In Doublet and Hose

Francis Stafford would rather run with the hounds and shoot a crossbow than sit over her embroidery, and her tutor keeps telling her so. When her father’s devotion to Mary, Queen of Scots calls for a courier nobody would suspect, Lord Stafford’s daughter pulls on a page’s doublet and hose and carries the secret letters herself. Lucy Foster Madison sets the story in 1586, with Sir Amyas Paulet holding his royal prisoner at Chartley, Anthony Babington pushing a rescue scheme toward something far darker, and Queen Elizabeth descending on Stafford Hall in the middle of a royal progress. A challenge, a strange duel, arrest and the Tower of London follow, and the closing chapters put Francis on an English deck facing the Spanish Armada. Penn Publishing issued it in 1904 as a story for girls.