December 24, 1553

These days of Christmas are hard for me. I cannot help but miss my mother more than ever. We begin to fast midafternoon – no evening meal until after Midnight Mass. I grow so hungry, but it is not just my stomach that hungers. It is my heart as well. I think of my mother constantly. I do not know whether to place her at Stirling Castle or Linlithgow. I sense, however, that she might be at the priory on the island of Inchmahome on the north shore of Lake Mentieth. It is only a few hours on horseback from Stirling. It was where they took me after the Scots were defeated at the Battle of Pinkie Cleugh by the English. I was hidden for three weeks. I can almost recall it although I was only four. But I do remember Janet Sinclair waking me up in the middle of the night and telling me – her face a bit too bright, her grey eyes darting nervously – that we were going on an exciting journey. And then I remember the mist on the lake and the monks who seemed to melt out of the mist as our boat approached the shore. The prior himself picked me up in his arms, and it is said I touched his nose and asked why it was so long!

So I try now on this Christmas Eve to fill my stomach and my heart with these memories. I must reach far back to a time that is so dim, to a place that is so distant, and a fine mist that wraps it all. I wonder if the fog will ever lift and if Mother and I shall stand in the sunshine together.

 

PS Francis just paid a visit. He said he wishes we were not considered too old to set out sabots, the wooden shoes we sometimes wear for rough play, for Père Noël to put gifts in. But we are! Christmas Eve is quite grim if you’re not quite a grown-up but not really a child anymore. Oh, we are given gifts, but serious gifts. Francis is worried that he shall get a sword his father once carried and that it will be too heavy for him and that he shall be embarrassed. He pictures himself falling over under the weight of the sword.