Dark Aemilia

by Sally O’Reilly

  ‘A trick of the light, madam.’

  ‘Don’t humour me. For you, a trick of the light. For me, no. My time is near. I should know. I chose it. I have a heat inside my breasts, Aemilia, which will not go. And around my throat an iron claw. I cannot swallow. The appetites of life are past.’

  ‘But…’

  ‘But? But what? Do you question your Prince?’

  ‘We still need you.’

  ‘Ha! Carey waits on my death so he can ride off to Scotland. Even though I have yet to let them know whether my studious Scottish cousin shall succeed me.’

  ‘The people love you.’

  Now she laughs, an odd sound, like tearing paper. ‘They are tired of me, as I am tired of life.’ Then she stops, very sudden, and stares at something past me. I look over my shoulder at the empty room, flickering and glimmering in the light of flames.

  ‘Do you know why I am here?’ she asks. ‘At Richmond?’

  ‘Because Whitehall is too cold?’

  ‘No. This is my warm winter box, but I would have kept at Whitehall longer, had I dared. No. John Dee told me to come here. Or rather, he told me to go from there. So off we all came, all the boatloads of us, but much difference it made.’ She glances towards the closed door as if to make sure that we aren’t overheard. ‘I want to die, you see. I want to be gone. Whether Heaven or Hell will receive my soul, I know I am all but done with this life. But the journey out is full of pain.’

  ‘I am sorry for that.’

  ‘Don’t spend your sorrow on me. Your turn will come, and I doubt you will be lying on a Turkey rug, as I am, with a blazing fire to warm you.’

  ‘I doubt it too.’

  ‘My mind is not still; it keeps flitting hither and thither, the past is before me. And, as it flitted, it saw you. For all your learning, a restless spirit. Is that not so?’

  ‘It is.’

  ‘Like me. I always saw it in you.’

  ‘Like you! I would not presume to think so.’

  ‘A bastard, like myself.’

  ‘A bastard, yes.’

  ‘And mother to a bastard child.’

  ‘Better a bastard than the child of Captain Lanyer.’

  She shakes her head, very slowly. ‘Ah, we are more like each other than you know. And you are not mellowed with the years?’

  ‘I am not mellowed.’

  ‘Good. Hunsdon would be proud of you. And how does the boy?’ I see that her eyes have filled with tears.

  ‘He is well. I love him dearly, too much. He is his father’s son.’

  ‘And who would that be, Dark Aemilia?’

  I look down.

  ‘I always wondered if Hunsdon could really keep you to himself. And you were a wild one, mistress. Don’t imagine that it went unnoticed.’

  I say nothing.

  ‘Nothing about you could go unnoticed,’ she says, quietly. ‘I used to watch you. Sometimes I thought you could be my obscure twin, a dark shadow of my own self. It has been hard enough for me to use my mind – how must it be for poor Aemilia? If ever a woman was born out of her right place, it was you.’

  I look away. In my mind’s eye I see a child’s hands spreading over ivory keys. They are ink-stained and the nails are bitten. I see a young woman in a yellow dress, glittering with jewels and borrowed pride.

  ‘And there are more similarities between us than you know – more links between our two fates.’ She pauses. ‘And now… wife to a recorder player.’

  ‘Yes, madam.’

  ‘Is he a proper husband to you?’

  ‘I couldn’t say.’

  ‘You hoped for more.’

  ‘Wedlock is a narrow business.’

  She laughs her tearing laugh again. ‘Oh, Mistress Lanyer! You can still amuse me. Narrow, too narrow, you have it right. The bastards have the best of it.’

  I hesitate again, not certain what to say. The Queen smiles, very thinly. ‘It is an odd thing, but as I sit here, trapped in my own crock of bones, and as the world shrinks, as it must, something else happens. Do you know what that is?’

  I nod. ‘The world is far from you, so you see the pattern. I sometimes think of London the way a kite must see it. From above.’

  ‘Sharp Aemilia. I should have made you Chancellor. If only I could have done. Yes. I see the world from far off, so though I am lodged here in my tiny room, propped next to my great bed of death, I see my life all clear, like the most wonderful tapestry of nonsense and pity.’

  I watch her clown’s face, lined with sadness.

  ‘My esteemed brother-in-law, Philip, King of all Spain, of the Americas, the high seas, ended in a tiny room. No different, when he died in the Escorial, than the humblest of his servants. The world stretched from that palace, a great and grand dominion. But in the end it was no longer his. He had to leave it.’

