The Heresy of Dr Dee jdp-2

by Phil Rickman

  ‘If I’d refused to step into that barge, Sir William, would they have brought me here in chains?’

  Cecil’s guard-dog eyes widened fractionally.

  ‘You think chains would have been necessary to restrain you? Taking more exercise nowadays, is it?’

  ‘Bigger books,’ I said. ‘Higher shelves.’

  He didn’t laugh. For Cecil, banter was never indulged in for its own sake, only to grant himself more time to think. I noticed he’d put on more fat since last I’d seen him, as if to make himself harder to shift. Fewer than forty years behind him, but you’d have thought at least fifty.

  ‘John, I regret that we haven’t spoken a great deal since your return from Somerset with the, ah… remains of King Arthur.’

  ‘The Queen—’ I cleared my throat. ‘The Queen believes it was Dudley’s mission. I was there to hold his bridle while he resolved matters.’

  I wouldn’t normally have passed this on, but I was tired of being undervalued and thus underpaid and guessed that, for the first time, this man, who had survived service to three successive monarchs, would begin to understand.

  ‘Oh really,’ Cecil said mildly, ‘What else would you have expected?’

  There was considerable tension this year between Cecil and Dudley, whose star had grown brighter in the royal firmament than Venus at dawn. Cecil, meanwhile, had been deemed a disappointment for his failure, in negotiations with the French, to regain Calais for England. This had ever been unlikely, but the idea that it was even possible had been put into the Queen’s head by… Dudley, of course.

  I said nothing. The word was that Cecil had felt himself abused to the point where he’d tendered his resignation to the Queen. But then Amy Robsart, who had become Amy Dudley, had died and something had snapped like an overwound crossbow.

  Cecil went to sit down behind his trestle. The great window’s lower frames were barricaded from outside by the builders’ scaffold, but when he leaned back, tilting his oaken chair on two legs against the sill, at least half the spires of London were, once again, at his elbows, blurred by rain.

  ‘John, would you happen to know why Mistress Blanche wanted to see you?’

  ‘Would you?’

  ‘I might.’

  ‘However,’ I said, ‘when she – and, presumably the Queen – find out that you physically prevented the meeting taking place, as arranged—’

  ‘She’ll simply realise that you didn’t receive the letter. I gather it was left with your mother, you being absent at the time.’

  How the hell did he know all this?

  ‘Having gone off on one of your… expeditions in search of the Hidden.’ Cecil leaned forward until the front legs of his chair met the floor. ‘Do you want to know what this visit may have been about, John?’

  And what was I supposed to say to that? Cecil half stood to pull off his bulky black robe, revealing a doublet in what was, for him, the somewhat frivolous colour of charcoal. He tossed the robe across the wide trestle in front of him.

  ‘Now sit down,’ he said.

  * * *

  The people of the Welsh border take a long path to the point. My father loved to explain that this was because, in an area ever riven by conflict between the Welsh and the English, they would need to know precisely where a visitor’s allegiances lay before entrusting him with even the most trivial intelligence.

  I’d oft-times marked this approach in the manners of Blanche Parry, who retained her accent, but was inclined to forget that the family of William Cecil – from whose tones all trace of Welshness had long ago been smoothed – had once spelled its name Seisyllt.

  ‘Did you know Amy Robsart, John?’

  ‘I wouldn’t say I knew her. She tended not to come very much to town.’

  An understatement. The Queen was not exactly approving of wives brought to court, or even to London. Especially Dudley’s wife, obviously. In the absence of a Dudley country mansion, Amy had spent most of her married life as a guest of various friends of her husband. A dismal existence.

  ‘Met her once,’ I said. ‘On one of her rare visits to Dudley’s house at Kew.’

  ‘And what thought you of her?’

  At last I sat down. Truth was I’d thought Amy quite beautiful. Also intelligent, lively and warm. In my view – was this treason? – as a wife, the Queen would not quite compare. God help me, I’d even caught myself, wishing that circumstances had been such that I might have met her before Dudley.

  ‘You’re blushing,’ Cecil said.

  ‘Heat of the fire.’

