“I do. And this distresses her.”
My Father laughed mirthlessly. “She is in a state of such appalling upheaval and fragility that I fear the sudden shock of your existence might kill her.” His voice grew gentle. “Your Mother cannot at present be told you are alive.” As we watched the vessels large and small coursing along the great water artery to the citys heart, Leicester put his arm round my shoulder. “You are like a frigate under full sail, Arthur. Pretty . . . but dangerous. I hope you understand why we shall have to wait for a more opportune moment to tell her.”
I would be a liar if I said I was not disappointed, but I saw his logic and knew that he shared with the Queen an indisputably honorable quality — the love of his country and the ability to put its needs before his own personal desires. And more important, I had at least claimed his love and acceptance. Patience, I knew, was a virtue I would have to learn.
“I understand, I do,” I replied, “but I wish so dearly to serve England, my lord!”
He smiled and said, “Father. I wish you to call me Father.”
We embraced and I whispered the word in his ear, mightily thankful there was still a man I could call by that name.
“Let me think on your future awhile,” he said, “for I can tell you this. If any harm should come to you on my account, when your Mother finds out, she will have me beheaded!”
We laughed and I assured him no one, himself included, could keep me long from harms way, for I lived for action, even danger, and I craved new sights and adventure in the way a drunkard craves his spirits.
“Perhaps you should come to the Netherlands, serve as my right hand,” he suggested.
“No, Father, I am no diplomat. I am a soldier, and one who has lost the taste for fighting — at least in the way the Dutch and the Spanish still fight. The siege . . .” I could hardly go on. “The siege holds only horrible memories for me. I somehow feel I have given all I can give in the Low Countries.”
He stroked his jowly chin and regarded me carefully. Then he questioned me as a schoolmaster might — but the subject was my self. What were my skills, besides the obvious? What were my loves, my hates? I said I had several languages besides English.
“Hmph. Your Mothers son in that. Elizabeth has a brilliant ear and speaks eight languages fluently.”
I smiled, shyly delighted to be compared to the Queen, for tho I was fast becoming comfortable with the thought of Leicester as my Father, Elizabeth as my Mother was as exotic as a tribe of New World savages.
I told him I enjoyed disguising my self and taking on alien roles, and related my experiences on the road to Gouda pretending to be a Dutch merchant, and of dressing up as a Haarlem prostitute to lure the Spanish soldiers to their death.
“What think you,” he said slowly, as if forming the thought only as he spoke, “of a career as a spy for England?”
I fairly whooped with joy.
“Walsingham has his men,” Leicester explained. “Some on the Continent. Others in Spain itself. But I could use my own ‘eyes and ears’ abroad. Someone I could trust implicitly.”
I thought my heart would burst with pride and excitement. We began making our plans at once.
My Fathers secretary, Mister Fludd, was assigned to deliver me to Francis Walsingham and request that he issue me a passport. Fludd had been told, and was to tell the man, I was an especial friend of the Earls, and to make haste in concluding this business.
We arrived at Secretary Walsinghams house on the Strand in the early evening amidst a great downpour. When he saw Fludd Walsingham graciously bid us enter, for he was a good friend of my Father and was eager to help him in any way he could. Fludd, however, must have been flustered by the suddenness of my appearance from nowhere, believing he knew all of my Fathers friends and acquaintances, and was perhaps wary of the urgency with which he had been directed to acquire this passport for me. So whilst he carried out his instructions correctly in every way, his manner of explaining my situation was so nervous and stuttering that Walsingham — head of the Queens Secret Service — became immediately suspicious. He said he would be glad to issue me the document but — he hoped I would forgive him — he would need to interrogate me fully. With England poised to make war against Philip of Spain, he explained, the security of the country was at stake, and he could not be too careful.
