"The Courtesan" - читать интересную книгу автора (Tranter Nigel)

Chapter Nine

THE cavalcade had barely left Berwick Bounds behind it, and crossed into England, before the wind died away and the sun blazed down upon a sodden and battered world. Men and women threw aside their heavy soaking travelling cloaks, sat up in their saddles after long crouching, and positively bloomed and expanded like sun-starved flowers in the genial warmth and brightness, the first that they had known for months on end. It was the second day of October.

'This, I vow, will set King Jamie smiling again,' the Earl of Moray declared, stretching his arms out luxuriously as he rode.

'I hope that you are right, my lord,' Patrick Gray said. He had been laughing gaily, rallying them all, rivalling the new sun's own brilliance this cheerful morning, but fell sober again at the other's words. 'If the sun but shines in Scotland likewise… and if His Grace's mind is not itself permanently clouded over and agley.'

Moray looked at him sharply. 'You mean…? You fear, sir, that… that…? You are not suggesting that James is affected in his wits?'

'I hope not, God knows. It is my prayer that I may be mistaken,' the Master answered gravely. 'But… he has been acting very strangely. For too long. It is a great cause of anxiety. You have not been much at Court of late, my lord. Those of us in daily touch with him cannot fail to be aware of the danger, of the sad but steady deterioration of his powers of judgment, the abdication of his kingly responsibilities…'

'He frets excessively for his princess – all Scotland knows it. And always he has been strange in manner, fearful of spirit. But more than that I cannot believe…'

Mary Gray, seeking to pay due and respectful attention to the feather-brained chatter of the Countess of Moray at her, and yet to miss nothing of the conversation of the two men immediately in front, above the clatter of their horses hooves, bit her lip.

'I do so believe it, my lady,' she said, straining her ears.

'Indeed, yes.'

'… for the good governance of the realm,' Patrick was saying. 'I fear – aye, i' faith, I fear for our land. Maitland rules, not James. If His Grace's condition grows the worse, then it behoves us all to take serious thought for the realm's weal, my lord. It will not serve to shut our eyes.'

'God save us!' The Earl's comely and attractive features reflected a simple consternation. 'I have heard naught of this, Master of Gray. No talk of it has reached me. I have been in the north, at Darnaway… ' He shook his fair head, at a loss.

Greatly daring, and with a swift apologetic glance at the Countess, Mary leaned forward to speak, and sought to make her voice low but penetrating. 'Hush, Uncle Patrick!' she said. 'If I can hear your words, so may others. And… and that is not to be desired, is it?'

Patrick turned in his saddle to stare at her, slender eyebrows raised. 'My dear,' he said evenly, 'what I say to my lord of Moray is for his ears alone, I would remind you.'

'Why, yes – that is why I speak,' the young woman nodded, with a darted look left and right as though to indicate that there were ears all round them – although in fact the nearest squire rode a good ten feet to the flank, and the men-at-arms in front still further away. 'If I overhear, others might. To great ill, perhaps.'

'You have over-long ears, girl – as I have had occasion to remark ere this!'

'Yes, Uncle Patrick – but so I have heard you say has Queen Elizabeth! Ears everywhere.'

'A plague, child! What's this? Would you teach me, me, how I should speak?'

'Ah, no. No – but my lord said that no talk of this sort had reached him at Darnaway.' Mary's colour was heightened and her breathing quickened. 'Forgive me – but I would but have you assure yourself that no talk of it reaches London either!

For – hear me, please – would not any such talk ruin all? If Queen Elizabeth was to question, even for a moment, whether King James was sound in his mind, to wonder if his wits were disordered, would she indeed cherish him further? Let you have the money for him? Do what you would have her to do, on this embassage? Would she even consider him heir? Heir to her England?'

Patrick had caught his breath. For a long moment he looked at the girl unblinking before, without a word, turning to face the front again.

Moray had gazed behind him also. 'Burn me, but she is right, Gray!' he exclaimed. 'The lassie is right. A knowing chit, eh? A head to her, as well as… other parts!' Still considering the girl, he smiled slowly, taking in all her flushed and eager young loveliness, looking at her with new and speculative eyes – eyes that did not once slide over in the direction of his wife at whose side Mary rode. 'Here is matter for thought,' he added, facing forward once more, and still smiling reflectively – for one who was not notably a reflective and thoughtful man.

The Countess of Moray slumped more heavily in her saddle, and fell silent for the first time since the weather had brightened.

James Stewart, Earl of Moray, had been selected personally by his royal namesake to be the second envoy on this embassage to the Court of St. James. It was always the prudent Scottish custom to send two ambassadors on any important diplomatic mission – lest one should perchance be tempted to betray his trust. Moray was a shrewd enough choice, whatever his companion's professed doubts about the King's sanity. Known as the Bonnie Earl, he was both popular and notably good-looking; not so brilliantly handsome and graceful as the Master by any means, but fair to look upon in a lusty, strapping and uncomplicated fashion, tall, broad-shouldered, and of a sort of rampant masculinity – and young. All important qualities where Elizabeth of England was concerned. A favourite of the Kirk party, he could be guaranteed to be suitably suspicious of the Master of Gray, whom few in Scotland believed to be other than Catholic at heart. Moreover he was very rich, in his wife's right rather than his own, and so could comfortably and conveniendy pay for the entire embassage -always an important consideration with King Jamie.

