“Damn you, Verney! If such speech as yours is heard again within these walls, there will be murder done, and none the wiser as to who threw your corpse in the river.”
Carew crossed his knees and ran the scattered cards through his fingers.
“Threaten him not with his life, Thomas. He’d as soon leap in the air, a target for archers, as to let any man think he loves Elizabeth the less!”
“Damn you—damn you both—” Verney choked. “Damn you to hell!”
He struggled and twisted, but Carew was beside Wyatt, and the two men pinioned his threshing arms.
“Peace, boy!” Carew said, all derision gone from his voice. “Would you kill Elizabeth now?”
Vemey subsided, flopping limply onto the bench.
“If you shout out our purpose as you have done,” Carew went on, “Princess Elizabeth will climb the steps to the block ahead of us, and that dear, shining head you love will fall in the dust, soaked in her blood… Think on that, Francis, and let it rule your conduct.”
Vemey covered his face with his hands.
“Oh God … God … God!” he groaned desperately. “I will keep silent.”
Peter Carew laid his hand on the boy’s bowed shoulders.
“I do know you love her, and I respect it. Though she is far above you, your love commends you. She has a magic that does take us all… Aye, she’s the one for England! ” Verney lifted a haggard, sweating face.
“Give me your promise,” he pleaded huskily, “that your plans are laid and that I’ll be part of them?”
“You have it,” Wyatt said briefly. “But how, and when and where, you must be content to know later.”
His head turned quickly to the door.
“Now, here she comes…”
The three men moved to the door and stood waiting.
“Oh God,” Francis Verney breathed, “she is beautiful!” “Quiet!” Wyatt ordered without turning his head.
“Fear me not! God! Must that fool be with her?” the distraught young man muttered almost inaudibly.
“Get rid of him, Thomas.”
“She’ll do it herself,” Wyatt returned in the same undertone.
The three bowed low, with a concerted murmur of “My lady,” as Elizabeth came from the gallery and stood just within the room.
Francis Vemey’s whispered cry of the heart was justified; she looked very beautiful. … It was not the shimmering rose-and-silver figure he had first seen, it was not the royal lady in burgundy silks and gold-set rubies of the procession. She wore a subtler beauty now, her face like a white flower. Only her eyes caught the green color of her gown and the green fire of the stones which trimmed it. Her hair burned too, now a darker red lying smooth and close to her head.
She bent her head gravely to the three men, and spoke to the fourth who stood behind her.
“I thank you, Lord Edward, for your company.” Courtenay bowed, came a little forward, looked vaguely at the three silent and waiting figures, and gave an amiable smile and a bow. He was an extraordinarily handsome young man, golden as a Dane, and elaborately dressed in satins of pink and blue.
“We will meet again soon,” Elizabeth told him sweetly. He made a tripping toe-pointed movement of one foot, and bowed again.
“Good day to you, my lord,” she said clearly, smiling kindly on him. And at last poor foolish Courtenay grasped that he was being dismissed. Still bowing and smiling he withdrew.
Elizabeth shut the door and leaned against it and her serious look broke into sparkling amusement.
“Oh, God be praised at the sight of the three of you!” she exclaimed without ceremony. “I am glad to know there’s yet such a thing as a man! Believe me, after the past half hour, I’ve doubted it! Thomas Wyatt, ask me no more to conduct such an interview as I’ve just come from…
“Oh God preserve me from Edward Courtenay!”
“What did I tell you?” Verney exclaimed delightedly to Carew.
“No, Francis, he’s a good man for the purpose.” Her voice and face were suddenly grave again. “Bishop Gardiner has a most strange affection for him. And Bishop Gardiner has more weight with the Queen than any man in England.
“Moreover,” Elizabeth added with a touch of contrition, “I do ill to be so impatient with that poor young man. Bethink you that one third part of his life he has been a prisoner in the Tower, and now comes out into the sun, and finds himself courted and made much of on all hands. It would be enough to turn a stronger head…”
“Did he tell you of our plan?” Wyatt asked forthrightly and with some anxiety.
“He—talked with me. I have said before, Thomas, and I say again, I will not be a party to a treason against my Queen. What you may do is on your own.”
“Think you she will keep you here at Whitehall?” Wyatt asked, worry creasing his high, narrow forehead.
“You know I am not favored here! There’s not a gentle-lady in the palace dare visit me.” Elizabeth’s eyes lit with a scornful amusement.
“If the men are somewhat bolder,” she added with a laughing look, “I say they are brave indeed, for they run a risk.” “Lady,” Verney gasped, ignoring Wyatt’s irritated and quelling look, “but name some risk and make me happy.” “Let her but see you with me, and the risk’s yours! … You’d serve me better, Francis, by being more cold.”
“I cannot,” he said wildly and helplessly.
“Then do not,” she answered. “For it warms me well to know there are those who love me… Thomas, if I am sent hence, I will receive no letter from you nor write none. And if there be disclosure, I will know nothing of it. I still say, hold your hand.” She spoke very earnestly. “Rebellion without reason is but treason, and I like it not. Until—that happens which we fear, I am not one of you, no! not even in my heart. But I am truest above all things in my heart to England and Live for the good of her people.”
“What think you of Courtenay?” Carew asked.
“You know what I think.”
“But do you think he’s safe?”
“If you can shut him up in a bottle, he will be!”
“So we know, to our sorrow,” Verney grumbled darkly. “He’ll be content in one, God knows,” Elizabeth said tartly. “Go to sleep at the bottom of a decanter and so meet his Maker — and never know the difference.”
She began to giggle, then to brim over with suddenly carefree laughter.
“Oh God! Thomas, preserve me from him. He stinks of scent like a woman.”
The stern and exasperated tension among the three men melted. They began to laugh with her.
“I know not which is the worse,” Elizabeth gulped through peals of mirth, “the smell of the wine on his breath or the scent on his hair! He gazes forth like — a young covo” she spluttered, “in a meadow of daisies! That one — as consort? Oh my dear God be merry! Know you what purpose a consort is for?”
“To beget heirs?” Carew said, laughing.
“Well, had he ever the inclination,” she cried with her old, airy impudence, “I think that his chronic condition of wine would make him chronically incapable of performance!” They were rocking with laughter. Elizabeth had come from the door while she was speaking, but they were all collected at that side of the room and their shouts of amusement could be heard in the gallery beyond.
Two persons walking slowly and in talk down that gallery heard them. Stopped; looked at each other, and quickened their pace.
The Queen and Gardiner were in the room before anyone was aware of their presence.
The laughter stopped instantly. The four went to their knees.
For one appalling moment Mary was unable to speak. A very convulsion of fury had her in grip. Then her voice came in a harsh calclass="underline" “Elizabeth!”
“Your Majesty.”
“Stand up!” Mary almost shouted. Her voice was naturally deep and oddly gruff; in uncontrolled anger it took on an inhuman sound.