by Barbara Kyle
Robert Young growled, “I hear Cardinal Pole called it a great victory.”
“A disaster,” said Sir Henry Peckham.
They sat in silence, chewing on their grievance and the challenge that lay ahead. Next up for debate in the coming days was the Exiles Bill. They could not afford to lose that one.
A cockfight was noisily underway in the next room. The battling birds flapped and squawked in their frantic fight to the death while the gamblers yelled encouragement. The bloodlust sickened Richard as he thought of George Mitford and that rabble who had come to watch him burn. And poor George was just one of so many—well over two hundred had been sent to the stake. This Queen had much to answer for.
He took in the bitter faces around him. To his left was Honor’s friend, the indefatigable Sir William Cecil, Richard’s astute leader in this fight. There were no official parties, but Cecil had been the driving force behind organizing a loose alliance of those opposed to the Queen’s bills. He was a skilled politician, and as Richard worked alongside him he had admired how the man kept at it day and night, coaxing MPs at suppers at his town house on Canon Row, calling informal conferences in local taverns, making common cause with men from all parts of the country, honing their discontent. And, perhaps most important, organizing the other leading men of the opposition, the others around this table. Peckham, Young, William Courtenay, Sir Anthony Kingston, Christopher Chamborne, Sir John Perrot, Alfred Roper. They were more than disappointed by today’s loss—they felt cheated, humiliated, outraged. And ready to fight back, Richard hoped. Roper’s pockmarked face was still red with fury. How many others felt the same? A hundred and nineteen had voted with them today—astonishing, he now realized, since it was rare for any bill promoted by the monarch to incite such opposition. But still it wasn’t enough. They needed a hundred and fifty-five. Defeating the Exiles Bill would be an uphill struggle, and Richard wasn’t sure it could be done, but a plan was starting to form in his mind. These men, he thought, are hungry to settle the score, and revenge is a powerful spur.
Cecil said quietly, “If we lose the Exiles Bill the danger goes beyond the threat to our property. It could embolden the Queen to move against Princess Elizabeth.”
“How?” Courtenay asked.
Richard said, “With a bill to declare her illegitimate and bar her from the succession.” Cecil had told him this morning.
“Good God,” Chamborne said, “I’d heard the rumors, but—”
“All true,” said Cecil.
There was a hush of dismay. “Would she dare?” Kingston said. “The Lady Elizabeth is a princess of the blood.”
“Northumberland did it,” Cecil answered darkly.
Richard well remembered those dangerous days not two years ago. At the death of the boy-king, Edward, the succession fell to his sister Mary, but the Duke of Northumberland made a grab for power and set his daughter-in-law, Lady Jane Grey, on the throne. The hapless seventeen-year-old was queen for nine days, until Mary rallied men and troops from all over the country, took back what was hers, and beheaded her cousin Jane.
“Northumberland’s scheme failed,” Cecil said, “but the Queen’s may not. I fear she dreams of passing on her throne to her husband.”
Peckham let out a low whistle of alarm. “Englishmen will never abide a Spanish king. Has she no sense?”
“Damn her eyes!” Roper growled.
“She has made no such motion yet, gentlemen,” Perrot said brusquely, “so let us stick to the issue at hand. The Exiles Bill. We must do our all to keep this malicious attack from becoming the law of the land.”
There was no argument. Every man here, and most other MPs in the Commons, too, had friends and relatives among the refugees who had fled the Queen’s policy of persecution. In Antwerp, Richard and Honor had hosted suppers for some of them, including Cecil’s brother-in-law, John Cheke, and his father-in-law, Anthony Cooke. Many were men of means, including the Earl of Bedford and Princess Elizabeth’s friends Sir Francis Knollys and his wife Catherine, Elizabeth’s cousin. The departure of these Protestants had begun as a trickle when the Queen had come to power, but became a flood as she’d stepped up her program of burnings. Richard downed his ale, trying not to worry about Honor’s long-ago conviction by the heresy court, and the threat that lurked for her because of it.
