Elizabeth I

by Margaret George

  “Your husband stated it baldly. ‘To rouse the populace,’he said. Evidently he and his fellows are hoping to overthrow the Queen, make her abdicate like Richard II. They want to rally supporters by showing this play.”

  Oh, God. Robert was in the thick of it. Christopher and Meyrick and Southampton and the others were not the beneficiaries. It was all for Robert. Did he hope to—was he planning to take the throne himself? Who else was a candidate? Would they go to all this trouble and danger for James of Scotland? What could he promise them that would make them want him instead of Elizabeth?

  “This is dreadful,” I finally said. Christopher’s confession about their plans had confirmed a coup against Elizabeth. All I could do was sit and watch, relegated to the sidelines.

  “It is more than dreadful,” said Will. “It is the end of our world. My career will be ruined—I will be seen as the traitorous playwright. Your son is doomed. He cannot win. And Elizabeth is destroyed. She will not recover from this betrayal—I mean, her spirits and her trust. She lives by the love of her people.”

  “Don’t perform the play!” I cried. “Stop it now.”

  “Phillips has already taken the money. In the theater, box office is all.”

  “We both stand to lose all,” I said. There was a wonder in stating it so simply.

  “All,” he said. “It is a cruel reward for Elizabeth in the sunset of her reign, to be greeted with this. And for me! Would that I had never written that play!”

  “You will survive this,” I assured him. “I am not so sure about the house of Devereux.”

  He shook his head. “If Robert attempts this folly ... yes, it will doom him, if not his house. There is no support for him. Why cannot he and his supporters see that?”

  “They have blinded themselves with bitterness and wishful thinking. Will”—I reached my hand out to him—“I have tried everything to make them see clear. But I am ignored and shunted aside. I am helpless. All I can do is watch. Watch them go down to ruin.”

  “Save yourself,” he said. “Distance yourself. That is what I will do.” He stood up. He dropped my hand. “I plan to be in my rooms, writing my new play, when the day comes.”

  “Do you know the actual day?”

  “No. I think they are past planning. I think they will just set out, willy-nilly, with no forethought. They will be quickly destroyed.”

  “We must rescue ourselves,” I said, thinking even as I said it he must think me an unnatural mother. I quickly added, “We are, after all, not the main players. The leads go to others; the stage is commanded by them.”

  He smiled. “Laetitia, one would think you were to the theater born.”

  “Life is a play,” I said. “Surely you of all people have noted that?”

  I saw him make his way toward the door and recalled happier times, when both our moods were so different, “Yes, frighteningly so,” he said, leaving my threshold.

  81

  ELIZABETH

  February 1601

  It was still. Too still. Around Whitehall, the throngs that usually swept through our public right-of-way had melted away, leaving the buildings stranded in a sea of pavement and dead grass.

  “I have never seen it so quiet,” I said to Catherine, standing beside me as we looked out upon the empty grounds. “They say such silence comes just before an earthquake, that the animals sense it, the birds fly away.”

  “Or before an eclipse,” she said. “The sky darkens, the air cools, and all is hushed.”

  For days the city had been agitated, with reports of fiery little Welshmen sleeping in attics and cellars, fresh horses being stabled in whatever makeshift stalls could be found, the movement of goods along the western roads from Wales and the northern ones from Scotland. Yet, like the faint trembling and wisps of smoke before a volcano erupts, it was impossible to know exactly what it portended.

  “An eclipse is always a bad omen,” I said. “And so is anything that mimics one.”

  Catherine shook her head. “We have lived through many of them, and we will live through more.”

  “Bless you, Cousin. You are my right arm.”

  “No, I am your left,” she said. “Here is your right.”

  She had seen Robert Cecil enter before I did, followed by Raleigh. I turned to face them. “What is it?” They were clearly vexed.

  “There’s been a special performance of Richard II this afternoon at the Globe!” cried Cecil. “They are just getting out now—a mob of men, grinning and shouting.”