I, of course, agreed with him enthusiastically and said I would answer all his questions and provide him with all of my papers which were in my saddlebags. I excused my self saying I was going to retrieve them and walked out the front door. Taking my horse from the groom I mounted her and rode hastily away into the storm, never looking back, for I had promised my Father that no one should know my true birth until the time was right. He for his part would refrain even from confiding to William Cecil that he knew of my existence. I now feared that Walsingham, a talented interrogator, might learn more than I — just beginning this life of subterfuge — and my father wanted him to know.
I had said my goodbyes to Lord Leicester, who claimed to be cheered beyond measure by my appearance in his life, and promised to stay in close contact with me on my sojourn. But he himself was in frantic preparation for his journey to the Netherlands — expecting to remain there a year or more — and tho he fervently wished to spend more time with me, said it was impossible. He looked forward to the day when he, my Mother and my self would all come together, and prayed it would be at a time when England had been delivered from the threat of war, and our meeting would be not simply a personal one, but a celebration of the peace which Elizabeth sought so religiously.
Leicester had given me more than sufficient funds to begin my life as a spy, with assurance that money should never again be a worry for me. My first expenditure — as the bid for a passport had been a failure — became a generous bribe to a sailor who happily smuggled me aboard a vessel bound for Calais. Twas the easiest crossing I had yet made. It surprised me how little I regretted leaving England again, and so soon. As the ship weighed anchor with a stiff breeze filling the sails, I gazed briefly back at the sparkling cliffs of Dover, then turned my eyes towards the other shore. In four hours time I was in France, and my life of spying had begun.
Thirty-five
“He has done what! Say again, Mister Davison, for I fear my ears may be rebelling in my head, as my teeth are currently doing. Repeat what you have said of Lord Leicester carefully and slowly.” Elizabeth sat this morning in council with Lord Cecil, Secretary Walsingham, and her new favorite, Walter Raleigh, staring incredulously at the envoy from the Netherlands.
“He has accepted the title pressed on him by the Estates, of Supreme Governor of the United Provinces, Your Majesty.”
Elizabeth was seething, but managed to restrain herself in the presence of Leicester’s adjutant, recently arrived at Court.
“To be fair, Your Majesty, they did press this honor on him very heartily, for they are so sorely in need of a leader since the death of the Prince of Orange.”
“Oh indeed,” sneered Elizabeth, “as sorely as they needed a way to ensnare England into an irrevocable gesture of hostility against Spain, a way that leaves me no choice but to commit all of my financial resources to win their war!” She turned to her advisors. “What think you of this contemptible treachery, gentlemen?”
Cecil and Walsingham were in silent but frantic contemplation of this entirely unexpected development. Leicester never failed to impress them with his self-seeking machinations, but this far exceeded any previous acts of insolence.
“I must say it surprises me, Madame,” offered Cecil. “Leicester knew quite well that you yourself refused the very same title some months ago.”
“And for good reason!” shouted Elizabeth. “’Tis an open proclamation of war against Spain!”
Walsingham squirmed in his seat. His friend had gone beyond the boundaries of good sense, and now the Secretary groped for a response that would not further anger the Queen, yet might offer a reasonable defense of Leicester’
s lunacy. Walsingham was doubly uneasy, knowing he must soon tell Her Majesty of a plot he had recently uncovered — once again devised by that evil spiderwoman Mary Queen of Scots, along with an Englishman named Babington — to overthrow Elizabeth, yea assassinate her. This time the Queen would have no choice but to try Mary for treason. Oh, how his head ached, but he forced himself to remain calm as he said, “Lord Leicester has shown tremendous organization and good sense in his garrisoning of your forces in Holland, Your Majesty. The troops are well behaved, they attend services regularly, and restrain themselves admirably in the retaking of the cities from the Spanish. There has been no looting or pillage or raping, and Leicester is credited with their most civil presence in a foreign land.”
Elizabeth snorted, but Walsingham went on. “I have had reports from Lord North that Leicester is going about inspecting fortifications and having numerous trenches dug. North says he does not shrink from placing himself in danger of musket shot and is apparently respected by the army. Perhaps, under the circumstances, his way is the most reasonable course of action.”