Never, surely, was a monarch so well supplied with cousins as was James, thanks to the phenomenal potency of his maternal grandfather James Fifth, whose heart may well indeed have broken at being able to show only the one surviving legitimate offspring, and that a mere girl, the unfortunate Mary Queen of Scots – although unkind gossip had it that his untimely death at the age of thirty was rather the result of being worn out by extra-marital exercises. At any rate, his bastards were legion, and few indeed of the ladies of his Court seem to have eluded his attentions; not that he confined his favours to the aristocratic and highly-born, by any means – for had he not been known as The Poor Man's King? The Reformation and the breaking up of the vast Church lands, at this juncture, had been a godsend indeed, providing properties and commendatorships innumerable for the suitable support of this host. Moray was the son of one of them, another James, titular Abbot of St. Colme, later created Lord Doune. A young man of initiative as well as looks, the son had eight years before managed to obtain the prized wardship of the two daughters of his late uncle, the most important bastard of them all, James Stewart, Earl of Moray and former Regent of Scotland – and the very next day married the elder daughter, Elizabeth, and assumed the earldom. The late Regent, needless to say, had done very well for himself in three years of ruling Scotland in the name of Mary's infant son – and having no son of his own, his heiress brought her husband great lands and riches. In the eight years of their marriage, the new Moray had managed to dispose of much of these responsibilities, but in return had given her five children. Now, at the King's insistence, the Countess accompanied her husband to London, and Mary Gray went as her attendant.

Patrick Gray, after only a brief period of quiet, was soon laughing and gay once more – for he was never the man to sulk or brood. Indeed, as they rode southwards, presently he was singing like a lark, seemingly without a care in the world, to the amusement of Moray, the delight of his wife, and the embarrassment of much of their train – and encouraging Mary to join in, so that apparently he was going to bear no resentment over her intervention. Her clear young voice rose to partner his rich tenor, to while away the long miles. It was noticeable that after fording the swollen River Aln, Moray rode behind, beside Mary, and the Countess in front with the Master of Gray.

That evening, at Morpeth, Moray was markedly more attentive to Mary than he was to his wife.

It was the following night, as the girl was preparing for bed in the country inn just over the Yorkshire border, that he came to her garret room, opening the door without any warning knock. Hastily drawing one of the bed-covers around herself, Mary turned to face him. She did not cry out or otherwise lose her head; indeed she did not even shrink back, but after only a momentary hesitation actually moved towards the man.

'My lord,' she said. 'I think that you have made a mistake.'

Moray's ruddily handsome features were flushed still further by wine. 'Not so, my dear,' he denied thickly. 'Far from it, I vow – as my eyes do assure me!' He grinned at her.

'Nevertheless, sir – you do much mistake. Your wife's room is below.'

'I know it, moppet!' Moray advanced into the room, having to stoop to get through the low doorway, his great frame seeming to fill the little coom-ceiled chamber. He shut the door behind him, with no attempt to do so quietly, furtively. 'Let her be. If mistake I made, it was in delaying so long down there at cards with your… your uncle!'

Mary sought to keep her voice even, although the heaving of the coverlet wrapped tightly around her told its own story. 'At cards – and wine, my lord!' she said. 'The wine, I fear, has confused your wits.' She looked very small, standing stiff and upright there before him. 'Else you would not be here.'

'Tush, girl – have done!' he exclaimed, and a hand reached out to her, to grasp the cover and wrench it aside, baring one white shoulder. 'You are good with words, I grant you. Let us see how good you are otherwise, my dear!'

Still she stood, unmoving, her head held high, her dark eyes meeting his steadily. 'It is pleasure that you seek, sir?' she asked, huskily.

'Why yes, Mary – pleasure it is! What else? And pleasure I shall have, I warrant – for you are passing pleasurable!' He laughed. 'Perhaps, i' faith, you shall win a little pleasure out of it also, lass – for I am none so ill at the business, so others have informed me!' He drew her irresistibly to him, and dragged down the coverlet further, stooping low to bury his face against the swell of her bosom.

She did not struggle, however stiffly she held herself. Her words continued, stiff also, level but emphatic. 'I cannot stop you taking me, my lord – since you are stronger than I am. But I can promise you that you shall have no pleasure in me.'

'Ha – think you so!' Raising his fair head, Moray chuckled in her face. 'Woman – do you not know that a little reluctance, a mite of resistance, but increases the pleasure? Certes, it is so, I promise you. For you also, perhaps. Come now, lass -enough of this foolery. I do not wish to hurt you…'

'Your hurt it is I fear, my lord. Your grievous hurt.'

'Eh…? A pox – what is this? Here's no way to bed! Am I so ill-looking? And you, I swear, have fire in plenty in this body

'I would need to have, to warm you… when you are bedding with your death, my lord! A cold loving!' Low-voiced she said it.

'Fiend take me – death? What i' God's name mean you, wench?' The man stared at her, actually shook her. 'What fool's talk is this? Are you crazed, girl?'

'I think you do not know the Master of Gray very well – or you would not ask,' she said. 'Nor would you be in this chamber.'

'Gray? I know him well enough to have lost three hundred crowns to him at cards this night, damn him! I will have some return, 'fore God!'

'You will have your death, my lord – nothing surer,' she told him gravely. 'And I would not wish that. You are too proper a man to die so young, for such a cause. And your wife and bairns deserve better, I think.'

Astonished, perplexed, Moray drew back a little, the better to consider her. 'Burn me – never have I heard the like!' he muttered.

'I believe it, sir. But never, I think, have you sought to injure the Master of Gray. My father.'

'Ha!' It was the first time that Mary had publicly claimed the Master as her sire – even though few at Court had any doubts of the fact. The Earl rubbed his chin.

'He is fond of me – otherwise I should not be coming to London with you,' Mary went on, drawing the coverlet over her shoulder again. 'He has other plans for me, I think, than to be your plaything, my lord. And consider well what happened to others who have crossed the Master of Gray! My lord of Morton, the Regent, did so – and died. Ludovick of Lennox's father likewise – and is dead. My lord of Arran, the Chancellor – he fell, and is no more. Even my lord of Gowrie, they do say, his uncle…'

'God's curse!' Moray all but whispered, staring at her. 'What are you? Devils both?'

She answered him nothing, but looked him in the eye, unwinking.

He drew himself up to his full and impressive height, mustering a short laugh. 'Do not think that you frighten me, young woman!' he said.

'I think it not. You are a man, and bold. It is I that am frightened,' she answered simply. 'For you. I cannot think that I shall pleasure you, sir.'

