queen in their turn, and that pistols, given by the
Master of Gray himself, had been found on the assassin.

This bad faith could not but open the envoys' eyes. Convinced at last
that they could do nothing for poor Mary Stuart, they left her to her
fate, and set out next day for Scotland.

Scarcely were they gone than Elizabeth sent her secretary, Davison, to
Sir Amyas Paulet. He was instructed to sound him again with regard to
the prisoner; afraid, in spite of herself, of a public execution, the
queen had reverted to her former ideas of poisoning or assassination;
but Sir Amyas Paulet declared that he would let no one have access
to Mary but the executioner, who must in addition be the bearer of a
warrant perfectly in order, Davison reported this answer to Elizabeth,
who, while listening to him, stamped her foot several times, and when he
had finished, unable to control herself, cried, "God's death! there's
a dainty fellow, always talking of his fidelity and not knowing how to
prove it!"

Elizabeth was then obliged to make up her mind. She asked Davison
for the warrant; he gave it to her, and, forgetting that she was the
daughter of a queen who had died on the scaffold, she signed it without
any trace of emotion; then, having affixed to it the great seal of
England, "Go," said she, laughing, "tell Walsingham that all is ended
for Queen Mary; but tell him with precautions, for, as he is ill, I am
afraid he will die of grief when he hears it."

The jest was the more atrocious in that Walsingham was known to be the
Queen of Scotland's bitterest enemy.

Towards evening of that day, Saturday the 14th, Beale, Walsingham's
brother-in-law, was summoned to the palace! The queen gave into his
hands the death warrant, and with it an order addressed to the Earls of
Shrewsbury, Kent, Rutland, and other noblemen in the neighbourhood of
Fotheringay, to be present at the execution. Beale took with him the
London executioner, whom Elizabeth had had dressed in black velvet for
this great occasion; and set out two hours after he had received his
warrant.

CHAPTER IX

Queen Mary had known the decree of the commissioners these two months.
The very day it had been pronounced she had learned the news through her
chaplain, whom they had allowed her to see this once only. Mary Stuart
had taken advantage of this visit to give him three letters she had just
written-one for Pope Sixtus V, the other to Don Bernard Mendoza, the
third