Legacy: The Acclaimed Novel of Elizabeth, England's Most Passionate Queen -- and the Three Men Who Loved Her (34 page)

instructions to act at once and in secret.

The warrant had been signed by Gardiner for the Queen in her indis-

position; Gardiner, the head of the Council, the most powerful man in

England; Gardiner who must be very sure of the Queen’s secret desires

to dare this.

The Lord Lieutenant buried his face in his hands and told himself that

no one could blame him for acting on the authority of this document.

Indeed, refusal to act upon this direct command would very likely cost

him his post—and Gardiner would see to it that he got no other. So he

must go to her now and tell her that she must die tomorrow, die secretly

and shamefully without trial or legal warrant.

He rose slowly with the document in his hand and stared out of the

window to the place where so short a time ago the Lady Jane’s scaffold

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had stood. It would take several hours to build a new one and he would

have to give the order immediately if it was to be done in time. He

wondered, with idle curiosity, how she would go to that death and with

the memory of that scene at Traitor’s Gate still fresh in his mind, he

imagined she was likely to kick up quite a fuss. It was always unpleasant

when they had to be dragged and held down, much better when they

behaved with calm dignity, in a decent manner—and oddly enough most

of them did when it came to it. Guildford Dudley had been a blubbering

wreck, but he had found courage at the last moment, while his young

wife had conducted the whole business like a lesson in deportment. Only

once, when they had tied the blindfold around her eyes, had Jane groped

for the block in a wild panic, crying, “Where is it?
Where is it
?”

Bridges had watched it all without a flicker of emotion for it was a

familiar part of his job and he was not a sentimental man; proprietors of

the slaughterhouse seldom are. He turned calmly to the door, and there

he paused and remembered the Queen, so notoriously sentimental, so

very unpredictable. And suddenly his vision was clear and true. He saw

Gardiner smoothly disclaiming all knowledge of the warrant in question,

once the deed had been safely executed.

“
Bridges exceeded his authority and anticipated your order…oh, yes, madam,

I quite agree…a gross dereliction of duty…an outrage. And I’m afraid I must

suggest, for the sake of Your Majesty’s good name…
”

Bridges cut off his vision, like a man snapping shut the pages of a book;

he knew damn well what Gardiner would suggest to the Queen!

His desk was only a step away; he took up his pen and inked it firmly.

Let Gardiner find himself another scapegoat.

Disgrace was unpleasant, but it was infinitely preferable to the hang-

man’s noose at Tyburn. He wrote at once to the Bishop, regretting

his inability to act on so great a matter without the direct authority

of the Queen.

t t t

“…It is not only difficult, but well nigh impossible to foresee what the

English may do, whose natural character is inconsistent, faithless and

treasonable; a character they have always exhibited and which the whole

course of their actions and of their history has proved to be just.”

Simon Renard had written his general curse against the perfidy of

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the English several months earlier and by April he had very little cause

to change his opinion. Wyatt had gone to his death as last, exonerating

Elizabeth from all part in his rebellion, and the people had danced in the

streets in spite of all the efforts to suppress the information. The entire city

was racked once more with religious agitators, opposition to the Spanish

match, and fierce popular support of the imprisoned princess. Renard

wrote home glumly that the whole Council was split from top to bottom,

with quarrels and ill-will becoming so public that several councillors, out

of spite, no longer attended the meetings. The Queen was powerless to

control the divisions.

“She spends her days shouting at the Council but with no results.”

No results, stalemate, impotent futility—they were crumbling bricks

upon which Mary seemed to have built her entire life. She had martyred

herself for her mother’s sake during her father’s reign and martyred herself

for her faith during her brother’s, with nothing to show for it. “Nothing”

was the keynote of her whole existence; even her marriage hung in mean-

ingless limbo. Legally she was now Philip’s wife, but Renard still insisted

that the Prince of Spain could not set foot in England while London

remained in such turmoil. And his advice was constant: remove Elizabeth!

But it was no longer so simple. Elizabeth’s image had taken root in the

popular imagination with wart-like tenacity; to execute her now would

be to kill all hope of reconciling England to Philip. Gardiner’s attempt

Mary had allowed to pass unpunished, and the halfheartedness of her

rebuke had only emphasised her bitter disappointment at the failure.

Remove Elizabeth, said Renard—if not from the world then certainly

from the capital. And so a new prison and a new gaoler were chosen—

the place Woodstock Palace, a broken-down hunting lodge barely fit

for human habitation, the guardian Sir Henry Bedingfield. The very

name alone would be sufficient to strike fear into her sister’s heart, for

Bedingfield’s father had had custody of Katherine of Aragon at Kimbolton

Castle, presiding over her dispirited and neglected death within those

walls. A fitting choice, thought Mary. Elizabeth’s notorious charm would

make no inroads on Sir Henry’s loyalty. He was a stickler for rules and

regulations; wooden, humourless, incorruptible—and
old
, too old to care

for natural curls and a pretty smile. Bedingfield was safe from her wiles.

Mary sat alone in her bedchamber, staring darkly into the flickering

red fire. She knew what Renard expected of her now, once Elizabeth

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was quietly out of the public gaze. She knew too that it would be easy to

arrange. There were poisons that killed slowly, evincing the symptoms

of recognised illnesses. If Elizabeth were to die quietly, privately, at

Woodstock, after a decent interval of time, who could point a finger at

the Queen who had already saved her from execution, against the advice

of her own chief ministers?

