The Marriage Game (15 page)

“Even the mean folk in the villages cry out against him, madam,” Bacon persisted, “and there is much grudging on the part of your nobles to see him held in such special favor, and—forgive me—the little regard in which Your Majesty appears to hold marriage.”

“How dare they say such things!” Elizabeth exploded, incandescent with fury. “I have
nothing
wherewith to reproach myself!”

“Madam,” replied Bacon, never faltering, “I would be failing in my duty if I did not report what is being said. I know Your Majesty will do what is best.”

“Oh, we will, we will, my Lord Keeper, never fear,” Elizabeth retorted, wishing all gossips at the bottom of the sea.

But there was no escaping the rumors. Cecil heard them, even in Edinburgh, and hastened to write to his queen:
It is my constant prayer that God will direct your heart to choose a worthy father for your children, so that the whole realm will have cause to rejoice and bless your seed
.

“Pah!” snorted Elizabeth when she read this, and when Cecil returned to court after his long, hot journey south, and all the councillors greeted him with effusive congratulations on his fine diplomacy, she showed herself cool and distant. She would not utter one word of thanks or praise.

“Madam,” murmured Sussex, appalled, “he has negotiated a great peace. Will you not show him some mark of favor?”

“No,” said Elizabeth glacially. “He has displeased us.”

Robert showed himself gleeful at Cecil’s discomfiture. He was busily courting Bishop de Quadra, hoping to secure Spanish support for his own promotion in opposition to Cecil. Elizabeth had told him to say that she needed a swordsman to counter her scribes.

Cecil, painfully aware that he had been away too long, knew exactly what was going on. No longer did Elizabeth linger to talk with him after council meetings; she seemed to want to avoid him. Not only had she shown absolutely no gratitude for his hard bargaining in Edinburgh, she would not even defray his expenses! Worse still, she had actually boxed his ears when he complained. With a heavy heart, he could only miserably conclude that Robert Dudley had made the most of his rival’s absence, and that matters had moved on apace between
Dudley and the Queen. He was sickened to find that gossip about them was livelier and more blatantly suggestive than ever. Talk of Dudley obtaining a divorce was rampant.

Elizabeth seemed to have been seized with a kind of madness that had addled her judgment. She made no attempt to preserve discretion. She visited Robert openly at the Dairy House at Kew and it was said that they spent long evenings there alone together. God only knew what they were getting up to.

Elizabeth loved the Dairy House; it was the one place where Robert had never lived with his wife. Elizabeth had made it clear to him, on bestowing the property, that it was out of bounds to Amy. She wanted to be able to call there unannounced without running the risk of being confronted by Amy’s woeful, sickly face.

One balmy summer evening, when Elizabeth returned from Kew late at night, her cheeks hectic and flushed, her eyes shining, Cecil was waiting for her. At that moment the Devil, complete with his pitchfork, would have been a more welcome sight.

“Madam,” Cecil said, bowing, and looking lugubriously unlike the Devil, “a word, if I may.”

There was a time when she would have seen him immediately.

“Not now, William,” she answered, fanning herself, determined to put him in his place. “I have just enjoyed a splendid evening at Kew. Do you not agree that Lord Robert has so many praiseworthy qualities? He has been most helpful in the matter of the Imperial alliance, and he has a good command of affairs in Europe. I am firmly of the opinion that he is deserving of further honors. That would be most fitting, would it not?”

Cecil gritted his teeth. To his mind, Dudley had no business advising the Queen on politics. “Praiseworthy qualities, loyalty, and hard work in your service should indeed be rewarded, madam,” he said pointedly. Inwardly he was alarmed. Such honors might be a preamble to making Dudley King. And then, Cecil wondered, what would befall him? And the Queen herself?

Cecil sought out his fellow councillors. All, to a man, deplored the Queen’s failure to take a husband.

“She will brook no master,” sighed Sussex, thinking how complicated things could become when women got above themselves.

“She means to use her marriage only as a bargaining tool,” said Bacon.

“It seems it is of little use to contemplate a foreign marriage alliance,” said Cecil gloomily, “because I fear that she has already decided to marry Robert Dudley. Gentlemen, the situation is becoming desperate. Bishop de Quadra has warned me to expect a palace rebellion by Dudley.”

