Elizabeth (31 page)

“Come here,” he said. “A bride's place is with her husband. Come and show me your ring, sweetheart, and let me prove to you that you are truly married.”

The Countess laughed. “Oh, no, my Lord—I've had proof enough of that already. How will you treat me now that we are married? Will you be a gentle husband or will you be a roistering old boor like poor Essex.…”

“If I were, you'd undoubtedly serve me as you served him,” he retorted. “And I prefer to have you happy—and faithful. Why did you say you couldn't believe it a moment ago?”

“Because I suppose it is the final proof that you have given up all hope of the Queen. And for all these years I have never been sure of you until now.”

“Women are never convinced,” he said slowly. “You know that I love you, but sometimes you are as bad as she is—asking and demanding and setting traps for me.”

Lettice came and sat on the side of the bed; she took his hand and suddenly kissed it.

“I do not demand and I do not set traps,” she said. “You would never have borne it from anyone else but the Queen, and I knew that. I love you, and you love me, and if she makes you turn somersaults to please her, that is not my fault.”

“I know,” he answered. He leant his head against her breast. “I'm very happy, Lettice. I can go back to Court now and dance on a high wire like all the others and know that I have you hidden in my life and that no one can take you from me.”

“You speak sometimes as if you hated her,” she said softly. “But you don't, Robert, even if you think you do. You are only jealous because there are other men around her with the same ambitions you once had yourself.”

“They won't gain any more than I did,” he answered. “She'll play the devil with them, just as she did with me, loving and smiling one minute and snarling the next. No man will ever have her now. When I first tried for her there was a chance, but a meagre one as I look back on it, and that has gone. The Queen is changing, Lettice; she changes before my eyes. You are always saying that I love her still, and I pay you a compliment for your intelligence when I admit it. But what manner of love it is I'll never know. How does a man love lightning, or riding at high speed over rough ground? How does he feel when he kisses the hand that strokes him and remembers how it struck him in the face.… I'm no poet or perhaps I could describe it. I leave that to Hatton, he's the rhymester now. I tell you this: the Queen is less of a woman than she ever was, and more than a woman in her need of men. She works and she governs—by God, her conduct at a Council leaves me breathless, no King could be more forceful when it comes to policy! She drinks in her power is if it were wine, and it has gone to her head like wine. She lives and breathes for her power. And her only relaxation is to pretend to herself and to others that all she really wishes is to be counted like a woman. Until her will is crossed. Then the mask falls. I've seen what lies behind it and there is no husband in the world who would survive a contest. So there will never be a husband. There will only be men like Hatton and the others, seeking what they can get from flattery, and one man like me, who stays because I dare not leave and could not keep away from her if I did.”

“I think,” Lettice remarked at last, “that I am a remarkable woman to hear such a discourse from my husband and not stab him with jealousy.”

“You are a remarkable woman, my love, and you will never stab me on the Queen's account.” He was smiling again and she settled into his arms.

“I don't want the part of you which belongs to her,” she whispered. “I love what I have, and we'd best make the most of it, before she sends a message ordering you back to Court. When does the French Prince's envoy arrive in London?”

“In a week; his name is Simier—he's Alençon's chamberlain. He'll stay for a month or so and then nothing will come of it. Are you hungry, Lady Leicester? Shall I ring for food or will you dine a little late today?”

“I shall dine late for a week,” Lettice answered. “And so will you, my Lord.”

William Cecil had relinquished the post of Secretary to the Queen. As Lord Burleigh he became her Chief Minister, and with his usual foresight, he presented his own candidate for the vacant post which was the second most important after his own. The Secretary was with the Queen night and day; he dealt with her correspondence and was in a position to shape the policy of her Government if Elizabeth trusted his advice. The wrong man in such a place of privilege might cause havoc with Burleigh's work. The right one could only complement it, and there was no one whose ideas were more in sympathy with his own than the late ambassador to France, Sir Francis Walsingham. They waited together in the Queen's ante-room.

