Authors: Carolyn Meyer
“You must not worry about me, dear Mary,” Seton counseled. “If an alarm is raised and they come looking for you, I will be sitting in your chair and stitching on your embroidery, and that will gain you a little time. And I shall not worry about you, for I know that my brother will keep you safe.”
I waited by the window of my tower chamber, watching for Willie's signal. When it cameâhe pulled a red kerchief from a pocketâI kissed Seton and crept down the winding stair to the courtyard. Servants were bustling about, but none paid me the slightest attention. I was not concerned about them; it was Fiona and Kirsten who worried me. And indeed, there they were. I held my breath, but they mistook me for Mary Seton; I was holding a prayer book, and they passed by without interrupting my devotions.
I continued to murmur prayers until I joined Willie near the main gate.
“I have it,” he said, grinning and brandishing a big iron key. “Sir William always hangs it on a hook near the door.”
The lock resisted at first. Willie cursed softly My nerves, already stretched taut, grew even tighter. At last the lock yielded, and Willie pushed open the heavy gate just enough for us to slip through and then closed and locked it again. He tossed the key into the mouth of a squat black cannon as we ran past. “That should slow them down for a while,” he said.
We hurried out onto the jetty, and Willie pointed out the half-submerged boats. We jumped into the only dry one and cast off the ropes, and he began to row as hard as he could across the loch. It was about a mile to Kinross. I marked the point at which the boatman had seen through my disguise as a laundress.
“Do you think Sir William has discovered our absence by now?” I asked Willie.
“Not yet,” he said. “They are entertaining guests from the other islands, and there is plenty of wine.” Then he added, “And when they do, they will discover that all the boats are filled with water.”
“The guests' boats as well?”
“Of course!” he said, pleased with himself.
Geordie, the laird's brother, was holding several fine horses, saddled and ready, as we came ashore. “From the laird's stables,” he explained. “He keeps them here on the mainland, rather than ferry them back and forth to the island. Fortunate for us.”
“He will be beside himself when he learns what has happened!” I exclaimed. “His prisoner gone and his horses too!”
“Aye, he will,” Geordie agreed dryly.
I mounted the gelding Geordie recommended. “Willie, will you go back now to Lochleven? How will you explain what has happened?”
He shook his head. “Nay, my queen. I'll not go back. I have pledged myself to serve you.”
“As have I,” added Geordie.
I began to make a little speech of gratitude, thanking them both for their support, but Geordie was eager to be off. “You may thank us later, madam. Now we must find Lord Seton and his horsemen and put as many miles as possible between us and Sir William.”
And off we rode. For the first time in nearly a year, I was free!
W
E RODE HARD
through the soft spring evening, heading directly south from the loch. I was jubilant. My strength had returned, as had my confidence. I was at liberty. How glorious! A pale light still remained in the sky as we made for the ferry where the Firth of Forth narrowed and found boatmen willing to take us across.
When my companions met again on the south shore, we speculated on what might be happening back at Lochleven Castle.
“Sir William is in a fury,” said Geordie. “He has found himself locked in from the outside. His key is gone. He cannot remember where he keeps the duplicate. He calls everyone to look for it.”
Willie continued, “His face is red with rage. He sends servants clambering over the wall. They report that the boats are all filled with water and must be bailed. He searches for Geordie and me, first one, then the other. He cannot find either.”
“Suddenly he remembers his royal prisoner,” I added, laughing. “She is gone!”
I had not laughed so heartily in a very long time, but beneath the laughter I was uneasy. What no one said was that Sir William had certainly reached the mainland by now. He would have found his stables raided and sounded the alarm. We were surely being hunted. What was more, he would have sent word to my brother Lord Moray, now in Glasgow. We could not afford to stop or even slow down.
Lord Seton rode in the lead, taking us to Niddry Castle, another of the fortresses that belonged to his family. “Accommodations will be simple,” he warned me. “Nothing luxurious has been prepared for us, for I did not want rumors to get out concerning our royal guest.”