  ‘And yet, it is a fine thing, to rule. You are not like other people.’

  She flaps her hand, as if batting away the foolishness of this thought. She looks again into the corner of the room, and again I turn, wondering what she sees. As she speaks, her eyes are steady on this unseen presence. ‘They cut her head off while she prayed. Did you know that?

  ‘I did not know that.’ I do not even know who she speaks of, but I dare to guess.

  ‘The executioner, hot from Calais, got his man to catch my mother’s eye, and slashed his blade right through her neck, in that moment. Cut right through the muscle and bone. He did his job well. Her lips were moving even as her head fell down into the straw.’

  Now, I truly cannot speak. I cannot breathe.

  The Queen presses on, remaining curiously still, as if all her living was in her head. ‘Was that mercy? Do you think? To smite her before she knew, but also before she had finished her prayers? Did she die in grace?’

  ‘I cannot tell. I pray to God she did.’

  ‘They said she was a witch. Will God forgive a witch? Is it a mortal sin? There is a place for every creature, for every leaf and blossom of the Lord’s creation. Even beggars. A wild rogue has his position, and an Abraham man, who rants and preaches in his rags. So witches, too, they must have a portion of their own.’

  ‘That must be so, madam.’

  ‘I thought to learn the craft, from Dr Dee, but it is harder than Greek or Latin.’ She sucks her finger again, childish. ‘I can read the Tarot. Such pretty cards.’

  ‘Evil’s in them, madam, if you ask me. I always draw the Devil.’

  ‘One day, Dr Dee prepared a chart for me. In my privy chamber, just outside this door, I will never forget. And then he refused to let me see. Later, I found out why. He saw it coming, this terrible duty. That I would be forced to kill my own kind. First Mary Stuart. God forgive me. I meted out to her what my father meted out to my poor mother.’

  ‘No prince would have done otherwise.’

  ‘And yet. That is not it… I killed my son. Robert Devereux, my dearest, bastard son. Not one clean blow for him, no! Three strikes of the axe. Mangled and bloodied, in an agony that I inflicted on him!’

  ‘Madam, I –’

  ‘Dreadful, most dreadful pain and suffering, that, but for me, he need never have endured! My little one, a traitor at my breast. Oh, I shall go straight to Hell! I am burning now!’

  I fear she is out of her wits. ‘Your Majesty – madam – you should rest now.’

  She looks around her, as if she is unsure of her safety. ‘They say I rule England like a king. But my duty is a prison. Would that I had the other power, that hideous, demonic gift!’

  ‘What gift?’

  ‘The greater one. That which makes castles into air, and air into castles. I would have done some mischief then. Sunk the Armada with the foul gale of my hag’s breath. Torn down the Tower walls, and thrown the scaffold to the winds so he could go free, my naughty, upstart boy! Opened up the seven gates of London so he could gallop forth, go anywhere, in peace and freedom.’

  ‘Oh, madam…’

  ‘I dream it is so, I still d
ream it is so.’ She starts. ‘Are we alone? Is Hecate here? She is a greater Queen than I.’

  ‘We are alone. But, madam –’

  ‘And did I summon you, or did you come by chance?’

  ‘You summoned me.’

  ‘Ah, yes. You live at Long Ditch. You are married to that ape Alfonso.’ She pauses, and squeezes my hand again. ‘I have a warning for you. That is why I have called you here. It concerns this thing, this matter of witchcraft. Dr Dee has told me something which concerns you…’

  A bell tinkles. The Queen frowns. ‘Tell them to go away. I am still their monarch, and I wish to speak to you for longer.’

  I open the door a crack, and see Lettice Cooper’s frowning face. ‘Please leave us,’ I say. ‘Her Majesty wishes it.’

  ‘Isn’t Her Majesty done with you?’ she asks.

  ‘Done with me?’

  ‘Address me as “my lady”.’

  ‘I have told you. My lady. She is not ready.’

