The Captive Queen of Scots

by Jean Plaidy

  To rule, one must be strong, the Regent believed. Mary had failed through sentimental weakness.

  He had determined to treat Mary’s followers with the same ruthlessness as he had shown to that young husband. He peremptorily ordered them to give up all their possessions, and sent his Justice-Clerk, Sir John Bellenden, to make sure that the order was carried out.

  In a country like Scotland, where it was not always easy to know who were one’s friends, it was necessary to pay highly those who did the most unpleasant work which the Regent would rather not himself perform. Bellenden therefore looked for rewards and, as payment for his services, Moray bestowed on him the estate of Woodhouselee which belonged to one of Mary’s mot ardent supporters—a member of the Hamilton family, James Hamilton of Bothwellhaugh.

  ALISON SINCLAIR, wife of James Hamilton, lay in her bed, her young child who had been born a few days before beside her. A great fire blazed in the fireplace, for it was difficult to keep the rooms warm during such weather. Outside the snow was falling.

  Alison was thinking of long ago days when she and her sister had knelt at the windows of this house looking out on the snow-covered countryside. She was remembering how they had been kept prisoners in the house by the weather and had amused themselves by playing hide and seek because it was such a wonderful house in which to hide. No matter where she went, she always thought of Woodhouselee as her home.

  She had inherited it and brought it to James Hamilton when they married; and she believed it was as well, because now that James was more or less an outlaw, since he was the Queen’s man, he had lost much of his own property; she was perpetually thankful that Woodhouselee, being her inheritance, was unassailable.

  James was now in hiding with his kinsman, Archibald Hamilton. It was sad that the troubles of the time should mean so many separations; but she was sure that when he heard that their child had arrived he would find some means of coming to her.

  While she lay thus musing she heard the sounds of arrival in the courtyard below, and called to her maid: “He is here! I knew he would come. Go and bring him to me at once and make certain that no one leaves the house while he is here. I expect all my servants to be loyal, but how can one be sure in times such as these. And if Moray’s men knew that he was here they would most certainly come to take him.”

  Smiling down at her newly born child, she called for a mirror. It was some time since she had seen her husband and she was eager to look her best. She was delighted because child-bearing had not changed her appearance, and she looked if anything younger than before. Perhaps that was because she was so happy. She had her baby . . . and now James had come to see them.

  The door was flung open and a man stood on the threshold of the room. She was surprised rather than alarmed in those first seconds.

  “But . . . ” she stammered, “who are you?”

  “Sir John Bellenden,” was the answer, “Justice-Clerk and owner of this house.”

  “You are mistaken. This house belongs to me. My father left it to me.”

  “You are wrong, Madam. It belongs to me. The estates of James Hamilton of Bothwellhaugh are confiscated by the Regent, and Woodhouselee is his gift to me for my services to Scotland.”

  “This cannot be so. This house is not my husband’s property, but mine.”

  “Madam, that which was your property became your husband’s on your marriage, and I tell you that all his possessions have passed out of his hands.”

  “If my husband were here . . . ”

  “Alas, he is not. We should know how to deal with a traitor.”

  “He is no traitor.”

  “Come, Madam, he has worked against the King and has sought to bring back Mary to the throne.”

  “You see my state. My child is but a few days old. Leave me in peace and this matter will doubtless be settled in due course.”

  “I have come to take possession, and I must ask you to leave my house without a moment’s delay.”

  “You see how I am placed!”

  “I see only that you trespass in my house.”

  “Please leave me now. I am not strong yet . . . and I feel faint.”

  “The fresh air will revive you. Come, Madam, rise from your bed. I shall give you five minutes in which to prepare to leave the house. If you have not gone in that time you will be forcibly evicted.”

  With that he left her, and she lay listening to the sounds of heavy footsteps in other parts of the house. Her maid came to her bedside; she was weeping.

  “What shall we do, Madam? What can we do?”

