‘I know you dislike her particular sin, but she has been punished enough for it now, surely? I have no love for her husband, and would gladly have seen the man rot in the Tower’s filthy confines until the end of his days, for all his service to your throne. But Bess is a sweet lady and has always been a friend to me.’
Essex raised his dark gaze to hers, and Elizabeth had the unsettling impression that her favourite was threatening her.
‘The Tower in winter is no place for a woman. I would not wish to see Lady Raleigh succumb to illness, Your Majesty, or fall into despair at her continuing imprisonment.’
Elizabeth did not know how to respond. It would be the work of a moment to order the woman’s release from the Tower. Yet she did not think she ought to bow to his will so easily. It would only encourage Essex to consider her weak and malleable.
Her calm surprised her. Why could she not be angry with Essex, as she would have been with any other man who spoke to her this way?
She waited a moment, staring down into her wine, then asked, ‘Is this all you came to say?’
He hesitated. ‘I have been over those documents of Walsingham’s that I have been able to decipher, and spoken to some of his men. All are agreed that Walsingham believed your person to be in danger from someone close at court. As yet we have no name, nor any clue as to the traitor’s identity, except that he is a secret Catholic. Which any fool could have surmised from the evidence.’
‘So you are no further along the road than Walsingham was when he died? But with two years passed, you surely cannot believe the traitor still holds to his course?’
‘It is not uncommon, I have been informed, for such agents to lie in concealment for years, never revealing themselves but waiting for a letter or agreed sign from their masters.’ He paused significantly. ‘A sign to proceed with their grisly task of assassination.’
‘God’s blood!’ She drank deeply, almost draining the cup, then regretted it, the strong wine leaving her light-headed. ‘How are we to discover him?’
‘It has taken me much investigation, but a few months ago I finally managed to track down the man who first discovered this plot. He was one of Walsingham’s most trusted agents, with great knowledge of these foreign spies and their loathsome work throughout Europe. Now that he is found, I have installed the man here in the palace, posing as a member of your own household, and instructed him to discover the identity of the secret traitor at the heart of your court. He reports directly to me, though none but you and I will know of his true identity.’
She was impressed, not having considered that Essex could achieve such a thing. Then she remembered what Robert Cecil had recently told her of Anthony Bacon’s friendship with Essex, and wondered if he had been the one to find this missing agent and put such a cunning scheme together.
‘His name?’
‘Master Goodluck.’
A memory came to her. ‘I know that name. He was Lucy Morgan’s guardian when she was a child.’
‘I did not know that.’
‘He served Walsingham well on many occasions, and more than once thwarted a plot to have me killed.’ She smiled warmly, holding out her hand to him. Even if Bacon had helped him to this goal, nonetheless the work had been conceived and planned by Essex. ‘You have done well, Robbie. I shall sleep easier knowing there is a sturdy agent in my household, working to uncover this traitor.’
‘I have done nothing but my duty to you, Your Majesty,’ Essex said easily, stripping off his gloves to take her hand, but she could see he was pleased by her praise.
‘Though I do not understand how any man, even a treacherous one, could live in a state of falsehood for years,’ Elizabeth added in a low voice, not wishing her ladies to hear any of this secret exchange and become frightened, ‘hiding his true intention from those around him, with the daily contemplation of a queen’s murder staining his heart.’
She shuddered. A man’s soul must be twisted by such evil until there was no hope of redemption.
‘Those who serve Spain,’ he observed, still holding her hand, ‘do so with much zeal and passion, undergoing any sacrifice to strike at England and her queen.’
‘Yet such a deed in his heart must be like a worm in an apple,’ she muttered, ‘eating away at its wholesomeness from the inside. Surely such a man would reveal himself to us by his very nature?’
‘If he exists and is at court, then our Master Goodluck will sniff him out,’ he reassured her, and rubbed his thumb slowly back and forth across her palm. ‘Do not distress yourself, madam. I will not allow this traitor to harm you.’
