The Queen's Caprice Page 8

  She listened, amused and touched. How young and simple he was! She could not understand all his rapid, jerky words. She put out her hands and slipped her fingers under his hot cheeks, pressed on the coverlet. Yes, they were wet with tears. How was it that he had had the courage to come? Fondling his hair she asked him that, drawing herself along the sheets so that she whispered in his ear.

  His voice came muffled, abashed.

  “It was to ask you if you played with me. I don’t know what to believe — I feel so lonely. The lies and the tricks—”

  “I too, detest them! Forget them!”

  “I feel so stupid. I understand so little of it. If you would tell me — Is this truth at last?”

  He raised his head, peering. It was as if he offered her his soul. He was ready to do what she told him; he implored her not to baffle him, not to deceive his stupidity. She passed by his offer, she took no heed of his appeal, her violent fantasy for him made his virtue, his distress charming but foolish.

  She told him to rise, to sit on the bed. He obeyed, stiffly, like an automaton. He began to stammer; she put her fingers over his mouth. She felt an indomitable will to live, to rule, to triumph, and as if the power to do this lay safely in her own small body, as if she needed neither help nor compassion, but only to unite herself to this pure, masculine strength, this profound devotion.

  “You and I together ought to be invincible,” she whispered.

  He did not understand what she meant; her unseen beauties, only to be glimpsed in the tantalizing web of light and shade, filled him with a sense of life-giving power. Her choice of him exalted him in his own estimation. He too felt free, of doubts, mistrusts, suspicions, weaknesses.

  Neither knew that the deceits of night, the false fires of passions and tainting appetites overwhelmed them. He entered the great bed and took her to his heart like a god leaning from a cloud to snatch an earthly, but a dazzling flower.

  *

  Moray felt as reassured and satisfied as if he were Regent, or almost King of Scotland. His spies had had nothing disturbing to report to him from Stirling. The spring weather had suddenly become overcast and gloomy and the Queen kept mostly to her chamber, complaining of her old trouble, pain in her side. Moray felt firmly in his place, no one would ever dare call themselves his master.

  The only man who had the capacity to do so, William Maitland, was very willingly his lieutenant.

  His possessive affection for the Queen was stilled. If she would not have Darnley and the affair with Leicester hung in abeyance, what had he to fear? Negotiations with foreign princes might continue endlessly. Meanwhile he could build up a strong, free, proud kingdom.

  Scotland was miserably poor in money, goods, natural resources. But she was rich in the material that Moray most loved to handle — strong, resolute, hardy men, robust, pious women, people who could work, adventure, and suffer. The conversion of Scotland to the Reformed Faith seemed to Lord Moray nothing less than a miracle. He regarded with reverence the rugged peoples of this rocky, remote country who had so earnestly embraced the truth and cast behind them error. He believed, with all the strength of a stubborn nature, in the principles of the Reformation. He thought that darkness and deceit had been driven out with the ousting of Pope, monk, and friar, with all the false pomp and pageantry with which Rome marked pernicious doctrines.

  Here Moray, who in so much was double and crafty, was sincere. He believed in John Calvin, in John Knox, and in what they taught. It was true that his convictions marched with his advantages, but he would have become a Protestant even if this had meant poverty and lack of power; dearly as he loved money and authority he would not have purchased them by remaining a Roman Catholic.

  He thought of the time when he had been a priest as a period of miserable torment and misguided sin. He rejoiced in the ruined temples of Papistry, the broken walls of the convents, in the blackened foundations of the monasteries that defaced the land from west to east, from north to south. He had stood over the Queen while she, with tears in her eyes, with lips that she could scarcely keep steady even by biting them, had signed the Act which drove forth monks and priests as idolaters and adulterers from the land. He had, with contemptuous chivalry, protected her in the celebration of her own Mass, the only Mass heard now in Scotland. He had allowed her her chapel and her singing boys and her priests and her vestments, but only out of compassion for her weakness and childishness as one might allow a child its toys to keep it from crying.

