant her women to discover him. He was to wait there until they had gone.”

  Before he died, Pierre de Chastelard quoted Ronsard’s famous Hymn to Death. He stood on the scaffold, his curling hair ruffled by the February wind; the people listened to his beautiful voice and wept afresh, although few understood what he said.

  “Te te salue, heureuse et profitable Mort

  Des extrêmes douleurs medicin et confort.

  Then smiling he laid his head upon the block and, as the axe descended, he was heard to say: “O cruelle dame …”

  But that was not the end of the scandal concerning Pierre de Chastelard. John Knox had decided that it should not be the end. The drama made too useful a scourge with which to attack the Queen.

  “’O cruelle dame!’” screamed Knox from his pulpit. “You know what that means, my friends. Cruel mistress—that is what is meant by those words. What that complaint importeth, lovers may divine. Ah, my good friends, now is seen the harvest of sin. A woman of the Court murdered her ill-gotten child, and by God’s mercy she and her paramour paid the penalty; now in divine justice another of Satan’s imps goes to eternal torment.”

  And in her candlelit apartment, although she tried to dance and sing as gaily as before, Mary was haunted by the memory of Chastelard.

  THREE

  TWO YEARS AFTER THE DEATH OF CHASTELARD, MARY WAS still unmarried. During that time there had been no lack of suitors; but it seemed that a royal marriage was indeed difficult to arrange. There were so many watching Mary. So the suitors were proposed and dismissed, over those two years.

  Mary had suffered one great loss in the death of her uncle François de Guise who had been assassinated at Orléans by a young fanatic, Poltrot de Meroy. The Cardinal wrote often and as affectionately as ever, but he was continually pointing out the advantages of a match with Charles, the Archduke of Austria. This she could not understand. She was hoping for the grandest of marriages with Don Carlos of Spain; and yet she had come to understand—with the help of David Rizzio—that the Cardinal was not working for that match but against it, and it seemed incredible that her uncle should be opposed to that which could bring her so much honor.

  “There must be some reason for it, David,” she said.

  David knew the reason, and it shocked her deeply.

  “Madam, the Cardinal is your uncle and you feel great affection toward him, but he works not for your good and your happiness. He works for the power of the Guises in France. A marriage with Don Carlos, while bringing great honor to yourself and to Scotland, would serve to strengthen Spain. France would be less powerful than of yore and, with France, the Guises. No, your uncle as we now know has exerted his strength against the Spanish match for that reason. Now, Madam, a Catholic Scotland with yourself and the Archduke as its rulers would be deemed a firm ally of France, but would in fact be a dependant of that country; there would be a strong France to stand against a weakened Spain. That is the Guisian policy. True, it would do you no good; but your uncle’s first concern is not with yourself, Madam, but with the Guises in France.”

  “But my uncle has done everything for my good… always.”

  “When your good was his also, Madam.”

  This was a tragic discovery, and yet she knew it to be true. She remembered now with humiliation those tender scenes between herself and the Cardinal. Always he had been subduing her will to his, not because he wished to help her, but because he wished to use her in order to increase the power of himself and his family.

  David had shown her this as he had shown her the falseness of her brother James; and she knew that David was right.

  She stood alone now with no one but David to help her; strangely enough the thought strengthened her. She would cease to listen to the advice of the Cardinal, as she had already to that of James. With David to help her she would arrange her own affairs.

  Maitland of Lethington had been back and forth during the past years with messages to and from the Queen of England. Maitland was that politician most likely to find favor with the English Queen. He was possessed of suave manners, good looks and a clever tongue; and all those qualities appealed to Elizabeth. Now James Melville was also at the English Court and was sending her regular dispatches giving accounts of the state of affairs there.

  There was one young man who was in the minds of several people as a possible suitor for the Queen of Scots. This was Henry Darnley, a tall, slim youth of nineteen. He was handsome and graceful, with large blue, rather prominent eyes, a fair complexion and beardless face which made him seem younger than he actually was. He had the additional advantage of royal blood, being a direct descendant of the Tudors. Elizabeth liked him since he was handsome, a good musician and dancer, but she never—or rarely—allowed her personal dislikes to override her political judgment.

  She made an open declaration that she would be much against the marriage of Mary and Darnley, but alone with Cecil who shared some of her secrets, she was less emphatic. Although she declared her desire to see Marys country living in peace and prosperity, that was far from her wish. An internally peaceful Scotland was a threat to England, and Elizabeth would never forget that Mary had dared to display the arms of England, suggesting thereby that Elizabeth was a bastard and had no right to the throne. In their secret sessions, Elizabeth and Cecil were not at all sure that a marriage between Mary and Darnley would be a bad thing for England after all, for they knew Henry Darnley to be a weak, vain and dissolute young man who would not help—but rather hinder—Mary in the governing of her country. But Elizabeth’s policy was to make a display of benevolent friendliness toward her cousin over the Border.

  Darnley remained at the English Court and, though his ambitious mother, who resided in England where Elizabeth could seize her if she wished, and his equally ambitious father, who had recently been allowed to return to Scotland where he had regained his estates, had high hopes of their son’s future, Elizabeth outwardly frowned on these hopes.

  There was another young man whom Elizabeth was prepared to offer to Mary. She would not at first disclose his name. Indeed, she declared, she could not bring herself to do so. She offered this man because she loved the Scottish Queen so devotedly and wished to do her so much good, for the man she had in mind was the most perfect man she, Elizabeth, had ever set eyes on, and she could not bear to contemplate his leaving her Court.

  But at last she was constrained to whisper the name of this man to Melville, and Thomas Randolph was given instructions to tell it to the Queen of Scots.

  When Randolph sought an audience, David Rizzio was with Mary. She had given him more and more work to do, and he was constantly at her si
de. The Englishman looked askance at the small stunted figure of the Piedmontese, but Mary said: “You may speak, Master Randolph, before my secretary.”

  Randolph then showed her a list of possible suitors suggested by the Queen of England and, on reading the last name on the list, Mary raised her eyebrows and looked full into the Englishman’s face.

  “Lord Robert Dudley!” she exclaimed.

  “The same, Madam.”

  “But this man is…”

  Randolph’s look silenced her. He greatly feared she was about to make some indiscreet observation concerning his mistress.

  “But this is a man with whom the Queen of England would not wish to part,” said Mary firmly.

  “My Queen bids me tell you that she is so desirous for Your Majesty’s happiness that she has set herself the task of finding for you the most perfect man she knows. This is Lord Robert.”

  Mary was aware of David’s eyes upon her; he was pleading: Do not show anger. Do not show that you regard this as an insult. The Queen of England is offering you one who, many would say, is her discarded lover but, Madam, I beg of you, show no anger.

  How well she was beginning to cooperate with David. How she delighted in following his lead! He was right, of course. David was always right.

  “There are times, Master Randolph,” she said, “when I think of my dead husband. Although several years have elapsed since he died, the memory of him is still too strong for me to consider remarriage.”

  “But, Madam, a handsome living husband would help you to forget one who is dead.”

  “I do not know. There has been too much talk of marriage. Sometimes I think I will follow your Queen’s example and remain unmarried.”

  “That would entail a grievous loss to Scotland, if you will forgive my saying so, Madam. My Queen assures you that if you marry Lord Robert she will then fix the succession. On her death you or your heirs would be rulers of England if my Queen should die without heirs of her body.”

  “It may be that I shall not outlive your Queen, Master Randolph. It is true that I am some years younger, but she is possessed of the better health.”