by Jeane Westin
“The grooms, having been taught well by you, will have their post again. We intend Sir John to install his water closets in all our palaces, and it is more fitting that a groom should travel and work with him.” The queen looked away and into the fire, a signal that she had no more to say.
Mary stood, curtsied, and backed out of the chamber. Before she could quietly close the door, Elizabeth spoke again: “You may now wear our miniature, Mouse.”
Warwick waited just inside the ladies’ antechamber. “Congratulations, mistress of the sweet herbs, and when you wear her portrait brooch all will know how the queen loves you.” The countess looked closer. “But why so gloomy? You’ve been promoted to the queen’s third lady of the bedchamber and promised a titled, landed lord who will have the salt tax when he takes you.” Anne lifted Mary’s chin. “And here I read nothing but misery on your pretty face.”
“No, my lady—”
“But yes, mistress,” Warwick said, lightly mocking. “Yours is a very old story. Think you that you are the first to form an unsuitable attachment that the queen must save you from in her greater wisdom?”
Mary looked at her with new understanding. “You, Lady Anne?”
Warwick shrugged. “Long ago and all for the best. Leicester’s brother, the Earl of Warwick, was a good man and good husband to me, though we were not blessed with children.”
“Who was this unsuitable man, my lady?”
“I have forgotten,” she said, and turned away.
Mary sensed rather than heard that the countess had lied to herself for so long that she had passed into believing the lie. Mary wondered if that always happened and hoped that the countess was proof that it did and that it would be so for her. Unless there was a way to deny the queen’s good care of her, and she couldn’t think of any.
The new mistress of the sweet herbs was not sure of anything later that night. Passing by John’s rooms on an errand for Lady Margaret, Mary was unable to stop herself from looking inside when she found the door open. Her gaze had turned there without any command from her head.
He was standing by his narrow bed in an open shirt, breeches and bare feet, smiling at her, appearing as she wanted ever to remember him. He bowed.
She curtsied.
He motioned her inside, and in spite of the danger of being seen and reported for entering his apartment, she obeyed as if on a leash. “I didn’t have time to ask you earlier, but did you get my last letter from Dublin, Mary, Mary, quite contrary?”
“Yes, John.” And she laughed in spite of her apprehension.
“Were you going to answer it?”
“All dispatches are read by Cecil,” she said.
“Shut the door,” he ordered.
“No, John.”
He grinned. “ ‘Yes, John, no, John.’ Are you afraid of what I’ll do?” he asked, moving rapidly toward her, his arms outstretched.
“Of what I’ll do, and it cannot be, John. It cannot,” she repeated, and fled, half hoping that he would follow, though it was only her own feet she heard echoing in the marble hall.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
“Affection? Affection’s false!”
—Elizabeth Regina
Accession Day
November 17, 1599
Whitehall Palace
Mary managed her side-skittering white mare as the Tower cannon saluted the queen’s entourage entering the city’s crowded streets across London Bridge from Southwark. Citizens lined their way, calling, “God save Your Majesty.” In return, Elizabeth waved on each side and up to the highest windows, shouting, “God bless you all, my good people.” Mary knew that the queen’s greeting was her heart’s truth. She loved her people, the richly dressed nobles waving from their grand gilt-painted town houses, the shopkeepers by their ware benches and the ragged beggars kneeling on the broken cobbles, loved them as if they were all the children she’d denied herself.
The forty-first anniversary of the queen’s accession to the throne was a holiday for all the people. The queen continued to smile and wave to her subjects past St. Paul’s and down Cheapside toward Ludgate. She sat her prancing black hunter superbly as flowers were thrown under its hooves, forming a fragrant carpet to be crushed atop the refuse running in the gutter midstreet. The scent of roses masked even the rank odor of the tanneries near the Fleet River.