The young Earl drew a long breath, opened his mouth to speak, and then shut it again almost with a click. He turned on his heel, strode to the door, threw it wide, and went stamping out.

Mary Gray sank down on her bed, trembling. Dark-eyed she looked through the open doorway. 'Forgive me, Uncle Patrick,' she whispered. 'God forgive me!'

For long she sat thus, motionless, before she rose and closed that door.

The next morning Moray was silent and withdrawn, and rode with his wife. Patrick, in the best of spirits, sought to draw him, and was rebuffed. He turned his attention to the Countess, and soon had that featherhead whinnying high laughter, to her husband's marked offence. Mary, save for being perhaps a little paler than usual, slightly darker about the eyes, was her quietly composed self. But when presently, as they skirted the low rolling Cleveland Hills, so much tamer than their Scottish uplands, Patrick began to sing once more, it was not long before she joined her voice to his. Moray eyed them both askance.

So they pressed steadily southwards. By the time that they reached the flat lands of Lincolnshire, two days later, the Earl was himself again, prepared to chat and even laugh with Mary – as he should have been, for she was at pains to be most kind to him. Now it was Patrick Gray's turn occasionally to eye them both, thoughtfully.

They came to London eleven days after leaving Edinburgh – and smelt the stench of it for miles before they reached its close-packed streets and teeming alleys, Patrick explaining that there being little in the way of hill and sea breezes in this flat inland plain, the cities here must needs stink worse than their windy Scots counterparts. Wait until they reached the oldest and most densely populated area near the river, he warned them.

Mary, for one, although much excited and impressed by the vastness of the sprawling city, the noise and bustle of the narrow thoroughfares and dark field lanes, where every prospect revealed but deeper labyrinths of crazily crowding, soaring, overhanging and toppling tenements, taverns, warehouses, booths and the like, all built of wood unlike Edinburgh's grey stone masonry – Mary was soon all but nauseated by the smell of it, dizzy with the clangour and ceaseless stir of milling humanity, and suffering from a claustrophobia engendered by the endless tall inward-leaning buildings that all but met over their heads to shut out the sky and seeming about to fall in upon them. She did not wonder in the least, and was duly thankful, when Patrick's shouted enquiries elicited the information that Elizabeth – good Queen Bess, as they called her – was not presently occupying her palace of Whitehall, in the midst of all this, but was down the Thames at Greenwich some five more miles to the east, where presumably the air would be at least breathable.

As the now much extended Scots company of about fifty threaded and worked its slow way through the congestion and turned eastwards parallel with the river, Moray demanded of a substantial burgher standing in the doorway of a handsome house with an elaborate hanging sign, what all the church bells were ringing for, in the middle of a week-day afternoon. The man eyed him with astonishment mixed with both scorn and suspicion, and pointed out that no true and loyal citizen need ask such a question. Nettled at his tone, the Earl replied sharply that they were travellers from Scotland, and in the habit of receiving civil answers to civil questions.

'If that's where you are from, cock, then belike you should heed well those bells,' the other returned, spitting at their horses' hooves. 'You'll be heathen of some sort, if not traitorous and bloody Papists, for sure. Those bells, I tell you, ring for the joyful examining and burning of thrice-damned recusants, priests and Jesuits! Aye – and for four days they have rung without cease, by the Queen's command. And Bess, God preserve her, will keep them ringing for four more, I warrant!'

'You mean… men are being burned? Now? Catholics? For their faith? Their religion?'

'To be sure they are, simpleton – praise God! Two score but three burned yesterday – and they do say that one lived two hours from his disembowelling. Sweet Jesu, I wish I could ha' seen it!'

'Faugh, man…!'

As Mary blenched, Patrick leaned over to jerk her horse's rein and urge the beast forward – but not before she heard their informant declare that if they cared to ride round by the Bridewell they would see a row of Jesuits and Papists hanging by their hands all day in preparation for tomorrow's burnings – which should be most apt warning to all traitors, Scotchies and other enemies of the good Bess.

'Lord!' Moray exclaimed, as they rode on. 'Is this how they treat Catholics here. F faith, the Kirk has much to learn, it seems!'

With a quick shake of the head Patrick glanced towards Mary. 'They are still afraid of Spain, with Guise and Philip in league, and Spanish soldiers as near as Brittany. There may be profit for Scotland in that same, let us not forget.' He changed the subject, abruptly for that man. 'There is the river, Mary. Down yonder lane. You just may see it. The first time that I came to see Elizabeth Tudor, we met her there. On the water. It was a notable ploy. Perhaps Davy… perhaps your father has told you of it?'

Despite the Master's spirited and graphic account of that adventure five years before, the girl hardly heard a word of it. Her ears rang much too full of the jangling of those church bells. It was as though she listened tensely to hear indeed what other sounds those bells hid and covered up. London seemed to be full of clamorous churches that afternoon. Even she sniffed at the tainted air, as though to test what dire elements it carried. Almost she wished that she had never contrived to accompany this embassage.

A mile from Greenwich Park, they were surprised to be met by a brilliant escort of gentlemen sent out to greet the Scots envoys in the name of the Queen. It appeared that Mr. Secretary Walsingham, that grim shadow on England's fair countenance, although reputed to be an ailing man, kept himself and his royal mistress as well informed as ever – so much so that the tall and slender, darkly-handsome man with the haughty manner but flashing smile, who led the party, knew even that he was going to meet the Earl of Moray as well as the Master of Gray. Since of deliberate policy no courier had been sent on ahead to herald their approach, this knowledge was the more remarkable.

'I rejoice to see you again, Patrick,' the spokesman declared, sketching a bow. 'Rejoice too that you are, I perceive, like to dazzle us, as ever! This will be my lord of Moray, of whom we have heard? Your servant, my lord. Her Grace sends you both greetings, and would welcome you to her Court.'

