The Virgin's Daughters

by Jeane Westin

  Cecil and his messenger bowed and backed away.

  Lady Warwick motioned the ladies to withdraw and they all walked quickly into the antechamber, leaving the door slightly ajar to listen for the queen’s call.

  Mary looked back and saw that Her Majesty had closed her eyes and rested her head against the high back of her upholstered chair, nothing to be read in her expression. She had long ago learned to hide her thoughts from her face.

  Mary hoped she had showed a tenth part of Elizabeth’s skill later, when she asked Lady Warwick if she might take the air in the courtyard garden and made her way toward that exit. It had rained earlier and swept clean the rough-cobbled palace courtyards. She turned away from the smooth gravel garden paths laid in geometric patterns, drawn out into the open by the fresh scent of rolling fields and woods. She swung out through one of the four-story gates into the north pasture, which was filled with tents and frolicking dogs. Nonsuch was not as large as Whitehall or Richmond, and many lesser courtiers had to live as they could. She took the carriage road toward the wooded hills, where she might find solitude and read John’s letter without raising questions.

  “Mistress Rogers.”

  She looked up to see the Earl of Hertford approaching slowly. She curtsied. “My lord.”

  “A word, if you please, Mistress Rogers. You were with my Kate for many years.”

  “As a very young child, my lord.”

  “Was her death”—he breathed deeply—“an easy one?”

  “Very peaceful, my lord earl,” she lied.

  His mouth relaxed, though she suspected he would question her answer later, since everyone knew that the bloody coughing death was never easy.

  He bowed and walked away.

  “My lord,” she called softly.

  He stopped, but did not turn back to her.

  “Ned was the word on her last breath before she saw heaven’s gate open to her.”

  Hertford grasped his stick tighter and walked on slowly, though Mary heard him mutter, still defiant, “I will soon be with her where God rules.”

  Wondering if she had said the right words, and if they would bring future solace or hurt, Mary moved toward the woods to be alone, to hear no command, no entreaty, no sly hint . . . the daily currency of the court. She stepped well into leafy shade and shafts of light under an old oak, kissed John’s signet seal on her letter, then broke it and slowly read the single sheet. Every word was so like him, she heard his voice speaking. She lifted the paper to her nose, trying to catch his scent, but there was only leather from the pouch and the salt of the Irish Sea. Distance had shed what there had been of him, except his words. She leaned against the rough bark and slid down, not thinking about her gown, and sat in leaves to read the letter again. And again.

  Michaelmas Eve

  September 28, 1599

  Early in the morning, just after sunrise, John, exhausted and covered with the dust of hard travel from Dublin, arrived at the ferry to Lambeth with Essex and a half dozen of his handpicked friends. John was certain he had been included in the party because His Lordship thought the queen’s liking for her godson would soften her anger at his return from Ireland against her express orders, nearly a treasonous action in itself. John wasn’t so sure he could help Essex or wanted to. He was also not at all satisfied that Essex and the eager lords around him were not prompted to rebellion, or some bold act against the queen’s person. Their speech was rash and, if overheard, surely would be counted treason. They talked of killing Robert Cecil and reducing Elizabeth to a puppet queen with Essex as the real power.

  John knew he had to reach the queen first or be suspect himself.

  At Lambeth, Essex seized fresh horses and headed for Nonsuch, ten miles south of London. A rider, whom John recognized as Lord Grey of Wilton, passed them at a gallop, refusing Essex’s shouted orders to stop.

  “Let me go after him,” Sir Christopher St. Lawrence begged. “I will kill him and afterward Cecil.”

  “I forbid it,” Essex said, and John saw that Essex was suddenly aware that such an act would be unforgivable and had stepped back from the brink. But Essex was half-crazed and might change his mind in the next minute.

  “My lord,” John shouted, “I have the best horse. I will follow Grey and command him in your name not to speak of your arrival at court.”

  “Go, John, and block Grey’s way to Cecil.”

