The Marriage Game: A Novel of Elizabeth I

by Weir, Alison

  ‘I marvel that you, my councillors, should think it doubtful whether there would be any greater surety for me and my realm than to have me marry and bear a child to inherit and continue the line of Henry VIII,’ she wept, glaring daggers at Robert. ‘I see that it was foolish of me to ask for your advice, but I had anticipated a universal request made to me to proceed in this marriage. I did not want to hear of any doubts!’ She broke off there, too distressed to go on, having envisaged the empty, barren years ahead, and herself alone, advancing into old age without ever having known the consolations of wedlock and children. She really had meant to commit to marriage this time; she had done her best to conquer her fears of the nuptial bed and childbirth, even though they had threatened at times to overwhelm her – and all for nothing!

  How could Robert have done this to her? He had made his choice and married where he would, so why had he tried so forcefully to prevent her from doing so? Was she not entitled to some happiness too? Anjou had been more than ready to make concessions; she could have loved him, she told herself, yea, and made a success of the match. But Robert had made it his business to suborn many who would have been in favour of it, and inflamed public opinion, she was sure. Her heart burned with resentment. She would not, could not, look at him, this man who had betrayed her more than once, and in so doing denied her the kind of happiness permitted to the meanest of her subjects.

  She sat there weeping, the paint on her face blurring and streaking as the tears fell. Her councillors did not know whether to approach her, offer comfort or withdraw. In the end, they slunk away, deciding that it was best to leave her be for now, and summoned her ladies to attend her. To a man, they felt uncomfortable about what had happened. Even those who had supported the marriage felt guilty about placing their mistress in a situation where she had had to choose, especially after she had craved their advice. Robert could not have felt worse, yet he was still convinced that he had done the right thing for Elizabeth, and for England, in opposing this marriage.

  Much arguing and deliberation followed, not to mention recriminations, and in the morning Elizabeth was surprised when the councillors asked to see her again. To their relief, they were told that she was dancing galliards, her usual morning exercise, and were pleased to find her in control of herself once more, with no trace of the emotional storm of the previous afternoon.

  ‘Madam,’ said Burghley, ‘we are come to tell you that we are ready to offer you our wholehearted support in furtherance of the marriage with Monsieur, if it shall please you.’

  ‘Well, this is a change of heart on the part of some of you,’ she said, looking pointedly at Robert, who would not meet her eye.

  ‘We have been moved to it by your Majesty’s obvious desire to have issue, and because you have made it plain that you want the Duke for a husband,’ Burghley explained.

  ‘I marvel at those of you who were against the marriage!’ Elizabeth reproved, her tone sharp. ‘Had it not been for your eloquence, the majority would have been content for it to proceed.’

  No one dared to say anything. At length Burghley broke the silence. ‘Will your Majesty promise to give us an answer?’

  ‘I will, after I have thought on it,’ she consented at length, ‘but I think it not meet to declare now what my decision will be.’

  When they had gone, she felt inexpressibly sad, and this melancholy remained with her, a heavy pall cast over her former happiness. She felt cross with everyone and snapped at those who dared approach her. In truth, she was alarmed at the prospect of what would happen if she followed her inclinations and said yes, as she wanted to do. Anjou’s handsome face kept coming to mind, and she could not help wistfully recalling their stimulating banter and his thrilling compliments. Should she give up her chance of happiness with him? If she seized it, would her subjects rebel, as they had rebelled when her sister Mary married Philip of Spain? The mood of the public was hostile towards Anjou and all he represented. There might be others, like Stubbs, who would speak out and inflame popular opinion. It even occurred to her that this marriage could potentially cost her her throne.

  She attended the next council meeting, sitting stiffly at the head of the board, and made it clear from the first that she was not speaking to Robert. When Walsingham opened his mouth to say something, she flared at him, ‘You had best go home, Francis, since you are good for nothing but protecting the interests of the Puritans. And you can go too, Christopher. You opposed me, and I don’t want to see your face at court for at least a week.’ Feeling like naughty schoolboys, the two men left the room.