“I think he could not resist the temptation of such grandeur,” interjected Raleigh, perhaps with too flippant a tone, though Elizabeth seemed not to notice. She was very, very angry at her old friend, and the darkly handsome Raleigh — arrayed like a peacock in his splendid new clothes and altogether magnetic charms — expressed perfectly her own thoughts on Leicester at this moment.
“If Robert Dudley was denied the crown of England,” Raleigh persisted, “he would no doubt settle for the crown of Holland. He is an arrogant, avaricious man. How could he resist the welcome he received? They say ’twas fit for a king — bells chiming, cannons saluting, feasts and pageants in his honor, fireworks. Even a triumphal arch. And I can only imagine the glee with which Lady Leicester is even now preparing to join her ‘sovereign’ husband.”
“Oh!” cried Elizabeth, flushing so angrily that pink glowed behind the thick white makeup she now wore. “I can just see the ostentatious display. Lettice already rides about Cheapside in a carriage drawn by four milk white horses, with four footmen and thirty mounted gentlemen before and behind her. God’s death, there is but one Queen in England!”
Walsingham wished he could stuff his fist down Raleigh’s throat to stifle his inflammatory remarks. Damage had been done and repair was in order, not further incitement.
“He will publicly renounce the title at once,” said Elizabeth, rapping her knuckles sharply on the table.
“I think perhaps that is unwise, Majesty.”
Walsingham turned in surprise at Lord Cecil’s cool-tempered response. Perhaps age had indeed mellowed the old man’s loathing for Leicester. Or, thought Walsingham, William Cecil was simply the most levelheaded councillor Elizabeth had had the good fortune ever to have serve her. Indeed, the Queen’s agitation, though still palpable, appeared to be receding slightly.
“You are suggesting we let him keep the title, William?” she asked.
“I’m afraid we must. ’Twould be far more disastrous to remove so lovingly bestowed an honor. A slap in the Estates’ face. And frankly, Your Majesty . . .” Cecil paused before continuing, as though the words he was about to speak were distasteful to him. “Though I have always shared your reluctance to openly engage with Spain, the die has unfortunately been cast. Philip, despite your protestations otherwise, cannot fail to see that you mean to protect the Netherlands against his invasion.”
Elizabeth’s face set itself into a stony grimace. She closed her eyes and breathed fiercely through flaring nostrils. “Oh, Robin, Robin, what have you done? What have you done?”
Thirty-six
No longer was I armed for a soldier, but for a spy. With my Fathers intelligence to guide me I sought to know all of Walsinghams secret agents abroad, there to learn the tricks of the trade, and also to improve my command of the languages which would become an important part of my disguise.
Leicester bade me present my self to the English Ambassador in France, one Edward Stafford, cautioning me on two counts to be ware. Firstly, Staffords wife was Douglas Sheffield, once my Fathers lover, and proof of my association with him would lend an unpleasant air to any relations I might attempt to promote with the couple. The libelous pamphlet about my Father had recently reached Paris and was causing no end of embarrassment to that lady, exposing all of the dirty linen of their affair and of the suspicious circumstances surrounding the death of her first husband.
Secondly, Leicester and Walsingham were convinced that Stafford was a double agent, a go-between for English and French Catholics in the pay of the Duke of Guise, and they suspected he also gave our secrets to Spain — both grossly treasonable acts which they explained away, quite cheerily, as a result of the Ambassador’s poor financial condition. I found the attitude strange, but learnt that Walsingham had once served in the very same post in France and likewise suffered in his tenure from the Queens meanness in salary and grants. The temptation towards bribery was undeniable. But Walsingham, besides being a principled man and a patriot, had no demanding wife to support in a state of luxury, and so never succumbed to such treachery. Too, he reasoned that Stafford, having gained the trust of the Spaniards by handing over English secrets, was therefore as valuable a source of information in the opposite direction, and that the one outweighed the other. Stafford was therefore allowed to retain his position. Twas in the very fine English Embassy in Paris that I visited him and his wife.