  Cecil laughed.

  ‘What a waste, eh, John? As I oft-times think about a carnal marriage—’

  ‘Starts in joy, ends in tears?’

  Cecil frowned. I’d gone too far.

  ‘A perceptive saying of yours oft-times retold,’ I said, in placation.

  He made a steeple of his fingers. His own first marriage may even have been a carnal union, but his second one, to the severe Mildred, could only have been founded on a need for reliability and circumspection. Cecil was a man long wed to his career.

  ‘Do you know when he last saw her alive?’

  I did but said nothing, remembering something else I’d noticed at my one meeting with Amy. While she was – of necessity, no doubt – fairly compliant, there was a certain equality in her union with Dudley. She was not nobility, merely the daughter of a country squire, yet seemed in no awe of the son of the Duke of Northumberland. To his credit, he seemed to like that about her.

  ‘It was over a year ago,’ Cecil said. ‘Over a year before she died.’

  ‘A long time.’

  Too bloody long.

  ‘Distance,’ Cecil said, ‘can bring about a cooling.’

  ‘Sometimes.’

  I’d never have left Amy for even a week. When I was called to Europe, I’d have taken her with me.

  ‘Let’s not walk around the houses, John.’ Cecil let his hands fall flat to the trestle. ‘I was ever fond of Robert Dudley, but never deluded about the extent of his ambition. He wants the highest role possible for a man not born to it. His whole life has been a play performed for the Queen. Whose side he’s scarce ever left.’

  ‘And she wished him away?’

  Cecil was silent. Poor Amy’s fate, in these circumstances, saddened me more than I could say. The inquest had been opened three days after her body was found at the foot of a short stairway. And then adjourned sine die. Nobody knew how long before the jury would reach its verdict but when it came it seemed likely to be one of Accidental Death.

  Nobody to blame. I pointed out to Cecil that Dudley had gone to great pains not to be seen as having or attempting to have an influence on the jury, calling for men who were unknown to him to serve on it.

  ‘Unknown? Is that what you think?’

  I said nothing. Dudley had sworn to me his wife’s death from a fall had been a bitter shock to him, and I’d very much wanted to believe that. Although he’d said, on an earlier occasion, that she’d shown signs of unhealth and once had told him she might not have long to live, I’d refused to accept the dark stories, dating back some months before her death, that attempts had been made to poison her.

  ‘Not that it matters.’ Cecil half turned away from me to peer out over the shiny roofs of London. ‘The Queen herself is young, impulsive and will remain’ – Cecil swung round of a sudden to turn his mastiff’s gaze on me – ‘conspicuously besotted with a man now infamed and likely to remain so for the rest of his life.’

  ‘But if the inquest verdict clears him of blame—’

  ‘It doesn’t matter what the inquest verdict is. Enough men hated him before this to make even his return to court a slight against all decency. As for the thought of a Queen of England wed to a murderer… how does that play across the capitals of Europe? And if the Queen thinks everyone here will forget, in time, then she’s not as close to the mind of her country as she likes to believe.’

  ‘I don’t…’ I was shaking my
head, ‘I can’t believe that Dudley’s a murderer.’

  ‘Well, not directly, no.’ Cecil spread his hands. ‘No one’s suggesting he planted his foot in her spine and kicked her down the bloody stairs. But whether he ordered it to be done, in his absence, is another matter entirely. Never be proven, but what’s that worth in Europe? Especially if, after however length of time, the Queen does something blindly foolish. She’s had suitors of her own standing in France, Spain, Sweden… and keeps them at arm’s length. At home, she has the Earl of Arundel waiting with his tongue hanging out…’

  ‘No hope for him, surely?’

  ‘I know there’s no hope, you know there’s no hope, but the old bladder peers blearily into the looking glass, sees a face twenty years younger and tells himself it’s only a matter of time before the Queen sees the sense of it.’

  I nodded in wry agreement. It was well-enough known that Cecil’s own choice as a husband for the Queen was the Earl of Arran. A resident of France from a Scottish family with no love of Elizabeth’s cousin, Mary, the Queen of Scotland, who was also, since her marriage, Queen of France. In terms of a lasting peace in the north, Arran had much in his favour and would be a satisfyingly severe blow to French hopes of putting Mary on the throne of England.

