He shook his head. “Lettie! You know what that woman is like! She would not leave me alone! She gave me no peace!”
In fact I thought Douglass was anything but a harridan—more meek than irksome. But I did not argue with Robert. After all I was not present at whatever ceremony went on—assuming there was a ceremony of sorts.
“Did you do it because of her baby?”
Robert was silent for a time. At last he said, “I want a son, Lettie, even if he is baseborn.”
“Her other baby died.”
“This one, I hope, will live.”
Thus it was that the boy Robert sired and Douglass bore, the boy given Robert’s name, came into the world under a cloud of uncertainty. Douglass continued to assert that she was Robert’s wife, while he continued to swear that he was not her husband.
As for me, I was certain of only one thing: that Robert loved me and I loved him, and that nothing—not words spoken before unreliable witnesses, not the queen’s wrath, not my family’s disfavor, not even Douglass’s protestations or her bastard son, could separate our hearts.
TWENTY-EIGHT
It was the hottest day of a very hot July, and we were on our way to Robert’s immense castle of Kenilworth, our carriage bumping and jolting its way along a narrow lane so rutted it might have been a stinking alley in Southwark.
“God’s teeth!” the queen cried out as we bounced our way over a stone, making the carriage sway precariously and causing her to swear and grab at her thigh through countless layers of silk and lace. “I’m all black and blue! Can’t the man make a straight road! He boasts about all the money he’s spent on repairing this damnable castle I gave him, why can’t he fill in the holes we have to sink in to get there!”
Robert had indeed been boasting, to anyone who would listen, of all the money he had been spending on renovations to Kenilworth, by far the most magnificent of his many residences. In the few years since the queen’s last visit, he said, he had put all the income from his lucrative import licenses into building an outer quadrangle for the servants’ privies and new stables large enough to shelter at least five hundred horses. The profits he had from his licenses on the importation of velvets and oils, currants and sweet wines alone brought in just enough to pay the laborers, he told me; his income from the new tax on barrel staves helped to buy the quarried golden stone and heavy timbers for the gatehouse and the long yew walk. To redo the fireplaces in the old castle’s hundreds of rooms large and small required new loans from the moneylenders, however, and a large loan from Francis Drake, who had brought back six tons of cloves worth an immense fortune from his recent voyage to the Spice Islands and who agreed to be Robert’s bank.
All this was on my mind as we jounced over the rough road, the queen swearing and keeping up her angry tirade with every new shock and shudder.
No matter how his wealth increased, it seemed, Robert sank deeper and deeper into debt. He was not like Walter, who watched his money carefully and was reluctant to part with any of it, for any reason. Walter the listmaker, who kept careful records of his finances and put the records away in a special large coffer with a strong lock. While Robert was spending more and more on his great houses, Walter was profiting from his Irish ventures. Every time the queen sent him to put down rebel Irish lords he not only defeated them but seized their properties, and made them his own. Some of the lands and houses he sold, always profitably. Some he kept, the deeds rolled into tight bundles and stored in his coffer, under lock and key.
Robert had never been more in debt than he was in this summer of 1575, when he had borrowed the vast sum of sixty thousand pounds to provide weeks of feasting and entertainment for the queen and her large traveling party. The renovations to Kenilworth were not entirely complete; the chimneys were still being restored and new milking sheds and brewhouses built. But the many apartments for visitors, and especially those set apart for the queen, were complete, he told me, and no complaints were expected.
The day wore on, our hot and dusty journey continued. The queen often chose me as one of the attendants to ride in her carriage, as I am patient by nature and can be soothing when I try. But by the time we approached the great house, just at dusk, my patience was nearly exhausted and I longed for a good meal and a quiet room with clean rushes on the floor and newly washed linen on the bed.
Instead we were met with a deafening roar of cannon.
