Mary Queen of Scotland & the Isles (82 page)

"We wait. And when enough men have come to Dunbar, then it is time for
us to march upon those miscreants."

Within three days, four thousand men had gathered at Dunbar, and the
news of this travelled quickly back to Edinburgh. Bothwell and Mary
decided that the time had come to leave Dunbar and march west; Bothwell
led out his Borderers and Mary four companies of professional infantry.
Altogether they enlisted the support of seven earls and four lords, and
more joined them as they marched. Darnley managed to ride in front of
the forces of Lord Seton as if he were commanding them.

As they neared Edinburgh the crowds thickened, cheering them. Just
outside the city, Archbishop Hamilton, in the name of his clan,
welcomed them. The people of Edinburgh streamed out, escorting them
back into the city; Bothwell fired his field guns.

"Soldiers!" he cried. "You are to be billeted in the city!"

There was no resistance, no fighting. The field guns turned out to be
merely a salute, not an opening salvo. The traitors had fled the city,
and were even then on their way south to cross the border.

Mary entered the city, deserted by her enemies, to the ringing sound of
cheers, at the head of eight thousand men-at-arms. The city was hers;
the victory was hers.

By the next day she and her Council excluding Darnley, who did not show
any interest in attending promptly attended to the work of punishing
the offenders and setting the government on its feet again. All those
who had not actually been present at the murder, but were indirectly
involved, were ordered to keep away from court; this included Argyll,
Boyd, Maitland, and Rothes and Kirkcaldy, still in England from the
last rebellion. Morton, Lindsay, Ruthven, and the Douglases were all
outlawed, both they and their partisans.

And what was to be done with Darnley? He had to be kept by Mary's
side, to vouch for the legitimacy of their child. A solution was
found: He would swear his innocence before the Council, and this
declaration, clearing him, would be published and posted. And so
Darnley, his face shining and guileless, swore that he had had nothing
to do with the conspiracy, and had "never counselled, commanded,
consented, assisted, nor approved of the same."

Afterwards he went out drinking at a tavern directly across from the
Market Cross, where his signed declaration was posted.

"Good, good, good!" he kept muttering, lifting his mug in a salute to
it.

THIRTY

The very sound of Darnley's knife clinking against his platter grated
on Mary's nerves. She hated everything connected with him, any
reminder that he even existed; the noises he made as he chewed his
meat, as he swallowed his wine, all were repulsive to her. She forced
herself to look at him, commanded herself to smile. He smiled back,
the simpleton. Could he not tell how false her expression was?

Not much longer now, she thought. He must be flattered and mollified
in order to acknowledge the child as his own and put the final lie to
the Riccio slanders. Have I not done everything possible to placate
him: issued a proclamation that he was entirely innocent of the
killing, kept him by my side .. . everything except admit him to my
bed, and in that I have had the excuse that the physicians forbid it
thank God!

Darnley was still smiling at her, cocking his head to one side like a
dog. "Shall we walk upon the ramparts, my love?" he asked.

She willed herself to stand up and nod. She even took his hand and
together they walked slowly from the chamber out into Edinburgh Castle
yard.

The thin May sunshine had no power to warm them, and Mary sent a servit
or to bring her a cloak. Fastening it about her shoulders gave her an
excuse to let go Damley's hand. As they left the protection of the
inner courtyard walls, the raw spring wind, fresh from the Forth, hit
them. Darnley laughed with glee, like a child. He rushed over to the
walls of the fortress, while Mary followed him at a more sedate pace.

"Look there! Look there!" he said, pointing to the patterns the wind
was making on the surface of the Nor' Loch at the foot of the castle
rock. The long thin lake, where the bodies of plague victims were
tossed, sparkled today in the sunshine, its blue-grey colour a
reflection of the sky.

"Yes, yes," she said, trying to keep the irritation from her voice.

What a child, she thought. And I thought him a man, and pledged fealty
to him, and put him on a throne. This time last year .. . no, I'll not
think of that. It's too painful.

The harsh sound of laughter carried across the courtyard, followed by
the ring of nailed boots. Bothwell and his brother-in-law Huntly were
deep in conversation as they headed down toward the Long Stairs and the
gateway, their cloaks flying out behind them.

Wait! Mary almost called, and raised her hand to signal them. Then
she dropped it. They had disappeared around the wall.

"As to the godparents, I think my father " Darnley was saying.

"No!" said Mary. "No, not your father!" She distrusted him; she
suspected he, too, had been involved with the Riccio murderers. "I had
thought that we should ask rulers of other countries to be godparents.
After all, this child will be monarch of Scotland, and possibly England
as well. It is fitting that this be recognized from the start."

Damley sighed. "Who, then?" he said.

"I hoped to ask Charles IX of France, and the Duke of Savoy, and Queen
Elizabeth."