“Well, he exaggerates everything,” Sussex observed, although the prospect of the Gypsy rampaging through the corridors of Whitehall was rather worrying. “But,” he added cheerfully, “I have also heard it muttered that there are those who have had enough of queens and want to see Her Majesty and Lord Robert clapped in prison.”

“Scaremongers,” Cecil sighed. “I would that Lord Robert was there, though. His influence is too great, and it is pernicious. But what is the alternative to Her Majesty? The next in line is also a woman, be she Katherine Gray or Mary Stuart. We have the prospect of petticoat rule ad infinitum! And I for one am weary of it. In truth, gentlemen, I am considering tendering my resignation. I may recall Sir Nicholas Throckmorton from Paris to replace me as Secretary.”

The others looked at him, horrified.

“How could Dudley possibly replace one such as you in the Queen’s counsels?” Sussex asked. “The Queen needs you. We need you. England needs you.”

“The Queen appears not to be aware of that,” Cecil said, his face drawn.

“There must be a remedy,” Bacon fumed. “We must prevent the Queen from ruining herself.”

“I have written to our ambassadors abroad,” Cecil revealed. “I have suggested that it would be helpful if they could convey in their reports how Dudley is disapproved of in foreign courts.”

“Ah, but will the Queen pay heed?” Bacon asked. “She has ignored public opinion so far, and the advice of her ministers.”

“Perchance the threat of William’s resignation will bring her to her senses,” Sussex said.

“Do not raise your hopes,” Cecil muttered gloomily.

When Elizabeth next visited Robert at the Dairy House, she found various items laid out on a table: gold buttons, a silver mirror, sewing silks, and some delicately embroidered stockings. Her eyes alighted on them in surprise.

“They are for my wife,” Robert said awkwardly.

She waited.

“They are gifts to cheer her,” Robert went on, sounding very much as if he was confessing to treason. “I have not visited her often of late.” That, of course, was because the Queen had prevented it.

“How is she?” Elizabeth felt bound to ask, but her tone was cool.

“Not well, Bess. In truth, I am deeply worried about her. I have arranged for her to stay at Cumnor Place, the house of a friend of mine, Anthony Forster.” Elizabeth was aware that Robert had never set up a country seat, and that Amy had spent her married life moving from house to house. “There are several ladies of quality lodging there, and she will have company. She is in very low spirits, and I hope that those ladies will help to restore her.”

Elizabeth felt oddly uncomfortable. A secret inner voice was whispering that it should be Amy Dudley’s husband who was at her side to restore her. “I am sure they will,” she said resolutely, putting all unpleasant thoughts firmly out of her head. Taking Robert’s hand, she drew him away from the hateful things on the table into the pretty gardens. There was a shady arbor there where they could talk privily and dally unseen, and she could make him forget about his wife’s woes.

The court moved to Windsor Castle in good time for the Queen’s birthday in September. She was twenty-seven, and she supposed her councillors would again take occasion to remind her that she ought to be married, so she took care to spend the day hunting with Robert at her side, shooting stags with a crossbow. They returned to find a messenger
waiting for Robert with a letter from Oxfordshire. She saw his face drain of color as he opened it.

“She is dying,” he whispered. Elizabeth took the letter and read it.

“I am sorry for it,” she said. She wondered why he did not crave leave to go to Amy.

“It will be a merciful release,” Robert said, his face unreadable. She was unsure if he meant for Amy or for himself—and she was not sure if she welcomed this news or not. Nor did she want to think of illness and death on this beautiful day, when one should feel happy just to be alive.

Bishop de Quadra came to see her that evening, to offer his master’s congratulations on her natal day.

“I thank His Majesty,” she replied graciously, then decided, on an impulse, to ruffle Philip’s feathers. “Alas, I am in no mood to celebrate, for I have heavy matters on my mind. Lord Robert’s wife is dead—or nearly so.”

Quadra’s eyebrows shot up. “Dead?” He collected himself. “Well, madam, from what I hear, it has been expected.”

It was Elizabeth’s turn to look startled. What
was
the bishop implying?

“It is well known that she is ill,” the bishop said, as if reading her mind. No doubt her consternation had been plain to see. “Please convey my condolences to Lord Robert,” Quadra went on, smooth as ever.

