Philip had built a terrifyingly large and well-provisioned Armada, the likes of which the world had never seen. Almost one year ago Francis Drake’s waterborne raiding party at Cadiz harbor had destroyed a good portion of the fleet, setting the King’s plans back substantially.
Captain Drake had returned to England buoyed by his rich spoils and convinced that the proper way to defeat the Armada was to never allow the ships to sail in the first place. He had urged Elizabeth to continue systematic attacks on Spain’s home ports. Many agreed with him that England’s defenses were too weak to withstand an attack on its own shores, and truly Elizabeth had been heartened by the Cadiz victory. But Cecil had unceasingly whispered in her ear what she wanted to believe — that peace negotiations could still save England from the horrors of war — and so she had denied Drake permission to sail again on his harrying missions.
In the year since, Philip had singlemindedly continued his subterfuge and preparations. Nine months ago John Dee had uncovered a heinous plot — by means she never questioned, for magic and spying were so deeply entwined in that man’s character — to burn down the Forest of Dean, the largest source of wood for the building of the English navy. With information supplied by Dee, two enemy agents passing as woodcutters had been caught in the forest, preparing to put it to the torch.
Walsingham’s spies on the Continent reported that Parma’s troops in the Netherlands were involved with the invasion, and from Spain came word that Philip had recovered from his losses at Cadiz, rebuilding and reprovisioning his mighty Armada. Now it had become a simple matter of when they would strike.
’Twas strange, thought Elizabeth, how the threat of war, far from ruining her popularity with the people, only served to increase it. True, there was a kind of hysteria gripping the country, but it took the form of a fervent new patriotism and an evergrowing adoration of their Queen — Gloriana. So whilst Elizabeth found her heart gripped by terror of a war on her own soil, her soul was nourished daily by the great and growing love of her subjects.
Hysteria of a different nature reigned on the Continent and in Spain — another clever contrivance of her magus and master spy Dee. He had recently trotted out a hundred-year-old prophecy by the astrologer Regiomontanus that the year 1588 would bring upheaval and catastrophe, and that great empires would crumble. Dee added to that his own reading of the stars, claiming the year would see the fall of a mighty kingdom amidst freak and monstrous storms. But he had offered up this occult intelligence to a particular audience only. He had whispered it into the ear of King Rudolph in Bohemia who had, as expected, relayed it to the Pope, and he to King Philip. Dee’s friend in the Dutch printing trade had like-wise been informed, and his prophecies of doom blanketed the Continent in thousands of books and pamphlets, spreading terror and panic amongst the population there, undermining Spanish morale when it was most needed. Contrariwise, at Dee’s urging, Elizabeth had seen to it that all such information was suppressed by English publishers so that her subjects would not become disheartened.
A brilliant strategy, thought the Queen, and a brilliant man. She picked up his latest correspondence. She could read between the lines Dee’s aching to return home. He’d been gone for five years on his mission. His beautiful library had been looted. His wife had died. Still, Elizabeth could not afford to be sentimental at a time like this. She would call him home soon enough. Now she had to make sense of Dee’s instructions contained within this dispatch. She picked it up and read again a paragraph near the bottom.
Most Gracious Majesty, whilst all conventional wisdom and consensus agree that England has not a chance under Heaven of winning a war with Spain, my own celestial consultations have shown otherwise. Be of good Faith, Majesty, for your glorious Empire expanding across the sea into New Atlantis is clearly foretold, and a crushing defeat by a tyrant such as Philip is simply nowhere to be found in your stars. Therefore proceed forcefully in this world — shipbuilding, armies, navies, provisioning and armaments (I highly commend your appointment of Lord Howard and Francis Drake to command the fleet), but begin as well the preparations which I have outlined below, those pertaining to the occult world. You may find such suggestions odd, even pagan in feeling and design, but do not doubt for a moment that for the purposes of winning this momentous battle, their efficacy is as great, and their results as real, as the mustering of men or the manufacturing of artillery.”