  But the lure of a carnal marriage. Twin souls since childhood. The power of the heart…

  ‘The Earl of Arundel would have had Dudley dead years ago,’ I said. ‘Or so it’s said.’

  Cecil let a silence hang and the rain ceased as if he’d commanded it.

  ‘Arundel’s too old and too vain, but he’s hardly alone,’ he said at last. ‘Think of Norfolk. Think of those who conspired to get John Dudley topped and now fear Robert’s vengeance if he’s in a position to wreak some. Let me be honest. If he’s betrothed to the Queen, no matter how long after his time of mourning, Dudley must needs be looking over his shoulder all the way to the altar. Indeed, if a messenger was to come knocking on my door now with news that he’d been cut down… or shot… or skewered in a crowd…’

  My hands had tightened around the seat of my chair. The rain had begun again.

  ‘Why are you telling me this?’

  ‘What did Mistress Blanche want with you?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘Oh, come now, John. Who does the Queen trust more than Mistress Blanche to conduct business of a highly personal nature? And what personal business might concern you, as a long-time friend and confidant of Robert Dudley?’

  ‘I don’t know, I can’t—’

  ‘Think you not that the Queen might wish you to perform, in secret, a similar task to the one you did before the coronation?’

  The sound of rain against the good glass panes was like to a cackling laughter. I felt my heart lurch.

  ‘You mean… she might want me to choose, by the stars, a day that’s mete for…?’

  ‘A royal wedding,’ Cecil said. ‘Indeed.’

  XI

  Dark Merlin

  BY NOW I’D learned that Cecil never ventured an opinion without a degree of secret certainty. It was said that his ambitious young fixer, Walsingham, had agents at court who didn’t even know of each other. Spies who spied on spies.

  I leaned back, gazing at the window. London had misted, the steeples no more than indents on a bedsheet.

  A terrible logic here. The Queen, for all her will and vigour, was ever indecisive, changing her mind three times in as many hours. Would make a firm decision then sleep on it and awake uncertain again. Dudley was no longer someone to play with. She would have accepted that the urging of her heart would not be enough. Might well seek some indication of heavenly affirmation, the design of destiny.

  Might seek a date, however many months hence, which the stars found fortuitous for the announcement of a betrothal which at present would be abhorrent to so many.

  Behind me, the coal fire hissed as rainwater dripped down the chimney. I took in a slow breath.

  ‘How does Blanche feel about this?’

  Cecil smiled and made no reply. Which may have been an answer in itself. Blanche was a cautious and watchful woman who only lived to keep the Queen secure. No wonder she hadn’t turned her head this morning as her barge had glid past.

  ‘If the Queen’s determined on this, then she’ll try again to have Blanche reach me,’ I said. ‘What then?’

  ‘That, John… is precisely why we’re having this discussion.’

  ‘I can’t refuse. You know I can’t.’

  ‘Of course you can’t.’

  ‘And if what Dudley says about the coincidence of their times of birth is correct, then their destinies may indeed appear interwoven.’

  ‘Oh, please.’ The trestle groaned as Cecil leaned forward. ‘I have no doubts about your ability in this regard. Which is why I don’t want you and your fucking charts within a mile of the Queen at this time.’

  ‘I see.’

  Cecil leaned back, folding his arms, giving me silence in which to consider my situation. I recalled how, on our return from Glastonbury, I’d been summoned here and shown a pamphlet handed out free on the streets. It was heralding a second coming – the birth of the child of Satan, the Antichrist, in the new black Jerusalem. Which was London, the fastest-growing city in Europe.

  False prophecy originating from France, seedbed of the campaign to put the Queen of Scots on the English throne. I myself had been named as some kind of dark Merlin, canting spells at the lying-in of Queen Elizabeth, pregnant with the bastard child of Robert Dudley. Elizabeth, daughter of the adulterous witch, Anne Boleyn. They were now saying that the Queen – thanks, some said, to the magic and prayers of the French prophet and magus Nostradamus – had miscarried the babe. But the devil would not give in so easily.