The immediate threat was to the exiles, for the bill would allow the Queen to confiscate their estates’ revenues, but Richard and the others were convinced that if she won this, she would set her sights on the property of suspected Protestants at home, and that threatened every man here and a good portion of their Commons colleagues, too. The trouble was, those colleagues were cowed by the Queen’s enormous power to punish and reward. She could make anyone who opposed her suffer, by stifling their advancement, while those who backed her got gifts of rent-rich lands or posts that brought windfalls of cash benefits.
“Our task is twofold,” Cecil said, getting down to business. “First, to keep on our side the hundred and nineteen who voted with us today. Some may be wavering, so we must be resourceful and vigilant in holding them to our cause. Second—and much more difficult—to win over the thirty-six we need for victory.”
“The great thing is we have Pollard,” said Chamborne. On the first day the Commons met, they had elected the Speaker of the House, who ran the proceedings. Sir John Pollard was a known Protestant sympathizer.
“We’ve got more than him,” Richard said, indicating Cecil. “Sir William, you’ve done miracles.”
Cecil looked far from convinced. “I’m afraid that’s what it’s going to take.”
Richard felt a pang of doubt. Cecil was the expert in this arena.
“A miracle…or else an uprising.” The quiet comment was from Sir Anthony Kingston, and it sent a subdued thrill through Richard’s colleagues around the table. He saw that they were all watching Kingston, waiting, as though wanting more.
“Anthony, have you had further talk with our friend?” Alfred Roper asked. His words were cautious but his tone rang with a fiery eagerness.
Kingston nodded. “Last night.”
Richard leaned in to Cecil. “Friend?” he whispered.
Cecil answered quietly, “Sir Henry Dudley.”
Richard knew the name. Dudley was a lifelong soldier, and had served as captain of the guard at Boulogne. During the Queen Jane debacle, the Duke of Northumberland had sent him to France to try to win backing for Jane.
“And does he still stand ready to command for us?” asked Roper. They all kept their voices low.
“Ready and willing,” Kingston said.
“As long as we will fund him,” Young put in. It wasn’t bitterness that steeled his voice, just realism.
“And pledge our retainers as his troops,” Perrot agreed.
“Still, as a last resort…” said Courtenay.
Richard wasn’t sure what to think. It was bracing to know that an experienced military commander was at hand should they need to resort to a real fight. And he did not doubt the commitment of these men. But he had marched with Wyatt, a brave commander, and seen Wyatt’s support evaporate overnight. Where Wyatt had failed, could this man Dudley succeed?
“War is always a last resort,” Cecil said grimly.
“But often the only way, sir,” said Roper. His pocked face had reddened again with zeal, and his eyes were alight like a Crusader’s. “And think, if we take Whitehall Palace, we can carry out the work of Christ. Destroy this devil-spawned queen and wash the streets clean with her papist blood.”
“No, sir, we will not,” Cecil said firmly. “If revolt is necessary, our goal will be to exile the Queen, not to kill her.”
The zealot, Roper, disgusted Richard. The last thing the country needed was to replace one tyrannically religious regime with another. Twenty years ago he had seen abominable cruelty in Münster, the work of fanatic Protestants. It was not love of Christ that drove them, but hatred of Catholics. Cecil obviously had faith in the war-eager Rop
er, so he must be reliable, but all Richard saw was a dangerous weak link of extremism. Zealots love to preach, he thought, and one unguarded word about planning an insurrection could lead them all to the gallows. But he was no strategist, so he held his tongue.
“Let us endeavor to win the battle without shedding blood or treasure,” Cecil told Roper. “Let us look to Parliament and rally our troops there.” It was a clear order to cut short the talk of rebellion. “Now, here is what we must achieve tonight.”
He talked on while the fight in the next room climaxed with a cock’s crow of victory and the winners’ jubilant hoots. By the time the nine of them adjourned, each had a roster of names of fellow MPs whom they had pledged to persuade or cajole into seeing where their best interests lay. They had to accomplish it by tomorrow’s vote.