The queen, who was always terribly frightened by loud noises, put her hands over her ears and squeezed her eyes shut, failing to see the elaborate red and blue and white fireworks that burst over our heads in an explosion of color and light as the great house and vast adjoining lake came into view.
Trumpets blew, drums beat and as our carriage crossed the bridge that led from the road to the castle’s wide stone entranceway giant figures loomed out of the gathering dusk, costumed as ancient mythic characters, bearing gifts to present to Her Majesty.
It was as if we were in the center of a vast pageant, with the god of the woods offering caged curlews and bitterns, the goddess of the earth reaching out with baskets overflowing with pears and cherries, an immense mermaid rising out of the lake to present slithering fishes and a dolphin spouting verses in Latin as each gift was presented.
Elizabeth had taken her hands from her ears and was rising to the occasion by accepting the gifts and thanking the givers. But it was plain to see that she was tired and travel-worn, and by the time we had taken off our dusty garments and arrayed ourselves afresh for supper, we could hardly hold up our heads, we were so weary.
Yet there was no respite to be had. Amid much clamor and joyous noise, Robert’s entire household—hundreds of people—came out to greet the queen and the villagers from the neighboring settlements crowded in at the lake edge and applauded and screamed with delight as fireworks once more exploded in the sky.
Elizabeth called for a cordial and drank it down, then called for another as darkness closed in around us and the tempting odors of roasting meat and loaves fresh from the oven called us to the banqueting tables. Not until hours later did we find ourselves at last in the beautifully renovated rooms set aside for us, large rooms with high roofs and a great deal of glass, candlelit and welcoming.
We slept long and well in the soft beds, and even the weary queen was forced to admit that Kenilworth was among the finest houses in all her realms.
The following morning we hunted in the extensive park, stocked with red deer. Elizabeth prided herself on her abilities as a huntswoman, and rode out ahead of the rest of the party, reckless as she always was, never content until she had brought down her first deer.
A handsome buck had been spied, and she galloped swiftly after it, determined to bring it down. But before she could shoot at it, she screamed.
“They’ve shot me!” she called out, causing all those in the hunting party to gallop as fast as we could to surround her.
She was gasping, one hand over her heart. As we neared she raised her other hand, and managed to gasp out, “No hurt! No hurt! They missed!”
A hasty search produced only one possible would-be assassin, a small man in a green jerkin who was carrying a crossbow. The queen’s soldiers, with Robert in the lead, quickly unhorsed him, seized his crossbow and began pummeling him and shouting at him. The vagrant arrow was found and brought to the queen.
She shuddered and turned aside.
“I thought for certain it was meant for me,” she said, visibly shaken and pale. “I thought my enemies had gotten to me at last.”
Robert broke the arrow over his knee and flung it to the ground.
“The fellow says he never meant to shoot at you, Your Highness. He was aiming at the buck, as you were.”
“And you believe him?” Elizabeth looked at Robert, incredulous. “Surely you are not that naïve!”
But Robert only shrugged. “You know I would gladly give my life for you, Your Highness. And just as gladly kill any man who raised his hand against you. But this man, he is
no assassin. I have seen him before, poaching in my park.”
Elizabeth was contemptuous. “Such a one would make a perfect killer. No one would suspect him.”
She turned to William Cecil. “Put him to the rack,” she said. “Then see how innocent he seems.”
And with those words she dug her heels into her horse’s side and rode on.
TWENTY-NINE
The lavish entertainments at Kenilworth went forward, with tilting matches and bearbaiting, pageantry and feasting and disguisings, each day bringing a new round of splendid diversions carried out in costly style. But the unnerving incident in the hunting park cast its shadow over every event. And what was worse, the queen and Robert fell to quarreling.
It happened in the richly appointed, extravagantly decorated apartments Robert had prepared for Elizabeth, while she sat before her looking-glass readying herself for a banquet and I and the other bedchamber ladies were in attendance. My father and William Cecil had just arrived from the court in London, bringing papers for Elizabeth to read and sign—for the work of government went on, even in the midst of the most elaborate entertainments—and she was irritated at having to attend to this unexpected business. She sat, pen in hand, restless on her cushioned stool, muttering to herself as she read and signed and flicking the papers here and there while tossing insults right and left.