It was noticeable that the speaker's distinctly arrogant glance, whatever his words, slipped quickly away from both Patrick and Moray, quite passed over the Countess and lingered unabashedly on Mary Gray, in keen and speculative scrutiny.

'Her Grace is most kind, Walter. We are sensible of so great an honour – as of your own presence. This, my lord, is Sir Walter Raleigh, whose fame has reached even poor Scotland. And Sir Francis Bacon, if I mistake not? And h'm, others, of no doubt like distinction… if that were possible! So much brilliance, I swear, quite overwhelms us humdrum northerners. Gentlemen – the Countess of Moray.'

'Enchanted, your ladyship.'

'Your devoted and humble servitor, madam. And, er, the other, Patrick?'

'A young relative of mine, no more – attendant upon the Countess,' the Master informed briefly.

'Ah!'

'Relative? Precisely. How fortunate is her ladyship! Come, then…'

Mary Gray rode towards Greenwich Park surrounded by such a glittering galaxy of male elegance and wit as ought to have quite intoxicated her – had she not still heard through the gay chatter and heaped and extravagant compliments, the echo of those jangling bells.

The travellers were installed, not in Greenwich House itself, which like James's Falkland was small as royal palaces went, but in a goodly house in the town, near the park gates. Here Mary did not have to roost in any remote garret room, but was allotted what seemed to her far too magnificent an apartment on the main floor, intercommunicating in fact with the Master's own. The dandified courtier who conducted them to these quarters clearly took her to be Patrick's mistress – a misconception which nobody troubled to correct.

So commenced a strange interlude for the Scottish party, a period of waiting which was both amusing and galling, flattering and the reverse, superficially active and basically futile and frustrating. They were treated with the utmost cordiality and courtesy. Hospitality was showered upon them, invitations without number. Seldom was there not some lord or gallant calling upon them. Gifts of fruit and comfits and even flowers came to them from the palace daily, many with verbal messages of goodwill and greeting from the Queen herself. Life was an incessant round of festivities, receptions, entertainments, routs and balls. But at none was Elizabeth herself present – although at many she was expected to be just about to come, or had just left – and no actual summons to her presence was forthcoming from the palace. Moray grew restive, however content was his wife to bask in the sun of a social whirl such as she had never even contemplated – for Elizabeth's Court was the most brilliant in the world at this period – and Mary frequently questioned the Master on what all this delay portended. But Patrick himself was unruffled, serene, at his most attractive, all good humour and high spirits, making no hint of complaint. He explained to the girl that this was not untypical of Elizabeth Tudor. Although one of the greatest monarchs in Christendom, with a head as shrewd as any of her counsellors, she loved to demonstrate that she was all woman, to keep everyone about her on tenterhooks, to play the contrary miss even on her glittering throne. None must ever know just where they stood with Elizabeth, even her closest and oldest advisers. Patrick smiled, and added that he thought that perhaps she would particularly apply this contrariness to himself.

'To you?' Mary wondered. 'You mean – yourself? Not just to this embassage?' And at his nod, 'Why to you, Uncle Patrick? Can you be so important to the Queen of England?'

'Why yes, I think so, my dear. Overweening modesty was never my greatest failing!' Laughing, he took her hand.

It was late at night, the eighth night of their sojourn at Greenwich, all but morning indeed, after a great ball and masque at the house of the Earl of Essex, where Sir Francis Bacon had presented Mr. Burbage's players in a notable play by a new young man from the Midlands named William Shakespeare, entitled Love's Labour's Lost – vastly entertaining. Mary was sitting up in her great bed, all bright-eyed eager liveliness, with little of sleep about her, and the man sitting on the edge of the bed. Often he came in from his own room, day or night, to talk with her, clearly enjoying her company, frankly admiring her loveliness, caring nothing how tongues might wag. Nor was Mary any more concerned, never experiencing the least fear or embarrassment in his presence -however fearful she was over much that he did.

'This Queen is a cruel and evil woman, I think,' Mary said. 'How you can mean much to her – sufficient for her to play such games with you, to hold you off thus, yet to send these flowers and gifts – I know not. I do not understand it, Uncle Patrick.'

'I believe that you are a Utile unfair on the great Gloriana, child. I would not call her evil. And I conceive her to be no crueller than the rest of her delightful sex – yourself included, given the occasion, my dear! She is a queen, the reigning prince of this great realm, and statecraft, as I have told you ere this, demands stern measures as well as kindly, cunning

as well as noble gestures. For Elizabeth, statecraft is her life. She is England, in a fashion that no Scots monarch has ever been Scotland. And… I have bested her more than once! Hence her present display of feminine contrariness.'

'You – you have bested Queen Elizabeth?'

'Why yes, my pigeon – I think that I have. And hope to again, bless her!'

Intently the girl looked at him. 'Did she not best you? Did she not once best you grievously? Did she not betray you shamefully to Chancellor Maitland? Deliberately. Causing you to be taken and tried for treason? Over the death of our good Queen Mary, whom she murdered? So that you all but lost your life?'

He stroked his chin. 'I suppose that is true, Mary. But… statecraft is a ploy in which one must learn to let bygones be bygones. Revenge and vindictiveness are luxuries that may not be afforded in affairs of the realm. Especially towards a reigning prince. I can nowise drag Elizabeth off her throne. Yet because she sits on that throne, I may achieve much of benefit. I would be a fool, would I not, to prefer to remember that it once suited her policy to be rid of me?'

'I see,' Mary considered him gravely. 'She might be so suited again.'

'Aye, she might.' He laughed, fondling her smooth bare arm. 'But enough of such matters – no talk for a girl lacking her beauty-sleep. We shall await Gloriana's pleasure, since we can do no other – and then seek to pit our wits against hers. For all dealing with Elizabeth is such – like swordplay. She has to be approached with a fresh and unprejudiced mind. But, you – you are not wearying, my dear? Finding your time to hang heavily? You, who have half of our ageing Elizabeth's pretty boys running after you, paying you court instead of her? I vow she will be sending for us soon, if only in sheerest desperation to be rid of you, my sweet!'

