Queen of This Realm

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Queen of This Realm Page 36

by Jean Plaidy


  “Robert,” I said, “you are wonderful. Is there anything you cannot do?”

  “Anything you ask me I will do for you,” he replied. “There is one thing I would you would do for me.”

  “Dear Robert,” I said, “who knows? One day perhaps all you desire will come to you.”

  A gleam of excitement shone in his eyes. I believe he was hoping for a great deal from the visit to Kenilworth. That was what I found so enchanting about Robert. He never lost hope.

  And so we came to Kenilworth. What a magnificent sight! The massive Keep which formed the citadel of the castle was of great antiquity and was called Caesar's Tower. There was a beautiful lake on the southwest side, over which Robert had had a bridge built. I was very happy as I rode forward with Robert at my side. I noticed in the strong sunlight that there were streaks of silver in his thick dark hair now—which somehow endeared him to me— but there was a look of such boyish enthusiasm on his face that I could not help smiling.

  I knew this was going to be the highlight of my trip—in fact, I believed, the zenith of all my wanderings—and not only because I loved to see the wonders of architecture and enjoyed the lavish entertainments my subjects devised for me, but most of all because it was Robert's achievement; he was proud of it but he could only be contented if I shared that pride.

  I said: “Robert, this is to be compared with any royal palace I ever saw.”

  I was reminded then of my father—as I often was—for when he had seen the splendors of Hampton Court, he had commented that it was too grand a house for a subject, and had soon taken it from Cardinal Wolsey and made it his. I did not want Kenilworth. I was content for Robert to have it; there was pleasure enough for me in remembering that it had come to him through my bounty.

  “It is only Your Majesty's presence in it that can make it that,” he said now. “You transform it. It is royal because you honor it. Without you it is nothing to me but a pile of stones and empty baubles.”

  That was not quite true. I knew he loved it and was often here. But it was pleasant to see the love in his eyes for me…as well as for Kenilworth.

  As we rode toward the Keep ten beautiful girls, all clad in white silk, appeared; they came toward us and one of them stepped forward and raised a hand. We pulled up, and coming to stand before me, she began to recite a poem which described the happiness my presence brought to Kenilworth this day, and the Sybil went on to proclaim that my coming to Kenilworth was symbolic of my coming to the throne, and she went on to prophesy a time of peace and prosperity for England under the great Elizabeth.

  I said: “What a delightful girl, what a pleasant voice and what comforting verses.”

  Immensely gratified, the sybils retired gracefully and I rode on with Robert until we came to a tiltyard, where a very big man, tall and square, a giant indeed, stepped out to bar my way, brandishing a club in one hand and carrying a bunch of keys in the other. He looked ferocious and quite terrifying and for a few seconds I wondered what was happening; but glancing sideways at Robert, I saw the smile about his lips.

  The giant demanded what was the cause of all the noise and who it was who dared to come riding into his master's stronghold which it was his bounden duty to protect. Then as he approached me, he looked as though he had been blinded; he put his hands up to his face and fell to his knees.

  “Rise, Sir Giant,” I said. “You seem less fierce than you did a moment ago. What has happened to change you?”

  “My Gracious Liege,” he cried in a parrot voice which suggested to me that he had the greatest difficulty in memorizing his lines, “I have been blinded by your glory. I have spoken rashly not knowing for a few moments what joy had come to my master's house. Clemency, Your Gracious Majesty, to your humble servant who, if you will forgive his initial mistake and take his club and keys of the Castle, only then can he hold up his head again and win back his master's regard for this terrible mistake.”

  “Rise and give me the keys,” I said. “I take them most willingly, and I congratulate your master on having such an excellent servant who is ready to defend him and his castle from all intruders.”

  The giant rose and handed me the keys, looking very relieved because his little act was over.

  As the gates were flung open, six trumpeters who were stationed on top of the wall, dressed in long garments of white silk, lifted their silver trumpets, and there was a glorious fanfare as we rode under the gateway into Kenilworth.