As they were leaving the tavern, Richard said to Cecil, “Do you know the sergeant-at-arms?”
“Of the House? Martin Rowland. Why?”
“We just might need him on our side.”
They all bade each other good luck for the evening’s work ahead, and Richard walked up Fish Street under dark clouds pregnant with snow. He was heading back to the Crane Inn, where he and Honor always stayed when they were in London. After the taste he’d had of the tavern’s pork and pease, more like gristle and lard, he was hungry for a trencher of something decent before setting out to visit his list of MPs. The wind was still sharp, and as he turned the corner onto Thames Street the first snowflakes scuttled down past the rooftops. He passed Fishmonger’s Hall, and through the snow he saw the Crane Inn’s bright red and blue sign depicting the river’s three famous loading cranes. The inn felt like a second home. He had known its owner, Leonard Legge, since the day twenty years ago when he’d fished Richard, pierced with three arrows, out of the Thames. Legge hadn’t been able to save his eye, but he had saved his life. A fine friend. Richard remembered how Isabel, at age seven or eight, used to love coming along on his trips to London’s Blackwell Hall cloth market, just to stay at the Crane and play with Legge’s boisterous young brood. Those children were parents themselves now, and it was Legge’s little grandchildren who served the guests their meals and fetched their beer.
How the years fly, he thought as he opened the door to the warmth of the inn’s common room. Isabel was now a mother herself. He knew Honor longed to see their first grandchild, and so did he. But if and when Isabel and Carlos came home to England with their baby son, what would they find? John Grenville had always cast greedy eyes on Richard’s property, especially the abbey. It spurred his resolve to rope in those fence-sitting MPs. He would not let Grenville strip his children of their patrimony.
He climbed the stairs and opened the door to their room and stopped cold. Honor was on her hands and knees, scrabbling to reach something on the floor. She turned to him, white-faced. Dread thumped his chest. He had never seen her look so frightened.
15
Discord
December 1555
Honor gasped when the door swung open. Richard walked in. She sank back on her heels, weak with relief.
She had been so shaken when she left the palace, her legs felt so limp she hardly knew how she managed to hire a wherry for the downriver trip to the Queenhithe Wharf and then walk the two blocks to the inn. She could still see the Queen’s furious face…Grenville’s wolfish smile…the steel battle-axe atop the sergeant’s halberd. She had started to pack almost in a panic, and fumbled a money casket that crashed to the floor, spilling coins. She dropped to her knees and pawed at it with her bandaged hands to see if it was broken, but she was trembling and had to steady herself against the rim of the trunk she was packing.
“What are you doing?” Richard said, frowning at the jumble of clothes she had thrown in the trunk, more clothes heaped on the bed, another open trunk across the room.
“Leaving.” She abandoned the broken casket and began scooping up coins in handfuls despite her cumbersome bandages, and dumping the money straight into the trunk. “We have to leave.”
“Leave? What’s wrong? Has something happened at home?”
“Can’t go home, either. They’ll come for us.” Coins had rolled under the bed and she crouched lower, reaching out blindly to grope for them. She and Richard would need every ounce of gold now.
She heard his boots come closer, heard the worry in his voice as he asked, “Honor, what’s happened?”
“You cannot go back to Parliament.”
“What? Of course I’m going back. The Exiles Bill comes up for debate first thing in the morning.” She was still grubbing under the bed, desperate to reach the coins. “Forget those and look at me, would you?” he said. “You know what’s at stake. If we don’t defeat this bill we could lose everything we own.”
She turned on him. “If we stay we’ll lose our lives!”
She struggled to her feet and started toward the other trunk, but he grabbed her arm to stop her. “What in God’s name has happened?”
