She was at length obliged to attend an auto-da-fé. She did not know how she would endure that ordeal. The memory of the hot square would live in her mind forever; she would never, she feared, forget the grim Inquisitors, the pomp of the royal gallery, the victims in their yellow garments dragging their tortured bodies to the stakes.
I am a Catholic, she told herself. I know the Catholic Faith to be the only true Faith, but I cannot bear to see these people suffer so. And when I see them I care not that they are heretics. I only want to save them. I find myself caring for nothing … not for God, not for religion if God and religion demand of us such action.
She felt a hatred toward the land of her adoption because it was the home of torture. She shrank with revulsion from the man who sat beside her in the royal gallery, his eyes intent, the fervor lighting his face. She wanted to cry out in protest when the people shouted with glee and the agonized screams of men and women filled the air while the flames licked their already mutilated bodies.
She wanted to live in a world of kindness and fun—not torture and misery.
One day Madame Clermont, one of the French ladies who had accompanied her into Spain, came to her and intimated that she had something important to say.
When they were alone, Madame Clermont could scarcely speak, she was so excited.
“Your Majesty, I have discovered a Frenchman in distress.”
“What is this?” asked Isabella indulgently, for poor Clermont was of a romantic nature and was constantly bewailing the lack of those adventures which had seemed to come about so naturally in France.
“He had an accident in the street close to one of the inns there … which was fortunate for him. It might have been on the mountain roads, and then Monsieur Dimanche would have said good-bye to this life.”
“You are incoherent, Clermont. Who is this Dimanche, and what is this all about?”
“It is very mysterious, dear Majesty; and that is what makes it so exciting. No one seems to know who he is or what his mission; and he, poor man, is too far gone in delirium to speak much sense. But he is handsome—very handsome—and he is a Frenchman. Spanish innkeepers are a grasping breed. Do you know, Highness, they do not wish to keep him in their miserable inn, for fear he should be unable to pay his bill? They do not like foreigners, they say. And that is a slight to your Majesty! They have put him in a barn close by; and he, poor man, is very sick indeed.”
“What is he doing here, I wonder?” said Isabella.
“That we shall doubtless discover later; but knowing how interested your Majesty is in our own countrymen, and women, I guessed you would not care to know that one of them was lodged in a barn, and a sick man at that!”
“Indeed I do not,” said Isabella. “It is most inhospitable.”
“One of the palace serving-women has a comfortable lodging not far from the inn—nor from the palace. If it should be your Majesty’s wish that this man be taken there, she is willing to have him, and to care for him until he has recovered.”
“Let it be done,” said Isabella. “I will send one of my own doctors to him. I should not like a Frenchman to return to France with tales of the ill-treatment he received in Spain.”
So the mysterious Frenchman was removed from the barn to the lodging of the serving-woman; and it was some days before Isabella knew what an important problem he was to bring into her life.
For the next day or so Isabella thought no more of the Frenchman. It was her custom to interest herself in her fellow countrymen, and if any visited Spain to do all in her power to see that their stay was enjoyable. It was not the first time she had helped people in distress. She herself would pay the servant in whose house Dimanche was lodged; she would reward her doctor for his services to the man. It appeared to her at that time that there the affair of Dimanche ended.
It was Clermont who brought the news to her—excitable Clermont who looked for drama and romance in everyday life. Drama had certainly been found among the papers of Monsieur Dimanche and, Clermont assured the Queen, in the few words he had let slip in his semi-conscious state.
Clermont begged to be alone with the Queen and, when she was absolutely sure that they would not be overheard, divulged what she had discovered.
“Dearest Highness, I do not know how to tell you. Dimanche is in the service of Spain.”
“A Frenchman … in the service of Spain!”
“What I have found out, Highness, is horrible. And I do not know what to do. I remember them so well … as you do … the Queen and her little son. That brightest of boys …”
“Clermont, Clermont, what do you mean? Of whom are you speaking?”
“The Queen of Navarre and her son young Henry. There is a conspiracy—and this Dimanche is one of those who will carry it out—to ride to Pau in Navarre, where the Queen is at this time with her son, to kidnap them and bring them here to Spain … to … the Inquisition.”
Isabella could not speak. The memories were too vivid. She was back in that hideous square; she was watching the shambling figures in their yellow robes. Their faces had been indistinct; perhaps she had not had the courage to look at their faces; perhaps she did not want those to haunt her all the days of her life. But now there would be faces … the faces of the Queen of Navarre—dear Aunt Jeanne—and little Henry, the rough young Béarnais of whom, in spite of his crudeness, they had all been so fond.
A plot had been discovered through this accident to one of the conspirators, a plot to take honest, noble Jeanne and torture her and burn her alive—and perhaps her little son with her. And Fate had brought this to the knowledge of the Queen of Spain.
“Highness,” cried Clermont, “what shall we do? What can we do?”
Isabella did not speak. She could only hear the chanting voices, taking the terrible Oath; she saw the man beside her—the man she had married—his eyes aflame, his sword in his hand, swearing to serve the Inquisition, to torture and murder—yes, murder—Jeanne of Navarre because she was a heretic.
At length her voice sounded in her ears, firm and ringing, so that she did not recognize it. “It must not be.”
“No!” cried Clermont excitedly. “No, your Highness. It must not be. But what can we do?”
What could she do—she the little Queen, the petted darling? Could she go to Philip and beg him not to do this thing? It would be useless, for she would not be pleading with the indulgent husband; it was that man with the eyes of flame and the sword in his hand who had decided the fate of Jeanne of Navarre.
It would be so easy to weep, to shudder, to try to forget. She had been her mother’s creature, now she was Philip’s.
But she would not be. She was herself—Isabella, kinswoman of the noble Jeanne; for noble she was, heretic though she might be.
So she said again: “It must not be.” And then: “It shall not be.”
She was going to fight this evil. She was going to pit her wits against Philip, against the Inquisition. She did not care what happened to her. She was going to do everything in her power to save Jeanne.