  There were more trumpeters on the walls of another tiltyard through which we went on the way to the inner gate. Passing through this we came to a pool on which floated a figure representing the Lady of the Lake; about her were nymphs holding blazing torches. As I stopped to admire, the Lady of the Lake began her peroration which was even more full of praise than that of the Sybil. Everything was so beautiful and original; and I was all attention wondering what was coming next.

  The bridge across the lake was about twenty feet wide, Robert told me afterward, and seventy feet long; and he had had it constructed purely for my pleasure. I dismounted and walked across beside Robert, and as I did so I was met by young men and women each representing a god of mythology, all with offerings for me. There was Sylvanus, the god of the woods, who presented me with birds—bitterns and curlews, live in cages; from Ceres I had sheaves of corn, and wine from Bacchus, fish from Neptune and musical instruments from Apollo. It was an enchanting pageant.

  As we came into the inner court Robert drew my attention to the clock in Caesar's Tower. It was one of the most beautiful clocks I ever saw, the face being a delicate shade of blue and the hands of gold.

  I said: “But look! It has stopped.”

  “All clocks have stopped at Kenilworth,” said Robert. “It means that while Your Majesty honors the Castle with your presence, time stands still.”

  He looked fondly at me and I thought: Would it be possible? Only with him. Never with another. And yet, would he be quite so tender, quite so caring, toward a wife—Queen though she was—as he was toward the one he was trying to persuade to marry him?

  Marriage grew stale. Courtship never.

  Even here at Kenilworth, I knew that I must be perpetually wooed but never won.

  WHAT HALCYON DAYS!

  Whenever I traveled my subjects took great pains to give diverting entertainments in their houses, but there had never been anything like this. Robert had thought of everything for my pleasure.

  “Even the Queen must remember this forever,” he said. “I want to make these days at Kenilworth some of the most memorable you have ever spent. I want no sadness to touch you, no irritation, however slight. Here is Your Majesty at this castle with your Master of Horse, whose great task and great joy in life is to serve you. I have thought of all that you love most to see and hear and do, and that is what I have planned. There shall be no moment of dullness. While Your Majesty is under this roof, every moment must be a joy, or I have failed.”

  “No one could ever arrange these matters as you can, Robert, but here you have surpassed yourself.”

  We hunted a great deal for he knew how I loved the sport, and he was always beside me. There were tournaments and tilting in the days and excellent feasting in the evenings when we would be entertained by tumblers, singers and musicians. There were colorful firework displays; and of course we danced every night. I danced chiefly with Robert. Although, of course, others implored the honor of partnering me, I never enjoyed dancing with anyone as I did with him—although men like Heneage and certainly Hatton danced more gracefully than he did. But I did not want too excellent a performance from Robert. He possessed all the masculine attractions to the full, and dancing perfection was not what I expected from Robert, although such as Hatton had won my regard for the performances they gave on the dance floor.

  I liked my men to show their different talents—and they did so admirably; but although I had always known that none could rank with me so high as Robert did, I realized during the days at Kenilworth how very m
uch I cared for him and how much a part of my life he was. During the years of my glory he had never been far from my side; he was closer to me than anyone else ever could be.

  Sometimes when I watched him with others I felt twinges of anger. I saw him dancing once with Lettice Knollys while Douglass Sheffield, sitting on one of the benches, followed their movements with yearning eyes. I felt annoyed—not so much with Douglass as with the saucy Lettice.

  When I was being helped to bed I noticed her there among my women, and I said to her: “It is time Devereux came back from Ireland, or you went to join him there.”

  “Oh, Your Majesty, I doubt I should be the slightest use to him there,” she said blithely. “He is completely absorbed in the tasks Your Majesty has set him.”

  “A wife should be with her husband. Long separations are unwise.”

