Royal Road to Fotheringhay Read online

  It had been explained to them. These rebels had planned to kidnap the King and Queen and members of the royal family, to banish the Guises and, if the King refused to become a Protestant, to set up a new King on the throne. But if the Guises had enemies, they also had friends. The plot had been concocted with the aid of the English, but English Catholics had heard of it and warned the Duke of Guise, with the result that it had been foiled and many prisoners had been taken.

  “And not a single conspirator shall be spared,” declared the Duke. “They shall all be brought up from their dungeons. This will be a lesson to traitors.”

  Heads, recently severed from living bodies, made ugly the beautiful battlements of the castle. The stench of blood was everywhere. Some of the rebels had been tied in sacks and thrown into the river. The beautiful Loire was stained with blood. There was blood everywhere… the sight, the smell of blood.

  And the royal House of France—even young Margot and Hercule among them—must look on at the slaying of tortured men. They must watch slow and cruel death being meted out.

  The Duchesse de Guise had struggled to her feet. She turned and ran from the balcony. Her husband, her brother-in-law and her son watched her with contempt.

  Mary said: “François… François … I too must go. These sights will haunt me forever.”

  “They will not permit it, Mary,” whispered François. “The Duchesse may go, but not the King and Queen.”

  “It must be stopped. François, you must stop it. I cannot bear it.”

  The Duke was looking at her coldly, the Cardinal in astonishment.

  “Your Majesty should resume your seat,” said the Cardinal. “Your Majesty sets a bad example to others present.”

  The Duke cried: “My wife and now my niece! By the saints, this is a sad day for Guise and Lorraine.”

  The Queen-Mother came forward and laid a hand on Mary’s shoulder. She looked at the Guises with understanding. She had been flirting with the Protestant cause and was anxious to show the powerful brothers—since they were at the moment in the ascendant—that she was with them.

  “Your Majesty will never know how to reign if you do not learn how to administer justice,” she said.

  François looked at his wife eagerly when she resumed her seat.

  He took her hand and tried to soothe her. But she was sickened by the stench of blood. She would never think of Amboise after this, she was sure—dear, beloved Amboise from whose eminence she had looked down on the mingling streams of the Loire and the Amasse—without remembering this terrible day.

  She knew, in that moment, that she was afraid not only of Catherine but of her uncles; never, until now, had she realized what an empty title she bore. Her dignity was touched; her anger grew. These terrible deeds were done in her name—hers and that of François. These poor men were crying for mercy to her and to François, and by sitting here, meekly looking on, she and François were registering their approval of the deeds which were done in their names.

  She could not stop the slaughter; she knew that. But she would not sit quietly and see it done.

  “I will not stay here, François,” she said firmly. “I will not.”

  “Hush!” he soothed. “Hush, dearest! They will hear. We have to stay. They say so.”

  “You are the King,” she murmured.

  The color was glowing in her face now as she went on: “The King may remain if he wishes. The Queen shall not.”

  She made to rise. Her uncle, the Cardinal, was beside her; she felt his hands forcing her into her seat.

  “François,” she cried, “you are the King.”

  And in that moment—for the first time in his life—François was the King.

  He rose, and suddenly a new dignity came to him. He said: “Monsieur le Cardinal, I command you to take your hands from the Queen.”

  There was silence on the balcony. In very astonishment the Cardinal had dropped his hands to his sides.

  “You wish to go to your apartments?” said François to Mary.

  His mother came forward. “My son,” she said, and there was the venom of the serpent in her cold eyes and her cold voice, “it is the duty of the King and Queen to see that justice is done. Remember you are the King.”

  “I do remember, Madame,” said François. “And I would ask you to do so. You also, Cardinal. Come, Mary. You wish to retire. Then let us go.”

  He took Mary’s hand and led her from the balcony. No one attempted to stop them. François, for one short moment, was indeed King of France.

  FRANÇOIS’S GLORY was short-lived. He had not the courage to sustain his new role. He realized that he had succeeded merely because he had taken those clever enemies of his by surprise.

  The Cardinal’s long mouth continued to sneer at him, continued to command. His mother was forever at his side. He was growing weaker. There was an abscess in his ear which caused him great pain, and Monsieur Paré could do little to ease it. Each day his strength seemed to wane.

  He knew that the people did not love him and that they blamed him for the terrible things which were happening under the reign of the Guises.

  Rumors concerning the young King spread throughout the country.

  “The King suffers from a wasting disease,” was whispered. “It is terrible in its consequences and a miracle that he lives at all. He only does so by drinking the blood of freshly killed babies.”

  Wherever the King rode, the people called their children to them in terror; they bolted and barred their doors in the villages through which he passed.

  “When my father rode abroad,” said François sadly, “the people hurried out to greet him. It was the same with my grandfather. Yet they shrink from me; they run from me; they hate and fear me. My father—good man though he was—was responsible for the death of many; my grandfather too. Yet they loved these Kings and they run from me who have killed no one. Oh, Mary, life is so unfair. Why was I born like this? Why was I not born tall and strong like my father and my grandfather? Why cannot I be a king, since I am born a king … as they were? Why do I have to be the tool of the Cardinal? I hate the Cardinal. I hate him… hate him….”