Elizabeth suddenly noticed one of her ladies kneeling at her feet, and wondered vaguely how long the girl had been there. “What?” The Queen had lost most of her patience with the young ladies of her chamber. They were for the most part beautiful and well educated, but all but her fool Mrs. Tomison were terrified of speaking any kind of opinion in her presence … as well they should be, she supposed. Elizabeth had taken recently to boxing the ears of anyone, man or woman, who vexed her. Something in her had grown very cold, very brittle. Remorseless. She knew this, and it saddened her, but there was no remedy. For too long she had suppressed unsuppressible desires, suffered insufferable losses, forgiven unforgivable betrayals. Together with the gift — or was it the damnation? — of wielding limitless power, Elizabeth Tudor had, over the years, become a woman less of flesh and bone than of ether. She was composed, she sometimes mused, entirely of thoughts and ideas — the greatness of her little island nation, the fierce protectiveness of her beliefs, her loves and loathings. Her body seemed sometimes a wooden puppet doll, not actually alive but appearing alive owing to pulls on its strings and a voice projected by the puppeteer.
“What did you say!” snapped Elizabeth with more irritation than she had intended.
“I have just told you that Lord Leicester has arrived, Your Majesty,” said the lady with downcast eyes.
“So you have,” replied Elizabeth in a somewhat warmer tone. “I’m afraid in a few years your Queen will be deaf as a post. Take all the ladies out with you now, and send Lord Robert in to me.”
“Yes, Your Majesty.” As she spoke the girl dared to meet Elizabeth’s eye. “You look lovely, Your Majesty,” she said.
With her old lover about to be shown in, and her vanity still very much alive, Elizabeth chose to believe the girl’s lie.
“I do admit I’m surprised at how well Drake has behaved,” said Robin Dudley, “under the circumstances.” He sat forward in the chair next to Elizabeth’s highbacked one, and rearranged his swollen leg on the padded footstool she’d had brought in for him. “He wished for the appointment as High Admiral of the Fleet more than anything in his life. And in my opinion he deserved it.”
“I agreed with you, Robin,” she replied evenly.
Leicester observed the Queen observing him. Probably, he thought with annoyance, she is thinking to be mild with me because I look so ill.
“But Lord Howard is not only my cousin,” she said, “he is the highest peer in the land with decent naval experience. Other ship commanders would never take orders from one of their own rank, even Drake. And frankly, Sir Francis has no one to blame for that state of affairs but himself. Was it not he who established the principle that a ship’s captain, and not the highest ranking soldier on board, was its supreme authority? They all think of themselves as little demigods now, the captains. ’Twill take a man of the highest order to pull them together under one command.”
“Indeed, I think your relative quite adept. He seems to have charmed our favorite pirate altogether. When last I saw him with Drake they were arm to shoulder, heads together and deeply immersed in nautical conversation.”
“Tell me,” she said, trying not to stare at the swollen ankle under his silk stocking, “do you think they are happy with their navy?”
“They like the new ships you have had built. They are sleek and sturdy and very fast. But I have heard both Drake and Howard complain about the provisioning of the fleet,” said Leicester pointedly, “and I can attest personally to the great disservice it does to the men and the war effort in general.” Leicester saw Elizabeth’s eyes narrow. He cou
ld see that her mildness with him was about to end. He wondered if she meant to berate him one more time for accepting the post in the Netherlands, or his now infamous bad blood with the English officers there under his command.
“You have great nerve to take issue with my policy on provisioning, my lord. You are very fortunate I’ve not chosen to censure you —”
“Censure me! ’Twas I who struggled to feed and clothe and arm your troops in the Low Countries with too little money! And I who was chastised and ridiculed and nearly recalled from duty for my so-called poor accounting practices. You try keeping the records straight when the only way you can keep an army of six thousand men alive is to beg, borrow, and steal!”
“That’s enough, Robin.”
“I’m not finished.” He saw her eyes snap open at his audacity. “I recommend that for once in your life you leave off crying poverty and throw every tuppence in your treasury behind the defense of this realm or I promise you, Madame, you will have no realm!”
