Unknown to History: A Story of the Captivity of Mary of Scotland by Yonge (best book club books for discussion TXT) 📖

this gentleman as Cis Talbot returning to her service."

Elizabeth bent her head as though assenting thoughtfully.

"How shall I thank you, gracious Queen?" cried Cicely, joining hands in a transport, but Elizabeth sharply cut her short.

"What means the wench? I have promised nothing. I have only said I will look into this strange story of thine, and consider this proposal—that is, if thy mother, as thou callest her, truly intend it—ay, and will keep to it."

"That is all I could ask of your Majesty," said Cicely. "The next messenger after my return shall carry her full consent to these conditions, and there will I abide your pleasure until the time comes for her to be conducted to her convent, if not to see your face, which would be best of all. O madam, what thanks will be worthy of such a grace?"

"Wait to see whether it is a grace, little cousin," said Elizabeth, but with a kiss to the young round cheek, and a friendliness of tone that surprised all. "Messieurs," she added to the ambassadors, "you came, if I mistake not, to bring me this young demoiselle."

"Who has, I hope, pleaded more effectually than I," returned Bellievre.

"I have made no promises, sir," said the Queen, drawing herself up proudly.

"Still your Majesty forbids us not to hope," said Chateauneuf.

Wherewith they found themselves dismissed. There was a great increase of genuine respect in the manner in which Bellievre handed the young lady from the Queen's chamber through the gallery and hall, and finally to the boat. No one spoke, for there were many standing around, but Cicely could read in a glance that passed between the Frenchmen that they were astonished at her success. Her own brain was in a whirl, her heart beating high; she could hardly realise what had passed, but when again placed in the barge the first words she heard were from Bellievre.

"Your Royal Highness will permit me to congratulate you." At the same time she saw, to her great joy, that M. de Chateauneuf had caused her foster-father to enter the barge with them. "If the Queen of Scotland were close at hand, the game would be won," said Bellievre.

"Ah! Milord Treasurer and M. le Secretaire are far too cunning to have let her be within reach," said Chateauneuf.

"Could we but have bound the Queen to anything," added Bellievre.

"That she always knows how to avoid," said the resident ambassador.

"At least," said Cicely, "she has permitted that I should bear the terms to my mother at Fotheringhay."

"That is true," said Chateauneuf, "and in my opinion no time should be lost in so doing. I doubt," he added, looking at Richard, "whether, now that her Highness's exalted rank is known, the embassy will be permitted to remain a shelter to her, in case the Queen should demand her of me."

"Your Excellency speaks my thought," said Richard. "I am even disposed to believe that it would be wiser to begin our journey this very day."

"I grieve for the apparent inhospitality and disrespect to one whom I honour so highly," said Chateauneuf, "but I verily believe it would be the wiser plan. Look you, sir, the enemies of the unfortunate Queen of Scotland have done all in their power to hinder my colleague from seeing the Queen, but to-day the Lord Treasurer is occupied at Westminster, and Monsieur le Secretaire is sick. She sent for us in one of those wilful moods in which she chooses to assert herself without their knowledge, and she remains, as it were, stunned by the surprise, and touched by her Royal Highness's pleading. But let these gentlemen discover what has passed, or let her recover and send for them, and bah! they will inquire, and messengers will go forth at once to stop her Highness and yourself. All will be lost. But if you can actually be on the way to this castle before they hear of it—and it is possible you may have a full day in advance—they will be unable to hinder the conditions from being laid before the Queen of Scots, and we are witnesses of what they were."

"Oh, let us go! let us go at once, dear sir," entreated Cicely. "I burn to carry my mother this hope."

It was not yet noon, so early had been the audience, and dark and short as were the days, it was quite possible to make some progress on the journey before night. Cicely had kept the necessaries for her journey ready, and so had Mr. Talbot, even to the purchase of horses, which were in the Shrewsbury House stables.

The rest of the mails could be fetched by the Mastiff's crew, and brought to Hull under charge of Goatley. Madame de Salmonnet was a good deal scandalised at Son Altesse Royale going off with only a male escort, and to Cicely's surprise, wept over her, and prayed aloud that she might have good success, and bring safety and deliverance to the good and persecuted Queen for whom she had attempted so much.

"Sir," said Chateauneuf, as he stood beside Richard, waiting till the girl's preparations were over, "if there could have been any doubts of the royal lineage of your charge, her demeanour to-day would have disproved them. She stood there speaking as an equal, all undaunted before that Queen before whom all tremble, save when they can cajole her."

"She stood there in the strength of truth and innocence," said Richard.

Whereat the Frenchman again looked perplexed at these incomprehensible English.

Cicely presently appeared. It was wonderful to see how that one effort had given her dignity and womanhood. She thanked the two ambassadors for the countenance they had given to her, and begged them to continue their exertions in her mother's cause. "And," she added, "I believe my mother has already requested of you to keep this matter a secret."

They bowed, and she added, "You perceive, gentlemen, that the very conditions I have offered involve secrecy both as to my mother's future abode and my existence. Therefore, I trust that you will not consider it inconsistent with your duty to the King of France to send no word of this."

