The Spymaster's Daughter

by Jeane Westin

  “Just so.” The queen leaned forward to whisper, ropes of huge pearls swinging from her shoulders, “And I must hear something of your adventures.”

  Of course, Elizabeth would know everything. She had numerous spies, including Dr. Dee. With another close, curious look at Frances, the queen swept into the presence chamber and past her lords kneeling with bowed heads. When she came to one bent head Elizabeth ruffled the russet curls, now sun-streaked from a soldier’s life, and the Earl of Essex lifted his handsome, young, adoring face to her. She motioned him to stand and he did, resplendent in a silver-embroidered velvet suit of foreign cut, the doublet padded and puffed to twice its size.

  He sent a quick smile toward Frances, but offered Elizabeth his arm. He was thinner and peasant brown, though even more strikingly handsome compared to the pale courtiers nearby. He led the queen to her throne, and she took her lone place under the gold cloth of estate, motioning the court to rise.

  “Sir Amyas,” she called, and the short jailer from Chartley approached, sweeping away his tall hat as he knelt.

  Holding her breath, Frances saw the man’s gaze pass over her face with admiration, but leave it without recognition. She had to hide a smile of triumph that her disguise had been such a good one.

  “We are happy indeed to see you at court, Sir Amyas. How go matters at Chartley?” The words were said while the queen’s eyes searched the chamber. She did not truly wish to hear more of Mary.

  “They go very well, Majesty…except for these bills…and that woman’s continued demands to be treated as a queen….”

  “Fingle-fangle,” Elizabeth said dismissively. “Do I look like an accountant? Take them up with my treasurer, Lord Burghley.” She motioned Burghley forward. He came, leaning on his cane. Sir Amyas Paulet, bowing, handed him a sheaf of foolscap filled with numbers. The queen waved Paulet away. “Later we will hear your reports, but no complaints, Sir Amyas, in our private chambers.”

  “Aye, Majesty,” Paulet said, his shoulders slumping, making him shorter still. He probably knew he would never get full payment, though perhaps an attainted traitor’s estate or two. He brightened and backed away, bowing. Pleasing Elizabeth was all the payment any Englishman could hope for.

  “Cod’s head,” the queen murmured, though Frances, suppressing a smile, heard the insult.

  “Walsingham, what have you for me that does not make demands on my poor purse?”

  Frances’s father, perpetually sober faced, stepped forward and bowed. “Majesty, I crave private audience on grave matters of urgent state business.”

  “You have come, as do they all, to raid my treasury for the Holland war,” the queen insisted, her hand rising and falling, sensing too much trouble to forestall, probably knowing something of his business, or suspecting it would also concern her longtime guest, Mary, queen of Scots.

  The public audience went quickly, Elizabeth accepting as many petitions as her impatient temper would allow, passing them on to Burghley, who would present them later with his recommendations. Finally her patience frayed and came to an abrupt end. She stood and the court knelt. “Come, walk with me, my lady Sidney.”

  Frances fortified herself with a quick prayer as the trumpets blared and the drums pounded, the guards marching off in unison.

  They swept from the presence and down the short corridor to Her Majesty’s apartments. She motioned Frances inside her reception chamber, ordering the doors closed behind them, leaving several anxious petitioners outside.

  “Ale,” she called, pointing Frances toward a chair at her big writing table.

  “My thanks, Majesty,” Frances said, drinking deeply.

  An attendant watered the queen’s ale, as she never touched strong drink. Then all in the chamber were waved into a side room, and Frances prepared herself for an inquisition.

  Elizabeth arranged her long white fingers in her lap. “You have good spirit, my lady, as I first observed. I have heard something of your adventure, but tell me all. Did you leave the castle in disguise only to find measles?”

  The question confirmed to Frances’s relief that the queen suspected much, but knew very little. “Aye, Majesty, disguised, as any good intelligencer would be.” Frances had seen others caught in the queen’s curiosity say too much and have Her Majesty happily snap shut the trap.

