The Queen-Mother was still more explicit and unblushing throughout the whole affair.

“The ambassador of Spain,” she said, “has made the most beautiful remonstrances he could think of about these deputies from the Netherlands.  All his talk, however, cannot persuade me to anything else save to increase my desire to have reparation for the wrong that has been done me in regard to my claims upon Portugal, which I am determined to pursue by every means within my power.  Nevertheless I have told Don Bernardino that I should always be ready to embrace any course likely to bring about a peaceful conclusion.  He then entered into a discussion of my rights, which, he said, were not thought in Spain to be founded in justice.  But when I explained to him the principal points (of which I possess all the pieces of evidence and justification), he hardly knew what to say, save that he was astounded that I had remained so long without speaking of my claims.  In reply, I told him ingenuously the truth.”

The truth which the ingenuous Catharine thus revealed was, in brief, that all her predecessors had been minors, women, and persons in situations not to make their rights valid.  Finding herself more highly placed, she had advanced her claims, which had been so fully recognized in Portugal, that she had been received as Infanta of the kingdom.  All pretensions to the throne being now through women only, hers were the best of any.  At all this Don Bernardino expressed profound astonishment, and promised to send a full account to his master of “the infinite words” which had passed between them at this interview!

“I desire,” said Catharine, “that the Lord King of Spain should open his mind frankly and promptly upon the recompense which he is willing to make me for Portugal, in order that things may pass rather with gentleness than otherwise.”

It was expecting a great deal to look for frankness and promptness from the Lord King of Spain, but the Queen-Mother considered that the Netherland envoys had put a whip into her hand.  She was also determined to bring Philip up to the point, without showing her own game.  “I will never say,” said Catharine—­ingenuous no longer—­“I will never say how much I ask, but, on the contrary, I shall wait for him to make the offer.  I expect it to be reasonable, because he has seen fit to seize and occupy that which I declare to be my property.”

This is the explanation of all the languor and trifling of the French court in the Netherland negotiation.  A deep, constant, unseen current was running counter to all the movement which appeared upon the surface.  The tergiversations of the Spanish cabinet in the Portugal matter were the cause of the shufflings of the French ministers on the subject of the Provinces.

“I know well,” said Henry a few days later, “that the people down there, and their ambassador here, are leading us on with words, as far as they can, with regard to the recompense of madam my mother for her claims upon Portugal.  But they had better remember (and I think they will), that out of the offers which these sixteen deputies of the Netherlands are bringing me—­and I believe it to be carte blanche—­I shall be able to pay myself.  ’Twill be better to come promptly to a good bargain and a brief conclusion, than to spin the matter out longer.”