  “It was commissioned by Essex’s men. They guaranteed a payment to cover it, no matter the size of the audience. It’s an old play, and the actors didn’t want to stage it,” added Raleigh. “No actor wants to perform something passé.”

  “Did they show the scene?” I asked. But I already knew the answer. What was the point of staging it otherwise?

  “Indeed they did,” said Raleigh. “The Essex men insisted on it; it was part of the agreement.”

  I had the best spies in the realm. I appreciated that. But they could not know everything, be everywhere. I had someone who attended on Gelli Meyrick and another who served Frances Walsingham in her chamber. I had been less successful in placing anyone in Essex’s private quarters. His movements, and his aims, were shrouded in obscurity.

  Twilight was falling; it came early on these February days. The play had finished just in time to allow the audience to disperse before darkness enveloped them. A faint mist lay over the river already, and it would creep up out of its banks and envelop the city.

  “It must end,” I said. I suddenly knew this was the hour. The time to strike.

  “Are you sure?” asked Cecil. “Perhaps we should wait, let the plot—whatever it is—come to a head.”

  “That is always the question,” said Raleigh. “Do we leave the plotters unmolested, in hopes that they will unequivocally incriminate themselves? Or do we cut it off before it can reach dangerous fruition?”

  “We have done both, in the past. The rising of the northern lords in 1569—we forced them into action before they were ready. The Scots queen—we had to let that develop far enough that we had enough evidence to proceed,” I said.

  “It is always a gamble,” said Cecil.

  “I think we must follow the pattern for the northern lords,” I decided. “If unchecked, this fomenting rebellion may overwhelm us. We cannot afford to wait for more evidence.”

  I sounded more certain than I felt. There was no doubt that Essex, with his popularity, presented a dilemma like that of the Scots queen. My actions toward him must be decisive, and without ironclad evidence of his hostile intent, my motives would be suspect. God knew I could not afford to offend public opinion at this point.

  “What shall I do? Arrest him?” asked Raleigh.

  “Not yet,” I said.

  “Are you sure?” he asked. “Don’t give him a chance to slip away.”

  “Send a messenger and command him to appear before the Privy Council tomorrow.” He had turned away the friendly warning from Buckhurst’s son, insulting me in the process. For my father, that would have been enough. He would have been in the Tower already. But calling me an old bitch, while it showed gross and shocking disrespect toward my person, was not treasonous. I reasoned carefully, keeping my scepter and my self distinct, trying to see where he had insulted one without injuring the other. To do otherwise would taint the brilliance of my reign by insinuations of the kind his followers put about, to risk losing the people’s belief in me.

  My messenger was turned away. He arrived at Essex House when Essex himself and his inner circle—Blount, Southampton, Meyrick, Cuffe, Rutland, and Danvers—were settling themselves down to a big meal, discussing Richard II with gusto while chewing their mutton and slurping their ale. Essex told the messenger he did not wish to speak with him and dismissed him into the night.

  “Arrest him!” said Raleigh. “This is tantamount to throwing down his challenge.”

  I was torn. How many
insults could I endure from this man? How many slaps, how many dares? “No. Let us try one more time. Let us provide the rope whereby he hangs himself.”

  “Do you want to be deposed?” cried Cecil.

  “Is that his aim? I do not think anyone knows what the aim of this deluded, confused man is,” I said. “Not even he himself.”

  “His aims may be separate from those of his followers,” said Raleigh. “The point is, they should not be allowed to control the events. There should not be any events.”

  “Of course, you are right. And there will not be. But I must send one more messenger, give him one more chance. I will send Secretary Herbert.”

  “It is already late,” said Cecil.

  “Order him to report to the Privy Council first thing tomorrow morning, Sunday.”

  But Essex turned Secretary Herbert away. It was near midnight when Herbert returned to me.

