could hear her uncle, the Earl of Lybster, denouncing him with a violence that made his voice echo round the room.
“A dissolute and corrupt man,” he had boomed, “who died from a disease that came from his excesses. A King who was a disgrace to the Monarchy wherever he might reign.”
Sheena had only been a child at the time and her uncle had not realised that, sitting in the window, half-hidden by a. tattered velvet curtain, she was listening to him.
“You must concede, sir, that he was at least a patron of the arts,” someone remarked.
“Arts!” Lord Lybster shouted. “What does art lead to but licentiousness? To men such as rule over France it means statues and pictures of naked women, it means debauchery where there should be discipline and lassitude where there should be strength of purpose.”
Sheena had wondered why they all should feel so violently about a King who had lived so many miles away and was long since dead. And then they had gone on to speak of Henri II, son of Francis I, who now ruled France and to whose protection they had entrusted the Queen of Scotland.
It was amazing, she thought, the stories and gossip which managed to drift back across the sea. Mary Stuart had enchanted the French King. She had sung to him and had recited a poem that had almost moved him to tears.
A tale that was most often repeated was that when Mary had first curtseyed to Henri II at Saint Germaine when she was not yet six years old, he had exclaimed,
“The most perfect child I have ever seen!”
It was compliments of that sort that fed the loyalty of the rough Scotsmen and kept them eternally on the defensive against the ever-encroaching onslaughts of the English.
“Tell Her Majesty that we are fighting for her by day and by night,” Sheena’s father, Sir Euan McGraggan, had said as he kissed his daughter farewell. “Make her understand how loyal the Clansmen are, and how much she means to us that we live for her return.”
Sheena had been moved at the simplicity of his words. She had known only too well that they were nothing but the truth and that the men waving goodbye as her ship moved away from the windswept quay sent with her a part of their hearts.
She had been utterly convinced at that moment that it was right that she should go. Mary Stuart must not be allowed to forget those who strove for her against almost overwhelming odds.
She thought it would be easy to tell the Queen stories of the heroism and courage and unquenchable bravery which drove the Scots into battle against far superior forces and which made them accept, with an almost unbelievable fortitude, the burning and laying waste of their lands and crops.
Now, nearing Paris, she began to be afraid. What had this sunlit and rich land in common with the great barren moors, the burns, swamps and dales where a man could march for days, if not weeks, and not meet another soul that he could pass the time of day with?
“Maggie, I am frightened,” Sheena said impulsively.
“Shame on you! You’re nothin’ of the sort,” Maggie retorted tartly.
She did not meet Sheena’s eyes and they both knew the feeling of uncertainty and fear of what lay ahead.
“They are kind gentlemen,” Maggie said almost gently, “despite all their fancy garments. They’ll show us the way right to the King’s door if nothin’ else.”
“If only we had some money that we could buy different clothes with,” Sheena breathed almost beneath her breath.
“They must take us as they find us,” Maggie retorted. “The men who are fightin’ for Her Majesty are doin’ it often in bare feet and without a piece of cloth to cover their shoulders. Let her remember that. Make her understand the sacrifices that are bein’ made not only by the men themselves but by their wives and bairns as well.”
“I will try,” Sheena said humbly.
She cheered herself up with the thought that Mary Stuart was nearly three years younger than herself, only a child, whereas she had now come to womanhood. It should not be hard to instruct a child in the truth.
Despite such comforting assurances her hands were cold, her fingers trembling a little, as she laid them on the arm of Comte Gustave de Cloude as he helped her alight at The Palace.
She had expected it to be Regal, but she had not expected so many servants, such a bustle of liveried footmen, of Major Domos and sentries besides numerous personages who had apparently little to do but stand around, waiting and staring.
Sheena was allowed only a few moments to tidy herself after the long journey and then, without being allowed time to change her gown, she was ushered straight into the presence of the King.
She was ready to hate and despise him. The stories of his liaison with Diane de Poitiers had lost little in the telling when they crossed the sea, also his neglect of the Queen, the fact that he ordered the initials ‘D’ and ‘H’ to be entwined as a monogram and carved on all his Palaces. These stories had made her father snort with indignation.
Sheena had not known what she expected the King to look like. Whatever the image she had preconceived it was certainly nothing like the heavy mournful features of the dark-haired man who looked at her with melancholy eyes.
“Mistress Sheena McCraggan, Your Majesty!” she heard a voice saying and swept to the ground in a deep curtsey.
'“Mistress McCraggan, we have been looking forward to your arrival,” the King said.
“I thank you, Sire.”
Sheena was surprised to hear her own voice, clear and apparently unafraid. She rose to stand before him, small and straight-backed in her crumpled homespun gown, her head held high so that the evening sun coming in from the window behind the King’s head glittered on the red-gold curls she had tried to straighten into unaccustomed neatness on either side of her cheeks.
“You had a good journey, mam’selle?”
“The sea was very rough, Sire,”
The King nodded, as if he had expected the sea to be rough, and then he commented,
“You speak French extremely well.”
“My grandmother was French, Sire.”
“Yes, yes, I have not forgotten. Jeanne de Bourget, one of the oldest families in France. You have good blood in your veins, Mistress McCraggan.”
“I am proud of my Scottish blood too, Sire.”
“Yes, yes, of course.”
Henri was quite obviously bored with the conversation. He looked round the audience chamber as if at a loss, wondering what he should say next or what he should do or perhaps seeking guidance.
And then the door opened and his face was very suddenly transformed.
The look of melancholy vanished, the air of uncertainty changed and he moved forward quickly.
Sheena turned her head.
The most beautiful
