A Second Daniel

by Neal Roberts

  Noah and Henry bow low and step back, in keeping with the dictates of protocol for departing the royal presence. They’ve turned to go when the Queen says blithely: “Master Neville, please escort Serjeant Ames out through the kitchen, and give him a roasted potato, as I believe it his custom to roast every potato at hand.”

  Noah stops in his tracks. Tears in his eyes, he turns and makes a long sweeping bow, just as he had as a small child so many years before. “At your service,” he says hoarsely, and is pleased to see tears in her eyes, as well.

  As Noah and Henry leave the palace, the skies make good their threat and pour a heavy rain onto London and all its environs. Noah and Henry share a closed carriage back to London.

  For a time, they sit in uncomfortable silence. At last, Henry makes an attempt at conversation.

  “Her Majesty is quite something, is she not?”

  Noah comes only partway out of his reverie. “Indeed, she is. She is one of the most perceptive people I have ever met.”

  “I imagine she gets that from her father.”

  “I would imagine,” Noah replies. But he cannot bear small talk with such a close friend when there’s such a point of contention between them. His mood changes swiftly and completely. He looks Henry in the eye. “How can you ally yourself with that man?”

  “As I’ve explained before — ”

  “He’s so full of contempt!”

  “Oh, I don’t know,” says Henry. “No more than many others of his rank.”

  “Being unfamiliar with others of his rank, I cannot opine on that. But I do know that, whatever feelings he may put on display, in fact he has contempt for everyone but himself. Believe me, Henry. I felt it today. For God’s sake, I saved his hand! And still he would have spat upon me like a cur, if he could.”

  “Oh, don’t feel bad about that. Suspicion of the Jews is rampant in England. We have so few here that it’s easy to attribute to them all the ills of the world.”

  “That’s another question. Has anyone given a moment’s thought to the vulgar Jew-hatred that Essex has deliberately ignited? There are wicked people prepared to sow the seeds of hatred for their own ends, and many credulous souls ripe for the picking. All Southwark is filled with blood libel and venom for the Jews. I fear for my daughter’s life, lest someone find out her heritage, and exact revenge for imagined wrongs.”

  “Your daughter is safe with Sir Henry — ”

  “And God bless Sir Henry for it, and you for bringing it about. But what about everyone else’s daughter, Henry? What about the Jewish merchant trying to do an honest business? Is it not enough we’re regarded as strangers, and therefore suspect? Must we also have hatemongers like Essex drumming up demons to promote our persecution?”

  “Can I ask you something?” Henry says sheepishly.

  “Anything,” says Noah.

  “Why don’t you all just convert to Christianity?”

  Noah is shocked. “Why should we?” He shakes his head. “Henry, I know you far too well to think that you would suggest something like that to save our souls through membership in the Church of England. What you mean is ‘why can’t we all pretend to be Church of England?’ No doubt, you think life would work so much more smoothly. Well, it wouldn’t! Everywhere it’s been tried by papism, it’s been an abysmal failure. People will not stop regarding us as outsiders simply because we profess to be like them. They will suspect our motives in converting, as well they should. People cannot choose what to believe. If someone does not believe Jesus to be his savior, then it’s nothing short of blasphemy to accept him into the Church, so he can mouth prayers he does not believe, in words that will never rise above the rafters.”

  “What about Lopez?”

  “What about him? Has there ever been a soul more lost? He has no idea who he is. He willingly plays the part of Proteus, conforming to whatever shape pleases those around him. ‘Just accept me, and I will pretend to believe anything you wish!’ So lost a soul is he that I’ve no doubt he has in fact changed his beliefs any number of times, to conform to whatever creed was demanded by the country he resided in at the moment. Yet, still they said — and continue to say — ‘You are not one of us, whatever you may pretend.’”

  Henry nods. “Marlowe certainly did the Jews no favor writing his Jew as though he were Avarice in a morality play.”

  “Perhaps you know a playwright who will write his Jew as a human being with the same feelings and weaknesses as a Christian.”