The young woman shook her head. 'I am not wearying, no. I like it very well,' she said frankly. 'But I do not flatter myself that the flattery of these gentlemen is more than that… nor their court more than a step towards winning into my bed.'

'H'mmm.' Patrick's stroking of her arm paused for a moment. 'I faith, you are… plain-spoken, girl,' he said, blinking a little. 'For your years. But… I give thanks at least that you are not swept off your dainty little feet by these gentry. Even Raleigh himself, I notice, seems over-eager. You are new and fresh, of course – a freshness that the Court ladies here notably lack. And devilish attractive, although I say it myself…!'

'Thank you. Sir Walter, I think, feels it necessary to conquer every new lady,' she said. 'He seeks to do so very spendidly. I would not wish to distress him that he has failed to conquer my heart – so long as that will content him. As I have told him.'

'On my soul, you have! Damme – that could be a dangerous hand to play! You think… you think that you can play it, lass? At your age? With such experienced gallants as these?'

'Why yes, Uncle Patrick – I think so. None of these fine gentlemen, you see, are one half so pressing as was Nick the stable-boy at Inchture. Or even the blacksmith's son of Longforgan.'

Swallowing audibly, the Master rose to his feet. 'Is that so?' he said, moistening his lips. 'I… ah… I perceive that I am but beating the air, my dear. Left far behind you. You must forgive me.' He took a pace or two away, and then came back to the bed. 'Moray,' he said, in a different tone. 'You have no trouble with Moray, I hope, Mary?'

It was the girl's turn to blink a little. 'Why, no,' she answered, after only a moment. 'My lord and I understand each other very well, I think.'

'I am glad of that,' he said. 'You must tell me if it should turn out… otherwise.' Patrick stooped to kiss her. 'Goodnight, my dear. Tell me… am I getting old, think you?'

Her soft laugh was very warm, as her arms went up to coil round his neck. 'You are younger than I am, I do believe, Uncle Patrick!' she said.

The very next evening they saw Elizabeth. They were all at a great entertainment of dancing and music given by the Earl of Oxford in the Mirror Ballroom of Greenwich House itself – for the Queen preferred her subjects, in especial such as basked in the light of her favour, to provide the festivities for her multitudinous Court out of their pockets rather than her own. An interlude of dancing apes, dressed male and female in the very height of fashion, was just concluding with the females beginning to lewdly discard their clothing, to the uproarious delight of the company, when a curtain of silence fell gradually upon the crowded colourful room. All eyes turned from the grotesquely posturing monkeys towards the far end of the mirror-lined apartment. Only a slightly lesser hush had descended when the apes had been brought in, and at first Mary Gray anticipated only another such diversion, and anyway could see little for the throng. Then, as everywhere women sank low in profound curtsies, and men bowed deeply, and so remained, she could see over them all. She caught her breath, dazzled.

The dazzlement was by no means merely metaphorical. The brilliance of what she saw actually hurt the girl's eyes – so much so that, initially, detail was blurred and lost in the blaze of radiance. Scintillating, flashing in the light of a thousand candles, and duplicated to infinity by the mirrors on every hand, a figure stood just within the doorway – a figure indeed rather than a person. It was only as Mary stared, scarcely believing her own eyes, that she belatedly perceived two facts; one, that there was a pair of very keen and alive pale eyes glittering amidst all this brilliance; and two, that she herself was the only other person standing fully upright in all that assembly, and in consequence that those searching eyes were fixed full upon her. Down the young woman sank.

The tap-tapping of a sharp heel on the floor was the imperious signal that all might resume the upright. Elizabeth Tudor came on into the ballroom on the arm of her host Edward de Vere, Earl of Oxford, with an almost tense and deliberate pacing, as though she held herself in from more rapid motion, and on all sides men and women pressed back to give her clear and ample passage. Even now Mary could scarcely discern the pale thin features of the woman herself, so extraordinary was their framework. The Queen was dressed all in white satin, but in fact little of this material was to be seen, so thick encrusted was it with gems and jewels. Her gown was rigid enough to have stood upright on its own, so closely sewn was it with diamonds, emeralds, rubies, in clusters and galaxies and designs. Her great upstanding ruff, which forced her to hold her head so stiffly, was pointed and threaded with literally hundreds of small pearls and brilliants. Hanging from her neck were at least a dozen long ropes of great pearls. Her once-red hair, now covered with an orange wig, had a myriad of pearls large and small threaded on many of the hairs. Above it a pearl and diamond tiara was perched. Her fingers were so beringed that they could scarcely bend, and her wrists and forearms were sheathed in bracelets of white enamel studded with more gems. All this, coruscating and sparkling in the bright light, was so overwhelming on the eye as to leave the beholder dazed, dizzy. Its absurdity was on such a scale as to benumb the critical faculties.

Woe betide anyone, however, who equated that absurdity with weakness or vapidity of character, took such outward display as indicative of emptiness within. Elizabeth's passion for precious stones was a weakness indubitably, but there was strength enough in other directions to counter-balance many such. None who knew her were ever so foolish as to allow themselves to be deceived.

The Queen paced stiffly round the great and respectful company, throwing a brief word here, a thin smile there, once hooting a coarse laugh at some whispered remark of Oxford's, poking a diamond-studded finger into the padded ribs of my lord of Essex, frowning impatiently at one unfortunate lady who, when curtsying, slipped a heel on the polished dancing floor and thudded down on one knee. It was the respect, awe almost, which so much impressed Mary Gray – so different a reaction to that inspired by King James in his courtiers and subjects. Which the girl found strange indeed, for Elizabeth in her own way was almost an incongruous and ridiculous a figure, on the face of it, as was her distant cousin of Scotland. Fascinated, the girl watched.

