Mary Queen of Scotland and the Isles by Margaret George
Had he forgotten that the last time he had seen her he had threatened her life? How could he forget—or expect her to?
“I heard you were mortally ill!” he said.
“Yet continued hawking,” she said matter-of-factly.
“Nay! I did not! I only heard two days ago! Someone kept the news from me! Someone—and there are many—who wish us ill!”
“You are chief amongst them. You play into their hands with your sulking, your statements against me, your withdrawals.”
Yet could I bear it if he were underfoot, constantly attendant on me? she asked herself.
“If you would only listen to me…” he began, pacing. “Yet even here, I see, there is no place provided for me to stay! Lord Bothwell occupies my quarters! He keeps state there—”
“He recuperates. He almost lost his life in the defence of the realm.” While you were hawking.
“He has no rights to the King’s quarters!”
“They are not ‘the King’s quarters.’ And am I obliged to keep chambers empty for you? They waited, Sire, whilst I alone sat for the justice court. They sat empty, as did your chair of estate, screaming, ‘No King here, no King!’ It is less conspicuous to have them filled. It calls less attention to your negligence!”
He glared at her. “I see I am not welcome here!”
“You are always welcome, when you are not drinking or in a rage,” she said wearily. “But your arrival now is a bit after the fact.”
He looked at her, his eyes searching hers. He wanted some confirmation of his importance to her, she realized. The same as I want from Bothwell. But I cannot give it.
“Adieu, then!” he said, flinging open the door and making for the stairs.
From the window she watched him gallop away, the muscular rump of his horse rounded and perfect.
He always had good taste in horses, she thought. She felt limp and weak, and climbed back into bed.
* * *
She had recovered, Bothwell had recovered, and it was early November. Time to leave this strange place of wounding and illness.
They set out, the entire company, riding eastward. Before her illness, Mary had meant to show herself to the people in this eastern march. It was the tamest of the three “marches,” or districts, lining the border, each with its English counterpart on the other side. It was the corridor by which invaders always came up to Scotland, for the land was flatter and held fewer bogs.
At Kelso a company of a thousand horsemen joined them, under the command of the warden of the East March, Lord Home, to give ceremony to their passage. They made their way to the sea, but before turning northward Mary stopped and looked south. England lay spread out like a soft green blanket beyond the glittering River Tweed.
Maitland was riding beside her as she murmured, “England.”
He edged closer and she became aware of his presence.
“I have never seen England,” she said. “I imagined one could see the border, that it would be a tangible thing. Instead, one country just shades into another. They are not so different after all.”
“Make no mistake, Your Majesty,” he said. “They are quite different. And as for a border one can see, there once was one: the old Roman wall. But it is farther south. So the English can congratulate themselves that they succeeded in extending their borders and encroaching on our territory.”
“It looks so beguiling, so harmless,” she said, staring at it. Prince James would rule there one day, she knew.
“Like a snake underneath a green leaf,” said Bothwell, suddenly beside her. His voice was as strong and sure as ever. “Believe me, danger lurks there, however beguiling it may appear.”
She cast a last look at it. “Someday the realms may be one, and this border no more than a memory.”
“Not in your lifetime, it goes without saying,” said Bothwell.
She winced to hear him speak of her death so offhandedly.
* * *
They turned north now, and the cavalcade made its showy progress toward Edinburgh through Eyemouth, Coldingham, Dunbar, and Tantallon Castle. Mary wore the costumes she had brought for such an occasion, and put on the embroidered taffeta hats with their coloured feathers, the Highland mantles lined with satin, the riding habits trimmed in gold braid and ornamented with pearls and topaz. She waved and smiled to ever-greater crowds who gathered along the main road.
But she was still weak, and at the invitation of the Laird of Craigmillar Castle, and the urging of Bourgoing, she agreed to stop two miles short of Edinburgh and spend further time recuperating at the castle, a stone bastion situated on high ground, with a distant view of the sea.