  “Perhaps.”

  “But Jew-hatred aside, Henry, you must abandon any alliance with Essex.”

  Henry shrugs. “Easier said than done.”

  Noah looks pityingly at his old friend. “I was very near him today, and could see his expression. Do you know there was only one person in that room for whom he showed greater contempt than for me?”

  Henry looks perplexed.

  Noah is dismayed by his friend’s blindness. “His greatest contempt is reserved for the Queen of England, Henry!”

  “No,” says Henry dismissively.

  “Yes, I tell you! You must abandon him. This is no harmless dalliance, Henry. It’s more like an alliance with the devil.” Noah nearly shouts in frustration. “That man will be your undoing!”

  The rest of the ride is spent deep in thought, although there could never be any real rancor between these two closest of friends. Noah worries that there may come a time when he’ll be required to use every bit of his knowledge and skill to save his best friend’s neck from the headsman’s axe, and wonders whether he’ll be up to the task.

  That night, Noah dines alone with Marie in the upstairs parlor, regaling her with the exciting events of the day. As his Hebrew faith has now become public knowledge, he can no longer delay in telling Marie.

  “When Essex accused me of being a Jew,” he says, “he obviously expected the world to cave in on me and, when it did not, he was thrown off his mark for the rest of the argument.” He takes her hand in his own. “So, my dear, the time has come when I must reveal to you that I am a Jew by birth, and have never converted to Christianity.”

  Her face turns bright red, and she turns her back to him. He’s dumbstruck.

  Seething, she turns to him again. “Only now that the whole world knows you’re a Jew do you deem it safe to tell me!”

  “But I always intended to tell you,” he insists.

  “When, Noah?” she asks, her eyes growing red. “When? Only once the whole world knows? Months ago, you sat on that sofa, looked me straight in the eye, and swore that trust is the most important basis for any relationship. Do you remember that?”

  “Yes,” he admits with trepidation.

  “For heaven’s sake, Noah!” she cries. “You confessed your faith to Essex before you told me. Can you imagine how that makes me feel? That it was so important to keep me in the dark? Is that how much you trust me?”

  “But, Marie,” he says, choking up. “I love you more than my life.”

  “How can you love me, if you don’t trust me? For heaven’s sake, Noah, I stuck by your side all the while Essex’s men pursued you to the ends of the earth — or as far as Oxford, anyway. I was nearly killed by that beast, Meyrick. I’ve stanched your wounds and nursed you to health. What more need I do — what more could I do — to earn your trust?” She weeps.

  His memory floods with all the blatant hints she’s dropped after returning from the Netherlands, and he’s staggered by the weight of his own stupidity and ingratitude.

  She wags a finger in his face. “Noah Ames, you are a great fool!”

  “Oh, Marie,” he says. “I am indeed a great fool! Greater than even you know.”

  “Well, for your information, I’ve known you’re a Jew for months!”

  “But, how?”

  “Oh, don’t be such a dolt!” she tells him, wiping away her tears. “Do you remember when you asked if I wished to light candles for my deceased husband, and then brought me some?”

  He nods.

&n
bsp; “And you also brought me your favored candlestick, so that we could light a single candle together, as my late husband and your late wife died on the same day of the year?”

  “Yes,” he mutters, unsure where she’s going with this.

  “Did you not see that there were Hebrew letters engraved on the bottom of the candlestick?”

  His eyes open wide. “Oh!” He can only imagine how comical his pained expression must appear. He shakes his head. “I always intended to tell you,” he repeats, at a loss for anything new to say.

  “Then, what kept you?”

  Well, if there’s ever to be an opportune time to ask her about it, it’s now. “I withheld it because I never wanted to upset you by asking about your connection with the Earl of Southampton … who is, after all, Essex’s closest friend.”

  “What? Who told you about that?” she asks sternly.

  “No one told me,” he mumbles, “but it was suggested by Lord Bleffingham and Sir Robert Cecil that you’re widely believed to be half sister to the Earl of Southampton.”

