News of this reached the fugitives to increase their desperate rage.
But what drove the iron into the soul of the arch-murderer Ruthven
was Darnley's solemn public declaration denying all knowledge of or
complicity in Rizzio's assassination; nor did it soothe his fury to
know that all Scotland rang with contemptuous laughter at that
impudent and cowardly perjury. From his sick-bed at Newcastle,
whereon some six weeks later he was to breathe his last, the
forsaken wretch replied to it by sending the Queen the bond to
which he had demanded Darnley's signature before embarking upon
the business.

It was a damning document. There above the plain signature and seal
of the King was the admission, not merely of complicity, but that
the thing was done by his express will and command, that the
responsibility was his own, and that he would hold the doers
scatheless from all consequences.

Mary could scarcely have hoped to be able to confront her worthless
husband with so complete a proof of his duplicity and baseness.
She sent for him, confounded him with the sight of that appalling
bond, made an end to the amity which for her own ends she had
pretended, and drove him out of her presence with a fury before
which he dared not linger.

You see him, then, crushed under his load of mortification,
realizing at last how he had been duped on every hand, first by the
lords for their own purpose, and then by the Queen for hers. Her
contempt of him was now so manifest that it spread to all who served
him - for she made it plain that who showed him friendship earned