by Susan Kay
He schooled his expression into appropriate lines of sympathy.
“I’m sorry to see you suffering, madam.”
“Yes,” she said ironically, “I have no doubt you would arrange a very speedy end to all my sufferings were it in your power to do so, Mendoza.”
He did not answer that, knowing how near the truth it was, and their interview minced along the usual irritable lines, winding its way inevitably to the question of the Spanish treasure. Mendoza, at first patient, became patronising and belligerent in quick succession. He begged leave to point out that the patience of His Most Catholic Majesty, though great, was not without its limits. He begged leave to remind her—
Elizabeth sat upright on the couch, with two bright spots of colour flaming into her thin face.
“Hold your damned rattling tongue, you insolent minion—I will hear no more!”
Something snapped in Mendoza. After all these months of holding his temper in bare restraint, he began to shout like a hysterical woman.
“Then if you will not listen to words, madam, you may shortly hear cannon in their place!”
Her eyes narrowed suddenly and riveted his as she leaned forward a little from her cushions.
“Speak to me like that once more, my friend,” she said softly, “and I will put you in a place from which you will not speak again.”
She meant it—he could see that. Diplomatic immunity would count for nothing with this woman if she were pushed too far. The steely hold of her eyes battered down the last of his defences and in a moment of stark terror, he began to flatter her, fingering his ruff with a nervous gesture, smiling uneasily, and curbing an urgent desire to urinate.
“Your Majesty has misunderstood my meaning—I spoke in jest, merely to take your mind off your pain. No threat was intended—indeed no. Who would wish to gainsay such a beautiful lady as Your Highness?”
The eyes released their hold and permitted him to step back from the precipice. There was an acrid tang of sweat emanating suddenly from his clothing and she held her pomander pointedly to her nose when she dismissed him.
As he bowed stiffly and backed out, he reflected on the depth of his hatred for her. It seemed to have taken control of his whole personality, colouring and dominating every aspect of his existence. There were times—today was one of them—when he could cheerfully have daggered her without pausing to consider the cost. His only comfort was the certain knowledge that her days were numbered—Spain, the Papacy, the Guise party in France, she could not hold them off her trembling throne much longer. It was a miracle she had lived so long.
It was true that many of her Catholic subjects remained loyal to her—the English had no zeal, it was his continual complaint! Yet Mendoza knew that the Council lived in daily dread of a Catholic assassination, and deplored the moderation to which the Queen had clung throughout her reign. The act of conversion to the Catholic faith had been made illegal since Elizabeth’s excommunication and in that measure lay the core of Mendoza’s hopes. In Douai, the famous Jesuit College was presently training a whole new batch of young priests for their calling in England; and once this formidable, dedicated band had infiltrated the country, their avowed mission would be to sweep a wave of conversion across the land. Faced with a steady growth in the numbers of English Catholics, Mendoza knew that Parliament would panic, raising a clamour for harsher measures which even the Queen could no longer ignore. There would be active persecution at last, and under persecution even the most loyal and docile Catholic might be prepared to put an end to England’s cunning Jezebel.
Mendoza went out of Elizabeth’s presence convinced that her charmed life was in sight of its end, and determined to further that end himself by any means available to him. In the doorway he almost collided with the Earl of Leicester, who smiled and bowed with mock civility, receiving in return a salutation so curt it was almost a snarl.
Leicester went across the room and eyed the Queen cautiously before sitting uninvited on the arm of her couch. Although she had been expecting him and showed pleasure at his arrival, he was never entirely sure of his welcome these days. The final departure of Alençon for his armed mission in the Netherlands had made her more unpredictable than ever and Leicester, above anyone else at court, found it necessary to tread very gingerly around her moods.
“Something appears to have bitten Mendoza.” He looked at her shrewdly. “Or would it be nearer to the truth to say someone?”
Elizabeth sank her teeth into a fruit sucket and smiled.
