The Captive Queen of Scots Page 10

  “Your Majesty, I am Christian, wife of Robert Douglas. My father was the Master of Buchanan.”

  “But of course,” said Mary pleasantly, “I could not forget the Countess of Buchanan who was once betrothed to my half-brother.”

  As the Countess flushed slightly Mary remembered that Christian had no reason to love Moray.

  “Welcome to my apartments,” went on Mary. “I trust you will not find them as dreary as I do.”

  “Your Majesty is a prisoner and that is why you hate your prison. It grieves me that I should be a member of that family who are your jailors.”

  “Thank you for those words. Come, sit down. Are you fond of needlework?”

  “Yes, Your Majesty.”

  “Then take a look at our work. I think we shall make it into a screen.”

  “It is very beautiful,” murmured Christian.

  “It is our great pleasure to work on it,” Mary told her. “There is something so satisfying about tapestry. It lives on after us . . . and consider, in years to come people will say: ‘That is what Mary Queen of Scots did while she was a prisoner in Lochleven.’”

  “Let us hope, Your Majesty, that they will say: ‘The Queen started it in her prison of Lochleven but completed it in the royal apartments at Edinburgh Castle or Holyrood House.’”

  Certainly Christian was more sympathetic than Lady Douglas’s daughters, thought Mary; and she was not wrong when she surmised that she might be an ally.

  Very often Mary was alone with her, and on one of these occasions Christian said: “I shall never forget the time when Sir William was in disgrace with Your Majesty. The Earl of Moray was in England and you sent word to Lochleven that Sir William and his family were to surrender the castle and leave Scotland within six hours.”

  Mary nodded, remembering the occasion well. They had tried to prevent her marriage with Darnley, and at that time she had been very eager for the marriage. Moray had taken up arms against her, and of course the Douglases were, as ever, firmly beside him in all he did.

  “It was a terrible day when we heard the news,” went on Christian. “I was in labor with my first child, and the thought of leaving the castle was alarming. Sir William had had to take to his bed with sickness.”

  “I remember,” said Mary. She had been skeptical of Sir William’s illness but there had been no doubt that the Countess of Buchanan was in childbed.

  “And you gave orders that we might remain,” went on Christian. “All you asked was that the surety of the castle should be at your command. I shall never forget the relief. And I shall never forget my gratitude to Your Majesty.”

  “Naturally,” said Mary quickly, “I should not have thought of turning you out at such a time. But Sir William does not feel equally grateful, I am sure. He has little pity for my plight and thinks only to serve my ambitious brother.”

  “Your Majesty . . . ” Christian looked over her shoulder . . . “you may know something of my story. If that is so, you will understand that I feel no great desire to serve your ambitious brother.”

  “I know,” Mary told her, “that you were once betrothed to him and that he forsook you for Agnes Keith, the daughter of the Earl Marischal.”

  “A match more to his liking!” retorted Christian meaningfully. “But that was of no moment. Matches which are made for us in our youth often come to nothing. But I was also his ward, and I was an heiress. He was not eager for marriage with me, seeing a more advantageous one elsewhere, but at the same time he did not mean to lose my fortune. I think he was rather sorry that there was no convent into which he could force me. So he sent me here to his family, and in this castle of Lochleven, Your Majesty, I was as much a prisoner as you are now.”

  “My poor Christian! I fear I have thought so constantly of my own woes that I have given little thought to those of others.”

  “Your Majesty is well known for your generous heart. And my plight was made less hard by the sympathy of Lady Douglas, who, although she would serve her bastard son, is always ready to be kind to those in distress, providing of course that in doing so she does not go too much against the wishes of Moray. Even so, she is ready to risk a little . . . as in my case. When Robert and I fell in love she helped us to marry . . . and she did not let Moray know what had happened until we had gone through the ceremony.”

  “So then there was nothing he could do about it!”

  “Oh yes, Your Majesty, he is always resourceful. That is why he has reached his present position. He still kept me a prisoner at Lochleven and he has taken my fortune from me. So here I remain—no longer an heiress—dependent on the bounty of the Douglases because I am Robert’s wife.”

  Mary was silent. Then she said thoughtfully: “It is a marvel to me that I always believed so firmly in the goodness of my half-brother. It is only now that I have time for reflection that I see him in his true light. Again and again he has stood against me; then when he was in my presence, his calmness and his appearance of stern devotion to duty deceived me. It will do so no longer; one of my greatest enemies in Scotland today is my own half-brother, Regent Moray.”

  “But Your Majesty has good friends. The Setons, and the Flemings are with you. And the Huntleys in the North.”

  “The Setons and Flemings have always been my good friends. Mary Seton and Mary Fleming were brought up as my sisters. Then there is Lord Semphill who married Mary Livingstone, another of my Marys, and he is also on my side.”

  “And I understand, Your Majesty, that Lord Semphill, with Lord Seton, is not far off at this moment. I do not doubt that they often look toward your prison from the mainland.”

  “It’s a comforting thought.”

  “Then you have friends abroad.”