  She said nothing but I fancied she was smirking a little, and when she was helping to unlace me, I gave her a sharp nip on the arm and said she was clumsy. I added that she must be absentminded thinking of her family at Chartley.

  She was never dismayed. She presumed too much on the Boleyn connection which made us some sort of cousins.

  There is a smugness about her, I thought, and I believed that at one time she must have been rather friendly with Robert.

  I would watch them. I was not having any immorality at my Court. Lettice was now a married woman, and if she did not remember it, I should.

  When the women left me, I dismissed Lettice from my thoughts. I was wondering what delights Robert had prepared for the next day.

  IT WAS SO HOT that July and because of this we did not go out hunting until the late afternoon and we would return in the twilight. Robert always had some new pageant to greet me and the days contained such a surfeit of entertainment that but for their brilliance and originality, they might have palled. I could never be sure what was being devised for my delight, and when I heard that the cost of all this exceeded one thousand pounds a day, I wondered at Robert's extravagance. When I mentioned this to him, he looked at me reproachfully and asked how he could count the cost when he was catering for the pleasure of his Queen.

  It was all very wonderful, but life had taught me that it is not natural to enjoy such unalloyed pleasure, and perhaps I began to look round for a little canker in the richness. I found that my suspicions would not let me get those women out of my mind: Douglass Sheffield and Lettice Knollys. Douglass I felt I understood; I could sum up her nature: soft and yielding, demanding affection which she should have got from Sheffield; and then there was something unsavory about Sheffield's death. Robert had feared that his promises to her might be brought to my ears. It was disturbing to wonder whether he would murder on my account. That thought brought back echoes from the past.

  However, the lady who caused me the most disquiet was Lettice. There was something so sly about her; she was harboring secrets. I had noticed the way in which she and Robert deliberately avoided looking at each other. That was not natural. Lettice was one of those women at whom men looked a good deal and Robert's studied indifference was too marked.

  So there were these suspicions to ruffle the soft beauty of the paradise Robert had devised for me and, though I forgot those qualms for long stretches at a time, and I threw myself wholeheartedly into the entertainments, they remained.

  Perhaps some of the most amusing moments occurred when the carefully organized pageants did not proceed as intended. I shall never forget the water scene which had been arranged to welcome me back to the castle after the hunt. It was on the lake, which always looked its best at night. Lighted by torches, the scene had a look of fairyland, and as I rode in I was greeted by the mermaid who was accompanied by a huge dolphin on whose back rode a masked man dressed to represent Orion.

  As I approached the lake Orion started to recite his verses; the theme was that which I had heard many times since coming to Kenilworth. I was the greatest Queen in the whole world. I had been sent by God's Grace to rule England. All was well while I was on the throne and Kenilworth was blessed because I had deigned to stay within its walls. The trouble was that Orion could not manage his words. Like everyone else he must have been instructed to learn them by heart, for to have read them would have robbed them of their spontaneity; and it was in any case unlikely that these people would have been able to read.

  However, Orion was having more difficulty than most and having stumbled his way through the first lines, he lost the thread and began again. I could see that Robert was getting very restive, but I was smiling pleasantly knowing that the humble man was doing his best.

  He had come to a stop and clearly he had forgotten the rest of his speech. He tore off his mask so that his hot face, purple with exertion, was exposed, and he cried out: “I am no Orion. I am but honest Harry Goldingham, Your Majesty's most loyal subject.”

  There was just a brief silence. Harry Goldingham had suddenly realized that he had ruined the pageant and was looking fearfully at Robert, glowering beside me.

  “But,” I cried, “my loyal subject Harry Goldingham you have made me laugh, and I do declare that I like your performance as well as anyone's.”

  Harry Goldingham leaped from his dolphin and came to kneel at my feet. I gave him my hand and he kissed it fervently. I had made a friend for life, and it was incidents such as this and my natural instinct for dealing with them which won the love of my people.