  “They cannot mean that they will turn us out. They will take this house . . . my Woodhouselee . . . but not now. They must give me time . . . .”

  She held her child tightly in her arms, and it was thus that Bellenden found her when he returned to the room.

  “So you are obstinate,” he growled. “Come, rise from that bed at once.” He turned to the maid. “Find a cloak for her. She will need it . . . it is cold outside.”

  For Alison what followed was as unreal as a nightmare, and as terrifying. Fainting, scarcely able to stand, she was forced to rise from her bed; a cloak was wrapped about her and, clasping her baby in her arms, she was turned out of doors.

  The cold winds tore at her garments; the snow was falling so thickly that she could not see. The baby began to cry but she could not comfort him.

  She tried to grope her way to the woods, where she believed she might find some shelter. She plunged through the snow, weeping and calling for her husband to come and help her.

  There was no one abroad on such a night and, although Alison knew the surrounding country well, the heavy snowdrifts had changed its contours, and soon she was lost.

  She stumbled on; she believed she had reached the woods but was not sure as, clutching the baby tightly to her, she fell into a deep drift.

  WHEN NEWS of the fate of his wife and child was brought to James Hamilton of Bothwellhaugh, who was at that time living secretly at Linlithgow in the house of his kinsman, Archibald Hamilton, his grief was uncontrollable. But it was soon replaced by a rage that was even greater, and the only way in which he could bear to go on living at that time was to plan revenge.

  Bellenden was in residence at Woodhouselee, and it was certain that there would be a strong guard about him, for it was believed that Bothwellhaugh would not be able to resist taking his revenge on the man who had sent his wife and child so callously to their death.

  But, reasoned Bothwellhaugh, and the whole Hamilton clan were with him in this, there was one who was more to blame than Bellenden. That was the man who set a ruthless example to his lieutenants; it was the man who would shrug callous shoulders when he heard of the tragedy at Woodhouselee, and wish everyone to know that such a fate was to be expected by all those who disobeyed the Regent’s orders.

  Bothwellhaugh would assuage his grief, not by the assassination of the insignificant Bellenden, but by that of the Regent Moray.

  ON THE 23RD DAY of January Moray would pass through Linlithgow on his way to Edinburgh, and Bothwellhaugh was ready for him. He had concealed himself in a house where the High Street was at its most narrow. At this point the cavalcade in which the Regent rode would be slowed down, and moreover it was impossible for more than two to ride abreast. The house backed onto fields; and in the fields a saddled horse was waiting.

  Bothwellhaugh, spurred, ready for flight, watching behind latticed windows, was thinking of Alison—lying abed, the child in her arms, waiting for him, of her wandering blindly through the snow, of her terrible end. When he thought of this his fingers grew steady and he knew with cold certainty that when he took aim he would not miss.

  At the lattice windows were hangings to conceal him; in these he had cut a hole only large enough to take the muzzle of his harquebuss. There were four bullets in that harquebuss. He intended to make no mistake.

  Now the cavalcade was turning into the High Street, and Bothwellhaugh, concealed by the hangings, could peep t
hrough them and watch its progress. At its head he rode—the Regent Moray, the man who, as much as that other, was the murderer of his dear Alison. Bothwellhaugh only needed to remember that, and he could feel quite cool and calm.

  The Regent was almost abreast of the window. Now was the moment.

  Bothwellhaugh took careful aim; and when he saw Moray fall forward, saw the red blood staining his jacket, he knew that he had avenged Alison and their baby.

  He heard the shouts as he ran from the room, down to the garden, leaped onto his horse and was a mile away before Moray’s men had succeeded in breaking into the barricaded house.

  Bothwellhaugh had flown to Hamilton; and the Regent Moray’s turbulent life was ended.

  JAMIE DEAD! Mary could not believe the news when it was brought to her.

  She pictured him, riding at the head of his men—vigorously living one moment; and the next slipping away to death.