I was eager in the extreme to meet them both, and I was not disappointed. The Embassy was exquisite, decorated in the French style which appeared to my eye — relatively untrained to luxury — more delicate, light and fanciful than the English. Lady Stafford, Mother of my half brother Robert, was still a beautiful woman with a great expanse of peach and cream bosom rising out of a low cut silken bodice. Twas easy to see how my Father could have fallen under her spell. Sir Edward was a staid fellow with a blunt, almost rude manner which I — somewhat unbalanced in my first undercover engagement — found slightly unnerving. Knowing I would be long gone from Paris before he could find out otherwise, I presented myself as Harold Morton, one of Walsinghams cadre of highborn students he used as agents.
As we supped in their dining room under a gold leaf ceiling, Lady Stafford openly made eyes at me, whilst her husbands face was in his soup, ranting about Walsinghams idiocy for bankrupting himself to keep his Secret Service afloat. Elizabeth apparently had not yet committed sufficient funds for the task at hand, still not believing the situation was as grim as he and her other war hawks did. During the capon and roast quail Sir Edward made mincemeat of the debauched French King Henry whom he disparaged for dressing like a woman, complete with makeup, hair done up in great ruffles, and a passel of tiny living dogs hung about his neck like a necklace.
But during the fish course Stafford began questioning me to determine both my credibility and my potential usefulness to himself. Having been briefed by my Father I had sufficient inside information to put the Ambassador at his ease, and so he admitted — with the first glimmer of any emotion save sourness that I had seen in him — that he had recently had intelligence from his Spanish sources. He had not yet passed along to Walsingham the information that within several months Elizabeth would be assailed in her own realm, and that a great Spanish army was preparing for it.
I had been in mid chew when he divulged this, and discovered my mouth hanging agape. Spain meant to attack England! Stafford went on to say that Philip and his agents had taken great pains to keep this information from Elizabeth, and that it should go a long way towards opening her eyes to the immediate danger Spain posed our country. I composed my self and — whilst chancing a flirtatious glance back at Lady Stafford, who seemed unable to tear her eyes from me — considered how clever was Francis Walsingham. Leaving the devious, bribable Stafford in his place had paid off handsomely, if only for this single brilliant piece of intelligence.
When the meal was done and all the civilities had been perf
ormed, Sir Edward excused himself for a meeting, and Lady Stafford showed me to the door. In retrospect I was less shocked than I thought I should be when she pressed her body next to mine and fondled my manhood which — somewhat embarrassingly — was unprepared for the assault. Douglas Stafford pulled away with a petulant frown. Knowing we would not soon meet again, and made bold by her boldness, I said in the pleasantest of tones, “How does your son, Robert Dudley?”
Her shock gave me a perverse sense of pleasure, but it had also taken her off guard, so she answered without questioning my curiosity, and perhaps more directly than she might have otherwise replied.
“He is in England and I rarely see him, but I understand he is well. He is almost thirteen now. They say he is tall and handsome … like his Father.” This last word she uttered so scathingly that I had to steel my self from cringing. Then she looked at me again with such searching eyes I thought it best to remove my self from her sight lest she see who I really was. I turned to go. She caught my hand, placed it on her pale breast, moved it down inside her bodice so my fingers grazed her risen nipple and said, “Do come again, Harry. You are always welcome here.”
I felt my self harden on the spot, but dared not linger a moment more. I went back to my rooms and composed in a rude cypher I had recently learnt, my first dispatch to Lord Leicester in Holland, informing him of Spains outrageous plan to invade England.
Having acquired knowledge of King Philips nefarious intentions I wished fervently to leave quickly for Spain to put my services to their best use. But Lord Leicester in his encyphered letters instructed me under no circumstances to leave Europe without first meeting up with his dear friend and tutor Doctor John Dee — a famous man to be sure, but one whose usefulness to the English cause was, to my mind, somewhat dubious. I never the less bowed to my Fathers wishes and travelling overland to Bohemia and the capital city of Prague, arranged to call upon Dee at the Royal Palace of King Rudolph II.
The Queen's Bastard Page 36