by Susan Kay
“It’s nothing, madam, truly. I fear the heat affects us all.”
Elizabeth smiled up at her slowly.
“Are you sure that’s all it is? Your health is very dear to me, cousin, I think perhaps you ought to see my doctor.”
The vial of perfume dropped from the girl’s hand and smashed on the floor, filling the room with the scent of musk. Everyone looked round in the sudden, electric silence to see Lady Katherine staring down into her mistress’s steady eyes like a hunted fox.
“Madam, forgive me—forgive me!”
Katherine dropped on her knees, catching the Queen’s hand and pressing it to her dry lips.
“Forgive you for what?” laughed Elizabeth lightly. “For breaking a silly bottle of perfume? Get up, you foolish girl, and go and change your gown—you’re covered with the stuff. You smell like a French brothel!”
The tension in the room broke up into hysterical amusement as all the women relaxed with the swing of Elizabeth’s mood. Katherine flushed hotly and fled from the room in a wake of muted sneers and titters. The prim haughtiness of the Grey sisters had not endeared them to the court, and most of Elizabeth’s ladies were glad to see Katherine flustered and embarrassed.
“Wretched girl!” muttered Mrs. Ashley, kneeling down to mop up the mess with flimsy handkerchiefs. “I can’t think why Your Highness makes so much of the proud trollop—I swear she did it purposefully! Your Majesty’s favourite perfume too, and so expensive!”
“Oh—Robin will give me another bottle—won’t you, beloved?”
Elizabeth held up her hand to him and he came to take it passionately, laying his lips daringly on the top of her brightly jewelled hair and watching her face in the mirror.
“I would give you the moon and the stars, madam—if you asked for them.”
She smiled and drew both his hands over her shoulders, clasping them just above her breast.
“I’ll settle for the perfume just now—as I rather think you will when Kat tells you the price. Here—put these on me, will you?”
She handed him the emerald earrings which she had rejected five minutes earlier.
“I thought they pinched,” he reminded her playfully as he bent to fasten them.
“These?” She glanced up at him in mock astonishment. “But these are my favourite pair—they were given to me by someone very special.”
She allowed him to lift her from the chair and kiss her with his accustomed familiarity. Everyone laughed and applauded softly as the kiss deepened, except Lettice, who stood abandoned and forgotten where he had left her at the window, glaring down at the drunken crowd outside. She took no part in the malicious female conversation which followed.
“Katherine Grey’s such an insufferable prig, madam—how can you bear to keep her with you?”
“Oh—I have my reasons, believe me. Now—where’s that dratted fan?”
“Here, madam—and so rude to Your Majesty at times, after all your kindness.”
“I swear she’d do anything to spite you, madam.”
“Mrs. Ashley’s right—she dropped that bottle deliberately.”
“Oh, I don’t think so.” From the window-seat near Lettice, Mary Sidney’s lazy, good-humoured voice cut in. “Your Highness knows how easily these things are done. Lord knows, when I was carrying Philip I broke almost everything I laid my hands on—”
“Pregnant women are noted for dropping things,” observed Elizabeth thoughtfully. She looked at Robin, who looked back at her, blank and uncomprehending.
It was not until the early hours of the morning that he gauged the significance of that casual remark. For it was only then that he awoke with a start to find Lady Katherine Grey on her knees at the side of his bed, beseeching her “good brother” to come to her aid with the Queen.
“I’m not your brother!” he snapped. “I’ll thank you to remember that any family connection between the Dudleys and the Greys has long since been severed.”
He got out of the bed with ungallant speed and stared anxiously at the door. Any beady-eyed spy of Cecil’s could have seen her enter his room—and if Cecil got to hear of this he would make sure the story reached the Queen in its most ugly form.
He pulled her roughly to her feet and looked at her with distaste.
“Stop bawling, woman,” he said shortly, “or I’ll give you something to bawl about! What the devil are you about coming here in the middle of the night anyway?”