“Does your sister know your plan?” I asked, suddenly fearful that the laird in his rage might pry the information out of Mary Seton, my stand-in for the past several hours.
“She would not think of Niddry. It has never been her favorite place. Too bleak, she claims.”
“Bleaker than Lochleven?”
Geordie and Willie laughed. “There is naught bleaker than Lochleven!”
We reached Niddry around midnight. It was as Lord Seton described: starkly simple. Waiting for me were two loyal men. One was my husband's cousin Sir Alexander Hepburn, whom I dispatched to secure Dunbar Castle for me. He agreed to leave at once and ride through the night. The other was Sir James Hamilton.
After a few hours of sleepâI slept more soundly than I had in some timeâwe were ready to move on to Craigne-than Castle, belonging to Hamilton. Within a day or two I had established a small court at the laird's castle. This gave me a base to rally support and make necessary decisions. I did not want to go into battle againâI had had quite enough of that at Carberry Hill, where our army had been so badly outnumbered.
“It may be your only opportunity to seize the throne that is rightfully yours,” Geordie reminded me. He had no love for his half brother Lord Morayâwho of course was my half brother as well. I had come to loathe Moray as much as I loathed anyone, understanding finally that any kindness he had ever shown me had been with an eye toward one goal: to rule Scotland as its king.
“You must fight,” insisted Lord Seton and Geordie, as well as the others.
In the end I agreed, as it became clearer each day that I was still much loved by the Scots who lived here in the countryside, far from Edinburgh. Many of the lords who had at first joined the rebels were now deserting their ranks and coming to side with me. I knew that I had superior numbers. My troops would triumph, my army would win the day, and my brother would be vanquished once and for all. I would put him on trial for treason, as he deserved. I would not forgive him for the way he had treated me. Our numbers continued to swell.
On Thursday, the thirteenth of May, I knelt and prayed with my troops and then mounted one of Sir William's finest chargers. I planned to ride at the head of my newly formed army toward Dumbarton, the huge and nearly impregnable fortress from which I had sailed for France twenty years earlier. At Dumbarton, to the northwest on the far side of Glasgow, I would be able to unite my allies to fight against Lord Moray's rebel troops.
Though I felt sure my troops would carry the day, my heart was pounding as the battle began. Alas, from the very beginning, it went badly! The lord set to lead the main army failed completely in his command, and in less than an hour more than a hundred of my men lay dead, and three hundred more were taken prisonerâincluding my dear friend Lord Seton, who had been dangerously wounded. Lord Moray had won. I tasted again the bitterness of defeat.
“Flee,” urged Geordie. “You must, madam. Flee for your very life.”
Young Willie stood with me, tears in his eyes. “Aye, my lady queen. I will go with you and share whatever fate befalls you.”
I nodded. “To my stronghold at Dumbarton.”
Geordie stopped his anxious pacing and stepped forward. “Too dangerous, madam. You will be cut off. You must flee southward.”
I considered. I could not abide the thought of being seized by Lord Moray and imprisoned again after less than a fortnight of freedom. Dumbarton was too far, and too big a risk. Grimly, I agreed. “Southward, then.”
Lord Herries, one of the most loyal of Catholics from the wild western part of Scotland, came to my assistance and offered himself as our guide through this rough and unforgiving country. We set out, winding around and sometimes doubling back to avoid being in the neighborhood of those who would be allied with my enemies. Search parties had been sent out in all directions with the intent of capturing me. We paused long enough to destroy an ancient wooden bridge to further impede those who might be following close behind.
The weather turned hot and then cold, and we were so hungry and thirsty I did not see how we could keep going. But we didâmore than ninety miles without knowing exactly where I was headed, or where I would end. I slept for a time on the hard, rocky ground of a poor-looking farm, shivering with cold, though young Willie gave me his jerkin for a pillow and Geordie covered me with his doublet.
