by Susan Kay
She laughed harshly and tapped his gaunt cheek with cynical amusement.
“I will not betray you, Walsingham, if that’s what you mean. Play your little games with my life in peace.”
* * *
A tall woman in a dull grey gown, still beautiful in spite of a thickened waist, shoulders stooped with rheumatism, and continual ill-health, stood by a window at Chartley. The July sun brought out the brassy glints in her chestnut wig and her long, hazel eyes were fixed on the secretary who bent over his work at the table in front of her.
At last the man laid the cipher down, shot an anxious glance at his mistress’s face, and handed the letter over with considerable reluctance. Mary tapped the paper against a white hand and pinned his glance with shrewd eyes.
“What is it, Jacques?” Her voice was gentle and even after all these years still retained its French accent. “Why that look?”
Jacques Nau swallowed nervously. “Madam, there is sufficient in that letter to take us all to the scaffold. I implore you not to answer it.”
He saw the flame of hope leap behind her eyes then and her fingers closed convulsively around the paper.
“I will consider your advice, of course.” Mary was never imperious when she could be conciliatory and she owed much to the loyal affection of the friends who had chosen to share the hardships of captivity with her. Though she had no intention of harkening to Nau’s advice, she did not wish him to think she held it in contempt. Smiling gently, she waved him from the room and watched him bow himself out.
“Wait in the next room, Jacques. I may need your services again.”
When the door had closed behind him, she took the letter to the light at the window and leaned against the casement, where Babington’s words danced out from the paper, like little black imps.
“…myself with ten gentlemen and one hundred of our followers, will undertake the delivery of your royal person from the hands of your enemies. For the despatch of the Usurper (from the obedience of whom we are by the excommunication of her made free), there are six noble gentlemen, all my private friends, who, for the zeal they have to the Catholic cause and Your Majesty’s service, will undertake that tragical execution.”
The letter slipped from Mary’s hand and fell to the floor; for the moment she could read no more.
She closed her eyes and tried to think with complete dispassion what this would mean. Escape. Freedom. The crowns of Scotland and England at last. A welcome chance to settle with her dear, devoted son who ruled in her rightful place without a qualm of conscience. Not one serious move had James ever made on her behalf. He was Darnley’s son, after all, rotten to the core. In all the dark story of male treachery, nothing had hurt Mary so much as the indifference of the son who had never known her. And revenge for eighteen years in an English prison, grovelling on Elizabeth’s whim for petty favours like a visit to the Buxton baths, which had become the highlight of her narrowed existence. And the price? That one little phrase: the despatch of the Usurper.
She bit her lip and stared out of the window, seeing nothing. Never had any plot required her to commit herself in such direct terms!
Her mind framed the cousin she had never seen. Elizabeth, bastard by birth, and bitch by nature. The first, Mary had always known. The second, she had learnt slowly and painfully since that fatal day in France when she had claimed the English throne. Some people said all her troubles stemmed from that moment, others that she had been a victim of her own emotions and played false by the lusts of men. She supposed in a way they were both right, but in the end it all came down to Elizabeth. Two women fated to fight to the death. She smiled, remembering how Bothwell had once said the pair of them would not make one honest woman between them. Dearest Bothwell, never one to mince his words, even now she could still weep at the memory of his death, ten years before, chained like an animal in a Danish prison, driven violently insane by years of captivity. A fate which might yet be hers if she did not seize her chance of freedom now. All it required was her written consent to Elizabeth’s murder, and she owed Elizabeth nothing at all—except her life. For nearly twenty years the English Queen had shielded that life against the Scottish lords, against the English people and Parliament and her own Council, playing the dual role of gaoler and protectress.
But only a fool would think in sentimental terms of the Queen of England. Mary had done that once, lulled by false promises of friendship, and had spent eighteen years paying for the mistake. And she would go on paying for it for the rest of her miserable life unless she acted now.
This would be the last chance; Jacques’s reaction had told her that very plainly. It would be the last chance and she was suddenly glad to find life or death within her reach. She had known all that life had to offer of pleasure and pain. The years of scintillating luxury and homage in France, long rides at the head of her armies across the bleak, invigorating moors of Scotland, love and hatred, passion and intrigue. Her life story read like a blood-stained legend, too extreme, too black and white, to be true. And yet it had been true. She had packed more living into her first twenty-six years than all the crowned heads of Europe put together, and all that had happened since had been in the nature of a grey, leaden shadow extending year after year with unceasing monotony. Her life had ended the day she set foot in England. For eighteen years she had existed in twilight, waiting to live again, and now she knew that if she could not live, she would rather die than go on existing in meaningless limbo.
Returning to the desk, she rang a little handbell and when Jacques Nau reappeared, she smiled and waved him to be seated.
“Trusty and well beloved…” she began calmly, and her expression brooked no opposition.
He took up his pen and began to write what she dictated without further argument.
* * *
The letter lay open in Walsingham’s trembling, triumphant hand.
