I cannot go through with this, she thought. No, not for anything can I
allow myself to be shut up with him, to spend the night in that room. I
will have to bring him back with me to Edinburgh, keep him close at
hand, and then, one night when he is healed.. ..
Or will he ever be healed? What if this sickness is permanent, or
mortal? What if he only gets worse? What if this is my only chance to
spend the night with him?
Then I will have to endure my later shame, for I cannot
"You stare, dear wife. Does the sight of me disgust you?"
This is what sin looks like, she thought. His happens to be visible on
his face, that is all. Mine and BothwelPs is as yet invisible. But
all sin is as ugly as this, could we but see it.
"No. I pity you." And it was true, she did. As when Frangois had
lain ill so many times, and as when Darnley himself had had the severe
attack of measles, she was moved. "I would you could be instantly
healed. It pains me to see you in such discomfort."
Anthony Standen, Darnley's handsome young English attendant, seemed to
materialize out of the shadows in the corner of the room. Damley
scowled at him.
"Bring me some heated towels," he demanded in a querulous voice. "My
face needs dabbing."
Standen left the chamber.
"Are you pained? It is your unkindness to me that has made me ill," he
said. "It is because of your cruelty that I am as you see me." He
glared at her and then slowly, accusingly, ran his hand over his bald
pate. "God knows how I am punished for making a god of you and for
having no other thought but of you!"
She stepped as far away from him as politeness would allow. "I fail to
see how I have treated you cruelly, nor have I ever in any way wished
you to treat me as a god."
"You are cruel when you refuse to accept my repentance, to reconcile
with me." He attempted to rise, but his weakened legs would not
support him. They shook with the effort. "Oh, you say I repent and
then fail again. But I am young! Am I not permitted the failing of
youth? Why do you expect so much of me?" He glared at her. "You have
forgiven others of your subjects who have transgressed traitors like
Morton and Lord James. Yes, to them you are merciful!"
He looked so innocent and helpless. But he was full of lies; possibly
he lied so much that even he could not remember his lies and therefore
felt himself honest.
"What of the rumours that have reached various members of the Council
that you have a ship at the ready to convey you from Scotland? And
there is a Mr. Hiegate who has revealed that you are plotting to seize
me and crown the Prince. A Glasgow man, Walker, reported it to me."
Mary attacked him back.
"I'll pluck his ears from his head!" cried Darnley. "He is a liar!
There is no plot except the one by members of your Council. Yes, I
have heard about the plan to put me in prison and slay me if I resist.
The Provost of Glasgow has revealed it to me! But then," he admitted
with a cloying tone, "it was also reported that you refused to sign the
request when they presented it to you."
Someone at Craigmillar had betrayed her! Or was it an eavesdropper,
and not one of the five conspirators? She felt cold, and very
vulnerable.
"Thus," he was saying softly, "I would never believe that you, who are
after all my own flesh in God's eyes, would do me any evil."
His flesh .. . his rotten flesh .. . one flesh .. . but can I say the
same of him, that he would never harm me?
Standen returned, carrying a tray of heated wet towels. He began
applying them gently to Darnley's neck and face, wiping away the crusts
from his sores. Damley looked contented, like a cat being stroked.
"I will take to my bed," he finally told Standen, and the groom pulled
him to his feet and then helped him to walk, trembling, into the
bedroom. Darnley fell to his knees on the priedieu and looked
longingly at the crucifix. Then he allowed himself to be ushered into
bed. Shaking with the exertion, he managed to crawl beneath the
covers. His spindly legs showed for an instant, like a stork's legs,
before being covered.
"I desire nothing more in this life than we might reconcile, and live
again as man and wife," he said, after Standen had left the chamber.
"And if that should not be, if I knew it would never come about, I will
never rise from this bed; no, never again!"
"It is what I wish, too," she said, in the most pleasant and persuasive
tone at Tier command. "I came to see you for just this reason. But
first you must be purged of your illness; and it is best you return
with me to Craigmillar
Castle for treatment. It is healthier than low-lying Holyrood, and yet
near enough that I can attend on you every day. And the chambers are
such that the series of medicinal baths you must undergo can be easily
administered."
"I cannot travel."
"I brought a litter to convey you."
"Are you, then, so anxious that I should recover and we be reunited?"
He sounded touched. "Do you truly wish this?"
She nodded.
"Ah, then! I shall persuade myself that it is true; for were it
otherwise, greater inconvenience might come to us than you are aware
of." He sighed, and drew up his covers.
"We are both tired," she said, relieved that the encounter was over for
the night. She turned to go.
"Stay here! Don't go!"