  Perhaps the time might come and even be not far distant when he would not permit the Mass even in Holyrood. He might choose to marry the Queen to a Protestant. There had been moments, he thought, when she had wavered in allegiance to the Faith in which the proud House of Guise had brought her up so strictly.

  He had forced on her his ideals of government, his friends and his alliances, he had swayed her councils to break with France and lean to England. He had made her crush her co-religionists, the Clan of Gordon; he had brought pressure on her to send away her French servants, he had lessened her train of balladists, her masking girls and lute-playing boys. In every direction since he came to Scotland he had bent her to his will. There had been dangers, he had had to be alert and prompt, and these had been surmounted. Bothwell, so imperious and implacable, dared come no further than the Border where he slunk in secrecy, in helpless defiance. Huntly, too, heir of the disaster of Corrichie, was a broken man. No doubt, there were others of the Lords of the Congregation who murmured against Moray, but he was able to deal with them and on the whole they suffered him and liked his leadership.

  He knew them all, their characters, their lusts, their greed, their wishes, their estates. Here and there, judiciously as occasion arose, he bribed or threatened, menaced or soothed. He had his agents everywhere; he did not economize in his system of spies and secret intelligencers, who searched in the most uncommon places for information to take to their master. He relied on his great wealth, he was gorged with lands and revenues and spent very little.

  John Knox was his friend, and John Knox swayed the people. Morton was his friend and Morton was a stout prop of the godly, one whom, despite his black reputation, was regarded as an upright patriot and a sound statesman. Maitland was his friend, and Maitland was clever enough for any sinister lie or devilment that any man might put his hand to in the interest of business.

  Moray stretched himself like one taking his ease after long tension. The prospect was fair, the prospect was good. There was sincerity behind the smile with which he informed Mr. Thomas Randolph, Elizabeth’s envoy, that there could be no question of a match between the Queen’s Grace and Lord Darnley.

  The people, who saw the danger of a Papist king pass by, the Hamiltons, who breathed again after this swift menace of a Lennox domination, looked gratefully towards Moray.

  *

  It was Maitland who said to the King’s bastard, from no other motive, Moray thought, than a desire to disturb any man’s satisfaction and twist anything simple to something difficult:

  “What does she do so long at Stirling? Lie abed and dream or listen to Mary Seaton at her prayers?”

  “Am I to be for ever checking a child at its play? Let her be.”

  “Do you think that because she is quiet, she is harmless?” asked Maitland with stinging bitterness.

  “I have no need,” smiled Moray, “to torture myself with vain surmises. I have those who watch for me in Stirling.”

  “Do they report nothing?”

  “Nothing. Lord Darnley and his wild young Papists ride about and fly hawks and try hounds they brought from England. The Queen keeps to her room. In two days’ time Lord Darnley goes to his father’s castle in Glasgow. Perhaps they will never meet again, save in company.”

  Maitland, playing with the sharp tags that fastened the laces at his wrist, asked suddenly:

  “The Italian is in young Darnley’s train. Have your spies told you that?”

  “They have mentioned him,” replied Moray,
unruffled.

  “There is no matter for conjecture there. I think young Darnley is like his father — idle, lazy with tongue and pen, not content unless he is in the saddle and the fresh air. This foreigner writes for him, keeps his accounts, mends his lute-strings, ties his laces. What more is there to say, what, at all, is there to wonder at?”

  “I have puzzled at it,” said Maitland. “It is a very swift promotion for a base Italian to get so high in so short a space and in a great household, too.”

  But Moray, with a gesture that reminded Maitland of the Queen in her impatient moods, shrugged, half-turning his shoulder, and would have no more of the subject.

  “When does she return to Edinburgh?”

  Moray, in his settled triumph, replied:

  “When I send for her. I think it is well to leave her where she is a little longer.”

  “You like,” said Maitland, “to think of her as safe, far from the temptations and toils of the court, a jewel locked in the casket of which you have the key, restrained from harm. Well, I see your mind and think it too strange for belief.”