  The Cardinal had come into the room. He was smiling slyly, but Francois’s grief was too deep for him to care for the Cardinal’s contempt. He ran to the man, grasped his padded robes and shook him.

  He cried: “I believe it is you they hate. I do not believe it is their King. They know I would not hurt them. It is you they hate… you… you! Why don’t you leave us alone? Why don’t you go away—then we shall know whom it is the people hate… you or me… you or me.” Francois’s voice rose to a shriek as he cried: “Renard lasche le roi!” Then he turned away and covered his face with his hands.

  The Cardinal laughed. “Is this a raving lunatic?” he asked of Mary. “I had thought to parley with the King of France, and I am confronted by a madman.”

  “He is not mad,” said Mary. “He has just awakened. He is no longer a boy to be led. He has discovered that he is the King.”

  “These are wild words,” said the Cardinal sadly, “and foolish ones. I would not have expected to hear them from you.”

  Mary thought of all the care he had given her, but she thought also of the love François had always had for her. She would never forget as long as she lived how, because she had been in distress on the balcony, he had forgotten his fear and in the face of all those whose displeasure he dreaded he had, for her sake, remembered he was a king.

  François had begun to sob hysterically. He cried: “You are afraid… you are more afraid than I. You are afraid of an enemy’s dagger. That is why your clothes are padded. That is why the fashion of cloaks and boots must be changed. In the fashions we see signs of the Cardinal’s cowardice.”

  “It would seem to me,” said the Cardinal, “that the King is deranged. Perhaps I should call the Queen-Mother. I thank God that there are others who could readily take his place should his mind become too deranged for him to wear the crown.”


  Mary cried: “Should you call him deranged because he seeks to remind you that he is the King of France?”

  The Cardinal looked at the sobbing boy. “There is the most cowardly heart that ever beat inside the body of a king,” he muttered.

  “I beg of you, do not try him too far,” said Mary.

  The Cardinal snapped his sparkling fingers to imply his contempt for the King.

  Mary’s eyes flashed. “Do not be so sure that you are right, my uncle. I am not the foolish girl you seem to think me. I know what is happening here—and in Scotland. You, and my uncle, have set the English against me. You may well have lost me my Scottish crown.”

  The Cardinal looked at her in horror. His face was stern as he said: “This I cannot endure. I have given my devotion to you. I have thought of nothing but your welfare since you came to France. I have cherished you. I have loved you more than any living person. And you talk to me like this! You break my heart.”

  Mary looked at him in anguish. What had she said? It was true that he had loved her. No one had cherished her as he had. She, remembering those intimate moments which they had shared, could not bear to see his proud head bent.

  “Uncle,” she said, “my dearest uncle …” She ran to him. His face relaxed. She was held in those arms; her body was crushed against the scarlet padded robes. His lips were on her forehead, on her cheek, on her mouth.

  “So you love me then, beloved? You love me yet?”

  “Dearest uncle, I shall never forget what you have done for me.”

  He took her face in his hands. “Plans,” he said, “the best plans go wrong sometimes, Mary. What has happened in Scotland is a bitter blow, I grant you. But have no fear. Your uncle François is the most powerful man in France. He loves you. I love you. Together we will face the world for your sake.”

  “I know.”

  “It is what happened at Amboise, is it not, which has turned you from me? That shocked you, my dearest. But it was necessary. You ask yourself, How could we order such things to be done? How could we look on with apparent satisfaction? For this reason, Mary: Because these scoundrels were attempting to harm our beloved niece. We may be hard men; but we love the deeper for that.”

  Now she was weeping. He was dominating her once more. Now he was, as he had said, her spiritual lover. Nothing could come between them—certainly not a diseased boy, even if he called himself the King.

  All was well, thought the Cardinal. Let her comfort the crying boy now if she could.

  Mary was his, and the King was hers; and that meant, of course, that the Duke and Cardinal, since they need fear no opposition from the King and Queen, could continue to rule France.

  IN THE antechamber at Saint Germain a young Scots nobleman was waiting to see the Queen of France. He came with letters from the Queen-Regent of Scotland, and he had proved himself to be one of the few men about that Queen whom she believed she could trust.

  He was twenty-five years of age. Tall and broad-shouldered, he gave an impression of enormous strength and vitality; his expression was one of cool unconcern; he was arrogant in the extreme, and many of the elegant Frenchmen who had looked askance at this man who had the appearance of a Norse warrior, had turned quickly away lest that indolent stare, which their faint mockery had aroused, might change to something still less pleasing. No man, looking into that granitelike face, sensing the power in those great arms and shoulders, would care to take the consequences of his anger single-handed.

  He stood, legs apart, a man who would be noticed in any assembly, dominant, the over-powering vitality showing itself in the coarse springy hair, the bold flashing eyes, the entirely sensual mouth which suggested that he was a man of many adventures, sexual and warlike; and this impression was by no means a false one. He was as hardy as the granite hills of his native land; he was as wild as the Border from which he came. He was James Hepburn, who had been for the last four years—since the death of his father—the Earl of Bothwell.

