“I would know your story. How came you and yours to this pass? Where
were you born? Of what degree are you? And this Michel de la Forêt,
when came he to your feet--or you to his arms? I would know all.
Begin where life began; end where you sit here at the feet of
Elizabeth. This other cushion to your knees. There--now speak. We are
alone.”
Elizabeth pushed a velvet cushion towards Angèle, where she
half-knelt, half-sat on the rush-strewn floor of the great chamber.
The warm light of the afternoon sun glowed through the thick-tinted
glass high up, and in the gleam the heavy tapestries sent by an
archduke, once suitor for her hand, emerged with dramatic
distinctness, and peopled the room with silent watchers of the great
Queen and the nobly born but poor and fugitive Huguenot. A splendid
piece of sculpture--Eleanor, wife of Edward--given Elizabeth by
another royal suitor, who had sought to be her consort through many
years, caught the warm bath of gold and crimson from the clerestory
and seemed alive and breathing. Against the pedestal the Queen had
placed her visitor, the red cushions making vivid contrast to her
white gown and black hair. In the half-kneeling, half-sitting
posture, with her hands clasped before her, so to steady herself to
composure, Angèle looked a suppliant--and a saint. Her pure,
straightforward gaze, her smooth, urbane forehead, the guilelessness
that spoke in every feature, were not made worldly by the
intelligence and humor reposing in the brown depths of her eyes. Not
a line vexed her face or forehead. Her countenance was of a singular
and almost polished smoothness, and though her gown was severely
simple by comparison with silks and velvets, furs and ruffles of a
gorgeous court at its most gorgeous period, yet in it here and there
were touches of exquisite fineness. The black velvet ribbon slashing
her sleeves, the slight, cloudlike gathering of lace at the back of
her head, gave a distinguished softness to her appearance.
She was in curious contrast to the Queen, who sat upon heaped-up
cushions, her rich buff-and-black gown a blaze of jewels, her yellow
hair, now streaked with gray, roped with pearls, her hands heavy with
rings, her face past its youth, past its hopefulness, however noble
and impressive, past its vivid beauty. Her eyes wore ever a
determined look, were persistent and vigilant, with a lurking
trouble, yet flooded, too, by a quiet melancholy, like a low,
insistent note that floats through an opera of passion, romance, and
tragedy; like a tone of pathos giving deep character to some splendid
pageant, which praises while it commemorates, proclaiming conquest
while the grass has not yet grown on quiet houses of the children of
the sword who no more wield the sword. Evasive, cautious,
secretive, creator of her own policy, she had sacrificed her
womanhood to the power she held and the State she served. Vain,
passionate, and faithful, her heart all England and Elizabeth, the
hunger for glimpses of what she had never known, and was never to
know, thrust itself into her famished life; and she was wont to
indulge, as now, in fancies and follow some emotional whim with a
determination very like to eccentricity.
[Illustration: “SHE WAS IN CURIOUS CONTRAST TO THE QUEEN”]
That, at this time, when great national events were forward, when
conspiracies abounded, when Parliament was grimly gathering strength
to compel her to marry; and her council were as sternly pursuing
their policy for the destruction of Leicester; while that very day
had come news of a rising in the north and of fresh Popish plots
hatched in France--that in such case, this day she should set aside
all business, refuse ambassadors and envoys admission, and occupy
herself with two Huguenot refugees seemed incredible to the younger
courtiers. To such as Cecil, however, there was clear understanding.
He knew that when she seemed most inert, most impassive to turbulent
occurrences, most careless of consequences, she was but waiting till,
in her own mind, her plans were grown; so that she should see her end
clearly ere she spoke or moved. Now, as the great minister showed
himself at the door of the chamber and saw Elizabeth seated with
Angèle, he drew back instinctively, expectant of the upraised hand
which told him he must wait. And, in truth, he was nothing loath to
do so, for his news he cared little to deliver, important though it
was that she should have it promptly and act upon it soon. He turned
away with a feeling of relief, however, for this gossip with the
Huguenot maid would no doubt interest her, give new direction to her
warm sympathies, which, if roused in one thing, were ever more easily
roused in others. He knew that a crisis was nearing in the royal
relations with Leicester. In a life of devotion to her service he had
seen her before in this strange mood, and he could feel that she was
ready for an outburst. As he thought of De la Forêt and the favor
with which she had looked at him, he smiled grimly, for, if it meant
aught, it meant that it would drive Leicester to some act which would
hasten his own doom; though, indeed, it might also make another path
more difficult for himself, for the Parliament, for the people.
