‘Your grace, I cannot allow . . .’
‘You cannot allow?’
The tone was so cold, John saw Cecil shiver. ‘I only meant, ma’am . . .’ He cleared his throat. ‘You have heard how dangerous a man he is.’
‘I have heard how dangerous he is to my enemies.’ She looked at John. ‘Are you going to kill me, Master Lawley?’
‘No, your grace, I am not.’
‘There you are. Go. And no re-entry behind the arras, sir.’
Dismissed, Cecil moved like a crab, reluctantly, to the door, turned at it. ‘Ma’am, let my scribe stay at the least.’
‘For what purpose?’
‘To take down what is spoken.’
‘To take down . . .’ Elizabeth cried the words. ‘You would take down the Queen’s private conversation? Do you seek evidence against even me?’ Forcing herself up on the chair arms, she continued in a yell, ‘Out, saucy knave, out!’ This last command came on a bellow and from the same place as the earlier laugh had done. Men scrambled to obey, and the door closed loudly behind them. ‘Well, that was satisfying,’ said the Queen, after a moment and in a tone of soft contrast. ‘On occasion my little elf is oversolicitous. His father knew better than to try and manage my . . . everything. Or mayhap he was subtler in his ways.’ She smiled, then focused on John again. ‘It is important to keep a balance, sir, and of late I have been perhaps favouring the pygmy over the giant. God’s teeth, when Raleigh was here it was all barking and snarling – three dogs and one bone ’tween them. Well, he is safely stowed building castles in Jersey. So only my two hounds need leashing now.’ She waved at him. ‘Do not stand there looking so uneasy, Master Lawley. For mercy’s sake, fetch us both some sack.’
John bowed and moved past her to the desk upon whose edge the bottle, glass and tankard stood – alongside his sword. How many thousands of men, he wondered, both in the realm and beyond it, would trade places with him now? Papists and Spaniards in the main, who had practised for years to kill the woman behind him. Many had come close to succeeding. None had been nearer, with a weapon to hand and only a maid in the room to cry, too late, for help. The officers of the Inquisition who’d worked on him in that Seville dungeon could only have dreamed of such an opportunity as this.
He looked down. Beneath the papers on which his own name was clearly written, there was a large parchment. He saw an inked circle, several triangles bisecting it, calculations and Greek letters. Though he had little faith in such things, he knew others did. He thought it odd that part of their examination of him was to draw up his chart.
Then he was corrected. ‘Are you gifted in the stars, Master Lawley?’
He turned. The Queen had swung partly around to study him. The Star and Anchor, he thought. The Indies Star and any other Star where whisky is sold. But he replied, ‘I am not, your grace.’
‘Then perusing my lord of Essex’s horoscope should not delay your mission. Magister John Dee has drawn it up and it bodes well for his enterprise, that is all you need know. Now, sack, if you please.’
‘Perhaps Magister Forman has reached similar conclusions, ma’am,’ he said, reaching for the bottle. ‘My lord of Essex told me earlier he was consulting him.’
‘Forman?’ the Queen snorted. ‘A street mountebank. Magister Dee is a scholar.’
Why did I venture that? he thought. I must keep a bit on my tongue and only offer what is demanded.
He glanced at the maid – and his study was boldly returned. Her eyes were startling, near black or seeming so in contrast to skin whose tone owed nothing to paint and all to a natural beauty. She wore a coif from which one small tress had escaped, trailing golden and thick across the alabaster forehead. He inhaled, scented something spicy – was it cloves?
Yet before he could gauge her further, Elizabeth called. ‘Come, sir, I thirst. You may ogle my maid later.’ He finished pouring – a tot for her and, after a moment’s hesitation, no more than a sip for himself – then returned. Bowing, he handed her the glass, lifted the mug. ‘To what or whom shall we toast, Master Lawley?’
‘May I toast your majesty’s majestic eyes?’
She laughed. ‘Oh, a courtier’s response! When many take you for a mere ruffian. No, let us toast . . . someone. And that one embarked on an enterprise that needs our pledges far more than these tired orbs.’ She raised her own glass. ‘Let us wish success to Robert Devereux, my lord of Essex.’
