The Queen's Favourite

by Laura Dowers

  The ambassador finished his sentence, and Elizabeth was suddenly aware that she was expected to make some reply.

  She smiled gently. ‘My good man, now is not the time for such a question.’ Whatever that question was, she thought. ‘We shall talk more another day.’

  The ambassador opened his mouth, his brow creasing in confusion. This was not the response he had expected. But Hatton guessed which subject was occupying the queen’s mind and he expertly guided the poor man away from the Presence Chamber with an offer of dinner.

  Hatton met Robert on the way out. ‘Leicester, it’s good to see you.’

  ‘And you, Hatton. How is the queen?’

  Hatton bit his bottom lip, and hung his head to one side, the ambassador at his heels, momentarily forgotten. ‘Not so good. The death of Mary Stuart, it…well, it has not been easy, Leicester, that I can tell you.’

  ‘I don’t imagine it has, Hatton. I hear Walsingham and Cecil are banished from her presence for their part in it.’

  ‘Yes. For Cecil’s part, I think he is almost glad. The queen sets a swift pace and he has difficulty keeping up these days. I know his wife praises the death of Mary Stuart for that reason alone.’ Hatton grinned at him. ‘The queen is eager for your return. This fellow here,’ he jerked a discreet thumb at the Ambassador behind him, ‘had no chance at all when I told her you were in the palace. She didn’t listen to a word of his speech, poor man.’

  Robert smiled gratefully. ‘I am just as eager to see her. Good to see you, Hatton. Let’s dine tomorrow.’

  The Warders opened the doors to the Presence Chamber, and as he entered, he felt dozens of courtiers eyes fall upon him. He held himself upright, making a strong effort to ignore a new pain in his right leg as he placed his weight upon it. He paid no attention to the courtiers as he passed them, though he was aware they smiled and inclined their heads to him. He looked only at the woman who seemed years older than when he had left her six months before, the woman who never took her eyes off of him.

  He stood before her, bent his left knee and suppressed a wince as his right banged against the floorboards. ‘Your Majesty.’

  ‘My Lord,’ the thin voice croaked and he looked up sharply in concern. She smiled down at him, and he suddenly knew that everything was going to be all right, she was not going to hurl abuse at him for his failures, at least not in public. She held her hands out to him and stepped down from the dais, her skirts swishing on the wood. ‘I am glad you are back,’ she said, pulling him towards her and kissing his cheek.

  ‘I am glad to be back, Bess,’ he murmured against her ear.

  She drew back, her eyes glinting with tears. ‘Come with me, my lord,’ and still holding his hand, drew him along behind her to her chamber. Her ladies moved to follow her but she shooed them away.

  She turned the handle of her Privy Chamber door herself, before her Warders could do it for her and dragged Robert inside. Before he could utter a word, Elizabeth had thrown her arms around his neck and was crying, great shuddering tears. He held her tight, until her tears gradually abated and she pushed him roughly away.

  ‘I do not know why I should be pleased to see you, Rob,’ she sniffed. ‘You have done me many an ill turn.’

  ‘Oh, Bess, please, don’t let us begin like this. I know you have reason to be angry with me, I admit my faults. Is that not enough?’

  ‘I needed you, and you weren’t here. They tricked me, all of them, those curs Cecil and Walsingham. They killed her, killed her without my consent. I didn’t want her dead.’

  ‘But Bess,’ he soothed, taking her hand, ‘she is dead and what is done cannot be undone. Why torment yourself?’

  ‘Because it isn’t over. There will be consequences, I know it. I have killed an anointed queen. What is stop anyone else from doing the same to me?’

  ‘You are well protected and well loved by your people.’

  ‘Maybe that is true, but what of the Spanish? Philip has been waiting for years to attack England and now I have given him the perfect excuse by killing a fellow Catholic. God’s Death, Rob, I have killed a saint.’ She began to laugh, a high hysterical laughing that made Robert think of her mother, Anne Boleyn, who was said to have developed a hysteria whilst waiting for her execution. Without thinking, Robert slapped her cheek, hard.