Elizabeth moved hither and thither amongst Oxford's guests, but though time and again she came close to the Master of Gray and the Earl of Moray, always she veered off. Almost certainly she was deliberately avoiding them, for it was unthinkable that she did not know well of their presence there; Walsingham and his horde of spies, had for years seen to it that Elizabeth was the best-informed monarch in Christendom. Mary glanced at Patrick sidelong. The man was his smiling assured self – although Moray was much otherwise, flushed and plucking at his pointed golden beard.

The Queen circled back eventually to the little group that stood actually alongside the Scots party – Raleigh, Francis and Anthony Bacon and the Lord Mountjoy. With them abruptly she was a changed woman, vivacious, easy, swift in gesture, rallying the young men, her strange pale golden-green eyes darting. Mary, watching closely, was sure that those eyes flickered more than once over in their own direction, but no move, no hint of acknowledgement of their presence, was vouchsafed.

Elizabeth was now in her fifty-seventh year, and in the girl's youthful eyes, was showing her age, although her clear and absolutely colourless complexion was still extraordinarily free of wrinkles. She was not beautiful, nor had ever been; the long oval of her face, high aquiline nose, faint eyebrows and thin tight lips, precluded it; but when animated, there was an undoubted attractiveness in her features, a magnetism that was not to be denied.

Suddenly, with a ringing laugh, she turned away from the four young men, ordering Oxford to proceed with the evening's entertainment, presenting only her stiffly upright back to the Scots emissaries in the process, and went pacing off towards the head of the room amidst the consequent stir. Seldom could there have seemed a more deliberate snub.

'My God…!' Moray growled. 'This is not to be borne!'

It was the Master of Gray's laughter that rang out now, and more melodiously than had the Queen's. 'My lord – you are a notable performer at the glove and the ball, we know. But this is a more delicate sport – and he who holds his hand to the last round may win the game!' He by no means lowered his voice to make this comment, and undoubtedly Raleigh and the rest heard him, possibly even the receding Elizabeth herself.

Oxford gave a signal to the musicians in the gallery, and thereafter Elizabeth led the stately measures of the first dance with her host as partner. Couples were slow to be first to venture out in the Queen's company, and only two or three had in fact been bold enough to make a move when Patrick, bowing to Mary, took her by the arm and swept gracefully out into mid-floor with her. For a few moments, although others were circling on the perimeter, only these two pairs were out in the centre of the room, the target of all eyes. Patrick guided Mary so that they passed very close indeed to the Queen and Oxford. Darkly smiling eyes met and held narrowed golden-green ones, and then they were past. The Master chuckled in the girl's ear.

'Heigho!' he said. 'Two can play this game. Let Gloriana pretend now that our presence is unknown to her!'

'I think that Her Grace is not greatly going to love me!' Mary murmured.

'Tush, lass – Elizabeth admires best those who stand up to her… if so be it she does not chop off their heads! And she can scarce do that to the King of Scots' envoys!'

After only a minute or two more of the dance, the Queen abruptly adandoned it, indeed abandoned the ballroom altogether, stalking off through the doorway by which she had entered, Oxford hurrying in her imperious wake. Few failed to notice the fact, Mary included.

'She has gone,' she told her partner. 'She is set against us, quite.'

'Wait,' Patrick advised. 'She is not gone for good, otherwise the music would have been stopped, and we would be all bowing and scraping. Wait you, moppet.'

They had not long to wait, in fact. The first bars of music for the next dance were just being struck up when Sir Walter Raleigh came to touch the Master on the arm.

'Her Grace commands the presence of my lord of Moray and yourself, with your ladies, in the ante-room,' he said expressionlessly. 'Come.'

'Indeed? We are ever at the Queen's commands, of course. We were about to dance this pavane, however. Perhaps…?'

'I think that would be inadvisable, Patrick.'

'Ah – you think it? Perhaps you are right. You agree, my lord? Lead on then, Walter.'

Elizabeth was seated in a throne-like chair in a smaller chamber beyond the ballroom, Oxford and Essex at her back. As the visitors made the required obeisance, she smiled graciously.

'Welcome to our Court and presence, once more, Master Patrick,' she said pleasantly. 'I see that you appear to be nowise disadvantaged from heretofore. I congratulate you on your… resurgence. I think, almost, that you are indestructible!'

'You are kind, Highness – as always. And more adorably beautiful than ever!' Patrick stepped forward, sank on one knee, took the proffered bejewelled hand, and raised it to his lips. 'It is like the summer returned to be put in Your Grace's presence once more.' It was noticeable that he retained a hold of the royal fingers.

The Queen looked down at him quizzically. 'You ever were a talented liar, Patrick!' she observed. She twitched her hand away from his grasp, then, almost flicking his face with the hard diamonds in the process. 'Impudent!' she snapped.

'Say, rather, overwhelmed and beside myself, Lady!' he amended gently, rising.

'I doubt it, sir – God's death, I do! But nor am I overwhelmed, I'd assure you! Be certain of that, my friend. If anyone is beside himself, I conceive it to be my peculiar cousin of Scotland, who can still consider you a worthy emissary!'

'On your own recommendation, Madam, I am grateful to say!' Smiling, Patrick half-turned. 'May I present to Your Grace my prince's other emissary – my lord the Earl of Moray, close kinsman to the King.'

'Aye, I have been noting him! A better-made man than you, Patrick – and more honest, I hope! Welcome, my lord – in ill company as you are!'

Moray, obviously uneasy, uncertain how to take all this, bowed stiffly over Elizabeth's outstretched hand. 'I present my prince's traist greetings and salutations, Your Grace.'

To be sure, to be sure. No doubt. But not your own – eh, sir?' the Queen rejoined dryly. 'I have heard you named bonnie, my lord – and perhaps with some slight cause. At least you are bonnier than your late good-father and uncle, the previous Moray! For he was as sour-faced a knave as any it has been my lot to meet!' Elizabeth opened her mouth, and then clapped a hand to it in a seemingly impetuous and girlish a gesture as might be imagined. 'Sweet Jesu – a pox on my runaway tongue!' she declared, eyes busy. This will be his daughter? You must forgive an old woman's scattered wits, my dear.'