When I awoke, an old crone brought out a basin of oatmeal and a spoon and offered it to me, along with a pitcher of soured milk. That was my supper, and I was glad to have it and thanked her for it. She smiled broadlyâshe was missing several teethâand replied in the Gaelic language that I could scarcely understand, though I thought she addressed me as “my sovereign queen.”
“How do you know who I am?” I asked, surprised, for I was mud spattered and uncombed and looked anything but regal.
Still smiling she reached out and touched a lock of my auburn hair, which had gone without dressing for several days. I understood: she recognized me by my hair.
My companions insisted that we could not afford to rest any longer. We rode through the night and stopped in the hour just before dawn at the home of the laird of Lochinvar, where I borrowed clean linens and a mantle and hood.
“Have you a knife, Willie?” I asked. The boy hovered nearby, ready to be of assistance whenever I let him.
He hesitated, no doubt fearing that I intended to do harm to someone, perhaps even myself. “Aye, my lady,” he replied tentatively.
“Then do me the favor of cutting off my hair. I do not wish to be recognized by it.”
Willie did as I asked, working quickly, until hanks of long reddish hair lay on the ground. I saw Willie twist a lock of hair into a circlet and put it away in the bosom of his shirt, and Geordie did the same.
We were on our way again, stopping briefly at Lord Herries's castle for fresh horses and then pressing on to a castle belonging to Lord Maxwell, a friend of Herries and a man faithful to my cause. It was the opinion of these two lords that I would be safe there while I decided on my next move.
“You can surely hold out here for at least forty days,” said Lord Maxwell. “That will give us time to rally our forces and to conquer the regent Moray once and for all.”
“Or to arrange to have help sent by your family in France, troops to assist you or a boat to take you there,” said Lord Herries.
I heard them out, listening carefully to the arguments advanced by each of my devoted friends. Then I interrupted them. “Gentlemen,” I began, “I do value your advice, but I have already made my decision. I will go to England and place myself in the hands of my dear cousin and friend Queen Elizabeth. I have no doubt that the good lady will make me welcome, and when the time is right, she will do whatever is necessary to help me regain the throne of Scotland.”
My friends objected vehemently to my plan. “I will say it bluntly, madam,” declared Lord Herries, “you must not trust Queen Elizabeth. The English have a reputation for clapping Scottish sovereigns in prison. What persuades you that she will not do the same to you?”
The more they tried to convince me otherwise, the more stubbornly I held to my belief that my sister-queen could not refuse to help me. Though I had lost or had taken from me most items of valueâincluding the bond James had given to me before he rode off, and a silver casket containing a number of important lettersâI had somehow kept hold of the diamond ring that Elizabeth had sent me as a token of her friendship. I produced it now from the chain I wore around my neck and proposed to send it to the queen along with a letter begging for her help.
“Permit me to have my own way,” I told the sad-faced men gathered around me.
The two lords and the rest of my disconsolate friends stared at me. I did not want to wait for Elizabeth's reply. She would not refuse me.
“My mind is made up,” I said. “Who will come with me?”
I sent the letter and the diamond ring off to Elizabeth. Then, my head shorn and my clothing disguised, I made my way from Lord Maxwell's castle to Glenluce, a Cistercian abbey on the coast of Solway Firth, opposite the shores of England, which were barely visible in the distance.
The next day, the sixteenth of May in the year 1568, after hearing Mass at the abbey chapel, I prepared to leave Scotland, not quite seven years after I had returned there from France. At three o'clock in the afternoon, with a handful of friends, Little Willie and Geordie Douglas among them, I boarded a small fishing boat.
The boat cast off from the jetty, and the sails bellied and snapped as the winds filled them, carrying us into turbulent waters. I did not bid a tearful farewell to Scotland as I left its shores. Soon Elizabeth would receive my letter and the ring enclosed as a token. She would surely respond with an invitation to come to London. I would have to procure a periwig to cover my shorn head, and I had no proper gowns in which to be received by the queen, but these were small problems, easily solved!
For now, I kept my face turned bravely toward England, certain that I would return one day to my kingdom as the triumphant queen of Scots.
I could not have been more terribly wrong.