although he did not much like the jest that the name had been given to him because he was the son of David. He was the son of the Earl of Darnley and Queen Mary; and it was a calumny to suggest that his mother had taken David Rizzio as her lover and that he was the result.
But there would always be these scandals; and what did they matter now that the crown which united England and Scotland was his? The result was peace in this island as there had never been before, and all because the wisest King in Christendom, who had been James VI of Scotland, was now also James I of England.
“Fill up, laddie,” he said gently.
Wine! Good wine! When he was a baby he had had a drunkard for a wet nurse; it had not been discovered for a long time, and sometimes he wondered whether her milk had been impregnated with stronger stuff and that as he had been nurtured on it he had acquired not only a taste but a need for it.
A strange childhood his. The youth of royal children was often hazardous and that was doubtless why, when they came to power, they frequently abused it. But his childhood was even more unsettled than most; and that was not to be wondered at when he considered the events which had taken place in his family at the time. His father murdered—by his mother’s lover—and some said that his mother had a hand in it. His mother’s hasty marriage to the Earl of Bothwell; the civil war; his mother’s flight to England, where she had remained a prisoner in the hands of good Queen Elizabeth for some twenty years. Not a very safe background for a child whose legs were weak and who had only his wits to help him hold his place among the ambitious lairds surrounding him.
How he had gloried in that good quick brain of his! He might not have been able to walk but he soon learned to talk. He could memorize with the utmost ease; his prominent eyes seemed to take in more than those of the grown-up people about him; there was little they missed; and with childish frankness he did not hesitate to comment on what he saw. As soon as he began to talk, his wit was apparent; and all those ambitious men who wished him to be no more than a figurehead for their schemes were often dismayed.
That excellent memory of his had many pictures of the past preserved for him; and one of those which he liked best was himself, not yet five, being carried into the great hall of Stirling Castle by his guardian the Earl of Mar, there to be placed on a throne to repeat a speech which he had had no difficulty in learning by heart. He had astonished them all by the manner in which he could make such a speech; and as he had made it, his observant eyes had noticed that one of the slates of the roof had slipped off, and through it he could see a glint of blue sky.
He could still hear his high, precise voice informing the company: “There is ane hole in this parliament.”
From then on men had respected him, for what to him had been a statement of fact had been construed as grim prophecy. The Regent Moray had been assassinated, and the Earl of Lennox, James’s paternal grandfather, who had been elected the next Regent, quickly met a violent death.
The Scottish lairds were certain that their young King was no ordinary child.
James had been gleeful. He could not walk, but while he had attendants to carry him wherever he wished to go, what did that matter? He would walk all in good time; and while he waited for that day he would read, watch and learn.
He had come a long way from that Stirling Parliament to the Palace of Whitehall.
His eyes brightened as he watched the riders. There was Sir James Hay. A pretty boy James Hay had been when his King had brought him to England from Scotland; now he was a very fine gentleman. James had been very fond of young Hay and determined to advance him. A pleasant boy with manners to please the English because they were more polished than most Scotsmen’s since Hay had been brought up in France; James had made him a Gentleman of the Bedchamber and young Hay had proved to be a good companion, his nature being an easy going one and free of tantrums.
He was a little vain, of course, but who would not be, the King asked himself indulgently, possessed of such outstanding physical charm? The young man liked ostentation and, as James liked to bestow gifts of money on his friends, it was no concern of his how they spent it. If their tastes ran to fine garments, lavish displays, well let them enjoy themselves, remembering all the time whose kindly—if somewhat grubby—hand bestowed these favors.
Sir James was followed everywhere by his retinue of pages, all handsomely dressed, though naturally less so than their master, and it was certainly a pleasant sight to see Sir James and his little retinue in action.
James caught the eye of the Queen upon him. Her expression was reproachful. Poor Queen Anne, she was getting somewhat fat and showed the effect of seven pregnancies; yet she still preserved the petulance which he had once thought not unattractive. That was in the days of his romantic youth when he had braved the storms to go to her native land and bring his bride back to Scotland. He could smile now to remember their first meeting and how he had been delighted with his young Danish Princess, how he had in time sailed with her back to Scotland and brought to trial those witches who he believed had sought to drown his Anne on her way to Scotland. Pleasant days but gone, and James was too wise a man to wish to return to youth; he would barter youth any day for experience; knowledge was more to be prized than vigor.
Theirs had not been an unsuccessful marriage, although they sometimes kept separate courts now. That was wise, for her interests were not his. She was a silly woman, as frivolous as she had been on her arrival, and still believed doubtless that what had been charming at sixteen still was at thirty-two. She kept with her those two Danish women, Katrine Skinkell and Anna Kroas, and it seemed to him their main preoccupation was to plan balls, the Queen’s great passion being dancing. But he must be fair: Dancing and her children.
Every now and then her gaze would rest with pride on their eldest, Prince Henry; and James could share her pride. He often wondered how two like himself and Anne could have produced such a boy. A perfect King, Henry would make one day; the people thought it. They cheered him heartily whenever he appeared in public. He was an English Prince, they thought, though he had been born in Stirling. Doubtless they would not be displeased when his old Dad gave up the crown to him.
But there’s life in the old gossip yet, thought James.
Then his attention was caught by a figure in the retinue of Sir James Hay. This was a tall, slim young man who was carrying Sir James’s shield and device and whose duty it would be, at the appropriate moment, to present these to the King.
That laddie is familiar, mused James. Where can I have seen him before? At Court? ’Tis likely so. Yet once having seen him, would I not remember?
He forgot the Queen and young Henry; he forgot his own brooding on the past.
His attention was focused on the young stranger, and he was impatient for the moment when the boy would ride to the stage, dismount and come to kneel before him with his favorite’s shield and device.