Passing York House on the Strand, the queen turned her head away and called out no greeting. Mary did not see Essex’s face in a window, but knew the queen thought he might be lurking out of sight. He was said to be ailing, but no one knew from what cause, other than his total loss of the queen’s favor. He had always been disposed to unknown illness when, after a quarrel, he was sent from court, and Elizabeth, knowing this, tried to keep her heart from being engaged by his yearning young face.
Everyone held their breath as to what would come next between angry sovereign and a disgraced former favorite, though the queen seemed in no hurry to decide, unable to settle for very long between melancholy and fury. Fortunes had already been wagered on the possibilities, with the most money bet on her forgiveness and the earl’s reinstatement to all his former high positions, as had always previously happened. This time, Mary was not so sure. She had sensed Elizabeth’s heart slowly hardening these past two months.
Cecil remained reserved, waiting for the queen’s decision. Mary overheard the Lord Secretary remark that advice to Her Majesty often brought trouble to the adviser, and she observed the truth of those words in what followed.
Raleigh and Francis Bacon did not heed Cecil, each for his own reason. Raleigh, obviously the earl’s enemy and unable to hide it, strongly advised the queen at every turn to prosecute. The queen was often angry with Sir Walter, because his judgment was frequently faulty and he would invariably criticize Essex when the queen was in her downhearted mood, forcing her to the earl’s defense, which annoyed her greatly.
Bacon, once an Essex follower, was more subtle, and used law yerly argument, keeping the queen’s interest. “Your Grace,” he reasoned, “His Lordship has clearly gone very far this time, and tried your forbearance to the limit.”
“Quite so,” the queen said, pleased to be understood, though Mary knew a courtier’s understanding wasn’t essential to Elizabeth.
“On the other hand, Majesty,” Bacon reasoned, “his prosecution without clear proof of treason could anger the more unruly citizens of London, who are always ready to erupt in riot. The public temper, Your Grace, ever seeks expression.”
All this Mary saw and heard, while knowing Bacon’s arguments for and against prosecution echoed the queen’s own indecision and encouraged her to weigh his opinions as much a match for her own. And, without doubt, caused her to consider him for a position on her council, which all the court knew he sought. Though he had influence, Mary determined she would never seek Bacon’s opinion about John, since he gave answers to please, not always the best advice for queen or subject. She already had too many such reactions swirling in her own mind when she was with John. And when she wasn’t. How could she defy the queen, a woman anointed by God whose will was law, making all defiance treasonous? Mary’s grandfather might give his consent to John in time. But how much time did she have? Back and forth. Back and forth. Her tangled thoughts allowed her no rest.
As the long royal train rumbled into King Street and through the Holbein Gate into Whitehall, the ladies left the grooms and gentlemen ushers to place all the queen’s furnishings. After decades of moving from palace to palace, each man, many of them the sons of her first grooms, knew his duties. Mary quickly followed Elizabeth and her other ladies to the long stone gallery overlooking the tiltyard, where the queen and her ladies traditionally watched all tournaments below.
The moment Her Majesty appeared in the window, trumpets heralded her coming and a knight in full polished armor on a richly caparisoned horse rode up the gallery steps to proclaim the day:
“In honor of our queen’s holiday
A gracious spor
t, fitting this golden time
The day, the birthday of our happiness,
The blooming time, the spring of England’s peace.”
The queen waved, thanked the knight and motioned Londoners in the bleachers to sit. At once trumpets proclaimed the entry of pairs of knights and their squires, most on horses, but one lord sitting astride a float built like a dragon who entered to great applause.
The tilt began and the weather stayed coldly crisp and clear.
Mary waited, her heartbeat mounting noticeably as John, his armor burnished to bright silver, took the field on a large dappled gray. His lance was tied round with black and white handkerchiefs, the symbol of virginity. Was it a tribute to the virgin queen or to Mary Rogers, or to all the court ladies who remained virgins or appeared to do so? Clever rogue! Each woman could think as she liked and only John would know. Mary suppressed a smile when she saw Elizabeth look pleased and nod. How could Mary’s woman-heart not adore such a man? Indeed, it was apparently impossible, since her hands were trembling, moist and warm.
