Chapter 92 Extra 1
After the matter was settled, the Queen of England embarked on her journey home amidst great anticipation.
On the day the Queen arrived at the gates of London, half of London was decorated with lanterns and colorful decorations, and bright red rose petals were scattered into the sky. The streets were lavishly covered with fiery red woolen carpets, reserved for the Queen to tread upon as she rode by on horseback. The guards on both sides played their instruments with great enthusiasm, and the cheerful music carried along the way. Servants from Whitehall Palace threw coins at the poor of London, receiving increasingly enthusiastic shouts in return.
They were all chanting, "God bless England! Long live Mary, Queen!"
Along the street, every face shone with a sense of pride.
Cecil, Maitland, Melville, Boswell Arthur Erkins, Old Wilson, Miss Emma, Lord Darnley… these high-ranking officials who frequently visited the court lined up according to their titles and ranks, standing at the front to greet the Queen.
The beloved Queen of England rode her tall horse through the city of London, as everyone imagined her to be, elegant and beautiful. Even when she waved to her subjects without smiling, she exuded an air of grace and majesty.
Mary led her high-ranking officials into the celebratory banquet held at Whitehall Palace. As she crossed the threshold, she paused and carefully examined the faces of the people surrounding her.
Bathed in the glow of crystal candlelight, everything was exactly the same as when we went to France, except that Albert was missing.
The blond youth who had inexplicably appeared in her life had already sunk into the cold waters of the Seine, bearing fatal wounds.
When winter turns to spring next year, everything will flourish, but he will leave behind not even flesh and blood, only a decaying skeleton sinking into the silt at the bottom of the river, keeping company with the Huguenots who also died in the massacre.
People stopped in their tracks at the Queen's sudden halt, and Cecil asked, "Your Majesty, what is wrong?"
“The Duke of Somerset…” Mary said in a weary voice.
The Queen of England only mentioned the name, and the Secretary of State thoughtfully chimed in.
"The Duke of Somerset is an eternal national hero of England. The Times has already published his heroic deeds, and a grand funeral is being prepared..." Cecil said.
The Secretary of State's arrangements were quite sound, taking into account every tiny detail. The territories previously granted to the Duke of Somerset were returned to the royal family, and his private property was distributed proportionally to the Duke's close friends. The glorious achievement of defeating France should be widely publicized in the newspapers, and the funeral should be held in a place like Westminster Abbey. If the Duke of Somerset had not remained unmarried and childless, he would have also taken care of the Duke's remaining relatives.
In short, everything was very thoughtful.
So Mary swallowed back what she was about to say, nodded, and said calmly, "You did a good job."
...
After the lively banquet finally ended, the Queen of England, who had drunk quite a bit, dismissed her maids from her bedroom, closed the door, and slowly lay down on her thick, soft white mink fur.
These are the furs that the Duke of Somerset obtained from his hunting trip last year.
If he had simply given the gift to the Queen, Mary would never have accepted it. However, he had also given his entire year's fur harvest as New Year's gifts to seven or eight nobles and several noble ladies who frequented the court. It would have been somewhat disrespectful for the Queen to refuse the Duke's gift.
So she accepted the New Year's gift.
The white mink fur was wonderful and warm, as white as winter snow and as warm as a campfire by the fireplace. Wrapped herself in the fur, Mary suddenly couldn't suppress the urge to cry.
A door suddenly opened, followed by unhurried footsteps approaching. Mary kept her eyes closed and said somewhat impatiently, "I told you not to come in and bother me!"
“It’s me, Your Majesty… Please wash up before going to sleep, otherwise it’s not good for your skin,” Seton said.
The Queen did not answer, so Seton took it as her consent as she lay in bed. He placed the silver basin, poured in rose petals, hot water and lavender essential oil, wrung out a towel and went to the bedside to wipe the Queen's face.
After wiping her face with a warm towel, Mary fluttered her long, thick black eyelashes and suddenly asked softly, "...Where am I? The Louvre?"
"Good heavens, how much have you drunk? You're even confused about where you are. You're home now..." The familiar voice, which was full of laughter, suddenly panicked halfway through its sentence, "...Your Majesty, why are you crying?"
The young queen, lying on the bed, covered her eyes with her hands, and cool tears streamed down her cheeks, dripping into her white mink fur.
The Queen's tears were not obvious; there were no rapid, choked breaths, no words of pain or sorrow, and her body movements and breathing were very steady. Only a few clear drops of water trickled down her cheeks and through her palms, revealing her inner pain.
“…I’m home,” Mary repeated, her eyes closed.
For months she deliberately avoided thinking about anything related to Albert.
She could choose not to think about him lying wounded on the deck, not to think about the time she finished writing all day's documents and watched him ride his white horse across the green meadow outside her second-floor window, not to think about his sorrowful gaze under the white Irish moonlight that year, not to think about him kneeling to offer her irises during the jousting tournament, not to think about his nervous, bitter smile under the midday sun on the day she was vaccinated against smallpox...
Therefore, she can be free from pain and mourning, and, as before, devote all her energy to the country.
She could cut out all memories of Albert and gently toss them into the depths of memory, like tearing out the most insignificant pages from a notebook.
She...she thought she could do it.
But Seton said she went home.
Isn't home supposed to be a place to relax? So, all the memories came rushing back the moment I lay down. Countless fragments of past memories, like blades, cut bloodily into my soul, bringing a pain even more intense than the moment I heard the bad news.
“Albert is dead, gone from my life forever…” Mary murmured to herself, “...Why was it him who died? It shouldn’t be like this. He should have been living a good life, married another lady, had children, and lived a happy life.”
Seton's expression changed several times, and finally he looked at the Queen sadly. After a while, he took off his shoes, sat on the bed, hugged the Queen's upper body in his arms, and gently patted her back, just like when they were children playing together.
“Someone passed by there, but he was gone. I searched for him, but I could not find him. You sent them away like water, and they went as if they had been asleep.”
“Behold, God’s dwelling place is among men. He will dwell with them and be his people. God himself will be with them and be their God.”
"God will wipe every tear from their eyes, and there will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away."
Seton paused, wiped the Queen's tears with his fingers, and slowly repeated the last sentence of Revelation in a soft voice.
"Because the past is the past."
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