  ‘Why don’t you banish me too?’ Robert said suddenly.

  ‘Shall we move on?’ Elizabeth asked the rest, ignoring him and putting on her most statesmanlike manner. ‘Now, my lords, it is clear to me that I cannot accept Anjou as a husband and retain the love of my subjects.’ Some faces around the table registered relief; but Burghley looked ineffably sad. Twenty years of scheming to get the Queen wed had come to nothing, and England still did not have her heir.

  ‘It is important, however,’ Elizabeth was saying, ‘that we prolong the marriage negotiations to keep the French friendly. You will attend me in council three days hence, and bring with you the French ambassador.’

  On the appointed day she dressed herself splendidly in virginal white satin, and placed on her elaborately be-wigged head a gossamer veil embroidered with gold fleurs-de-lis, the emblem of France. When she was seated in her chair of estate, she addressed the men before her. ‘My lords, your Excellency, I am come to inform you that I am determined to marry and that you need say nothing more to bend me to it. I command you all to discuss what is necessary for concluding the treaty. Baron Simier and I have drawn up the marriage articles, and we will both sign them. I make one proviso: that I be allowed two months in which to dispose my subjects, as represented in Parliament, to agree to the marriage before I conclude the treaty. If I am unable so to dispose them, the agreement will be null and void.’

  She was stalling, as of old, but this time she was half-hoping that Parliament would agree, even though she knew that there was little likelihood of it. It was at times like these that she felt very much the loneliness of her exalted position. There was no one impartial in whom she could confide. She remembered her father saying, long ago, that princes took in marriage spouses brought them by others, while only poor men made their own choices. She almost wished she was poor.

  There was Anjou to think of too. She had led him to believe that she was sincere in her intentions, and hated to imagine that he might think ill of her for imposing this new condition. But there was a chance that he might be able to help. In some agony of mind, she wrote to him: You realise, my dearest, that the greatest difficulties lie in making my people rejoice and approve. The public practice of the Roman religion so sticks in their hearts. I beg you to consider this deeply. For my part, I confess there is no prince in the world to whom I think myself more bound, nor with whom I would rather pass the years of my life, both for your rare virtues and sweet nature. With my commendations to my dearest Frog. She smiled weakly at that. It conjured up so many happy memories.

  Soon afterwards Simier went home to France, laden with gifts but leaving the marriage articles unsigned for now. And Anjou did not take the hint and abjure his faith.

  Elizabeth never normally paid much attention to gossip unless it was about something worthy of her attention, but one day she overheard two of her maids of honour chattering in the linen closet next to her bedchamber. Had she heard correctly? Had they actually said that Douglass Sheffield had been secretly married to the Earl of Leicester?

  ‘Where did you hear that?’ she asked from the doorway.

  They spun round in panic at her voice and dropped into curtseys.

  ‘Answer me!’ she demanded.

  ‘Lady Frances Howard said it, Madam,’ one piped up nervously.

  ‘Did she indeed?’ Satisfied, she dismissed them, knowing that they would repeat their gossip elsewhere
, and with embellishments.

  This was most interesting – and most gratifying. Frances Howard was a known tattler of tales, but she was Douglass Sheffield’s sister and therefore in a position to know the truth about her. And if Robert had in fact been married to Douglass, he could not be lawfully married to that woman. Elizabeth had been longing to have her revenge on her traitorous niece, and now she saw her opportunity.

  She summoned Burghley and told him, in the gravest tones, that she feared there was an impediment to the Earl of Leicester’s marriage.

  ‘I have it on reliable authority that he was married at the time to Lady Sheffield.’

  ‘Married?’ Burghley’s bushy brows shot up. ‘Forgive me, Madam, I knew she was his mistress and bore him a child, but this is news to me. If he was married, why did he not declare it? Why should a man deny his own son his rightful inheritance?’

