Виктория Холт - Royal Road to Fotheringhay

And now, praise the saints, thought Lady Fleming, the peril was well-nigh over.

Mary was unable to feel anything but excitement. She had almost forgotten the terror of seeing English ships on the horizon. It seemed a long time ago when her brothers had stood about her with Lords Erskine and Livingstone, determined to defend her should the need arise. The saints had answered their prayers, and the wind had turned in their favor, so that they were able to speed across the rough waters until the English dropped below the horizon. Now here they were in sight of France, and their galley was drawing in to the little Brittany port of Roscoff.

As soon as she stepped ashore Mary was made aware of the magnitude of the welcome which was to be given to her.

The little port was festooned with gay banners, and the people had come for miles round to line the shore and shout a welcome to la Reinette. In this they were obeying the orders of the King, who had said: “Welcome the little Queen of Scots as though she were already my daughter.”

And when these people saw the little girl—so small and dainty—with her four attendants the same age as herself, in their fur-lined capes, they were enchanted.

“Vive la petite Reine!” they cried; and Mary, sensing their admiration, smiled and bowed so prettily that they cried out that she was delightful, this little girl who had come to them from the savages.

The progress across France began. From Roscoff the procession made its way to Nantes, Mary sometimes riding on a small horse, sometimes carried in a litter; and each town through which they passed had its welcome for her. Accustomed to the more restrained greetings of her own countrymen and-women, Mary was enchanted by the gaiety of these French who were so ready to drink to her health and make a fête day of her short stay in their towns or villages.

At Nantes a gaily decorated barge was awaiting her and she, in what proved to be a glorious river pageant, sailed with her entourage up the river Loire through the villages and vineyards of Anjou and Touraine, where the people lined the riverbank to call a welcome to her. When she left the barge and went ashore in her litter, the people crowded around her, their eyes flashing, laughter bubbling from their lips, and she thought them the merriest people she had ever seen. How could she be homesick for those castles which had been nothing more than prisons! Here the people were not only gay but friendly. It was an informal pageant in which the laborers from the vineyard, the tillers of the soil, and plump peasant women, joined merrily.

She had never witnessed anything like it and she was as delighted with the French as the French were with her.

But when they left the barge at Tours, the journey became more of a royal progress, for waiting to greet her was her grandfather Claude Duc de Guise, and her grandmother, the Duchesse, was with him—she who before her marriage had been Antoinette de Bourbon.

These great personages received her with much ceremony, but when they were alone her grandmother took the child on her knee and embraced her. “You are indeed a pretty child,” she said; and her eyes gleamed, as did those of the Duke her husband, for the fortunes of the mighty house of Guise and Lorraine rested on this dainty child’s shoulders.

“I shall write and tell your uncle François that he will love you,” went on her grandmother.

“Is my uncle François not here then, Grandmother?”

“No, my child, he is much occupied with the affairs of the country. So are his brothers. But they will be delighted, all of them, to hear what a dear little girl you are.”

Her grandfather talked to her too. He reminded her that while she was Queen of Scotland she was also a member of the noble house of Guise and Lorraine.

“We stand together, my little one. One for all and all for each. That is the rule of our family. Soon you will be meeting your uncles. Your uncle Charles will keep you under his wing.”

Mary listened gravely. She had heard most of it already from her mother.

The Duchesse traveled with the party by river to Orléans where they disembarked and continued by road through Chartres.

“You will be housed,” the Duchesse told Mary, “with the royal children—the Dauphin and his little sister Elizabeth. The little Princess Claude and Prince Louis are babies still. The King has decided that you shall live at the palace of Saint-Germain as soon as it is sweetened. Meanwhile you will stay nearby at Carrières.”

“When shall I see the King and Queen?” asked Mary.

“Ah, you go too fast. The Court is at Moulins, so to begin with you will make the acquaintance of the royal children. The King wishes the meeting to be informal. You understand, my child? The King loves children and thinks tenderly of them—not only his own but others also. He has decided that you shall come to know the children with a complete absence of ceremony. He is anxious that you should love each other. You are to share a room with Madame Elisabeth. She is only three and a half. He hopes that you will be particularly fond of the Dauphin.”

“I shall, I know I shall. I am going to take great care of him.”

The Duchesse laughed. “Ah, my little one, you have the proud spirit of a Guise. So the Queen of a savage land will take great care of the heir of France, eh?”

“But he is younger than I,” protested Mary. “And I hear that he is not strong.”

Madame de Guise patted her shoulder. “You are right, my child. You must take every care of him, for on him will depend your future… and that of others. Let it not be too obvious care. Let it be loving tenderness. I know you will be a credit to us. There is another matter. The King is pleased to allow your four little friends to be with you, but he wants them to go away after the first few days at Carrières. No! Do not be afraid. The King has heard of your love for them and he would not for the world part you from them. But for a little while he wishes you to be alone in the royal nursery with François and Elisabeth. He wants no other children to come between you for a little while.”

“It will only be for a little while?”

“For a very little while. You need have no fear, dear child. You will be happy in our royal nurseries.”

“The King is a very good king,” said Mary. “The Queen … is she beautiful?”

“All queens are beautiful,” said the Duchesse lightly.

“Does she too say that she wants me to love François and Elisabeth?”

“The Queen agrees with the King in all things.”

Mary was intelligent. She noticed that the manner of her grandmother changed when she mentioned the Queen of France. Why? wondered Mary.

She was longing to see the Dauphin and his little sister; she was longing to see the King; but oddly enough, as she explained to her Marys, she felt more curious about the Queen.

THE MEETING between the children was unceremonious as it had been intended it should be. In the big room at Carrières Mary went forward to greet them. With them were their Governor and Governess, the Maréchal d’Humières and Madame d’Humières. With Mary were her grandmother and the members of her suite.

The Dauphin stared at Mary. She was taller than he was. His legs were thin and spindly and it seemed as though the weight of his body would break them. His head seemed too large for the rest of him and he was very pale.

Mary’s tenderness—always ready to be aroused—overwhelmed her. She knelt and kissed his hand. He stared at her wonderingly; and rising she put her arms about him and kissed him. “I have come to love you and be your playmate,” she said.

The little boy immediately responded to her embrace.

Mary broke away and glanced with some apprehension at her grandmother. They had said no ceremony, but had she been too impulsive in embracing the Dauphin?