Mary Queen of Scotland and the Isles

by Margaret George

  She smiled with delight. “A waterproof box in a beer barrel! How ingenious!”

  Her eyes were shining.

  * * *

  She did not dare to write any letters, lest it was a hoax and Paulet would swoop down upon her, search her rooms, and find them. But she waited, so anxiously that she was glad the nights were so long in the January cold, so that others could not see her nervously tossing and turning. She, who usually talked so freely, hugged this secret to herself, praying that it was true.

  January sixteenth came, a cold, clear day. There would be no trouble in the cart making its journey from Burton-upon-Trent, twelve miles away. It was Saturday, and the routine was somewhat relaxed, in comparison with the rest of the week. The laundresses passed in and out—searched down to their shifts by Paulet’s women—and the miller delivered his flour. Then Mary saw the cart, with its huge barrel, creaking up the entrance road. It lumbered across the drawbridge and finally stopped in the courtyard. The fat driver called for help, and soon three guards were struggling to hoist the barrel down. In the meantime, the empty one from the week before was being rolled out.

  Mary clutched at Nau’s sleeve. “Is it in there?” she whispered. “Is it really there?”

  “We will have to wait, and send a page down to the cellar. It would not do for me to go, or even Willie.”

  She wished she still had her little clock, or even an hourglass. She had no way of setting a time to wait. “Let us count to a hundred,” she said. “No, let us say a rosary!”

  When the rosary had been recited, Nau peeked out the window and saw that the brewer’s cart had gone. He called over one of the pages, the one who always helped him with his regular duties, and gave him the instructions. The boy nodded gravely, and was gone.

  Mary went to her private corner—the one where she was never to be disturbed—and waited. She could not even pray; she tried to suspend her thoughts. Soon enough, Nau was wordlessly handing her a leather-wrapped package. She rose and, drawing him aside with her, unwrapped it.

  Inside lay two letters.

  Her heart was pounding, and she hardly dared open the first. But she did, and quickly.

  My dearest sovereign lady and Queen,

  This is to vouchsafe the bearer, Mr. Gilbert Gifford, as someone in complete accord with our mission. You may safely confide in and employ the same, a deacon in our own Holy Mother Church, devoted to your cause. His uncle dwells within ten miles of Chartley.

  Yours to command, in loving obedience,

  Thomas Morgan.

  Mary gave a long sigh, almost like a cry. It had been so long!

  She unfolded the second, and read it. It was from the French ambassador, and it merely affirmed the authenticity of the messenger, and said that twenty-one packets of letters were piled up in the French embassy—a year’s worth of correspondence to be forwarded.

  “This is from the French ambassador,” said Mary, “proving that all is in order.”

  She handed it to Nau, and he read it quickly.

  “All my mail! A year’s worth!” she said.

  During the next few days, she spent all her time writing four letters, three to France—to her agent Morgan, her ambassador Archbishop Beaton, and her nephew the Duc de Guise—and one to the French ambassador in London. In them she enclosed the new cipher code to be used for future communications. And to the French ambassador, she wrote assuring him that she had found Gifford a faithful messenger, as he had promised: “You may safely entrust all the letters that have been sent to you for me to this new and devoted agent, through whom you may henceforth safely communicate with me.”

  * * *

  On the last day of February, the French ambassador turned over to Gilbert Gifford a sack containing the twenty-one packets of letters received from all over the world—from Morgan and Paget and Beaton in Paris; from Catholic political exiles and agents in the Netherlands; from Robert Parsons, the Jesuit mastermind, and Sir Francis Englefield in Spain; from the Duc de Guise and the Duke of Parma.

  In March, they began appearing—their seals broken because they had had to be inserted into the small box—at Chartley, and Mary was able to read, for the first time, what had been happening in the outside world since the failure of the Throckmorton Plot.

  She read how the Catholics had lost hope in the promises of Guise and his “Holy League,” and had turned increasingly to Spain and the promise of using Spanish troops to effect an invasion of England. She read that hostile actions between England and Spain had already begun, with the Spanish seizing English shipping, and Elizabeth formally taking the Dutch rebels under her “protection.”