He’d wished him in hell often enough. But he had pledged him too in their shared past. So it was easy enough to do so now. ‘My lord of Essex. May he thrive.’
Both drank, he the tiny sip he allowed himself, immediately wishing he’d poured more. ‘But can he thrive, think you? It is that I wish to discuss with you, Master Lawley.’ She gestured to the arras. ‘Sometimes it is necessary for me to hear and not be seen. I gleaned there that you have known my Robin a long time and have been his staunch friend. Would that he had many so faithful, but he does not. He has sycophants. He has enemies. Many of both and both do him almost equal harm.’
John was not going to dispute his designation of staunchness – nor the summation of the earl’s position. But he was feeling the exertions of the day . . . and of the month that had preceded it. He had heard of those who, sleeping, had actions whispered in their ears which on waking they performed. He did not wish to find himself so entranced. So he said, clearly, almost what he had said to the Secretary, ‘How can I serve your grace?’
There was a question in her study of him again, a different one he suddenly felt, especially when she swallowed it down, reverted to her previous thought, her pressing need. ‘I wish you to do something – for me, for your lord, Essex, and for England, all of which you have served.’ She hesitated.
‘And that is?’
She looked above him now, her voice lowering. ‘I know what is whispered of us. How all consider the earl to be my lover . . . in the sublimest sense,’ she added. ‘And I do love him. He is my sweet Robin, I his Bess, and when he is fond . . . ah!’ She continued to stare above John’s head, her eyes and thoughts lost to him. She was somewhere else, with someone else. Someone, he could clearly see, who made her both happy and sad in the same moment. Then she blinked as if startled he was there, and continued with strength again in her tone. ‘Yet I tell you this – for years now the earl has been more son than . . . anything else. A loved son, but wayward, testing to the limits a mother’s affections. I have scolded him, exiled him from my regard and person. I have forgiven him, put up with his tantrums and his neglect.’ She sighed. ‘It is what one does, I suppose, for love.’ That look was there, of infinite sadness, there and gone again and she continued, more forcefully, ‘People will do as much for hate, sometimes more. Witness my pygmy, my Secretary of State, who has always hated Essex from their time together in his father’s house. I am sure my Robin treated him cruelly. He can be most cruel, as I well know. It is not something that has concerned me overly much. Hatred, like love, can be managed, at least in others. And there is something healthy in rivalry, is there not? Did not your friend the playwright thrive when Kit Marlowe, God rest his soul, was alive to goad him on?’ A smile came fast, went as quickly. ‘But it has gotten beyond the point of health now. Far beyond it. It blinds the rivals to the other’s strengths. Their necessary strengths. And it is both their strengths that are required now.’
She swivelled, stretched back to the table, to the quill Cecil had thrown down, lifted it, turned back. ‘Because my pygmy is not gifted with any other weapon, he considers this one to be superior. And indeed there are times when it is. War is not only cruel and barbarous, it is ruinous to the Exchequer and so most harmful to our nation’s health. If I could use this and write away all wars, I would do so at a stroke.’ She drew a great ‘E’ in the air, then turned and threw the quill back upon the table. ‘But you and I both know that the Armada of ’88 was not turned aside by words, no matter how many letters I sent Philip of Spain. It was defeated by the swords – aye, and the shot ?
?? of heroes like Drake, Howard, Raleigh. Those, and the prayers that brought God’s providential storms, dispersing the fleet, ending the threat. England was spared invasion, the horrors that war would have inflicted upon our land.’ She closed her eyes for a moment, shuddered. ‘But if Robert fails in Ireland, fails to subdue the Earl of Tyrone, that Irish traitor will be a threat equal to one any Armada could pose – for he will open his door to Spain, our most bitter enemy, letting him land a vast army there to be hurled again and again at our shores till at last we fall. And all I have lived for – Albion free, at peace, worshipping God in the truth of His word, not the idolatry of the Papist under the scourge of the Inquisition – will be set aside. We will be just another impoverished corner of their empire, subject to the barbarities they visit on all their conquered peoples.’ She stared above him again. ‘Something I will not live to see – for I will be burned as the heretic they have always called me, my stake one of thousands as my subjects burn beside me, lighting England’s most sorrowful night.’
