Chapter VIII: The Divorce of Mary Livingstone

(_To an Italian Air_)

The ranging eye of the Muse, sweeping up the little with the big, rediscerns Monsieur de Châtelard, like a derelict ladybird, tide-swept into Scotland once more. It is true, unfortunately, that you have not yet done with this poet, though the time is at hand.

He came warily pricking back in October; and, nosing here and there, found a friend in a certain portly Italian gentleman, by name Signior David, who professed to be deeply attached to him on very short notice, and whose further employment was, discoverably, that of foreign secretary to her Majesty. Needing alliances—for his venture was most perilous—Monsieur de Châtelard had sought him out; and found him writing in a garret, wrapped in ample fur. A cup of spiced wine stood by him, a sword and toothpick lay to hand: no Italian needs more. He was a fine, pink, fleshy man, with a red beard, fluff of red hair in his ears, light eyelashes, blue eyes. His hair, darker than his beard, was strenuous and tossed.

He was not very clean, but his teeth were admirable. Monsieur de Châtelard, coming in with great ceremony, credentials in hand, hoped that he might have the satisfaction of making Signior David a present.

The Italian was franchise itself. ‘Per la Madonna, my lord, you may make me many presents. I will tire you out at that pastime.’ He ran his eye over the Marquis D’Elbœuf’s letter. ‘Aha, we have here Monsieur de Châtelard, poet, and companion of princes! Sir,’ said he, ‘let two adventurous explorers salute each other. If I were not a brave man I should not be here; still less would your honour. A salute seems little testimony between two such champions. You are Amadis, I am Splandian. We should embrace, Monsieur de Châtelard.’

They did; the poet was much affected. ‘I come with my life in my hands, Signior David.’

‘Say, rather, on the tips of your fingers, dear sir!’

‘You see in me,’ continued the Frenchman, ‘a brave man. You said as much, and I thank you. But you see more. You see a poet.’

‘Aha!’ cries the other, tapping his chest with one finger; ‘and here is the little fellow who will sing your verses as merrily as you make them.’

‘Allow me to perorate,’ says Monsieur de Châtelard. ‘You see also, signore, a disgraced lover of the Queen, who nevertheless returns to kiss the hand that smote him.’

‘_Sanguinaccio!_ my good friend,’ Signior David replied: ‘I hope I don’t see a fool.’

Monsieur de Châtelard considered this aspiration with that gravity it deserved. He hesitated before he made answer. ‘I hope not, Signior David,’ he said wistfully; ‘but, as a lover, I am in some doubt. For a lover, as you very well know, is not (by the nature of his case) many removes from a fool. He may be—he is—a divine fool. Fire has touched his lips, to make him mad. He speaks—but what? Noble folly! He does—but what? Glorious rashness!’

‘Undoubtedly,’ said the Italian. ‘But does he not know—when a Queen is in the case—that he has a neck to be wrung?’

‘He knows nothing of such things. This is the sum of his knowledge—I love! I love! I love!’

The Italian looked at him with calmness. ‘I speak for my nation,’ he said, ‘when I assure you that an Italian lover knows more than that. He considers means, and ends too. Hungry he may be; but how shall he be filled if you slit open his belly? He may be thirsty; but if you cut his throat? However, I am speaking into the air. Let us be reasonable. How can I serve you, dear sir?’

‘Signior David,’ says the poet, ‘I shall speak openly to you. Howsoever brave a man may be, howsoever dedicated to impossible adventure, there is one wind which, blowing through the forest, must chill him to the heart. It is the wind of Indifference. By heaven, sir, can you sing before mutes, or men maimed of their hands? And how are you and I to do admirable things, if no one admires, or cares whether we do them or not? The thought is absurd. Here, in this grey Scotland, which is Broceliande, the enchanted forest hiding my princess, I suffer acutely from my solitude. Formerly I had friends; now I have none. Sir, I offer you my friendship, and ask yours again. Be my friend. Thus you may serve me, if you will.’

The Italian took up the fringe of his beard and brushed his nose with it. ‘I must know one little thing first. What do you want with your enchanted princess in the middle of your forest? Everything?’

Monsieur de Châtelard opened wide his arms, strained them forward, clasped them over his bosom, and hugged himself with them.

‘Everything,’ he said; and the Italian nodded, and sank into thought.

‘If I assist you to that, good sir,’ says he presently, looking at his client, ‘it will be a very friendly act on my part.’