“Are you through?”
“Yes.”
Leicester was strangely calm. He had angered and defied and infuriated Elizabeth their whole lives together. She had shrieked and cursed, hurled abuse and punishment down on his head, and he had survived it. But he knew her heart and her mind. Knew that they were all for England, and that the advice he was giving her now was honest, and was for England too.
“I have been thinking about our land forces,” she went on as though no harsh words had ever passed between them.
“And what have you been thinking?”
“That they are appallingly ill prepared. We have lived in peace so long in England we have neither the machinery nor the spirit for war. Our castle fortresses are falling down in disrepair. Our militias are inexperienced, and too hastily gathered, and our coastal towns are defended by farmers and fishermen who train together once a week. Robin” — she leaned forward and clutched his arm — “what will happen if our fleet cannot hold the Armada back? What will become of us if thirty thousand of Philip’s rabid soldiers overrun our shores, sail up the Thames into London? Another Haarlem? Another Spanish Fury?” Naked fear shone in Elizabeth’s eyes. Her thin vermillion lips were trembling.
Dudley’s only answer was to place his reassuring hand over hers. He wished suddenly that he could gather Elizabeth into his arms, whisper soothingly, still the shaking core of her. He remembered the many times he had lain with her in her Bed of State and kissed away her terrors. Most of all he longed to tell Elizabeth about their son. That he lived. That he had grown into a fine man, tall and broad shouldered, a master horseman. That he had her skin and hair, and her mother’s black eyes. Arthur …
But he could not. He had heard nothing from his son in more than six months. Dispatches had until then made their way to Leicester regularly. Arthur had traveled widely, quickly learned the art of spying, and sent valuable and necessary news to him from every part of the Continent. His intelligence regarding the fleet at Cadiz had made possible Drake’s astonishing victory, buying England an additional year of preparation for the Spanish invasion. Leicester had received subsequent communications from Lisbon and the north of Spain, where Arthur had been surveying the progress of the Armada as Philip had begun rebuilding it. Then the flow of letters had ceased abruptly. Though Leicester could not bear to think it, his son might be dead. He could tell Elizabeth nothing until he knew. ’Twould be too cruel a twist of the knife to say now that their son had indeed lived, but might have died before she’d been able to know him. No, Leicester would say nothing to the Queen of Arthur Dudley. He would speak only to God in his prayers every day, and beg that their child’s life be spared, that England somehow prevail in the coming war with Spain, that someday the three of them might stand face to face and rejoice in each other’s company.
Robin Dudley was still a widely despised man, he knew, and possessed many qualities which deserved him of it. But he had been imbued with one excellent quality — an ever hopeful spirit. It had held him steady through dark times before and now he summoned that hope and clung to it with all the strength left in his bloated and feverish body. He would see his son again, and Elizabeth would know and embrace him as well.
“I must give command of the land forces to someone,” said Elizabeth suddenly, shaking Leicester out of his reverie.
“Who is it you have in mind? Raleigh? Hatton? Northampton?”
“You, my lord.”
Leicester was forced to turn away, to blink back sudden tears. He cleared his throat, but found he had no words.
“Robin,” she said with a softness in her voice he thought never to hear again, “there is no one in the world I trust more than yourself. I trust you with my life … and my life is England.” She ran her still beautiful ivory fingers in a gentle trail down his red-veined cheek. “I know you are not very well. That you are weary to the bone. But will you take command, my love? As a favor to me?”
He turned back and met her gaze, which was as clear and steady as it had been when she had conferred the post of Horsemaster upon him, moments after she had learned she was Queen of England.
“My honor, Your Majesty,” replied Robin Dudley, taking Elizabeth’s fingers to his lips. “It will be my honor.”