Essex was standing very close, she realized. She had been shocked and a little frightened by his passion last time they were alone together. Yet she had lain awake at nights remembering it since, and her body had begun to think its own thoughts about the Earl of Essex, thoughts she found it dangerous to examine too closely.
Shyly, she raised her gaze to his face: dark eyes, deep-set beneath thin arched brows, dark curly hair, an adventurer’s abandon in the way he wore it too, brushing against his ruff.
She tried to shake off the illusion that this boy was Leicester and steeled herself to dismiss him.
‘My ladies will return soon,’ Elizabeth reminded him, yet lacked the strength to draw her hand from his. Was it a sin to wish for his youthful company a little longer? ‘So if that is all, my lord …’
‘Your Majesty,’ he said huskily, and raised her hand to his lips. As he kissed her skin, his gaze burned into hers. ‘You haunt my dreams and my waking hours. When will you grant this body some peace and permit me to love and worship you, as you should be loved and worshipped?’
‘Never,’ she managed, stumbling over her denial.
He ignored that and drew closer. ‘I am no poet, so never think my words are false or honeyed. I love you with all my body and soul. That you are my queen I accept as only natural, for who else should reign here but one whose beauty and wit surpass that of every other woman in England? But that you resist my love is painful to me. I wish only to show you the depths of my heart.’
‘You are a married man,’ she reminded him. ‘You must share your heart with your wife, Frances, not with me.’
She was no fool, she had heard many men praise her in just such an extravagant fashion in hope of advancement. But there was an honesty to the pain in his face, a sharpness to his voice that made her believe Essex truly suffered as he spoke.
‘My wife has feet of clay,’ he said bitterly, then lowered his head, kissing her palm. ‘Forgive me, I should not speak ill of Walsingham’s daughter. I am sworn to her before God. But she makes my life difficult. She does not understand why I must spend so much time at court, or go away fighting for England, or be alone in your company. She is a jealous wife, and fears to lose me to war as she lost her first husband.’
Elizabeth thought it more likely that Frances feared to lose him to his mistress the Queen, but she did not voice that. ‘Perhaps you should have thought of such obstacles before you wed her behind my back, my lord.’
‘Forgive me, Your Majesty. Frances caught my eye and my weak body thought only of begetting an heir.’ Essex hung his head, and she was reminded of Leicester, weeping in her lap as he confessed his need for a son. ‘A man must have a wife, and a young wife too, to ensure sons for himself and his name. But love can thrive beyond the marriage bed – as it thrives in this heart, for you.’
He placed her hand flat above his heart. Beneath the white silk she felt his broad muscular chest, the strong expanse of the ribcage, and beneath them, the quick rhythmic thud of his heart. His eyes watched her fiercely, his hand holding hers in place.
Elizabeth struggled to pull away, and he tore loose his ruff and the collar of his white jacket, and thrust her hand on to his chest. Touching his bare skin, she felt heat sweep over her, her cheeks suddenly burning, her body weak with physical desire.
‘Elizabeth,’ he murmured, and bent his head to hers.
They kissed like young lovers,
her tongue in his mouth, inviting him to further outrages, his arm tight about her waist, one hand stroking sensuously down her back.
‘My love,’ he groaned against her mouth, and she let her head tilt back, encouraging his lips on her throat. ‘You never married, which means you have no heir,’ he muttered, kissing her skin fiercely, ‘and that has put you in danger, my beautiful queen. For until the succession is agreed, you will never be free from those assassins who seek your life’s blood. My fear for your safety is as strong as my love—’
Suddenly there was a quiet knock at the door, probably one of her ladies come to help her retire. Elizabeth only just sprang away from Essex in time to see it open, Lady Helena standing there with a candle in her hand, her face horrified.
‘Forgive me,’ her lady-in-waiting said hurriedly, but Elizabeth shook her head, coming back to her senses.
‘No, come in, Helena. Our business here is concluded. His lordship was just leaving,’ she said unsteadily, and watched in silence as Essex bowed and withdrew, his eyes dark with turmoil.