‘Sir,’ replied the Frenchman, ‘I require a friendly act.’

Signior David looked down, ever so lightly, at the jewel in his hand, which the poet had put there. ‘But!’ and he raised his eyebrows over it, ‘it will be impossible for future rhapsodists to devise an act more friendly than this! It might be—I do not say that it will be, for I am a simple scribe, as you see—it might be a partaking which Achilles would never have allowed to Patroclus.’

‘But you, signore, are not Achilles,’ urged Monsieur de Châtelard.

The Italian shrugged. ‘I have not yet found Achilles in this country; but many have offered themselves to be Patroclus. ‘Come,’ he added, with a pleasant grin, ‘Come, I will serve you. We will be friends. For the moment I recommend discretion. Her Majesty returned but two days ago, and is already in the midst of affairs. This annoys her extremely. She thought she had done with business and might begin her dancing. But I cannot think that she will dance very long, the way matters are tending.’

Monsieur de Châtelard went away, to brace himself for the opening scene of a new act. He came often back again to see his friend, to submit to his judgment such and such a theory. How should the lover encounter his mistress, against whose person he had dared, but not dared enough, the storming of the sweet citadel? Here was the gist of all his inquiry.

‘Show yourself, dear sir, show yourself!’ was his friend’s advice, whose own tactics consisted in never showing himself and in making his absence felt.

The Frenchman, finally, did show himself, with very little result one way or the other. The Queen, occupied as she had been with Huntly’s ruin, and now with the patching up of a comfortable fragment out of it, hardly knew that he was there. This was the way of it. A lightly-built young man with a bush of crimped hair sprang out of the press in hall at the hour of the _coucher_, and fell upon his knees. ‘Ha, Monsieur de Châtelard, you return?’ If she smiled upon him, it was because she smiled on all the world when the world allowed it.

‘Sovereign, the poor minstrel returns!’

‘I hope he will sing more tunefully. I hope he will follow the notes.’

‘All the notes of the gamut, Princess; faithfully and to the utterance.’

She nods and goes her way, to think no more about him.

From this unsubstantial colloquy, the infatuated gentleman drew the highest significance. Why, what are the notes of the chant which a lover must follow? There is but one note; the air is a wailing monotone: _Hardiesse, Hardiesse, Hardiesse!_ O Queen, potent in Cyprus, give your vassal effrontery!

_Amantium iræ!_ She had hopes that the piping times were come, with an air cleaner for the late storms. She had won back young Adam Gordon, as you know, and sealed him to her by kisses and tears. She had hopes of his elder brother, now a faithful prisoner at Dunbar. James Earl of Moray proved a kinder brother than Lord James Stuart had ever been; Ruthven was gorged, somnolent now, like a sated eagle, above the picked bones of Huntly. Morton was at Dalkeith, out of sight, out of mind; Mr. Secretary wrote daily to England, where Sir James Melvill haggled with bridegrooms; Mr. Knox reported his commission faithfully done. He had laboured, he said, and not in vain. Her Majesty knew that the two lords, Bothwell and Arran, had been reconciled. He took leave to say that, since her expedition to the North, he had rarely seen a closer band of friendship between two men, seeming dissimilar, than had been declared to every eye between the Earls Arran and Bothwell.

The news was good, as far as it went; it made for the peace which every sovereign lady must desire. So much she could tell Mr. Knox, with truth and without trouble. But—but—the Earl of Bothwell came not to the Court. He had been seen in town, in September, when she was fast in the hills; he was now supposed to be at Hailes; had been at Hamilton, at Dumbarton, at Bothwell in Clydesdale. Why should he absent himself? If by staying away he hoped to be the more present, he had his desire. The Queen grew very restless, and complained of pains in the back. What he could have had to do with these is not clear; but the day came very soon when she had a pain in the side—his work.

That was a day when there was clamour in the quadrangle, sudden rumour: the raving of a man, confused comment, starting of horses, grounding of arms; the guard turned out. The Queen was at prayers—which is more than can be said for the priest who should have lifted up her suffrages; for if she prayed the mass through, he did not. The poor wretch thought the Genevans were after him, and his last office a-saying. Whatever she thought, Queen Mary never moved, even though (as the fact was) she heard quick voices at the chapel doors, and the shout, ‘Hold back those men!’

She found Lethington waiting in the antechapel when she entered it. He was perturbed.

‘Well, Mr. Secretary, what have my loving subjects now on hand?’

