Melville answered: “You are the fairest …” She smiled graciously at him, but he continued: “… in England. Our Queen is the fairest in Scotland.”
She pouted. “Come, come! That will not do.”
“Nay, Your Majesty pokes fun at this poor ambassador.”
“I am in earnest. I wish to know. I greatly regret that I have not my dear sister here in England. I would remedy the lack. I wish to know exactly how she looks.”
“Your Majesty, you and she are the fairest ladies in your Courts.”
“I am fairer of skin and lighter of hair, am I not?” she persisted.
“That is so, Your Majesty, but …”
“But what, sir?”
“Our Queen is very beautiful.”
“We have heard that said. We would we had her here that we might prove the truth of it. Who is the taller, she or I?”
“Our Queen is taller, Your Majesty.”
“Then she is too tall!” said Elizabeth. “For it is said that I am neither too tall nor too low.”
She was a little annoyed, and talked no more of appearances. This man was certainly uncouth; he did not even know how to compliment a Queen. She thought of the charming things Robert would have said to reassure her.
“How does your Queen pass the time?”
“She hunts.”
“Does she read?”
“She does, Your Majesty. She reads good books—the histories of countries.”
“And does she love music?”
“Very much, Your Majesty.”
“What instruments does she play?”
“The lute and the virginals.”
“Does she play well?”
“Reasonably well, Your Majesty … for a Queen.”
Then the Queen must play for the Scottish ambassador; she did so, and he had to admit that, on the virginals, she excelled her rival.
Then she must arrange for dances to be performed before him that she might show him how she danced. The inevitable question was asked: “Who is the better dancer, the Queen of England or the Queen of Scotland?”
He was frank: “My Queen dances not so high nor so disposedly as Your Majesty.”
She was inclined to be amused at the reply, but she answered tartly that she held the dance to be an expression of joy and high spirits, not so much a matter of elegance as she believed the French and the Spaniards looked upon it.
“Ah, that I might see your Queen!” she sighed. “You cannot guess how I yearn for a meeting. Would you could bring her to me.”
“I would willingly convey Your Majesty to Scotland. Our King James the Fifth went in disguise to France in order to inspect the Duke of Vendôme’s sister who was proposed for his bride. He was dressed as a page. What if Your Majesty so disguised herself?”
“Ah, that it could be so!” she sighed.
Then she said those words which set the whole world laughing and raised the high indignation of Scotland. “I have found a husband for your mistress.”
“Your Majesty?”
“Yes. I will give her the only man in the world whom I consider worthy to mate with her. This is the most virtuous, the most perfect of men, one whom I would have married myself had my mind not been given to
the virgin state. You have guessed? But surely you have. There is only one man who could fit such praises. I refer to my Lord Robert Dudley.”
The ambassador was at a loss for words.
She smiled at him pleasantly. “Ah, you feel his rank is not high enough? That is easily remedied. I shall do for him that which I have long promised. I shall make him the first Earl in the country. Now, my dear Melville, to your chamber, and write to your mistress that she may no longer remain in ignorance of the great good I would do her.”
Robert was furious.
He demanded instant audience and she, nothing loth, granted it.
“My lord, what ails you? See how I have your good at heart!”
“You would make a laughing-stock of me, Madam.”
“What! In offering you one of the most sought-after of brides?”
“There is only one bride I would have.”
“You are too ambitious, Robert.”
“I do not understand you.”
“You do not seem to understand that you speak with your Queen.”
“But you have led me to believe you would marry me.”
“Time and time again I have told you that I would never forsake the virgin state. Why, Robert, she is the fairest of women.”
She waited and of course it came: “That is untrue. You are the fairest of women.”
“Master Melville does not seem to think so, and he has seen us both.”
“The man is an uncouth ruffian from a land of barbarians.”
“I believe you are right, Robert.”
“Then put an end to this farce.”
“Come here, my love. Kat … a cushion for my lord. I would have him kneel at my feet. Nay, woman, the best of my cushions, for only the best is good enough for him. Hath he not said so?” He took her hand and kissed it. “Robert,” she said, “my fool Robert, do you think I would let you go to her!”
“Do you think I would ever leave you?”
“I’d send you to the block if you tried.”
“Then we see this matter through the same eyes as always?”
“Yes, my dearest Eyes, we do. But the woman is an arrogant creature. She will be angry when she knows I offer you, and she’ll not dare refuse you. But she will be angrier still when you refuse her. It will be as though you choose between us—marriage with her or the hope of marriage with me. And Robert, you are a man whom any woman would delight in having for her husband.”
“Except one who torments and teases and will not decide.”
“It is the Queen who is uncertain. The woman would take you this moment.”
“My beloved … my Queen …”
“Hush! That sly Kat listens. My dear one, now I shall show my love for you. I shall make you an Earl … the Earl of Leicester and Baron of Denbigh, that title which has only been used until now by royal persons; and I shall give you the Castle of Kenilworth and Astel-Grove. Now, you see, my darling, why I have seemed harsh to you to whom I could not be harsh. I did not grant you this state before, for I did not wish our enemies to call you my lap-dog. Now a great title will be yours; you will be the richest man in England—almost a King—and that is what I wish you to be. This I can do now, and none dare say me nay; for to marry with the Queen of Scots you must indeed be Earl of Leicester. And if you do not marry the Queen of Scots, you will still be with your own Elizabeth, and you will be none the worse—the Earl of Leicester instead of plain Lord Robert.”
He was kissing her hands, her throat, and her lips.
Robert was created Earl of Leicester with great pomp and ceremony at Westminster.
The Queen had insisted that, before he departed for Scotland, Sir James Melville must witness the ceremony, that he might report to his mistress in what high esteem the Queen held the man she was offering to her dear sister of Scotland.
She would allow none but herself to help him put on his robes. He was very solemn and dignified, and never had he looked quite so handsome as he did in his robes of state.
All those present noted the tender looks the Queen bestowed upon him; and, as he knelt before her and bent his head, she could not resist tickling his neck, there before them all.
She turned to the Scottish ambassador and, her face shining with love and pride, said: “How do you like him?”
“He is doubtless a worthy subject,” said Melville. “He is happy to serve a Queen who discerns and rewards good service.”
She smiled and her eyes fell on young Darnley who, as Prince of the Blood Royal, was standing near her. She knew that the sly ambassador was in touch—as he thought, in secret—with that young man, and that he hoped to make him, instead of the Earl of Leicester, the husband of Mary Queen of Scots.