"Nay, I must sleep elsewhere, away from the sick-chamber. The
Archbishop's Palace is only a hundred yards away. I shall come back
early, I promise "
His hand darted out with the speed of a striking snake and grabbed her
wrist.
"No! You must not leave! You will not return "
"I promise I shall!" She tried to unwrap his bony fingers.
"Is Bothwell here?"
Her blood stopped. "No, of course not!" She pulled her wrist away.
"Pretend this is the Hermitage, then, and the Archbishop's Palace is
Jedburgh, and I doubt not that you shall return speedily enough in the
morning," he muttered. Then his tone suddenly changed. "Oh, I am so
happy to see you I could almost die of gladness!"
Finally settled alone in her inmost chamber as the guest of the
permanently absent Archbishop, she slipped out of bed. Mary Seton, her
only attendant Madame Rallay was too old to make this wintertime
journey had dutifully prayed with her and then withdrawn, leaving her,
as she thought, to sleep.
But sleep? No, this was not a night for sleep. Seeing Darnley like
that, reduced to a mere manifestation of illness, was shocking. Even
in this chamber, the strange mantle of evil that seemed to blanket
Glasgow Castle lay heavy in the room. Mary Seton, earnest, pious woman
that she was, might not have even sensed the aura. Perhaps one had
already to be acquainted with evil to perceive it.
Mary pulled out some sheets of paper, which she had managed to hide
with her personal effects, although they were not of the best quality.
Quietly she smoothed one out and then placed a candlestick at one
corner to light it and hold it down.
She took her pen and began to write. No salutation, no date, no
address. She must not identify either herself or the receiver.
Being gone from the place where I had left my heart, it may easily be
judged what my countenance was, considering what the body is without
the heart.. ..
It had been so hard to leave him and ride away to do this repugnant and
difficult task. It was because of their love, and their sin, that she
was forced into it.... But would I undo it? she asked herself. Would
I erase every embrace, make every kiss not to have happened? No. I
did not start to live until then, and to obliterate my joy would be to
die.
Bothwell .. . She imagined him holding her, now, bending his head down
to kiss her breasts, she laying her cheek against the sleek hair
growing so closely on his head.. .. Her body ached to hold him,
receive him.
She was trembling. The candle flame moved in the cold draft from the
walls.
She must communicate what had happened today.
Four miles from Glasgow a gentleman of the Earl of Lennox came and made
his commendations and excuses unto me.. ..
She wrote of her arrival in Glasgow, of the lairds who had greeted her
and, more ominously, of the ones who had stayed away.
She recounted Darnley's answers to the rumours of his own plot, his
counter accusations of her plot to have him imprisoned and then killed,
and his entire conversation regarding her estrangement from him and his
desire to be forgiven and reconciled. The candle burned down and
splashed wax on the paper. She replaced it with a fresh one.
The King asked me many questions, about whether I had taken French
Paris, and Gilbert Curie as my secretary. I wonder who has told him so
much even of the coming marriage of Bastian, my French master of the
household?
He became angry when I spoke to him of Walker and said that he would
pluck his ears from his head, and that he lies; for I asked him earlier
what cause he had to complain of some of the Lords and to threaten
them. He denied it, and said he would rather lose his life than do me
the least displeasure. As for the other, he would at least sell his
life dear enough.
Perhaps Bothwell would understand this. It was good that it be
recorded.
He has told me all on the bishop's behalf and Sutherland's, touching
the matter that you had warned me about. Now to make him trust me I
must pretend toward him; and therefore when he desired me to promise
that when he should be well we should make but one bed I told him,
feigning to believe his fair promise, that if he did not change his
mind, I was contented. But to keep it secret, for the Lords feared
that if we came together, he might take revenge on them.
"I am glad that you talked to me of the Lords," he said. "I hope that
you wish to live a happy life with me from now on. For if it is not
so, it could be that greater inconvenience should come to us both than
you expect."
Those were his words. What had they meant? Perhaps Bothwell would
know.
He would not let me go, but would have me watch with him. I made as
though I thought all to be true and that I would think upon it, and
have excused myself from sitting up with him this night, for he said
that he does not sleep well. You have never heard him speak better or
more humbly; and if I had not proof that his heart is changeable like
wax, and that mine is already hard as a diamond, I would take pity on
him. But fear not, I shall not fail of my purpose nor be untrue to
you.
Darnley was touching, Darnley was a picture of contrition but Darnley
was a liar and a murderer.
I shall not be deceived in him, she thought, no matter how pitiable he
is.
She felt as though there were some other presence in the chamber. She
turned her head and looked into the shadows, but there was nothing.
Just a feeling.