He laughed his dismay. ‘Madam, here is come, with foam on his lips, my Lord of Arran, the Duke’s son.’

‘Doth he foam so early?’ says she. ‘Give him a napkin, and I will see him clean.’

Presently they admitted the disordered man, frowning and muttering, much out of breath, and his hair all over his face. Kirkcaldy of Grange held his arm; the Secretary and Lord Lindsay hovered about him; through the half-open door there spied the anxious face of Des-Essars.

‘Speak, my Lord Arran,’ says the Queen.

‘God save us all, I must, I must!’ spluttered Arran, and plunged afresh upon his nightmare.

If that can be called speech which comes in gouts of words, like tin gobbling of water from a neck too narrow, then Lord Arran spoke. He wept also and slapped his head, he raved, he adjured high God—all this from his two knees. Mystery! He had wicked lips to unlock. He must reveal horrid fact, devilish machination, misprision of treason! God knew the secret of his heart; God knew he would meet that bloody man half-way. In that he was a sinner, let him die the death. Oh, robber, curious robber! To dare that sacred person, to encompass it with greedy hands—robbery! God is not to be robbed—and who shall dare rob the King, anointed of God? Such a man would steal the Host from the altar. Sorcery! sorcery! sorcery!

When he stopped to gasp and roll his eyeballs in their sockets, the Queen had her opportunity. She was already fatigued, and hated noises at any time. ‘Hold your words, my lord, I beg of you. Who is your bloody man? Who steals from a king, and from what king steals he? Who is your sorcerer, and whom has he bewitched? Yourself, by chance?’

Arran turned her the whites of his eyes—a dreadful apparition. ‘The Earl of Bothwell’—he spoke it in a whisper—‘the Earl of Bothwell did beguile me.’

‘Then I think he did very idly,’ said the Queen. ‘He has been profuse of his sorcery. Tell your tale to the Lord of Lethington, and spare me.’

And away she went in a pet. Let the Earl of Bothwell come to her or not, she did not choose to get news of him through a fool.

Yet the fool had had seed for his folly. He was examined, produced witnesses; and his story bore so black a look that the council confined him on their own discretion until the Queen’s pleasure could be known. Then her brother, Mr. Secretary and others came stately into her cabinet with their facts. Mr. Knox, said they, had waited upon the Earl of Bothwell to urge a reconciliation with Lord Arran. The Hepburn had been very willing, had laughed a good deal over the cause of enmity—a kiss to a pretty woman, etc.—in a friendly manner. The two lords had met, certain overtures were made and accepted. Very well; her Majesty had observed with what success Mr. Knox had done his part. But wait a little! Friendship grew apace, until at last it seemed that the one Earl cared not to lose sight of the other. Incongruous partnership! but there were reasons. A few weeks later my Lord of Bothwell invites his friend to supper, and then and there proposes the ravishment of the Queen’s person—no less a thing!

At this point of the recital her hand, which had been very fidgety, went up to her lip, pinched and held it.

‘Continue, my lord,’ she said, ‘but—continue!’

‘I am slow to name what I have been slow to believe,’ says my lord of Moray, conscious of his new earldom, ‘and yet I can show your Majesty the witness.’

The plan had been to surprise her on her way from Perth to the South, take her to Hamilton, and marry her there by force to the Earl of Arran. Bothwell was to have been made Chancellor for his share. He had asked no greater reward. The Queen looked down to her lap when she heard this. What more? My lord of Arran concealed his alarms for the moment, and told no one; but the secrecy, the weight of the burden, worked upon him until he could not bear himself. Before the plot was ripe he had confessed it to half-a-dozen persons. Bothwell threatened him ravenously; his mind gave way—hence his frantic penance. Here was a budget of treason for the Queen to take in her hands, and ponder, wildly and alone. Alone she pondered it, in spite of all the shocked elders about her.