Little as Elizabeth could endure tales of love and news of marriage;
little as she believed in any vows, save those made to herself;
little as she was inclined to adjust the rough courses of true love,
she was the surgeon to this particular business, and she had the
surgeon’s love of laying bare even to her own cynicism the hurt of
the poor patient under her knife. Indeed, so had Angèle impressed her
that for once she thought she might hear the truth. Because she saw
the awe in the other’s face, and a worshipping admiration of the
great protectress of Protestantism, who had by large gifts of men and
money in times past helped the cause, she looked upon her here with
kindness.
“Speak now, mistress fugitive, and I will listen,” she added, as
Cecil withdrew; and she made a motion to musicians in a distant
gallery.
Angèle’s heart fluttered to her mouth, but the soft, simple music
helped her, and she began with eyes bent upon the ground, her linked
fingers clasping and unclasping slowly.
“I was born at Rouen, your high Majesty,” she said. “My mother was a
cousin of the Prince of Passy, the great Protestant--”
“Of Passy--ah!” said Elizabeth, amazed. “Then you are Protestants
indeed; and your face is no invention, but cometh honestly. No, no,
’tis no accident--God rest his soul, great Passy!”
“She died--my mother--when I was a little child. I can but just
remember her--so brightly quiet, so quick, so beautiful. In Rouen
life had little motion; but now and then came stir and turmoil, for
war sent its message into the old streets, and our captains and our
peasants poured forth to fight for the King. Once came the King and
Queen--Francis and Mary--”
Elizabeth drew herself upright with an exclamation.
“Ah, you have seen her--Mary of Scots,” she said, sharply. “You have
seen her?”
“As near as I might touch her with my hand, as near as is your high
Majesty. She spoke to me--my mother’s father was in her train; as yet
we had not become Huguenots, nor did we know her Majesty as now the
world knows. Then came the King and Queen, and that was the
beginning.”
She paused, and looked shyly at Elizabeth, as though she found it
hard to tell her story.
“And the beginning, it was--?” said Elizabeth, impatient and intent.
“We went to court. The Queen called my mother into her train. But it
was in no wise for our good. At court my mother pined away--and so
she died in durance.”
“Wherefore in durance?”
“To what she saw she would not shut her eyes; to what she heard she
would not close her soul; what was required of her she would not do.”
“She would not obey the Queen?”
“She could not obey those whom the Queen favored. Then the tyranny
that broke her heart--”
The Queen interrupted her.
“In very truth, but ’tis not in France alone that Queen’s favorites
grasp the sceptre and speak the word. Hath a queen a thousand
eyes--can she know truth where most dissemble?”
“There was a man--he could not know there was one true woman there,
who for her daughter’s sake, for her desired advancement, and because
she was cousin of Passy, who urged it, lived that starved life; this
man, this prince, drew round her feet snares, set pitfalls for her
while my father was sent upon a mission. Steadfast she kept her soul
unspotted; but it wore away her life. The Queen would not permit
return to Rouen--who can tell what tale was told her by one whom she
foiled? And so she stayed. In this slow, savage persecution, when she
was like a bird that, thinking it is free, flieth against the
window-pane and falleth back beaten, so did she stay, and none could
save her. To cry out, to throw herself upon the spears, would have
been ruin of herself, her husband, and her child; and for these she
lived.”
Elizabeth’s eyes had kindled. Perhaps never in her life had the life
at court been so exposed to her. The simple words, meant but to
convey the story, and with no thought behind, had thrown a light on
her own court, on her own position. Adept in weaving a sinuous course
in her policy, in making mazes for others to tread, the mazes which
they in turn prepared had never before been traced beneath her eyes
to the same vivid and ultimate effect.
