‘Pah!’ cried Elizabeth, much affronted. ‘There are but ten years between Anjou and myself!’
Lady Cobham – realising rapidly that while it was perfectly all right for the Queen to refer to such things, it was most certainly not all right for any lesser mortal to do so – did not dare to correct her.
Elizabeth was furious with Anjou for making his antipathy to the marriage so public. It was mortifying! She was the greatest catch in Europe, was she not? The best match in her parish, as Walsingham put it. Far greater princes than Anjou had vied for her hand. It was humiliating to have this young coxcomb wax unenthusiastic about the glorious prize that was being offered him. Well, she would make it clear that there was a price to be paid for such insulting behaviour.
‘This marriage contract leaves much to be desired,’ she declared, pushing it away from her. ‘William, you can tell the French that the return of Calais is the price of my hand.’
‘They will never agree to that!’ Burghley protested.
‘Tell them also,’ she went on, ignoring him, ‘that my conscience will not allow me to permit the Duke to hear Mass in private. I do not see why he cannot worship as an Anglican.’
‘All this talk of his being staunch in religion is just a ruse,’ Robert said, unhelpfully in the circumstances, she felt. ‘He is merely pretending, to wring more concessions out of us. Your Majesty is justified in taking a stand.’
‘You just want to marry her yourself, don’t you?’ Burghley muttered in his ear.
‘Not at all,’ he muttered back. In fact, he had secretly advised the French to stay firm in the matter of the Mass. Elizabeth would give in in the end, he had told them. Now he was not so sure, and it was clear to everyone that she was up to her old tricks, stalling, procrastinating and stringing out negotiations. It was clear also that she had no real intention of marrying Anjou. And good riddance too, Robert thought savagely. The thought of that pervert doing with her what he himself had longed to do for years made him feel sick.
Another French envoy came and went without any progress being made. A stalemate had been reached. The negotiations skidded to a halt, then collapsed, gasping, in the dust.
Burghley came to the Queen, his face pained, barely able to keep the exasperation out of his voice. ‘Madam, I see how it is with you in regard to the French marriage. I will instruct your Council to devise other means for your preservation, although how your Majesty shall obtain remedies for the perils that threaten you is, I think, only known to Almighty God.’ And he took himself off, muttering in his distress, to commiserate with Walsingham and Leicester.
‘We should have known at the outset,’ Robert reflected. ‘Her Majesty’s heart is not inclined to marry at all. We did our best to smooth the way for her, but at each point she made the usual difficulties.’ In fact, he himself had done his best to make difficulties, although mercifully the others were not to know that. ‘Fear not,’ he went on. ‘We still have a good understanding with France that may yet lead to an alliance.’
Elizabeth’s face was white with rage. In her hand she held incontrovertible evidence that Norfolk – whom, of her magnanimity, she had graciously freed and forgiven – had been plotting to marry the Queen of Scots, plainly to overthrow Elizabeth and reign jointly with Mary over England. But the Duke’s letters had been intercepted. Dangerous plotter he might be, but an inept one at that. Worse still was his betrayal. Elizabeth was his cousin as well as his Queen.
‘Draw up a warrant for his arrest,’ she commanded, her voice icy, and within hours Norfolk was in the Tower.
‘But had the common people had their way, he would have been liberated,’ Burghley reported, frowning. ‘He has ever been popular with them, and when word spread that he had been taken, there were crowds outside the Tower when he arrived, all protesting his innocence.’
‘They will soon find out the truth!’ Elizabeth seethed.
‘Indeed they will, Madam, for he has already confessed to some of the charges, although he denies that he had ever meant to harm your Majesty. For all that, the evidence we have against him is enough to send both him and the Queen of Scots to the block.’
Elizabeth hesitated. Her face was drawn.
‘Norfolk is a fool,’ she said at length. ‘He has been seduced into treason by his misguided devotion to Queen Mary.’ God rot that brainless, aggravating woman! ‘But must I send him to his death? It is a deed much against my stomach. And he is of my blood.’