Bedingfield was loyal—a devoted Catholic. She had only to give the

word and it would be done. It would be done; and how many problems

it would solve. The Protestant opposition, bereft of its figurehead, would

fall into disarray. The next claimant to the throne was Mary Stuart and

the malcontents of England were unlikely to champion a French Catholic

against their reigning monarch. Remove Elizabeth and the seething unrest

would wither away into sullen resignation to the status quo. And there

were times—dark soul-searching nights like this—when Mary knew she

was capable of giving that order.

Kill her!
whispered a cold serpent of fear in Mary’s head.
Kill her before

Philip sets eyes upon her! She is possessed—I know it is so. How else could

she seduce good men from their allegiance—men like Sussex and Arundel who

were her sworn enemies? She will take Philip from me, as her mother stole my

father. So kill her, kill her soon, before she has the chance. It will be no sin to

do it, it will not be murder but—exorcism. I shall set her soul free and when we

meet again in eternal life, she will thank me for it—my little sister—the child

I once loved…

She got up stiffly and went to kneel at her prie-dieu, praying for

guidance until the velvet cushion was wet with her tears. Was it God’s

will that she should kill her father’s child—or was it her own, born of a

jealousy that placed her on the same level as the woman she hated?

“
Murder is always murder
,” said Katherine of Aragon’s voice, pure and

true above the whispering darkness in her mind. And it was so, she knew

it was. Murder could not be dressed up in a cloak of respectability, and

motives could not be hidden from God who would one day judge her, as

she was already judging herself. She could not imperil her immortal soul

by sinking to murder.

A gleam of light stole through the casement and played upon the

benevolent stone smile of the Virgin. It was morning and Mary had not

slept again, but the shadow on her soul had lifted a little. There was an

alternative. Marriage would remove Elizabeth from England almost as

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effectively as death. The Duke of Savoy had sued for her hand more

than once and as a Spanish vassal would control her more surely than

any gaoler.

It was the best solution, the only solution.

Mary left the prie-dieu for her desk and there wrote out the order that

would release her sister from the Tower.

t t t

When Sir Henry Bedingfield with a hundred men at arms, all dressed in

blue, approached the Tower and surrounded the Princess’s apartments,

Elizabeth, who had been informed of nothing, jumped to the very

reasonable assumption that they had arrived to escort her to execution.

“But they’ll have to wait,” she muttered savagely. “Oh yes, I’ll make

them wait until they send me the sword of a French executioner! Where

is the Lord Lieutenant of the Tower? Say I demand to see him at once.”

He found her waiting for him in the window-seat, clasping her hands

firmly in her lap so that he should not have the pleasure of watching

them tremble.

“Has the Lady Jane’s scaffold been removed?” she asked bluntly.

“Yes, madam. Why do you ask?”

She laughed shortly and pointed to the window.

“Do you tell me all those armed men are not for me after all?”

“For you certainly, madam, but there’s no cause for alarm I assure you.

You are to leave the Tower.”

“
Leave
!”
She stared at him with open disbelief. “Never tell me I am

to be set at liberty!”

“No, madam.” He shifted his weight to the other foot, a little uncom-

fortable to see the colour flood into her pinched face. “My orders are to

consign you to the charge of Sir Henry Bedingfield.”

“And what are
his
orders, do you know?” Her voice was sharp

with sudden anxiety; she was beginning to sense the possibility of even

greater danger.

“You are to be conveyed to Woodstock, madam.”

She nodded absently, as though his words had just confirmed her

private suspicion.

“So—” she whispered, “it is to be murder after all.”

The Lord Lieutenant stiffened indignantly.

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“Madam, Sir Henry is an honest and courageous gentleman who will

do you no harm. He is a true knight.”

“Yes. My sister’s!” She stood up suddenly and fixed him with a

piercing glance. “Can you deny that if murder were secretly committed

to his charge his conscience would be too dainty to execute it?”

Beneath her steely gaze Bridges lowered his own eyes to the floor.

“Madam—as to that—”

“You cannot say, of course, how could you?”

He looked up and found she was smiling.

“May my next gaoler be as courteous as you, sir. I thank you for your

gentle care of me.”

She knew about the death warrant, he was suddenly certain of that

as he bent clumsily over her hand. And as he went out of her room he

found himself hoping with curious intensity that she was mistaken over

Bedingfield’s instructions.

t t t

Sir Henry Bedingfield, that grey-bearded incorruptible, escorted his pris-

oner to the waiting barge in unencouraging silence. He had an unbending

air which sent her heart plummeting; a cold, correct formality which

offered her little hope of winning him for a friend.

As the barge pulled away from the landing steps, she looked back at the

Tower with a sudden pang of real regret. She was leaving Robin Dudley

alone in his prison cell and the odds were high that she would never see

him again. In the short time that remained before her departure, there

had been no way of sending a message; the sense of loss was unexpectedly

strong and she felt strangely depressed. There would be very little to look

forward to at Woodstock, she saw the promise of that in Bedingfield’s

stony face.

As the barge glided steadily towards Richmond Palace, all the city bells

began to peal madly and the merchants of the Hanseatic League fired a

royal salute for her from the riverside factories of the Steelyard. From the

corner of her eye she saw Bedingfield half rise from his seat in anger. His

grim fury would be but a pale reflection of the Queen’s when news of this

outrage was carried to her.

What need have I for enemies, she thought bitterly, my friends will

hang me yet…

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When they landed at Richmond, where they were to spend the first