I could imagine Lettice's wrath for I was certain she was the one who had goaded Robert to his outrageous plans.
That was a year of death.
The first blow was the news that my dear little Frog had passed away. I had always known that he was no commander of men. He was a courtier, simply that. It had been a cruel joke to give this poor little man the name of Hercule—though he had been called Franois later. Not even of medium height, disfigured by the pox; it was as though Nature had regarded him as a joke, a travesty of a man. However education and upbringing had given him social grace but that somehow had made the contrast between manners and appearance more grotesque.
I had treated him badly, played on his vanity, allowed him to believe that I had thought him attractive… all in the name of politics… and my own desire to be admired, of course.
And now the little man had died—not in battle, but in his bed. He had lived a life of debauchery, I knew, which somehow seemed more to be deplored because he was so ugly and could only have found partners to share in his frolics because of his wealth and royalty.
I went into mourning for him and wept a little. Perhaps some of my men thought I was acting but I did feel a genuine grief.
Then there occurred another death—one which was to shatter the whole continent of Europe. William of Orange was murdered.
This was a great blow to the Protestant world. He was one of their most respected leaders—an upright, noble gentleman who had given his life to the protection of the weak against the strong. In his youth he had been a Catholic and had discovered through Henri Deux of France, that France and Spain were formulating a plot to destroy the Protestants in the two countries. The massacre which had taken place on the eve of St Bartholomew's Day had been only a step toward this. When William heard that the Duke of Alva was raising an army to come against Holland and that his object was to exterminate what he called heretics and set up the Inquisition in that country, he became a Protestant and steeled himself for the almost impossible task of fighting Philip of Spain. He was determined to sacrifice everything he had— including his life—to preserve the welfare and liberty of his people.
But there was no holding back the Spaniards and Alva arrived with ten thousand troops and established what he called The Council of Troubles and which the Netherlanders called The Council of Butchers. In a short time he had put twenty thousand innocent townsfolk to death.
William escaped to Germany where he attempted to build up an army, while his people were submitted to a tyrannous Spanish rule.
It had been believed that William could never regain his land. The Spaniards were there in strength; the bloody Inquisition was established and the most cruel deaths were being suffered by people who had committed no fault beyond—if that can be called a fault, which I called a virtue—refusing to accept the Catholic Faith.
Then a great event occurred—one of which the Dutch were justly proud. Many Dutchmen having been driven from their land had taken to the sea and formed themselves into a company of pirates who robbed the Spanish ships coming into Holland. They were known as the Beggars of the Sea. They captured the town of Briel which they fortified and declared they were holding for “Father William.”
It was a turning point because it showed the Spaniards that they had not won the complete victory which they believed they had, and it enabled William to return to Holland. William the Silent—as they called him, for he was a man of few words—was in control again, proclaimed ruler of the land.
They were a valiant people, those Dutch, and they were heartened by the Huguenots of France who, disgusted by the massacre of St Bartholomew's Eve, came to Holland to help in the fight. William was seeking allies. That was when he had turned his eyes to us.
I wanted to help him; but I had a great aversion to involving my subjects in wars—however righteous. It was for this reason that I had been so pleased to send Anjou to Holland. It was not only to be rid of him but to assist a worthy cause.
Philip must have hated William the Silent, the man whose name was a magic talisman among his followers. He was a perfect leader; his people were devoted to him; he shone with his desire to make any sacrifices which would bring about their liberty.
Philip knew such men were dangerous, and desperately he wanted him out of the way. There had been many attempts on William's life—none of which had come to anything. His people believed that God preserved him to be their savior.
And so it seemed until that dismal day in July of the year 1584 when, in his city of Delft, he was shot dead by a certain Balthasar Gerrards. The irony was that Gerrards had begged from William himself, asking for alms for a poor Calvinist, and William had responded to his appeal. With the money his ruler had given him Gerrards bought a pistol and shot the great man dead.
Gerrards was immediately arrested and tortured. He confessed that he was Philip's spy and was executed most barbarously for the Dutch knew that he had dealt them the most cruel blow possible, and they wanted revenge. But revenge could not bring back William the Silent.
When we heard the news Burghley immediately called a meeting of the Council.
The position was grave, he said. The death of William meant that the responsibility for saving the Dutch from Spain now rested with England.
I was loath to accept this. I could see a long-drawn-out war fought on Dutch soil if it was true—I would never allow it to be the soil of England. I could see men dying and money wasted … and little success with it. If William had not been able to drive out the Spaniards, how could we?
“He was very successful in the circumstances,” said Burghley. “If he had had more resources, who knew what he might have done?”
We had equipped Anjou to fight the Spaniards, I pointed out, and the Dutch owed us money which they had not repaid. They were hardworking people and were not poor. It was merely that the state of the country made it difficult for the government to impose taxes.
They agreed that what I had said was true but pointed out to me the danger of Spain's taking over complete control of the Netherlands, which would bring them uncomfortably near to us. We must never forget that the most dangerous enemy we had was Philip of Spain.