The Countess, flustered and speechless, curtsied, glance darting towards her husband, who seemed all but choking. 'Your Grace…!' that man spluttered. 'Yes, my lord?'

When the other found no words, and Patrick seemed about to intervene, smiling still, Elizabeth raised a hand to halt him.

'Tell me, my lord of Moray – how many bastards besides your father and goodfather did the late King James of pious memory produce? On ladies of noble blood, I mean, naturally

since the rest can be ignored. It was always been a question of some doubt with me. Once, I thought that I could count seventeen – but since I had no fewer than five named James amongst that total, I grew confused. Perhaps no proper count was kept?'

The Earl's good-looking ruddy features grew almost purple, but the Queen went on before he could speak.

'And this,' she said, turning to look at Mary now, 'is the wench of whom I have not failed to hear! An interesting face is it not, Patrick? Even though it need not show its mislike of me so plainly! Your name, child?'

'Mary Gray, Your Grace.'

'Aye. It could scarcely be other! I wonder, Patrick – have I wronged you? Or… not wronged you enough?' She was patently comparing the two Gray faces, feature by feature. 'A fascinating problem, I vow! What do you find so amiss in me, child? Come – tell me.'

Mary shook her head gravely. 'I would not dare to find aught amiss with the Queen of England, Madam, in her own palace.'

'Ha! Minx! That is as good as to admit you mislike! What ails you at me? Out with it, I say. Be quiet, Master of Gray! Speak but when you are spoken to!'

The girl chose her words carefully, but with no sign of agitation. 'I but wonder, Your Grace, why so great and powerful a princess should act so. Assuredly there must be a reason.'

Elizabeth's jewelled shoe tapped the floor. 'Act so…?' she repeated. 'You, in your wisdom and experience, chit, conceive it that I act amiss as a princess? On my soul, this intrigues me! And you seek a reason for my actions?' 'Why yes, Highness.' 'And have you thought of one?' 'No, Your Grace. Not yet.'

The Queen barked a brief laugh at that. 'Fore God – you are candid, at least! Like that other you once brought to my Court, Patrick – the natural brother that you miscalled secretary. Was not Davy his name? Aye, Davy Gray. He had the same critical eye, the same damned uncomfortable honesty! Unlike yourself, Patrick! And yet… and yet the likeness between you two, otherwise, is not to seek! A strange contradiction, is it not?'

'Not so strange, Highness – since Davy Gray had the upbringing of Mary here,' Patrick told her.

'Ah – so that is it? The upbringing, you say? But not, perhaps, the begetting?' She smiled, looking from one to the other. 'I perceive it all now. A remarkable situation. I see that you deserve my sympathy, child, rather than my just ire. To be such as you are, to have in you such opposing strains -to be Patrick and Davy Gray both! God help you!' The Queen leaned back in her chair. 'But enough of this,' she said, changing her tone. 'Is my young cousin of Scotland in good health? He has sent me no poems, of late. He is not sickening?'

'His Grace is much distressed, Madam, in awaiting his bride. The Princess Anne,' Patrick told her. 'These long continuing contrary winds and storms…'

'Ah, yes,' Elizabeth sniffed. 'Had he chosen the Princess of Navarre, as we advised him, he could have spared himself this. You led me to believe, Master of Gray, that you could convince him to that course. And you did not. I do not commend such failures, sir. Navarre is now France, and his sister heir thereto. Here was folly.'

'Admittedly, Highness. Nor have I ceased to point it out. But His Grace had reversed his decision before ever I reached Scotland. Indeed the selfsame day that I arrived there, the Earl Marischal was being sent to Denmark with betrothal gifts.'

'Your prince is advised by fools, I swear! How shall little Denmark serve him? I am much displeased, sir. God help this sweet realm of mine should he and his advisers ever have the ruling of it!'

At her back the two English earls made hurried and fervid protestations that the Queen should even for a moment consider the possibility of such a disaster. Elizabeth, if not immortal, undoubtedly would outlive them all.

Mary shot a troubled glance at the Master, whilst Moray frowned and tugged at his beard.

Patrick seemed nowise upset however. He laughed. 'So far distant an eventuality need scarce trouble us today, Your Grace,' he declared. 'By which time, who knows how much additional wisdom King James will have gained… and how much better advisers!' With something of a flourish, he tossed back the tiny scarlet-lined white satin cloak which hung from one shoulder of his padded doublet, to reach into a deep pocket therein. 'At least in this matter, Madam,' he went on, 'I deem that you will consider His Grace well advised – since I myself was consulted! From King James, Your Highness, with his esteem and devotion.'

Elizabeth's eyes narrowed and then widened, as she stared at what the Master held out to her. Too swiftly for dignity her hand reached out to grasp it. 'A-a-ah!' she breathed.

A great diamond, as large almost as a pigeon's egg, set in a coiling snake of amethysts, hung on a golden chain composed of delicately-wrought smaller serpents, each in its tail clutching a pearl.

The Queen, thin lips parted, held the jewellery up to the light, turned it this way and that so that it all flashed and glittered, as did the rest of her sparkling, shimmering display, stroking her finger-tips over the polished surfaces, weighing, assessing, gloating, her breathing heightened, her hands trembling a little.

'Whence… came… this?' she got out.

'It was one of the late Queen Mary's gifts from her first husband, the Dauphin of France,' Patrick answered easily, without the flicker of an eyelid. 'It was found in one of the houses of the deplorable lord of Morton, but recently.'

'It was… hers!'

'Aye. Who more fitting to have it than yourself, in consequence, Madam?'

Elizabeth's eyes met his for a long moment, her lips moving slightly. But no words issued therefrom.

It was Moray who broke the silence. He too delved into a pocket and brought forth a little gold casket, cunningly wrought to represent a beehive which, when its tip was pressed, opened on hinges to reveal a brooch sitting in a velvet nest within, in the lifelike form of a great bee, fashioned wholly in gold and precious stones.

