It was most unwise, declared Hatton.
“We shall have Leicester ruling us all,” declared blunt Walsingham.
I realized, of course, that in my fondness for Robert I had perhaps gone too far and as the appointment had not yet been confirmed I decided it should be put aside for a while.
Robert was bitterly disappointed, but I did my best to console him.
“You must take good care of your health,” I said. “Get well, Robin, and we will go into this matter then.”
We decided that he should go to Buxton for the baths, which had done him good before, and he said farewell and went off to make preparations for the journey.
A few days after he left I received a letter from him. I read and re-read it and shall treasure it forever. Whenever I see that handwriting it brings him back to me so clearly.
“I most humbly beseech Your Majesty,” he wrote, “to pardon your poor old servant…”
The two “o”s in poor were written to look like eyes—my name for him, which he had always loved to hear me use.
“ … to be thus bold in thus sending to know how my gracious lady doeth and what ease of her late pains she finds, being the chiefest thing in this world I do pray for, for her to have good health and long life.
“For my own poor case I continue still your medicine and find it amends much better than with any other thing that hath been given me. Thus hoping to find perfect cure at the bath, with the continuance of my wonted prayer for Your Majesty's most happy preservation, I humbly kiss your foot.
“From your old lodging at Rycott this Thursday morning, ready to take my journey.
“By Your Majesty's most faithful obedient servant,
“R. Leicester.”
That letter was written on the twenty-ninth of August. By the fourth of September he was dead.
When they brought me the news I was stunned. I could not believe it. It was some hideous joke. Death! Not Robert! He had always been so alive. He was fifty-five years old—more or less my own age. Never to see him again! Never to hear his voice! Never to wonder what secrets he was hiding behind those enigmatic eyes!
There was no savor in life. There never would be again for Robert Dudley was dead.
I ordered everyone out of my apartment and shut myself in. I would have no intrusion on my grief. I lay on my bed and thought of everything… right from the time when we were children and had danced at my father's Court; I thought of those weeks when I had been in the Tower and he had been near; I thought of the day he had come to me and laid his gold at my feet, and how he had ridden into London with me at the time of my accession. So many memories. That was all I had left now.
I took his letter and read and read it again. I kissed it. It was wet with my tears. Then I wrote on it “His Last Letter” and put it in a jewel box. I would preserve it forever. Perhaps later I could draw comfort from it, but now it only brought home to me the magnitude of my loss.
Then I took out one by one the presents he had given me over the years. They had all meant something special to me because he had given them. There was the bracelet of gold adorned with rubies and diamonds. He had given me this in a purple velvet case embroidered with Venetian gold in the year 1572 when I had been fourteen years on the throne. The following year he had given me a collar of rubies and diamonds.
I put them both on and remembered the time he had brought them to me. I could see him with his handsome dark head bent as he fixed the collar about my throat.
Then there was the white feather fan with the two magnificent emeralds on one side of the handle and the inevitable rubies and diamonds on the other.
I brought them all out, his gifts over the years, love-tokens all of them.
And, I thought, there will never be another.
How ironical was life! God had given me this magnificent victory and had taken away the one I loved—shall I say better than anything else. No, that would not be quite true. I loved my country more than anything else, more than my own life or that of Robert. And I had just been given the finest example of God's grace when my seamen with the help of His winds had scattered the mighty so-called invincible armada along the inhospitable coasts of Scotland and Ireland and driven off the Spanish menace forever. But at the same time He had dealt me this most cruel and tragic blow.
He had taken Robert from me.
Time passed, but I did not notice. There were knocks at my door, but I ignored them. I could not bear to look on anyone at this time.
I do not know how long I kept them out. I don't know whether I should have eventually let them in.
Burghley spoke to me from outside, begging me to open the door. But I just sat in stony silence. I cared for nothing. I could think of nothing but: Robert is dead.
Vaguely I heard Burghley's voice outside the door.
“Your Majesty, for God's sake open the door. Are you ill? We beg you to let us in.”
But still I sat there. I could only think of Robert, who had been so alive and now was dead.
There was a whispering outside my door. Then I heard the tremendous noise as the door burst open.
Burghley stood there. He hastened forward and seeing me cried: “Thank God. We feared for Your Majesty.” He was on his knees. “Forgive me, Your Majesty. We were very much afraid. Your Majesty, you must rouse yourself. England needs you.”
And as I looked at him—my dear tired old Spirit, who had been my good friend for so long—I knew that he was right.
I put out my hand. He took it and kissed it.
“You speak truth,” I said. “I must about my business.”
And then I began to live again.
* * *
THERE WERE RUMORS about his death. They aroused my anger to such an extent that my grief was somewhat assuaged. Could it be true? There had been so many suspicions concerning the manner in which he had removed those who stood in his way, was it possible that he had met a fate which, many said, he had meted out to others?
Could it really have been that Robert had been murdered?
I should not believe it. It was idle gossip. Heaven knew, I had suffered enough from that—and so had Robert. But rumor persisted.