“He is a trifle ruffled, I grant you. Probably consequent on the fact that he just declared war.”
“War?” Leicester stared down at her in alarm. “You mean real war?”
Elizabeth laughed shortly. “I don’t imagine even Mendoza would dare to threaten me with toy soldiers!”
She sat upright on the couch and Leicester sank down into the space she had made for him, looking extremely shaken.
“Good God!” he muttered, studying her face with anxiety. “This could be serious.”
“Oh, I don’t think so. I’m afraid Philip simply won’t oblige him in the matter, not while I continue to hold Mary under lock and key. Poor Mendoza will have to ease his spleen by sticking pins into my wax effigy a little longer.”
Recalling the ambassador’s expression of demonic rage, Leicester was uneasy. Like most men of his age, he had a very healthy respect for all manifestations of witchcraft and he did not take such an accusation lightheartedly.
“If you really think that then the Spanish dog ought to be arrested and sent packing.”
Elizabeth sighed.
“I can’t expel Mendoza without indisputable evidence that he intends me harm—and I don’t have any evidence.”
Except, this stupid pain in my hip…which in anyone else I might call rheumatism, only of course I know it’s not…it couldn’t be…by God, I’ll hang the first doctor who dares to even suggest it…
She stood up with slight difficulty and the great drum farthingale flung out a wide sweep of pearl-encrusted skirts about her hips.
“Don’t lose any sleep over Mendoza, Robin. If that spineless little turd was really capable of doing me any mischief he’d have done it by now, I promise you.”
“And the treasure?”
“The treasure stays.” She smiled suddenly. “Only consider how it would distress dear Francis if I returned it.”
“Quite,” conceded Leicester drily. “And we mustn’t upset dear Francis must we?—I thought you were going to hang the knave!”
“I will, when I find a piece of rope long enough to do it.” Elizabeth glanced out of the window where the sun was peeping sulkily through patches of cloud. “Saddle that new gelding for me, Robin, and we’ll ride out in the park when I’ve changed my gown.”
As she walked away from him towards the Privy Chamber, he suddenly noted the slight, but unmistakable, limp which marred her old graceful carriage and the sight made him frown.
“Madam,” he called after her quickly, “let us play cards or backgammon instead—it will be more restful.”
She stopped abruptly with her back still towards him and every muscle in her body tensed with sudden fury. She had been confident it didn’t show, would have sworn she could defy the most observant eye to pick out that one tiny, disabling detail so symbolic in her mind of encroaching age. But he had noticed—the one person in all the world from whom she would have died to conceal it!
“Restful?” She repeated the word slowly as though it was an obscenity and wheeled round to fix him with a look of absolute loathing. “It’s not rest I need, Robert Dudley, but exercise. And be assured I’ll find it with a man who’s nimbler on his feet these days than you are!”
The door of the Privy Chamber slammed in his face and he sat down on the couch with rueful resignation. She had not forgiven him for Alençon and there were times when he f
elt she never would. He never knew for sure now just when she would turn on him without warning or provocation; since the birth of his son to Lettice she had been downright hostile on occasions. Once she had appointed his old enemy, Sussex, to inquire into his previous liaison with Douglass Sheffield, seeking proof of a pre-contract which would automatically invalidate his union with her cousin. There had been no proof, thank God, and the matter had served no purpose other than to make him look an absolute fool in the eyes of the court and drive Lettice into a transport of vindictive rage. For some considerable time his home life had been conducted in frigid silence, and he knew in his heart that that result had been the Queen’s only motive in the whole distasteful affair. Yet, curiously, he could not hate her for it. In a warped way, it had made him love her all the more, for he was satisfied that her attempts to humiliate him made her suffer at a far deeper level than he did himself. He had a family and she had nothing—nothing but the crown which had cost her so dear in terms of private happiness. In spite of his bondage, he had snatched a small part of his life back from her, setting up one petty boundary beyond which she could never pass. He felt able to cope with whatever she might choose to do against him, for he understood that she was a deeply unhappy woman. And because of that understanding, he found he was able to forgive her a great deal.