“…the affairs being thus prepared and forces in readiness, both within and without the realm, then shall it be time to set the six gentlemen to work, taking order upon the accomplishing of their design, I may be suddenly transported out of this place.”
“Bring me the proof, written, irrefutable and positive…” He had that proof now, the bosom serpent had coiled to strike for the very last time.
He had learnt more of European conspiracy over these last months than he had for a long time, for her correspondence had been truly prolific. A woman with nothing better to do, he mused with malicious amusement; soon she would have more pressing concerns on her mind!
Common sense told him to strike now, but fanaticism had taken control of his cool brain and he knew he could get more out of Babington, much more, if he let this letter go through. It needed only a little alteration and he would have the whole pack in his net.
You are aware, aren’t you, Walsingham, of how I would reward forgery?
By forgery she had meant the acquiescence of Mary to the murder plot, and he had not tampered with that. The fact that he would have done if necessary conveniently slipped his mind. And, besides, she need never know. The alteration would be so small, just enough to get further information out of Babington.
Walsingham had conducted his work with masterful efficiency; he was not to know that his one error of judgement would ring down through centuries of heated controversy.
He forged a postscript, asking for names and details of procedure; but the letter was eleven days reaching Babington; and when he had read it he began for the first time to smell the faint scent of treachery.
* * *
Elizabeth had lived in daily expectation of secret death for over four months. She had gone about her duties as normal and confided her fears to no one, not even Burghley. She told herself firmly that it would soon be over, but as the weeks crawled away and still Walsingham did not act, she began to think he never would, that he would go on waiting, waiting, trying to be more and mo
re sure, until it was too late. Could she trust him? He had little enough cause to like her, she had often been unreasonable and unkind to him. Was she in league with her own enemy?
No! It was absurd, ridiculous, she was becoming crazed with the long suspense. How could she suspect Walsingham? And yet—it was possible—anything was possible in this treacherous world where no man could be trusted.
Each night she lay staring at the bed curtains wondering whether they would shortly part to reveal the sudden gleam of an assassin’s knife, while the conflicting arguments and suspicions chased through her confused brain, turning her now hot, now icy cold. She had believed she did not greatly care if death came violently, but suddenly it was so real, so close, that her nerves were stretched as taut as a piece of ragged string. She was aghast at her inward cowardice when a sudden draught moving the tapestries, or an unfamiliar creak of the floorboards sent an icy plunging through her stomach and covered her with a clammy sweat. Her public appearances were now interminable ordeals which left her trembling with exhaustion. She had begun to feel like a hunted animal, desolately alone without Leicester, who was still struggling vainly in the Netherlands and who was also the only other member of her Council who knew exactly what was happening.
Six men were at liberty in her palace, waiting for the right moment to arrange her murder, and there had been a time in Richmond Park when she had believed that moment had come. Walking with Hatton and a few of her ladies, unguarded as was her wont, she had come face to face with a man she recognised from the portrait—that incredible portrait!—which Walsingham had shown her with such fierce indignation. Barnwell was a swarthy Irishman, his eyes set a little too close together for comfort: he wore a short Spanish cloak which hid his right hand from view, and there was a nervous expression on his face.
She wanted to scream: “Arrest this man,” but there was nobody at hand to do it, only poor bumbling Hatton, who was not even armed. To scream was just as likely to panic the man into action as drive him away and if she had been mistaken she would have destroyed the essence of Walsingham’s mission. So she did the only thing she could think of and stared at him with a piercing, unwavering glance which dared him to go through with whatever he intended.
Already jumpy and uneasy, that fixed stare shattered Barnwell’s nerve. He bowed, averted his eyes and began to edge away from the little group. As he did so, he heard the Queen laugh on a high, sharp note and turn to Hatton.
“I’m well guarded today, am I not, Kit, with no man near me who wears a sword at his side?”
“Your Majesty?” Interrupted curtly in mid-eulogy on her many perfections of mind and body, Hatton blinked at her in surprise. Barnwell had slipped away to the back of her attendants now and Hatton had not the faintest idea what had prompted a remark so alien to their conversation. “I’m sorry, madam—what did you say?”
“Nothing,” she said quickly, placing her hand on his arm. “Nothing at all. Please continue with your verses.”
Hatton frowned faintly and cleared his throat, for he had lost his thread by now and wished he had brought his notes. They walked on and after a moment the familiar, stilted voice began to pour the old honeyed hyperbole into her ears. She scarcely heard a word he said, staring abstractedly in front of her, lost in dark thought, moving with an effort on legs which seemed to have turned to jelly.
Oh Robin, if only you were with me now…
Chapter 3
The vague unease that Babington had experienced on receipt of Mary’s letter grew steadily after the unexpected arrest of John Ballard, a fellow conspirator. It was true that Ballard was a known Catholic priest and that Catholic priests daily faced the possibility of arrest; but the incident alerted Babington’s sense of self-preservation—better developed than his powers of political intrigue—and he began to make plans to leave the country. He applied to Walsingham for a passport to visit France and received instead an invitation to dine with Walsingham’s secretary, an inquisitive man who plied him with wine and such penetrating questions that Babington hastily left the house and went straight into hiding.