‘Madam, the Duke has committed treason. It is the most heinous of crimes, being against your sacred person. Was he thinking of ties of kinship when he plotted with the Scottish Queen? I think not.’
‘Madam, to show weakness now would be to encourage others who would play traitor,’ Robert said.
‘Then I must consider what to do for the best,’ Elizabeth said. ‘As for Mary, she is an anointed queen, and not a subject. There can be no question of doing violence upon her person, treacherous though she is.’
‘Madam,’ Cecil bristled, ‘we have proof that she will stop at nothing to gain her freedom and the English crown.’
‘To execute her would set a dangerous – and doubtless illegal – precedent,’ Elizabeth insisted, twisting her hands in agitation. Her cousin, she realised, was virtually untouchable, and therefore doubly menacing, for she could never be rid of her. ‘From now on she must be held more securely and closely watched. And Burghley, have the Casket Letters published, so that the world might know what she really is. We cannot have scenes like those at the Tower repeated. I will not have traitors cheered or my justice derided.’
‘The most effective remedy would be for your Majesty to recognise Queen Mary’s son as king of Scots,’ Burghley urged.
‘We will do that too!’ Elizabeth declared.
The uncovering of the plot had shaken Elizabeth to the core.
‘An alliance with France is now absolutely essential,’ she told her Council. ‘We must seal it with a marriage. See if you can revive the negotiations, my Spirit. Let it be known that I will allow Anjou his Mass in private.’
But Walsingham now sent a timely warning: do not proceed! Anjou, he wrote, would utterly refuse the Queen, for he had his sights set on becoming king of Poland. If her Majesty persisted, she would invite a humiliating public rejection.
Her Majesty did not persist. She had looked in the mirror that very morning and seen the first strands of grey in her thinning hair. When she looked again she noticed new lines about her eyes, which had surely not been there the last time she checked. She was thirty-eight, and it dawned on her that she was beginning to look it.
Through the good and discreet offices of her women, a curly wig was made for her, of a red shade to match her own hair. Soon she ordered a long false tress that she could attach at the back of her head. Within days most ladies of the court were wearing something of the sort. Elizabeth then began using a paste made of powdered eggshell, borax and alum, to smooth and whiten her skin. When her painter, Nicholas Hilliard, came to take her portrait, she insisted that he did so outdoors, where there was no shadow, so that her face would appear luminous and ageless. It was vital, she knew, to preserve the mask of youth. Let her courtiers and ministers – yea, and foreign princes – perceive the signs of ageing, and they would begin to wonder if she was past marrying.
Robert noticed the change in her appearance. He said nothing, but felt melancholy at this evidence that youth was fleeting. Elizabeth should know that, however she looked, he would love her, and love her for herself. Beauty lay in the inner woman, not upon the skin.
Armoured in her wig and make-up, the Queen faced her Council, only to be told that Anjou had definitely lost interest in both her and the crown matrimonial of England. She snorted at that. ‘Since my attempts to get a husband have caused me to be so ill used, I hope you can now understand why I prefer to remain single!’ she declared.
But the French were not giving up so easily. Just two days later, Queen Catherine, as keen as Elizabeth for an
alliance, offered her youngest son, Francis, Duke of Alençon, as a substitute for Anjou.
‘He is a far less scrupulous fellow when it comes to religion!’ Burghley said, clearly relieved, and in fact almost rubbing his hands in glee. ‘This marriage is ten thousand times better than the other. Alençon is known to be friendly to the Protestants in France, and he is not so obstinate and restive a mule as his brother. He is more moderate, more flexible – and the better fellow.’
‘He is also unlikely ever to become king, and therefore could live in England,’ Sussex added.
‘And he is more apt to get children,’ Leicester observed, and was rewarded by seeing Elizabeth wince.
‘But he is only seventeen!’ she objected. ‘He is reportedly very small for a man, and his skin is said to be badly scarred from smallpox.’ Her eyes met Robert’s; both were remembering his poor sister Mary. He thought it unkind in Elizabeth to use that for an excuse.