  “He refused to talk to me. He pleaded ill health, although he looked hearty enough to me,” Herbert reported. “He was surrounded by his cronies, flushed with ale, wearing his best blue doublet. I have never seen him look more splendid.”

  “So.” I took my time in responding. “Go home, John. You have done a good night’s work. Now sleep. The rest is up to me.”

  The hour had come. The hour that Dee had prophesied, when he said a great final battle would shadow the latter years of my reign. Mordred, he had said.

  Was Essex my Mordred? It was tempting to think so, but there is no such thing as exact repetitions, exact fulfillments of prophecy. I was a descendant of Arthur, but I had no Round Table, no Lancelot, no Guinevere, no Morgan Le Fay. I had only my own powers to sustain the realm.

  The night was dark, no moon. Looking out my window at the river, I saw no reflection on the water, although I could hear its gentle lapping. The dead, dull hour held the city in its grasp.

  Catherine slept on her bed near mine, breathing lightly. I envied her for a moment but put that aside. I keep vigilant so you may sleep; so all of you in my kingdom may sleep.

  My father had entrusted it to me, his beloved England.

  I will preserve you, my people, I vowed. If for an instant I thought another could serve you better, I would make way for him or her. I have no desire to rule an instant past the time I may rule to your benefit, but to leave before that time is to desert you. And that I will never do.

  I did not really sleep. I lay down, true, but I did not draw my bed-curtains—those who would have drawn them slumbered peacefully—and so I saw the deep blue that signaled the winter dawn frame my windows.

  February 8. It was the fourteenth anniversary of the execution of the Queen of Scots. A cursed day.

  Whitehall was unprotected. We had only a scant guard, my two-hundred-strong Queen’s Guard and the fifty Gentlemen Pensioners. Essex House was but a twenty-minute march away, and its courtyard was filled with eager soldiers and retainers. It was Sunday, when the apprentices—always a volatile group, and one that was taken with the likes of Essex—would be off work in the City. We were utterly vulnerable. As I lay watching the deep blue turn violet and then pale gray, I thought that perhaps Raleigh was right. We should have taken them last night. Now we had lost the advantage.

  Up, up. I called for my clothes and dressed myself in serviceable garb to withstand a very long day. Raleigh was announced in the outer chamber. I went out to meet him and saw that he was in his soldier’s uniform, clutching his helmet under his arm. I could see by his face that he, too, had not slept.

  “Your Majesty, I propose to speak to my kinsman Sir Ferdinando Gorges this morning. He is with them at Essex House, but perhaps he will talk to me. It may still be possible to reach them, before ...”

  “Be careful,” I said. “We cannot know what they might do.”

  After he left, still in the mist of dawn, I called Cecil and told him to send the councillors back to Essex House. “This time, it will be an official summons,” I said. “Lord Egerton must take the Great Seal, and if they do not respond, command their obedience under its authority. In the meantime, send warnings to the lord mayor and aldermen of London; they’ll be at St. Paul’s Cross for the eight o’clock sermon. Those are the biggest crowds of the day, and the rebels may try to recruit them.”

  I stopped myself, realizing I had just formally anointed them “rebels.”

  “Yes, Your Majesty.” Cecil did not contradict my choice of words. “I have already taken the liberty of alerting the lord mayor. I will also see what forces our supporters can command in the City, in case we need them.”

  Now I would wait. Wait, while the vast, sprawling palace seemed to be holding its breath. Although it was impossible to do anything else, to think of anything else, I must make a show of it. I called for my secretary and my correspondence box. There were diplomatic letters I should answer, local petitions to respond to. The foreign secretary of King Henri IV inquiring about a property dispute near Calais ... a request for a royal portrait from the Merchant Adventurers ... a proposal that captive bears be better fed by their wardens ...

  “Your Majesty!” There was a fierce knocking on the door, and the voice of Raleigh.

  “Enter!” I bellowed. Oh, God. Whatever it was, this was the first report of the situation.