Forty-three
My overland journey to Lisbon with Enrique had proven the most difficult ride of my life, but I had arrived some hours before Captain Drake again put out to sea, and delivered to his great gratification my intelligence of the fleet at Cadiz. I had afterwards finished my convalescence in Lisbon, making the acquaintance of Nicholas Ousley, reputed the bravest of Walsinghams agents inside of Spain. We two conspired to provide England with the latest news of the Armada, which began after Drake’s devastation of Cadiz to rebuild with astonishing rapidity. Not only did we need to report the number of ships to the Queens spymaster, but each vessels tonnage, munitions, muster of sailors, soldiers and galley slaves, and of course provisions.
Ousley and I would sit of an evening on the balcony of his casa overlooking Lisbon Harbor, drinking sherry and conspiring against Spain. He was a jolly fellow with a broad face and large fat nose, whose imposture was as a Scottish Catholic wool merchant. His wife managed the largest wool shop in the city. He was reasonably safe, he always said, as the Portuguese hated the Spanish, all the more since Philips coup several years before.
We devised a plan whereby he would concern him self with the buildup in Lisbon, and I would establish my self in the northern ports of Corunna and Ferrol, assessing the concentration of the fleet and the fortifications there. There would be Breton captains to share gossip with, and I would ferret out Englishmen of doubtful loyalty who might be planning to give easy landing to the Spanish ships in the south of England, and agents of Philip making forays into English ports to spy on our fleets. Happily, the Kings intelligence gathering was inferior to Walsinghams, and tho they tried to search out English agents, they came up empty handed more times than not.
In the meanwhile Enrique had ridden back to Don Ramón with news of my safe arrival and success. The boy returned immediately under instructions to guide me into whichever city I should request and help establish me with the members of the Lorca family network in that place.
I took my leave of Ousley and rode north with what I supposed was my first manservant. Enrique was a great boon to me, very toward and likeable, and a fine horseman who looked upon me as his teacher as much as his master. When we reached Corunna there was great activity to be seen in the harbor. As shipbuilders and provisioners finished their work, vessels would depart, sailing down to Lisbon where the whole fleet was being assembled.
Enrique had delivered me to the home of Rodrigo Lorca, nephew of Don Ramón, a loriner by trade. His stirrups and bridles of worked silver were everywhere in Spain renowned. Rodrigo was a handsome fellow, impeccably attired and highly cultivated, short and swarthy with dark flashing eyes. He seemed to embody the spirit of the Spanish male so precisely that I sometimes had a hard time rememberin
g he was not the devout Catholic he pretended to be, but a Jew. A highly skilled artisan, Rodrigo no longer plied his trade, and only oversaw the workers in his factory, this because of the Spanish tendency to regard manual labor of any sort as demeaning. In fact, like so many of his Spanish compatriots, despite an outwardly affable and courteous manner, he disdained anyone not Spanish, even countrymen not of his own region. For me he made an exception, he told me, for I was a friend of his uncle and was taking a bite out of King Philips despicable hide.
“Let me show you something,” he suggested one evening after a meal I had shared with him and his wife, a rather unlovely woman with a simpering manner and syrupy voice. She was one female I believed was improved by the custom of heavy veils. He took me into his study and laid out on his desk what was clearly the Lorca family tree, beautifully lettered and decorated all round with painted and gilt figures.
“We call this the Green Book. Every family of honor has one.” He pointed with his manicured fingers. “You see here, our lineage can be traced back to the twelfth century. This is our proof of pedigree.” He laughed humorlessly. “As you can see, we are old Christians with the purest of bloodlines.”
“With a master forger in your employ,” I added, smiling.
“We live so carefully,” he said, smoothing his long waxed mustache. “The merest scandal would bring the Lorca family down like a house of cards in a high wind.”
Rodrigo had been very kind, providing me with safe living quarters not far from his own casa. I was a frequent guest at his home, tho I used many disguises to come and go from there, to deter suspicion. I was sometimes a fat Italian silk merchant and other times a local beggar knocking at the servants entrance of the Lorca house. Each fortnight I would ride to Ferrol. The port was much smaller than Corunna, but enough shipbuilding was there to be of concern, so I added the intelligence to my regular dispatches to Lord Leicester.
The Queen's Bastard Page 42