“I have told Her Majesty that she can rely upon you for discretion and sober judgment,” Burleigh repeated. “I have praised you to her so highly that she will certainly give you the appointment unless you spoil your own chances.”

Walsingham was a tall thin man, with very piercing eyes of a peculiar green and a narrow mouth which never smiled. It was the face of a fanatic, harsh and uncompromising and perpetually at war with what he referred to as the powers of evil. This description embraced every interest and adherent of the Roman Catholic Church throughout the world.

“If you tell me the pitfalls, I shall avoid them,” he said. “I have dealt with Her Majesty by letter, but I hear she is capricious; it is a common failing among women and I am not incapable of dealing with it, my Lord.”

“Then take care not to speak to the Queen in the tone you have just used to me,” Burleigh said sharply. “If you want this position you must not hector the Queen, or contradict her, or advance an opinion which conflicts with hers. You must be humble without fawning, alert and truthful when she questions you, you must be able to tell her where every piece of correspondence is, and exactly what you dealt with last. You must not betray bias of any kind, and above all, refrain from religious controversy in matters of State. The Queen is a devout Protestant but she is quite out of sympathy with your extreme views and expressing them will only irritate her. I have learnt to muzzle my own tongue and you must do the same. Never forget that she is the Queen, and that while she must be treated courteously as a woman, she does not suffer from a woman's failing. Do not, Sir Francis, show your contempt for her sex; you will quickly find Her Majesty is an exception.”

Walsingham nodded; there was no time to answer because the Royal Page summoned them, and he walked behind Burleigh into the Privy Chamber.

He had not seen Elizabeth for nearly two years, and he had become used to dealing with Catherine de' Medici whose sluggish eyes never rested on his face when she was speaking. He was therefore unprepared for the penetrating stare with which Elizabeth met him.

He was also unprepared for the silence which lasted for a full minute before the Queen spoke after Burleigh had presented him.

“Sir Francis Walsingham, you may kiss my hand. And you my dear Burleigh, may leave us. I prefer a man to speak for himself.”

Sir Francis kissed her hand and bowed a little deeper than he had intended. But he resisted the impulse to look away; he had never seen such an odd contrast as those jet black eyes set in the pale and painted face. There was an enormous pear-shaped pearl in the middle of the brilliant red curls which he noticed with distaste were artificial. He did not approve of wigs; he did not approve of any of the female vanities which were evident in the jewels and scent and the lavish cosmetics used by his Queen.

“I need a replacement for Lord Burleigh as Secretary,” Elizabeth said. “He has strongly recommended you. So strongly that I can hardly believe in the existence of such a paragon of virtue. Can you fill the post, Sir Francis?”

“I believe so, but that is for you to say, Madam.”

“I am quite sure that he has told you what to say to me and how to conduct yourself. You are to forget every word of it. I don't want someone else's puppet as my Secretary. Whatever you are I shall find out in time, so it had better be now. You may sit down, Sir Francis, and we will talk. And I want to hear your own voice and not Burleigh's.”

He sat on a low stool facing her; he would have preferred to stand. He wondered whether she knew this and had offered him the seat to put him at a disadvantage; she looked down on him shrewdly from her chair.

“Tell me, whom do you consider the greatest enemy of England?”

She had asked for an honest opinion and Walsingham gave it to her in spite of Burleigh's warning.

“The Papist Church, Madam.”

“I see. And which of the offshoots of that Church would you say was the most dangerous?”

He did not know it but if his answer was the Queen of Scots he would lose the post.

“Spain.”

There was a moment of silence. Elizabeth leant back in her chair, and suddenly she smiled.

“Master Walsingham,” she said. “You are the first man who has shown that he can see beyond his nose. Spain is our danger; the rest, my cousin of Scotland, the English Papists, France, all of them are secondary to the real enemy, and we have not done battle with him yet. Now, what is the situation in the Netherlands—how is the rebellion faring?”

Walsingham frowned. “Badly, Madam. The Duke of Alva is a master of repression, his troops are the best disciplined in the world and he is a man without mercy or scruple. Our Protestant brothers are dying for their faith in thousands, but they still fight on. The unhappy country runs with blood; they are in terrible need of help from us.”

