The Virgin's Lover

by Philippa Gregory

  “Well, at any rate, Mr. Forster wants you,” Lizzie said stoutly.

  “Did you write to him and ask if we could go?”

  Lizzie’s gaze dropped to the ground. “Yes,” she admitted. “I think it is either there, or Stanfield.”

  “We’ll go there then,” Amy said quietly. “Do you know, only a year ago he was honored by my company, and pressed me to stay longer than those few days. And now he will tolerate me for only a month.”

  Elizabeth, who had once snatched at every opportunity to see Robert alone, was now avoiding him, and finding ways to be with William Cecil. She cried off from a day’s hunting at the last moment, saying that her head ached too much to ride, and watched the court, led by Robert, ride out. Laetitia Knollys was at his side but Elizabeth let him go. Back in her rooms, Cecil was waiting for her.

  “He says he will wait,” she said, standing at the window of Windsor Castle to catch a last glimpse of him as the hunt wound down the steep hill to the town and the marshes beside the river. “He says it will make no difference if we do not announce our betrothal. We can wait until the time is right.”

  “You have to withdraw,” Cecil said.

  She turned toward him. “Spirit, I cannot. I dare not lose him. It would be worse than death to me, to lose him.”

  “Would you leave your throne for him?”

  “No!” she exclaimed passionately. “Not for any man. Not for anything. Never.”

  “Then you have to give him up,” he said.

  “I cannot break my word to him. I cannot have him think of me as faithless.”

  “Then he will have to release you,” Cecil said. “He must know that he should never have entered into such a promise. He was not free to enter into it. He was already married. He is a bigamist.”

  “He’ll never let me go,” she said.

  “Not if he thought there was any chance of winning you,” Cecil agreed. “But what if he thought it was hopeless? And if he thought he might lose his place at court? If it was a choice between never seeing you again and living disgraced in exile; or giving you up and being as he was before the promise?”

  “Then he might,” Elizabeth conceded reluctantly. “But I can’t threaten him with that, Spirit. I don’t even have the courage to ask him to release me. I can’t bear to hurt him. Don’t you know what love is? I cannot reject him. I would rather cut off my own right hand than hurt him.”

  “Yes,” he said, unimpressed. “I see that it has to be done by him, as if by his free choice.”

  “He feels the same about me!” she exclaimed. “He would never leave me.”

  “He would not cut off his right hand for you,” Cecil said knowingly.

  She paused. “Do you have a plan? Are you planning a way that I can be free?”

  “Of course,” he said simply. “You will lose your throne if any word of this mad betrothal gets out. I have to think of a way to save you, and then we have to do it, Elizabeth. Whatever it costs.”

  “I will not betray my love for him,” she said. “He must not hear it from me. Anything but that. I would rather die than he thought me faithless.”

  “I know,” Cecil said, worried. “I know. Somehow, it has to be his decision and his choice.”

  Amy and Lizzie Oddingsell rode across the broad, open Oxfordshire countryside from Denchworth to Cumnor. The high ground was wild and open, pretty on a summer’s day with flocks of sheep shepherded by absentminded children who shouted at the travelers and came leaping like goats themselves to see the ladies ride by.

  Amy did not smile and wave at them, nor scatter groats from her purse. She did not seem to see them. For the first time in her life she rode without an escort of liveried menservants around her, for the first time in many years she rode without the Dudley standard of the bear and ragged staff carried before her. She rode on a slack rein, looking around her, but seeing nothing. And her horse drooped its head and went along dully, as if Amy’s light weight was a heavy burden.

  “At least the fields look in good heart,” Lizzie said cheerfully.

  Amy looked blankly around her. “Oh, yes,” she said.

  “Should be a good harvest?”

  “Yes.”

