انگلیس

CHAPTER EIGHT

England

Elizabeth didn’t give me her army. She put me in prison. You know this, James - it is the story of your life, not mine. I was twenty-five years old when I came to England, and I am forty-five now. Twenty years in English prisons.

Moray told lies about me. Mary and Bothwell killed Darnley, he said. Mary slept with Riccio and Bothwell and killed her husband. But it’s not true! They’re all lies, James - wicked lies! They only said these things because I am a woman, and a Catholic, and they don’t want a Catholic queen in Scotland, they want a Protestant king.

A king like you, James. Why, James my son, don’t you help me? Why are you friendly with Elizabeth, my enemy? You don’t want me back in Scotland, do you? You believe these lies, don’t you? You talk to Moray and his friends, every day. But they lied about me, James. Moray and his friends killed Riccio. Then killed your father, too. They stole my husband Bothwell, stole my son…

Stole my son’s love…

I am sorry, James. Forgive me. Sometimes I get very angry. It is difficult not to be angry, when you are in prison for twenty years.

Elizabeth didn’t know what to do. Sometimes she believed Moray, sometimes she didn’t. She was afraid to kill me, because I was a Queen. She was afraid to let me go free, because I have friends in England. The English Catholics want me to be Queen of England, not her. And she is a woman with no husband and no son, so she hates me, too.

Sometimes the English Catholics write to me and ask me for help, and sometimes I write to them. Sometimes Elizabeth’s men find these letters. The English Protestants want to kill me because of these letters. ‘You are a wicked woman!’ they say: ‘You killed your husband, Darnley, and now you want to kill our Queen Elizabeth. You’re going to die!’

‘I did not kill my husband,’ I said. ‘And when l came to England, I did not want to kill your Queen. I asked her for help - I wanted to go back to Scotland! But, my lords, she put me in prison for twenty years! Twenty years, my lords! I want to be free - don’t you understand that? When men write to me and try to help me, then yes, sometimes I write back! Why not? Is that wicked, do you think?’

They didn’t listen. Of course not. They want to kill me. And so they wrote to Queen Elizabeth. And now I sit here, in Fotheringhay Castle, and wait for her to answer. I do not want to die, James my son, but I do not want to live all my life in an English prison. I am old, and tired of life. Think well of me, James, my son, and…