'Henry Howard loves the
queen. You must be the queen to him. You must receive his letters,
and answer them in the queen's name. You must grant him interviews
by night, and, favored by the darkness of the night, make him
believe that it is the queen whom he holds in his arms. He must be
convinced that the queen is his lady-love; and in his thoughts, as
in his deeds, he must be placed before the king as a traitor and
criminal whose head is forfeited to the headsman's axe. One day we
will let the king be a witness of a meeting that Henry Howard
believes he has with the queen; it will then be in his power to
punish his enemy for his criminal passion, which is worthy of
death!' And as I thus spoke to the woman, sire, she said with a sad
smile: 'It is a disgraceful and dishonorable part that you assign
me; but I undertake it, for you say I may thereby render a service
to the king. I shall disgrace myself for him; but he will perhaps
bestow upon me in return a gracious smile; and then I shall be
abundantly rewarded.'"
"But this woman is an angel!" cried the king, ardently--"an angel
whom we should kneel to and adore. Tell me her name, Douglas!"
"Sire, as soon as you have forgiven me! You know now all my guilt
and all my crime. For, as I bade that noble woman, so it came to
pass, and Henry Howard has gone to the Tower in the firm belief that
it was the queen whom he just now held in his arms."
"But why did you leave me in this belief, Douglas? Why did you fill
my heart with wrath against the noble and virtuous queen also?"
"Sire, I dared not reveal the deception to you before you had
sentenced Surrey, for your noble and just moral sense would have
been reluctant to punish him on account of a crime that he had not
committed; and in your first wrath you would also have blamed this
noble woman who has sacrificed herself for her king.
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