  ‘For your own good, Bess,’ he whispered, his face close to hers. ‘Now I will not have this madness. Mary Stuart is dead. You driving yourself mad is no help, to you or your people. This must stop. I am here now.’

  ‘Then stay here with me,’ she pleaded, gesturing to her bed. ‘Don’t go home to Lettice tonight.’

  He hesitated. ‘What will everyone think if I stay?’

  ‘To the devil with what everyone thinks,’ Elizabeth snapped. ‘At my time of life, why should I care for the tongues of gossips?’

  ‘At your time of life, Bess? You are not old. You could dance those young scamps out there under the table every night.’

  Elizabeth dismissed all her attendants and they supped till late, and Robert consumed a vast amount of wine, and for once, Elizabeth did not chide him for it. His head was nodding upon his breast when Elizabeth pulled him to her bed and laid him back on it. He was asleep as soon as his head touched the pillow. She pulled off his boots and threw them upon the floor. She stood for a moment looking down at him. This was Robert Dudley, Sweet Bonny Robin, lying bloated and red-faced upon her bed. She laughed to herself. Time was when Robert would have been anything but asleep at such a time.

  But Time had moved on. She felt herself growing old. She tried to hide the signs with heavy makeup and unnaturally red wigs, but these props could not change her inside. The death of Mary Stuart had heaped even more worries upon her, and she had felt alone, so very alone.

  She allowed herself a satisfied smile. She was not alone now. Robert’s first night back in England was spent with her, and the husband of Lettice was even now in Elizabeth’s bed.

  Robert began to snore, and like a mother, Elizabeth pulled the bedclothes over him, tucking them under his chin. For the first time she could remember, she undressed herself, her fingers clumsy with the unfamiliar lacings and hooks. Wearing nothing but her shift, she eased back a section of the bedclothes and curved her thin body around Robert’s, covering herself again with the blankets. He moaned groggily as her leg rested upon his, and he eased his arm under her body, arcing it around her waist. He did not wake up at all that night, and the two of them slept late the following morning.

  30

  Whitehall Palace, London, May 1588

  ‘We are sorry to say it, but we have a poor opinion of this Spanish Armada, and fear some disaster,’ Elizabeth said to the council, reading from the letter she held. ‘There, gentlemen. Even the Pope has no faith in the Spaniards. Why look you so, Walsingham? Do you doubt the words of your own spies?’

  ‘No, madam,’ Walsingham shook his head. ‘I do not doubt that the Pope spoke those words, but I do fear he underestimates the power of Spain.’

  ‘Ha,’ Elizabeth snorted, pulling a plate of walnuts towards her. ‘Drake has seen to the power of Spain. He has destroyed Spanish ships faster than Philip can build them.’ She bit down and winced as a pain shot through her cheek. No one noticed and Elizabeth was faintly annoyed. All her councillors were searching through the documents scattered across the table before them, trying to find some argument amongst the thousands of words to convince the queen of the danger. ‘Cecil and I will settle this matter with Spain. Peaceably.’

  ‘You mean a treaty with Parma, madam?’ Robert asked. ‘The peace is a fraud, madam. Parma plays you for a fool.’

  Elizabeth’s eyes blazed. ‘How dare you, I will-’

  ‘I dare madam, because next to you, the thing I hold most dear is the safety of this country and its people.’ It was a calculated answer, one that all present knew the queen would not argue with.

  ‘Do you dare to say I hold them any less dear?’ Elizabeth said, ‘I am trying to spare them
from another war-’

  ‘Walsingham,’ Robert again interrupted her, holding out his hand, ‘that letter from Lord Howard.’

  Elizabeth watched tight-lipped as Walsingham sifted through his pile of papers, found the letter Robert wanted and handed it to him.

  Robert held the paper at arm’s length and read aloud. ‘‘There was never, since England was England, such a stratagem and mask made to deceive England as this treaty of peace.’ You see, madam? Even Admiral Knollys, your own cousin, knows this peace to be false.’

  ‘Indeed?’ Elizabeth tapped at her empty wine cup with her fingernail and Hatton poured more wine into it from a jug on the table. ‘What else does the Admiral know?’

  ‘Only what is known by us all, madam,’ Walsingham answered. ‘The Spanish are preparing a fleet for the invasion of England and may be on our shores at any time.’

