“I have no such fears,” replied Dudley, sternly.
“Then you own that I am right?” cried Jane, anxiously.
“You are so far right,” replied Dudley, “that I am resolved to depose Mary, and restore you to the throne, of which she has unjustly deprived you.”
“Not unjustly, Dudley, for she is the rightful queen, and I was an usurper,” replied Jane. “But oh! My dear, dear lord, can you have the ingratitude—for I will use no harsher term—to requite her clemency thus?”
“I owe her no thanks,” replied Dudley, fiercely. “I have solicited no grace from her, and if she has pardoned me, it was of her own free will. It is part of her present policy to affect the merciful. But she showed no mercy towards my father.”
“And does not your present conduct, dear Dudley, prove how necessary it is for princes, who would preserve their government undisturbed, to shut their hearts to compassion?” returned Jane. “You will fail in this enterprise if you proceed in it. And even I, who love you most, and am most earnest for your happiness and honour, do not desire it to succeed. It is based upon, injustice, and will have no support, from, the right-minded.”
“Tush!” cried Dudley, impatiently. “I well knew you would oppose my project, and therefore I would not reveal it to you. You shall be queen in spite of yourself.”
“Never again,” rejoined Jane, mournfully; “never again shall my brow be pressed by that fatal circlet. Oh! if it is for me you are about to engage in this wild and desperate scheme, learn that even if it succeeded, it will be futile. Nothing should ever induce me to mount the throne again; nor, if I am permitted to occupy it, to quit this calm retreat. Be persuaded by me, dear Dudley. Abandon your project. If you persist, I shall scarcely feel justified in withholding it from the queen.”
“How, madam,” exclaimed Dudley, sternly; “would you destroy your husband?”
“I would save him,” replied Jane.
“A plague upon your zeal!” cried Dudley, fiercely. “If I thought you capable of such treachery, I would ensure your silence.”
“And if I thought you capable, dear Dudley, of such black treason to a sovereign to whom you owe not merely loyalty and devotion, but life itself, no consideration of affection, still less intimidation, should prevent me from disclosing it, so that I might spare you the commission of so foul a crime.”
“Do so, then,” replied Dudley, in a taunting tone. “Seek Mary’s presence. Tell her that your husband and his brothers are engaged in a plot to place you on the throne. Tell her that your two uncles, the Lords John and Thomas Grey, are conspiring with them—that your father, the Duke of Suffolk, is the promoter, the leader, of the design.”
“My father!” exclaimed Jane, with a look of inexpressible anguish.
“Add that the Earl of Devon, Sir Thomas Wyat, Throckmorton, Sir Peter Carew, and a hundred others, are leagued together to prevent the spread of popery in this country, to cast off the Spanish yoke, with which the people are threatened, and to place a Protestant monarch on the throne. Tell her this, and bring your husband, your father, your whole race, to the block. Tell her this, and you, the pretended champion of the gospel, will prove yourself its worst foe. Tell her this, enable her to crush the rising rebellion, and England is delivered to the domination of Spain, to the inquisition, to the rule of the pope, to idolatrous oppression. Now, go and tell her this.”
“Dudley, Dudley,” exclaimed Jane, in a troubled tone, “you put evil thoughts into my head—you tempt me sorely.”
“I tempt you only to stand between your religion and the danger with which it is menaced,” returned her husband. “Since the meeting of parliament, Mary’s designs are no longer doubtful; and her meditated union with Philip of Spain has stricken terror into the hearts of all good Protestants. A bloody and terrible season for our church is at hand, if it be not averted. And it can only be averted by the removal of the bigoted queen who now fills the throne.”
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