* * *
The Parliament of 1581 was, as Mendoza had anticipated, panic-stricken at the rising level of recusants. Elizabeth was faced by a bill which prescribed the death penalty for anyone found guilty of converting a subject to the Church of Rome. She moderated it as far as she dared without alienating Parliament, insisting that conversion itself was treasonable only if accompanied by withdrawal of allegiance to her; but she was forced to accept that recusants should be taxed out of existence by staggering fines, far beyond the reach of the majority of her Catholic subjects. She didn’t like it and she made no secret of the fact, but Burghley had made it plain that there was now no choice.
In May of that year the most famous Jesuit priest of all entered England. Edmund Campion had once been Leicester’s cultured protégé and had stepped in court circles, basking in the warmth of the Queen’s friendship and favour; but now he travelled through England like a hunted fugitive. For over a year he eluded all Walsingham’s efforts to capture him and his stature and reputation soared in the eyes of the Catholic population as he slipped from village to village, ministering secretly to the spiritual needs of the persecuted. He was doing more than the entire Jesuit force to put heart into the Church of Rome in England and his supporters were beginning to think him invulnerable, when Walsingham’s spies finally took him on a hot July day from a priest’s hole in Berkshire and imprisoned him in the Tower.
* * *
Elizabeth stood very still in the window embrasure, twisting the coronation ring that of late had begun to grow uncomfortably tight on her finger. Leicester, who had brought the bad news to her, stood beside her, glad even of this tragedy which had suddenly brought them so close together.
“It had to happen,” he said softly, “sooner or later. With Walsingham’s spies all over the country it was inevitable. I didn’t find out until today or I would have told you sooner—they put him in Little Ease to make him talk.”
“What!” The Queen swung round and stared at him. Little Ease was a grim hole at the far end of the Torture Chamber in the bowels of the Tower, so built that a man could neither stand nor lie full length. Sunk in utter darkness, crouched in the foul reek of their own filth, men had gone blind and raving mad in Little Ease, reduced to poor gibbering wrecks, covered from head to foot with lice and sores. And Edward Campion had once been their trusted friend—
“How long has he been there?” she asked furiously.
Leicester swallowed and looked out of the window.
“Four days—so Walsingham said.”
“Four days! By God, I’ll break that damned Puritan’s neck!”
Leicester caught her hand as she moved to walk past him.
“You can’t blame Walsingham, madam—he’s only doing his job—and doing it well, you have to admit.”
She compressed her lips with rage. “Yes! Thanks to him my prisons have never been so busy, nor my streets so full of gibbets—and that shrivelled spider gloats over every new victim, I swear he does. Well, he won’t add Campion to his list—I shall write out an order for his immediate release.”
“Madam, you know that can’t be done unless he recants and forswears the Pope’s authority—do you want riots in the streets?”
Elizabeth sank on to the window-seat and bit her lip. He was right of course—Parliament would expect her to make an example of such a famous man. After a moment she looked up uncertainly.
“Suppose we were to see him—you and I as old friends. Suppose we persuade him to affirm his loyalty by one attendance at a Protestant service—”
“Yes—yes, by God, you’re right, madam! Even Walsingham would admit it’s worth a try for a man of such public standing.”
She stood up and the sunlight turned her curls to burnished copper.
“I don’t give a damn for Walsingham’s opinion—or even Burghley’s in this instance! If Campion yields just one iota to show his good faith, he can say Mass in St. Paul’s Cathedral for all I care! How soon can you arrange the meeting, Robin?”
Leicester frowned and examined the watch which hung on a golden chain around his neck.
“Well—he can’t be brought to court. It would have to be my house in the Strand—say this evening?—and there would have to be witnesses of course—Burghley and one or two other members of the Council.”
She nodded and touched his arm with gratitude.
