by Susan Kay
Evening drew on and a body-servant lit candles on his table with respectful curiosity.
“Will there be anything else, Sir William?”
“What? No—no—get yourself to bed.”
“You’ve had nothing to eat, sir.” The man paused in the doorway uncertainly. His master was a man of regular habits, reliable as a clock; he was not wont to sit brooding with that odd fierce look on his face. But the fellow received no answer and at length closed the door and hurried away.
Cecil sat with his hands clenched on the desk in front of him and surveyed the ominous facts before him. The Queen was cold with him, cold in a manner she had never shown him before, and in her moody preoccupation with Dudley he read a woman on the brink of a disastrous love affair. If Dudley obtained a divorce she might well be tempted to marry him. And then—and then it was simple. Once Robert Dudley was King Consort, there would be no place in the government of England for the man who had betrayed his father. Cecil knew that a few weeks might be all that were left before he was fighting to keep his place, and perhaps—since it seemed he could no longer depend on the Queen’s loyalty—even his life!
Change of fortune was not unfamiliar to Cecil. Twice now he had attached himself to men who had fallen, yet had failed to take him with them to the block. He had a shrewd politician’s instinct which told him when to risk a desperate gamble. He was ready to risk one now if it should prove necessary, but it would be a risk, probably the greatest he had ever taken in his life. And certainly the most unscrupulous.
It was a risk because it involved the Queen’s whole future; and in many ways the Queen remained an enigma to him. He did not really know her and he doubted if anyone ever had or ever would. But he knew this: the crown of England meant more to her than anything else on this earth. She guarded her power with animal-like intensity. If Dudley could be discredited in the eyes of the world, if there could be a straight choice between her lover and her crown—Cecil swore he knew which way the cat would jump.
The spies he had planted in Amy’s household at Cumnor Place informed him that her servants had begun to keep a careful watch over her food. Rumour was rife all over England and Europe that Dudley would soon dispense with his unwanted wife. Divorce was the obvious means to gain his freedom and, after King Henry’s matrimonial escapades, was no longer the scandalous procedure it had once been. The Protestant Church permitted it—even the late Duke of Somerset had once availed himself of the legal loophole. But the scandal-mongers of Europe were not trafficking talk of divorce; they were waiting with gleeful anticipation for murder. Speculation was at such a pitch in foreign courts, that if Amy were to die now, even of natural causes, there would not be one voice raised in Dudley’s defence.
Not even the Queen’s. Cecil was ready to stake his whole career on that. She might in a rash moment risk marrying a divorced man, the son of a traitor, and hope that her popularity would weather the storm. But she could not possibly hope to marry a murderer and survive the scandal.
Cecil buried his face in his hands. It was a gamble—too great a gamble. And he was not without conscience. He remembered Amy well—a pretty, innocent creature already wronged by two utterly selfish young people. Oh no, he did not want to do this; there was too much that could go wrong.
But if it came to it, if there should be no other way of restraining the Queen before she ruined them both…
Oh God, let her come to her senses before it is too late…
The candles wilted on his desk and he sat on in the darkness, a quiet, eminently civilised, middle-aged man—with murder in his heart.
* * *
“I have this theory,” said Robin complacently, “that the complete man at some point in his life must make war to fulfill a basic need. It goes without saying, of course, that the complete woman must make love.”
Elizabeth pirouetted beneath his hand.
“And the complete monarch?”
“Makes both, naturally, madam.” He smiled and continued to glide down the crowded ballroom at her side. “So—since you are already at war with Scotland—may I not come to you tonight and complete your royal fulfilment?”
“No.” She smiled and made him an exaggerated curtsey. “Not tonight, not tomorrow, not next week, next month, next year—”
“Why is it always No?” he interrupted with a sigh.
She lifted her face to his and her eyes slanted a gleam of open mockery.
“I should have thought the complete man would know the answer to that. Perhaps he’d better ask Cecil, since an heir for England, and who best to get it from, is the sum total of his conversation these days.”
“Is he pressing you to marry?” Robin was alarmed.
“It would be closer to the truth to say he’s squeezing me in a damned vice!”
Robin’s hand tightened angrily on hers, causing the coronation ring to bite into her flesh.
“I knew he’d make trouble for you. The man’s a snake in the grass—get rid of him while you still can.”
“While I still can?” She raised her fine eyebrows slightly. “Perhaps you would care to explain what you mean by that?”
“I mean that he’s beginning to be resented.”
She laughed. “By you!”
“And others,” he countered swiftly. “A great many others.”
“Oh?” She turned, glided to the right and looked at him over her bare shoulder. “And with what snake should I replace him, my cunning mathematician—an adder perhaps?”
He acknowledged her sly wit with a sulky frown.
“I tell you this, madam, no man at court will be able to fart soon without asking Cecil first.” He saw her smile complacently and lowered his voice. “But there’s something else that won’t amuse you quite so much—something they’ve begun to call him behind your back.”