“Help me, ye saints, but things are not at such a pass in this
place!” she said, abruptly, but with weariness in her voice. “Yet
sometimes I know not. The court is a city by itself, walled and
moated, and hath a life all its own. ‘_If there be found ten honest
men within the city, yet will I save it_,’ saith the Lord. By my
father’s head, I would not risk a finger on the hazard if this city,
this court of Elizabeth, were set ’twixt the fire from heaven and
eternal peace. In truth, child, I would lay me down and die in black
disgust were it not that one might come hereafter would make a very
Sodom or Gomorrah of this land; and out yonder--out in all my
counties, where the truth of England is among my poor burgesses, who
die for the great causes which my nobles profess but risk not their
lives--out yonder all that they have won, and for which I have
striven, would be lost.... Speak on. I have not heard so plain a
tongue and so little guile these twenty years.”
Angèle continued, more courage in her voice: “In the midst of it all
came the wave of the new faith upon my mother. And before ill could
fall upon her from her foes, she died, and was at rest. Then we
returned to Rouen, my father and I, and there we lived in peril, but
in great happiness of soul, until the day of massacre. That night in
Paris we were given greatly of the mercy of God.”
“You were there--you were in the massacre at Paris?”
“In the house of the Duke of Lançon, with whom was resting, after a
hazardous enterprise, Michel de la Forêt.”
“And here beginneth the second lesson,” said the Queen, with a smile
on her lips; but there was a look of scrutiny in her eyes and
something like irony in her tone. “And I will swear by all the stars
of heaven that this Michel saved ye both. Is it not so?”
“It is even so. By his skill and bravery we found our way to safety,
and in a hiding-place near to our loved Rouen watched him return from
the gates of death.”
“He was wounded, then?”
“Seven times wounded, and with as little blood left in him as would
fill a cup. But it was summer, and we were in the hills, and they
brought us, our friends of Rouen, all that we had need of; and so God
was with us.”
“But did he save thy life, except by skill, by indirect and fortunate
wisdom? Was there deadly danger upon thee? Did he beat down the sword
of death?”
“He saved my life thrice directly. The wounds he carried were got by
interposing his own sword ’twixt death and me.”
“And that hath need of recompense?”
“My life was little worth the wounds he suffered; but I waited not
until he saved it to owe it unto him. All that it is was his before
he drew his sword.”
“And ’tis this ye would call love betwixt ye--sweet givings and
takings of looks, and soft sayings, and unchangeable and devouring
faith. Is’t this--and is this all?”
The girl had spoken out of an innocent heart, but the challenge in
the Queen’s voice worked upon her, and, though she shrank a little,
the fulness of her soul welled up and strengthened her. She spoke
again, and now in her need and in her will to save the man she loved,
by making this majesty of England his protector, her words had
eloquence.
“It is not all, noble Queen. Love is more than that. It is the waking
in the poorest minds, in the most barren souls, of something greater
than themselves--as a chemist should find a substance that would give
all other things by touching of them a new and higher value; as
light and sun draw from the earth the tendrils of the seed that else
had lain unproducing. ’Tis not alone soft words and touch of hand or
lip. This caring wholly for one outside one’s self kills that self
which else would make the world blind and deaf and dumb. None hath
loved greatly but hath helped to love in others. Ah, most sweet
Majesty, for great souls like thine, souls born great, this medicine
is not needful, for already hath the love of a nation inspired and
enlarged it; but for souls like mine, and of so many, none better and
none worse than me, to love one other soul deeply and abidingly lifts
us higher than ourselves. Your Majesty hath been loved by a whole
people, by princes and great men in a different sort--is it not the
world’s talk that none that ever reigned hath drawn such slavery of
princes, and of great nobles who have courted death for hopeless love
of one beyond their star? And is it not written in the world’s book
also that the Queen of England hath loved no man, but hath poured out
her heart to a people; and hath served great causes in all the earth
because of that love which hath still enlarged her soul, dowered at
birth beyond reckoning.” Tears filled her eyes. “Ah, your supreme
Majesty, to you whose heart is universal, the love of one poor mortal
seemeth a small thing, but to those of little consequence it is the
cable by which they unsteadily hold over the chasm ’twixt life and
immortality. To thee, oh greatest monarch of the world, it is a staff
on which thou needest not lean, which thou hast never grasped; to me
it is my all; without it I fail and fall and die.”