  The queen’s head lifted and her deep blue eyes looked into the distance. “Many times, I slipped away in disguise as a maid, once to see my lord Leicester win at archery…though he lost…to a pigeon.” She smiled slyly.

  There was a clamor in the outer chamber.

  “The Earl of Essex is an eager boy. Soldiering has not taught him patience,” the queen said, her face unreadable, motioning the guard to open her outer doors. “And I must see my spymaster.”

  “Majesty,” Frances said, and backed from the room, happy to escape more questions.

  Essex bowed as Frances walked past him into the outer chamber. “Lady Sidney, may I call upon you later? Sir Philip has sent gifts and letters to you, not three days gone.”

  Essex seemed changed. He no longer swaggered even when not moving. His face, though leaner, held a man’s calm assurance. His eyes held sadness, as if he had stared at death on too many battlefields. War had been his maturity. She wondered how Philip might be altered, though a brief pale image of her husband was blurred by Robert’s face.

  “I must to my father now, my lord,” Frances said. “Most gladly will I welcome you at three of the clock.”

  “Shall we walk in the garden?”

  She hesitated, remembering their last meeting there.

  “If you will.”

  He smiled and bowed again. Gathering her skirts, she moved to her father near the huge portrait of Henry VIII. There would be no escaping Essex without insult, but she would take her servants.

  “Lord father,” she said, bowing her head for his blessing.

  He smiled, or at least his mouth turned up on one side. “Frances, it is good to see you so in the queen’s favor and in health.”

  “And you, Father,” she said sweetly. He knew nothing. The great spymaster had been deceived by a daughter he thought no intelligencer. Or had he?

  “Aye, I am in health,” he answered. “I was able to persuade Her Majesty to return from her progress as our great business proceeds to its finish.” Something near to full satisfaction touched his face briefly and was gone.

  When her father was called to the queen, Frances found Will waiting in the corridor admiring the guards, gleaming silver breastplates and their red liveries with the Tudor rose on their sleeves.

  “Come, I must to my father’s office, and you to my chambers, where Meg will have duties for you.”

  She fair ran to her chambers, scrubbing her face until it was clear of the white mask and glowed pink; then she raced down the stairs. The guards, uncrossing their pikes, bowed her inside. The long room was as gloomy as ever, with clerks bending to their tasks, candlelight wreathing their earnest faces. Her gaze swept past lanterns that created shadows to dance on the gray stone walls, until she found Robert.

  The queen had not listened long to Mr. Secretary, who was already at his big writing table bending over a large map roll, Robert beside him. Her heart told her that it couldn’t be a map of France. Surely the continent was not the place to send the best intelligencer in all England.

  Phelippes called to her. “Lady Frances,” he said, and lowered his voice. “I have heard of all you did to bring the business at Chartley to success, and I must tell you—”

  She waved him to silence, dreading that her father would hear. “I beg you, do not speak of it further. What about the Scots queen’s cipher?”

  “Not enough, my lady.”

  “Not enough? But the message goes to the traitors at the Plough Inn in her own hand!”

  “Aye, but Her Majesty will believe only Mary’s evil intent, when she calls for Elizabeth’s death in plain words.”

  “Must she draw a dagger? And yet she doe
sn’t.”

  “Nay, she is too clever, but we are close…very close, breathing down her regal papist neck. Your father will not stop now.” He looked back to Walsingham’s office again. “Sir Amyas just left, but it is a good thing you weren’t here. He would not recognize you as a lady of the presence, but here he might give you a closer look.”

  “Why was he here?”

  “Sir Amyas longs to be quit of Mary. Having another mission for Pauley, your father entrusted Sir Amyas with the keg for the next message”

  “A message? Babington has responded already?”

  “Aye, within hours. Since we have her new cipher, it took little time to read it and make a copy for Her Majesty.”

  “Is that what my father and Master Pauley now discuss? Is something amiss?”

  “I am not privy to their talk, my lady. We will know in good time, but the matter moves swiftly.”