  “Why, Elizabeth has even sent troops over there!” Mary told Nau in disbelief. “And sent her beloved Earl of Leicester to command them!”

  “Ah! With the English so occupied, now will be the time to escape, if ever!” he said. “If the Duke of Parma can just spare a few troops, effect a landing.…”

  “Nau!” she said, clapping her hands to her mouth. “There is a new Pope! Look—Sixtus V! So many changes!”

  “Yes, the world has rushed on, while we mouldered here,” he answered grimly.

  * * *

  In late March the unexpected happened: Nicholas de Cherelles, the French ambassador’s assistant, arrived at Chartley, bringing letters from the royal family in France, and asked to be allowed to deliver them personally to Mary. Paulet made a great show of frowning and complaining, opening the letters himself, and finally saying that it might be allowed, but only if he himself was present.

  The young man was ushered into Mary’s presence, where she was seated on her makeshift throne minus its canopy, and immediately fell to his knees.

  “Oh, Madam,” he said, “to behold your glorious visage is something all true knights long to do!” The words rushed out like a spring torrent.

  “You need not garble your words, nor speak at such a gallop,” said Paulet, “for I understand French well enough, having served Her Glorious Majesty Queen Elizabeth as ambassador there.”

  “It was an honour to have you, sir,” said Cherelles.

  “And how are His Majesty King Henri III and his royal mother?” asked Paulet.

  “Fighting against their cousin Henri of Navarre, and the Duc de Guise,” he replied. “They call it the War of the Three Henris.”

  “Always wars,” said Mary. It saddened her. France had fought itself almost continuously since she had left. This Cherelles—a handsome, blond young man—probably had no memory of anything else.

  He handed her the letters and she opened them, exclaiming how delighted she was to receive a letter, and thanking Paulet for allowing it. While she read, Paulet suddenly was called out, leaving them alone.

  “Madam,” whispered Cherelles, “my master the ambassador bids me ask you to please send him another copy of the cipher. He has lost his! Never fear, it was not stolen, merely an accident. His Excellency’s dog—I see you have dogs also, so you will understand—made a … an accident of nature on it, rendering it illegible.”

  Mary began laughing. By her side, Geddon barked. “Yes, Geddon, we know what he means. Certainly. He shall have it forthwith.”

  Paulet stepped back into the room, muttering. Cherelles took his leave, and after he was gone, Paulet sniffed, “Henri III, so I hear, prefers women’s clothes and men’s company, and carries about little dogs in his bosom.” He looked at her sadly, as if it were her fault.

  XXI

  Walsingham reached across his desk and took a small stoppered medicine bottle, and, after removing the top, drank directly from it. The bitter taste of the physic—made with sorrel from Cecil’s own medicinal garden—hurt his throat, but it was supposed to be good for those suffering from a “feeble stomach,” and Walsingham’s was decidedly feeble. He was minded to settle his stomach before Phelippes arrived.

  Not only his stomach, but his leg was acting up these days. It always did, just before the full warmth of spring came. But now, in the luxury of blooming mid-
May, he would soon be on the mend.

  May. He had the casement windows open wide to let in the sweet, soft air. Petals were falling from the apple tree just outside. Why, it was on just such a May morning that Anne Boleyn had walked to the scaffold and paid the price for her treason. He had always thought that the date made it all the harder to die.

  This time next year, will the Bosom Serpent still be alive? he thought. Or will she be going to her execution? Or—God forbid!—will we still be intercepting her letters and hoping for a means of undoing her?

  Phelippes knocked, and Walsingham admitted him. After offering him some fresh mead, Walsingham reluctantly got up to close the windows. It was sad to have to shut out the May, but spies might rely on just such carelessness and human weakness as a wish to smell the spring.

  He looked at the man with the peculiar narrow eyes, seated before him. He was pleased with him, and with the arrangements he had made.

  “Today’s letters, sir,” said Phelippes, handing them over. “I think you’ll find them of considerable interest.”