XXXVIII
Bothwell slammed his fist into the straw-stuffed calf’s skin as hard as he was able. He felt the pain hit his belly, travelling along the exact lines of his wound, and spread even into his good arm. Gritting his teeth, he pulled back his fist to do it again. He would do it as many times as necessary to build his strength back up. It hurt less today than it had yesterday. Being even temporarily crippled was a horrible experience, and he intended to stay that way as short a time as possible.
The stuffed calf’s skin had been his idea, whereas the hot compresses and stretching had been the Queen’s physician’s recommendation—that affable Frenchman. Yet he seemed to know medicine well, Bothwell had to admit.
“Good day.” The chamber door opened and Bourgoing entered. He nodded toward the stuffed skin, tied between two chests in this dry but cold and barren chamber in Craigmillar Castle. “I have already sent for the heated oil and water,” he announced. “It is time to change the bandages.” He patted a thick bundle of clean white linens under his arm.
Bothwell lowered his arm, which was aching. He was glad for an excuse to rest. Obediently he peeled off his shirt and waited, shivering, for Bourgoing’s ministrations.
The French physician deftly removed the stained bandages and felt gently along the scabbed ridge of the great belly wound. “Mmm … mmm…” was all he said. He massaged unguent into the reddened skin. “This was an enormous wound. You will have a formidable scar.”
“I await the day when the scab turns into a scar. I do not mind scars.”
Bourgoing poked one of Bothwell’s chest muscles and was surprised to find his finger could barely press it down. The man surely had muscles of iron, or as near iron as flesh could get. He murmured in admiration, “You will soon be out fighting again.”
“Good. It is my charge and livelihood.” Bothwell put his shirt back on.
“This evening you should apply the warm compresses,” Bourgoing said.
“It will be a task for French Paris,” said Bothwell. “You need not take your time for a valet’s task.” He grinned at the physician, reading his thoughts. “I promise to follow your instructions,” he said.
When Bourgoing had left the grey, dull chamber, Bothwell turned again to the punching-skin. He pounded it with his fist, imagining it to be an enemy. Imagining it to be his greatest undoing, his lust for the Queen.
No intelligent man is undone by lust, he told himself.
Whap! His fist struck the skin.
That is for students and apprentices and old fools. An intelligent man harnesses his lust, brings it under subjugation, like an unruly horse. Or he even lets it serve him and bring him fortune … if another’s lust proves his or her undoing.
Whap!
The business with the Queen …
He flinched as he remembered that shameful weakness on his part when he had kissed her at the Exchequer House. She had been alone, and he had always found her bonny … but it was a foolish thing to have done. Had he amended it sufficiently? Why did he feel as though it was still unsettled, or hanging over them? Yet to mention it again, to try to reapologize, would be to emphasize it, give it new life.
Whap! That was what was so much better about encounters in the field—no ambiguity. Just fighting, the simpler the better. The best was single combat to settle an issue. But no one
Now pain began to tear through him. His left arm felt as though it were on fire.
“So perish all the Queen’s enemies,” said a flat voice behind him. The Lord James stood in the doorway, his head cocked appreciatively, his gloves held in one flat palm.
Bothwell grunted and sat down heavily on a stool. “It grieves me to know she has so many enemies,” he said. He gestured to the other stool and James sat. Bothwell picked up his wine flagon and poured out two cups without asking James if he wanted any.
James took one. “Yet she does. In many places.” He took a sip of the wine.
Silence hung between them, with only the sound of the wind outside catching in the great stone windows.
“My sister—the Queen—” James finally continued, “at last regrets her marriage with her cousin, the Lord Darnley. She admits this openly. She has received a letter just today that makes her weep. ‘How to be free of him,’ she said, ‘I see no escape.’ And ‘Would that I had died at Jedburgh!’”
“‘Will no one rid me of this meddling priest?’” Bothwell leaned back and threw one of his arms across the back of the chair. It smarted.