  I said at last, ‘What would you have me do?’

  Cecil rose and put his robe back on, like a judge about to pass a hard sentence.

  ‘As I see it there are two approaches to this problem. One is for you to spend some time with your charts and return with the information that the stars at present are frowning on the prospects for a union of two people born under their particular signs.’

  ‘Which, as I’ve already said—’

  ‘Would be unlikely, yes.’

  ‘Sir William, I spent more than a year teaching mathematics and the elements of astrology to Dudley. One of the subjects he showed most interest in. What I’m saying is that to convince Dudley – and even the Queen, who’s far from ignorant of planetary movement – that the stars disapprove of their match—’

  ‘Or might better approve of them under some heavenly configuration not due to take place for… say, five years?’

  A lot could have happened in five years. The Queen’s infatuation might have lost some of its fire. Or equally it might be proved beyond all reasonable doubt that Dudley had not killed his wife. Who could say?

  I shrugged.

  ‘If it was not the answer she sought… I’m far from the only astrologer in England. All it needs is for one of them to go to another and my competency would be called into question. Also my integrity and all of my past work, and worse than that—’

  ‘All right. We’ll go no further down that road. Examined and rejected. This leaves the second path… from which you disappear.’

  Cecil rose, sweeping his robe behind him, and picked a single lump of coal from the scuttle with tongs and dropped it on the fire.

  ‘I mean on one of your ventures in search of the Hidden. We spoke of this earlier. Wouldn’t be the first time, would it? Were you to be gone even for a matter of weeks, that might be sufficient.’

  ‘Oh.’

  I felt a momentary relief. For one instant in time, I’d thought he’d meant that it was to be permanent, and the air betwixt us had seemed, of a sudden, cold with menace.

  ‘Do you have a matter of, ah, science, requiring your specific and immediate attention?’

  ‘I don’t know. Maybe.’

  ‘Preferably in some place at least two
days’ ride from London.’

  Dear God, this man thought he could move anyone around, like a chesspiece, to suit his purposes.

  Which, of course, he could. After a period when his advice had rarely been sought, Amy’s death looked to be putting him back where he was certain he belonged. And maybe he was right; I could think of no one at this time who was fit to replace him.

  Replacing the tongs, Cecil went back to his chair.

  ‘Methinks this expedition of yours should begin at once. Would you agree?’

  ‘Sir William—’

  ‘Which means you won’t be lying at your mother’s house tonight.’

  ‘But my mother—’ I rose to my feet. ‘My mother has need of me. The fabric of the house wants repair, the roof leaks.’

  I’d used this one before, but it was no less true for that.

  ‘Your skills extend to roofing, John? I’d hardly think so. But we’ll see to all of that. I’ll have a number of men dispatched to Mortlake to mend whatever needs mending. Your mother will scarce know you’re missing.’

  He was right. My mother would be in delight.

  Bastard.

  ‘My barge will take you back briefly to collect your bag, but I’ll want you away by nightfall.’

  ‘That’s impossible.’

  ‘Two days, then. Maximum.’

  ‘Sir William, if the Queen thinks I’m making distance between myself and—’

  ‘My problem, not yours. Two days. And stay out of London, meanwhile.’

  The discussion over, Cecil rose.

  * * *

  Enshrouded in a damp dismay, I stumbled out onto the cobbles and knew not which way to turn. The Strand, once the home of senior churchmen, was now rosy with the new brick of London’s richest homes. Not a place which the secretary, his building work yet incomplete, would want to leave.

  The rain had stopped and the brightening sky had brought out the chattering wives of the wealthy with their servants and pomanders, though this was hardly an area where nostrils might be assailed by the stink of beggars. Amongst the throng, I espied the unsmiling, unseasonably fur-wrapped Lady Cecil, out shopping with their two glum-faced daughters. Suspecting she’d be among those who considered me little more than a common conjurer, I turned back to walk the other way and thus glimpsed a man discreetly sliding through Cecil’s doorway.