John had heard that the Queen was eloquent. She was also insightful. He did not claim to any great knowledge of strategy, but he had stood silently warding the doors of enough rooms while men of power discussed their options. Ireland in Spanish hands was a dagger at England’s throat, already drawing blood. And he had experienced enough of those same horrors that Spain had perpetrated to wish his own country spared them.
However, before he could ask how much he could do for that cause – and how little, for he had ventured enough for England in the past and had his own life and his loves to consider now – Elizabeth rose, agitated by her speech and by her legs, which she bent to rub now, though her farthingale and the layers of her dress impeded her. ‘Alack, I cannot rest still for long. I must be moving.’
‘Shall I call someone?’
‘No. Let me stand – and Sarah,’ she called over her shoulder to the maid, who had stood too and drawn nearer, ‘sit.’ The Queen stepped towards the door and back again. ‘Better,’ she murmured, turning fully to him again and continuing. ‘You know, more than most men, I suspect, my Robin’s character. How he switches from the highest to the lowest spirits within a span of hours – well, we witnessed that tonight from his abasement at the play to his vaulting in the galliard! Yet when he is high, how he inspires!’ Elizabeth’s eyes gleamed. ‘He can sweep any opponent from the lists – or any lady from her footing. In that mood he can do the same to Tyrone – if he has an army that will serve the purpose. That is my job and I will see it well done. The Secretary, whose genius such organisation is, will see it too. However much he hates my lord of Essex and desires him to fall, it is not at the cost of the realm – for he well knows who would be burning on my right hand.’ She shook her head, began to pace again. ‘Yet how to muster a sufficient army when the cause yields not treasure nor booty but only honour? And how, if they do rally, to inspire them? For an army alone is not enough. Both it and its commander must have the heart to triumph.’ She halted directly before him, looked up, straight into his eyes. ‘And that, Master Lawley, in a nutshell, is the matter between us. The reason you are here. The answer to your question: what it is that I require from you.’
John looked at her for a long moment. This nutshell seemed so crammed, he feared he had missed something. Between his head, his lack of sleep and a very long day concluding a month of them, it was entirely possible. So he licked his lips, said, ‘Uh, majesty, I still do not quite see . . .’
‘It is to do with the twin worlds you straddle,’ she said briskly, as if impatient with his dullness. ‘That of the sword . . . and that of the playhouse.’
‘The . . . playhouse?’ It was not anything he’d expected her to say. He thought she’d order him to be constantly at Essex’s side, cheering him, as he had earlier that night. He was going to gently point out that with the earl’s temperament, it would be easier to keep snowflakes whole upon a fire grate. He would then promise to attempt it – and seek a burrow to hide in till the army had marched. Now he swallowed, stuttered. ‘H-how means your majesty?’
She smiled at his obvious confusion. ‘It is not just worlds you straddle but men also . . . if you will excuse such inelegant phrasing.’ She nodded. ‘For you love two men, and have had an effect on both their lives.’ She sat again. ‘How long have you known Master Shakespeare?’
‘For near as long as I have know the earl,’ John admitted.
‘And you have influence with him?’
‘Some, aye.’ John rubbed his beard, remembering how wild it was. If I’d known about a royal audience, he thought, but said, ‘He listens to me – once in a while.’
‘Then have him listen to this.’ Elizabeth leaned forward, her eyes fixed hard upon him. ‘What Englishmen need now is not a tragedy to sadden, nor a comedy to distract – they need a tale to inspire. I have preachers who can sway believers at St Paul’s pulpit of a Sunday – yet far greater crowds than attend there attend the playhouse each and every day. So if the Lord Chamberlain’s Men – my men, effectively, for they thrive by my whim – were to play something that inspires the apprentices, the burghers, the merchants, yea, even the very drabs of Bankside – for all know what influence they have on youth’s ardour’ – she let out another laugh before continuing – ‘something to inspire them thus, I say, and send them forth from entertainment aflame with Albion’s cause . . . why then, that is a fire that could reach Finsbury Fields! And one that, once my standard is raised there, will make those inflamed souls rally to it.’ Her eyes gleamed. ‘By the honour of my blood, if Master Shakespeare can so easily muster the tears and laughter that came tonight, he can as well muster the spirit of patriotism – and muster my Robin an army fit to crush the Irish snake!’