  “The King of France greatly desired to marry me,” mused Mary. “I am certain that he would help if he could; but he is ruled by his mother, Catherine de’ Medici, and he never liked me.”

  “Yet no Queen is happy to see another in captivity. It is an insult to royalty, which they must needs resent.”

  “If I could but write to them . . . . if I could but make them see my humiliation and the indignity of my position . . . ”

  “I am sure Your Majesty’s eloquence would move them to pity.”

  “I have no means of writing. No writing materials. They have been taken from me. I have no means of conveying letters to my friends.”

  Christian was silent, and Mary picked up her tapestry and began to work with a desperate concentration.

  But the next day when Christian came to see her she brought writing materials.

  “Your Majesty must have a care that you are not seen with these,” she said. “But if you wrote your letters I could see that they are delivered to a reliable messenger. They do not watch me, you see. They do not fear that I shall escape. Here I have my home and my family . . . and my fortune is already Moray’s.”

  How quickly hope was ready to spring up. The Queen sat at her window looking out over the lake. She had lost George and Willie, and now Fate had offered her Christian.

  Charles of France would help her. She knew he would because he had loved her with all the force of his strange, twisted nature; although he was much younger than she was his jealous rage, when she had married his brother François, had been alarming to behold.

  But he was entirely ruled by the mother whom he feared, and Mary knew that any letter he sent to Charles would first pass through his mother’s hands. So there was only one thing to do. She must write to Catherine de’ Medici and try to arouse in her the indignation all queens must feel for insulted royalty. She must hope that the Queen would show her letter to her son; and then the King of France would long to come to her aid.

  There were few moments when it was safe to bring out those writing materials, and she had to wait for her chance. But it came at last, and Seton and Jane kept watch while she sat at her table and wrote.

  Her appeal was pathetic.

  . . . I am so closely guarded that I have no leisure but
when they are at dinner or sleeping, when I rise stealthily, for their girls lie with me. This bearer will tell you all. I entreat you to give credit and reward him as you love me. I implore you both to have pity upon me for unless you take me hence by force, I shall never come out, I am certain. But if you will send troops all Scotland would revolt from Moray and Morton on perceiving you took the matter in earnest . . .

  She sealed the letter. And when Christian came to her apartments next day she took it and assured the Queen that it should be dispatched to France at the earliest possible moment.

  HOW LONG the waiting seemed! How long before she realized how foolish she had been! To have written to Catherine de’ Medici, to expect help from her, surely showed how blind she had become. The woman had hated her from the moment they had first met when Mary was a child and she, the neglected wife of Henri Deux, was taking second place to the dazzling Diane de Poitiers.

  Why should Mary expect help now when she was alone and helpless? But it was in her nature to dream of the impossible and, if it were pleasant enough, imagine it would come true.

  She could picture the slow smile on that flat, expressionless face as Catherine de’ Medici read her appeal. She could hear the sudden loud laughter which she had always found so unattractive.

  Young Charles would never see the letter.

  How foolish to have hoped for succor from that direction! But for what else could she hope? She was only in her twenties. Was she to spend the rest of her life in the dreary island fortress of Lochleven?

  The waters of the lake had begun to have a great fascination for her. They were dappled now with April sunshine. Spring was here but it brought her little hope. George was lost to her. She had not realized until she had lost him how much he had done to make her life tolerable.

  When she sat at her window looking down on the lake, she began to picture herself walking there and letting the water lap about her ankles (those ankles which had betrayed she was no laundress to the observant and lecherous boatmen) and not pausing but walking on and on until the whole of her body was submerged in the water of the lake.

  She would not struggle for life, for what had life to offer her? She would eagerly embrace death because she was weary and hope had fled.

  But that was folly; it was sinful. Whatever happened she must go on living; hope would return to comfort her; it had never deserted her for long.

  Sir William and Lady Douglas were alone in the latter’s apartment and on a table before them lay a letter which they had both perused with some concern.

  It was from George, who wrote that he realized there was nothing for him in Scotland, since he had ruined his hopes of advancement, and he planned to leave for France where he hoped to make his fortune. Before he left, however, he wished to see his family. Would Sir William be prepared to receive him at Lochleven? He merely wished to say goodbye and would be gone within an hour. But he had a great desire to see his mother as he did not know when they would meet again.

  “Of course he must come!” cried Lady Douglas. “I cannot agree, William, that he should be allowed to go to France without saying goodbye to his mother.”

  “All this time,” Sir William murmured, “he has been in the Kinross area. He will have been with Seton, Fleming, Semphill and the rest. How do we know that this is not yet another plot?”

  “Nonsense!” snapped Lady Douglas. “He is going to France. How could he plot from there? He says he will not remain more than an hour. I insist on his coming. He is my son, William, as much as you are.”

  “And have you thought what your other son might have to say if he knew George had come back after he had banished him?”

  “Jamie need never know,” retorted Lady Douglas complacently. “Or if he does, it will then be too late for him to protest, for George will be in France by that time. It is a sad thing when a mother must plead to be allowed to say goodbye to her son.”