  Frances looked on his table and saw he had been drawing a hanged woman over and over. He saw where she looked and gathered the papers into a pile, dismissing her.

  She must yet learn not to ask questions, to have an intelligencer’s patience, though it went against her nature to be docile and left wondering.

  Her heart was sore as she went to her writing table. There was one purpose here and one only: to bring the queen of Scots to her end, to rid England of the threat of Catholic rule, uprisings in England, and Spanish or French soldiers parading through London. Yet Frances sore ached to think of that aging beauty at Chartley, a ruler without a realm, a queen with no crown who was gradually being maneuvered toward a waiting headsman.

  There were no messages or work on her desk for her, and thus she did nothing, the hardest job for her. At last her father left his office with the rolled parchment held against his chest, Robert walking behind, his eyes meeting hers with a loving message. Though his intent may not have been there for others to see, it was there for her.

  Walsingham, his face grown darker with anger, gathered all his men about him, and though not specifically invited, Frances stood and joined the others.

  “We will have that devilish woman soon,” he said, gripping the parchment roll so hard his fingers turned white. “She grows eager to escape, and impatience is the mother of mistakes. We must give her encouragement.” His mouth widened, and for him it was the broadest of smiles.

  “Aye, Sir Walsingham,” Robert said, taking up the narrative. “The fastest way is to get inside the confidence of the young traitors under Sir Anthony Babington, deeper inside than ever before. They have become cautious with our man Bernard Maude at the Plough Inn, but Babington, in his letters to the queen of Scots, seems eager to put his head in a noose.” Robert stopped, and everyone except Frances moved in closer.

  “We must get a new man inside that group of traitors who is so trusted he can push them to act. They think themselves clever. It is easy to work with men who parade their quickness for Mary’s approval. Babington is Catholic, overeager but careful, though not as cunning as he thinks. We read his every word. He expects an earldom from Mary, and that has made him lose some natural caution. An imprudent man is apt to play the fool.”

  Walsingham advanced the narrative. “Maude, at the Plough Inn, has pushed too hard. Babington thinks Maude may want to take his place and gain all that Mary has promised her young lord. Pauley will be introduced amongst the traitors in the usual way…from prison.”

  Frances opened her mouth to cry out, but Robert had anticipated her distress and his face warned her to silence. Holding her breath, she heard his next words as in a nightmare.

  “I am to the Fleet this night and to the Tower tomorrow, chained to a priest who was captured on a recent ship from France. There can be no better companion to bring acceptance amongst the traitors.”

  Walsingham advanced again, a warning hand in the air. “No word of this plan must leave this room.” As if to underscore his words, a torch flared on the wall behind him and went out, leaving his face in darkness.

  Frances, unable to hold fast to her desire to shout against putting Robert in such danger, went to her writing table as if only routinely interested. Quickly, she grasped her shawl from the chair and walked out of the room, fighting a lump in her chest that near stopped her breath and a desire to shriek her objection: Robert. Always Robert is sent to danger. He has done enough. Send another. Of a sudden, the excitement of being an intelligencer drained from her.

  She had reached the top of the stone stairs when Robert caught her arm. “Frances, I must speak with you.”

  Two courtiers strolled by at the end of the corridor, arguing about the lord admiral’s players.

  “They hold no candle to the Earl of Leicester’s players,” one man announced. Espying Robert, the man shouted, “What say you, sir?”

  “Will Kempe is the greatest actor!” Robert yelled, giving the name of the queen’s favorite.

  They took the bone, laughing, and went on arguing even when out of sight.

  “Frances,” Robert whispered, and turned her into the first alcove, where he sat beside her, stretching his stiff leg in front of him, his shoulder resting against the cushioned window seat. “You must see that this is the only way to gain the traitors’ confidence.”

  “I see that you are chosen for danger time and again. You are trusted and known to be brave.” Her voice would not lift to a pleasant pitch even on her command. “But…the Tower,” she said, the words shivering from her memory of that place of pain, “and you are not healed. You must not do this thing!”

