“It must be stopped. François, you must stop it. I cannot bear it.”
The Duke was looking at her coldly, the Cardinal in astonishment.
“Your Majesty should resume your seat,” said the Cardinal. “Your Majesty sets a bad example to others present.”
The Duke cried: “My wife and now my niece! By the saints, this is a sad day for Guise and Lorraine.”
The Queen-Mother came forward and laid a hand on Mary’s shoulder. She looked at the Guises with understanding. She had been flirting with the Protestant cause and was anxious to show the powerful brothers—since they were at the moment in the ascendant—that she was with them.
“Your Majesty will never know how to reign if you do not learn how to administer justice,” she said.
François looked at his wife eagerly when she resumed her seat.
He took her hand and tried to soothe her. But she was sickened by the stench of blood. She would never think of Amboise after this, she was sure—dear, beloved Amboise from whose eminence she had looked down on the mingling streams of the Loire and the Amasse—without remembering this terrible day.
She knew, in that moment, that she was afraid not only of Catherine but of her uncles; never, until now, had she realized what an empty title she bore. Her dignity was touched; her anger grew. These terrible deeds were done in her name—hers and that of François. These poor men were crying for mercy to her and to François, and by sitting here, meekly looking on, she and François were registering their approval of the deeds which were done in their names.
She could not stop the slaughter; she knew that. But she would not sit quietly and see it done.
“I will not stay here, François,” she said firmly. “I will not.”
“Hush!” he soothed. “Hush, dearest! They will hear. We have to stay. They say so.”
“You are the King,” she murmured.
The color was glowing in her face now as she went on: “The King may remain if he wishes. The Queen shall not.”
She made to rise. Her uncle, the Cardinal, was beside her; she felt his hands forcing her into her seat.
“François,” she cried, “you are the King.”
And in that moment—for the first time in his life—François was the King.
He rose, and suddenly a new dignity came to him. He said: “Monsieur le Cardinal, I command you to take your hands from the Queen.”
There was silence on the balcony. In very astonishment the Cardinal had dropped his hands to his sides.
“You wish to go to your apartments?” said François to Mary.
His mother came forward. “My son,” she said, and there was the venom of the serpent in her cold eyes and her cold voice, “it is the duty of the King and Queen to see that justice is done. Remember you are the King.”
“I do remember, Madame,” said François. “And I would ask you to do so. You also, Cardinal. Come, Mary. You wish to retire. Then let us go.”
He took Mary’s hand and led her from the balcony. No one attempted to stop them. François, for one short moment, was indeed King of France.
FRANÇOIS’S GLORY was short-lived. He had not the courage to sustain his new role. He realized that he had succeeded merely because he had taken those clever enemies of his by surprise.
The Cardinal’s long mouth continued to sneer at him, continued to command. His mother was forever at his side. He was growing weaker. There was an abscess in his ear which caused him great pain, and Monsieur Paré could do little to ease it. Each day his strength seemed to wane.
He knew that the people did not love him and that they blamed him for the terrible things which were happening under the reign of the Guises.
Rumors concerning the young King spread throughout the country.
“The King suffers from a wasting disease,” was whispered. “It is terrible in its consequences and a miracle that he lives at all. He only does so by drinking the blood of freshly killed babies.”
Wherever the King rode, the people called their children to them in terror; they bolted and barred their doors in the villages through which he passed.
“When my father rode abroad,” said François sadly, “the people hurried out to greet him. It was the same with my grandfather. Yet they shrink from me; they run from me; they hate and fear me. My father—good man though he was—was responsible for the death of many; my grandfather too. Yet they loved these Kings and they run from me who have killed no one. Oh, Mary, life is so unfair. Why was I born like this? Why was I not born tall and strong like my father and my grandfather? Why cannot I be a king, since I am born a king … as they were? Why do I have to be the tool of the Cardinal? I hate the Cardinal. I hate him… hate him….”
The Cardinal had come into the room. He was smiling slyly, but Francois’s grief was too deep for him to care for the Cardinal’s contempt. He ran to the man, grasped his padded robes and shook him.
He cried: “I believe it is you they hate. I do not believe it is their King. They know I would not hurt them. It is you they hate… you… you! Why don’t you leave us alone? Why don’t you go away—then we shall know whom it is the people hate… you or me… you or me.” Francois’s voice rose to a shriek as he cried: “Renard lasche le roi!” Then he turned away and covered his face with his hands.
The Cardinal laughed. “Is this a raving lunatic?” he asked of Mary. “I had thought to parley with the King of France, and I am confronted by a madman.”
“He is not mad,” said Mary. “He has just awakened. He is no longer a boy to be led. He has discovered that he is the King.”
“These are wild words,” said the Cardinal sadly, “and foolish ones. I would not have expected to hear them from you.”
Mary thought of all the care he had given her, but she thought also of the love François had always had for her. She would never forget as long as she lived how, because she had been in distress on the balcony, he had forgotten his fear and in the face of all those whose displeasure he dreaded he had, for her sake, remembered he was a king.
François had begun to sob hysterically. He cried: “You are afraid… you are more afraid than I. You are afraid of an enemy’s dagger. That is why your clothes are padded. That is why the fashion of cloaks and boots must be changed. In the fashions we see signs of the Cardinal’s cowardice.”
“It would seem to me,” said the Cardinal, “that the King is deranged. Perhaps I should call the Queen-Mother. I thank God that there are others who could readily take his place should his mind become too deranged for him to wear the crown.”
Mary cried: “Should you call him deranged because he seeks to remind you that he is the King of France?”
The Cardinal looked at the sobbing boy. “There is the most cowardly heart that ever beat inside the body of a king,” he muttered.
“I beg of you, do not try him too far,” said Mary.
The Cardinal snapped his sparkling fingers to imply his contempt for the King.
Mary’s eyes flashed. “Do not be so sure that you are right, my uncle. I am not the foolish girl you seem to think me. I know what is happening here—and in Scotland. You, and my uncle, have set the English against me. You may well have lost me my Scottish crown.”
The Cardinal looked at her in horror. His face was stern as he said: “This I cannot endure. I have given my devotion to you. I have thought of nothing but your welfare since you came to France. I have cherished you. I have loved you more than any living person. And you talk to me like this! You break my heart.”
Mary looked at him in anguish. What had she said? It was true that he had loved her. No one had cherished her as he had. She, remembering those intimate moments which they had shared, could not bear to see his proud head bent.