  “Hmmm.” Walsingham took out his reading glasses and flipped the letter—or rather Phelippes’s deciphered copy of it—open. “From Mary to her agent Paget—her agent and ours—and another to Mendoza, the Spanish ambassador.” His eyebrows shot up as he read. “So. She has committed herself, in writing, to a plan for Philip to invade England on her behalf. She not only permits it, she strongly encourages it. She makes suggestions about how to go about it. How helpful. I am sure General Parma will treasure these instructions from her, with all her vast experience in battle.”

  “We’ve got her!” said Phelippes. “We’ve got her! When do we notify Elizabeth, and strike?”

  “No, we haven’t got her,” said Walsingham.

  “What?” Phelippes sounded disgusted. “Why do you hold back?”

  “Because we need something more irrefutable than this. What does this tell us that we did not already know? That Mary is in complete sympathy with the enemies of England? That should an invasion come, she will side with them? Who did not know that?”

  “But the evidence! And in writing!”

  “It will never convince Elizabeth that Mary should be done away with. There is no invasion, so the entire thing is an exercise in words. Elizabeth will never consent to the removal of Mary on such a flimsy charge as a nonexistent invasion. Ah, Phelippes … it must be something more compelling.” He sighed. “And, having set up such a perfect trap, we should never betray it unless we are absolutely sure we have what we want.”

  He fingered a leaf from a huge potted plant that was sitting on the floor. The leaves were long and floppy, like a hound’s ears. “Do you know what this is?” he asked Phelippes. “Tobacco. I mind to plant it out at Barn Elms in the country. From the New World. One of the voyages I put a little into has brought back such exotica. Not that I would smoke it, not I…” His voice trailed off as he suffered a stomach pain. Some people said it was good for cramps. Well, perhaps …

  “There’s another letter, coming the other way, from Paget to Mary. The usual plotting and planning.” Phelippes put it in front of Walsingham and looked bored.

  Walsingham read it and, to Phelippes’s surprise, seemed to take it seriously. “So that crazy priest, Ballard, is still running about,” he said. “And has just returned from a conference with Paget. I am beginning to doubt Paget. He may not be ours after all; he has not reported this to us. So Ballard claims that the English Catholics are ready to rise on the instant that Spanish troops land? And Paget has put him in contact with Mendoza. And Ballard has been talking to John Savage, the soldier who swore to kill Elizabeth last summer. Ballard himself went to Rome two years ago, and possibly pledged himself to kill Elizabeth. What does this add up to, Phelippes?” Walsingham drummed his fingers on the desk. “Two plots to kill Elizabeth are joining forces, so it would seem. Where is Ballard now?”

  “According to our agent Bernard Maude, he has just returned to England. He landed at Dover two days ago. He seems to have a passport that permits him to come and go as he will.”

  “And where has he gone?”

  “To London. He’s here now. I took the liberty of having him followed.”

  Walsingham leaned back and smiled. “Good, Phelippes. Good. Now perhaps, if we are very lucky, someone will inform the Scottish Queen about this Ballard-and-Savage plot, and she’ll be foolhardy enough to join it.”

  “Sir, Ballard has a friend in London, an Anthony Babington—”

  “Ah!” Walsingham sat bolt upright and smashed his fist against his palm. “Ah!”

  Phelippes was puzzled. “Sir?”

  “I have it here, I have it here—” Walsingham had jumped up and was yanking open the “Serpent—England” drawer. “Yes, yes, here it is!” He thrust the letter into Phelippes’s hand.

  “Oh, yes, that letter Paget wrote in late April suggesting that the Scots Queen get in touch with Babington. He even sent a draft. You didn’t send it on to Chartley?”

  “No. I was waiting. Now I know why.” He shook his head. “This is why. If Babington can be brought into the plot, and if Mary then somehow becomes involved in it—! Oh, it would be exactly what we have sought! This Babington, tell me what you know about him.”

  Phelippes cocked one eyebrow. “Sir, I am only a lowly decipherer, not actually an intelligence agent. I do not know much about him, other than that he lives in a fashionable part of London and has court connections. You must know about him; you tell me.” He folded his arms and waited.