'Also from King James,' he announced, but omitted to proffer with it any message of devotion or regard.

Almost absently the Queen took the casket from him with one hand, whilst in the other she still caressed the diamond and chain. 'I thank you, my lord,' she said, more or less automatically. 'You will thank His Grace for me, for his munificence… ' But her glance returned almost at once to the Master's face, to the first gift, and back again.

Moray cleared his throat. 'I shall do so, Highness,' he agreed brusquely. 'Now – as to the subject of our visit, it is our prince's request that you…'

'In due course, my lord – in due course,' Elizabeth interrupted. 'Not now.'

The earl blinked. 'But, Madam – we have waited… waited…'

'A mere day or so, my lord. Is King James in such pressing need that we must discuss his rescue at my good lord of Oxford's entertainment?' Suddenly the Queen was her commanding, assured self again. 'So do not I the state's business, sir. Anon, I say. I shall inform you of a suitable occasion.'

Before Moray could reply, Patrick spoke, quickly. 'We are grateful for this gracious audience, Highness, for your royal acceptance of these toys and of our master's fair wishes. We shall wait your further summonses assured of your kindly goodwill towards our prince… and even perhaps towards our humble selves?'

'Do that, Patrick,' Elizabeth agreed, cryptically. 'My thanks for these… tokens. I shall consider the quality of your advice to King James.' Her pale eyes flickered over diem all -and came to rest on Mary Gray. 'You have given me food for thought,' she added. 'All of you. You have my permission to retire.'

They bowed, and backed out, Raleigh still with them.

Although Patrick might have remained to partake of more of Lord Oxford's hospitality, none of the others were so inclined. Moray was seething with ill-suppressed rage, and caring not that Raleigh perceived it.

When they were safely out of Greenwich House, and alone, the Earl burst forth. 'The bitch! The arrogant, grasping, ill-humoured bitch! Fiend seize her! This is not to be borne. To be insulted thus! Mocked at – by that barren harridan! I'll thole no more of it, Gray, I tell you. It's home to Scotland for us – forthwith. I'll not stay to be spat upon by yon Jezebel..!'

'We must first perform what we came for, my lord…'

'How shall we do that, in God's name? She will have none of us, the harridan! She will snatch at your gifts, but give us nothing in return. She is set against us, man. Even you must see it. There is no profit for us or King Jamie here.'

'I think that you misjudge the matter somewhat, my lord,' Patrick declared, soothingly. 'I believe our case is less ill than you imagine. I know Elizabeth…'

'Then I do not congratulate you, sir! You may swallow her insults and play toady to her – but I will not. Not for King James, or Christ God Himself! I ride for Scotland tomorrow. We have wasted too long here already.'

'As you will, my lord. I cannot stop you. But I think it unwise. I have a card or two yet to play…'

'Play them then, sir – but play them without me!'

'I shall, if I must

Later, in the privacy of her own room, it was Mary's turn to speak. 'Is not my lord of Moray right?' she put to Patrick. 'This Queen will serve you no good. She hates Scotland, I think – or she would not treat its envoys so. She hates our King, her heir though he is. She basely slew his mother. Will it indeed serve any purpose to wait on her longer, Uncle Patrick?'

*Why yes, my dear – I believe that it may. Do not judge Gloriana too sorely. She is not just what she seems, as I have discovered. And recollect that we are the beggars – not Elizabeth. We desire much from her – and she knows it. She needs nothing from Scotland – save only peace…'

'And our Queen Mary's jewels!'

'M'mmm. Jewels are her weakness, yes – and thank God for it! Jewels and young men.'

'She did not greatly esteem my lord of Moray.'

'She might have done – had he played her aright. For he is good to look at. But he was too hasty. I fear he has no gift for statecraft… '

'Why did you advise King James to send the Queen that great jewel, Uncle Patrick? Surely that was ill done? The good Queen Mary's, whom this Elizabeth murdered…'

'Hush girl – watch your words! In Walsingham's England, even walls have ears! And what you say is foolishness. Queen Mary has no further need of such. They are the King's now. And this was the finest – the most apt to please Elizabeth and bring her to think kindly of our embassage…'

'But your embassage is but to gain money from her – this pension. Surely the jewel itself is worth a great sum? To give it to her, when it is worth…'

'It is worth a great deal, yes – but only what men will give for it. In money. The King needs money, siller, not jewellery. No lord in all Scotland has sufficient to buy yon toy – even if he wanted it. Scotland is ever short of money, lass. It is the blight of the land.'

'I see. Only one of the blights, I think.' She shrugged slender shoulders. 'So you think that the Queen may be kinder to you hereafter?'

'That is my hope.'

'It may be so,' the girl said slowly, thoughtfully. 'I think that she may have misjudged you – as she said. I think that my presence with you has harmed you with her, Uncle Patrick – and I am sorry. No doubt she was informed that I was close to you. She would believe that I was your doxy, bedding with you – as I think do many. That she would not like, for she is foolish enough to desire that all men around her think only of herself, I do believe. But now – she has seen me, seen us together. She knows the truth of what is between us -for her eyes are sufficiently sharp. I think that she will relent, perhaps, towards you. If that is what caused her to keep us waiting.'

Stroking his chin, the Master looked at her wonderingly. 'You… you continue to surprise me, Mary,' he said. 'Where did you get the wits in that pretty head of yours? Heigho – it

must have been from myself, I suppose, for your mother, though fair and kind, is scarcely so gifted! Yes – you may well be right. It may be as you say..'

A knocking at the door of Patrick's adjoining room interrupted him, and drew him through thereto. A servant stood there, and beside him a messenger in the royal livery.

'The Master of Gray?' this functionary enquired. 'The Queen's Grace commands your presence in her private apartments forthwith, sir.'

'Ah! She does? Then… then, sir, the Queen's Grace must be obeyed of course. Instanter. Give me but a moment… '