Part 55 (1/2)
”They, and above all my poor maid, will be comforted to have done their utmost,” she said; ”but I scarcely care that they should prevail. As I have written to my cousin Elizabeth, I am beholden to her for ending my long captivity, and above all for conferring on me the blessings and glories of one who dies for her faith, all unworthy as I am!” and she clasped her hands, while a rapt expression came upon her countenance.
Her chief desire seemed to be that neither Cicely nor her foster-father should run into danger on her account, and she much regretted that she had not been able to impress upon Humfrey messages to that effect before he wrote in answer to his father, sending his letter by Cavendish.
”Thou wilt not write again?” she asked.
”I doubt its being safe,” said Humfrey. ”I durst not speak openly even in the scroll I sent yesterday.”
Then Mary recurred to the power which he possessed of visiting Sir Andrew Melville and the Almoner, the Abbe de Preaux, who were shut up in the Fetterlock tower and court, and requested him to take a billet which she had written to the latter. The request came like a blow to the young man. ”With permission-” he began.
”I tell thee,” said Mary, ”this concerns naught but mine own soul. It is nothing to the State, but all and everything to me, a dying woman.”
”Ah, madam! Let me but obtain consent.”
”What! go to Paulett that he may have occasion to blaspheme my faith and insult me!” said the Queen, offended.
”I should go to Sir Drew Drury, who is of another mould,” said Humfrey-
”But who dares not lift a finger to cross his fellow,” said Mary, leaning back resignedly.
”And this is the young gentleman's love for your Grace!” exclaimed Jean Kennedy.
”Nay, madam,” said Humfrey, stung to the quick, ”but I am sworn!”
”Let him alone, Nurse Jeanie!” said Mary. ”He is like the rest of the English. They know not how to distinguish between the spirit and the letter! I understand it all, though I had thought for a moment that in him there was a love for me and mine that would perceive that I could ask nothing that could damage his honour or his good faith. I-who had almost a mother's love and trust in him.”
”Madam,” cried Humfrey, ”you know I would lay down my life for you, but I cannot break my trust.”
”Your trust, fule laddie!” exclaimed Mrs. Kennedy. ”Ane wad think the Queen speired of ye to carry a letter to Mendoza to burn and slay, instead of a bit scart of the pen to ask the good father for his prayers, or the like! But you are all alike; ye will not stir a hand to aid her poor soul.”
”Pardon me, madam,” entreated Humfrey. ”The matter is, not what the letter may bear, but how my oath binds me! I may not be the bearer of aught in writing from this chamber. 'Twas the very reason I would not bring in my father's letter. Madam, say but you pardon me.”
”Of course I pardon you,” returned Mary coldly. ”I have so much to pardon that I can well forgive the lukewarmness and precision that are so bred in your nature that you cannot help them. I pardon injuries, and I may well try to pardon disappointments. Fare you well, Mr. Talbot; may your fidelity have its reward from Sir Amias Paulett.”
Humfrey was obliged to quit the apartment, cruelly wounded, sometimes wondering whether he had really acted on a harsh selfish punctilio in cutting off the dying woman from the consolations of religion, and thus taking part with the persecutors, while his heart bled for her. Sometimes it seemed to him as if he had been on the point of earning her consent to his marriage with her daughter, and had thrown it away, and at other moments a horror came over him lest he was being beguiled as poor Antony had been before him. And if he let his faith slip, how should he meet his father again? Yet his affection for the Queen repelled this idea like a cruel injury, while, day by day, it was renewed pain and grief to be treated by her with the gentlest and most studied courtesy, but no longer as almost one of her own inner circle of friends and confidants.
And as Sir Andrew Melville was in a few days more restored to her service, he was far less often required to bear messages, or do little services in the prison apartments, and he felt himself excluded, and cut off from the intimacy that had been very sweet, and even a little hopeful to him.
CHAPTER XLI.
HER ROYAL HIGHNESS.
Cicely had been living in almost as much suspense in London as her mother at Fotheringhay. For greater security Mr. Talbot had kept her on board the Mastiff till he had seen M. d'Aubepine Chateauneuf, and presented to him Queen Mary's letter. The Amba.s.sador, an exceedingly polished and graceful Frenchman, was greatly astonished, and at first incredulous; but he could not but accept the Queen's letter as genuine, and he called into his counsels his Secretary De Salmonnet, an elderly man, whose wife, a Scotswoman by birth, preferred her husband's society to the delights of Paris. She was a Hamilton who had been a pensionnaire in the convent at Soissons, and she knew that it had been expected that an infant from Lochleven might be sent to the Abbess, but that it had never come, and that after many months of waiting, tidings had arrived that the vessel which carried the babe had been lost at sea.
M. de Chateauneuf thereupon committed the investigation to her and her husband. Richard Talbot took them first to the rooms where Mrs. Barbara Curll had taken up her abode, so as to be near her husband, who was still a prisoner in Walsingham's house. She fully confirmed all that Mr. Talbot said of the Queen's complete acceptance of Cis as her daughter, and moreover consented to come with the Salmonnets and Mr. Talbot, to visit the young lady on board the Mastiff.
Accordingly they went down the river together in Mr. Talbot's boat, and found Cicely, well cloaked and m.u.f.fled, sitting under an awning, under the care of old Goatley, who treated her like a little queen, and was busy explaining to her all the different craft which filled the river.
She sprang up with the utmost delight at the sight of Mrs. Curll, and threw herself into her arms. There was an interchange of inquiries and comments that-unpremeditated as they were-could not but convince the auditor of the terms on which the young lady had stood with Queen Mary and her suite.