  “Right gladly. I was just testing you. By the way, Phelippes, I am impressed with your work in this whole operation. And it was truly a stroke of genius to be bold enough to send the French secretary directly to Mary to obtain those ciphers, since we were having trouble with some of the letters. Boldness, boldness! How admirable!” He suddenly laid hold of a dispatch on his desk. “Here’s more boldness, from one of our agents in the Netherlands. Now that’s a spy’s dream, to be there.”

  Phelippes took the lengthy dispatch and skimmed it. There was a lot of information about cannons and horses and stores of ammunition. Then followed a page of poetry. “Poetry?” he snorted. “Why should an agent send poetry?”

  “Poetry can lead to interesting ideas, Phelippes. Do not despise it.” He held out the paper and began quoting, “‘I hold the Fates bound fast in iron chains, and with my hand turn Fortune’s wheel about.’ Is that not what we do, or hope to do? Young Christopher Marlowe here writes about Tamburlaine, but of course he is really writing about Elizabeth and Philip.”

  “Why are all the soldiers poets these days, and all the poets soldiers? They should stick to one trade. What if spies thought themselves poets, and filed all their reports in blank verse?”

  “‘And ’tis a pretty toy to be a poet,’ Marlowe admits. You must learn to understand them, the way the young people think, if you are to use them. Now this Anthony Babington thinks himself a wit, and consorts with poetry-making courtiers like Chidiock Tichborne and Charles Tilney, all Catholics, of course. He comes from an old Catholic family and was once a page in Shrewsbury’s household, where he formed a worshipful attachment to the Scottish Queen. He left six years ago, went to London, got married, joined Catholic secret societies, made the usual journeys back and forth to France to the plotters’ nests. He has even, in the past, acted on her behalf, forwarding and delivering letters. The point is this, Phelippes: she knows him. Better yet, she trusts him. Now if he will just urge this plot on her…”

  “Do you think he will entangle himself in Ballard’s line?”

  “Most likely. He is a firebrand, and six months ago was urging a foolish plot to ‘kill all the councillors at once in Star Chamber.’ Yes, he’ll bite.”

  “And then we’ll bite.”

  “Like the steel jaws of a trap, Phelippes.” He leaned forward and took another draught of the medicine to ease his gnawing stomach pains. He felt as though a steel trap were inside him.

  XXII
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br />   “Roses, roses for all!” Anthony Babington dipped his hand in the silver bowl and drew out a dozen roses, which he began passing around the table to his companions. He took a deep red one and stuck it behind his ear, getting it tangled in dark curls. “These are from my own garden, just gathered this dusk. Is there anything more intoxicating than roses in June?”

  He felt intoxicated. Perhaps it was the lulling, perfumed air that had wrapped itself about him as he strolled, a basket of roses under his arm, to the tavern. Perhaps it was the intimate sounds he heard all about him on the London streets, as desires and secrets spilled out into the open after a winter of confinement. Perhaps it was the promise of a great adventure and service before him. Or perhaps it was just that it was June, and he was twenty-five, and rich.

  “These wear a most delicate scent,” said Charles Tilney. He shut his eyes and inhaled.

  “As delicate as the scent of the Queen’s perfumed gloves?” asked Babington. Tilney was at court as one of Elizabeth’s gentlemen pensioners.

  “Which queen?” asked Tilney. “Our true Queen, or the usurping competitor?”

  “Hush!” said Babington, laughing. “There may be spies about! So let us refer to her as ‘the UC,’ for safety’s sake.” He flourished his wine goblet. The wine, fresh from France, was rosy red and tasted of the sun and soft rain. “Drink all you wish, it’s my pleasure!” he said, passing the flagon around.

  “The UC’s gloves are most delicately perfumed. She cannot stand strong odours. As for our Queen, I cannot know,” admitted Tilney.

  “Well, I do! I can tell you, there’s no creature quite like her,” said Babington. “Her own aroma is like the fragrance of a dream.” He sighed and closed his eyes, remembering.

  Around him at the table were his best friends here in London, men as eager as he to try the great adventure: rescuing a captive queen. And more than that, putting her on the throne she deserved. Babington laughed softly and said, “I have something to show you. It is done!” He pulled a portrait out of a leather bag and stood back from the table, displaying it.