She looked up at his face and felt a shot of strength from his firm grip. Enough strength to pull herself together and tell him everything. How the Queen had turned against her in a rage, had cast doubt on Adam’s loyalty for saving Elizabeth, had questioned Richard’s loyalty for inciting the Commons, livid that she had ever pardoned him. She told him how John Grenville had been about to march her away with the palace guard. “And if she had agreed, I would not be here to tell you.”
“Good God.” He took her in his arms and held her close. “What hell for you.”
She closed her eyes, her cheek against his chest, and took comfort in the smell of him, that familiar mix of laundered linen, sweat, and horse.
“How did you stop her?” he asked.
“I didn’t. Frances Grenville did.”
He said baffled, “What?”
She pulled away to look at him, still not quite believing it herself. One moment Grenville had been about to march her off to some cell for questioning, and the next moment Frances was whispering to the Queen, and then the Queen told Grenville to let her go. “I think, maybe, it’s because of Adam.”
That seemed to stun him even more. “Is she so besotted with him?”
“Enough to want to save his good name, I think. And the Queen has such affection for her she relented.” It was the only explanation that made sense. There was a bang out on the street and she flinched. Just a wagon, she told herself, but it shook her back to the crisis. “Richard, the Queen’s last words were ‘Rein in your husband.’ She means it. You cannot go back to the Commons.”
He was looking across the room, his mind moving on. He said grimly, “This changes the battlefield.”
“Exactly. We have to get away as soon as possible. Back to Antwerp. For good. Come, help me pack.”
She started to turn, but again he took her arm to stop her. He looked at her for a long moment.
“Let me go. There’s so much to arrange before—”
“Honor, stop. We’re not going back. Now that we’re under suspicion, there’s no way to go but forward. We have to stay and fight.”
“Stay and…?” She did not want to say fight. The word felt sharp in her mouth, like a nettle. From the corner of her eye she saw snow fall past the window, jerking in the gusts as though in pain. Downstairs, someone was laughing. “Don’t you understand? We have to save ourselves.”
“I’ve given my word. There are good men counting on me. We need every single vote to defeat this bill, you know we do, because—”
“Damn the bill. Let them defeat it. It’s you the Queen is watching.”
“Because if we don’t,” he said pointedly, “if we let her have her way, we’ll be handing her a weapon to ruin us. I won’t let her steal everything we’ve built. We have to take a stand.”
She didn’t want to hear this. She turned to the bed and snatched things—a linen shirt of his, a silk shift of hers—and balled them up and threw them in the trunk.
“You know it’s true,” he said. “You knew it
when you warned the Princess back at Hatfield. You told her she may have to fight.”
“I was wrong!” She grabbed an armful of clothes and dumped the things into the trunk. “I was wrong about everything. I told Adam to stay with Elizabeth and it almost got him killed. I told you to take the seat in Parliament and it could get you killed.”
“What’s happened is not your fault.”
She slammed down the trunk lid. “No, the fault is all the Queen’s. And the power is all hers, too.” She went to the trunk across the room and picked up books stacked on the floor and threw them in.
He came to her. “People are counting on me, Honor. I have a job to do here.” He added gently, “And so do you. The Princess needs you. Cecil knew that when he asked you to advise her. Elizabeth is in as much danger as we are. More. You cannot desert her now.”
She looked at him, trying not to tremble, not show how deeply his words cut her. She shook her head, hardly able to find words. “I’ve had enough of danger, Richard. Enough of terror. George was…” She fought the quaver in her voice. “I cannot fight them anymore. I cannot bear another day of this.”
He seemed to take her weak tone as a surrender, and started to pull her into his arms. “I’ll do the fighting.”
“I don’t need pity!” she cried, pushing him away. “I need you to see sense and come away with me!”
He said very soberly, “I can’t do that. I will not slink back to Antwerp and forfeit everything we own. Honor, we have a good chance of winning this fight in Parliament if we—”
“That’s what you want. The thrill of Parliament. And for that you would bring down the Queen’s wrath on us.”
“Thrill? I’m scared to death.”
“Then come away!”