“And that?”
“King Cecil.”
Her glance impaled him like a spear and made him catch his breath; she was suddenly no longer safe to tease. Daring to hint at Cecil’s dominance had placed him on very treacherous ground. She moved away again, this time to her left, swung back, and touched hands with him. Her eyes were a hard, brilliant gleam of challenge.
There is no king here,” she said coolly, “and as long as I live there never will be. You had better remember that, Sweet Robin—and choose your words with more care.”
“While he chooses your husband! Marries you off to some impotent, imbecile princeling who’ll make your life a misery!” Robin’s voice dropped to a note of desperate daring. “He’d never let you marry me now—would he?”
Elizabeth halted abruptly in the middle of the measure and stared at him. The music in the gallery above trailed into uncertain silence, and the rest of the dancers also stood still, watching them with speculative eyes.
“Play on!” she said curtly and walked away to the table at the window to pour ale. Robin followed with his heart in his mouth, knowing that if he had misjudged this moment his whole future lay in the balance. It was the first time he had ever dared to mention marriage; had he presumed too much at last?
“Madam—”
She handed him a tankard of ale and spoke without turning to look at him.
“So that’s what’s behind all your pretty love talk—I should have known, of course—”
His hand groped out towards her and fell back to his side.
“Elizabeth—” he whispered.
She turned to look at him then and there was a crooked little smile on her lips. He had laid his cards on the table and he was entirely at the mercy of her whim. She rather enjoyed watching him sweat.
“Why should I want to marry you?” she inquired at last with quiet amusement. “Women marry for security, for wealth or power—I need no man to give me these things.”
“Some women marry for love,” he ventured softly and she laughed out
loud.
“Some men like to think so.”
Well—at least she was not angry! He drew a breath and dared a little further.
“If I were free of Amy would you marry me?”
“You?” She shrugged carelessly. “You are unsuitable on every count—a low-blooded upstart descended from a tribe of traitors.”
“In that case why keep me with you?”
“I suppose because I’ve got no taste.” She set down her tankard and he felt his confidence mounting. She had the hesitant, uncertain look of a coy female hedging for delay and he felt suddenly masterful and decisive enough to force a decision.
“I shall seek an immediate divorce,” he said quickly. “Amy won’t stand in our way, I know that.”
Something moved behind the Queen’s eyes and was gone almost before he saw it. For a moment he could have sworn it was fear.
She shook her head.
“No divorce. Not yet. There is scandal enough.”
“When I am a free man the scandal will die. I don’t see any point in prolonging this meaningless relationship with my wife.”
“I forbid it, Robin!”
There was a sharp note in her voice now that warned him to push no further for the moment.
“Very well,” he said ungraciously. “If that’s what you wish—but will you give me no reason?”
The bitter disappointment on his face softened her and she reached up to pat his cheek.
“Andante andante,” she said softly and led him back into the centre of the floor where all the dancers swept back to make room for them. “Step softly round my crown.”
* * *
She swung into the bedchamber an hour later with the heavy satin gown swirling out from her tiny waist like the upturned petals of a tulip. The new fashion she had set had led to an outburst of billowing gowns, with skirts so full and wide that sheer lack of space enforced many of her ladies to dine on cushions on the floor. Fashions were becoming preposterous, muttered the elderly—they matched the new Queen’s morals!
She swept past her women with an impatient wave of her hand.
“Leave me,” she said.
The women left with the speed which was beginning to characterise obedience to Elizabeth and only Mrs. Ashley dared to linger, observed the slight flush in her mistress’s normally pale cheeks, and thought: Something has happened between them.
“Kat,” said her mistress, but not unkindly, “I told you to leave me.”
For a moment Kat’s eyes appealed to her.
Trust me, take me back into your confidence. I will never betray you again. You need to talk to someone, to share your hopes and fears. Let it be me. Please!
Elizabeth looked at the woman who was all she had ever really known of a mother and for a moment the need to pour out her confused emotions almost overwhelmed her common sense. But she dared not trust Kat, or anyone, with her confidence. She had lost the power to surrender herself. Kissing the old woman lightly on the cheek, she turned away to the window; after a moment she heard the soft click of the door closing and knew that Kat had gone.
She began to pace up and down the room and felt the prickle of cold sweat breaking out over her body in spite of the heat. Suddenly her whole life was in turmoil once more, and she felt an unwilling rage surging up in her towards the author of her distress. In a few short moments he had altered the entire course of their lives, for he was no longer a pleasant friend, a casual, harmless flatterer. He was a threat to her power and nothing could ever be the same between them again. He had spoilt everything!
She had expected him to make some clumsy bid to become her lover, but she had never dreamed he would have the sheer effrontery to suggest marriage. He had shot that arrow when she was totally off guard and sure enough it had pierced to the core of the barricaded citadel which she called her heart. And she had been so sure that no man would ever have the power to do that again.
