Stung by failure, and fearing to be outwitted after all, Sussex now devised a safer and surer method than either war or diplomacy. There had perhaps already been one attempt to stab O'Neill, which he attributed to Sussex; but we are not bound to believe this, for a chief who punished unsuccessful agents by torturing them and slitting their ears was not likely to gain much affection. Neill Gray now declared that he was ready to serve the Queen, if Sussex would write to her on his behalf. The nature of the service required was not such as could be publicly avowed, and Gray swore on the Bible to keep it secret, on pain of death, if it became known during the continuance of the Earl's government. 'For the benefit of his country and his own assurance,' he agreed to do whatever Sussex wished, and 'in fine I brake with him to kill Shane, and bound myself by my oath to see him have 100 marks of land by the year to him and his heirs for his reward. He seemed desirous to serve your Highness, and to have the land, but fearful to do it, doubting his own escape after. I told him the way how he might do it, and how to escape after with safety;' and at last Gray promised to do it if he saw a prospect of security. Sussex assured the Queen that his accomplice might do it without danger if he chose, 'and if he will not do what he may in your service, there will be done to him what others may. God send your Highness a good end.' To hire a man to murder your enemy, and to determine to murder that hireling in the event of failure, are hardly matters deserving of divine favour, and it is deeply to be regretted that no letter is extant from Elizabeth expressing horror at the scheme. Such a letter may nevertheless have been written, for it would have been the interest of Sussex to destroy all evidence of the contemplated crime. On the same day that the Lord-Lieutenant attempted to make his sovereign an accessory before the fact, he informed her of the way in which he had received Shane's matrimonial proposal. 'I told him he should at his coming find my sister at the Court, and if I liked the other, I would further it as much as I could.' The treachery of Judas was hardly more dramatically complete. It must not, however, be forgotten that Shane was a proclaimed traitor, and that the political morality of the day was very different from ours. Sussex may have thought he was doing little more than putting a price upon an outlaw's head.[32] [Sidenote: General disaffection.]