  Eager to escape the escalating madness, John spurred his horse toward the dust cloud, though he knew he would never overtake Lord Grey of Cecil’s party, who now smelled trouble and was whipping his horse to a furious gallop.

  Reaching the main entrance towers at Nonsuch, with its enormous stucco wall painting of Henry VIII as Zeus on his throne, John clattered into the cobbled courtyard. He turned right toward the stables, throwing his reins to a groom and running on stiff legs toward Cecil’s office. The secretary was eating breakfast with one hand and writing one of his endless papers with the other.

  “Sir John,” he said, half standing as John burst upon him.

  “Essex is hard by the gate, Cecil, and his mood is such that you should warn the queen.” John collapsed into a chair to take needed breath.

  “Lord Grey has been and gone in haste and reported as much.” Cecil seated himself, but made no further move.

  “My Lord Secretary,” John pleaded, “did you not hear what I said?”

  “Yes, Sir John, I have had communications from Ireland since he arrived. I know what was done and not done and what was said in his closest councils. I have been ready for the earl since he left Ireland, and was troubled to hear you were among his men.” He shrugged. “The guard has already been doubled around the queen, though I didn’t alarm her by making it obvious.”

  John was not surprised, but he was upset to have his loyalty doubted. “I have served my godmother always, my Lord Secretary.”

  Cecil nodded and dipped his pen into the ink. “I know that as well.”

  John clambered up, swaying with fatigue. “Stop Essex and the hotheaded scoundrels around him, or you send him to his doom.”

  “He sends himself, Sir John. No one can save Essex from Essex. It was always going to end this way.”

  Cecil sat as straight as his crooked back would allow and smiled.

  John summoned energy he thought had fled and flung himself away, running down endless halls, through the presence chamber and into the queen’s antechamber. He meant to warn the queen, to protect Mary from desperate men . . . to do something, anything to interfere with events that were now cascading beyond control.

  The queen’s antechamber doors stood open, the guards stationed near the presence chamber down the hall. They should be nearer. Surely Cecil would not endanger the queen to trap Essex. Or would he?

  John walked into the antechamber, knocking on the inner privy chamber door, his hand on his sword, ready to draw if necessary. “Majesty, my lord Essex swiftly approaches,” he called.

  Inside the Queen’s bedchamber Mary heard John’s voice with relief. He was here. She would see him, touch him. Then she saw Elizabeth’s eyes grow wide, wounded, her hand jerking to her face. The queen touched what Mary saw, what everyone saw, felt what she had not been able to look at since banning all mirrors: her puffy eyes in her sagging face.

  Elizabeth clutched at her brilliant blue embroidered silk morning robe, open and showing her ashen neck. Wisps of gray hair straggled from under her nightcap. Elizabeth was abruptly more distraught woman than queen.

  Essex, his rough clothes covered with dust, his face exhausted, but still impossibly handsome and boyish, opened the privy chamber door without knocking and rushed in, his men crowding close behind him.

  John, held by Sir Christopher in the antechamber, twisted out of his grip and slipped inside, standing to one side of Essex’s men, separating himself, his hand on the hilt of his weapon, alert to any sudden moves.

  The earl knelt and began to swear his love and duty in a choked voice. “Your Grace, I must
speak.”

  The queen gripped the table before her. “Say on,” she said, her voice unlike Mary had ever heard it.

  “Majesty, it is beyond the strength of any man to be absent from your beauty for so long. I have gained for you an end to the Irish rebellion, as you commanded, led men to their death for your honor. Now I find I cannot breathe without the sun of your person shining on me. I am more yours at this moment than any man.”

  Mary’s hands were frozen in midair, holding the queen’s curled wig, her eyes on John’s face to see if he was well, unwounded. Then the queen’s hand jerked to her breast to cover her heart. Elizabeth was in fear for her life.

  Lady Warwick, obviously stunned by this astonishing intrusion at such an hour and into the center of the queen’s privacy, moved to protect the queen with her own body, but as suddenly as fear had descended on them, it lifted.