She took a shuddering breath and stepped back from him. She had heard it said that he had a violent temper when roused and for the first time she believed it.
“Well,” he demanded, “are you going to tell me what this is all about or not?”
“Oh, Robert,” she whispered, “I’m pregnant!”
He stared at her—the proud, the loudly virtuous young lady who had once made it so plain where her ambitions lay. And he could not help it—he began to rock with laughter.
“You stupid little harlot—the Queen will throw you out of the court for a common whore!”
“You don’t understand.” Katherine was stung by his contempt, “It wasn’t like that. We were married—”
“In that case,” he remarked heartlessly, “she’ll have your head—and since it doesn’t appear to have been much use to you I don’t suppose you’ll miss it greatly!”
Her mouth opened and shut again and she swayed where she stood; he cursed and caught her, holding her against him for a moment and feeling the sobs welling up in her. He was horribly reminded of Amy’s soft, clinging hands as he pushed her helplessly into a chair.
“Treason,” he muttered. “You do realise that what you have done is treason—or as near as makes no difference? In your position so close to the throne how could you be fool enough to marry without the Queen’s consent?”
“I loved him—I couldn’t go to him differently. And now he’s in France—and I’m here—and I can’t keep it secret much longer. This evening when she looked at me, I was almost sure she had guessed. And she hates me, Robert—for all her sweet words I know she hates me—she’s been waiting for some excuse to destroy me.”
“Very likely,” he said drily. “So why come to me with this fiasco? What do you expect me to do, for God’s sake?”
Katherine caught his hot hands and covered them with kisses.
“Speak to her for me—put my case and beg for mercy. She’ll listen to you, she likes to please you—everyone says that she—”
“You would have done better to have gone to Cecil if that’s what you believe,” he said bitterly. “But, God knows, you could expect no quarter from him. I hope you realise what a difficult position you’ve placed me in—”
“But you will speak to her?”
“I haven’t got much choice, have I? If she hears of this visit from anyone else but me I’ll be finished. Come—you had better tell me the whole story—I’ll go to her first thing in the morning.”
It was a sorry tale of a secret wedding to the young Earl of Hertford and some of the details were so ludicrous that he would have laughed again if the matter had not been so deadly serious. Hertford’s sister, who had been the only witness to this hole-in-a-corner marriage, had died in March and Katherine had mislaid the relevant legal documents. By the time she had finished her tale, he was reasonably convinced her true destination should be a madhouse; but at the same time he knew very well where she would be going once he had broached the subject to the Queen. She had signed her own death warrant, and he did not have the heart to tell her that the only cause he would be pleading with the Queen was his own! He had troubles enough without being sucked into this stupid quagmire.
When at last he managed to be rid of her, he went back to bed in the steamy, mosquito-ridden heat and lay awake for the rest of the night rehearsing his lines for the morning.
* * *
He h
ad expected anger and Elizabeth did not disappoint him. His nervous revelation of Katherine’s crime was greeted by a string of enlightening oaths and the immediate despatch of that unfortunate girl on the first stage of her journey to the Tower.
When the dust had settled and her women had been driven out of her presence for a pack of clacking hens, Elizabeth sat down in her chair and began to laugh.
“It’s safe now,” she said mockingly. “You can come out of the shadows, Sir Galahad, and stop bleating about your integrity.”
Robin took a few uncertain steps towards her, unnerved by this volte-face.
“I never knew you were so afraid of me,” she remarked calmly.
“Afraid?”
“Yes—flattening yourself against that wall and hoping I wouldn’t notice you were still here. Come now—it wasn’t a very chivalrous performance, was it? Pushing her out of your room and working yourself into a muck sweat for fear of getting involved.”
“Mud sticks,” he pointed out coolly, “and I am smeared enough.”
She nodded.
“A sensible attitude—if not very noble. Sometimes I think it must be the baseborn dog in you that attracts the bitch in me.”
“So I do attract you?” He took her hand and smiled.