“The Queen would give anything to be free of the young fool and proud tyrant.”
“Anything except give a direct order for achieving this freedom. ’Tis a prerogative of royalty to suggest the deed and then make others take the blame.” He shot a look at Lord James, the craftiest man in Scotland. Only once had James come out in the open, in the Chaseabout Raid, and been severely trounced. It was not a mistake he would make again. He had taken care to hide all traces of himself in the Riccio affair. If he thought he could engineer a removal of Darnley in like fashion, using Bothwell as cat’s-paw, he was mistaken.
“What do you want from me?” asked Bothwell bluntly.
“Only that you use your brains to devise some way that she can shed him. There is annulment, divorce, censure by Parliament, trial for treason—he did hold her prisoner and dissolve Parliament on his own usurped authority—mishap on the way to imprisonment.… Your own parents were divorced. Perhaps you can persuade her to—”
“No. That was a different case.”
“We mean to approach her and discuss all this. Maitland, Argyll, your wife’s brother Huntly, and myself. We need you to join us. She needs our help.”
Bothwell grunted again and took another draught.
“This is not treason! We mean to sign a bond and pledge to obey only the Queen. Darnley has forfeited all rights—”
“To live?” A bond always had do with death, eventually.
“To be her husband, and to bear the title of King, even in courtesy.”
* * *
The five men stood before Mary, their faces shining with nervousness and sincerity. Mary herself, more slender than ever after her illness, stood very white and still, looking from one face to another.
“Your Majesty, we are gathered here out of love and concern for you, as loyal subjects,” Lord James began.
Mary looked dreadful, Bothwell thought. Her face showed all the strain of her situation and the demand of her recent illness. The colour of her skin was gone, replaced by the dull sameness of chalky paste. Her voice was weak and sounded resigned.
“Shall we sit?” she asked, and Bothwell realized she did not have the strength to stand for any length of time.
She and the five men took their places in a circle of chairs near the fireplace, which housed a good fire. The heat felt good. Craigmillar was a very drafty castle, and its thick stone walls seemed to hold in the chill.
Lord James flipped up his cloak and sat down carefully. Just as carefully he opened his mouth and spoke.
“We here”—he gestured to the others—“wish to help you in your dilemma. The Lord Darnley has proved unworthy of the high position to which he was called, and for the sake of Scotland some remedy must be found.”
“Divorce,” said Maitland, “would seem to be the solution. Certainly there are grounds. His—”
“My faith does not permit divorce,” said Mary in a small voice. “And nothing must be undertaken that would prejudice my son the Prince’s royal rights.”
“My own mother and father were divorced,” said Bothwell. “Yet it did not hinder my rights to succeed to my father’s titles at his death.” He felt duty-bound to speak.
“Titles are not the same as a throne. And perhaps even a throne in another realm as well,” said Mary pointedly.
“An annulment is certainly a possibility,” said Maitland. “The close relationship—half first cousins—would raise questions. And—”
“No! An annulment is worse than a divorce! An annulment means a marriage never legally existed, and the offspring are left in no clear state!” Mary spoke in a surprisingly loud, clear voice.
Maitland looked abashed.
“There can be no prejudice, no impediments, to his title! Else all was sacrificed in vain! And think not to have some evil befall him, as did Riccio! No, although such things happen regularly here in Scotland, I will not have my conscience stained, nor my honour blotted, with such a crime! For I must face God and be able to look Him directly in His face!”
“Aye, aye,” said Argyll soothingly. “Then perhaps he should be arrested and tried for treason by Parliament. The other conspirators in your servant’s death were condemned and banished, while the head of the conspiracy and mischief went unpunished.”
“Everything will be done aboveboard, lawfully, all approved by Parliament,” said Maitland. “And although the Lord James is as devout a Protestant as Your Grace is a Catholic, he will put his fingers in front of his eyes and look the other way. That we promise you.”