  ‘For fear of my just wrath, for marrying without my consent.’

  ‘But Madam, he did just that with Lady Essex, and your Majesty graciously forgave him.’

  She threw Burghley a contemptuous look. ‘I had no choice in the matter. But William, this information comes from Lady Sheffield’s sister, one of my own gentlewomen.’

  ‘A known gossip,’ he observed.

  ‘But why should she lie?’

  ‘For profit?’ Burghley answered.

  ‘Ah, my Spirit, you have grown cynical in your old age. It could be that she has broken her silence because she cannot bear to see her sister so wronged. And if Lady Sheffield has been wronged, I cannot allow the situation to continue. There must be an investigation. If there was a marriage between Robert and Lady Sheffield, we need to establish whether the ceremony was legal and binding.’

  ‘And if it was?’

  ‘Then I have resolved to give Robert an ultimatum: either he has his union with Lady Essex’ – she nearly choked on the name – ‘annulled – or he goes to the Tower.’

  Burghley sighed. He knew why Elizabeth was doing this, and he was almost certain what the outcome would be. He also knew that she would not be gainsaid. ‘Very well, I will arrange it,’ he said wearily.

  Sussex, being cousin to Douglass, was deputed to question her, and as soon as possible, because she had just married Sir Edward Stafford, England’s ambassador in Paris, and was about to depart for France.

  ‘She says that Robert ruined her and that she wants nothing more to do with him. She fears, of course, that talk of their affair will compromise her new marriage. She will admit nothing.’ And off she had blithely gone to France.

  Elizabeth was furious. It seemed that that woman was to triumph at every turn, and that proved not to be all! When news came that she had borne Leicester a son, the Queen wept hot tears of frustration and fury. Not even a letter from Simier, tied with pink ribbon, could cheer her. Be assured, on the faith of your Monkey, that your Frog lives in hope! he had written. Already, she knew, the magical spell that Simier had woven around her was wearing off.

  1580

  Months later she was finding it hard to stay angry with Robert, although there were still times when she burned with fury towards him. Her feelings for him were desperately complicated; she loved him as fiercely as she hated him. But as she became mistress of herself once more, she came to realise that he was still the Robin she had known of old and cherished for so long, he was still devoted to her, and they might still share the interests, easy companionship and confidences that they had once done. The bonds between them had become so much of a habit that Elizabeth would find herself relapsing into the old ways without even noticing it. It could never be quite as it had been, though. There would always be what she saw as Robert’s betrayal lying like a sword between them. She would never forgive him for marrying that woman, but there was nothing that she could do about that, and as he now made sure never to mention her faithless niece, she could pretend for most of the time that it had never happened – or that he was now the proud father of an heir. In the wake of that noble imp’s birth, Robert had again ventured to ask Elizabeth to receive his wife, but she had responded so violently that he had never dared raise the subject again.

  She had now come to see that Robert had been opposing the French marriage only in her interests, and from deeply held convictions, and when the French ambassador criticised him for placing obstacles in the way of it, she was stout in his defence.

  ‘He was merely doing his duty as a councillor!’ she snapped, as Robert stared at her in astonishment. More often than not he could do little to please her these days.

  Otherwise, though, she was glacially distant to him, and the ice did not thaw until spring set in. By then, it was clear to everyone, Anjou included, that she was stalling in the matter of her marriage. The deadline for her to conclude the treaty had passed without her making any decision. Anjou, to demonstrate his good will to her subjects, had written begging her to free Stubbs from prison.

  ‘I am beset on all sides!’ Elizabeth complained to Burghley.

  ‘I believe that your Majesty is disinclined to marry at all,’ he observed sadly.

  Elizabeth said nothing, yet her warring emotions were evident in her expression.

  ‘If you do not intend to marry, you must undeceive Anjou at once,’ he advised.

  ‘I had hoped to keep him in correspondence indefinitely,’ she said.