  The queen’s face softened with a slightly tremulous but fond smile. “My lord, I see you as you are. You see me as I am. Now go and refresh yourself while I finish my toilet. Return later and we will talk much of the Irish adventure.”

  Essex, pouring out more words of longing, his shoulders slumping with what Mary thought must be relief at this reception, rose and backed from the chamber. He looked at John with an air of triumph and, before the doors to the antechamber closed, Mary saw that John looked a warning to her . . . or a question . . . or more she could not read, but hoped she could guess. She must see him alone. He had been so close, across a room, and yet as far as he had been for months.

  “Boy Jack,” the queen called, regaining her full voice and courage. “I believe you innocent of any foul intention.”

  “Godmother, never in my life have I acted or had a thought to act against your royal person.”

  Elizabeth nodded. “Follow my lord Essex and see that he goes to his quarters, then quietly send Cecil to me at once.”

  “At once, Majesty,” John said, bowing, and left, though Mary could see that his body sagged with fatigue. She longed to speak to him, to be pulled into the warmth of his arms. Soon, pray God, soon.

  “Lock the doors,” the queen shouted at the gentlemen ushers and yeoman guards whom Essex and his followers had bypassed, probably by coming through the servants’ hall.

  Mary, the wig in her hands, stood behind Elizabeth and saw that the queen’s counterfeit welcoming smile had been replaced by taut relief. Mary saw no affection for Essex there.

  “He saw me like this?” The words, sad and wondering, violated, trailed away. The queen took one deep breath. “Dress us quickly,” she said, and it was her regal dignity that spoke, swallowing the betrayed woman’s voice.

  Two hours later, when Essex returned alone, the queen waited in her apartment, wearing a gown of true silver threads and a pendant necklace of three huge emeralds. She graciously gave him her hand and allowed him to sit opposite her, while Anne Warwick, Lady Margaret, Mary and the other ladies were arrayed behind the queen’s chair. Silently, yeomen guards with long pikes stationed themselves inside both privy chamber doors, their eyes never leaving the earl.

  Her Majesty spoke for some time with Essex as he explained his troubles with the Irish and personal fevers and sundry ailments, obviously delighted with his now cordial reception, flirting with Elizabeth and her ladies in turn.

  “Majesty,” Essex said as he knelt to depart, “after the many storms of battle in Ireland, your loving soldier is happy to find such sweet calm in you again.”

  But Mary knew he would find neither sweetness nor calm. She’d heard Elizabeth give orders to Cecil to put him under doubled guard and call him before the council that afternoon to give account of his actions in Ireland, especially his disregard of the queen’s orders. For hours, it was reported later, he had only excuses, admitting to no fault of his own, blaming others, including John Harington. The council listened and voted against him. This handsome favorite had at last gone too far and fallen. Even his friends would not speak for him.

  Essex was commanded to keep to his chambers. And the queen, always fearful, ordered Cecil to watch for any suspicious troop movements in London. No one yet knew if all or part of Essex’s army was loyal to him and followed close behind him. His falseness raised fears in a queen who had been weaned and raised on lies and fear, a queen who knew how an ambitious and impatient man’s mind worked.

  The next morning, after reports from the west and in the city assured the queen that no such contingent loyal to Essex was abroad, she ordered Lord Keeper Edgerton to take Essex a prisoner to York House in the Strand. She refused to see him or read his letters of love and submission. “We have read and heard all his words before,” she said aloud to no one in particular, “once finding them delightful and moving, but now knowing them to be empty.”

  As Mary backed away, she heard the queen murmur again and again as if commanding her heart, “Strike or be stricken. Strike or be stricken.” Essex would not be pardoned this time.

  Later that day, in answer to a passing whispered invitation, Mary managed to slip into the woods near Nonsuch to meet John. He was waiting in the grove where she had read his last letter, leaning against an oak tree.

  “Come,” he said, lifting his arms to enclose her. “The shade is cool, but I am warm.”

  She laughed and ran into his embrace. He lifted her, swinging her about, careless of who might see, holding her so tight she could scarce draw breath.

  “John, oh, John, have a care that we are not seen.”