“I cannot stain my conscience!” she kept repeating, hysterically. “I cannot, I cannot—”
Bothwell dared not look at her.
“Leave it all to us,” Lord James said smoothly.
XXXIX
Madame Rallay carefully placed the calvados-and-cream posset before her mistress as she sat at her little inlaid desk, not working, just staring off into space.
“Happy birthday, my dear Queen,” she whispered.
Mary looked up and smiled in a preoccupied way. “Thank you,” she said. Then she actually noticed what had been placed before her, and a genuine smile broke over her face. “You remembered,” she said, touched.
“Indeed, yes, Madam. How could I forget?”
“I am four and twenty today. Yesterday was the Lord Darnley’s birthday, and he is twenty-one. Yet we are not celebrating together, and although—or perhaps because—he is so young, dissoluteness has him in its grip. I fear he will never be delivered from it.”
“You must stop brooding,” said Madame Rallay. “If ever you hope to recover your spirits, you must stop thinking on these unpleasant things. Now, as to the baptism—when do the godparents arrive?”
Mary smiled. “Once again Elizabeth declines to meet me. Evidently she is not very curious to see me. She sends the Earl of Bedford, governor of Berwick, with her christening gift, a huge gold font. But of course everything is political—for the Earl, being a staunch Protestant, cannot actually attend, so he himself has to choose a proxy—a proxy for a proxy!” She could not help laughing.
“And the French?” Madame Rallay looked on approvingly as Mary drank the posset.
“The Count de Brienne will represent Charles IX; he is travelling from France. And dear Monsieur du Croc, the regular French ambassador, will have to stand in for the Duke of Savoy’s own proxy, Moretta, who seems to tarry overlong in Paris.” She could not help feeling slighted; even the glittering ceremony she had planned, and the accompanying honours, seemed not sufficient to lure people north. She hated the implied slight to her country, even though she herself had imported French people and trappings to this land. Still, that was different.…
“He will be sorry to have missed it, when he hears it described.”
“The colour of loyalty.”
“He has been loyal. And I need to speak with him. Pray, tell Nau to summon him.”
“Indeed, Madam. And are you finished with the posset? I shall have the glass taken away.”
* * *
Bothwell came straightway. She saw immediately that he was walking briskly, and complimented him on his recovery.
“It was partially thanks to your fine physician, Bourgoing,” he admitted. “He babied me, made me treat myself like a French whore, almost, with stinking perfumes, hot cloths—but I enjoyed it. I trust you are recovering likewise.”
“My wounds are not as treatable as yours,” she said.
“I presume we speak now of the Lord Darnley?”
“Yes,” she said, bowing her head in shame at referring to her husband as a wound. “What have you … decided? What is to be the plan? I left it all in Lord James’s hands. I have not even received any letters from Darnley since the one at Craigmillar.”
“I know not to what you refer, save the Lord James said you had received one that made you weep.”
“In it Lord Darnley threatened not to attend the baptism at all. He said that since the foreign ambassadors would not address him as King, especially the English one, he declined to attend. Of course it will throw doubt on the Prince’s legitimacy, when his father does not attend! Oh, Bothwell, what am I to do?” As soon as she said it, she regretted it. She did not want to make him uncomfortable, or make him feel she thought of him as anything other than a councillor whose advice was sometimes necessary. She did not want to chase him away—no, not when just being in his presence was her most treasured thing in all the world. He must not be allowed to know or even sense that—or he would go away. She knew it. She had known it after the kiss at Exchequer House. This was all she would have, all she should have; and it must suffice.
Bothwell looked perplexed. “You have no choice but to proceed as ever. Write him and try to persuade him to attend. But do not beg, or he will take pleasure in rejecting your plea. As for what we have decided to do … nothing, for the present. All must be suspended until after the ceremony. It would not do to have a fracas or a scandal or an … accident to the Prince’s father while the foreign dignitaries are gathered here.”