  As he waited he was wondering what good could come to him through this meeting with the Queen. He had heard a few days ago that her mother had died. She had long suffered from a dropsical complaint and her death was not unexpected. Now the girl who had not reached her eighteenth birthday was his Queen; he would offer her his faithful service, but in return he would expect rewards.

  He had heard tales of her fascination but he was sceptical. He did not believe that one woman could be as perfect as she was represented to be. His lips curled a little. The beauty of queens was apt to be overrated. No Hepburn would join the ranks of their idolators. Queens were women and it was folly to forget that all-important fact. No Hepburn should. There was a story in the family that his ancestor, Adam Hepburn, had found the royal widow, Mary of Guelders, most accessible, and that Queen had become, so it had been recorded, “lecherous of her body” with the Hepburn. His own father, Patrick Hepburn—who had been called the Fair Earl and had had a way with women—had hoped to marry the Queen, Marie de Guise, and had even divorced his wife, James’s mother, to make the way clear. It was true that the royal widow had used his desires in that direction to suit her own purposes, but she had been the loser when, in his pique and anger against her, he had become friendly with the English.

  To James Hepburn queens were women, and he had yet to meet the woman who had been able to show an indifference to him.

  He would ask for some high office, for he was an ambitious man. He would never be like his father, whatever the provocation, for he hated the English and wished to serve Scotland and the Queen faithfully; but he wished to be rewarded for doing so.

  He whistled the tune of a border song as he waited. He was glad to be in France. He had spent some of his youth here, for a certain amount of education at the Court of France was considered by the Scots nobility as a desirable part of a young man’s upbringing. Scotland was closely united with France and the French had the reputation of being the most cultured Court in the world. To France came young Scotsmen, and so to France some years ago had come James Hepburn.

  He was particularly glad to be here at this time; not only because it was an important time politically, but in order to escape the tearful and too passionate devotion of Anna Throndsen. Anna was expecting their child; he had promised marriage, but he grew tired of women very quickly.

  His upbringing had aggravated those characteristics which made him the man he was. He did not remember very much of his life before he was nine years old. That must have been because it was so easy and pleasant; his mother had had charge of him and his sister Janet, and the two of them had been tenderly cared for. They were perhaps wild by nature; they needed restraint, for the family traits were strongly marked in both of them. Their ancestors were lusty men, strong, wild and sensual.

  It was unfortunate that, when James was nine years old, his father had secured a divorce from his mother. Ostensibly the grounds were consanguinity; actually they were brought because the Fair Earl wished to pay court to Mary of Guise.

  The Countess of Bothwell was forced to leave her home and with it her two children. Gone was the restraining hand and the two—redheaded Janet and tawny James—ran wild.

  As a boy of nine James saw terrible things. Henry the Eighth had declared war on Scotland and with typical ferocity had instructed his soldiers to put all to the fire and sword.

  “Burn and subvert!” cried the tyrant. “Put all men and women to fire and sword without exception where any resistance should be shown to you. Spoil and set upside down, as the upper stone may be the nether, and not one stick stand by another, sparing no creature.”

  The life of adventure had begun. James in his flight from one town to another, saw the soldiers of the English King carry out his orders. As a result the boy was filled with a passionate hatred toward the English, a hatred which burned within him and made him long to act as he saw their soldiers acting. Rape, torture and death were commonplace sights to him. They did not disgust; they were part of the adventurous way of li
fe; he merely longed to turn the tables, and he swore he would one day.

  He became a man at an early age. He was cynically aware of his father’s alliance with the enemy; he knew of his father’s fondness for women.

  He spent a great part of his youth in the establishment of his great-uncle Patrick, Bishop of Aberdeen. The Bishop was a merry man, eager to educate his great-nephew in such a way as to bring credit to the name of Hepburn. He was a great drinker; food and drink, he declared, were the greatest pleasures in life, apart from one other. He would slap the boy on the back when he told him this. The one other? Did he not know? The Bishop put his hands on his knees and rocked with laughter. He would wager the boy— being a Hepburn—would soon know what he meant; if he did not, then, by all the saints, he could not be his fathers son.

  In the Bishop’s Palace the young James would lie awake and listen to the nightly perambulations of his great-uncle’s friends. There were whisperings and laughter, little screams of pleasure. James thought he understood. Life at Crichton, his fathers home, had not been without these phenomena, but never had he known them conducted on the scale they were in the Bishop’s Palace of Spynie.

  The Bishop was very fond of several comely serving women. He would chuck them under the chin or pinch various parts of their bodies as he passed them. Sometimes young James would be with him, but he did not abstain from his intimate greeting for the sake of the boy. Why should he? The boy was a Hepburn.

  “A real Hepburn!” he would say; and if there was a woman at hand he would push the boy toward her and she, taking her cue, would caress him and say that he was indeed a lovely boy.