I had often seen her act in just this way, and I knew from experience that in fact she was attending to the contents of the papers, as she would demonstrate later as the need arose. But at the same time she was registering her displeasure, making others suffer while she did what had to be done.
Presently Robert came in, elegantly garbed for the banquet he had planned and arranged with such care in a doublet and hose of silvered silk, amethyst buttons and buckles winking in the waning light.
“What, not ready yet?” he called out to the queen, his tone jocular and indulgent. “How much time does the wench need then? Has she no appetite, when my cooks have gone to such trouble to prepare three hundred dishes for her pleasure?”
“I am no wench,” Elizabeth growled without looking at Robert. “I am your queen. And what I do here is more important than any feeding.”
Robert sighed. “Please hurry, Your Highness, or the food will be spoiled.”
She looked at him then, a baleful stare, freighted with displeasure.
“Then let it spoil. Surely I am more important than your woodcock pies and gilded calves’ heads!”
“Your Highness is more important than anything,” Robert said with a bow.
“As recent events have shown,” William Cecil put in. “We were greatly distressed to hear of the accident in the hunting park. Should anything untoward happen, Your Majesty cannot be replaced.”
Elizabeth put down her pen.
“Replaced?” she said, in quiet anger. “And why should I be replaced?”
“What Lord Cecil meant,” my father put in, “was that in the event of your death—which heaven forefend—there is no one to carry out your responsibilities. It is a dread possibility we in your royal council have faced once before, when you had the pox many years ago.”
“Yes,” Robert spoke up, “and then, as you lay on your deathbed, you knew what to do. You ordered the council to name me Lord Protector.”
“I know you better now,” Elizabeth said wryly. “I would not make the same mistake twice.”
Robert turned red.
“Must you insult me as well as ruin my costly banquet?”
Elizabeth shrugged. “I can do what I like,” she said, looking at herself in the pier glass and adjusting her elaborate red wig. “And as it happens, I am not hungry.”
“But others are,” I heard William Cecil mutter. “Hungry for power.”
Elizabeth chuckled at this, and Robert, infuriated, confronted her.
“Is this to be my reward then, for all my years of service? For the tens of thousands of pounds I have spent in the vain effort to give you pleasure? To be humiliated, cast aside, treated with less regard than a lowly servant? I who have loved and served you more loyally than anyone?”
“I believe Kenilworth is my reward to you, milord earl. You have it backwards.”
Before more harsh, blunt words could be spoken William Cecil took a step toward the queen and cleared his throat.
“The fact is, Your Highness, this fearful accident—if it was indeed an accident, and not the work of an agent of the Spanish, as I fear it may have been—reminds us all of what is constantly in our thoughts. The urgent need for a successor to Your Highness’s throne. You must marry. You must provide for the succession.”
I felt a tremor pass through the women standing nearest to me, and a sharp increase in the tension in the room. Elizabeth stood, suddenly and clumsily, knocking over the stool she had been sitting on and nearly knocking over the table on which her papers were scattered.
“I did not come here to be harangued about the state of my virginity. Or the prohibited subject of my marrying or not marrying.”
“We must discuss it eventually, whether the discussion pleases Your Majesty or not,” my father said. “Why not now? When the fragility of your life is on all our minds?”
“You are fond of the French prince, are you not?” Cecil put forward. “Why don’t we bring him here, so that you can meet one another. A French match would benefit our two countries. The prince would be a sound choice, young, intelligent—”
Robert’s angry shout interrupted Cecil. “I am the queen’s choice! I have always been her choice!”
“You are married already,” the queen remarked languidly. “I believe you are married to Douglass Sheffield, who has had at least two of your children.”
