Just a Queen

by Jane Caro

  A wolf, a viper. It seemed I was surrounded by creatures with their fangs bared. I could think of no solid argument to refute their case, but I was their queen. I did not have to win the argument with logic. I held up my hand to silence them. ‘We will await the verdict. Then, my lords, you can put your case to me again.’

  Their greatest fear was the same as always. If something happened to me and I had not married and borne a legitimate heir to my throne, the Queen of Scots would inherit it. If such an outcome had horrified my Protestant lords before, now that she was a proven murderer, adulteress and whore, in their eyes at least, the possibility was simply too much to contemplate. If I had married and had children, would the Queen of Scots have been of such importance? Maybe not, but, as so many do, I might have died in childbed and as it has turned out I have outlived her. That threat at least has now gone. No wonder my advisors find my grief and despair so unfathomable.

  Thirteen

  I have thrown open the windows, despite the cold outside. I like the feeling of the cool air on my face, while the roar of the fire behind me warms my back. The sun is fully risen now, but the sky is the watery grey-white that so often characterises the grim month of February. And this February is grimmer than most. The trees of the park stand with their limbs stark and lifeless, silhouetted against the black mass of the distant hills. The snow of a few days ago has melted but the ponds are still iced over and what grass remains is brown and frostbitten. I can hear the echo of an axe and the shouts of distant woodsmen across the cold, still air. The men are taking advantage of the lack of foliage to trim the hedges and lop the branches from the trees that overhang the avenue. A cat from the kitchens cleans itself on a wall and a few hardy swallows swoop and dive across the blank sky. A maidservant empties a washbasin into a drain with a whoosh. The water splashes the cat and sends it running. The maid laughs and stands up to ease her back and stare at the sky. Life goes on.

  When Mary, Queen of Scots, first began her long incarceration almost twenty years ago now, it was also a cold February. Once the key had turned firmly in the lock of her new lodging place, Tutbury Castle, I experienced an irresistible urge to wander. It was time, I declared, to go on a progress. I wanted to move my limbs and get among my people and breathe the open air. I hoped that by escaping the confines of my own castle walls I could lift the oppression of my spirits. Every time I thought of my cousin shut up inside the thick walls of the castle in Staffordshire, I returned in my mind to my own weary time as a prisoner of my sister at Woodstock. Like Mary, I was treated kindly and with all the deference due to my status as a royal princess. I was allowed to keep my attendants, as Mary had been allowed to keep hers, I was allowed to ride to hounds, as Mary was, but I was not free and I had no worthwhile occupation – nothing to engage my mind and my energies. There are only so many walks, only so many books and only so much fine needlework you can do before your life weighs heavily on your hands. And Mary was still so young, only a little older than I was as a prisoner. It is shocking to feel the sap and energy of your youth being sucked out of you by captivity.

  Impatient as I was to escape the confines of my castle, I was forced to wait until the weather improved before we could at last take to the open road. Despite my cumbersome retinue of fine lords and ladies, a great phalanx of servants and a train of four hundred wagons, when I finally left the gates of London, I did so without a backward glance. My heart lifted as we moved from narrow streets into open country. When I hunt, I like to ride fast after the hounds, with my blood up. On progress, I like to travel at a more leisurely pace so I can be seen by my people. Their heartfelt greetings never fail to raise my spirits and, on this occasion, they helped me forget my vexatious cousin at least for a little while.

  ‘God save Your Majesty!’ They called to me – wagoners who had been forced to pull over to the side of the road to let us pass, but who did so with good cheer.

  ‘God save Your Grace!’ Housewives fetching pitchers of water from wells, and farmers resting on scythes in their fields, all paused in their labours to watch the royal parade. Parents held their babes up to me as I rode by and told their older children that I was good Queen Bess, daughter of the old king, and that they should remember this day for the rest of their lives.