“They shall have help,” Elizabeth said. “I am sending what money I can spare, and God knows it's little enough, and somehow I shall squeeze out more, but I will not go beyond that; I dare not. We are not ready for war.”

“Nor is Spain,” he countered. “So long as her troops are needed in the Netherlands and her Treasury is being bled to keep them there, she cannot attack. We are safe from Spain for the moment, Madam, and that brings me to another point. You asked me to speak with my own voice and with your consent I'll take you at your word. We've talked of the enemy abroad, but I believe the time has come to deal with the enemy in England.”

“Go on.” Elizabeth nodded.

“I know your reluctance to punish the Queen of Scots for her crimes against you, and against humanity.” Walsingham spoke slowly. “I must admit, Madam, that I agree with Lord Burleigh and all your Councillors that your clemency is a mistake. But if you will not proceed against her, now is the time to cut down her adherents. While I was in France, a Jesuit seminary was opened at Douai with the sole object of training English traitors to be priests. These men will return to England to try and revive their religion and to foment plots against you. Their numbers have increased since the proclamation of your law making it an act of treason to say their Mass or take the cloth of Rome. They are dangerous and fanatical, and they are not deterred by the fear of death.”

“Several have already been caught,” the Queen interrupted him. “What are you suggesting—if a man doesn't balk at being hanged and disembowelled alive, what more can be done with him?”

“Nothing. But mete out the same punishment to any Englishman or woman who shelters him or fails to betray him if he is hiding in their district. The Papists in England are a dagger at your throat, Madam. You have been too soft with them for too long. Fines and a few executions are not enough. They must be hunted down and destroyed.”

“You are a religious man I see,” Elizabeth remarked, and he flushed at the sarcasm. “But if you are to serve me, you will not confuse dogmas with politics. And you will not suppose that I confuse them either. I tell you, as I have told Burleigh, that I don't care whether a man says his prayers in Latin or English and I don't think the God he's praying to cares either. But if the man who prays in Latin is a menace to my throne, then he will have to change his language if he wants to live to pray at all. Half of the men bleating about Papists and wanting me to cut their throats were Papists themselves in my sister's time. I know that you were not among them.” She smiled slightly at him. “You're of the same mettle as these Douai priests, whether you like to be told so or not. But it's a mettle I respect, and I would have it on my side rather than against me. You are a man of sense, Master Walsingham, and also a man of vision. If I leave the problem of these Catholic exiles to you, how will you deal with it?”

“I will set spies in France and spies in every port in England. I will found an army of informers who will nose out every traveller coming to this country, every stranger in the villages and towns, every son of known Papist families who reappears at home. I will offer rewards and pay them, and we will have our prisons full within a few months.”

“Informers are expensive; so is the spy system you propose,” Elizabeth said. “I cannot afford it.”

Walsingham looked at her. She saw the cold fanaticism in his pale green eyes and thought that in spite of his abilities, she would never like him.

“I can afford it, Madam. I am a rich man, and I will pay the expenses out of my own pocket.”

“I can see that Burleigh has sent me the right man,” she said. “Your duties begin tomorrow.”

She held out her hand.

“Farewell, Master Secretary.”

CHAPTER ELEVEN

Snow fell at the beginning of February, 1579, and it covered the park outside Mary's prison at Sheffield so deeply that there had not been a visitor to the house for nearly twelve days. The house itself was bitterly cold, and the Queen's rooms were covered in tapestries and hangings, and Shrewsbury had moved one of his best beds and much of his furniture into her apartments; she was as comfortable and as warm as he could make her.

She had grown attached to the Earl; she was even glad of his wife's company and she bought the Countess's favour with flattery and little gifts. The Countess was an incredibly tough and energetic woman, obsessed with money and possessions; she reminded Mary of a foul-mouthed man. When she was in a good temper she joined her prisoner and amused her by repeating the current slanders about Elizabeth, and after so many years fighting that elusive personality and always losing, Mary listened to every word spoken against her with enjoyment.