‘Queen Catherine writes that his beard covers the worst of the scars,’ Burghley reassured her. ‘She also says that he is vigorous and lusty.’
‘Then God help him,’ Robert said sourly. Elizabeth banged the table.
‘You will not say such things!’ she rapped.
‘I beg your pardon, Madam,’ Robert said, sketching an ostentatious bow from the waist. ‘It was but a joke.’
‘And not a funny one. No, my lords, Alençon is too young and too small.’
‘He is the same height as yourself, Madam,’ Burghley protested.
‘Say rather the height of your grandson!’ she retorted. Cecil had to smile, for his namesake was just five. ‘They called Alençon Hercules at birth, but he could not live up to it, so to save himself embarrassment he changed his name to Francis when he was confirmed.’ They all laughed.
‘Nevertheless, Madam,’ Burghley persisted, ‘Sir Francis Walsingham urges us to proceed with negotiations for the marriage. This is an opportunity not to be missed. Alençon would make the perfect husband for your Majesty.’
Robert glared at him.
1572
Elizabeth looked at the tiny timepiece set into her bejewelled bracelet. It had been Robert’s New Year gift to her, and many had marvelled at it, never having seen the like. But she was not thinking of their delighted amazement now. She was wondering if Norfolk’s trial was over, and what the verdict had been.
At long last Burghley came to her. His face said it all.
‘Guilty,’ she whispered.
‘And condemned to a traitor’s death,’ he added.
Norfolk would not suffer it, of course. As a peer of the realm, he was entitled to be spared the full horrors of hanging, drawing and quartering, because monarchs customarily commuted the sentence for those of noble blood, but he would still lose his head. And Elizabeth, his cousin, must sign the death warrant. Suddenly she understood something of what her father must have felt when he signed the paper that would send her mother to a bloody death.
She could not do it. She shuddered away from the prospect. It was against her every instinct to condemn Norfolk to a fate that had haunted her dreams since childhood.
‘He has asked that I be appointed guardian to his children,’ Burghley said.
‘Yes, yes, of course,’ Elizabeth answered distractedly.
‘The execution is set for the twenty-first.’ Five days hence.
‘No,’ she said.
‘No?’ Cecil was bewildered. The law must take its course; there could be no question of that.
‘He is the premier peer of the realm, and he is popular with the people.’
‘Madam, he would have had you assassinated. Greater persons have died for much less.’
‘Oh, dear Spirit, I know that well!’
Cecil stared at her, appalled at what he had said. ‘Dear Madam, forgive me. It was thoughtless of me.’
‘I know you intended no hurt, old friend,’ she said, forcing a smile. ‘But no, Norfolk shall not die.’
‘I beg of you, Madam, to do your duty. Make an example of him, lest others mistake your mercy for weakness. His death must be a deterrent to other would-be traitors.’
‘I will think on it,’ Elizabeth promised. Cecil knew of old what that meant.
But she did think on it. She thought of little else. The matter overshadowed her every waking moment. She would steel herself to do her duty, then find herself shrinking from it at the last minute. Every time she came to put pen to paper, she saw before her Anne Boleyn kneeling in the straw on the scaffold, and imagined the terror that her mother must have felt in those final moments of her life. No, she could not do it.
They all put pressure on her, Burghley, Robert and her other councillors; they were relentless, but she resisted them. The days turned into weeks. In the Tower, Norfolk would be wondering why he had not been marched out to the block.
‘Your Majesty has ever been a merciful lady,’ Burghley cozened her, ‘and in being so you have suffered more harm than justice. Do you think you will be more beloved by letting others get away with treason?’
Elizabeth gave in. She signed the warrant for Norfolk’s execution. But that night, overcome by distress, she rescinded the order. The next morning a crowd turned up at Tower Hill to witness the spectacle of a great duke dying, and found that they had had a wasted journey.
The councillors could not understand the Queen’s reluctance. They pressed her, again and again, to let the law take its course. She protested that she felt ill under the strain and retired to her bed.
Then she became ill indeed, disgustingly so.
