Shakespeare's Rebel

by C. C. Humphreys

  ‘Nay, stepfather,’ answered Essex. ‘I do not fancy the exile’s road. Not when I have a sword half drawn.’ He looked down the length of the table. ‘What say you, Lord Sandys?’

  ‘Draw it all the way, sir,’ shouted the older lord. ‘By God, you have three hundred men out there, all armed and sworn to your cause. The Queen in her palace cannot muster half that number. Let us send this answer.’ On that he drew his dagger and drove it into the table before him.

  Argument became general, a chorus of competing voices. Ned looked up at his father. John gestured with his eyes to the door. His son had seen more than enough madness this night to feed his forthcoming role. The result of it he could miss. John could sense now what had been absent before – that taper at last hovering over the fuse. Well, he was ready for the blast himself. But he would see his son well clear of the explosion.

  They were at the door, his hand upon the knob, when one voice rose above all others. ‘And what says my most loyal of retainers? What thinks an ordinary man from London’s streets? What advice would John Lawley give?’

  I was afraid of that, John thought, turning slowly to a room of suddenly silent men, all staring at him. They were, in the main, not a crew he would care to follow into battle. His lord, however? He saw him as he had seen him standing in the prow of the boat that bore them on to the sands of Cadiz. Poised. Ready. And old Lord Sandys was right – there were three hundred men outside made of hard stuff. Also he remembered what he’d promised himself – however strong his misgivings, for good or ill he was Essex’s man, would be through the triumph or the disaster that was to come. He had promised himself that he would act. It began now.

  ‘I think you should forgo all doubt, my lord,’ he said. He thought of that same play that Essex had misquoted earlier. He knew it better than the earl. ‘Follow your spirit, good my lord, and upon this charge cry, “God for Essex, England and St George.” ’

  He felt Ned gape up at him. But it was on Essex that he fixed his gaze. ‘By that saint, by all of them, you are right!’ cried the earl, springing up. ‘Tomorrow is the day. But what is the event?’

  Cries came.

  ‘Storm the palace.’

  ‘Rouse the city.’

  ‘Seize the Tower.’

  Once again, a babel of voices. Definitely time for Ned to leave, John thought, grabbing the doorknob, opening the door. Halberdiers, their weapons at port, peered in at the shouting nobility. John began to push through them.

  A cry from behind, louder than the rest. ‘Before we decide anything, we must secure our own doors so no one is forewarned.’ John glanced back. Lord Sandys had left the table and was approaching the door. ‘Bar all the gates,’ he shouted. ‘No man is to come or go without our express leave.’

  ‘Fast,’ John said, shoving his son ahead. And fast they moved – but not as swift as shouted commands. By the time they reached the garden’s side wicket, five stout pikemen stood before it. Their officer, a large Welshman, put his hand in John’s chest when he tried to pass. ‘You heard the order,’ he growled, ‘no man in or out.’

  ‘And what of a boy?’ John asked. ‘He has no part in this.’

  ‘He looks man enough to me,’ came the reply, accompanied by a shove.

  John stepped back, gauging the opposition. But there were too many, and besides, this was no time for a brawl. It was time to think, bide . . . and seek another way out for his son. He had wanted to show him some madness, not immerse him in it.

  Ned was looking up at him, fear clear in his pale blue eyes. ‘What do we do, Father? I thank you for this instruction, but I believe now I have learned enough to pass the test.’

  John forced a smile. ‘You shall be off and soon. I shall find a way. Meanwhile’ – he moved to an unoccupied stretch of wall, sat and put his back to it, opening wide his cloak – ‘come and share a soldier’s warmth while we await the opportunity.’

  After a moment’s hesitation, Ned knelt and John swathed them both. When he pulled him close, he could feel his son’s heart beating fast. ‘Did I ever tell you of the night I spent with Sir Philip Sidney?’

  ‘The poet-warrior?’ The eyebrows rose. ‘I am . . . a great admirer of his verse and life. You knew him?’

  ‘I lay with him even thus. Wrapped in one cloak in the siege lines at Zutphen. Alas, ’twas to be that noble gentleman’s very last night upon this earth . . .’

  XXXIV

  ‘We Rise For Essex!’