  “Nonsense! Typical of noblemen and politicians. They think that, just because their own mothers cannot keep their knees together — ”

  “Marie!” exclaims Noah.

  “Oh, I’m sorry. But my mother was a wonderful woman by all accounts, and completely faithful to my father, bless her soul. Bless both their dear departed souls. My mother died bringing me into this fetid world, and I cannot abide hearing her name dragged through the mud. I’ve heard the same stupid things all my life!” She briefly covers her face with her hands. “Look at me,” she says, uncovering her face. “Do you think I’m pleasant looking?”

  Noah suspects that saying the wrong thing is likely to start a war, possibly a biblical plague, though he has no choice but to venture, “I think you’re the most beautiful thing on earth, excepting possibly my daughter.”

  “Thank you for that.” She smiles, pulls out a handkerchief, and daubs at her tears. “But I wasn’t fishing for a compliment. I simply wished to point out that my father was a strikingly good-looking man, even if he was a stableman. And I’m the spit and image of him.” She holds up her hands. “These hands are not more alike. Oh, maybe there’s a bit of my mother thrown in for good measure.

  “That little weasel, Henry Wriothesley, who calls himself the earl now? If he looks like me, it’s more likely because the stableman was his father, too. The old Earl of Southampton was an absurdly God-fearing papist. There was more than one crucifix in every room of that house, yet not a single Bible to be read.

  “It’s been my experience that the truly godly are not much for the sack. It’s those who merely pretend that you have to watch out for. The time my father was arrested and threatened with the rack … ” She’s briefly overcome, but brings herself together by an evident force of will. “Every stinking one of them came after me. Animals! I learned the dagger and pistol just to fend them off. After a while, I started sleeping in a hayloft in the stables, where I’d removed two of the slats, so that anyone coming after me would put his foot straight through the floor up to his crotch. And, before you ask, it happened … twice!”

  He tries to change the subject. “Is that when you learned to ride so well?”

  She regards him as though he’s a bit dim-witted. “No. My father was a stableman, for heaven’s sake!” She pulls a fresh handkerchief from her dressing gown. “Did you see how ‘fondly’ Wriothesley treated me when Stephen was killed? Why, he didn’t even step out of the carriage! He obviously doesn’t think me his sister.”

  “But has he a sister?”

  “Mary. Poor thing. At sixteen, she looked every bit the spinster. Oh, but I’m sure he doesn’t care for her, either. He’s his own sister!” She laughs through her tears, and looks up at Noah. “I’m sorry, but doesn’t he strike you as a bit … girly?” Noah shrugs. “When he was younger, Lord Burghley hired an anonymous poet to write him sonnet after sonnet persuading him to marry Burghley’s granddaughter.” She laughs again. “I stole into his room one night, and read some. The poetry was excellent. But more than half the sonnets were designed to persuade him that he was interested in women.”

  “Is he?”

  She seems puzzled. “I don’t know. I’m not sure he knows. But, for all that, I can tell you he’s the most self-concerned brat who ever lived.”

  “Marie, please,” he pleads. “I don’t know what to say. I’m so sorry for not trusting you, as my every instinct commanded.” He places his arms awkwardly around her.

  “Oh, it’s all right,” she sniffs. “It’s my own fault. I should have made the connection myself, and put your mind at ease about it. Southampton came here the other day, looking for dirt on you. So you weren’t wrong in thinking he’d try to turn me against you. I handed him his walking papers.” She barks a laugh. “So, I suppose you and I are both great fools!”

  He holds her until she calms down, then tilts her face up to his own. “A perfect match,” he says softly. “Two great fools.”

  She laughs through her tears.

  He drops to one knee, and swallows hard. “Will you, great fool, take this great fool to be your lawful wedded husband?”

  Though she’s unable to get a word out, she nods vigorously, and they embrace.