Until the succession is agreed, you will never be free from those assassins who seek your life’s blood.
His kisses had served to distract her well. Oh yes, they had been a distraction. Look over here at this shiny new love while I steal your throne, Your Majesty. But now her head was clear, and she knew herself betrayed. Not openly, by young rebel lords as Cecil had suggested, but surrounded by those on her council who would force her into naming Mary Stuart’s son James as her heir.
Mary Stuart’s son!
She would rather any man sat on the throne of England than the Scottish whelp of her dead cousin, for all that the treacherous Queen died by order of her own hand.
Was that the real reason Essex had come to see her tonight? Not to make love to her, but to settle the question of the succession?
Part Three
One
Greenwich Palace, January 1593
JANUARY CAME CRUELLY to Greenwich, freezing the Thames in dangerous patches of thin ice, a trap for the unwary, and hanging glassy icicles from the courtyard walls. Snow lay thick on the ground, making the many outside steps and stone-flagged cloisters treacherous, and not even the vast roaring fire that was kept burning continuously in the Great Hall could seem to warm the courtiers. Out of the Presence Chamber, cosy enough when packed wall to wall with fur-wrapped gentry and nobles, the only way to keep the limbs from stiffening and the fingers from growing numb was to dance.
And to Lucy, dancing was like breathing.
So while others grumbled, and stubbed their frozen toes on the hard stone flags, she took pleasure in being able to move freely and hold her head up high. It was rare these days that she was asked to dance before the court, since younger girls had taken her place in the Queen’s favour, and she no longer remembered the more intricate steps required of the entertainers. But she would be permitted to dance with a courtier or two, along with the other ladies of the court, and lose herself for a short space in the haunting lilt of music.
It had been nigh on two months since she discovered that Master Goodluck was in residence with the court. She had barely seen her guardian since that night he had surprised her in the palace garden, except about his duties, and while she could wish he had not overheard her shameful quarrel with Will, at least there was no longer any need to hide the doubts of her heart from him. Goodluck knew how it lay between her and Shakespeare, and she took some comfort from knowing she did not have to bear that grief alone.
‘Beware Southampton,’ Goodluck had told her that night, as he accompanied her back through the darkened palace to the ladies’ chambers. ‘He is part of a wild set of noblemen, youths interested only in power and pleasure.’
‘But why does he pursue me with such hatred?’
‘It may not be you he pursues, but Shakespeare.’
She had not understood that, and had told him so.
‘Why this nobleman has threatened you is not important,’ Goodluck remarked, kissing her gently on the forehead as they reached the door to the women’s bedchamber. ‘For now, try never to cross him nor let yourself be alone with him. These great men of wealth are cruel and vengeful towards those they consider their enemies, for whatever reason. The Earl of Southampton would think nothing of destroying you, as an entertainment for himself and his friends.’
‘I know it,’ she told him. ‘I will be careful, and try never to put myself in his power.’
‘I cannot help you beyond this advice,’ Goodluck murmured, releasing her hands, ‘though I dearly wish I could. I have been given a task which requires great secrecy, and I dare not risk my true identity being uncovered. Forgive me.’
She had not spoken to him since that night, but had been relieved to find herself largely ignored by the Earl of Southampton that winter, as though she was no longer of any importance to him.
With the whole court in attendance at that evening’s lavish feast given in honour of the French ambassador, who appeared to have come seeking fresh help for their struggle against the Spanish, the Queen had insisted upon dancing. She loved nothing better than to show off her skill in the dance to visiting ambassadors, and indeed her athletic prowess, for she was as nimble and swift at the Gavotte and Volta as any woman half her age.
‘Tonight everyone must dance!’ the Queen had declared, holding out her hands, then waited impatiently for one of her nobles to lead her forward first, as was the tradition.
Now the hall rang to the clack-clack-clack of their heeled court shoes, the shuffles and thuds of their leaps, while the musicians played beneath the high windows, their faces raw with cold but filling the air with sweet sounds.