  Lizzie had written to Sir Robert to tell him that his wife was moving from Abingdon to Cumnor and received no reply. His steward sent no money for the settlement of their debts, nor for tipping the Abingdon staff, and did not tell Lizzie that an escort would be provided for her. In the end, they were attended by Lizzie’s brother’s men, and a small cart came behind them with their goods. When Amy had come out on the doorstep into the bright morning sunlight, pulling on her riding gloves, she saw the little cavalcade and realized that from now on she would travel as a private citizen. The Dudley standard would not proclaim her as a wife of a great lord, the Dudley livery would not warn people to clear the road, to doff their caps, to bend their knees. Amy had become no more than Miss Amy Robsart—less than Miss Amy Robsart, for she was not even a single woman who might marry anyone, a woman with prospects; now she was that lowest form of female life, a woman who had married the wrong man.

  Little Tom clung to her skirt and asked to be lifted up.

  “Me-me!” he reminded her.

  Amy looked down at him. “I have to say good-bye to you,” she said. “I don’t think they will let me see you again.”

  He did not understand the words but he felt her sadness like a shadow.

  “Me-me!”

  She bent down swiftly and kissed his warm, silky head, smelled the sweet little boy scent of him, and then she rose to her feet and went quickly out to her horse before he could cry.

  It was a beautiful summer day and a wonderful ride through the heart of England, but Amy did not see it. A lark went up from the cornfield on her right, higher and higher, its wings beating with each rippling note, and she did not hear. Slowly up the green slope of the sides of hills they labored, and then slipped down to the wooded valleys and the fertile fields on the valley floor and still Amy saw nothing, and remarked on nothing.

  “Are you in pain?” Lizzie asked, catching a glimpse of Amy’s white face as she lifted the veil from her riding hat for a sip of water when they stopped by a stream.

  “Yes,” Amy said shortly.

  “Are you ill? Can you ride?” Lizzie asked, alarmed.

  “No, it is just the same as always.” Amy said. “I shall have to grow accustomed to it.”

  Slowly, the little procession wound past the fields on the outskirts of Cumnor and then entered the village, scattering hens and setting the dogs barking. They went past the church with the handsome square stone tower standing tall on its own little hill, skirted by fat trees of dark yew. Amy rode by, without a glance at Elizabeth’s flag which fluttered from the pole at the head of the tower, through the muddy village streets which wound around the low-browed thatched cottages.

  Cumnor Place was set alongside the churchyard but the little cavalcade went around the high wall of pale limestone blocks to approach the house through the archway. The drive led them through an avenue of yew trees, and Amy shivered as their gloom fell over the sunlit path.

  “Nearly there,” Lizzie Oddingsell said cheerfully, thinking that Amy might be tired.

  “I know.”

  Another soaring archway set into the thick stone walls took them into the courtyard and the very heart of the house. Mrs. Forster, hearing the horses, came out from the great hall on the right-hand side to greet them.

  “Here you are!” she cried out. “And in what good time! You must have had a very easy ride.”

  “It was easy,” Lizzie said, when Amy did not reply, but merely sat on her horse. “But I am afraid Lady Dudley is very tired.”

  “Are you, your ladyship?” Mrs. Forster inquired with concern.

  Amy lifted the veil from her hat.

  “Oh! You do look pale. Come down and you shall rest,” Mrs. Forster said.

  A groom came forward and Amy slid down the horse’s side in a clumsy j
ump. Mrs. Forster took her hand and led her into the great hall where a fire was burning in the large stone hearth.

  “Will you take a cup of ale?” she asked solicitously.

  “Thank you,” Amy said.

  Mrs. Forster pressed her into a great wooden chair by the fireside and sent a page running for ale and cups. Lizzie Oddingsell came into the room and took a seat beside Amy.

  “Well, here we are!” Mrs. Forster remarked. She was conscious of the difficulty of her position. She could hardly ask for news of court, when the only news was that the queen’s behavior with this white-faced young woman’s husband was becoming more blatant every day. The whole country knew now that Robert Dudley was carrying himself like a king-to-be, and Elizabeth could hardly see anyone else for the glamour that was her dark-headed Master of Horse.

  “The weather seems set very fair,” Mrs. Forster said, for lack of anything else.

