‘In July of that year, my cousin sent a message for me to come to her. She had what we wanted. I went to her straightway, across the loch, and found her waiting for me with a bag, waterproofed and sealed with beeswax. It contained the dead foetuses of twins, miscarried just hours earlier, still attached to their navel strings, with the placenta, all immersed in pig’s blood from the butcher.
‘I kissed my cousin and offered her silver, which she would not accept. She was helping me for the love of our sovereign and for the love of God. The bag was easy to conceal in my gowns, and I returned with it across the water to the island of Lochleven. For the next few hours we waited our moment. We needed a time when the other ladies and servants were dining and I and the Lady Mary Seton were alone with the Queen. Our chance came in the late evening, just before darkness fell.’
Shakespeare listened intently. Sir Francis Walsingham had once told him that Mary had miscarried twins at Lochleven. There had never been any doubt that it had happened, for the Lord Lindsay and other rebels had come to her the next day on one of their regular visits and had seen her, weeping, still in her bloody clothes and bedding, and had lain their eyes on the dead foetuses before they were taken away for burial in unconsecrated ground. ‘It was a good deed that God did that day,’ Walsingham had said. ‘For a claimant born to the adulterous Scots devil and her co-conspirator in murder would have shaken the very earth of Scotland and England.’ Now this woman, this nun and one-time maidservant to Mary, Queen of Scots, seemed to be telling a different tale.
‘We had to be quick, but we accomplished our task. The Queen lay on her bed and we spread the pig’s blood all about her nether parts and on the sheets. Then we placed the foetuses and placenta in a bowl as if it were she that had miscarried twins. Finally, with much ado, we called for help. The other women came and saw what seemed to have happened and there was much sorrowing and wailing. Lady Mary Seton’s design had worked, but the deception was far from complete. We still had to bring Her Majesty to term and protect her baby.
‘Every month from then on, I would bring in pig’s blood to soak in rags and sprinkle about her bedding to show that she had been brought to her flowers in normal kind, as any woman who is not with child. All this time, of course, she was putting on weight, but she wore loose gowns and her weight gain was attributed to her great sadness, an increased appetite and her lack of proper exercise, so that no one questioned it. And why should they have? For all were certain that she had lost her babies, as they thought.
‘At last, on the thirtieth day of November, she was delivered of a healthy boy. Her throes were thankfully short, no more than two hours, and we stifled her groans and cries with cushions. We had been most fearful that the child would arrive when others less well disposed were about, but God smiled upon us. Apart from me, there were in attendance her other maidservant, who was a Frenchwoman, the Lady Mary Seton and Her Majesty’s private physician, who had by then been brought to her prison household. He was afraid, but she swore him to secrecy, that he would tell no man what was happening on the hazard of his immortal soul.
‘As soon as the child was born, there was no time to lose, for sooner or later the wails would be heard. I took the baby away that night by the ferry, all wrapped tight in swaddling and huddled inside my cloak. He had been well fed by his mother’s milk to make him sleep, and I also gave him a sleeping draught of brandy and herbs so that he should not wake. At one point on the short ferry journey to Kinross the baby stirred, but I was talking loudly to the ferryman and offering him wine to keep his mind distracted, and he seemed to hear nothing of the bairn. And so we arrived safe and I handed the child to my cousin, who found him a wet nurse.
‘The wet nurse never knew whose baby she fed for the next six months, but she fed him well and he grew strong and bonny. At last my sovereign lady escaped and fled to England, where she was to end her days, but I did not go with her. I took charge of the baby boy and, with the help of a certain gentleman, brought him across the sea to Spain, where he was raised to be a king and one day claim his inheritance. And that is my story, sir. Simply told, but true in every detail.’
The tale sounded true to Shakespeare. It had been so guilelessly told that none could doubt it. But what was the old nun’s motive in telling it? Perez wanted money, so did Cabral — but what did the old woman want? He put the question to her.
‘I told you, sir, I want the prince to claim his inheritance. If James the Sixth should die without issue, he must become king of Scotland and heir to the throne of England. It is what Queen Mary always wished and why she wished so desperately that the boy should survive.’
‘Why did you say nothing before?’
Sister Madeleine smiled. ‘Because Walsingham would have despatched an assassin to do away with him.’
‘And now?’
‘Now he is here in England ready to take his rightful place.’
‘No one will believe this. There would need to be proof.’
‘There is proof. And there are witnesses. For the time left to me, I will bear witness. My cousin still lives, as does the Queen’s physician at Lochleven Castle. And though she is now frail and confined to her convent in Rheims, the Lady Mary Seton will tell her story. There are letters, too, in Queen Mary’s hand, which mention her baby’s birthmark. Fear not, Mr Shakespeare, there is no doubt. There will be no doubt in any man’s mind when the Prince steps forward.’
‘When will that be?’
‘Soon enough.’
‘Where exactly is he?’
‘I cannot say.’
‘Cannot — or will not?’
The old woman said nothing. Her dim eyes did not waver. Shakespeare turned to look at Ana, who stood as still as a rock and gave nothing away.
‘What is this prince’s name, Sister Madeleine?’
‘Francis Philip Bothwell Stuart.’
‘You must tell me his whereabouts,’ Shakespeare commanded. ‘It is treasonable not to.’
‘I am not English, Mr Shakespeare. And you have no threats to frighten a dying woman. Truly, I would accept martyrdom as a blessing.’
Shakespeare rose from the bed. He turned once again to Ana Cabral. ‘You shall have your gold, Dona Ana,’ he said. ‘Come to me in London. I must ride from here without delay.’
‘Of course, Mr Shakespeare. I would not have expected it otherwise. But take care as you leave, for you are unarmed — and there are those here who do not wish you well.’
Chapter 15
For hours, as daylight turned to night, Boltfoot watched the stockade of Godstone powdermill from the woods. He observed the comings and goings of those who worked there and those who visited until, in the end, exhaustion took him and he slept beneath a blanket of leaves.
He was startled awake by a sound of cracking twigs and rustling leaves. He did not move but listened. There were whispers. In the thin light he could make out the shapes of two men carrying what looked like heavy staves. Were they charcoal-colliers? Unlikely. Honest workmen would not lower their voices so. They were ten yards from him, moving stealthily away, towards the powdermill. He allowed them to go on further, then followed, silently, as a bowman stalks a deer.
From their manner of walking he took one to be an older man and one a youth. Close by the stockade they stopped. The older one stood in the shelter of a tree. On the outside of the stockade there was a series of pitch lanterns, the flames safely enclosed in sides of thin, translucent horn so that no errant sparks should fly. Boltfoot could see now that the men did not carry staves but muskets. They were dressed in common countrymen’s clothes; coarse wool breeches, frayed and torn jerkins of hide and felt caps about their heads and ears. The older man waited at the tree with both the muskets while the younger crawled forward on his belly. Boltfoot saw immediately that he was making his way towards a hole in the palisade. He disappeared through it like a fox going to earth.