Could we not work out something in conjunction with the French? They would not want to see Spain victorious.
Our relations with them were not very friendly. They were still smarting from the humiliation suffered by the Duc d'Anjou and were probably realizing now that I had never intended to marry him and had merely dallied to gain more time to see what happened in the Netherlands.
There would be new uneasiness in France because the scene had changed there with the death of Anjou. Henri Trois had no son and the nearest heir was Henri of Navarre, himself a Huguenot.
I was disturbed when I heard that in desperation Holland had offered the sovereignty of the Netherlands to Henri Trois provided he would give them military help. This threw us into a panic for the idea of a Frenchdominated Netherlands was almost as alarming as a Spanish one. However Henri declined, for which we were grateful, but the situation was fraught with danger.
I was glad some of my counselors agreed that it would be unwise to meddle. Walsingham was one of them. We could not hope to succeed, he said; and our best plan was to make sure that our own country was well defended. We should push ahead with more rapid building of ships and make England impregnable.
I agreed wholeheartedly with this. Henri Trois was as unhealthy as his brother, I pointed out. They were a diseased race, those Valois. If he were to die everything would change in France, for Huguenot Henri of Navarre would come to the throne.
Walsingham's men brought alarming news. The Duc de Guise had formed an alliance with Philip of Spain. It was their avowed purpose that, when Henri Trois died, they would prevent Henri of Navarre from taking the throne and would purge France of its Huguenots so forcefully that in a short time they would have an all-Catholic country. They would extend their methods until the whole of Europe became Catholic.
I needed time, I said, to work out what was the best thing to be done.
THAT YEAR THERE was yet another death. Poor Robert, he was very sad. He had been so proud of the boy. I was sorry I had castigated him so sharply for trying to make an alliance for the child with Arabella Stuart.
I always made excuses for Robert. After all, I asked myself, what father worthy of the name would not want the best for his child?
He came to me and told me that he had received news of his son's illness and asked leave to retire from Court. I gave it at once and sent him off, saying that I would pray for the swift recovery of the little boy.
I believe they were both at young Robert's bedside when he died. I even felt a little sorry for Lettice. She was, after all, a mother. But she had other children—four of them; whereas poor Robert had only one—unless one could count Douglass Sheffield's boy.
My thoughts were with him during that time, and it occurred to me that in spite of all his scheming he had failed to get what he wanted most. He had wanted to share my crown and I had denied him that, and the older we grew the more I realized my wisdom in doing so. He had tried to make grand marriages for his son and stepdaughter and I had foiled him in that, too. But I had made him the most powerful man in the country, and the richest. Not that he would ever feel himself to be rich! Whatever Robert had, he would spend more. Robert loved extravagances and it must cost him all he had—and more—to run those magnificent places of his where everything had to be of the best.
He was more full of faults than any man I knew.
But I wept for him now.
The little one was buried in the Beauchamp Chapel at Warwick.
I sent for Robert and when he came to me I dismissed all the others.
“I think you might want to share your grief with me alone,” I said, at which he sat on a stool at my feet and leaning his head against my knees wept silently. I caressed his curling hair and wept with him.
I said: “Talk if you wish, Robin, but if you would rather remain silent, do so.”
But he wanted to talk. He told me of the mental perfections of his son; physically he had always been frail. It surprised me that Robert with his magnificent physique could produce a fragile child—but nature is like that. He told me of the anxiety he had suffered because the little fellow had been subject to fits and when they were over he had been very weak indeed.
“Robert, we must bear our trials,” I said. “You have much to be thankful for. This is a cruel tragedy but it will grow less as time passes.”
He thanked me for my sympathy, which he said was the best thing in the world to him, and I replied that he should know by now that I would always stand by him when life used him ill.
He nodded and kissed my hand and there was great accord between us. We knew again that our love for each other was a very precious thing and that it would last until one of us died and left the other desolate.
“His mother is prostrate with grief,” he said.
“It is natural that a mother should be,” I answered.
“She is so unhappy at your anger with her. If you could allow her to come to Court, it would help to cheer her.”
My softness dropped from me.
“No,” I said coldly and firmly. “There is no place for that woman at my Court.”
He was silent and so was I. The intimacy was over. He had ruined it by introducing a snake into our Eden.
BURGHLEY BROUGHT ME the pamphlet which he thought I ought to see.
I had had a pleasant evening, although it had been arranged to mourn and honor our lost friends, the Duc d'Anjou and William of Orange. I had dressed with the utmost care in black velvet decorated with silver thread and pearls. Over this I wore a shawl of silver mesh; it was as fine as a spider's web and had meant many hours of work by my good needlewomen to bring it to its perfection. My ruff was twinkling with gold and silver stars. I knew that I was looking my best.
I was still pondering as to what my action should be regarding the Netherlands problem. There were so many varying opinions in the Council and Burghley's view was that the Dutch, having failed to get Henri Trois to accept their crown in return for his aid, might offer it to me.