“See to it then. And when he recants, I’ll bring him back to court in my own barge.”
For a moment Leicester regarded her steadily in the harsh July sunlight, disquieted by her sudden optimism. Campion had been a member of his own household. He had known the man very well before his defection to Rome, rather more closely than the Queen had, and what he remembered most vividly about him was his absolute integrity and stubborn sense of right. Suddenly, in Leicester’s own eyes, the outcome seemed frankly less than hopeful.
“Madam,” he began slowly, “if we fail to move him in his resolution, pardon will be out of the question. The Catholics will take it as a sign of weakness and that is the last thing we dare to show at the moment. You do understand that, don’t you?”
She turned her head away from him and looked out of the window.
“When I want Walsingham’s advice I will hear it from his lips,” she said curtly. “Go now and make the necessary arrangements.”
He bowed and left her.
* * *
The hours that Campion had spent cramped in a space rather less generous than a coffin would afford had bent and stiffened his joints. He stumbled when they dragged him out and poured cold water over his naked body, scraping the caked filth from his skin. Dried and dressed in rags, he was bundled into the waiting barge, bent double between his guards like an old man, and he blinked in the cool dusk of the summer evening as the plain prison barge floated down the dirty river.
They landed at the water stairs among a flurry of swans and he looked up at the great house silhouetted against the clear sky, the roof rising in four gables, terminating at the eastern end in a battlemented tower which made the building resemble a church. Campion felt a wave of shock flood through him. Leicester’s town house! Surely he was not to be granted the privilege of seeing his old friend and patron after all this!
As he mounted the stairway, his reeling senses recorded the fleeting, familiar glimpses of portraits and furniture and the smooth, polished wood of the banisters beneath his gaunt fingers. At the top of the staircase, the heavy double doors swung open before him and momentarily he was dazzled by the blaze of candles from the room within. At last his eyes focused on a small group
of soberly clad gentlemen standing around an oak table, equipped with pen and ink. Beyond them he saw Leicester and beside him, in absolute disbelief, he recognised the Queen, dressed in black satin blazing with diamonds, a fantastic stiffened ruff framing her thin face. He noted that the blazing hair was a wig, the face a mask of skilfully applied paint, and he was reminded of a wax effigy. She no longer looked quite real and he failed to identify the gay, laughing woman who had dazzled him with her attention more than fifteen years before. Leicester, too, he scarcely recognised with his silver-grey hair, ruddy face, and considerable girth, the penalty of too many years of good living and unrestrained indulgence at the table. He felt a little shock of pity for them both, two glittering but jaded personalities who had lost their immortal souls for a ride on fortune’s wheel.
The Queen came a step towards him and held out a long pale hand which shimmered with huge gems in the candlelight; as he knelt to kiss it, he closed his eyes and felt time roll back in his feverish memory fifteen years…
Hot sunlight playing on the stately stone buildings of Christchurch, church bells pealing in mad welcome, the high-pitched Latin paean of young boys’ voices:
Vivat Regina! Vivat Regina!
Edmund Campion had shouted as loud as anyone in that crowd for the red-haired Queen whose reputation as a scholar was a byword in Oxford. Leicester lifted her down from the litter and the President of Magdalen College, that notorious Puritan, hurried forward to kiss her hand. She smiled her charming smile and admired his outfit.
“Loose gowns become you, Doctor—how sad that your opinions should be so narrow.”
A ripple of laughter ran through the students as her words were picked up, repeated, and passed on, and Campion had been close enough to see the hated President blush hotly. The Queen’s eyes, dancing with sly and subtle humour, had made the young man burn with desire to capture her amused attention.
Later, in the long round of intellectual debates, his chance came. He had prepared a brilliant paper on the influence of the moon upon the tides and all the time he spoke he was aware of those eyes upon him, keen with interest. When he had finished she smiled and beckoned him to her side, where the Earl of Leicester still stood, tall, magnificently dressed, flat-stomached as an athlete.