  The tale lulled his son. Ned slept fitfully against his father’s chest. John did not, watching the gate for opportunity. None came, for none were admitted nor left – until Gelli Meyrick appeared accompanied by six cloaked and shrouded men just as the bell in nearby Bridewell’s hospital tolled seven. The reforming whores who dwelt there must rise, and so, it seemed, must conspiracy. Meyrick’s conversation with the captain was in Welsh, of which John knew not a word. But the upshot was clear. The gate was unbarred, six messengers were let out and some supporters who had gathered the other side were admitted before it was barred again.

  He lay there, watching and hoping for another hour. But no more men came nor went. Finally he rose, stretching cramped and aching muscles and limbs. Too old to sleep in the field, he thought. Ned woke and John bent, wrapped him again in the cloak. ‘Do not leave this spot,’ he said. ‘I will need to find you again, and swiftly.’

  ‘I will not, Father,’ Ned replied, the worry clear in his eyes.

  John walked between rows of recumbent men, some snoring, some wakeful, seeking he knew not what. And found it, in the reassuringly large form of Captain St Lawrence. ‘Good morrow, Lawley,’ he cried, pumping John’s hand with bone-cracking vigour. ‘Did I not say you returned happily upon your hour?’ He beamed. ‘I cannot wait for my captain to lead me over the barricades, can you?’

  ‘Hardly.’ John looked around. Everywhere men were astir, shaking off night and dirt. ‘So you believe that hour has come? What news?’

  ‘We march upon the court!’ The captain’s brow furrowed. ‘Or upon the Tower.’ It creased further. ‘Or indeed the city. Rumour has them all.’

  It was John’s turn to frown. He had heard the same dispute within Essex’s dining hall. ‘Yet surely in the end there is but one choice, Captain? The court is where the Queen is. Seize her, seize the realm.’

  ‘I’m with you, to be sure,’ St Lawrence replied. ‘As long as we also grab the hunchback and his cronies in the first scoop of the net.’

  His rejoinder was delayed by another voice. ‘Lawley.’

  John turned. ‘Despair.’ The formerly fat knight stood there, looking too tired to even muster annoyance at the old joke about his name. ‘So you are here?’

  ‘And an uncomfortable time I have had of it too. The summons was not as urgent as you made out,’ the man whined. ‘His lordship had no pressing need to see me, it appears, and has not summoned me though I have sent him three notes.’ The whine rose. ‘I could have spent the night in my own bed and still been here for . . .’ He faltered. ‘For whatever is to occur this morning.’

  ‘Or not,’ John breathed.

  ‘What do you imply, sirrah?’ demanded Sir Samuel.

  ‘I imply nothing, sir. I merely observe that your duty—’ began John, but got no further, for loud banging interrupted him. It was the sound of a pikestaff striking wood, and it was accompanied by a bass voice bellowing, ‘Open, I say. Open in the name of her majesty the Queen.’

  The three men joined the surge to the back gate, which opened at the Queen’s, and Gelli Meyrick’s, command. The man who entered first was a head taller than the Welshman, and John recognised the face instantly. He had seen it only recently, for Sir Thomas Egerton, as Lord Keeper of the Realm, was in charge of all its prisons, including the Tower. He was also a member of the Privy Council. ‘I come hotfoot from the court,’ he declared loudly, ‘bearing the Royal Seal of England as my warrant. So hence from my way, you saucy knave, and bring me to my lord of Essex.’

  Meyrick was
a saucy knave, a shepherd’s son whom fortune had raised to knighthood. But he was in his dominion now and his warrant ran. ‘Shut the gate,’ he shouted, and was instantly obeyed. There were more in Egerton’s party still to be admitted, but these were shut out to his loud protests. However, Meyrick’s voice topped his. ‘There are diverse plots afoot to murder my noble lord and master. No man but a friend may approach him. And you, sir, are no friend to Essex!’ He turned to his guard. ‘Take their swords!’

  Despite complaints, all weapons were seized. Even the Great Seal was taken and only returned to its bearer, the one liveried servant to get in, on Egerton’s strong objections. Yet his nobility did not stop him and his party being jostled as they progressed along the gauntlet of men that had rapidly formed, which led to the rear of the house – from whose doors now spilled another party, this one greeted by cheers, not jeers. John had heard whispered ‘Egertons’, and ‘Great Seals’ pass like the twittering of starlings from garden end’s to house. They had drawn forth the conspirators.