“Perhaps. You and I deserve each other. We are so passionately devoted to ourselves.”
“And Katherine?”
“I was certain yesterday. I have been suspicious for some time.”
“Then—you are not truly angry?”
“Not in the least. It is remarkably obliging of her to remove herself permanently from the scene.”
Permanently. He knew what that meant—or thought he did. Well—it had been inevitable.
He said quietly, “You can’t execute a pregnant woman. You’ll have to wait until the child is born.”
All the colour left the Queen’s face and she shivered in the hot sunlight.
“I shall not execute her at all,” she said faintly.
He was startled.
“You are actually going to leave her alive and let her raise a brood of children to menace your throne?”
“Bastards are no threat to me.”
“But the child won’t be a bastard,” he said patiently. “She’s married.”
“She’ll have difficulty proving it with the relevant documents lost and her only witness dead.”
He began to smile slowly with admiration. She was so quick, so clever. Banished to the Tower as a slut, Katherine would lose all the puritanical support of those who, until now, had been parading her virtue and her legitimacy and comparing it so favourably with the Queen’s questionable birth and even more questionable honour.
“So—”
“So I graciously commute her sentence—to life imprisonment.”
He laughed and bent over her chair to kiss her lips in a sort of salutation.
“You cunning cat—is there anything you can’t twist to your own advantage?”
“Ask me that again,” she said softly, “when I have all my rivals safely under lock and key. Both the Greys—and Lennox—”
“And the Queen of Scots?”
They laughed at the absurdity of his suggestion and at length Elizabeth leaned back in her chair, studying him with amusement.
“Oh, Robin,” she said wistfully, “if I ever got the chance to turn the key in that lock I should throw it into the Thames.”
Chapter 2
In August, the French galley bearing Mary Stuart eluded the English warships in the Channel in a thick fog and arrived at Leith. There was no official welcome, her bastard brother James having been under the impression that she would be making an unplanned detour through England first. The dour Protestant preacher John Knox screamed at his cowering congregation that the haar which shrouded her entry was the devil’s work, an ill omen; but the Queen’s party were inclined to thank God for its shelter, having lost to the English ships, which had plainly been lying in wait for them, only the vessel carrying the royal stable.
James arrived at last with his Scottish courtiers, sombrely dressed and most apologetic, trying hard not to betray his surprise that she had arrived at all. Mary entered her capital city on a clumsy, battered, old nag and her heart sank as she rode through the winding streets to the bleak and uninviting edifice that was Holyrood Palace. A clumsy celebration followed, reminding her of the forced gaiety of a funeral feast, and she recoiled from the hulking, grubby figures of the Scottish lords, pounding their tankards on the bare tables, scratching, belching, and spitting in the dirty rushes. They were little better than savage chieftains, thought Mary. She was privately appalled to find herself Queen of such barbarians and was bitterly aware of the cynical glances among her lofty French attendants.
A huge fire roared in the stone hearth but it made no more impression on the Great Hall than the flame of a candle. Mary shivered. The long, elegant feet inside her satin slippers were like ice and the damp hung so heavily on the air that she fancied it to be solid. She could not believe this was really happening to her; it was a distorted nightmare from which she would surely awake.
The night dragged to an end with members of the Scottish kirk droning tuneless Protestant dirges beneath her window. She was glad to retire to the tiny stone-walled bedroom, where her women stood on the hems of one another’s sweeping trains as they attended her.
“It won’t be for long,” she said cheerfully, and they tried to smile; they had already seen their own sleeping-quarters.
It wouldn’t be for long, for Mary had no intention of staying; Scotland was an uncomfortable resting place, not a destination. Lying back on the hard bolster pillow she became aware of the spider busily spinning a large web between the far post and the tester—she too could spin as fast and furious on a web of intrigue.