"Queen Elizabeth?" screamed Damley, so loud that the soldiers keeping
watch on the walls turned around. "What, when she forbade our
marriage? No, no, no!"

"But this is the way to win her, don't you see?" Mary tried to keep
her voice low and reasonable. "Queen Elizabeth loves children, and if
she has bound herself in vows to ours, she will look on it with favour
later "

"Never! The insult was too great! Never, never, never!"

"I intend to ask her, and I am the Queen," said Mary firmly.

Darnley ignored her, in one of his sudden changes of mood. He turned
and looked out at the loch again. Suddenly his voice was quiet. "Do
you think it's true what they say, that witches float? That's how they
tried them here, so I heard."

Mary shuddered. "I hope never to see such a trial. The poor wretches
are hauled out of the waters and then burnt at the stake."

Witches, she thought, and all sorts of evil seem to surround me. My
mother died within these walls, and I may follow her.

Her thoughts were so heavy she felt pulled downward toward the
glistening surface of the loch.

"My love!" Darnley was holding her, with surprising strength. His
face was pale and he looked alarmed. He turned her away from the
height and led her back across the courtyard.

Why was he holding her protectively? She tried to shrug him off.

"You almost fell," he said. "You swayed forward, and had I not caught
you " He was trembling.

Holy Virgin! She herself began to shake. Did I faint, then?

"You must lie down," he was saying. "I shall see you to your
chamber."

She lay on the royal bed, resting her cheek against the tawny satin bed
covers, the ones she had embroidered with the Marys when they were all
unmarried. They had laughed and sung and teased one another about
their future mates, making wishes about the beds these satins would
cover.

Now I lie on it and know all too well what my hub and turned out to be,
Mary thought. If I could never lie in this bed, or any other, with him
it would be all I would ask. Are Livingston and Beaton happy? Beaton
married just a month ago, and seemed content with her fate. Flamina
still writes to banished Maitland, even though she knows he was
involved with the murder. Seton .. . she shows no interest in
sweethearts.

"Ma Reine, they said you fainted up on the ramparts." A small woman
was suddenly standing beside her. A familiar smell of sweet lemon balm
soothed Mary.

"Madame Rallay." Her presence was more comforting than any satin bed
covers. "I fear I did. Yet it is most unlike me. And I am feeling
much better now. And no, I do not need to partake of any of your
calvados and frothed-cream concoctions!" That had been Madame Rallay's
cure-all for her since the days in France.

"I have already ordered it, and you must drink it!" said the
Frenchwoman sternly.

Mary knew better than to argue. But she suddenly knew what she wanted,
and it was not a posset. She clasped Madame Rallay's hand. "I will
drink it, I promise. But after I have had it, I pray you send for my
confessor. I need to see him. It is time."

Mary was sitting on a bench in the shuttered room, awaiting Father
Roche Mamerot. She found herself shaking. Death: it was all around
her, and lying on the bed she had suddenly felt its presence, waiting
for her as it had for her mother. Childbirth was dangerous, and she
could well die. Die .. . and go to Hell for her sins.

"My child." The old Dominican, who had come with her from France and
had grown elderly as her sins had progressed from refusing to share her
toys with the other children in the royal playroom, to unsettling
desires for vanity and luxury, to adult failings, greeted her kindly.
He had always been a good confessor, stressing God's mercy rather than
His wrath.

"Bless me, Father, for I've sinned, sinned, sinned " She grabbed his
hand and covered it with kisses, closing her eyes to try to stop the
tears.

"There, my child, the sacrament is meant to ease hearts too
burdened...." He tried to extricate his hand, but she clung to it,
weeping. "What is it that troubles you so?"

"I have committed sins of commission, the sins of pride and anger! I
have failed to practise charity! I have "

"People do not weep over 'failing to practise charity." " His voice
was gentle, almost teasing. "Such abstracts do not wound the soul,
producing the pain of repentance that I see here. What is it you have
done?"

"I hate him! I hate my husband! I hate him in my heart! Is that not
evil? I wish he would die ... I wish he were dead ... I despise him!"
She buried her face in her hands and wept stormily. "I cannot bear his
presence! He feels repulsive to me! Father, what can I do?"

"You must, unfortunately, overcome this aversion. He is your husband,
and in the eyes of God you are one flesh. You know it is your duty "

"I cannot! I cannot!"

"Humanly you cannot, but with God's help "

"Nooo," she moaned, holding her side and bending over. She looked as
if she had been kicked.

"You say no because you cannot bear to submit yourself, not because you
doubt that God has the power to help you." He looked stricken himself.
"And there can be no absolution without a sincere attempt to change, I
fear to say."

"I am afraid, Father, I am afraid that if I die, Damley and his father
will rule, and that they will kill the baby such dreadful, nightmarish
thoughts torment me! How can I go to the bed of a man I believe wants
me dead?"