  He strode in, brushing drops of water from his sleeves. “Essex insisted that Gorges and I talk only in the open, from boats in front of Essex House.”

  “Never mind the particulars, what did Gorges say?”

  “He said, and I quote, ‘You are like to have a bloody day of it.’”

  So. Now all was clear. It was as bad as the worst we had imagined.

  “Then he signaled his comrades, who rowed out from the water stairs aiming muskets at me. I did not stay.” He laughed, as if at his simplicity in stating the obvious.

  “I am sorry, Walter. It is sad to lose a kinsman who chooses a different path.” As I had known time and again.

  “Christopher Blount yelled from the shore that he should kill me.”

  “Then he’s as big a fool as your cousin,” I said. “It’s a shameful thing when a man becomes enthralled to his own stepson.” What did Lettice think of her son and husband leading a rebellion? Was she encouraging them? Or was she horrified and helpless? “Did you see how many men they have? Was there a large crowd?”

  “I couldn’t see into the courtyard. But it looked as if some of them had already gone. Most likely to the City.”

  I turned and looked out the window. I did not see any crowds approaching. Every moment that they held off gave us more time to collect our counterforces.

  It was ten o’clock. The crowds at St. Paul’s would have already dispersed. The rebels had lost their opportunity there. By this time the deputation of councillors must have reached Essex House. All depended on this. Perhaps they would be respectfully received and Essex politely swear to his peaceable intentions.

  But no! That would be the worst result, for it would be a lie and serve only to buy him more time. We must flush him out now, not later.

  “Thank you, Walter. You must see to your guardsmen now. They must be ready, all two hundred of them.”

  Bowing hurriedly, he swept out of the chamber. I stood rooted to that spot, as if nails fastened my feet to the floor. I would stay here, helpless, while the rebels poured into Whitehall, stormed into the chamber. I could see their faces, see Essex flushed and bright eyed, see Christopher Blount, open mouthed and yelling, see Southampton with his pretty curls flying. They would truss me up, convey me to a little room, force me to abdicate, as the Scots queen was forced, as Richard II was. They would treat me with exaggerated courtesy, bowing and mocking, wrench the coronation ring off my finger, try it on themselves. Then I would be transported to some place of “retirement,” a place well guarded. Whom would they put in my place? Essex himself? Or would he proclaim himself lord protector and summon James of Scotland to come claim his crown?

  They would capture Robert Cecil and the other Privy Councillors, have a trial,
and execute them. The realm would be left without either monarch or wise councillors, for they had no one of any caliber to staff the government with. The leaders of this grim treason had all tried for court positions and failed to obtain them, due to lack of qualification.

  My feet moved. I slid first one shoe, then the other, across the patterned floor. Movement gave relief; just doing something broke the spell of helpless waiting.

  I walked through the connected rooms of the royal apartments, with a guard at each door, clutching his halberd, wondering if I were reviewing them in order to take my leave. Would I remember each table, each tapestry, the view out of each window, in my prison cell?

  Whitehall was a massive palace, spread out over twenty-three acres. Some called it the largest in Christendom, but how could anyone know that? Nonetheless, it could take several hours just to pass through all its halls and its two thousand chambers. How far would I progress before I was apprehended? Like a silent wraith, Catherine kept pace with me. I kept stealing glances out the windows as we glided past. No movement; nothing stirring, either on land or on the river.

  The brisk walking calmed me, and by the time we reached the shield gallery I felt strong again. This gallery, overlooking the river, was the place where the fanciful shields from the Accession Day tilts were displayed. They lined the walls and framed the windows; forty-one years’ worth of them gleamed back at me. Had I held my last tilt celebrating my coming to the throne? Who would sit upon it this November when the seventeenth rolled around?

  “I will,” I said out loud. “God did not bring me to the throne and keep me here through all the dangers I have seen to desert me now.”

  “I believe that, dear Queen,” said Catherine.

  “He will keep me here where he has placed me,” I insisted.