The summer of her reign these first two years had been; her power, her glorious power, untouched by her harmless flirtation. And now it was spoilt, spoilt, spoilt! She threw an inkpot from her desk into the empty hearth in a tearful temper. Could she really have been so stupid as to fall in love with him? Had she learnt nothing from the past, after all? She sank into a chair and covered her face with her hands in an attitude of despair. What a fool she was, what a fool! Was it about to happen all over again, the whole ugly sordid business? She did not doubt his friendship, but she doubted his love, and her suspicion, now suddenly thrown into clear focus, was like a physical pain.
She sat very still in her chair, utterly miserable. He wanted her crown—all very natural, she could even understand it—but she could never take the risk of believing in his love.
I will not trust my body or my soul to anyone in this world.
How in God’s name had she ever let it go so far, permitting a court flirtation to become a determined pursuit of her crown? And all because she had thought she was clever enough to play with fire and not be burnt! There was only one thing to do and that was to put an end to it by sending him away, lightheartedly, casually, as though the whole thing were no more than a joke to her. Let him ride back to Norfolk and cool his ardour with that silly little country bitch! Yes—that was it—she would send him away tonight, tomorrow, next week. Soon!
And the future? Bleak years of using herself like so much political merchandise, buying time for England, time and peace and the chance of prosperity. There was no one else who shared the memories of her traumatic childhood and miserable adolescence, no one else who made her laugh and forget her worries as he did, covering his ambition with a cloak of sincere affection so that she was almost—almost—tempted to believe in it. No, there was no one else she would ever love as she loved him. Without him, her world would be cold and empty, a gorgeous, glittering, lonely shell, and she who had prided herself on her ability to face life in splendid isolation was suddenly terrified at the prospect of that existence. To be alone—utterly alone for ever—would be a living death!
God damn it, she would not send him away—and the devil take any man—yes, any man—who tried to spoil what little happiness she might find in Robin’s company. His company was all she wanted. Was it too much to ask to remember that she was human?
She turned as the door opened and Mary Sidney bobbed an apologetic curtsey on the threshold.
“Your pardon, madam—but Sir William Cecil is waiting in the ante-room and begs to remind you that you promised him an hour this evening.”
King Cecil!
All her furiously bottled-up rage rushed out at the thought of that whey-faced lawyer. What did he want now? More nagging about the damned succession? All he cared about was pushing her into bed with some crowned nonentity; he didn’t give a damn whether or not she would be happy, just as long as she did her duty and gave England a son. And if she died in childbirth, he would stand beside her coffin with reproachful eyes and say she had failed them all! She wanted to storm out into the ante-room and stuff his state papers down his throat, to scream and kick and shout: I hate you—it’s all your fault!—to behave as she had done as a spoilt, wilful two-year-old when she could not have her own way. Years of deadly danger had forced her to learn a rigid self-discipline but, beneath the iron core of control, that petulant little girl still existed. She was always there, threatening to break out, and sometimes it was very hard to keep her out of sight.
Swallowing her temper, Elizabeth crossed the room slowly and deliberately, took a book from a table, and settled herself to read.
“I’m busy, Mary. Tell him—” She paused and met her friend’s even, puzzled stare. “Tell him to wait.”
Cecil waited almost thirty minutes in the antechamber, chafing at the delay which kept him from the stack of papers waiting in his room. Mary Sidney sat in the window-seat and uncomfortably avoided his questioning gaze each time he pointedly
glanced at his timepiece.
When he was finally admitted, the sight of Elizabeth sitting idly in her chair turning the leaves of a book was the final straw. How dared she treat him as though he were the lowest counting clerk!
Stiff-necked with indignation, he informed her of the progress their troops had made in Scotland. There seemed every opportunity of a favourable peace treaty in which England would dictate the terms.
She patted a yawn and he had to put a hard grip on himself to hold his tongue.
“I hoped the news would please you, madam.”
“I think you are quite pleased enough for both of us,” she said unkindly. “And since this is so plainly a personal triumph for you I feel you should see it through to the end.”
“Madam?” He was alert and uneasy.
“You will travel to Edinburgh and handle the terms of the treaty yourself.”
So she was sending him away from court! Why? What was she about to get up to behind his back?
She saw his face stiffen with alarm and laughed at him.
“Poor Cecil. You’ve no spirit for such a journey, have you? But I’m sure my cousin’s Protestant subjects will make you very welcome. Take Mildred with you if you can’t bear the separation. The Scottish air may bring a little colour to your sour face—God knows, it wouldn’t come amiss!”
“I find it rather difficult to believe in Your Majesty’s concern for my comfort.” He was coldly incredulous. The jibe at his wife was intolerable.
She shrugged indifferently.
“I desire it as I would my own.”
“But it is Your Grace who destroys it!” he burst out at last. “Forgive me, madam, it is my duty to warn you of danger. Your conduct with Lord Robert Dudley will be your ruin.”
She looked at him calmly and he was unaware that he had just set fire to a very short fuse.