Again they assured her of their secrecy, and the promise was so far kept that the story was reserved for the private ear of Henri III. on Bellievre's return, and never put into the despatches.

Two days later, Cicely enjoyed some of the happiest hours of her life. She stood by the bed where her mother was lying, and was greeted with the cry, "My child, my child! I thought I never should see thee more. Domine, nunc dimittis!"

"Nay, dearest mother, but I trust she will show mercy. I bring you conditions."

Mary laid her head on her daughter's shoulder and listened. It might be that she had too much experience of Elizabeth's vacillations to entertain much hope of her being allowed to retire beyond her grasp into a foreign convent, and she declared that she could not endure that her beloved, devoted child should wear away her life under Elizabeth's jealous eye, but Cis put this aside, saying with a smile, "I think she will not be hard with me. She will be no worse than my Lady Countess, and I shall have a secret of joy within me in thinking of you resting among the good nuns."

And Mary caught hope from the anticipations she would not damp, and gave herself to the description of the peaceful cloister life, reviewing in turn the nunneries she had heard described, and talking over their rules. There would indeed be as little liberty as here, but she would live in the midst of prayer and praise, and be at rest from the plots and plans, the hopes and fears, of her long captivity, and be at leisure for penitence. "For, ah! my child, guiltless though I be of much that is laid to my charge, thy mother is a sinful woman, all unworthy of what her brave and innocent daughter has dared and done for her."

Almost equally precious with that mother's greeting was the grave congratulating look of approval which Cicely met in Humfrey's eyes when he had heard all from his father. He could exult in her, even while he thought sadly of the future which she had so bravely risked, watching over her from a distance in his silent, self-restrained, unselfish devotion.

The Queen's coldness towards Humfrey had meantime diminished daily, though he could not guess whether she really viewed his course as the right one, or whether she forgave this as well as all other injuries in the calm gentle state into which she had come, not greatly moved by hope or fear, content alike to live or die.

Richard, in much anxiety, was to remain another day or two at Fotheringhay, on the plea of his wearied horses and of the Sunday rest.

Meantime Mary diligently wrote the conditions, but perhaps more to satisfy her daughter than with much hope of their acceptance.

CHAPTER XLIII. THE WARRANT

"Yea, madam, they are gone! They stole away at once, and are far on the way to Fotheringhay, with these same conditions." So spoke Davison, under-secretary, Walsingham being still indisposed.

"And therefore will I see whether the Queen of Scots will ratify them, ere I go farther in the matter," returned Elizabeth.

"She will ratify them without question," said the Secretary, ironically, "seeing that to escape into the hands of one of your Majesty's enemies is just what she desires."

"She leaves her daughter as a pledge."

"Yea, a piece of tinsel to delude your Majesty."

Elizabeth swore an oath that there was truth in every word and gesture of the maiden.

"The poor wench may believe all she said herself," said Davison. "Nay, she is as much deluded as the rest, and so is that honest, dull-pated sailor, Talbot. If your Majesty will permit me to call in a fellow I have here, I can make all plain."

"Who is he? You know I cannot abide those foul carrion rascals you make use of," said Elizabeth, with an air of disgust.

"This man is gentleman born. Villain he may be, but there is naught to offend your Majesty in him. He is one Langston, a kinsman of this Talbot's; and having once been a Papist, but now having seen the error of his ways, he did good service in the unwinding of the late horrible plot."

"Well, if no other way will serve you but I must hear the fellow, have him in."

A neatly-dressed, small, elderly man, entirely arrayed in black, was called in, and knelt most humbly before the Queen. Being bidden to tell what he knew respecting the lady who had appeared before the Queen the day before, calling herself Bride Hepburn, he returned for answer that he believed it to be verily her name, but that she was the daughter of a man who had fled to France, and become an archer of the Scottish guard.

He told how he had been at Hull when the infant had been saved from the wreck, and brought home to Mistress Susan Talbot, who left the place the next day, and had, he understood, bred up the child as her own. He himself, being then, as he confessed, led astray by the delusions of Popery, had much commerce with the Queen's party, and had learnt from some of the garrison of Dunfermline that the child on board the lost ship was the offspring of this same Hepburn, and of one of Queen Mary's many namesake kindred, who had died in childbirth at Lochleven. And now Langston professed bitterly to regret what he had done when, in his disguise at Buxton, he had made known to some of Mary's suite that the supposed Cicely Talbot was of their country and kindred. She had been immediately made a great favourite by the Queen of Scots, and the attendants all knew who she really was, though she still went by the name of Talbot. He imagined that the Queen of Scots, whose charms were not so imperishable as those which dazzled his eyes at this moment, wanted a fresh bait for her victims, since she herself was growing old, and thus had actually succeeded in binding Babington to her service, though even then the girl was puffed up with notions of her own importance and had flouted him. And now, all other hope having vanished, Queen Mary's last and ablest resource had been to possess the poor maiden with an idea of being actually her own child, and then to work on her filial obedience to offer herself as a hostage, whom Mary herself could without scruple leave to her