“I will,” she said. “And Bishop, I beg of you, say nothing about this. You know how people will talk.”

Walking through the castle precincts the next day, and puffing a bit because the incline was steep, Quadra met Cecil. He felt sorry for the Secretary, who, though a heretic, was a clever, worthy man who should not have been in such disfavor. Alas, it was all the fault of that adventurer, Robert Dudley, who was blatantly doing his utmost to replace Cecil in the Queen’s counsels.

Cecil seemed disposed to talk; indeed, it soon became clear that he
was eager to unburden himself. That was a little surprising, because usually he was not exactly forthcoming, save when it served him well to be so; nor was he one to gossip or touch on sensitive matters.

“Bishop, may I tell you something in confidence?” he asked now, glancing around to check that no one was nearby.

Surprised, Quadra hastened to assure him that he was the soul of discretion. (He would report whatever was said to King Philip, of course, and perhaps to various interested persons at court, if it served his purpose, but otherwise he would be discreet.)

“This must be kept secret,” Cecil emphasized.

“You may rely on me to keep it so, Master Secretary,” Quadra declared.

“Then I may tell you that the Queen is conducting herself in such a way that I am about to withdraw from her service.”

Quadra was agog. This was momentous! He could not wait to pass it on to his master, and his friends too.

Cecil’s face was grave. “It is a bad sailor who does not make for port when he sees a storm coming,” he observed, “and I foresee ruin impending through the Queen’s intimacy with Lord Robert. Lord Robert has made himself master of all the business of the state, and of the person of the Queen—”

“The
person
? You mean they have proceeded to the ultimate conjunction?” the bishop interrupted, astonished to be hearing such a thing from Elizabeth’s chief minister.

“It would not surprise me,” Cecil sighed, “but whatever the truth of that, the way Her Majesty conducts herself with Lord Robert can only be to the extreme injury of her realm. He, for his part, has every intention of marrying her.”

“I cannot believe that she would be so foolish,” Quadra said, shaking his head. Wait till King Philip heard this!

“I do not believe that the realm will tolerate the marriage,” Cecil went on, “and I do not intend to be here to find out. I am determined to retire to the country, although I suppose she will have me in the Tower before she will let me go.” He looked like a dog anticipating a blow from a cruel master.

“Is there anything I can do?” Quadra asked.

“I beg of you,” Cecil urged, “remonstrate with the Queen! You have the might of Spain behind you. Persuade her to not utterly throw herself away as she is doing. Urge her to remember what she owes to herself and to her subjects.”

The bishop promised he would do that as soon as the opportunity presented itself, and Cecil thanked him profusely. But there was an angry gleam in Cecil’s eyes.

“Lord Robert would be better in Paradise than here!” he muttered.

“I believe he thinks himself there already,” Quadra observed drily.

“Nay, Bishop, I mean he would be better off if he were in Heaven. And so would we! I must be honest with you. I despair of the Queen seeing sense! It is all down to Lord Robert, of course. He will be the ruin of this realm, and of me. You do not know the half of it.” Cecil looked around him, bent his head closer and spoke in a low voice. “They are thinking of destroying his wife. They have given out that she is ill.”

Quadra stiffened in silent amazement, remembering what Elizabeth had told him the day before.

“She is not ill at all,” Cecil went on. “She is very well, and taking good care not to be poisoned. I trust that God would never permit such a crime to be accomplished, or so wretched a conspiracy to prosper.” He gave the bishop a weighty look.

Quadra was stunned. Was Cecil actually telling him that Dudley and the Queen herself were conspiring to murder Lady Dudley? He had definitely said
they
, so who else could be involved but Elizabeth? If Cecil was so concerned for his mistress’s reputation, he was going the right way about thoroughly wrecking it for good and all. Yet would the Queen, an intelligent woman, really be so rash as to risk her crown by abetting murder? Quadra found it inconceivable. There was no mistaking it, however: Cecil was distraught. His career was at an end and he faced ignominy and ruin, and all because of the upstart Dudley. Small wonder that he had thrown his customary caution to the winds, and perhaps even exaggerated! For even now, with disaster facing him, the man’s thoughts were for the well-being of the queen he had served
and her godforsaken kingdom. It was beyond belief that he had meant to implicate her in a vile crime.