On the first pass down the S-shaped barrier, John and his opponent’s lances both missed. At the turn, John took up another lance, lowered his visor and, following the trumpet’s sound, spurred his horse to a full gallop. Mary felt her nails bite into her palms. John’s lance shattered on his challenger’s shield and, without thought of her own risk in doing so, Mary rushed forward toward the open window, her legs having a will of their own. Such a sharp blow was dangerous to both men.
John reined in and rode around the barrier to the other knight, who had dropped his lance and swayed in the saddle. John valiantly held his opponent upright as they rode from the lists to applause from all the people who had paid their shilling to sit in the bleachers.
Lady Anne was at Mary’s back, whispering urgently, “Return to your place at once, mistress.”
Mary obeyed, stepping back behind the queen, who did not look at her, though she knew that the queen was probably aware of which knight had drawn her forward. Mary glanced up at the brilliant painting of Moses on the ceiling. Would that she had such wisdom. Could Elizabeth understand that Mary, too, was torn between love for a man and her duty to the sovereign? Surely the queen could see how alike women were, no matter what their station.
It was five of the clock when the tilt ended and those knights not too bruised or injured retired to the great hall for a feast with the court, the queen and her ladies. A fool with a belled cap led a monkey dressed in a gown and ruff from table to table, introducing the animal as the Duchess of Egypt, to the general merriment.
Her Majesty, as usual, was seated on the dais, taking a little of the many dishes offered, then eating only a bite or two of each. Drinking her watered wine in small sips, she graciously received each knight in turn. When John approached, his gaze on Mary, the queen greeted him fondly: “My gallant Boy Jack.”
“Majesty,” he said, kneeling.
“We congratulate you on your victory today, Sir Knight, but do think your talents wasted in the tiltyard. Your future fortune surely lies in the jakes.” Laughter swept down the hall.
John grinned and seemed to grow taller, though he knelt. “It’s not every day, Your Grace, that a poor knight can lay claim to more gaiety than a fool with a monkey.”
The queen raised her hand for silence. “Boy Jack, do not mistake us. We are well pleased with your water closet and bid you build one in each of our palaces of Windsor and Greenwich. When you have finished, you may return to us.” The queen had spoken loudly enough for all to hear, and again with barely suppressed amusement.
John stood and bowed with great flair. “Most well-loved godmother, I thank you with all my heart. Dame Fortune, men say, gives too much to many, but never gives enough to any.”
Mary gripped her chair. Oh, sweet Lord, another epigram, this one aimed at Elizabeth. And maybe Essex? How did he dare? He could be banished permanently.
But John had not mistaken Elizabeth. Clever impudence engaged her humor always. She smiled, then covered it with her fan, dismissing him with a wave of her hand. When John turned his head from the queen to glare at the diners lining the tables, the laughter ceased.
But the queen would have the final word. She called to Cecil before John had taken a seat at a lower table. “My Lord Secretary, send word that we desire the Lord Howard to attend us next month for Advent festivities and before Twelfth Night. I would have him meet a certain lady.”
Those in the court who did not know the gossip beyond John’s giving up his wager with Essex for the first bedding of Mary Rogers knew more now when they heard the queen and looked from John to Mary.
There was a buzz of whispers around the tables.
The next morning John left again on the queen’s service. Mary watched him adjust his bridle and stirrups from a shadowed seat overlooking the stable yard, and although he looked back toward the palace, he could not see her. She leaned heavily against the stone wall, needing support as he rode out, the dust and strewn hay he stirred quickly settling. Another month or even two without him. And what more? Would Lady Howard die and Mary Rogers’s betrothal be announced during Christmastide, when that lord was at court? Or would her marriage be celebrated? It was a great honor for the queen to attend a lady’s wedding, since she disliked them so. Others would be envious.