  ‘What, Lord Keeper?’ Essex cried, halting. ‘Are you come to arrest us?’

  ‘Not so, my lord.’ Egerton’s deep voice rose above the cries of ‘Shame!’ ‘Knave!’ and ‘Traitor!’ ‘I am come only to command what our former supplicants have merely asked before. That you present yourself forthwith to the Privy Council and explain what this gathering of fellows means.’

  ‘Present himself to be murdered, you mean,’ shouted Southampton, ‘just as I was nearly murdered by the Council’s creature Grey only last month. By God, my sweet page Christopher lost his hand defending me!’

  ‘For which Lord Grey was imprisoned, good my lord . . .’

  ‘And from which prison he was freed after less than a fortnight,’ thundered Mounteagle. ‘We know what treatment the earl can expect from you villains. A speedy condemnation and still speedier murder.’

  Baying, the crowd surged against the halberdiers mustered to guard the visitors, threatened to overwhelm them. Shouts of ‘Murder? Murder them!’ and ‘Treason!’ rang out. Spittle flew.

  Above the noise, Egerton struggled to be heard. But he was tall and lean, unlike the previous summoner, Herbert, and had a dignity that went with his title. ‘My lord, you cannot be condemned if you have not sinned. And I know you have not . . . yet.’ He glared with enough vigour at the men who pressed close to make them give back. In the relative silence he continued, ‘So I urge you to come before the Council straightway. Let your grievances receive a hearing. If they are valid, you will receive redress. Those are the exact words the Master Secretary urged me to speak to you. He means you no harm . . .’

  It was a mistake to mention someone so reviled. Egerton himself was reputed honest – yet the Lord Keeper had spoken one of Satan’s other titles, and the abuse that came drowned out any reparation he could make.

  Essex was one trying to be heard. His friends were shouting so he could be. But in the end it was the Lord Keeper’s voice that again cut through the babel. He had taken off his hat as a sign of friendship when he’d approached. Now, seeing he was achieving nothing, he replaced it as a sign of his authority. ‘Know, sirs’ – he glared around – ‘and all you that have assembled here, that I come on the command of the Queen herself. That I bear the Great Seal of England. And by the office given me I warn you all now: disperse. Submit your complaints to the Council – or take the consequences.’

  John thought it a brave speech from a bear in a bear pit. But its bravery had as little effect as that beast’s would have before a crowd hot for blood. ‘Throw the seal in the river!’ someone shouted. ‘Throw the keeper in after!’ came another shout, both surpassed by St Lawrence opening his huge mouth and yelling, ‘Kill the traitors!’

  Someone must have anticipated this, for now more halberdiers rushed forward, surrounded the party and hurried them up the terrace steps and into the house, right on the heels of Essex and his friends. It would serve no one to murder the Council’s representatives. Yet.

  But what would serve? This was the moment. John recognised it, for he had seen many such before; the one when talk turned to action, when courage and madness were screwed to the sticking point and burst their bounds – or when they did not. His men would have followed Essex to hell right then. All around him men were screaming, ‘To the court!’ John felt it too, though not from passion. From long experience. Do it now, Robbie, he thought, willing it through the walls of the house. Do it now.

  The doors were flung open. A single man strode forth – the Earl of Rutland, youngest and handsomest of the conspirators. He was buckling on his sword, at the moment of pushing the pin into the final hole on the belt. Achieved, he looked up, flung his long brown locks back, his arms wide, and cried, ‘To the courtyard! To arms and to horse! We rise . . . for Essex!’

  The shout that came could have brought down walls. ‘For Essex!’ John already had sword and buckler affixed, but many men rushed for theirs. St Lawrence gave him a comradely slap hard enough to fell a tree and ran off. John looked behind him, seeking. But the garden was a maelstrom now, Ned somewhere in its midst. He could only hope that his injunction to remain in it would be obeyed. Unless he could escape, he would be better here than on the streets while this game played out.

