Mary Stuart (40 page)

But Elizabeth was by no means inclined to take in good part this dutiful answer of her trusty Paulet, whom shortly before she had so enthusiastically praised on account of his “spotless actions, wise orders and safe regards.” Angrily she tramped up and down the room, shouting that she could not stomach those “dainty and precise fellows” who would promise everything and perform nothing. Paulet was a perjurer. He had signed the Bond of Association undertaking to serve the Queen at risk of his own life. “But I can do without him,” she screamed. “I have Wingfield, who will not draw back.” With real or pretended wrath she stormed at the unhappy Davison (Walsingham was better advised in being laid up at the moment!), who, with lamentable simplicity, assured her that the legal method was best. “Wiser men than you,” said Elizabeth contemptuously, “hold different opinions.” It was time that the matter was settled once for all, and a scandal to everyone concerned that she had not been freed from the “burthen” of responsibility.

Davison held his tongue. He might have replied to his royal mistress that steps to make an end to the matter once for all had already been taken. He knew, however, that nothing he could say would be more distasteful to the Queen than an honest assurance of what she already knew and pretended not to know—that the messenger carrying the signed and sealed death warrant was on his way to Fotheringay, accompanied by a thickset and burly man who was to translate words into blood, commands into performance—the London executioner.

“E
N MA FIN EST MON COMMENCEMENT
”—In my end is my beginning. Such was the device, not then comprehensible, which, years before, Mary had stitched into one of her embroideries. Her foreboding was to be realised. Her tragic death was the true beginning of her fame; it only would compensate in the eyes of posterity for the offences of her youth, would transfigure her crimes and follies. For weeks the condemned woman had been circumspectly and resolutely preparing for this last ordeal. Twice, as a young queen, she had looked on while a nobleman perished beneath the executioner's axe, and had thus learnt that heroism on the scaffold is the only way of compensating for so cruel a death. Mary Stuart knew that the contemporary world and posterity would scrutinise her behaviour closely when, an anointed queen, she perished by a public execution, and that to show the white feather in this decisive moment would be treason to her royal reputation. Thus, during the weeks of waiting, she concentrated her energies. Creature of impulse though she had always been, for this last hour of her life she tranquilly made ready—with the result that there might have been written of her what Andrew Marvell wrote of her grandson Charles I on the like occasion: “She nothing common did or mean, upon that memorable scene.”

She gave no sign of terror or astonishment when, on Tuesday, 7th February 1587, her servants told her that Shrewsbury, Kent and Beale had arrived from London, that they were accompanied by the High Sheriff of Northampton, and that they and Sir Drue Drury had news to communicate to her. She summoned her ladies and most of the members of her domestic staff. Then the visitors were admitted. She wanted to be surrounded by friendly witnesses, who would declare that she had been stalwart to the last, that she, daughter of James V of Scotland and Mary of Guise, she, in whose veins flowed the blood of the Tudors, the Valois and the Stuarts, could be steadfast in this terrible emergency. Shrewsbury, under whose care she had lived for the greater part of her long imprisonment, bent his knee and bowed his grey head. His voice trembled as he announced that Queen Elizabeth had found it necessary to yield to the urgent petition of her subjects and to command that the death-penalty should be carried into effect. Then he read the death warrant, to which Mary listened without a sign of emotion. Having crossed herself, she said: “In the name of God, these tidings are welcome, and I bless and pray Him that the end of all my bitter sufferings is at hand. I could receive no better news, and thank the Almighty for His grace in allowing me to die for the honour of His name and of His Church, the ancient Catholic and Romaine religion.” She made no further protest—except insofar as a protest was implied in her placing her hand on a Bible which lay on the table near her, and swearing: “I have never either desired the death of the Queen, or endeavoured to bring it about, or that of any other person.”

Herself a queen, she no longer wished to defend herself against the injustice perpetrated against her by another queen, but was ready, as a Christian woman, to accept the afflictions imposed on her by God's will, and perhaps welcomed her martyrdom gladly as the last triumph He might vouchsafe her in this life. She made only two requests: that her chaplain should assist her to the last with ghostly consolation, and that the sentence should not be executed the very next morning, that she might have more time to prepare herself for death. Both petitions were rejected. The Earl of Kent, a fanatical Protestant, answered vehemently that she needed no priest of the Popish faith, but he would see to it that she should have the ministrations of a cleric of the Reformed Church, who would instruct her in the True Religion. Of course, at this supreme hour when Mary Stuart wished to avow before the eyes of the Catholic world her faith in the creed in which she had been brought up, she would hold no commerce with a heretic. Less cruel than the refusal of the consolations of her religion to a dying woman, was the rejection of her plea for a postponement of the execution. Once the matter had been decided, the less time between the announcement and the act of doom the better. The few hours that remained to her would be so busily occupied that little opportunity was left for the intrusion of fear or unrest. One of God's gifts to mortals is that, for the dying, time is always too short.