  At long last, Marie extinguishes all but one candle. She leans into him, and in the midst of a kiss that steals his breath away, her hands slide up to his cheeks and stroke them adoringly. She presses her body ardently into his, molding its softness to his firm shape. In the space of a single steamy breath, her embrace is transformed from gentle adoration into urgent desire. Her ample breasts flatten against his ribcage. Her groin presses so hard against his that, even through their clothing, his thigh feels the burning heat of her female desire.

  Noah wrests his arms free, and places his left hand on the nape of her neck, pressing his lips ever more urgently into hers. As he’s backed up hard against the wall and off balance, his right hand seeks for purchase in the curve of her lower back. Instead of allowing it to settle there, she grasps it and lowers it to her left buttock, which he cups in his hand, kneading its softness. His maleness begins to respond, and his body writhes in unison with hers.

  The air rising onto his face from the narrow space around his collar grows hot and moist as a bread oven, and his heaving chest feels as though it might actually be scalded by their conjoined heat.

  He blows out the remaining candle.

  One of the Queen’s ladies-in-waiting ushers Noah into a small private room containing a single long table, and seats him at its foot in a comfortably upholstered chair.

  “Her Majesty is expected in just a moment,” she says demurely.

  “Thank you,” he says, as she bustles out.

  Noah is even more nervous today than he was yesterday. At least then he was in the accustomed confines of a courtroom, however beautifully appointed, surrounded by lawyers and professional rhetoricians. Today, he’ll sit and have coffee alone with the Queen, a favor rarely bestowed upon anyone in the land.

  A clock on the mantel ticks loudly. At precisely four o’clock, the Queen enters, attired much more informally than the previous day, in a dress that one might see on any number of fashionable ladies in London, but more finely made, no doubt.

  He rises and bows. “Your Majesty,” he says.

  “Do sit down, Serjeant Noah Ames. I gave you that name, did I not? Many years ago?”

  “You gave me all parts of my name, madam —‘Noah Ames’ many years ago, and ‘Serjeant’ much more recently. I hope I have brought it credit to your satisfaction.”

  “Tell me, Serjeant Ames. The Exchequer informs me that, over the years, you have repaid him the full amount expended by the Crown for your upkeep and education. Is this true?”

  Noah blushes. “It is, Majesty.”

  “The Exchequer is not in need of your charity, Serjeant Ames.”

  “No, madam. He would indeed be in pitiable condition if he were forced to rely upon what meag
er charity I can spare. But charity to the Exchequer was not my aim. I thought perhaps the Crown might use the extra funds to provide another disadvantaged boy with the wonderful opportunities given me.”

  She nods. “I thought that might have been your purpose. Very commendable. The Exchequer has assured me that your contribution will go to that very purpose.”

  A servant wheels in a table bearing coffee, cream, and tangerines, reminding Noah of his first morning at Billingbear, but evoking far less pleasant memories, as well.

  “Is this not to your liking?” asks the Queen, evidently mistaking his woolgathering for distaste.

  “It is very much to my liking, Majesty, although I cannot say I will ever think of tangerine and cream in quite the same way again.”

  At first she seems confused, then it dawns on her.

  “Ah, yes. Essex’s livery. My father tried to rid the kingdom of these rival liveries, but, as you can see, some things must be dealt with anew in every generation. In any event, I doubt you need fear Essex, sir, as you have saved him the use of his right hand.”

  “Indeed, madam. It is not I for whom I fear. I was thinking of my employer.”

  “But that’s … me. Oh, you don’t think … ? Well, we can’t worry about everything at once. That’s what I always say. I show Essex favor in honor of his stepfather, the Earl of Leicester.”

  “Old Sir Henry Neville said that the two could not have been more dissimilar.”

  “Did he say that?” she asks thoughtfully.

  Noah gives a moment’s thought to whether he’s gotten the Nevilles into hot water by saying so, but decides that a statement so vague could be written off as small talk.

  “He did, madam. His gout is much improved, incidentally.”

  “I am glad to hear it. He has suffered from it so long.”

  “Madam, if I may ask, while I am in the Crown’s employ, will I be taking on private clients, as well?”

  “Do you wish to do so?”