  “Indeed, yes. It’s hot,” Lizzie agreed. “But the wheat looks very well in the fields.”

  “Oh, I know nothing about it,” Mrs. Forster said quickly, emphasizing her position as the wealthy tenant of a beautiful house. “You know, I know nothing about farming.”

  “It should be a very good crop,” Amy observed. “And I imagine we shall all be glad of the bread to eat.”

  “Indeed, yes.”

  The arrival of the page broke the embarrassed silence. “Mrs. Owen is also staying with us,” Mrs. Forster told them. “She is the mother of our landlord, Mr. William Owen. I think your husband…” She broke off in confusion. “I think Mr. William Owen is well known at court,” she said clumsily. “Perhaps you know him, Lady Dudley?”

  “My husband knows him well,” Amy said without embarrassment. “And thinks highly of him, I know.”

  “Well, his mother is honoring us with a long visit,” Mrs. Forster continued, recovering. “You will meet her at dinner, and Mr. Forster will be home for dinner. He rode out today to see some neighbors of ours. And he told me to take particular good care of you both.”

  “How kind,” Amy said vaguely. “I think I should like to rest now.”

  “Certainly.” Mrs. Forster rose to her feet. “Your room is just above the hall, overlooking the drive.”

  Amy hesitated, she had been going toward the best bedroom on the other end of the building.

  “Let me show you,” Mrs. Forster said, and led the way out of the great hall, through the double archway, through the stone-flagged buttery to the circular stone stairs.

  “Here you are, and Mrs. Oddingsell is nearby,” she said, gesturing to the two wooden doors.

  “It seems so odd that this should have been a monastery only fifty years ago,” Amy said, pausing by one of the wooden corbels which showed a little cherub, polished from dark wood to blond by constant touching. “This little angel may have helped someone to pray.”

  “Thank God that we have been freed from Popish superstition,” Mrs. Forster said fervently.

  “Amen,” Lizzie said smartly.

  Amy said nothing at all; but touched the cheek of the little angel, and opened the heavy wooden door to her chamber and went in.

  They waited until the door had closed behind her.

  “She is so pale, is she ill?” Mrs. Forster demanded.

  They turned and went to Lizzie Oddingsell’s chamber. “She is very tired,” Lizzie said. “And she hardly eats. She complains of a pain in her breast but she says it is heartache. She is taking it all very badly.”

  “I heard she had a canker of the breast?”

  “She is always in pain but there is no growth. That is another London rumor, like all the others.”

  Mrs. Forster pursed her lips and shook her head at London rumors, which were wilder and more detailed every day. “Well, God protect her,” Mrs. Forster said. “I had the devil’s own job to persuade my husband to have her here at all. Of all the men in the world I would have thought him the most likely to pity her, but he said to my face that it was more than his life was worth to offend Sir Robert now, and more important than anything in the world to him to be in his lordship’s good books if he is going to rise as everyone says.”

  “And what do they say?” Lizzie prompted. “How much higher can he go?”

  “They say he will be king-consort,” Mrs. Forster said simply. They say he is married to the queen already in secret, and will be crowned at Christmas. And she, poor lady, will be forgotten.”

  “Yes, but forgotten where?” Lizzie demanded. “My brother will not have her back, and she cannot live at Stanfield Hall all the year round; it is little more than a farm. Besides, I do not know that their doors are open to her. If her family refuse her, where is she to go? What is she to do?”

  “She looks as if she will not survive it,” Mrs. Forster said flatly. “And there will be the solution to his lordship’s difficulty. Should we get a doctor for her?”

  “Yes,” Lizzie said. “There’s no doubt in my mind that she is sick of grief, but perhaps a doctor could give her something so that at least she could eat and sleep and stop this continual weeping.”

  “She cries?”

  Lizzie’s own voice trembled. “She swallows it down during the day, but if you ever listen to her chamber door at night you will hear her. She cries in her sleep. All night long the tears run down her cheeks and she cries for him. She whispers his name in her sleep. Over and over she asks him: ‘My lord?’”