She had spoken as she felt, yet, because she was a woman and guessed
the mind of another woman, she had touched Elizabeth where her armor
was weakest. She had suggested that the Queen had been the object of
adoration, but had never given her heart to any man; that hers was
the virgin heart and life; and that she had never stooped to conquer.
Without realizing it, and only dimly moving with that end in view,
she had whetted Elizabeth’s vanity. She had, indeed, soothed a pride
wounded of late beyond endurance, suspecting, as she did, that
Leicester had played his long part for his own sordid purposes, that
his devotion was more alloy than precious metal. No note of praise
could be pitched too high for Elizabeth, and if only policy did not
intervene, if but no political advantage was lost by saving De la
Forêt, that safety seemed now secure.
“You tell a tale and adorn it with good grace,” she said, and held
out her hand. Angèle kissed it. “And you have said to Elizabeth what
none else dared to say since I was Queen here. He who hath never seen
the lightning hath no dread of it. I had not thought there was in the
world so much artlessness, with all the power of perfect art. But we
live to be wiser. Thou shalt continue in thy tale. Thou hast seen
Mary, once Queen of France, now Queen of Scots--answer me fairly,
without if, or though, or any sort of doubt, the questions I shall
put. Which of us twain, this ruin-starred Queen or I, is of higher
stature?”
“She hath advantage in little of your Majesty,” bravely answered
Angèle.
“Then,” answered Elizabeth, sourly, “she is too high, for I, myself,
am neither too high nor too low.... And of complexion, which is the
fairer?”
“Her complexion is the fairer, but your Majesty’s countenance hath
truer beauty and sweeter majesty.”
Elizabeth frowned slightly, then said:
“What exercises did she take when you were at the court?”
“Sometimes she hunted, your Majesty, and sometimes she played upon
the virginals.”
“Did she play to effect?”
“Reasonably, your noble Majesty.”
“You shall hear me play, and then speak truth upon us, for I have
known none with so true a tongue since my father died.”
Thereon she called to a lady who waited near in a little room to
bring an instrument; but at that moment Cecil appeared again at the
door, and, his face seeming to show anxiety, Elizabeth, with a sign,
beckoned him to enter.
“Your face, Cecil, is as long as a Lenten collect. What raven croaks
in England on May Day eve?”
Cecil knelt before her, and gave into her hand a paper.
“What record runs here?” she asked, querulously.
“A prayer of your faithful Lords and Commons that your Majesty will
grant speech with their chosen deputies to lay before your Majesty a
cause they have at heart.”
“Touching of--?” darkly asked the Queen.
“The deputies wait even now--will not your Majesty receive them? They
have come humbly, and will go hence as humbly on the instant, if the
hour is ill chosen.”
Immediately Elizabeth’s humor changed. A look of passion swept across
her face, but her eyes lighted and her lips smiled proudly. She
avoided troubles by every means, fought off by subtleties the issues
which she must meet; but when the inevitable hour came none knew so
well to meet it as though it were a dearest friend, no matter what
the danger, how great the stake.
“They are here at my door, these good servants of the state--shall
they be kept dangling?” she said, loudly. “Though it were time for
prayers and God’s mercy, yet should they speak with me, have my
counsel, or my hand upon the sacred parchment of the state. Bring
them hither, Cecil. Now we shall see--Now you shall see, Angèle of
Rouen--now you shall see how queens shall have no hearts to call
their own, but be head and heart and soul and body at the will of
every churl who thinks he serves the state and knows the will of
Heaven. Stand here at my left hand. Mark the players and the play.”
Kneeling, the deputies presented a resolution from the Lords and
Commons that the Queen should, without more delay, in keeping with
her oft-expressed resolve and the promise of her council, appoint one
who should succeed to the throne in case of her death “without
posterity.” Her faithful people pleaded with her gracious Majesty to
forego unwillingness to marry, and seek a consort worthy of her
supreme consideration, to be raised to a place beside her near that
throne which she had made the greatest in the world.