Mary looked far down the Thames, thinking to see the Tower, understanding at the thought of such a marriage what it was to be a prisoner for life.
On November twenty-eighth, late in the afternoon before the supper ceremony, the queen called Cecil to her. Mary labored with the queen’s personal and bed linen in the closet, folding clothes just delivered by the queen’s washerwomen. Placing them in the press, an ingenious machine that lowered one plate on a screw to rest tight against another plate, flattening all the wrinkles, she then separated the personal from the bed linen and laid them in their separate chests with small cloth bags of dried rose petals and violets between the layers. Lavender would have been sweetest, but the queen could no longer abide the heavy scent.
“Majesty,” Cecil said, his long, narrow face purposeful as always, “I have brought several documents for signing.”
Mary heard him clearly through the open doors to the queen’s antechamber.
“Not now, Pygmy. We have decided to see for ourselves if my lord Essex is truly too ill to answer the charges we will bring against him in Star Chamber, with or without his presence.”
Cecil hesitated, and Mary could sense him carefully choosing his words. “Your Grace, the people might be better satisfied if he were allowed to openly answer.”
Following a long silence, the queen, unable to keep all bitterness from her tone, asked, “Is he yet so much their hero?”
“Your Grace, they remember him from the heroic attack on Cádiz harbor and the taking of that town.”
Elizabeth replied impatiently, and Mary wondered if the queen were advancing on the chair where her sword customarily hung. Did she use it as a symbol of her power, as when the sword of state was carried before her in procession? Or was it the only way an old queen could express serious anger without fear of fainting?
But the queen was speaking, her tone ever more fierce. “. . .and do they not remember his more recent great failures off the Azores, when he missed the Spanish fleet because he sought personal glory over following his sovereign’s orders, and again, of late, in Ireland for the same reason? This much-too-mighty lord will be tamed, sir! I rule here!”
Cecil hesitated again, and Mary sensed that great intellect atop the twisted body working on a careful response. “Majesty, the people need their faith in heroes, someone to lift them out of their daily miseries and offer them purpose. When their hearts are invested in such a man, it is difficult for them to give him up, no matter what his exposed failures. They simply dismiss them.”
Mary held an embroidered silk night shift in midair, expecting to hear the queen fly into a jealous rage. She was relieved by a thoughtful answer.
“You are wise, Pygmy. We made no mistake in you, or our worthy Spirit, your father. Yet we must see for ourselves if he is truly ill, for he will answer the flaunting of his sovereign’s orders. And to my face!”
“Majesty, your doctor reported him near death.”
“Doctors are fools. We will judge, and will require Lord Worcester to attend us with two of our ladies. Tell him to meet us at our barge.”
“As you will, Majesty.”
Mary heard the doors close behind him. Finished with the linen chests, she rose and silently entered the room where Elizabeth sat.
“Mouse, you and Lady Warwick will accompany us. Cloak yourselves.”
“Yes, Your Grace.” Mary curtsied and stepped quietly into the ladies’ antechamber, where the Countess of Warwick was already donning a suede rain cloak.
They traveled by the queen’s barge, the bargemen fighting the outgoing tide running fast, and at dusk ascended the river stairs at York House. Mary looked up at Essex House next door, facing the Strand with a garden running to the Thames. A woman in black mourning stood in a rear window, watching. Mary looked a question to Lady Anne, who nodded and mouthed, His wife. The queen seemed to pay no notice. Why would she? She had ordered Essex to be held in York House, next to his own Essex House, but not to allow visitors of any kind, least of all his wife.
For a moment, Mary’s heart ached for Lady Essex, so near her husband. Her Majesty was still firm in keeping them apart, allowing no loving comfort or extra support by his friends to the man who had betrayed her own love and friendship. Mary imagined herself standing in some northern manor window, looking out, remembering, regretting, and drew her cloak tighter about her body against the chill.
Lord Keeper Edgerton rushed from a rear door with a lantern and knelt. “Majesty, I did not know you were coming, or I would—”