  ‘Would she not care for a drop of rose-water?’ Her words are solicitous, but her tone is ice-cold. Before I can speak, there is an odd sound from the Queen behind me. I turn, and she is trying to rouse herself from her place, but is weighted down by the jewelled robe. One hand is raised, but, instead of words, all that comes this time is a strange cry, like the call of a gull. Lettice Cooper pushes past me, in a rustle of damask and velvet, and I stand back as she soothes the Queen, and offers her rose-water, which Elizabeth declines, turning her head away and pursing her lips tight shut. Then she points to me. Somewhat unwilling, Lettice nods to me. The Queen seems unable to summon her former strength, and stares at me for a moment, her eyes seeking mine as if I could explain a mystery that is puzzling her. She raises her hand again, beckoning me near. I stoop before her, obliged to lean over Lettice and her glistening skirts; she does not shift an inch.

  ‘Wait…’ The Queen stops.

  I lean closer.

  ‘Sa…’

  ‘Your Majesty?’

  She pulls me forward so that our cheeks touch. Her stench is overwhelming. Then she whispers, ‘Save the boy. By fair means or foul. I could not save mine. Save yours. Guard him.’

  Scene III

  News of the Queen’s illness has spread. London is silent, waiting. The ports are closed by government decree, and the dockyards stand empty. There is barely a sound along the alleyways and cat-creeps, or among the mean hovels in the east, or the grand courtiers’ houses at the river’s edge. The sound of hammering has ceased, the church bells have been muffled and even the dogs have stopped fighting. Only the sound of birds remains: the soft song of the woodpigeon, the peewit’s cry, the seagulls calling and squawking, sometimes with the screams of dying babes, sometimes the chatter of Tower monkeys. The weather has changed, too. The snow has melted, and unseasonable sunlight floods the empty streets. Wild flowers have opened their petals, fooled by the early heat. The bluebell fields of Charing Cross are an azure wasteland.

  It is a freakish spring, and these are strange days. I know we are willing Elizabeth to die. The golden time is over, and something else must follow. The old Queen seems as ancient as London Bridge itself, as relentless as the river tide, as long-lasting as a Sunday sermon. Now her life, like everything on earth, must end.

  This is the subject of Father Dunstan’s homily. He is a miserable, choleric old man, and he has taken the occasion of her illness, and the convenient deaths of several children of Long Ditch parish, as an excuse to ruminate upon the similarity of Flesh to Grass, and, by his religious logic, the need to obey the Word of God. He has chosen as his text, as is his usual habit, one of the Homilies most thoughtfully provided by poor Archbishop Cranmer, who later plunged the very hand that wrote these words into the fire. The subject is ‘Against Disobedience and Wilful Rebellion’ and the method – again one our good priest is wont to use – the brute punishment of boring us to death. Father Dunstan’s borrowed sermons, read out from his weighty book, are often two hours long.

  So the droning progresses thus: ‘…and as GOD would have man to be his obedient subject, so did he make all earthly creatures subject unto man, who kept their due obedience unto man, so long as man remained in his obedience unto GOD… in which obedience, if man had continued still, there had been no poverty, no diseases, no sickness, no death, nor other miseries wherewith mankind is now infinitely and most miserably afflicted…’

  He booms the words over the pulpit at us, daring us to daydream at the white-limed walls. I look down at Henry, who is scuffing his shoe round, making a circle in the strewing-herbs. I frown and pretend to cuff the top of his head, and he squints up at me, half-smiling.

  ‘…He not only ordained that in families and households the wife should be obedient unto her husband, the children unto their parents, the servants unto their masters: but also…’

  Alfonso, who was at the gaming tables last night, has his head bowed, his hands clasped before him, as if in prayerful thought.

  ‘…the root of all vices, and mother of all mischiefs, was Lucifer, first GOD’s most excellent creature, and most bounden subject, who by rebelling against the Majesty of GOD, of the brightest and most glorious Angel, is become the blackest and most foulest fiend and…’

  Joan is standing a little apart from the three of us. She is staring at the priest, her green eyes giving nothing away. As I watch, I notice that she is rocking to and fro, to and fro, slowly, as if a gentle song were lulling her to sleep.

  But then, as if he has observed that we are dozing through his tedious words, Father slams the book shut, and fixes the congregation with a furious gaze. ‘When Death comes for us, we must make our reckoning. We cannot tarry, we cannot bargain, we cannot name the day we are ready to meet our Maker. We must go when we are called, and there is no way back from the gates of Hell.’ He seems to be staring at me, though I know this is how each person feels in a great crowd, confronted by a lone orator. The priest isn’t addressing me, any more than Burbage aims his monologues at one particular groundling in the crowded Globe.

