Read Online The Memoirs of Mary Queen of Scots by Carolly Erickson - Free Book Online

care. I grinned, drained my goblet, took the bet, and won. I certainly never expected to see the young nobleman again—or his fiancée.”
    He looked up at the ceiling, shook his head, and went on. “I was wrong. The woman came to find me, and said she was my betrothednow, and that I would have to marry her. The nobleman had abandoned her, she said, and had gone away to Iceland. Her family had renounced her. She is the daughter of a Norwegian admiral, and as I am hereditary admiral of the Scottish fleet I must keep her father’s goodwill. We rely on the Norwegians to crew our few ships, as you may know.”
    “What a cruel dilemma! But you are unmarried. Why not just marry the woman, rather than become her victim?”
    “You have seen her. You know why.”
    “She is certainly plain, and graceless, but not hideous.”
    Jamie looked as if I had just handed him a plate of stinking rot from the refuse pile.
    “She is not only plain as a pikestaff, but a violent, vengeful scold. Even though she does have a dowry of seven thousand ecus. And I have half of it—at least I did have half of it until I lost it to a Dutchman who, I’m sure, was cheating.” The last words were mumbled, his voice dying away as he spoke. He did not meet my eyes.
    “No wonder she follows you. She wants her dowry back.”
    “Let her take it! I told her the Dutchman’s name. It’s Lukas Korthals. I wish to God she would follow him and not me. She says she prefers me. Besides, she claims she is carrying my child.”
    At that I began to feel wary. Had Jamie slept with the woman who called herself the Scottish wife? And if he denied it, could I be certain he was telling me the truth?
    “And is she?” I asked, trying to keep my voice even.
    He spat. “Of course not. If there is a bastard, it belongs to that drunken young lord who gambled her away. Or some blind man.”
    I thought for a moment. “She must be paid off.”
    “If only I could—”
    “Can you borrow from your friend Cristy?”
    “He only lends me gambling money. And he takes more interest than the Italian bankers.”
    We were both silent for a time. Jamie went back to polishing his bit of leather, and I began to ponder. Jamie had a dilemma to solve—but so did I. And mine, it seemed, was on a vaster scale.
    Leaving him in his room over the stables, I returned to my bedchamber, the bedchamber of an eighteen-year-old widow and dowager queen whose prospects were unclear and whose ability to choose her path was about to be tested.



TWELVE
    It was not long after Francis died that I received a letter from my half-brother Lord James Stewart in Scotland. I had a dim memory of him, from the time when I was a young child, before I left for France. He was much older than I was, already a tall, good-looking, solemn young man. Now, as I knew from Jamie and from my mother’s letters, he was even more solemn, with an air of religiosity (“terribly full of himself,” in Jamie’s words) and a sense of mission.
    Lord James was writing to me, his queen, yet the tone of his letter was that of a ruler, not a subject. (Nor was it that of an affectionate brother writing to his younger sister.) He was graciously inviting me to return to my realm, the invitation extended on behalf of the Protestant lords.
    I reread the letter several times, reading the Scots with ease—for Scots is very like English, and my English is good—and looking for clues as to his purpose in writing. I found none.
    I did not send a response right away, for I had not yet decided what my best course of action was. It was clear to me that my troubled realm of Scotland needed a firm ruler. No doubt my presence there would help to shore up the waning power of the throne. That was a reason to accept my half-brother’s invitation and go to Scotland assoon as possible—which, I knew, would please my mother-in-law no end.
    Had Lord James written because he wanted me to give him the power to rule in my absence? Not as regent,