  He shook his head, denying her words, his fingers lacing through hers. “We must move fast…. I know you see that. We have no time for another man to slowly rise in their confidence.”

  She, too, shook her head, but not so forcefully, knowing that what he said was true.

  He tightened his grip on her. “The traitors are ready to act, ready to attack the queen, thinking that Catholics will rise and Spanish soldiers will land. Babington is young enough to believe what he wants.” When Frances did not agree, Robert spoke more urgently. “We cannot wait, sweetest. We must know when they mean to attack the queen before and not after. Babington must be pushed.”

  She knew he spoke truth. “But why you? Always you.”

  “The queen is in danger every day we do not stop them. You know that. They will try to kill her as soon as Mary gives clear orders, mayhap sooner to show their loyalty to her.” He scanned up and down the corridor. No one was coming, and he clasped her to him, wincing a little. “Don’t you see that I might get some preferment, and that would put me more rightly in your company?”

  What? Was he saying that he was doing this for her? “Robert, Sir Walter Raleigh is begging the queen for advancement; he is most handsome and writes her verse. Yet Elizabeth refuses even him.”

  “Am I not handsome?” he whispered, his eyebrows lifting in jest. “And would I not grow in splendor if I saved her life?”

  She closed her eyes and shook her head, making herself light-headed, since she had not slept. “Robert, you’ll be doing this for naught.” Her heart ached to say it, but truth was truth. Not even love could change certainty. “Philip will be home soon, and that will mark the end of what we are to each other.”

  “Never the end.”

  Her heart could hear no more. “Good-bye,” she whispered, and slipped from his arms.

  As she moved down the corridor to her chambers, exhaustion was sweeping over her like western clouds bringing in a storm. She must sleep. Then she could think what to do.

  Meg put her to bed with lavender sprinkled over her pillow and a glass of wine. Frances refused the touch of laudanum Meg spooned for her and lay with her eyes wide, imagining the sound of Robert’s guitar and his low voice singing in the anteroom. Would she hear him all the days and nights of her life? And would it be her only happiness?

  She slept nightmarishly, dreaming of the Tower, descending endless stairs that never reached the stone-piercing screams below. When she woke, she parted the b
ed curtains to see that it was almost dark. Meg had laced her wine with laudanum despite her protest, and for that she should be whipped, but Frances could not order it, since Meg had acted from kindness.

  The girl was curled at the foot of the bed watching her. “My lady, shall I send Will to the kitchens for your supper?”

  Frances stretched, and her stomach rumbled. She was hungry. “Aye, Meg, I will have some pottage left from the dining hall. What o’clock?”

  The case clock chimed eight, and Frances knew that Robert was gone. Even now he could be entering a filthy, straw-strewn cell in the Fleet, chained to the priest.

  Meg smiled as Frances closed her eyes. “Mistress, he left this note for ye.”

  Eagerly, Frances reached for it before seeing Essex’s crest on the red wax seal.

  Your maid tells me you needs must rest further from your illness. I would not hinder your complete return to health. Tomorrow I have a duty for the queen, but we will walk together come the day after.

  Essex

  The word will was large and splotched, as if the quill were held to the paper hard and the point splayed out.

  Now Frances felt the hours drag by to the next day like a chain and heavy weight about her. She joined the queen’s entourage the next morning. She went through the activities of her day, little better than a puppet, speaking seldom, craving news, but there was none. As the hours passed, several times she haunted her father’s office, where every secretary was quiet and waiting.

  Phelippes whispered to her, “Another cipher has gone to Mary from Sir Anthony about the priest sent to the Tower with a man known to be of your household.” He grinned. “They are breathless with the possibility of making Pauley a double agent to know exactly what your father knows of them and what he plans.” He grinned, then sobered. “But—” He clamped his mouth together on the rest of his thought.

  “What?” Frances questioned, taking hold of his doublet.

  Phelippes flushed and looked away.

  “Tell me!”

  “I should not worry you, my lady. I know Pauley is your…special friend.”