The Captive Queen of Scots - Plaidy Jean - Страница 84

THE EARL AND COUNTESS of Shrewsbury came to the Queen’s apartment and, as soon as Mary looked into their faces, she knew that they had grave news.

She asked all her attendants to leave her, and when they had gone she cried: “I pray you tell me without delay.”

“The conspiracy with Ridolfi, of which Your Majesty will be well aware, has been discovered.”

“Ridolfi?” repeated Mary.

“Norfolk is in the Tower. Lesley is there also. There have been many arrests. You have not heard the end of this matter, Madam.”

“But . . . ” cried Mary, looking appealingly at Bess, “this is disastrous.”

“It would indeed have been, Your Majesty,” retorted the Countess, “if this plot had succeeded. It is difficult to know what will come out of it. But we have new orders from Her Majesty.”

Mary was trying to concentrate on what they were saying. Norfolk in the Tower! Ridolfi! This meant that Elizabeth had discovered that the King of Spain and the Pope were endeavoring to interfere in English politics.

But I never wished for this, she was telling herself. I never wanted to harm Elizabeth. All I asked for were my rights . . . my own throne . . . to have my son with me . . . to bring him up as my heir. I never wanted to interfere with the English.

Norfolk! For her sake he had been trapped into treason against his Queen. And the penalty for treason . . .

She dared not contemplate what the future might hold.

“The Queen’s immediate orders,” went on Bess, “are that you shall remain in these rooms and not on any pretext whatsoever leave them. Certain of your servants are to be sent away from you. You are to have no more than ten men and six women.”

“I will never send my friends away,” cried Mary.

Bess shrugged her shoulders. She was shaken, angry with herself and with Shrewsbury. Here was a pretty state of affairs with a conspiracy of this magnitude going on under their noses, and they knowing nothing of it.

This would be the end of Norfolk—of that much she was certain. Would it also be the end of Mary Queen of Scots? That might well be, for if it could be proved that she was involved in a plot against Elizabeth she had indeed earned the death penalty.

It was imperative that the Shrewsburys should be able to prove their innocence.

Bess had rarely been so shaken. They lived in dangerous times and Shrewsbury could be a fool on occasions—particularly over his beautiful Queen—so that Bess had to think for them both.

“Your Majesty would do well to select the sixteen you wish to keep with you,” she said tartly. “If you do not, it will be for us to select them for you.”

Shrewsbury said almost gently: “Your Majesty will understand that you are in grave danger.”

Mary said impatiently: “I have been in grave danger ever since I sought refuge with your mistress.”

“But never,” warned Shrewsbury, “in such danger as you find yourself at this time.”

“Come, come,” said Bess, “it is useless to commiserate with Her Majesty. If she is involved in plots against our Queen, she knows full well the risks she runs. It would be well if Your Majesty made your own selection . . . and that with speed; for I must warn you again that if you do not, it will be made for you.”

She signed to Shrewsbury and together they left the Queen. Mary immediately called for Seton who from the ante-room had overheard what had been said.

Seton said nothing. There was no need for words.

Never in all her life had Seton felt such fear for her mistress.

THERE WAS DEEP MELANCHOLY in the Queen’s apartments.

“How can I choose from all those I love so well?” asked Mary again and again. “How can I spare one of them!”

Bess came in. She treated Mary with disapproval in the presence of others, but when they were alone she allowed a little sympathy to show. Secretly she thought Mary a fool . . . surrounded by fools. So many attempts and not one successful! Bess was thankful that they were not. She was anxious that none should be able to say that she had given any help to the Queen of Scots. Small wonder that Shrewsbury’s health suffered through this task of his. There could be none more dangerous in the kingdom than guarding the Queen of Scots.

“Your Majesty,” she said coolly, “if you will not decide who of your servants are to go and who to stay, the Earl and I will have no alternative but to decide for you.”

With tears of wretchedness in her eyes Mary turned away; but still she could not bring herself to make the choice.

WILLIE DOUGLAS stood before her, all his jauntiness departed. He was one of those who were to leave her.

Willie looked bewildered; he could not believe that he was to go. Mary took him in her arms and kissed him.

“Oh Willie, never will I forget . . . .”

“Your Majesty,” said Willie, “we must get you out of that wicked woman’s hand. We must get you back to Scotland where you belong.”

“You will go to Scotland, Willie?”

A shadow of the old grin crossed Willie’s face. “They’ll be remembering Lochleven up there, Your Majesty. They’ll cut me into collops if they catch me.”

“That must never happen. Go to France with George, Willie.”

“I’ll not let them get me, Your Majesty. I’m going to bring you back to your throne, remember.”

“Oh, Willie, how can I bear this! How can I! You and so many whom I love to be torn from me! Be assured though that the life you hazarded for mine will never be neglected while I have a friend living . . . .”

When Willie had left her, Seton led her to her bed and there they lay together, weeping silently—Mary thinking of all those who had risked their lives to be with her; Seton wondering what the future held for them.

UNABLE TO LEAVE her rooms in the castle, left to the care of only one or two of her ladies—for those servants who remained were not allowed to come and go as they once had—Mary’s melancholy turned to sickness, and once again those who loved her despaired of her life.

Her French physician, who had obtained special permission before he was allowed to visit her, was in despair because he had no medicines with which to treat her. In desperation he implored Cecil, recently created Lord Burleigh, to lift the ban which prevented him from treating the royal invalid. Burleigh—shocked by the Ridolfi plot which was being slowly revealed through the torturing of Norfolk’s servants and others involved—did not answer the physician’s request; and when Mary wrote to the French ambassador asking for his help, the letter was intercepted by Burleigh’s spies and this too brought no relief.

“If they would but send a little of the ointment which relieves Your Majesty’s spasmodic pains, that would be something,” mourned Seton. “I would I could acquire a little cinnamon water and confiture of black grapes.”

“What is the use?” answered Mary wearily. “They have determined to kill me, and if I die what they will call a natural death, so much the better from their point of view. There is one request I will make though, and perhaps Elizabeth will answer this: I shall ask her to send me a priest, for I believe I shall soon be in dire need of his services.”

She was so weak that she could scarcely write, and she hoped this would be apparent to Elizabeth when she received the letter, and that her heart would be touched.

It was some days later when she believed that this had come about, for a priest came from the Court of England to visit her.

When she heard that he was in the castle she begged that he be brought to her at once; and when he arrived she held out her hand and prepared to greet him warmly.

The priest bowed coldly, and there was no pity in his pale ascetic face as he looked at her, so wan, so helpless in her sickbed.

“It pleases me that you have come,” she said. “I have need of your services.”

“I came from my Sovereign Lady Elizabeth,” he told her, “not to act as your priest and confessor but to bring you this.”