If he had done it! If he had—if he had! Ah, the adventure of it, the rush of air, the pounding horse, and the safe, fierce arms! Marry her to Arran, forsooth, and possess her at his magnificent leisure: for of course that was the meaning of it. Arran and his Hamiltons were dust in the eyes of Scotland, but necessary dust. He could not have moved without them. Thus, then, it was planned—and oh! if he had done it! So well had she learned to school her face that not a man of them, watching for it, expecting it, could be sure for what it was that her heart beat the tattoo, and that the royal colours ran up the staff on the citadel, and flew there, straining to the gale. Was it maiden alarm, was it queenly rage, that made her cheeks so flamy-hot? It was neither: she knew perfectly well what it was. And what was she going to do in requital of this scandalous scheme? None of them knew that either; but she again knew perfectly well what she was about. She was about to give herself the most exquisite pleasure in life—to deal freely, openly, and as of right, with her secret joy; to handle in the face of all men the forbidden thing, and to read into every stroke she dealt her darling desire. None would understand her pleasure, none could forbid it her; for none could under-read her masked words. And her face, as glacial-keen as Athena’s, like Antigone’s rapt for sacrifice; her thoughtful, reluctant eyes, her patient smile, clasped hands, considered words—a mask, a mask! Hear the sentences as they fell, like slow, soft rain, and listen beneath for the exulting burthen: ‘If he had! Oh, if he had!’

‘My lords, this is a fond and foolish adventure, proceeding from a glorious heart to a distempered head. My dignity may suffer by too serious care for it. But as I may not permit any subject of mine to handle my person, to deal familiarly with my person, even in thought, I must take as much notice of it as the fact deserves. Let the Lords Arran and Bothwell be committed to ward during pleasure. Prepare such writs as are needful. They shall see my sign-manual upon them.’

She rose, they with her, and went across to the curtain of the private rooms; she held the curtain as she stayed to look back.

‘Be secret, Mr. Secretary, and swift.’

‘I shall obey your Majesty in all things.’

Sitting alone and very still, she wrought her hardest to be offended at this tale, as became a sovereign lady. She bit her red lip over it, frowned, covered her eyes—acting a horror which she could not feel. Resolutely then she uncovered them again, to look it in the face and see it at its worst. But what she saw, and exulted to see, was a Man. And the face of the man was broad-jowled, flushed, and had a jutting under-jaw; its mouth snarled as it laughed, its eyes were bloodshot and hardily wicked, it was bearded from the throat. Wicked, daring, laughing Bothwell—hey, yes, but a Man!

His plot—how could she but admire it as a plot? It was a chain of fine links. Arran was heir-presumptive, and would hold the South; Arran’s sister married to Huntly’s son—there’s for the North. In the midst, Bothwell with the wittold’s wife—herself. Now, if that were the plan, then Bothwell was her lover. Observe the plain word: her lover, not her adoring slave. Also, if that were the plan, and Arran a catspaw, then Bothwell would be her master. Another plain word for a plain proposal, with which no woman, be she chaste or frail, is altogether offended.

Certainly this young woman was not offended, as she dallied with each thought in turn—weighing, affecting to choose. Lover! Master! This saucy, merry robber. How should she be offended? It was only a thought. Lancelot had loved his queen, and Tristram his. Let the plot be put before these two to judge, Lancelot would have laughed and Tristram grieved. Arran had been like Tristram, and she curled her lip to think of him, and laughed aloud as she chose for Lancelot. Ah, how can you be offended with Love and his masterful ways? Or with the blithe lover, who laughs while he spoils you? It is _son naturel_; and must we not follow our nature? Love, which made George Gordon glum, made Bothwell merry. He would go, humming the same southern air, to battle or to bride-bed, to midnight robbery or the strife of love. He was a man, do you see? They had such in France, a plenty; but in Scotland what had they but pedlars, hagglers, cattle-drovers, field-preachers? What other in Scotland would have shaped such a plan as this, and gaily opened it to a fool? The Earl of Morton, do you suppose—that thick schemer? Her brother Moray, the new Earl, sour, careful merchant of his store? Dead old Huntly, John of Findlater, wordy, bickering hillmen? Or George Gordon, chastened and contrite at Dunbar? Not one of them, not one. Gordon was her lover—accorded. But Gordon made eyes,—and this other, plans to carry her off. Oh, here is the difference between a boy’s kisses and a man’s. The one sort implies itself, the other all the furious empery of love.

The slim, pale, wise young witch that she looked—sitting here alone, spelling out her schemes, glancing sidelong from her hazel eyes! _Tenez_, she was playing with thoughts, like a girl hot upon a girl’s affair. Not thus meditates a prince upon his policy! She began to walk about, looked out of window, fingered the arras; and all the while was urging herself to princely courses. As a prince, she would certainly make a high alliance; as a prince, she must show disorderly subjects that she was not to be touched too familiarly. The man must be reminded; prison walls would cool his fevers. Let him think of her in confinement. When he came out she would be affianced, perhaps wedded—safe in either case. Then it would be lawful to see him again, and—and—oh, what a laughing Lancelot went there!