  Sometimes petitioners cried out for us to pause a while that they might speak to me and, sometimes, I called a halt. Villagers handed me bouquets of wild flowers as we rode down their high street and offered me drinks of cool ale or mead. Children ran from alleyways in market towns to cheer themselves hoarse and schoolboys flooded from classrooms to give me three cheers. When I am on a progress, I sometimes feel it is the only time I reap the joys of being a queen who is beloved by her people.

  I love the sounds that accompany a progress: the rhythmic creak of saddles and the jingling of reins and buckles. I love the lazy clomping of the horse’s hooves on dusty roads as the shadows lengthen. Even the acrid stink of their urine and dung are smells I delight in. The horse is my favourite animal; for me it promises freedom, escape and the distancing of duty.

  ‘Frimley is only half a mile hence, Your Majesty.’ Blanche Parry had ridden up beside me.

  ‘You shake me from my reverie, Blanche.’

  ‘There will be a welcoming party, Your Grace.’

  ‘Aye,’ I sighed. ‘And no doubt I look like some wild woman who is a complete stranger to both water and comb.’ Blanche smiled at this and I put my hand up to my hair.

  ‘Not at all, Your Grace. I can comb it a little and re-pin it and it will serve very well. We may just need to sponge your gown.’ As if to emphasise her words, the breeze picked up a cloud of dust and blew it over us.

  ‘If you sponge it, the dust will simply stick the tighter. Let them see me as I am – tidy of hair and dusty of habit.’

  Once my hair was set to rights, Robin held a hand out to me to help me remount, and a stable-boy bent to allow me to put my foot into his clasped hands.

  ‘You will dazzle the lucky burghers of Frimley, just as you have everyone else who has ever laid eyes on you.’ Robin’s eyes were frankly admiring.

  I bent and tapped his cheek gently with my crop. ‘You flatter me, my lord. I am like a mucky child whose mother has spat on her handkerchief and cleaned her up as best she can. The “good burghers of Frimley” as you call them will see every mark.’

  ‘You are magnificent, my queen.’ And he swept off his hat and made a courtly bow.

  I laughed. ‘You are ridiculous, dear Robin, but I love you for it.’

  I wore a black habit and, dusty though it was, it looked very well against the stark white coat of my high stepping mare. I let Robin and the others in my entourage admire me for a moment and then I signalled that all should mount and follow me to our destination.

  ‘Onwards to Frimley, good my lords. Let us see how their hospitality compares with that of the other towns and villages of England.’

  We arrived at the outskirts of the village within a few minutes. As always a small party of prominent townspeople stood ready to welcome us. Robin had ridden out in front and signalled a halt, but I spurred my horse forward until I stood before the mayor and aldermen and smiled down upon them. Few of them had ever seen me before, but they knelt immediately.

  I bade them rise, and as they did so I saw that a sea of faces were gathered behind them, all agape. When I first became queen such attention embarrassed me. I was unused to being the centre of so many eyes, but after more than a decade on the throne I had become accustomed. Indeed I took it as my due. I was their queen, the mere sight of me was a story they would tell their grandchildren. But even as I was enjoying the balm of admiration from the good people of Frimley a chill little thought intruded. No doubt the common people of Scotland had stared at my glamorous and equally royal cousin in just this rapt and awestruck way, until the day they turned and spat on her and called her whore. The unbidden thought was like a dark cloud tha
t covered the sun on a warm day.

  My attention was drawn to a scholar standing behind the mayor’s shoulder. On such occasions, there was always a local scholar whose task was to record everything said. Many were defrocked monks and priests who had been turned out of their monasteries during my father’s time and who now made a living as the town scribe. Theirs had been a hard fate and I was always pleased to see them in an honourable occupation, but I suspected many of them would not think well of me. I was, after all, my mother’s daughter and it would be easy for them to see me as the cause of much of their pain. Until my mother’s time this man may have resided at nearby Chertsey Abbey, but that once grand episcopal palace was now a ruin. Its treasure stolen, its decorations and statuary stripped, its stained glass windows smashed and the lead mullions melted down and used for God knows what. Even some of the abbey’s masonry had been stolen and taken for more prosaic use in the town. Chertsey Abbey and its occupants had been humbled and brought low, and such dismal changes of fortune always breed resentment. The fate of such once splendid religious houses was seen by followers of the old faith as blasphemous and the theft of their wealth created fertile ground for those whose thoughts turned to rebellion, and perhaps, to my cousin the now prisoner queen.

