A Rough Wooing Read Free

Anne, mainly because you feel that dark
and brooding Edinburgh Castle would be as confining and
inhospitable as a prison fortress.
    But now that fortune has smiled upon the
Scots, you are presented with the chance of a lifetime. Queen Anne
and her chosen ladies will shortly be traveling from Edinburgh to
London. At every stop that she and her entourage make on her
journey through England, she will be greeted by throngs, and feted
by the English nobility as they do their utmost to curry favor with
their new, young queen.
    To be part of the Queen’s Court in London,
moving from Westminster Palace to Windsor Castle, from Hampton
Court Palace to Greenwich would be beyond a young woman’s wildest
dreams, and is guaranteed to satisfy your great love of
adventure.
    Your chances of making a good marriage will
be expanded a thousandfold if you will take advantage of this
splendid opportunity that now presents itself. I have every
intention of joining Queen Anne’s Court, and hope with all my heart
that you will join me.
    King James will travel to London with all
speed to claim the English Crown, while Queen Anne, and her
children will make a more leisurely progress. My dearest Douglas, I
urge you to pack your things and accompany Will on his return to
Edinburgh.
    Fondest love,
    Katherine Douglas Elliot.
     
    Douglas set the letter down and gazed across
the room. Her vivid imagination conjured images of the English
palaces her mother mentioned. One sentence stood out from all the
rest: Your chances of making a good marriage will be expanded a
thousandfold if you will take advantage of this splendid
opportunity that now presents itself.
    Douglas smiled knowingly. Her mother’s words
had been carefully chosen to lure her to Queen Anne’s Court. She
had visited twice, but had not pursued the opportunity to become a
lady-in-waiting. The petty rivalry between the queen’s Danish
attendants and her Scottish ladies made a post at Court unappealing
to Douglas. But the real reason she had stayed away from Court was
to avoid the advances of Alex Hume, the young brother of Lord
George Hume, the king’s Treasurer. Since Douglas’s father died
while she was still a child, she was technically a ward of the
Crown and would need the King’s consent to marry until she came of
age. She did not care for the foppish Alex Hume and feared he would
influence the king in consenting to their marriage.
    She looked down at the letter and read again: Your chances of making a good marriage will be expanded a
thousandfold. Douglas bit her lip. She is talking about
marriage to an English noble. Such an idea would have been anathema
to Mother only a week ago. The thought is abhorrent to me.
    Unbidden, a vision came to her of Sir
Lancelot Greystoke, and suddenly the thought of a noble English
husband did not seem quite as abhorrent. Since childhood she had
been taught to speak in a more refined manner than her brothers,
who spoke with the same brogue as their moss troopers. She would
not be so out of place as the wife of an Englishman.
    Douglas felt torn. She did have a love of
adventure. Experiencing new places, customs, and people offered
challenges that were hard to resist. But she knew that her
personality was one part confidence and one part bold bravado—a
good deal of her bravery was pretense.
    She dipped her pen and answered her mother’s
letter.
     
    Dear Mother,
    Your momentous news that King James is now
King of England and Scotland stunned everyone at Castle Elliot. As
I write, I can still hear everyone below in the hall rejoicing over
such good fortune.
    You are absolutely right that great changes
will take place and there will be many opportunities for Scots to
improve our circumstances. I think you have made the right decision
to join the Royal Court and travel to London with Queen Anne, and I
thank you for your generous invitation to join you. Your tempting
offer has given me much food for thought. I shall consider it
carefully and let you