* * * * *

She kept her own counsel, having made up her own mind, and contrived to seem severe without being so. The Earl of Arran was sent to Dumbarton, a nominal confinement; but Bothwell was warded in Edinburgh Castle, the length of a street away. ‘He is more dangerous, it seems, the farther off he is lodged,’ she gave as her reason. It was easy to learn that he made good cheer, kept a generous table, saw his friends and had all the Court news; not quite so easy to pretend not to learn it. Yet, I suppose, she knew by the next day everything that he had said or done overnight. Des-Essars was go-between, not officially, of course, but as by accident. Few beside Mary Livingstone remarked that this discreet and demure youth was off duty for half the day at a time. Then Bishop Hepburn, my lord’s reprobate, chuckling uncle, came to Edinburgh, and sauntered up and down the hill as he chose; an old hand at a game as old as Troy town. Playing a round at cards with the Queen, he treated the late escapade as a family failing. But this was a false step of his: the Queen was not to be caught.

‘When you say that the thing was folly, you are more cruel than I have been. I have punished your nephew for presumption and crime, but have never accused him of being a fool. However, since you are in a position to judge, I am willing to take it from you.’

He stood corrected, but did not cease to observe. The Queen’s circumspection filled him with wonder, and at the same time taught him, by its accuracy, all he wanted to know. His lesson pat, he went up to the Castle again.

‘Nephew,’ he said, ‘the cage-door is not set open, but I believe you have only to turn the handle when you please.’

‘I shall not turn it just yet awhile, my good lord bishop,’ said the Earl, playing a tune upon his knee; ‘I find this a fine post of observation.’

It was Mary Livingstone who first found out the truth of matters, and by plunging into the fire to save her mistress succeeded in nothing but burning herself. When, after a sharp examination, she learned where Des-Essars had spent his free days, she could not contain herself. ‘Fine use for pages! Fine use!’

This provoked a quarrel. The Queen stamped her foot, flung up and down, shed tears. ‘You are too masterful, my girl, too much the husband. You mistake a game and play for a bout-at-issue. I do not choose to be mistressed by a maid of honour. There must be an end of this.’

Livingstone listened gravely. ‘Do with me as you will, madam. Put me in my place. What is your pleasure?’

‘To rule my people, child.’

‘Rule, madam, rule. Command me in anything. Forbid me everything, but one thing.’

‘I shall forbid you what is unwholesome for you, and for me also.’

‘You shall not forbid me to love you,’ said the maid, very white.

‘Nay, that I cannot do!’ cried the Queen, laughing and weeping at once. So they kissed.

But, for all that, she removed Livingstone from her side, and chose Fleming. Mr. Secretary, acceptable widower in that lady’s sight, rubbed his hands over the choice; and Fleming herself was so sweetly gratified that nobody could grudge her her promotion. She was a gentle-natured, low-voiced, modest girl, with the meek beauty of an angel in a Milanese picture. Older than the Queen, she looked younger; whereas Livingstone was younger and looked older. No doubt this one felt her fall; but, being as good as gold and as proud as iron, she held her head the higher for her lower degree, and smiled benevolently at the raptures of the new favourite.

‘My dear,’ she said to Fleming, ‘do not think that I grudge thee. In truth, I do not. What I said was done advisedly. I knew what must come of it; I sought it, and shall put up with it. I have a deal to think on, these days, and my thoughts will be my night-company.’

‘She will never love me as she loves thee,’ says Fleming; and was answered:

‘I care not greatly if she do or no; nor will I measure loves with any one. Our affair the now is to get her fast wedded.’

‘So saith Mr. Secretary at all hours,’ said Fleming.

But Livingstone tossed her head. ‘Fine he knows the heart of a lass, your Lethington body!’

Fleming looked serious. ‘He hath spoken to me of my Lord of Lennox,’ she said, in a lower tone. ‘This lord is near akin to our mistress; nearer, if the truth were known, than the Duke. He hath a likely son in England, a noble young man—my Lord of Darnley. The Queen of England holds him dear, and (they say) looketh to him to be her heir.’

Livingstone made an outcry. ‘Then she looketh askew! It is well known to her and hers who the heir of England is. Who should it be but our own lady?’

But Fleming persisted in her quiet way. ‘Mr. Secretary speaks of him as a hopeful prince—having seen and had speech with him. I do but use his own words. Sir James Melvill writes of him. Mr. Randolph owns him to be something, though unwillingly. And, says Mr. Secretary, we may depend upon it that when Mr. Randolph admits some grace in a Scots lord, there is much grace.’

