‘She has been unhappily rash,’ says Moray; ‘I cannot think more. Maidenly lengths would have become her, a queenly regard, but surely no more.’ He turned to Argyll. ‘Frankly, brother-in-law, Mr. Knox should not hear of these late doings—of these bedside ministrations, these transports, these fits of self-communing, this paltering with the tempter, this doffing of regalities. I pray, I pray for Scotland!’
‘The gowk’s a papist,’ says Argyll, a plain man.
‘He is young, brother-in-law; that we remember always.’
‘He stinks of pride,’ says Argyll,—‘sinful, lusty pride of blood. If this marriage be made we shall all rue it.’
The Earl of Moray clapped a hand to each of his shoulders.
‘Brother-in-law, pray for Scotland!’
‘Oh, ay,’ says Argyll, ‘and put an edge to my Andrew Ferrara.’
How she lingered over him, prayed over him, watched every petulant twitching of his limbs, no one could know altogether save Mary Sempill, and she had affairs of her own to consider—a wife who knew she was going to be a mother. But for this proud preoccupation, she might have seen how touchingly the Queen made the most of her treasure, and how all the ardour which had hurried her into wedlock was now whipped up again to prove it bliss. Was he fretful—and was he not? It was the fever in his dear bones. Was he gross-mannered? Nay, but one must be tender of young blood. Did he choose to have his Englishmen about him, his Archie Douglas to tell him salt tales, while she sat with her maids and waited? Well, well, a man must have men with him now and again, and is never the better husband for cosseting. When they urged her to be a queen, she lowered her eyes and said she was a wife. This raised an outcry.
‘He is, he can only be, your consort, madam.’
‘I am his, you mean,’ said she. ‘The man chooses the woman. There are no crowns in the bridal bed, and none in heaven. Naked go we to both.’