  ‘Which of us will live to see Midsummer? Which of us will light a flame for Candlemas? Who will see another winter? Hmm? I ask you? Who can say this?’

  Mouths gape. Eyes open. A lap-dog growls. ‘Death is coming – for you, just as surely as for the Great and Good. Do not feel your Prince is nearer to the grave than Thee. There is not one of us that knows that we will live to see another dawn…’

  Oh, Lord preserve us. I hate this worship of the dead.

  ‘They say the plague ships are come from distant places, the Indies, and the Azores. They are docked now, at the quayside, by East India House. None can know what causes us to die when the sickness comes. The barrels are rolled into the taverns. The sailors are gone among us. It is God who sends the pestilence, and only God can save us. Fear him.’

  I notice a man on Joan’s left side, at the end of our pew. He is a brown-skinned, wrinkled peasant, a stranger in the parish. He regards the priest with an air of confusion and unease, blinking as if he can’t quite see. He takes a dirty napkin from his leather doublet and mops his face, which dribbles sweat and is mottled purple. Joan catches my glance, and looks at him. Even as she turns, I see the bubo on his neck, yellow as a head of corn. He drops down on his knees. ‘Lord have mercy!’ he shouts. ‘Lord have mercy on us!’ It is the plague cry, the words the doomed daub upon their houses. And he vomits a bellyful of bile right out upon the herbs and rue. The old peasant might have the sweating sickness or the clap; he might have eaten a plate of mouldy mutton – it makes no odds to me. I see that horrid image conjured by the witches: the dead child still in his bed. My skin goes cold. I take Henry’s hand, push past Alfonso and run to the end of the pew.

  ‘Do not run from Death!’ shouts the priest.

  ‘I run towards Life, Father,’ I call over my shoulder. With Henry’s hand clasped firm in mine, I run towards the back of the church.

  ‘Jezebel!’ he shouts. ‘How dare you speak to your priest in
this manner? Remember your place, and be silent.’

  It’s almost enough to make you laugh. What fools does God take us for? But I have no breath for laughing; I am turning the great iron catch on the church door, then pushing it open. Outside, it is a bright spring day. I look back and see all the rows of faces, turned towards me, and the priest, pale with anger, leaning over the pulpit.

  I wake, suddenly. All is darkness: it is the dead of night. Aptly named. I know the Queen has gone. Did I hear a noise? A cry? A scream? A fired musket? Something has disturbed the blackest hour. I push back the eiderdown, and go to the window. Opening it quietly, I look both ways, up and down our street. The cold night air smokes my breath. There is nothing to be seen. All is silent beneath the stars. The only living creature is a house-cow, tethered opposite. She dozes by the water conduit, sleeping on her feet. Behind me, Alfonso rolls onto his back and sets to snoring louder. I crane my head to look westward, towards Richmond, but I am hemmed in with brick smoke-stacks and tight-sewn thatch.

  The good news about the death of the Queen is that Alfonso is employed again. All the Court recorder players are summoned to Whitehall, to rehearse some new tunes for the funeral. They brought her corpse from Richmond in a lead coffin, and she is lying in state at Westminster Hall to await the orders of King James of Scotland, soon to be King of England. The bad news is that we are still in a state of anxious waiting. The Queen is dead, but where is this new Prince? Alfonso says he is processing down from Scotland in grand style, meeting his northern subjects along the way. So we are suspended in a nowhere place between two monarchs. And, just as spirits walk between Christmas and Twelfth Night, so idle and malicious talk fills up this space. For evil is about us and among us, evil acts are more common than saintly deeds, wicked men prosper and the good starve; angels are frailer in our world than night’s black agents, and in this dark and shifting place of nightmare we must seek protection where we may.

  Rumours spring up and run along the streets. They say Elizabeth never saw her own face in her dotage, that her cheating courtiers gave her a magic mirror that reflected only what she had been in her youth. That when at last she saw her true self, aged, unadorned and ugly, she died of grief. (This was false, I knew. It was a twisted version of the truth, which was that John Dee gave her an obsidian mirror, and that she knew most precisely what its powers were, and valued it most highly.) And they say that her body was so racked with vile disease that it swelled monstrously and exploded, bursting forth from her coffin. I think this must be falsehood too, but then remember her swelling fingers and the missing coronation ring.