Spain was her best hope. The Spanish heir was misshapen and mad, but such things scarcely mattered when set against the advantages of a Spanish match. A Catholic army at her back would certainly force Elizabeth to acknowledge her as her successor. Invasion might not be necessary after all. There were encouraging rumours that suggested Elizabeth’s health was failing and doubt had been cast on her ability to bear children. Mary glanced about her with a resigned sigh. With the candles lit and the tapestries hung, the bleak little room was now moderately comfortable. It would suffice for a time if she chose to wait a little longer for her prise. Waiting would mean winning Scotland to her and courting the English Queen’s favour; waiting would mean lies and pretence and pretty artifice.
But I am young and I have time on my side—
The fire died and the shadows on the stone wall grew longer. In the twilight zone between waking and sleeping, Mary imagined Elizabeth’s scream of rage at being presented with horses in place of a royal captive. No doubt a few ears would be soundly boxed—they said the woman had a spitfire temper and no qualms about making a disgusting exhibition of it. No control, of course, lack of breeding; it always showed. Poor Elizabeth—one could almost pity her unquestionable inferiority. So let her enjoy the jewels and the fine dresses, the little group of fawning lovers, and everything else that decorated her outrageous reign. Let her have a few fond memories to take to an early grave, for one way or another her dance would soon be ended.
And then, thought Mary, as she turned her face into the lumpy goose-feather pillow, it will be my turn.
* * *
October 1562 was a cold, squally month which seemed to echo the distress of English soldiers fighting a lost battle in the French civil wars. Plague had broken out among them, decimating their ranks to the point where retirement from the venture now seemed inevitable; and since Ambrose Dudley, Lord Warwick, was leading those forces in France, the Dudleys had more cause than most to fear what was happening across the Channel. Certainly the Queen had had her fill of war. Twice now she had humoured Cecil’s military am
bitions, once with success, once, it now seemed, with failure. In future she would avoid war at any cost.
A fierce wind was buffeting the palace casements and driving showers of dried leaves across the lawns at Hampton Court. Elizabeth stood at the river’s edge, feeding a cluster of hungry swans, and occasionally leaning against the balustrade, shaken by a dry, rasping cough.
“This wind is like a knife,” said Mary Sidney in an anxious whisper. “She ought not to be out in it. Can’t you persuade her to go in, Robin?”
Robin did his best. Twice he remarked that it looked like rain; twice he complained peevishly that he was cold. Finally he took to stamping up and down beside the parapet, swinging his arms across his chest and remarking rudely that no one in their right senses would have ventured out of the palace on a day like this.
Elizabeth emptied the last crumbs from her hanging pocket and turned to look at him with amusement.
“You’re growing soft with good living, Rob. Perhaps I should push you in the river with the swans—then you’d know what it means to be cold.”
He smiled. “Any time you care to try your hand at that, madam, I shall be happy to put money on the outcome.”
“Done!” Elizabeth reached across Mary and drew Robin’s sword from its scabbard. She pressed the sharp blade against the olive skin which showed between his chin and his ruff and forced him steadily backwards to the water’s edge.
He raised his hands in submission and began to laugh uneasily.
“Now, madam—you know you don’t really mean this.”
“I took a bath this morning—did you, my love?”
“What—in this weather?”
“In that case, you won’t mind taking it now, will you?”
With his heels on the edge, he was forced to hold on to the blade to keep his balance; beneath his feet the dirty river, swollen with rain, rushed on downstream.
“If I fall in there I shall stink for days.”
“True. But then I don’t have to receive you, do I?”
For one moment he considered how easy it would be to overpower her and shake the sword out of her hand. Had they been alone he would have done it, but with his sister present he did not dare to risk such an assault upon her dignity. It was nothing for him to help himself to her handkerchief in public or stand in her rooms while she dressed, handing her her shift or choosing her jewels. It was nothing for him to kiss her uninvited—though certainly the Duke of Norfolk had objected—but there was a fine distinction between familiarity and insolence, a line over which he must not step in front of witnesses—even when that witness was his own sister and the Queen’s best friend. So, now, he played it safe.