The King thought fit to change his mood, so that it was with uplifted
brows and a quizzing smile at the corners of his mouth that for a minute
he greeted these frightened lords in the doorway. They stood there
silent, the Archbishop very dejected, the Lord d'Espahn, with his grey
beard, very erect and ruddy featured.
'Why, God help me,' the King said, 'what make of Court is this of mine
where a King may not send a messenger to his wife?'
The Archbishop swallowed in his throat; the Lord d'Espahn did not speak
but gazed before him.
'You shall tell me what befell, for I am ignorant,' the King said; 'but
first I will tell you what I do know.
'Why, come out with me into the corridor, wife,' he cried over his
shoulder. 'For it is not fitting that these lords come into thy
apartment. I will walk with them and talk.'
He took the Archbishop by the elbow and the Lord d'Espahn by the upper
arm, and, leaning upon them, propelled them gently before him.
'Thus it was,' he said; 'this cousin of my wife's was in the King o'
Scots' good town of Edinboro'. And, being there, he was much upon my
conscience--for I would not have a cousin of my wife's be there in
exile, he being one that formerly much fended for her....'
He spoke out his words and repeated these things for his own purposes,
the Queen following behind. When they were come to the corridor-end,
there he found, as he had thought, a knot of lords and gentlemen,
babbling with their ears pricked up.
'Nay, stay,' he said, 'this is a matter that all may hear.'
There were there the Duke of Norfolk and his son, young Surrey with the
vacant mouth, Sir Henry Wriothesley with the great yellow beard, the
Lord Dacre of the North, the old knight Sir N. Rochford, Sir Henry Peel
of these parts, with a many of their servants, amongst them Lascelles.
Most of them were in scarlet or purple, but many were in black. The Earl
of Surrey had the Queen's favour of a crowned rose in his bonnet, for he
was of her party. The gallery opened out there till it was as big as a
large room, broad and low-ceiled, and lit with torches in irons at the
angles of it. On rainy days the Queen's maids were here accustomed to
play at stool-ball.
'This is a matter that all may hear,' the King said, 'and some shall
render account.' He let the Lord d'Espahn and the Archbishop go, so that
they faced him. The Queen looked over his shoulder.
'As thus ...' he said.
And he repeated how it had lain upon his conscience and near his heart
that the Queen's good cousin languished in the town of Edinburgh.
'And how near we came to Edinboro' those of ye that were with me can
make account.'
And, lying there, he had taken occasion to send a messenger with others
that went to the King o' Scots--to send a messenger with letters unto
this T. Culpepper. One letter was to bid him hasten home unto the Queen,
and one was a letter that he should bear.
'For,' said the King, 'we thought thus--as ye wist--that the King o'
Scots would come obedient to our summoning and that there we should lie
some days awaiting and entertaining him. Thus did I wish to send my
Queen swift message of our faring, and I was willing that this, her
cousin and mine, should be my postman and messenger. For he should--I
bade him--set sail in a swift ship for these coasts and so come quicker
than ever a man might by land.'
He paused to observe the effect of his words, but no lord spoke though
some whispered amongst themselves.
'Now,' he said, 'what stood within my letter to the Queen was this,
after salutations, that she should reward this her cousin that in the
aforetime had much fended for her when she was a child. For I was aware
how, out of a great delicacy and fear of nepotism, such as was shown by
certain of the Popes now dead, she raised up none of her relations and
blood, nor none that before had aided her when she was a child and poor.
But I was willing that this should be otherwise, and they be much helped
that before had helped her since now she helpeth me and assuageth my
many and fell labours.'
He paused and went a step back that he might stand beside the Queen, and
there, before them all, Katharine was most glad that she had again set
on all her jewels and was queen-like. She had composed her features, and
gazed before her over their heads, her hands being folded in the lap of
her gown.
'Now,' the King said, 'this letter of mine was a little thing--but great
maybe, since it bore my will. Yet'--and he made his voice minatory--'in
these evil and tickle times well it might have been that that letter
held delicate news. Then all my plots had gone to ruin. How came it that
some of ye--I know not whom!--thus letted and hindered my messenger?'
He had raised his voice very high. He stayed it suddenly, and some there
shivered.