I was thinking of the magnitude of this when Burghley came to me and asked if I had seen the scurrilous pamphlet which was being circulated throughout the Court.
I said I had not and to what did it refer?
He said that it was entitled The Copye of a Letter wryten by a Master of Arts at Cambridge and was concerned with the misdeeds of a certain nobleman.
“Leicester?” I asked.
Burghley nodded.
“There are always those who will malign Leicester,” I said. “He has aroused so much envy. Who is making mischief now?”
“The author of the pamphlet is a little elusive, but it is said to be written by a Jesuit priest named Robert Parson.”
“I have heard his name. He is one of those who burn to restore the Catholic faith in England, I believe, and is ready to do so by any means however foul… like most of his brethren. England would be a happier place without his kind. Well, where is this pamphlet?”
“If Your Majesty wishes to see it I will fetch it, but I warn you it does not make pleasant reading.”
“By which I infer I am mentioned in it.”
He was silent.
“Bring it to me at once,” I said.
And so it came into my hands, the most wicked and scurrilous document I ever beheld. It was so absurd that I felt it must be worthless. On the other hand there were parts of it which might have had their roots in truth. Jesuit Parson had not been clever enough; if he had been content with recording the more plausible incidents he might have succeeded in his purpose, which was to destroy not only Leicester's reputation but mine as well. But as is often the case with such fanatical fury, he had gone too far.
Venom leaped out from those pages. Heaven knew, Robert's record was not so pure that it needed such ferocious blackening. I was faintly amused in spite of my anger—and yes, alarmed—to see how Parson had betrayed his passionate envy. Not very clever for a man who claimed to have dedicated himself to God.
He referred to Robert as The Bear and as soon as I read the opening sentences I was prepared for what followed.
“You know the Bear's love, which is for his paunch …” It was ridiculous. Robert might indulge somewhat excessively in what is called good living, but he had many greater loves—for power, for glory, for possessions; and he had loved his dead son and Lettice—and I was sure myself.
“He is noble in only two descents and both of them stained with the block…”
That was so, but was it Robert's fault that his grandfather had died to placate the people who had blamed him for the taxes imposed by my grandfather? His father had come to the block through ambition, but was Robert to blame for that? My own mother had died on the block and so had many innocent people. The Jesuit was a fool.
“He was fleshed in conspiracy against the royal blood of King Henry's children in his tender years,” he continued.
It was true that he was at Court when a child, but he had stood for me as long as I had known him and had sold his lands in case I should need money to hold my throne.
I was reluctant to read on because I knew that this man Parson would be no respecter of royalty. I was right. After an account of how Leicester had advanced his own family, he turned to his relationship with me. All the gossip, all the slander had been revived. The children who had been killed at birth or smuggled into secrecy…it was all there. I felt myself growing more and more enraged as I read.
He was a murderer, wrote Parson, not only of his wife, who stood in his way, but of others. He began with the death of Amy Robsart whom, he insisted, Leicester had ordered his servants to dispose of that he might be free to marry the Queen.
Previously he had said that Leicester exerted an evil spell over me whic
h forced me to submit to his lusts. Surely all reasonable people would ask why, since he had murdered Amy in order to marry me, he did not use that sorcery to bring about the marriage.
The death of Lord Sheffield was described in detail. He had been murdered at Leicester's command because he had threatened to divorce his wife naming Leicester as her lover. So an artificial catarrh had stopped his breath. Lord Essex had been killed through a clever Italian recipe after he had learned that Lettice was with child by Leicester. The child was afterward destroyed. Lady Sheffield was being poisoned, and the evidence was that her nails were dropping off and her hair falling out, when her life was saved by her marriage to Sir Edward Stafford. And all knew that there had been an inquiry about that as there had been about the death of Amy Robsart. But Leicester's minions were afraid of him and they saw to it that the truth was not brought out into the open.
What a fool the Jesuit was! These crimes he had laid at Robert's door, while they could not be substantiated had their roots in fact—distorted fact maybe, but there was some reason for plausibility. But he was not content with that. Endowing me with children was absurd, as my movements were followed all the time and it would not have been possible for me to become pregnant without many being aware of it. So that made a nonsense of that particular scandal.
He had to invent absurd crimes and one of the most foolish concerned the death of the Cardinal de Chatillon. It was well known that Catherine de' Medici had wanted him out of the way and that she was a skillful poisoner. Why lay his death at Robert's door? There was no reasoning behind it. Parson's feeble answer was that the Cardinal had threatened to reveal how Leicester had obstructed my marriage with the Duc d'Anjou so the earl's spy poisoners had been sent to dispatch him.
I was horrified and fascinated. Not only was this a libel against Robert but many others as well. Myself for one. If that Jesuit was caught, this was going to cost him dear. John Dee, the astrologer, was implicated, so was Dr Julio, Robert's favorite physician, who, it was said, had brought the art of poisoning with him from Italy. He was named as one of those who had assisted Robert in bringing about the deaths of his victims.
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