  She wept for the Jamie she had known as a child when she had believed him to be her friend. She had loved him then, and she had found it difficult not to go on loving him. He was clever; he was meant to be a ruler; he was his father’s son; she had understood more than most, the terrible frustration he had suffered because he was not the King’s legitimate son. She, who was that King’s legitimate daughter and heir, could forgive Jamie more readily than most of her friends could do.

  Seton came to her and found her weeping.

  “Your Majesty should dry your eyes,” she said. “This should prove no hardship to you. He was never your friend, and of late years your most bitter enemy.”

  “All that is over now, Seton,” Mary replied sorrowfully. “He is gone to his Maker, and I can only remember my big brother . . . whom once I thought to be my friend.”

  “Then Your Majesty should remember his conduct to you since Carberry Hill. Most of your sufferings can be traced to him.”

  “Perhaps I should, Seton, but I was never one to do what I should. My emotions will always command my actions; and I can only think of Jamie in the days when I loved him so dearly and thought I was the luckiest girl in Scotland to have him for my brother. So leave me now, and since you cannot share my grief, let me mourn in secret.”

  So Seton left her with her memories of the young Jamie; and as the Queen wept for the past, which might have been so different, her faithful friends were asking each other what difference this would make to her future.

  ELIZABETH WAS HORRIFIED by the assassination of the Regent, whom she had looked upon as an ally and who was ready to obey her wishes; it had been part of her plan to keep him ruler of Scotland; she had also of late wished him to rid her of the Queen of Scots.

  It had been an obsession with Elizabeth—since the rising of Northern Catholics—that she must rid herself of Mary; and to find this plan—which had seemed to her the only safe one—foiled by Moray’s assassination, made her for the time being almost frantic.

  Her first action was to seize the person of Mary’s ambassador to England, Lesley, Bishop of Ross, and send him to the Tower.

  She saw at once that her fears had not been without grounds. Mary’s friends in Scotland, led by Huntley and Argyle, marched on Edinburgh. Kirkcaldy of Grange, who was keeper of the Castle and regretted his disloyalty to the Queen at Carberry Hill when he led Moray’s forces, had joined the lords of the Highlands. Fernyhirst, who had once offered Mary refuge in his castle if she could escape her English captors, marched across the border. And Leonard Dacre, on whose behalf Mary had pleaded effectively with Norfolk so that Dacre had not lost all his family possessions, gathered together three thousand men, and there was a new rising in the North.

  If only Mary could escape, there was an army waiting to fall in behind her.

  Huntingdon and the Shrewsburys, realizing the danger, doubled the guard at Tutbury; for they knew that fresh schemes for rescuing the Queen were being set in motion, and they believed that never had Mary’s chance of escape been so good.

  Mary, however, thought constantly of Norfolk in the Tower. There was one thing she needed more than freedom; and that was affection. Generous as she was, she poured out her affection on any who were ready to receive it; and although she knew Norfolk only through his letters, she was prepared to give him the devotion she had always longed to give to a husband.

  She wanted to be loyal; she wanted to make sacrifices; she was striving toward that perfect relationship which in her three previous marriages she had not attained.

  “Mine own good Lord,” she wrote, “I would know your pleasure if I should seek to make some enterprise. If it please you I care not for my danger . . . ”

  There was no answer from Norfolk, and she wrote again;

  “If you think the danger too great, do as you think best, and let me know what you please that I do, for I will be for your sake perpetual prisoner, or put my life in peril for your weal and mine . . . .”

  And she signed this letter “Your own faithful to death Queen of Scots, my Norfolk.”

  When Norfolk received the letter he sweated with terror. Did she not know that, since the death of Moray, she was being watched more closely than ever before? He was not risking his head to write love letters.

  MARY BELIEVED that she was now living through the most dangerous weeks of her life. Her enemy and father-in-law, the Earl of Lennox, was the new Regent; and all Scotland was aflame.