Mary allotted the minutes of her remaining hours with far more thoughtfulness and circumspection than had been her wont in ordinary life. As a great princess, she wished to die a great death, and, with the immaculate sense for style which had always characterised her, with her native artistry and her inborn talent for seemly behaviour on solemn occasions, Mary prepared for her exit from life as one prepares for a festival, a triumph, a grand ceremony. Nothing was to be improvised, nothing was to be left to chance. Every effect was to be calculated; all was to be regal, splendid and imposing. The details were to be as carefully thought out as the words of one of those heroic sagas that depict the exemplary death of a martyr. She ordered her evening repast for a somewhat earlier hour than usual, wanting time in which to write a few necessary letters and to compose her mind for the solemn occasion. The meal was to symbolise the Last Supper. Having herself eaten, she summoned the members of her domestic staff and, having drunk to their welfare, enjoined them to remain faithful to the Catholic religion and to live at peace one with another. As in a scene from the
Lives of the Saints,
she asked each of them for forgiveness for any wrong she might have done to them. Then she gave to each a memento, distributing among them the rings and other jewels, the lace and whatever valuables were left to her. On their knees, silent or sobbing, they accepted the gifts, and the Queen, against her will, was herself moved to tears by their signs of devotion.

At length she retired to her private apartments, where wax candles had been lit on the writing table. She had still much to do before the morning: to read her will once more, to make arrangements for the hour of doom and to write the last letters. The first of these was to Préau, her chaplain, begging him to pray for her throughout the night. He was sequestered in another part of the castle—the Earl of Kent, who was pitiless, having forbidden him to leave his room lest he should administer to Mary Stuart the “papistical” extreme unction. There were sentinels in all the corridors, and it does not seem that this letter can have been conveyed to the chaplain. Perhaps Kent did not know that the prisoner had a gold and jewelled ciborium containing a consecrated wafer sent her by the Pope, with a unique dispensation to administer the Eucharist to herself, if denied the attendance of a priest! Next the queen wrote to her relatives, Henry III and the Duke of Guise. It is an honour to her that, during this last dreadful night, she had tender thoughts for others. She knew that at her death the cutting-off of her widow's pension would leave her domestics un-provided for. Consequently she begged the King of France to make it his business to see that none of them should suffer want, to distribute her legacies and to have Masses read “for a Christian queen, who dies as a Catholic and has been despoiled of all her worldly goods.” She had previously written to Philip II and to the Pope. There was only one of the rulers of this world to whom it might still have been expedient to write—Elizabeth. But to her Mary Stuart had no further words to say. She would ask Elizabeth for nothing, nor thank her for anything. Only by a proud silence could she still put her long-time adversary to shame; by that, and by a dignified death.

It was long after midnight when Mary went to bed. She had done all that she could during the brief span of life that was allotted her. Only a few hours more and her soul would leave her weary frame. In a corner of the bedroom the maids were kneeling, praying silently, for they did not wish to disturb the Queen's slumbers. Mary could not sleep. Her eyes were wide open in the darkness. Still, she could rest her limbs for a while, so that refreshed in mind and body she would have strength to meet Death, who was stronger than herself.

Mary had robed herself for many festal occasions, coronations, baptisms, weddings, chivalric sports, war and the chase, receptions, dances and tourneys—always splendidly, fully aware of the power which beauty wields on earth. But never did she dress more carefully than for the greatest hour of her life, which was to be her last. She had thought out every detail of her attire on this unprecedented occasion weeks in advance, as if wishing, in a final display of vanity, to show the world how perfectly a queen could present herself on the scaffold. For two hours the tire women were at work. She would not go to the block clad as a sinner, in drab array. She chose a robe of state for this last formal appearance—black velvet, stamped with gold, and a black stomacher. The dress had a train so long that Andrew Melville, her master of the household, carried it as she walked. She wore two rosaries and a number of scapularies. After her wig had been adjusted, a wired white veil reaching to her feet was clipped to it. The shoes were of white Spanish leather, soft leather which would not creak when she mounted the scaffold. She took out of a drawer the kerchief with which her eyes were to be bound; it was made of the finest lawn with a gold fringe, probably embroidered by her own hands. Each article of her apparel had been most purposively selected, every detail, down to her underclothing, being combined to form a harmony, and with full knowledge that on the scaffold she would be partially disrobed before the eyes of strange men. The petticoat and camisole were of crimson velvet, and she had scarlet sleeves to match, that when her neck was severed the spurting blood should not contrast too crudely with her underwear and her arms. Never had a woman condemned to death made herself ready for execution with more artistry and dignity.

