Mary, Queen of Scots visited Darnley from Holyroodhouse. His chamber servant Thomas Nelson mentioned how the queen and Margaret Beaton, Lady Reres would play and sing in the garden at night time. On the night that Darnley was killed, Mary attended the wedding banquet and masque for her servant Bastian Pagez and Christily Hog at Holyrood, and then visited the Kirk o'Field lodging.Alison Weir, Mary Queen of Scots: And the Murder of Lord Darnley (Vintage, 2008), p. 244: Clare Hunter, Embroidering Her Truth: Mary, Queen of Scots and the Language of Power (London: Sceptre, 2022). According to one narrative of the events, Mary was dressed in men's clothing on that night, "which apparel she loved oftentimes to be in, in dancings secretly with the King her husband, and going in masks by night through the street".R. H. Mahon, Mary, Queen of Scots, a study of the Lennox Narrative (Cambridge, 1924), pp. 99, 130.Thomas Finlay Henderson, Mary, Queen of Scots, her environment and tragedy, a biography, 2 (London, 1905), p. 659 Costumed performances at weddings were not unusual at the Scottish court.Michael Pearce, 'Maskerye Claythis for James VI and Anna of Denmark', Medieval English Theatre 43, 2021 (Cambridge: D. S. Brewer, 2022), p. 109.