  ‘Come hither, little recorder,’ I said to the scholar. He looked up, as startled as any stalked deer, made a clumsy bow and the quill and paper he held shook visibly. Was it shyness that made him tremble so? Or hatred?

  I set myself to charm this man and gently tease him from fear (if fear it was) into affection. ‘How now, good sir? I have been told that you would be afraid to look upon me or to speak boldly; but you were not as afraid of me as I was of you.’ I spoke softly, but all around could hear. They burst into delighted laughter at the irony of hearing a queen claim to be afraid of a poor scribe. But I was afraid of the scholars I met on the road. I was afraid that they might resent me and, if I failed to show them proper courtesy and consideration, they might foment what unrest they could. Most of the people I saw on progress could not read or write. The ex-monks, priests and nuns surely could. They were educated. They could read rebellious tracts and read them to others. Worse, they could compose such pamphlets. I wanted them to be loyal to me. They had influence and could persuade where once they had preached.

  I have learnt the wisdom of bestowing attention on the smallest and least important. If I do so, they will remember and retell our encounter for the rest of their days. I also know that it delights onlookers to see me pay more attention to those without status than to those who are already important enough. I wonder at those among my retinue who regard themselves as too high and mighty to hobnob with the common people. When I call some cottager, schoolmaster or midwife over to me, I see some of my fine lords and ladies clutch their pomanders closer to their noses and hitch up their gowns as if in fear of contamination. What fools they are. They do not realise that just a little kind attention will reap a lifetime of loyalty. I have permitted my hand to be kissed by the dirty and even the snotty-nosed. I laugh with the lowest of the low and clap the unimportant on the back with brotherly affection. They gawp at me and I see their eyes soften with admiration and – yes – love. And in that love resides great power.

  It is in this, perhaps, that my cousin and I are at our most different. I was a child brought up without much love and little admiration. I was no one’s pampered darling and I knew from an early age that any luck I had I would need to make on my own. So it is, I suspect, for many in my kingdom. They must scratch out what living they may and never waste what little luck comes to them. Without the loyalty of the ordinary people, I know that as a woman whose right to the throne is questioned by many, I could be ousted from it easily. I also know, thanks to my cousin’s foolish example, and my poor sister’s, how easy it is for adoration to turn to hate.

  My pampered cousin had no interest in the approval of her subjects. I think she saw them as an alien rabble and had no fellow-feeling. She was as foreign to them as they were to her. She regarded her throne as hers by divine right and never seemed to grasp that while God may give us our thrones, it is the ordinary people who allow us to keep them. She was not the only one.

  Just a few days after our visit to Frimley, at Titchfield, the pre-eminent nobleman of the land Thomas Howard, Duke of Norfolk, left my entourage quietly, without formally taking his leave of me. This rather unexpected departure by a man as prominent as the Duke of Norfolk was remarked upon. As a widower and a Catholic, he was pursued by rumours, but I did not pay them serious mind.

  The maidservant is making amends to the cat. She is offering it a fish head left over from last night’s supper. He comes sniffing at it, still protective of his dignity. He has tried to remove the dirty dishwater, cleaning his black coat diligently with his pink tongue, but still much of his fur remains matted and wet. The maid is making little clucking noises and reaches out to scratch the cat behind his ears. He pulls back, suspicious still, but the temptation of the fish is too great. He succumbs and takes the head daintily in his mouth as the maidservant strokes his fur and calls him soft names. They stand in a patch of watery sun, but I can see their breath, icy against the air. Suddenly I myself shiver and become aware of the cold. I reach out and pull the casement closed and as I do, the noise and movement alert the maidservant. She looks up and sees me at the window. She recognises me and immediately drops into a low curtsey. The cat, no respecter of persons, takes his opportunity and, fish head clasped firmly in his mouth, he leaps gracefully over the wall and gets away.

