Some such reflection must have crossed his tortured mind.
"You always disliked Strafford," was all he said.
"No," said the Queen vehemently, as if she disclaimed some shameful thing. "No, never, and I would have saved him. Do not take me to be so mean and creeping a creature as to counsel you pass this Bill because I hate my lord."
She was justified in her defence; she had been jealous of the powerful minister, and she had never personally liked him, but it was not for vengeance or malice that she urged the King to abandon Strafford, but because she was afraid of that power which asked for his death, and because her tyrannical royal pride detested the thought that she and hers should be in an instant's danger for the sake of a subject. And when she saw her husband, for the first time since their marriage, so absorbed in anguished thought as to be scarcely aware of her presence, as to be forgetful of her and her children, she felt jealous of this other influence that seemed to defy hers, and a fierceness that was akin to cruelty touched her desperation.
"Who is this man that I should be endangered for his sake?" she cried, after she had in vain waited for the King to break his dismal silence.
"He is my friend," muttered Charles.
"Save him then, or share his fate," returned his wife bitterly. "As for me, I will go to my own country, and there find the protection that you cannot give me."
Charles sprang up and faced her.
"Mary, what is this? What do you speak of?" he cried in a distracted voice, and holding out to her his irresolute hands.
The Queen took advantage of this sudden weakening of his silent defences; her whole manner changed. She went up to him softly, took his hands in hers, and, raising to him a face pale and pleading, broke out into eager and humble entreaties.