  Moray challenged him with a look and Maitland insisted:

  “Yes, I think it strange, Lord Moray, that one so acute as you, should soothe your fears with syrup.”

  These words, spoken by one whose intellect and discernment he much respected, might have started a tempestuous debating in Moray’s mind, but he quelled his own fears. Maitland was too quick, too subtle, he often saw a tanglement where all was straight. Moray would be wise, he would be circumspect, he would, as ever, be watchful, but he was sure that there was no occasion for apprehension. The Queen was safe in Stirling.

  Two days later his sense of security, of triumph, dissolved like mists before a sudden sun. The Queen, without waiting for his command or suggestion, returned to Holyrood. Lord Darnley had not gone to Glasgow — he rode through Edinburgh by her side.

  Moray was at the palace to meet them and, as the young man came up the narrow staircase, the Queen’s half-brother saw on the golden boy’s fair right hand the blood-red ring, circling, like a wound, his little finger.

  *

  Lord Darnley went to his father’s lodgings in Edinburgh where the old man fumed and waited.

  April rain danced on the greenish glass of the window while Lennox, in a red fur coat, bent over a fluttering fire.

  “You have left me without news,” he said sullenly. “Were you so occupied I might not have had a letter?”

  “I wrote twice,” replied the young man briefly.

  “Bah! By the hand of that Italian, and your mother was always proud of your scholarship. I wish she had had you taught fewer dainty tricks and more respect and manly virtues.”

  The young man smiled acidly at this meaningless rebuke. He stood by the window and unbuttoned the high collar of his riding-coat. Lennox saw at once that it was of purple velvet lined with sable.

  “Where did you get that?” he demanded, pointing at the gaudy finery. “More debts. You know I am burdened enough already.”

  “It was a gift from the Queen,” said the young man, over his shoulder.

  Lennox stared, eyes bulging, lips loose, avid interest in his puffy face.

  “The Queen! She gave you presents! How did you spend your time at Stirling?”

  Lord Darnley opened his lips and was about to speak, but was silent. He was troubled how to put what he had to say into words. He was indeed indifferent to his father; he would have had the old man miles away with his mother in England. He was free of him; he was a man now, settled in his estate; he did not want to be questioned, forced to answer, make evasions. Well, better come to the truth at last. He looked down at the small, red ring on his finger and reassured himself that what he was about to say was the truth.

  “I am married to the Queen.”

  The highest hopes of Lennox had not expected this. He was quite overwhelmed, and stammered.

  Darnley stopped him.

  “You must be silent, sir, or it may be dangerous. We are still in her hands, I don’t know what she may do. Moray will be against us, and all the others I expect.”

  “What will that matter if you are King.”

  “King! I did not say that! I said I was married to the Queen. It was secret — the ceremony was in her chamber.”

  “Well, that should be good enough,” said Lennox eagerly. “A ceremony, there was a priest and witnesses?”

  The young man looked away, tossed his head and flushed.

  “There was a ceremony, and before witnesses,” he replied obstinately. “She holds it lawful and that’s enough. We shall be married again, and publicly, with full rites. She is waiting her chance.”

  “She! The Queen! That’s how you speak of her!” Lennox sat staring into the fluttering flame. “Well, well! I suppose I’m to know nothing about it. It was sudden and might have been managed better. Yet, I don’t know, I suppose you have her firmly. Wedded and bedded, eh?”

  Darnley did not reply. His father looked at him, laughed coarsely and shrugged.

  “I hardly thought—” he began, then laughed again, his lips trembling in the midst of the fat, wrinkled cheeks.

  Darnley said impatiently:

  “Say no more about it until I give you leave. I have given you the secret, let that be sufficient.”

  “Hah! the King so soon!” grinned Lennox, not without bitterness. “Remember, Harry, I too am a pretender to the Crown. Well, what will she give us? I want the Lieutenancy of the Marches, of the Border. You should have a revenue, too, to enable you to live in royal state. Am I to run in debt,” he added, with awkward humour, “to help keep the King?”