  John ran around the side of the house for its front. God’s beard, he thought, he’s going to do it. At last! A grin came. He could not help it. No matter how old he’d grown, how weary his limbs, he had lived for this kind of scrape once – and seemingly still. Rushed through streets or jungles, over besieged walls and the burning decks of galleons – for glory, for England, for gold; and for himself. Finally, no matter the cause, for himself. Now all questions were past, debate ended, now he could truly do no other, he felt as he ever had. Ecstatic. He was going to fight this day. It was something he’d always been good at.

  In the courtyard, men lined up in rough ranks facing the house, some mounted, most on foot, some jabbering like crows, some silent, each man approaching the moment in his own way. John made his way to the bottom of the stairs and no one tried to stop him – not even Sir Samuel, jostling for position. Many there knew him, knew who he was – their leader’s guard through all the years. Those who did not saw how he walked, the ease of it, the readiness. His hand rested on the pommel of his backsword, so lightly it appeared to float above it. No one there would grudge such a man his place.

  He’d just settled when the front doors of Essex House were flung wide. Out marched earls and lords, booted, spurred, some with breastplates, some with plumes in their hats, all armed. They formed a rough V to the top of the staircase, paused there, waiting. Silence took everyone now, and John could only hear the breathing of men, the snort of horses – and the bell in the Bridewell tolling ten. On the tenth stroke he came, to a huge shout, wearing a tangerine scarf crossways over his chest, over an exquisite suit of ruffled black velvet. He strode to the head of the V, then passed on through the ranks below, cheered as he went. Before the gates he mounted, his horse frisked, as caught in the mood. But Robert Devereux was a superb horseman, and in a trice he had control. John saw no doubt in a face from which the years had dropped away. He had seen him so over the years . . . at Zutphen, at Cadiz. Fidgety as a cat before, cool as steel once decided.

  The Earl of Essex stood up in his stirrups. He looked at his followers, silent again, ready. He drew his sword – a backsword, just like John wore. No foreign fancies for him this day. ‘For Essex,’ he cried, as John had cried before. ‘For England. For St George!’

  It was echoed. ‘For Essex. For England. For St George!’

  John shouted too, then took a deep breath. This was it. Rebellion. By day’s end he would be a traitor or a hero. Sooner. For the Palace of Whitehall was less than a mile to the west, three hundred men could march there in twenty minutes, and in ten more overwhelm the palace guards and the Council’s few followers. It would be over in moments. Essex would have done what he should have done fifteen months before at Nonsuch – seized the Qu
een’s person. With her secured, his enemies imprisoned or fled, he would dictate terms, would again be Earl Marshal of England, the Queen’s closest adviser and friend. Or . . .

  Or he could be Bolingbroke and so he would be king.

  The sword swung down in command. The gates were opened.

  King Robert the First! Perhaps John would reclaim his misplaced knighthood then. He would have to give up the theatre. But he could also take Tess and his son, and Sir Samuel would never keep them from him.

  John found himself smiling into a future. It would begin in the next moment. It would begin when Robert Devereux shouted, ‘To the court!’ and rode west along the Strand.

  The earl was still standing in his stirrups, sword aloft again. Now he waved it above his head and cried out in that strong voice, ‘To the City!’

  And led his forces east along the Strand.

  XXXV

  The Stages of Revolt Part Two

  ‘My lord! My lord of Essex!’

  Because he’d been at the front to watch his lord come from the house, he was near the rear of those that squeezed slowly out of the gates. So it took John till they were halfway down Fleet Street before he reached the horse’s rear. Even then he could not immediately get his lordship’s attention, such was the volume of shouting that bounced between the house fronts and caught in the jutties that curled out over the way. Many were about, on their way to or from church, or having attended St Paul’s pulpit for the Sunday sermon. More poured down from the alleys and lanes around, voices adding to the adulation. ‘Essex!’ most cried, making his own cry hard to distinguish. A few, ‘Bolingbroke!’

  With a last swivel and slide, he was beside the earl’s horse. ‘My lord!’ he called up from the stirrup, to no response, for Essex was busy acknowledging his acclaim with slow circles of his wrist. ‘Robert!’ he finally bellowed, loud enough to be heard over gunfire.

  It startled the earl’s horse, which baulked and skittered to the side. It startled the horseman who, gaining control again, looked down. ‘Eh?’ His frown at the familiarity cleared when he saw who had addressed him. ‘Johnnie!’ he cried. ‘Ever at the forefront, what? Good to be about them, eh?’