  I made it clear to Robert that I did not want Harry Goldingham reprimanded. I said: “I have enjoyed his efforts. There is a good man and a loyal one.”

  So that passed off very well and I said afterward that it was one of the highlights of my stay at Kenilworth.

  People from the surrounding countryside were allowed to come in and see the performances, but I think most of them came to see me. I was always gracious to them, being aware always of the need to hold my people's approval, and that it was more necessary to me than anything else.

  Some of the performances of these country folk could be a little wearisome, but I never showed that I was in the least bored nor that I compared their rustic antics with the sophisticated players who entertained me at Court.

  I sat through Hock Tuesday which was played by certain men of Coventry and was founded on the massacre of the Danes in the year 1002. The insolence and cruelty of the Danes and the bravery of Hunna, commanderin-chief of Ethelred's army, was stressed. There were realistic encounters between Danes and English knights, which ended in the Danes being beaten and held captive by the English women. This I took as a compliment to my sex.

  Afterward I expressed my delight in the play and my fears that the Danes might be victorious in swordplay.

  “Oh no, Your Majesty,” roared the English knights, “us 'ud never have let that be.”

  I said that I should have known the English must triumph.

  I gave gifts of money to the players, which pleased them well, and to make it a very special occasion I bestowed knighthoods on five members of the nobility—among them Burghley's eldest son, Thomas Cecil.

  There was one other play for my pleasure. This was entitled A Country Bridal and, compared with Hock Tuesday, it was a polished production.

  It was the story of a country marriage which for some reason was considered to be a matter for ridicule. The bridegroom was by no means handsome and was clad in an old tawny worsted jacket, a straw hat, and had a pair of harvesting gloves on his hands as he came limping onto the scene. The morris dancers followed him with Mad Marian, a jester, and the bridesmaids—none of them below thirty years of age. A boy came next carrying the bride cup; and last of all, the bride, who was nearer forty than thirty, and made up to look as ugly as possible in a tousled wig and an ill-fitting smock.

  The morris dancers danced and the pair were married and staggered off together to the wild excitement of the crowd who had been allowed into the grounds to see the performance.

  How they loved it! And yet their eyes were more often on me than on the players; they were clearly
gratified to see me laughing.

  I did wonder why Robert allowed this piece to be performed. The bride, who was well past her prime, might have been meant to be a lesson to me. Was Robert trying to tell me that we were both getting old and if ever we were going to marry we should do so now? Subtlety was not one of Robert's gifts. However, so much did the people enjoy the play that I refused to consider that there might be some ulterior motive in its selection.

  The next day there was an incident concerning Lady Sheffield.

  I had been watching the ban dogs. There were thirteen of them and they were very wild, having been locked away and kept short of food to make them fierce. Before the dogs appeared the bear had been trundled into the arena. He looked vicious and very formidable. I was so close as to see his little pink eyes leering round him, scenting danger, ready for the attack.

  Then the dogs were let out. The battle was fierce and bloody. I sat there watching, entranced. Sometimes I thought the bear would win… but no, the dogs were triumphing, but at what cost to them! The people shouted and cheered the dogs. There was a deafening noise and a constant yelping as the dogs, panting and bloody, went in again and again to the attack.

  When the battle was over with no victor, for although one or two of the dogs survived they would never fight again, I was sitting in the shade with some of my ladies round me when a young boy ran up and stood beside me. With the innocence of children he placed his hands on my knees and gazed up at me wonderingly. He was a particularly handsome child, and I was always drawn to children.

  “Why do you gaze at me, little boy?” I asked.

  He replied: “You are the beautiful Queen.”

  I patted his head. “So you find me beautiful, do you?” I could never resist compliments. “Is it because I am the Queen, or would you find me beautiful if I were not?”

  The child was puzzled, but he delighted me even more by nodding vigorously which I accepted as Yes.

  “You know I am the Queen,” I said. “But I do not know who you are. Tell me your name.”

 

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