‘I thank your Majesty—I would not seem too hard. Maybe I have been stiff, maybe I have brooded. There has been too much thinking time, sitting at work for ever in our dark house. I thank your Majesty—I thank your Grace.’
The Queen lay back again, smiling through her tears. Mary Fleming, deeply moved, took her hand and lifted it, holding it out—by look and gesture commanding the other to do it reverence. So it was done at last.
The Queen said softly: ‘I thank you, child; I thank you, Jeannie. You make me happier. Trust me now, and sit beside me. I have a matter for your ears, and for your heart too, as I hope.’
So Jean sat staidly by her on the cushions and heard the marriage-plan. All she could find to say was that she hoped it would give satisfaction to her Majesty.
The Earl of Bothwell, then, was married upon the Lady Jean Gordon on 24th February, at Holyrood, by the Protestant rite. The Queen and Court were there, she very scornful and full of mockery of what was done. She said, and loudly, ‘If the bride is content with this munchance, why should I be discontent?’ meaning, of course, that there was every reason in the world why she should be. But the truth was that the bride, who professed the old religion, had no choice; for the Earl had insisted upon the minister and his sermon at the price of marriage whatsoever, and the lady’s brother Huntly shared his opinion. Whereupon the bride had shrugged her shoulders.
‘I am bought and sold already,’ she said; ‘therefore what matter to me whether the market is out of the statute?’
The Queen laughed. ‘Tu as rayson, ma belle,’ she said. ‘Le vray mariage s’est faict ailleurs.’
And Lady Jeannie replied in a low voice, ‘Nous verrons, madame.’
All things accomplished, and the Queen gone out by her private door, the Earl handed his Countess through the press to the great entry. Many people came surging about them; the courtyard seemed chockablock, with vexed cries tossed here and there, both ‘God bless the Queen!’ and ‘God damn the Paip!’ In the midst of all the Countess makes as if to falter, cries out, ‘Oh, my foot hurts me!’ gets free her hand and stoops. What was she about?