“That is vile gossip! I am not married to anyone!” He knelt before Elizabeth, head bowed, his voice constricted with strong emotion. “You must choose me, if you choose to marry anyone! You must!” He raised his face to hers. Hot tears flowed down his cheeks.
“You love me. You have always loved me.”
There was a pause. Then the queen said, “Sir, you forget yourself.” She adjusted her skirt, setting its folds into perfect alignment. I saw that her hand trembled, though her voice did not.
Robert stood, and began pacing the large room impatiently.
“Once and for all, I am no woman’s husband! Yes, I have bastards. What lord in this realm has not?” I noticed that he pointedly avoided looking at my father as he spoke those words. My chaste, faithful father.
“Yes, I wanted a son,” he went on. “Lady Sheffield provided me with one. He will carry on the Dudley name, as no one else in my family has sons, or is likely to have any. All but one of my brothers are dead. My sisters bear their husbands’ names. Their sons are not Dudleys.
“And besides—” He hesitated. Clearly he was reluctant to go on, but forced himself. “And besides, the queen is not likely to give me a son of her body. No one speaks this truth, but everyone believes it.”
Many in the room gasped at this daring avowal, which was clearly wrenched from Robert in great anguish. But Elizabeth did not allow herself to react. Though she continued to tremble, she contained herself. She did not allow herself to notice, as I did, how while pacing the room Robert had begun to limp on his gouty foot. I could tell that it was giving him pain.
“But if you cannot give me a son,” he was saying, practically shouting and groaning at the same time, “at least make me Lord Protector!”
“And if I did,” Elizabeth spat, suddenly finding her fire, “and you had to take my place, what would happen when you died? Would Douglass Sheffield’s bastard succeed to the throne? I think not!! Now, leave me—and to hell with your banquet!”
Red-faced and shaken, his voice cracking, Robert shot back, “Then all is ended between us! You have been my playfellow, my bedfellow, my hunting partner and my mate—in all but law! Married or not, we are and always have been together! I care not who hears me say it! I speak the truth! But from this moment forward, if you
will not marry me, then I will marry any woman I choose!”
Startled, embarrassed, the councilors and the royal attendants shuffled nervously for the door, until stopped by the sound of the queen’s cheerful voice.
“Cecil!” she cried. “I am suddenly hungry! Escort me to the feast!”
The councilor held out his arm, and, grasping it, Elizabeth strode almost jauntily out of the room, all hauteur forgotten, leaving Robert to glower in her wake.
The following year, Walter went to Ireland as he so often did. But this time he became very ill.
“It is the bog fever, for sure,” Cecelia murmured when the news reached us. “He has caught it at last.”
We learned, in a letter from one of his officers, how he was brought to Dublin Castle where physicians sat by his bedside and treated him with plasters and leeches. Penelope and Dorothy both wept as I read the letter aloud, and little Rob nestled beside me, trying to give me comfort. I read, with tears, how he wasted and at last succumbed, grasping the hand of a priest as he took his last breath.
I did what I could to help the children grieve. As for myself, I could not help but mourn Walter a little. After all, I was a widow now. And I was only thirty-five.
THIRTY
Our wedding was private and the queen was not told about it. We were so discreet that even her spies did not find out. We exchanged vows in the traditional way, with a priest present, and Robert gave me the ring he had once given Douglass, the heirloom gold ring with a great glowing sapphire. I wore it proudly—though never at court, where the queen or her spies could see it.
Robert and I were man and wife—yet when I told my father after the ceremony he was not satisfied.
“It is bad enough that Lady Sheffield says she was married to the man you now call your husband,” he remarked in his most moralistic tone, without making any attempt to hide his contempt for Robert. “Now you have made matters worse by exchanging a few brief words in secret, instead of being married according to the service of the communion book, and with relatives and friends in attendance as witnesses to your troth. It looks to others as though you have something to hide.”
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