  Cecil and Elizabeth were in the rose garden at Windsor with the ladies of the court when Robert Dudley came to join them, the Spanish ambassador with him.

  Elizabeth smiled and gave de Quadra her hand to kiss. “And is this visit one of pleasure or one of business?” she asked.

  “Now I am dedicated to pleasure,” he said in his strong accent. “I have conducted my business with Sir Robert and I can spend the rest of my time taking pleasure in your company.”

  Elizabeth raised her penciled eyebrows. “Business?” she asked Robert.

  He nodded. “All done. I was telling the Spanish ambassador that we are to have a tennis tournament this evening, and he would be most interested to watch.”

  “It is only a little game,” Elizabeth said. She did not dare glance toward Cecil. “Some of the young men of the court have formed themselves into teams, the Queen’s Men and the Gypsy Boys.” There was a ripple of laughter from the ladies at the two names.

  The Spanish ambassador smiled, looking from one to another. “And who are the Gypsy Boys?” he asked.

  “It is an impertinence to Sir Robert,” the queen said. “It is a nickname they call him.”

  “Never to my face,” Sir Robert said.

  “An insult?” the more formal Spaniard asked.

  “A jest,” Robert said. “Not everyone admires my coloring. I am thought too dark for an Englishman.”

  Elizabeth took a little breath of desire; it was unmistakable. Everyone heard it and Dudley turned to her with a most intimate smile. “Fortunately, not everyone despises me for my dark skin and black eyes,” he said.

  “They are practicing now.” Elizabeth was unable to take her eyes from the curve of his mouth.

  “Shall we go and see?” Cecil intervened. He led the ambassador away and the rest of the court followed. Slowly, Dudley offered Elizabeth his arm and she slid her hand on his sleeve.

  “You look entranced,” he said quietly to her.

  “I am,” she said. “You know.”

  “I know.”

  They walked for a few paces in silence. “What did the ambassador want?” she asked.

  “He was complaining about Spanish gold being shipped out of the Netherlands by our merchants,” Dudley said. “It is illegal to take their bullion out of the country.”

  “I know that,” she said. “I don’t know who would do such a thing.”

  Blandly, he ignored the quickness of her lie. “Some eager inspector searched one of our ships and found that the cargo manifest was forged. They have confiscated the gold and let the ship go, and the
Spanish ambassador was to make a formal complaint.”

  “Is he to come before the Privy Council?” she asked, alarmed. “If they discover we are shipping gold they will know it is to mint new coins. There will be a run against the old coins. I will have to speak to Cecil; we have to keep this secret.” She started forward but Robert retained her hand and kept her back.

  “No, of course he can’t see the Privy Council,” Robert said decisively. “It has to be kept private.”

  “Have you given him a time to see me and Cecil?”

  “I have dealt with it,” Robert said simply.

  Elizabeth paused on the path, the sun very hot on the back of her neck. “You’ve done what?”

  “I dealt with it,” he repeated. “Told him that there must have been a mistake, I condemned smuggling as a general rule, I agreed that smuggling bullion from one country to another is most dangerous for trade. I promised him it would not happen again and said that I would look into it personally. He believed half of it, at the most, but will send his despatch to the Spanish emperor, and we are all satisfied.”

  She hesitated, suddenly cold despite the heat of the day. “Robert, on what basis did he speak to you?”

  He pretended not to understand her. “As I have said.”

  “Why did he speak to you? Why not take this complaint to Cecil? Or come direct to me? Or ask to meet with the Privy Council?”

  Robert slid his arm around her waist, though anyone of the court glancing back could have seen him holding her. “Because I want to take trouble from your shoulders, my love. Because I know as much about kingship as you, or Cecil, and to tell the truth, probably more. Because I was born to do this, just as much as you, or Cecil; probably more. Because his complaint was about your agent Thomas Gresham, who now reports directly to me. This is my business as much as yours. Your business is my business. Your currency is my currency. We do everything together.”