At eight o'clock in the morning there came a knock at the door. Mary Stuart did not answer, for she was kneeling at her prie-dieu, reading aloud the prayers for the dying. Not until her devotions were finished did she rise, and at the second knock the door was opened. The Sheriff of Northampton, carrying his white wand of office (soon to be broken), entered and, with a profound reverence, said: “Madam, the lords have sent me to you.” “Yes, let us go,” replied the Queen, as Bourgoigne, her French physician, stepped to her side.

Now began her final progress. Supported to right and to left by two of her servants, walking slowly because her legs were swollen with rheumatism, she went out through the door. She was triply armed with the weapons of the faith, that no sudden access of fear might overwhelm her. Besides the Agnus Dei hung round her neck, and the rosaries, she carried in one hand an ivory crucifix. The world was to see how a queen could die in the Catholic faith and for the Catholic faith. It was to forget the crimes and follies of her youth, and that she was now to suffer death as accessory before the fact to an intended murder. For all time to come she wished to be regarded as a martyr to the Catholic cause, a victim of her heretical enemies.

Only as far as the doorway leading out of the corridor was she accompanied by her own servitors. Paulet's men-at-arms, acting under orders, barred the way to her staff. They might serve her while she was still in her own chamber, but not in the last minutes before her death. Down the great staircase, therefore, she was assisted by two of Paulet's troopers. None but enemies were to join in the crime of leading an anointed queen to the block. On the last step, in front of the entrance to the hall where the execution was to take place, was kneeling Andrew Melville, her master of the household. To him, as one of the Scottish gentry, would be entrusted the duty of acquainting her son that the execution had taken place. The Queen lifted him from his knees and embraced him. His presence was welcome to her, for it strengthened her in her forced composure. When Melville said: “It will be the sorrowfullest message that ever I carried when I shall report that my Queen and mistress is dead,” Mary replied: “Not so. Today, good Melville, thou seest the end of Mary Stuart's miseries, and that should rejoice thee. I pray thee carry a message from me that I die a true woman to my religion, like a true Queen of Scotland and France. But God forgive them that have long desired my end and thirsted for my blood, as the hart does for the water-brooks. Commend me to my dearest and most sweet son. Tell him I have done nothing to prejudice him in his realm, nor to disparage his dignity.” Then, turning to the Earls of Shrewsbury and Kent, she asked them “to permit her poor distressed servants to be present about her at her death, that their eyes and heart may see and witness how patiently their Queen and mistress will endure her execution, and so make relation, when they come into their country, that she died a true constant Catholic to her religion.” To this the Earl of Kent objected. The women would make a scene. “Besides, if such an access might be allowed, they would not stick to put some superstitious popery in practice, if it were but dipping their handkerchiefs in Your Grace's blood, whereon it were very unmeet for us to give allowance.”

“My lords,” rejoined Mary, “I will give my word that, although then I shall be dead, they will do nothing of the kind. I hope your mistress, being a maiden queen, will vouchsafe in the regard of womanhood that I shall have some of mine own people about me at my death. I know Her Majesty hath not given you any such strait charge or commission, but that you might grant a request of far greater courtesy than this is, if I were a woman of far meaner calling than the Queen of Scots.” Seeing that the Earl of Kent looked stubborn, she burst into tears, and said: “I am cousin to your Queen, and descended from the blood royal of Henry VII, and a married Queen of France, and an anointed Queen of Scotland.”

The two earls consulted together, and at length agreed that she might be accompanied to the scaffold by “six of her best beloved men and women.” Thereupon “of her men she chose Melville, Bourgoigne, the physician, Gourion, the surgeon and Gervais, the apothecary; and of her women, those two, Jane Kennedy and Elizabeth Curie, which did lie in her chamber.” With Melville carrying her train, she walked behind the sheriff and Shrewsbury and Kent into the great hall of Fotheringay Castle.