John considered. What was she asking for? A play to suit the times. Well, it was ever Will’s delight to fix the spirit of the streets in ink upon paper and then release it upon the platform in speech. And as for himself – what was he being asked to do? Storm a breach? Spy? No. He was not even commanded to enlist, though that might yet come. All he was being asked to do was use his influence. ‘I warrant your majesty that something . . . something may be done here.’ He sucked at his lower lip. ‘Yet surely your majesty has but to command him . . .’
Elizabeth shook her head impatiently. ‘You misunderstand me – and, I think, underestimate the regard I have for the theatre. I do not want a proclamation, to be derided and ignored. I do not even want something obvious – such as the performance we witnessed tonight, with my pygmy Cecil influencing the players to goad his rival. Hotspur indeed!’ She snorted. ‘What I love in theatre, and especially in Master Shakespeare’s plays, is how he makes his points without making them obvious. He fashions men who struggle with who they are and so, when they at last embark on a cause of honour, you believe that they will see it through because they have thought it through. It is not all bombast and rhetoric, that a crowd would mock. And because an audience sees someone like themselves – flawed, contrary and thus true – they can believe in them and so follow them, perhaps even to the point of honour itself.’ She nodded. ‘I believe Master Shakespeare’s best work is ahead of him, because he is beginning to understand that essence more and more. In writing a play to suit this great purpose, he will serve his art, and he will serve his country, in the hour of its great need.’ She rose to pace again. ‘Your friend knows his history. He has sketched some of England’s sadder days when all was discord in our realm. He has written of civil strife, of usurpation . . .’ She shuddered. ‘Perhaps he now may seek a more triumphant time to suit the hour.’
Will could – and so could John. He bowed his head. ‘Your grace, I will attempt it.’
‘Do so, Master Lawley, and to your utmost. And let the playwright know this: that in helping England and his sovereign, he is also helping his friend.’
‘Friend?’
She stopped before him, looked him square in the face. ‘You, sir. Succeed in this and you will be the Queen’s man. I will remembe
r your services. And no one in this wide world can harm you then.’ She glanced back to the desk. ‘No one.’
John smiled. It was clear even to his befuddled brain. ‘Do you know, majesty, I think we may have a deal.’
‘A deal? You make a deal with your sovereign? Saucy knave! Ha!’ She shrieked in delight. ‘Now I see the spirit that has filled Cecil’s papers with stories that eclipse Sir John Mandeville’s.’ She glanced back at the desk. ‘But no contract can be written for this deal. My Secretary has words enough already – from both of us.’ She studied him. ‘If you were to conclude a bargain on the street, you would seal it with a handshake, would you not?’ She held out a bejewelled hand. ‘Let us seal this so.’ He hesitated, then slowly raised his own hand, suddenly aware of how grimy it was. ‘You may forgo the spit.’
He allowed her to take his – the opposite seemed presumptuous. Her hand was bony, heavily veined, blotched on the back as if an inkwell had spilled upon it. Yet there was a surprising strength in it. He shook once, made to withdraw, but she held on. He’d lowered his eyes out of deference but now he looked up . . . to find her gaze again fastened upon him.
‘It is remarkable how familiar you seem to me,’ she said softly, studying. ‘Have I seen you before?’
He did not think he would mention that he was there, kneeling on the deck of the Golden Hind, when she knighted his kidnapper Drake. ‘I . . . I played before your majesty in . . . ’94, I believe. ’Twas not here but in—’
She shook her head, his hand. ‘I do not mean as a player. I mean . . .’ She turned his hand over. ‘I have some gift in this,’ she said. ‘May I?’
He could hardly jerk his hand free and refuse her study. So he nodded and she bent to her perusal. ‘Hmm,’ she said, after a moment. ‘I see a life lived in great violence. With more to come.’
He thought, what a surprise! Given all that Cecil had revealed, what else would she see? But he held his tongue and she his hand as she continued to pore – and speak. ‘Yet I see something else too – that half your nature leads you to these deeds and half away from them.’ She looked into his face. ‘What is your lineage?’