His wife, that she-wolf, Lettice Knollys, had taken a lover, it was said— her husband's young Master of Horse, Christopher Blount.
How dared she! She who had the most wonderful man in the country so to demean herself…and him…by taking a lover! I never hated her so much as I did at that time, for although I had hated her for taking him from me, I hated her more for turning to someone else who must be inferior—for how could anyone equal him?
It was said that Robert had discovered the liaison and had intended to take revenge on her. But she had maneuvered that he should drink the poisoned cup which he had prepared for her.
It could not be true. No one would ever be able to do that to him. I would not believe that he had died through poison. The doctors said it was a fever and I knew he had caught that in the Essex salt marshes. He had said so himself before he went back to her.
Yet I wanted to believe it. I wanted to hate her more than I had ever done before.
One of his servants declared he had seen the Countess give the Earl a goblet, after drinking the contents of which, the Earl had collapsed.
I believed she was capable of that and if she had taken a young lover… Oh, I had warned him that he would one day come to feel her poisoned fangs.
But the autopsy revealed no poison in his body and she was exonerated; but I should never be sure for I knew that the clever Dr Julio, like many Italians, had poisons which killed and left no trace.
I hated her because he had loved her enough to brave my wrath and marry her; but I would certainly hate her more if it were proved that she had hastened his death and robbed me of the one person I loved more than I ever could anyone else.
When his will was read it did not seem that he was aware of her infidelity, for he left her well provided for and there was no hint that he had a rival fo
r her affections.
How touched I was when I read what he had written:
“And first of all, before and above all persons, it is my duty to remember my most dear and gracious Sovereign, whose creature, under God, I have been, and who hath been a most bountiful and princely mistress…”
So he went on to praise me and to say that it had been his greatest joy in life to serve me. He prayed to God to make me the oldest prince that ever reigned over England. And he bequeathed to me a jewel with “three fair emeralds with a large table diamond in the middle and a rope of pearls to the number of six hundred.” These gifts were to have been mine when he entertained me at Wanstead…so he must have known that he was near death.
After that he went on to write of his wife:
“Next to Her Majesty, I will return to my dear wife, and set down for her that which cannot be so well as I would wish it, but shall be as well as I am able to make it, having always found her a faithful and very loving and obedient careful wife, and so do I trust this will of mine shall find her no less mindful of me being gone, than I was always of her being alive…”
He could have known nothing of her infidelity—if infidelity there was—when he wrote that. He had left her Wanstead and Drayton Basset in Staffordshire and two manors—Balsall and Long Itchington in Warwickshire. I was glad Kenilworth did not go to her. Strangely enough he acknowledged paternity of Douglass Sheffield's son—that one who called himself Robert Dudley—and he had left him well provided for. Although Kenilworth had gone to Robert's brother, Ambrose, Earl of Warwick, on his death it was to go to Robert's base-born son.
I was sure Lettice was grinding her teeth about that. The biggest prize— splendid Kenilworth—was not for her.
I was glad. I could not have borne thinking of her there in that beautiful castle where I had spent such a memorable time with Robert.
So she was free now… free to marry her lover, which the brazen creature could not do immediately, but she did within a year of Leicester's death. She was bold, that one. I admired her in a way—but I hated her more than ever.
Robert proved to have been deeply in debt. His debts to the Crown alone were over twenty-five thousand pounds. He had spent extravagantly on gifts to me, and I was touched to discover that, apart from the upkeep of his magnificent houses, that was his main expenditure. The houses had of course cost him very dear; he had the richest curtains and tapestries I had seen outside royal palaces. In fact some of Leicester's rooms had been much grander than those of Greenwich or Hampton.
I had always rejoiced that he lived like a king even though I had denied him the satisfaction of being one.
Some of those houses had been passed on to Lettice Knollys. Well, she should pay his debts. I let it be known that I insisted that Lord Leicester's debts should be paid in full and the burden of those debts rested on the shoulders of that careful, loving and obedient wife.
She immediately declared that she had not the means to pay her late husband's debts to which I replied that she had valuable articles in those grand houses which were now hers and they could be sold… all those art treasures, all those fine carpets and hangings and four-poster beds. Their sale would meet the cost of Leicester's indebtedness.
How she must have raged! I imagined her at Wanstead among her newly acquired possessions. She had thought herself so clever to have married rich Leicester. Well, now she should discover that he owed his greatness to me, and if I said she should give up the articles she valued to pay what her husband owed, then she would do so.
I had scored a victory over the she-wolf, which brought me some satisfaction, though it did not ease the ache in my heart.
IF ONLY HE HAD been beside me how I would have reveled in those celebrations which were taking place all over the country in honor of the great victory over the Spanish armada.
The most important of them all was the thanksgiving at St Paul's when I rode in state through the city of London attended by members of my Privy Council, the bishops, judges and nobles of the land. I sat in a triumphal chariot shaped like a throne with a canopy over it in the form of a crown. Two white horses drew this and next to me rode my newly appointed Master of Horse, Robert Devereux, Earl of Essex.