Fear for the Queen’s safety now panicked Walsingham into action, forcing him to abandon his devious tactics and swoop down upon the known conspirators at once. It took several weeks to track Babington down and the Secretary was weak with relief when news of the arrest was finally brought to him, knowing how close to disaster his intrigue had brought him.
The Queen of Scots was promptly removed to Tixall under the façade of a hunting expedition, and during her absence Chartley was ransacked by Walsingham’s men. All her private papers, with the keys to sixty different ciphers, were seized and a mass of paper evidence was stacked high on a table before Elizabeth at Windsor.
“The proof,” said Walsingham, softly triumphant, “written, irrefutable, and positive.”
Over the neat stacks of documents her eyes met his with hatred, but he did not flinch; instead he removed a document from the Chartley papers and handed it to her.
She read through the list of English nobles who had secretly tendered their future allegiance to Mary, and dropped it wearily into the fire.
“Your Majesty!” he protested and made a move towards the hearth. But the parchment was already curling and shrivelling in the flames.
“I see but say nothing,” she said quietly. “What else can I do?”
He was about to tell her, but she turned away abruptly and went through into her private chamber. After a moment Burghley extracted another document, exchanged a significant glance with Walsingham, and hobbled after her.
He found her sitting by the fire, staring bleakly into the leaping flames; as he entered slowly she looked up at the paper in his hand and burst out angrily, “Christ’s soul—you surely don’t expect me to read that whole mountain out there!”
Burghley looked at her steadily in the candlelight.
“There is one letter, madam, which in common decency we will not produce in evidence against the Scottish Queen—nevertheless, since it is addressed to Your Majesty I feel you should be allowed to read it, in spite of,” he hesitated, “its distasteful nature.”
She eyed him cautiously for a moment, then held out her hand for the sheets of paper. The letter was written in Mary’s own hand and for sheer venomous libel it would be hard to surpass. It was a cruel and malicious catalogue of every low rumour that had ever circulated about Elizabeth’s habits and morals and it contained some new and startling anecdotes, apparently related to Mary by the wife of her former custodian, the Countess of Shrewsbury. Elizabeth had bedded with Leicester and many others including Alençon and Simier, but, owing to her physical malformation, her sexual excesses could only be partially consummated. She had forced Hatton into bed against his will. She was vain to the point of open ridicule and secretly mimicked by her ladies, several of whom had suffered from her violent physical assaults. She had broken the finger of one with a candlestick and slashed another’s hand with a knife. She was rotting with a foul disease inherited from her father…
Elizabeth glanced up at Burghley, who was watching her hopefully, and she knew quite well why he had shown her this humiliating document; he was hoping to see her wreak a quick revenge on the authoress of this filth. But, oddly enough, though shocked, she was not angry. She could imagine the mood of bitter frustration and blind hatred in which Mary had written this, obviously more for her own satisfaction in getting it all down on paper than for anything else. It had never been sent, because Mary had never found the courage to send it. She was helpless and resentful and afraid and a wealth of pity suddenly coursed through Elizabeth. How well she remembered the impotent resentment of the hopeless prisoner!
She leaned towards the fire, but this time Burghley was too quick for her and caught her hand.
“No, madam, I beg you, don’t destroy it—I give you my word no one has read it except Walsingham and myself.”
She looke
d up at him coldly.
“It is not to be filed among the Chartley papers.”
“Then at least allow me to file it among my personal documents—it’s a valuable piece of evidence, madam—it shows the true feelings of the Queen of Scots towards you more plainly than anything else.”
Her painted lips curled suddenly in a sardonic smile.
“You want it as a souvenir—is that it?”
Burghley smoothed the rescued document between his gnarled fingers.
“I want it for posterity, madam. Those who defend the integrity of the Scottish Queen have only to set eyes on this to see her for what she is.”
Elizabeth closed her eyes. “It’s late and I’m tired. Take your trophy and go.”
He bowed and began to shuffle backwards to the door. When he had reached it she called after him quietly.
“This makes no difference to my attitude towards her crime—no difference at all. But allow me to congratulate you, my friend. I have long suspected you would sink to anything if you felt it would further your cause and you have just confirmed that belief. I admire you a little more—and like you a little less. Do you understand me, Burghley?”
“Your Majesty.” He inclined his head in brief acknowledgement and went out to report his failure to Walsingham.
* * *
The trial of Babington and his confederates went smoothly enough, the verdict a foregone conclusion, the sentence to be hanged and quartered alive at the Queen’s pleasure.
“And that,” spat Elizabeth, rounding on Burghley hysterically, “is not enough. Devise something new and let the people see the price of treason!”
He was astonished at this sudden brutality, which seemed so dreadfully out of character.
“Madam, to alter the penalty would be illegal and, to be honest with you, quite unnecessary. If the executioner takes care to prolong their pain, I feel sure their end will be as terrible as you could ever wish.”