  “No king as yet, I do assure you, sir, though she has promised me the Crown Matrimonial.”

  “So soon, so amorous. Well, you have spent your time profitably. Wedded and bedded — so lusty, so impatient!”

  He sat gaping at the tall young man; he was scarcely able to credit this sudden flick of fortune’s wheel. He had had his hopes and his fears, doubts this way and that, but he had scarcely ever pictured the possibility that his son might marry the Queen within six weeks of first catching sight of her. And so secret, too! He began to laugh with real pleasure as he thought of the Hamiltons and Moray, slapped his knees as he contemplated their fury. Maitland, too. He would slink away through the city like a snake.

  He looked at his son, who stood sullen and ill-at-ease by the window watching the sliding drops melting one into the other.

  “Well,” he said, trying to speak like a man of the world, “you must see this is no false step on her part, that she is not indulging a whim. You must go quietly, Harry, for a while, at least. But press your advantage, boy.”

  He stopped abruptly, recalling that his son was, as he had said, the Queen’s husband. He must, then, speak of her with a respect that he would never again feel. Darnley seemed to sense what was behind the unfinished sentence:

  “You irritate me with your hints,” he said rudely. “To-night I lodge in the palace, you may come too if you want. It is as well that Moray and his creatures should begin to know us.” He added, with awkward insolence: “I will have David Rizzio as my secretary, he will receive a good wage. Be civil to him, if you please, I owe him for much service.”

  Lennox understood at once. Of course Harry, woman-bred as he was, would never have done it alone. The knave had been useful, then.

  *

  Moray slept uneasily. He was much given to dreaming; in his visions of the night all his native day fears escaped and flew loose in the darkened heavens.

  He thought he walked across the land he loved, the rough heather yielded beneath his feet, the dark hills lowered to right and left of him, the thick clouds were low and almost pressing on his brow. Before him stalked a gigantic figure in armour whom he took to be his guide, his protector, perhaps his providence. It walked where there was no path and Moray followed, over round pale pebbles, dark moss soaked by mountain streams, by the wild wet winds which beat on his fac
e.

  He was troubled by his lonely, toilsome march, yet all his hopes were on the armoured giant in front of him, who promised him the confirmation of all his desires — a crown and a queen. They were hidden somewhere ahead, on the inaccessible mountain-top draped by the wraithlike clouds.

  On Moray walked, on, on in his dream. The moon came out and shone on the clear tinkling water-breaks and on the heather that was the colour of old, dried blood. Moray was exhausted; his vigour slipped from him like a cloak thrown away, but the tramp of the majestic armed figure did not relax, and at last they reached together the top of a mountain, where there was a cairn surmounted by a monument of grey stones.

  The figure turned; Moray looked at a closed visor. He thought this figure was himself, symbolic of his fortunes, mighty, majestic, impregnable, implacable upon the highest mountain-top. He peered to see the circlet on the helm, and there it was, the royal crown of Robert Bruce, while on the red and yellow scarf twisted across the breastplate he saw the thistles gleam in gold — King, King of Scotland.

  He implored the figure to speak, but it did not move. Moray, in his dream, then leant forward and unbuckled the helmet-strap and let the visor fall. He gazed into a void, the helmet was empty. As he stared, the armour fell to pieces where it stood, a heap of useless metal on the mountain-top, gorgets and vambrace, greave and breastplate, helm and crown, and as he knelt down beside this collapse of all his high hopes, he saw that they had withered to rusty shafts of discarded metal.

  He woke, half-shrieking in his sleep, but what he said had nothing to do with the vision which had troubled him, which was instantly dismissed from his mind as it had instantly been begotten. He muttered, turning from his placidly sleeping wife:

  “Where did the boy get the red enamelled ring?”

  *

  Moray was in conference with the Queen. Gravely, and without a hint of emotion he put before her all the business he had done in her absence.