It gave me some comfort to look at him. He was not Robert, of course, but there was an indefinable charm about him, and I had a special fondness for him. He lacked Robert's suave manners; very few of my men were as outspoken as Essex; he was the sort of man who would make no concessions in his conversation … even to his Queen. But he admired me. I knew that because I read it in his eyes, in his gestures; and being the young man he was his feelings must be sincere. With most of the others I should have known they were looking for advancement, but with Essex, he must admire me for he would not pretend to do so if he did not. In a way Essex was in love with me. It may seem absurd for a young man of his age to feel love for an old woman, but it was a special sort of love. It was not a physical emotion. That would have been abhorrent to me… but a kind of adoration. It might have been for my royalty or my strength of character; but there were times when he appeared to be dazzled by my person. I was always bejeweled with emeralds, rubies and diamonds and my gowns were decorated with scintillating aglets; my ruffs often sparkled with tiny diamonds; so I was a figure of splendid royalty. But Essex had a special kind of devotion to give me which was different from that I received elsewhere. All my beautiful men—Raleigh, Hatton, Heneage, Oxford, behaved as though they were in love with me. Some were—Hatton, I think. He had remained a bachelor all his life; not that he—unlike Robert—had hoped for marriage, but simply out of love for me. That was touching. Dear Hatton! Burghley, Walsingham… well, to them I was their beloved Queen and they served me devotedly. But with Essex it was different. There was an element of romance in his feelings for me—and that did more to soothe my pain at the loss of Robert than anything else could, and I must be grateful to him for that.
So it pleased me to see him riding beside me, looking extremely distinguished and handsome with that thick auburn hair and those big expressive dark eyes—that look of Lettice which irritated me a little. I was not sorry that the man I had taken such a fancy to was her son.
We passed through the gates of Temple Bar where I was received by the Lord Mayor and Aldermen, and after the ceremony of the keys the scepter was placed in my hands.
From the Temple to St Paul's the streets were hung with rich cloth and the people crowded out to cheer me. I entered the church under my canopy while the clergy sang the litany; and afterward I listened to the sermon which was given by the Bishop of Salisbury.
His text was: “Thou didst blow with the winds and they were scattered.”
It was more than that, I thought. My gallant seamen did a great deal toward gaining that victory; and the winds which finally scattered the armada—after it was beaten—were responsible for our losing the prizes; the booty from those ships would have covered the cost of the enterprise.
After the service I returned through those decorated streets to the palace of the Bishop of London. The cheers thundered out and I knew that whatever tragedy had come to me, I still held the hearts of my people.
It was a time for rejoicing, and would have been the happiest time of my life if Robert had been beside me.
I was trying to stop thinking of him and I told myself that this victory was my great compensation. We had dispersed the menace of years. The Spaniards had been too crippled, too ignobly defeated, to come again to us. My people revered me. They loved me. There could not have been a reigning monarch who was more beloved by the people.
I had another example of this a few days later when I was returning from the Council. It was December and dark and I came back to my palace lighted by torches.
A rumor had gone around telling the people that if they waited they would catch a glimpse of me. Thus, when I returned I found a crowd gathered at the gates.
A cheer went up as the people saw me and many of them cried: “God save Your Majes
ty.”
I stopped my coach and called to them: “God bless you all, my good people.”
Then the cry went up again from all assembled there. It was deafening. “God save Your Majesty.”
I was deeply moved. I held up my hand and there was an immediate silence.
“Dear people,” I said, “ye may have a greater prince, but ye shall never have a more loving one.”
They were all about me. I smiled and waved my hand and they saw that I was as affected as they were. Some were in tears and I knew that they would have died for me.
My spirits were uplifted. My life had lost that which had made it joyous, but I had to go on. It was a fortunate ruler who after thirty years of rule could arouse such emotions.
I was amused that the Spaniards should attempt to tell their people that they had had a great victory. Philip must indeed be governing a country of fools. Did not the Spaniards know that they had lost their armada which they had been told was invincible?
A pamphlet which was being circulated throughout Europe came into my hands. It made us laugh. It was so ridiculous. It was supposed to have been written by an eyewitness of the great battle and was called Relations and Advise come to His Majestie from the Happie Fleete whereoff is Generall the Duke of Medina in the Conquest of England.
It explained how the English had been hopelessly defeated, fled or been captured, and the Duke of Medina Sidonia had El Draque as his prisoner.
We ceased to laugh because we feared that some people who were away might believe these lies.
Drake was furious; so was Raleigh; and one of them produced a counterattack in the shape of a pamphlet entitled A Packe of Spanish Lyes, sent abroad to the world Now Ripped Up, Unfolded and by Just Examination, condemned as conteyning false, corrupt and detestable wares worthy to be damned and burned.
How I despised them! They had been overboastful before the conflict. Surely it was tempting fate to call an armada invincible? They had come with their instruments of torture to set up their vile Inquisition in our land with their organization of pious persecution. They had been soundly beaten; and now they sought to cover up their ignoble defeat by telling blatant lies which they hoped the world would believe.
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