  Fourteen

  ‘My lord. Cousin, tarry a moment – what news is abroad?’ I put out my hand to detain Thomas Howard, Duke of Norfolk. The rest of my councillors continued to depart through the carved oak doors being held open for them. We had just finished a meeting.

  The duke smiled and performed a courtly and elaborate obeisance.

  ‘Alas, I am aware of no news of any import, Your Grace.’

  ‘No? You come from London and can tell me no news of a marriage?’

  His eyes widened with surprise and, if I read their expression right, with fear. ‘I … no … I … what marriage, Your Grace?’

  He stammered and blushed and shifted his weight on his silk-clad legs. He was fond of fine clothes: they advertised his status. We were related through my mother. His grandfather and namesake, the third Duke of Norfolk – this Thomas Howard was the fourth – had been brother to my grandmother, Elizabeth Howard, who became Boleyn. The third Duke of Norfolk had schemed to have his niece Anne married to the king, for which, I suppose, I ought to feel much gratitude. When that triumph proved short-lived, so to speak, Thomas Howard the elder did not give up. He bided his time until he saw his next opportunity. His poor, foolish granddaughter Katherine Howard was the next pawn in the game, married at seventeen to my father who by that time was three decades her senior. So ill-fated were the third duke’s political games that both his young female relatives – my mother and my erstwhile stepmother – lost their heads. Perhaps such outcomes explain my lack of necessary gratitude towards the Howard family.

  ‘What marriage, Your Grace? I know nothing of any marriage, apart from base rumours and scuttlebutt not worthy of repetition. You don’t mean those rumours, Your Majesty? Surely not.’

  I did not reply, but kept my hand firmly on his arm. I also remained seated, forcing him to look down upon me. Carefully, without loosening my grip, I turned my head back to my council papers and began to annotate a margin. I could feel the duke wriggle slightly beneath my fingers, but he did not quite dare to pull away. Eventually he broke the silence between us.

  ‘The rumours you have heard, Your Grace, they are false. Others – my lord Maitland – may have suggested to me that a match between the Queen of Scots and my humble self would make much sense, but that does not mean that I have attached to them any importance, or that I harbour any desires in that direction.’

  I nodded, bu
t continued to scribble notes with my right hand while I held his arm with my left. I noted his attempt to deflect responsibility to the powerful and devious Scot William Maitland, a man whose loyalties were always suspect. But still I did not speak.

  ‘My good wife, Elizabeth, as you know, Your Grace, has been dead these two years and I have mourned her greatly and have three fine sons, so I am not in need of an heir. I would prefer not to marry again. Nay – three wives, all of them lost too soon and much lamented, are more than enough for any sane man, Your Grace. And, for all we know, the Queen of Scots has a husband, still living.’

  We had not then heard of Bothwell’s fate but, since he was the acknowledged murderer of Mary’s first husband, an annulment would not have been hard to get.

  ‘It is not your lack of heirs that is the issue here, I suspect, my lord. It is my own lack thereof.’ At my words, said quietly with my head still turned towards my papers, I felt the muscles of his arm stiffen under my hand. He stopped jiggling and froze.

  ‘Oh no, indeed no, Your Majesty. That was never— Of course, I would never— It may have been Lord Maitland’s thought. I cannot answer for what devilish or traitorous thoughts may go on in another man’s head, Your Grace, but I swear to you, on my late wife’s grave, that marrying the Queen of Scots is not something I have ever considered.’

  ‘Your family has a history of manoeuvring for power by making ambitious marriages.’ I still had not lifted my head, nor had I changed my quiet and reasonable tone. I had, however, removed my hand from his arm. I used it to put the paper I had been annotating to one side and take hold of another.

  ‘That was my grandfather, and I hardly knew him, Your Grace. He … was a loyal servant to you, Your Majesty, and whenever he spoke of you it was always with pride and admiration. He predicted you would be a great queen.’