Lucy was dancing with Francis Bacon, whose fascinated smile had caught her eye from across the Great Hall, when someone tapped him on the shoulder.
‘My turn, Francis,’ a familiar voice drawled, and as Bacon stepped aside, bowing ironically, she looked into the face of Henry Wriothesley, the Earl of Southampton.
Her first horrified instinct was to refuse his hand in the dance. But such an insult would have drawn unwanted attention to her, and possibly gained her the Queen’s displeasure. So she curtseyed, and slipped back into the swaying circle of dancers with this new unwanted partner, trying not to shrink when he put his arm about her waist.
‘You are very tall, Mistress Morgan,’ he commented.
‘But not taller than the Queen.’
He glanced across at the Queen, comparing the two of them with a critical eye. ‘You have the edge, I think.’
She looked away, and saw Cathy watching her from across the room. As befitted her position as servant to the Queen’s ladies, Catherine’s long fair hair had been hidden away beneath a demure hood. She ought not to be here, her duties sadly no longer permitting her to attend the feasts.
Lucy stared, bemused, and saw Cathy nod her head significantly, as though trying to pass on a message.
What could her friend want?
‘Do you like to jump?’ Henry Wriothesley asked, whispering in her ear. ‘Or do you prefer to be lifted?’
She looked him in the eye. ‘I like to jump, my lord.’
‘I have heard that.’
She stiffened but said nothing. He wanted her to lose her temper, but she would not give him the satisfaction.
The music changed tempo, becoming faster, and she whirled before him in the steps of the dance, her broad skirts flying.
They were dancing a few steps from the Queen and her partner, the exquisitely dressed Earl of Essex, his doublet black and white, his slashed sleeves of gorgeous black velvet, pure white silk peeping through from beneath. A large pearl trembled in his ear as he bowed to the Queen.
The Queen leapt lightly up in the dance, laughing with pleasure, and Essex stepped forward to catch her. The many panels of her magnificent rainbow-skirted gown shimmered and swayed as she descended in his arms, her waist and chest still pleasingly small and narrow above their broad expanse.
‘You
are a bird of paradise, Your Majesty!’ Robert Devereux flattered her, holding her with deliberate intimacy.
Watched by hundreds of envious eyes, the earl slid his hands down her back in a display of ownership that Her Majesty did not seem disposed to object to. Her long white fingers gripped his shoulders as he placed her gently on her feet, as flushed as a young girl at her first dance, her eyes fixed on the earl’s handsome face.
‘And you are a swan, my lord,’ she countered, though still smiling. ‘A bird to be watched most carefully.’
Lucy leapt a few seconds later, not daring to jump higher or earlier than the Queen, and Henry Wriothesley caught her by the waist.
She looked down at him. Loathsome, dangerous man. But her expression gave nothing away.
His hands dropped to her hips, drawing her closer than she found comfortable. She felt Wriothesley’s body against hers, the insistent press of his knee. His breath scorched her neck. Then he was forced to release her as she turned in the dance, her arms spread wide, her long white silk-lined sleeves hanging down.
As they came together again, he asked, ‘Have you seen Master Shakespeare lately?’
Her glance was hostile. ‘No, my lord. But I think you must know that already.’
‘And has he written? Sent you any word at all?’
This time Lucy had to bite her tongue, keeping her tone light. He might be young, but he was influential at court as well as enormously wealthy, and therefore not a man to offend.
‘No, my lord Southampton. I took your warning most seriously and have had no dealings with Master Shakespeare for many months.’
She leapt in the dance, and again he caught her. Only Henry Wriothesley did not let her go, pulling her even tighter into his body than before, his smile greedy and contemptuous.
‘My lord, you must release me!’
‘Must I indeed?’ He laughed, and his hand squeezed one of her breasts quite openly, hurting her. She struggled, her eyes wide with shock, but he paid no heed, tugging at her white-beaded bodice as though to release her breasts in front of the whole court. ‘Dancing is not for me, clearly. I seem to have forgotten the steps. But perhaps you can teach them to me.’
Her Last Assassin Page 18