  “I cannot, with you so close at last.”

  She caught her breath. “You didn’t find the Irish maids pretty?” It was a jest, but an answer she needed.

  “I didn’t look.”

  She laughed, not believing him and wanting to believe him together.

  A party of courtiers came strolling on the carriage road near the woods.

  He pulled her deeper into the shade, kissing her face, her hands, and taking her lips again in a searing kiss. He stopped and loosed her a little to let her breathe. “Earlier when I saw you—”

  “John, I wanted so much to run to you when you came to warn the queen.”

  “Sweetheart, I feared for you, as well as Her Majesty, knowing Essex was half-mad with worry and hating you above all women. He knew that too many reports of his conduct had come to the queen.” He kissed her again and they forgot Essex for as long as they could.

  “Essex is finished,” she said against his lips, not wishing to be even the slightest distance from him.

  They stood in silence to let another group of strollers pass, but one man stopped to look inside the glade.

  “Soon, my love,” John promised, and strode quickly to the carriage road. “Ho, Sir Josiah,” he said, drawing the group away.

  As she tended to her duties in the palace, Mary saw everyone wondering and wagering how many days or weeks it would take the queen to forgive Essex this time. When Mary returned to the ladies’ chamber, Anne Warwick motioned for her to come close.

  “The queen wishes to speak to you at once . . . and alone.”

  My sweet Lord! She had been observed. But at Mary’s indrawn breath, the countess reassured her: “Nothing to worry you, my dear.”

  After a quick tug on her kirtle and a glance in the ladies’ mirror to see that no leaves clung to her gown and her ruff was straight, she entered the bedchamber as quietly as possible. The queen often forgot that she had called for a lady and was displeased to be disturbed. But this evening she sat close to her fire as she had during their first meeting. Mary approached and knelt.

  Elizabeth looked up, distracted. “Mouse?” she asked, not completely focused. Mary had no doubt what had occupied the queen’s mind to bring such sadness to her face, and she remembered seeing it before. It was the face of lasting loss that only a death, or something as permanent as death, could bring. She had seen it before on her grandfather’s face when her father was killed and when Lady Katherine Grey wrote to her Ned.

  “Your Grace,” Mary said.


  “You are an unaffected, sweet-tempered maid, Mary Rogers, and we are well pleased with you. Lady Warwick has high regard for your diligence.”

  “Majesty, to serve you well is my happiness.” It was not a lie, but not the whole truth, either.

  The queen smiled ironically and took a deep breath. “If you wish to serve us well, give up all notion of Boy Jack.”

  Mary did not raise her head because the queen would see everything confirmed in her face. Of course, Cecil opened all the dispatches and reported their content to the queen.

  “Do not mistake us. We love the rogue dearly, but we would be a natural mother to you and warn you from unsuitable men . . . although we grant you have had a settling effect on Jack. We would see you rewarded as you deserve for your caring of us. We have in mind for you our distant cousin Lord Matthew Howard, a lesser member of that family, but good advancement for you, in our eyes.”

  Before showing her face to the queen, Mary made an effort to compose it. “Majesty, is it true that Lady Howard yet lives?”

  “That unfortunate lady has a growth in her belly that has not proved to be a babe at her years. You will be mistress of a great northern manor. His Lordship has already spoken of you with me.”

  Mary felt her clasped hands tighten at her waist. Such a lord, who looked for a replacement before his current wife had suffered to her end, was not a good man, to her mind. A graybeard, he must be approaching fifty years.

  The queen smiled, rightly reading her thoughts. “Men of any age do not like to be without a bedmate.”

  As if Mary’s life were now completely written, the queen added, “We are promoting you from mistress of the stool to mistress of the sweet herbs. You will have care of our body linen, a great responsibility. And one final duty . . . the care of our ivory treasure chest.” She motioned to her bedside table to the small carved box that she always kept near her in the same place in every palace. No one knew what was in it, but everyone guessed it to be precious.

  Mary forced a smile. “I thank you, Majesty, for this honor, but who will care for your closestool?”