  ‘Such melodrama, my Moor,’ Elizabeth sneered and Walsingham had to bite his lip. ‘I will not tolerate such scare mongering. I want evidence of this armada, before I set my people on a course of war. Bring me that evidence, and I may reconsider.’

  31

  Whitehall Palace, London, May 1588

  ‘Enough, Rob.’ Elizabeth took the wine cup from his hand. ‘Any more and you shall be asleep, and I want you awake. I want to talk to you about your stepson wants something to do.’

  Robert belched. ‘I thought he was busy keeping you amused?’

  ‘Do you mind that?’

  ‘Would it matter if I did?’

  ‘Of course it would,’ she said, leaning forward and stroking the swollen blue veins on the back of his hand. ‘I wouldn’t want you to think you are being replaced.’

  ‘I’m teasing you, Bess. It’s all right, I can see the attraction. He’s a lively lad.’

  Elizabeth grunted. ‘Needs bringing down a peg or two.’

  ‘Well, he gets that from his mother.’

  Elizabeth gave his foot a gentle kick. ‘Anyway, you are getting fat and overworked. I want you to give your stepson the Master of the Horse.’

  ‘That would keep him close to you.’

  ‘You are jealous.’

  ‘Can you blame me?’ he cried. ‘And I’ve held the Master of the Horse since the beginning of your reign, Bess. I have made it what it is. You have the best horses of any monarch in Europe and now you want me to hand it over to a boy just out of his swaddling clothes.’

  ‘He’s hardly that,’ Elizabeth giggled.

  Robert was suddenly too tired to argue. ‘Oh, give him the Horse, if that is what you want. What have you in store for me?’

  ‘First, tell me what you really think of Spain, and do not exaggerate the matter.’

  ‘What I really think is what I said earlier,’ he protested. ‘The Spanish are planning to attack and at present, we will not be able to put up any kind of defence. It is as simple as that. And remember, you said yourself Philip of Spain now has the perfect excuse to invade.’

  Elizabeth nodded unhappily. ‘With Mary Stuart dead by my hands. She causes me more trouble dead than alive.’

  ‘Mobilise the fleet, Bess. Walsingham and Drake can provide the evidence you demand. Parma deceives you with talk of peace. Philip is readying his fleet. The Spanish are coming.’

  ‘I suppose I must believe you, as you all say the same thing. Except Cecil, of course.’

  ‘Oh, Cecil is an old woman,’ Robert said impatiently.

  ‘What am I then, Rob?’ Elizabeth raised an eyebrow.

  ‘Cecil is a good man,’ he replied hastily, sidestepping her question, ‘but cautious, too much so. He has his eyes on his account books and the treasury. Of course, to prepare for invasion will take money, and your treasury will shrink, perhaps desperately so. But if it is a case of an empty treasury or a Spanish swollen England, I know what course I should take.’

  Elizabeth considered for a few minutes. ‘You always were most persuasive, Rob. Damn you.’

  ‘Then you will-’

  She nodded. ‘I shall give the order for war, however much it goes against my conscience.’

  ‘To hell with conscience. What have you to feel guilty about? It is Spain who are the aggressors, not us. And besides, your conscience will feel better when we are celebrating an English victory.’

  32

  Tilbury, Essex, July 1588

  Tilbury was damnably cold, and Robert wrapped his fur cloak tighter about his neck. Once Elizabeth had made up her mind to see off the Spanish, events progressed at a swift pace. Orders were sent to Dover and along the coast to prepare for an invasion, and Robert was despatched to Tilbury, with orders to amass a land army in the event of an incursion into England via the Thames. Elizabeth had promised him an office to make up for the loss of the Master of the Horse and she had been as good as her word. Robert had command of the land army and the grand title of Lieutenant and Captain General of the queen’s armies and companies.

  Robert had taken up his command with enthusiasm at first, but by the time he had set up camp, he had realised what a burdensome task he had ahead of him. It was like the Netherlands all over again. So much to do and few officers capable to execute his orders or willing. He had found some of his officers treating the whole thing as a joke, disobeying orders and sauntering off to the coast, where they had behaved like ruffian schoolboys, disdainful of Robert and his position.