  ‘The French will not take kindly to your treating him so shabbily,’ Burghley warned.

  ‘I am not interested in what they think,’ she countered.

  ‘Those that trick princes trick themselves,’ he said sagely. Her face told him plainly that she did not like his bluntness.

  She sent Anjou a steady stream of letters in which she implied, with increasing candour, that they should perhaps renounce each other, since her people objected to his hearing Mass. She asked for more time in which to convince her subjects of the benefits of the marriage. She kept praising the firm rock of his constancy, and repeatedly – and rather tactlessly – blamed all the delays on the French.

  Our souls are meant to be united, she assured him, but left him wondering when, and how. Whenever the French ambassador was within earshot, she told people in a loud voice that she was still in love with Monsieur, and wore his frog pendant to prove it. She tucked the gloves he had given her into her belt and ostentatiously took them out and kissed them a hundred times a day. She almost managed to convince herself that this was no charade, but of course it was being played out purely for the ambassador’s benefit.

  Even her councillors began to wonder if she was serious. ‘I would to God your Majesty would resolve one way or another touching the matter of her marriage,’ Walsingham fretted. ‘It would behove you to come to a speedy resolution, or you will breed greater dishonour than I dare imagine.’

  ‘I will decide in my own time,’ Elizabeth told him, her voice rising in ire. ‘As for dishonour, may I remind you all that you and my lord of Leicester here did your best to prevent the marriage and stir up opinion against it.’

  ‘Madam, we were but thinking of your welfare and the weal of the realm,’ Robert protested.

  ‘Your interference was most unwelcome!’ she barked. ‘I should have had you in the Tower!’

  ‘Better for me to sell my lands and live a humble life than fall into this harsh disfavour,’ he retorted. Was she never going to forgive him?

  Elizabeth’s sour humour became even more acidic after she received news from Rome that Pope Gregory XIII had reissued his predecessor’s bull of excommunication against her. She knew, through Walsingham’s intelligence network, that Jesuit priests, trained to undermine her rule and give succour to English Catholics, were infiltrating her realm. Her chief fear now was that they would organise Catholic resistance and even attempt her assassination.

  To make matters worse she was sure that the Queen of Scots was plotting with the Spanish ambassador. Then word came that King Philip had annexed Portugal and so strengthened his naval power. The French were once again fighting th
eir interminable wars of religion, and Elizabeth feared that they would not now be so readily able, or willing, to support her against this enhanced threat from Spain.

  Immediately she offered to support Anjou’s military venture in the Netherlands, and she invited his brother, King Henri, to send commissioners to England to conclude the marriage treaty as a matter of urgency.

  There was no response. Anjou, it was clear, now had his sights on becoming king of the Netherlands, of which there seemed to be more chance than becoming king of England. Elizabeth was stung by a cruel report from Paris that his ardour had cooled because of her advanced age and repulsive body. Repulsive? Oh no! It was a blow to her heart, and her pride, and she flung the offending letter into the fire. Had he really said that? Or was it her enemies spreading sedition?

  Then came news that the Dutch had offered Anjou the crown.

  ‘If the marriage goes ahead,’ Burghley said, grave, ‘it will be on condition that we give Monsieur an army to use against the Spaniards.’

  ‘No!’ Elizabeth snapped. ‘It would be foolhardy to provoke King Philip thus, and I am not prepared to impoverish my subjects to fight a foreign war.’ She was almost beside herself. ‘I am not well used!’ she complained. ‘The nuptials would be savoured with my subjects’ wealth, because the marriage would involve England in a costly enterprise. Have Monsieur informed that I am entirely against his becoming King of the Dutch.’

  But Monsieur proved impervious to her angry protests. Defiantly he accepted the crown and was proclaimed Prince of the Netherlands.

  1581

  Anjou had run out of money. Desperately needing to boost his resources, he suddenly remembered that he was in love, and dispatched commissioners to England to revive the marriage negotiations.