‘We fear for her life,’ her physicians admitted. ‘She can keep no food down, and she has a constant bloody flux.’
Robert was in terror lest Elizabeth die. Despite her protests that she did not want him to see her in such a state, he sat for three days by her bed, with a distraught Burghley on the opposite side, taking it in turns to feed her sips of boiled water, which was all that she could tolerate. Both of them feared what would happen if they lost her, and both knew that they would grieve immensely. When St George’s Day came, the day Elizabeth had appointed for Burghley to be admitted to the Order of the Garter, it was Robert who deputised for her and conferred the honour on him, both of them grim-faced and heavy-hearted. They were friends now, despite themselves, their earlier rivalry forgotten. They corresponded frequently, visited each other’s houses, and – although they did not always agree – enjoyed an amicable working relationship, united in their love for their royal mistress, their Protestant faith and their loyalty to the realm.
They both gave heartfelt thanks, therefore, when Elizabeth recovered, and both had tears in their eyes when she rose from her bed and sat once more in her usual place at the head of the council board.
‘God’s blood, my lords, what whey faces!’ she chided them mischievously. ‘I just ate some bad fish.’
‘Madam,’ Burghley protested, ‘I know that I speak for us all when I say that the severity of your illness was very terrible to us, who love you. What if you had died? The succession is unresolved, and England would surely be lost to our enemies, who would force the Catholic religion on our people—’
‘I have said that I will consider marrying Alençon,’ Elizabeth interrupted, not wishing to hear more of the woes that would befall her kingdom should God call her hence. She had heard it oft-times enough.
‘But in the meantime, Madam, will you please summon Parliament urgently, so that measures can be taken to prevent the Queen of Scots from plotting against you ever again. Public feeling is running high against her. So long as this devilish woman lives, you cannot rest in quiet possession of your crown, nor can your faithful subjects assure themselves of the safety of their lives.’
‘Very well, I will call Parliament,’ Elizabeth agreed. But she continued adamantly to refuse to sign Norfolk’s death warrant.
‘The Lord Treasurer has died,’ Elizabeth informed Robert sadly, remembering William Paulet, Marquess of Winchester, the man who had shown her kindn
ess when he escorted her to the Tower in her sister’s reign.
‘God rest his soul,’ Robert said. ‘He was an upright nobleman.’
‘I would like you to fill his shoes, my Eyes,’ she said.
‘Me – as Lord Treasurer?’ He was surprised and pleased. ‘It is an honour, Bess, but I do not have sufficient learning and knowledge. It should properly go to Burghley, who deserves it.’
‘Then I shall offer it to him,’ she agreed. ‘It will help relieve his gout!’
That was the only time she felt her spirits lighten during that ghastly spring. In May Parliament met to debate the catalogue of Queen Mary’s crimes.
‘Cut off her head and make no more ado about her!’ both Lords and Commons clamoured.
‘I will not do it!’ Elizabeth cried, near to hysteria. The execution of a queen would set the most dangerous precedent of all, and the very thought of it raised the terrible spectres of her mother, Katherine Howard and Jane Grey, three other queens who had met that fate.
‘Parliament must legislate to bar Mary from the succession,’ she declared, ‘and she must be warned that, if she plots against me again, she will suffer death.’
Back came Parliament’s unequivocal answer: ‘Warning has been given her. The axe must be the next warning!’
Elizabeth was equally adamant. ‘Honour does not permit me to attaint a foreign queen who is not subject to English law.’
Parliament did not care about such niceties. It was baying for blood. ‘If her Majesty does not put to death this husband-murderer and arch-traitress, this Scottish Clytemnestra, she will offend not only her conscience but God Himself!’ These brave words were followed by a petition voicing the call and cry of all good subjects against the merciful nature of her Majesty.
‘I will not put to death the bird that, to escape the pursuit of the hawk, has fled to my feet for protection,’ Elizabeth declared. ‘Honour and conscience forbid! Nor do I have any desire to provoke armed retribution on the part of Queen Mary’s Catholic allies.’