  For himself, Robert was often sent here and there, trying to raise up companies of men with patriotic speeches, or if those did not work, trying to generate self-interest with talk of rewards. The army was seriously under-stocked and a great deal of his time was spent trying to find supplies to feed the men.

  It took time and much effort, but his army was eventually ready for a visit from the queen.

  33

  Tilbury, Essex, July 1588

  Elizabeth arrived by a gloriously bedecked and canopied barge, escorted by two thousand men. Her entrance was grand, but her land procession was to be intimate. She rode a white horse, herself dazzlingly arrayed in a gown of purest white, a steel corselet and bodice her only concession to the safety concerns of her councillors. Robert walked on her right, his stepson, Essex, leading her horse on the left. The ranks of men parted as they approached, and many dropped to their knees before this woman who appeared, goddess-like, in their midst.

  She dropped down lightly from her horse, into Robert’s arms, and he led her by the hand to a makeshift dais from which she was to address her subjects. Robert took up a position to the side, and her words flew over his head to the men, who he noted, looked at their queen with awe. It was easy for a man like Robert, who had been almost daily in the presence of the queen for thirty years, to forget that the ordinary people of England rarely had a chance of seeing their sovereign close up.

  Elizabeth was remarkable. Her speech was full of rousing phrases and stirring words. She promised to stay and fight with them if necessary, to lay down her life for her subjects and her country, and they believed her. The cheering was overwhelming as she stepped down, her hand in Robert’s and she smiled warmly at him, basking in her subjects love. He led her towards the tent where a supper table awaited them and the officers.

  ‘I bid you all, leave us.’ Elizabeth said to the officers, and they departed. ‘So, Rob, how did I do?’

  ‘You were glorious,’ Robert said.

  ‘I was, wasn’t I?’ Elizabeth laughed and clapped her hands. ‘I still love to hear it.’

  ‘You love to hear how wonderful you are?’

  ‘The cheers of my people, you rogue,’ she flicked her napkin at him. ‘But I do love to hear how wonderful I am as well.’

  Robert laughed, then wished he had not as it seemed to make the pain in his stomach worse.

  Elizabeth’s eyes narrowed. ‘Rob, you are not well.’

  ‘No, Bess,’ he admitted, ‘I am not. I will be glad when all this is over, and I can go to Buxton.’

  ‘The waters there will cure you?’

  ‘They always have before.’


  ‘You eat too much,’ Elizabeth said, sinking back into the chair and fidgeting with a cushion.

  ‘As you always tell me,’ Robert agreed, he wishing Elizabeth would dismiss him, for he was damnably weary and wanted nothing but his bed.

  ‘You cannot stay too long at Buxton though. I shall need you.’

  ‘If you need me, I will not go.’

  ‘Oh, you fool, of course you must go. But I want you back, sound in mind and body, you hear? You look tired, my love. Go to your bed.’

  He smiled gratefully at her. ‘Thank you, Bess. My stepson shall escort you to your lodging. Shall I see you in the morning?’

  ‘Yes, Rob. Let us hope the morning will bring good news.’

  The morning came, clear and bright, and with it, a muddied, horse-sweat stinking messenger from the coast with the news that the Spanish Armada was defeated. Drums beat, fire beacons blazed, and there was wine and song aplenty throughout the camp at Tilbury. Money was always a concern with the queen, and Robert was instructed to break up his army and send his men home as soon as possible to avoid unnecessary expense. This done, he made his way to London.

  He stayed only two days, enough time to celebrate and watch his stepson parade the remaining troops, but he was more than ready to make the journey to take the soothing waters at Buxton.

  34

  Whitehall Palace, London, September 1588

  Robert went home to Wanstead first. The journey had been beset by torrential rain, and the road had turned to thick mud. He had pulled up the wooden windows of his coach against the foul weather, and now sat huddled in the corner, wrapped in his thickest fur cloak and leaning his aching head against the side of the swaying, rattling coach.

  ‘My lord.’ His attendant, Richard Pepper, reached forward and gently shook Robert’s knee. ‘My lord, we have arrived.’