Livingstone’s open eyes showed that the thing had to be considered. ‘There may be some promise in all of this,’ says she. ‘What you tell me of Mr. Randolph gives me thoughts. Had he nothing more to own? Has Mary Beaton got nothing from him?’ English Mr. Randolph, you must know, was apt to open his heart to Mary Beaton when that brown siren called for it.

‘He told Mary Beaton,’ Fleming replied, ‘that the Queen of England valued one lord no more than other, until—until—I know not how to put it. In fine, he said, that if any lord of her court was sought after by another, then his Queen would need that lord more than any other. Do you follow?’

‘Ay,’ says Livingstone, ‘I follow thee now. My lord of Darnley, he is called? Why, let him come up then: we can but look at him.’

‘Oh, my dear chuck,’ Fleming protested, ‘princes are not wed by the eyes’ favour.’

‘They have the right to be,’ said her mate; ‘and it is only thus, let me tell you, that our Queen will be well wedded.’ She grew exceedingly serious. ‘Look you, Fleming, she is in danger, she is dangerous. I know very well what is passing up and down between this and the Castle rock. Ask me not—seek not to learn. It is not enough for her that she contract with this man or that. I tell you, _she must want him_.’

Fleming blushed painfully, but there was no gainsaying the truth. ‘It is true, she hath a great spirit.’

‘Ay,’ muttered Livingstone grimly, ‘and needeth a greater.’

‘They say,’ Fleming continued, ‘that the Lord Darnley’s is a royal soul.’

And Livingstone ended the council. ‘Let the young man come up. We can but look at him.’

* * * * *

Mary Livingstone, the divorced, had a secret of her own, but made very light of it. The Master of Sempill demanded her person; said he could not be denied. Her father was willing, and his father more than willing; yet she laughed it all away. ‘I am husband of the Queen of Scots,’ she said, ‘or was so yesterday. What should I do with the Master?’

The old lord, her father, tapped his teeth. ‘You speak pleasantly, daughter, of a pleasant privilege of yours. But the Master is a proper man, who must have a better answer.’

‘Let him bide till I am ready,’ says the good Livingstone.

‘I doubt he will do it, my lass. He may spoil.’

‘Then he is not worth the having, my lord,’ replied the maid. ‘What use have I for perishable goods?’

The Master chose to wait; and when the Court moved to Saint Andrews he waited in Fife.

The Court went thither with various great affairs in train, whose conduct throve in that shrill air. The Queen would work all the forenoon with Lethington and her useful Italian, play all the rest of the day, and to bed early. She played at housewifery: bib and tucker, gown pinned back, all her hair close in a clean coif. The life was simple, the air of homely keenness, the weather wintry; but the great fire was kind. All about her made for healthy tastes; inspired the hale beauty of a life within the allotted fence, a taskwork smoothly done, and God well pleased in His heaven. Lethington, a pliant man, lent himself to the Queen’s humour; Signior David was never known to be moody; there were Adam Gordon and Des-Essars to give their tinge of harmless romance—a thin wash, as it were, of water-colour over the grey walls. Sir James Melvill, too, who had been to England upon the high marriage question, and returned, and was now to go again, arrived, full of importance, for last words. It had come to this, that the Queen was now to choose a husband.

Sir James was struck by her modest air, that of a tutored maid who knows that she is called to matronhood. ‘_Ecce ancilla Domini!_’ In truth she was listening to those very words.

‘I shall strive in all things, Sir James Melvill, to please my good sister. Whether it be my Lord Robert[1] or my cousin Darnley, I trust I shall satisfy my well-wishers.’

Soft voice, lowly eyes, timid fingers! ‘Who has been pouring oil upon this beading wine?’ asked himself Sir James. Who indeed, but Saint Andrew, with his frosty sea-salt breath?

It was just at this time, as things fell out, that the Earl of Lennox, father to that ‘hopeful prince’ of Mary Fleming’s report, came to Scotland, as he said, upon a lawsuit concerning his western lands. But some suspected another kind of suit altogether; among whom, for the best of reasons, were the Queen’s brother James, and the Lord of Lethington the Secretary. Another was Signior David, dæmonic familiar of Monsieur de Châtelard.

[1] Lord Robert Dudley, later the too-famous Lord of Leicester.