He had heard of the terrible deaths of Babington, Ballard and those others who had died with them. Sometimes he awoke sweating in the night dreaming that the executioner’s knife was poised above his quivering body. Torture and degrading death on one side . . . Bessie and all that he longed for on the other. Yet what joy could there be for him if he must always live with the knowledge that to gain it he had helped to send his mistress to her death?
He was standing before the Commissioners, and Walsingham was questioning him.
He would not say what they wished him to. Letters from Babington there had been, but the principal accusation against Mary—that she had conspired to assassinate Elizabeth—was false.
He threw back his head and cried: “You, my lords, will have to answer to Almighty God if you should, on false charges, condemn a sovereign Queen.”
The fury in the faces of the Commissioners did not dismay him.
“I ask,” he continued, “that my protestation be made public.”
Curle was smiling at him, for they stood together in this; and it occurred to them both that the evidence they had to give was the most important in the trial.
The Commissioners were not deterred. Such words should not be heard outside the doors of the Star Chamber.
They had come here to pronounce Mary Queen of Scots, guilty and deserving of death.
This they were determined to do.
WALSINGHAM AND BURLEIGH presented themselves to their royal mistress.
“And the verdict?” she asked.
“Guilty, Your Majesty. We cannot find that there is any possible means to provide for Your Majesty’s safety but by the just and speedy execution of the Queen of Scots, the neglecting whereof may procure the heavy displeasure and punishment of Almighty God.”
“I am unwilling,” answered the Queen, “to procure the displeasure and punishment of God, yet in my heart I remember this is a Queen and my cousin. Tell me, were all in agreement as to this verdict?”
Walsingham and Burleigh exchanged glances. “There was one, Your Majesty, who declared himself unsure that the Queen of Scots had compassed, practiced or imagined the death of Your Majesty.”
“And his name?”
“Lord Zouche.”
“One in the Star Chamber,” mused the Queen. “How many in the country?”
“Your Majesty,” said Burleigh, “this is no time for weakness. While the Queen of Scots lives you are in danger. The time is ripe.”
Elizabeth nodded.
“Then go to Fotheringay and warn her of the verdict which my Star Chamber and Houses of Parliament have pronounced against her.”
Jubilantly her ministers left her.
HOW DREARY WAS THE WINTER at Fotheringay, how irksome in London.
The two Queens were constantly in each other’s thoughts. Will she relent? wondered Mary. How can I accomplish her death without seeming to have done so? Elizabeth asked herself.
Her ministers were anxiously awaiting her decision.
Young James had written to her, imploring clemency for his mother. How that would have comforted Mary if she had known!
But she shall not know! thought Elizabeth angrily. Let her wait in her prison, apprehensive and fearful—for she has cast a shadow over my life since the day I took the crown.
Walsingham was fretful in his impatience. Mary was proved guilty. Why did Elizabeth hesitate?
He called on her Secretary, William Davison, and told him of his impatience. They must devise some means of bringing Elizabeth to the point of signing the death warrant.
Davison shook his head. “She grows angry when the matter is brought to her notice. Yet she is as impatient as you or I for the deed to be done.”
“We must find some means of ending Mary’s life. Let the warrant be made out . . . and slipped among some unimportant documents for the Queen’s signature.”
The two men were looking at each other speculatively. It might work. Elizabeth wanted very much to sign that death warrant, but she wanted it to appear that she had not done so. If she could sign it, pretending not to realize what it was, and the sentence could be carried out—as she would like it to be known, without her being able to prevent it—she would be happy.
This sly method was characteristic of the way in which she had so successfully carried her country from one danger to another.
They could try it.
DAVISON LAID THE DOCUMENTS before the Queen. She noticed he was trembling, and she knew that there was something of importance among those documents. Moreover she guessed what it was, because she knew what matter was at this time uppermost in the minds of all her ministers.
She chatted with him as she took up the documents. “You are looking pale, William. You do not take enough exercise. You should take more for your health’s sake.”
Calmly her pen sped over the papers. Davison held his breath. She did not appear to be looking. And there was the warrant. He saw the firm strokes of her pen. It was done.
She looked up and saw Davison staring at the paper before her. An idea had come to her as she looked down at it.
“Why,” she said, “I see now what this is.”
Davison bowed his head as though preparing for her abuse. But it did not come.
“So,” she murmured, “it is done at last. I have long delayed it because it grieves me so. All my friends know how it grieves me. It is an astonishing thing to me that those who guard her should have so little regard for me to make me suffer so. How easy it would be for them to do this for me.”
She sighed and handed Davison the warrant.
Stumbling from the room he went with all speed to Walsingham and told him what had happened.
“Write to Paulet,” commanded Walsingham.
So together they compiled the letter which complained that the Queen was not satisfied with Paulet’s service to her, since he had not discovered some means of shortening the life of the Queen of Scots, a task which was imperative for the preservation of their religion and the peace and prosperity of the country. Elizabeth thought ill of those who sought to throw the burden of her cousin’s execution on her shoulders, knowing her natural reluctance to shed the blood of a kinswoman and a Queen.
“Let that be dispatched to him with all speed,” said Walsingham.
WHEN SIR AMYAS received that letter he was deeply shocked. He looked upon Mary as an enemy, but he was a Puritan and a stern Protestant.
He immediately sat down to reply.
“It grieves me that I am required, by direction of my most gracious Sovereign, to do an act which God and the law forbiddeth. God forbid that I should make so foul a shipwreck of my conscience or leave so great a blot to my poor posterity as to shed blood without law or warrant.”
He called to Sir Drue Drury, whom the Queen had sent as joint guardian to the Queen of Scots since her coming to Fotheringay, and Sir Drue added a postscript to this letter, saying that he subscribed in heart to the opinion of his fellow jailor.
When Davison and Walsingham received this letter they were alarmed, and wrote with all speed asking Paulet to burn their previous letter.
The fate of Mary had been decided.
The warrant was signed. It only remained to perform the last act.
ON THE 7TH FEBRUARY, the Earl of Shrewsbury arrived at Fotheringay with the Earl of Kent. It was their unpleasant duty to read the warrant to Mary, and it was a task which was particularly repugnant to Shrewsbury.
They asked to be taken to Mary’s apartment without delay, where she received them, guessing why they had come. Shrewsbury met her eyes apologetically, but Kent was arrogant and truculent. With them came Robert Beale, the Clerk of the Council, Paulet and Drury.