Gravely, solemnly, the chief members of the Lords and Commons spoke,
and with as weighty pauses and devoted protestations as though this
were the first time their plea had been urged, this obvious duty had
been set out before her. Long ago, in the flush and pride of her
extreme youth and the full assurance of the fruits of marriage, they
had spoken with the same sober responsibility; and though her youth
had gone and the old certainty had forever disappeared, they spoke of
her marriage and its consequences as though it were still that
far-off yesterday. Well for them that they did so, for though time
had flown and royal suitors without number had become figures dim in
the people’s mind, Elizabeth, fed upon adulation, invoked, admired,
besieged by young courtiers, flattered by maids who praised her
beauty, had never seen the hands of the clock pass high noon, and
still remained under the dearest and saddest illusion which can rest
in a woman’s mind. Long after the hands of life’s clock had moved
into afternoon, the ancient prayer was still gravely presented that
she should marry and give an heir to England’s crown; and she as
solemnly listened and dropped her eyes, and strove to hide her virgin
modesty behind a high demeanor which must needs sink self in royal
duty.
“These be the dear desires of your supreme Majesty’s faithful Lords
and Commons and the people of the shires whose wills they represent.
Your Majesty’s life, God grant it last beyond that of the youngest of
your people so greatly blessed in your rule! But accidents of time be
many; and while the world is full of guile, none can tell what peril
may beset the crown, if your Majesty’s wisdom sets not apart, gives
not to her country, one whom the nation can surround with its care,
encompass lovingly by its duty.”
The talk with Angèle had had a curious influence upon the Queen. It
was plain that now she was moved by real feeling, and that, though
she deceived herself, or pretended so to do, shutting her eyes to
sober facts and dreaming old dreams--as it were, in a world where
never was a mirror nor a timepiece--yet there was working in her a
fresher spirit, urging her to a fairer course than she had shaped for
many a day.
“My lords and gentlemen, and my beloved subjects,” she answered
presently, and for an instant set her eyes upon Angèle, then turned
to them again, “I pray you stand and hear me.... Ye have spoken fair
words to my face, and of my face, and of the person of this daughter
of great Henry, from whom I got whatever grace or manner or favor is
to me; and by all your reasoning you do flatter the heart of the
Queen of England, whose mind indeed sleeps not in deed or desire for
this realm. Ye have drawn a fair picture of this mortal me, and
though from the grace of the picture the colors may fade by time, may
give by weather, may be spoiled by chance, yet my loyal mind, nor
time with her swift wings shall overtake, nor the misty clouds may
darken, nor chance with her slippery foot may overthrow. It sets its
course by the heart of England, and when it passeth there shall be
found that one shall be left behind who shall be surety of all that
hath been lying in the dim warehouse of fate for England’s high
future. Be sure that in this thing I have entered into the
weigh-house, and I hold the balance, and ye shall be well satisfied.
Ye have been fruitful in counsel, ye have been long knitting a knot
never tied, ye shall have comfort soon. But know ye beyond
peradventure that I have bided my time with good reason. If our loom
be framed with rotten hurdles, when our web is wellny done, our work
is yet to begin. Against mischance and dark discoveries my mind, with
knowledge hidden from you, hath been firmly arrayed. If it be in your
thought that I am set against a marriage which shall serve the
nation, purge yourselves, friends, of that sort of heresy, for the
belief is awry. Though I think that to be one and always one, neither
mated nor mothering, be good for a private woman, for a prince it is
not meet. Therefore, say to my Lords and Commons that I am more
concerned for what shall chance to England when I am gone than to
linger out my living thread. I hope, my lords and gentlemen, to die
with a good ‘Nunc Dimittis,’ which could not be if I did not give
surety for the nation after my graved bones. Ye shall hear soon--ye
shall hear and be satisfied, and so I give you to the care of
Almighty God.”
Once more they knelt, and then slowly withdrew, with faces downcast
and troubled. They had secret knowledge which she did not yet
possess, but which at any moment she must know, and her ambiguous
speech carried no conviction to their minds. Yet their conference
with her was most opportune, for the news she must presently receive,
brought by a messenger from Scotland who had outstripped all others,
would no doubt move her to action which should set the minds of the
people at rest, and go far to stem the tide of conspiracy flowing
through the kingdom.
Elizabeth stood watching them, and remained gazing after they had
disappeared; then, rousing herself, she turned to leave the room, and
beckoned to Angèle to follow.