  At length William gave way and replied to George’s letter that they would see him at the castle.

  George arrived half an hour before supper and was received with tearful embraces by his mother, and even William was not unmoved. There had always been deep family feeling among the Douglases; and William, being really fond of his young brother, sincerely deplored the fact that he had made what he called a fool of himself over a woman—not that William could not understand that.

  “Come along in, my dear son,” cried Lady Douglas. “Come to my own private chamber. I have much to say to you. You come also, William.”

  When they were alone, Lady Douglas looked in consternation at her younger son. He was thin, she declared. How had he been living since he left the castle? She had suffered many a sleepless night on his account.

  George told her she was not to worry. He was well able to take care of himself, for he was not a boy any longer.

  “I suppose,” said William, “you have been with Seton and Semphill on the mainland?”

  George nodded.

  “And you’ve been within a stone’s throw of the island, I swear.”

  “Where else did you expect me to be?”

  “And you were in that plot to smuggle her out as a laundress, I’m certain.”

  “You should not feel so disgruntled about it, brother. It failed.”

  “And might so easily have succeeded,” growled William.

  “Don’t you see,” said George, “the matter is hopeless. That is why I want to get away to France.”

  Sir William was pensive. He was thinking: Out of sight, out of mind. He is no longer so enamored of his Queen. He is weary of the plots and subterfuge. Well, he was but a boy suffering from the pangs of calf-love.

  “Look here,” he said, “your mother does not wish you to leave Scotland.”

  “Oh, George,” cried Lady Douglas, “stay in Scotland. I am sure that Jamie would give you some position with him . . . if you could only assure him that you would serve him faithfully.”

  “He is, after all, your brother,” added Sir William.

  “I do not think Moray will ever be my friend again,” said George. “No, it is better for me to get right away. Perhaps in a year or so I shall return and by that time Moray may have forgiven me. But I think it best now that I go to France.”

  Lady Douglas continued to persuade and Sir William joined with her; but George shook his head and at length they realized that he had made up his mind.

  As it was supper time, Lady Douglas said that George must take the meal with them. George said he would be delighted to join them, and so once more he took his place at the supper table.

  He noticed the keys beside William’s plate, and William followed his gaze.

  “We have been doubly careful since the attempted escape,” he told his brother. “As all the guards are off duty during mealtime, when they come to table I lock the castle gates and the Queen’s apartments, and during that time the keys are never out of my sight.”

  “Ah,” said George, “you had a good warning, brother. You were nearly caught once. I’ll warrant you will not be so easily caught again.”

  Sir William drank freely of the wine which the page had poured into his goblet. He was feeling sad, partly because he was wearying of his commission to guard the Queen, and partly because he was saying goodbye to his young brother.

  “No,” he said firmly, “it shall not happen again. We’re determined on that. We watch her night and day. She would not now be able to slip out of the castle in the guise of a laundress. Everyone who leaves is closely scrutinized.”

  “William,” said George, “there is one request I would make to you before I go. I trust you will grant it.”

  “I will if it is in my power to do so.”

  “It concerns young Willie.”

  “That young rogue!”

  “Oh, not such a rogue, William. I admit he worked with me. I gave him money . . . and he was always my friend, as you know. We were like brothers.”

  Sir William nodded.

  “You cannot blam
e him for doing what I asked him to.”

  “So you admit you asked him to help you.”

  “I do. You should blame me for what happened . . . not Willie.”

  “You might have caused God knows what damage between you. You weren’t rescuing a lady in distress, brother. You were freeing a Queen and preparing to start a civil war.”

  “I know. I know. I was young . . . so was Willie. It was my fault. But I ask you not to blame Willie. He has been with me since he left the castle. What will happen to him, think you, when I go to France?”

  “You’re taking him with you?”

  “That was not my plan. I am going to ask you to take him back into the castle. He can do no harm; I shall be in France, so there’ll be no temptation to. He’s sharp but he’s too young to roam the country by himself. He’d starve to death or fall in with robbers. William, will you take young Willie back?”

  Sir William hesitated. He would not have admitted it, but he had often thought of the engaging lad, and he was secretly pleased to have an opportunity of bringing him back.

  He pulled at his beard. “Well . . . ” he began, and tried to make excuses for his leniency. “’Tis true the fellow who now serves me at table is a clumsy loon.”

  “So you will? I thank you, William. Now I can go with an easy mind.”

  George did justice to the food on the table. Not at all, as Lady Douglas said afterward to Sir William, like a lovesick young man.

  Afterward they conducted him to the boat, for in spite of his seeming indifference Sir William could not run the risk of his seeing the Queen.

  No harm had been done. He had been with George all the time he had been in the castle, and even Moray could not take exception to that.

  He stood with Lady Douglas beside him watching until the boat reached the mainland.

  “Did you notice,” he said to his mother, “that George did not once look up to the keep?”

  “I did. Jamie was right to banish him for a while for the trick has worked. But how I wish that he could now come back to Lochleven.”