  But Elizabeth had no intention of allowing Mary to be reinstated; she subdued the rebellion in England as she had that led by Northumberland; and she sent Sussex to Scotland with seven thousand troops to teach Mary’s supporters a lesson. Lord Scrope followed Sussex, and Sir William Drury laid waste many a Scottish community which had declared loyalty to the Queen.

  Each day melancholy news was brought to Mary of the suffering of her supporters, who could not hold out against the military superiority of the English.

  That winter and early spring were desperate days, and in addition to her sorrow and despair Mary suffered the return of the pains in her limbs and the sickness which seemed to her to grow out of the contaminated air of Tutbury.

  She found small comfort in her tapestry and the companionship of her faithful friends. Bess and George Talbot were friendly, but she knew that they were—as they must be—spies for their Queen. They were not harsh jailors, but they were determined not to let her escape.

  “How I wish,” she told Bess, “that I could ride out into the country now and then. I should love to have my horses again; I always had my dogs, for I love the creatures. I sadly miss having no animals of my own.”

  “It may be that someday the Queen will consent to your having pets if you wish for them,” was all Bess offered. Yet Mary believed that, had Bess decided she might have a little dog, she would not have thought it necessary to ask the Queen’s permission.

  There was some good news. When Scotland was defeated and there was no longer any hope that an army of Mary’s faithful followers would come marching to Tutbury to rescue her, Elizabeth released the Bishop of Ross from the Tower.

  But even when Scotland was subdued, there were continuous arrests of those who had rebelled in the North and many were taken to London, tortured, and finally subjected to the horrible traitor’s death. Mary knew that these men were tortured in the hope that they would betray her as having urged them to rebel against the Queen of England.

  Each day when she arose she wondered whether it would be her last on Earth; every time there was an arrival at the castle she wondered whether an order had been brought to conduct her to the Tower.

  THE EARL OF SHREWSBURY had recovered from his sickness, and the gentleness Bess had shown him during his illness had disappeared. She was sharp and domineering, and there were times when George Talbot deeply regretted having married her.

  Often he would find himself comparing her with two women—the Queen and the serving maid.

  He was deeply aware of Eleanor Britton and it seemed to him that in the course of the day he saw more of her than he did of any other per
son. Perhaps he was always aware of her; perhaps he sought her out, and she was eager to be sought. When he sent for a serving girl, it was often Eleanor who came; he found himself thinking of the tasks he could give to one of the serving girls; thus she came often to his apartments.

  It was dusk and when he had sent for a girl to light a fire in his ante-chamber, it was Eleanor who came, graceful, hesitant yet eager, her coarse gown cut low to show her white skin; her apron clean, having been hastily donned since she was to come to him; her hair was hidden by her cap and he felt an irresistible urge to see it.

  “My lord desires a fire?” she asked in her gentle voice.

  He nodded.

  She said: “I have just lighted one in the Queen’s apartments, where my lady sits with Her Majesty. They are together at the tapestry.”

  She did not move as he came toward her.

  He took off her cap, and her hair fell about her shoulders; it was long, thick and gold-colored.

  “It seems a shame to hide it,” he murmured.

  She was waiting breathlessly for what would happen next; although she knew; and he knew; for in that moment they both realized that this was inevitable. This was what they had been waiting for since they had first become aware of each other.

  DURING THAT LONG WINTER, Mary suffered greatly from the rigors of Tutbury. She was longing for the spring to come. When she received the news that a papal bull had been obtained, which dissolved her marriage with Bothwell on the grounds of rape, she was devoid of emotion. There was one thing it did teach her though; she was free of Bothwell in all ways. She no longer thought of him as her husband; she thought of herself as a widow—Darnley’s widow—and it was as though that most turbulent relationship had never existed.

  She longed to change her state of widowhood. Sometimes she would call Seton, Jane and the others to her and discuss the gowns she would have made after her marriage. It would be wonderful, she told them, to have beautiful clothes again. “I shall have some little dogs,” she declared. “Oh, how I long to be free again!”