by Jean Plaidy
She was Queen of England and she alone would rule. Robert should remain her lover, for all knew that lovers were more devoted, amusing, and interesting than husbands, who could become arrogant—especially if they were arrogant by nature.
She would win back the people’s love as she had after the Seymour scandals. Moreover, if she did not marry Robert, how could it be said that she had urged him to kill his wife?
Her mind was made up. She could not marry Robert now, for to do so would be tantamount to admitting she had schemed with him to murder Amy. Therefore she would stand supreme. She would keep her lover and remain the Queen.
SIX
As the months passed, Elizabeth began to regain her hold on the people, and she knew that she had acted wisely. All the world thought that Robert had murdered his wife; but how could they believe that Elizabeth had had a part in that murder when she showed as little eagerness to marry her favorite as she did one of her royal suitors?
The Archduke Charles was spoken of once more. She also pretended to consider Eric, who had now become King of Sweden. She was sure of herself now, and determined never again to be the prey of her emotions.
This did not mean that she loved Robert any the less. She was unhappy when he was not with her and she was gay in his company; she liked to keep him at Court, guessing whether or not she would marry him.
She could not hide her affection. She believed she would never know another man who could stir her emotions as Robert did. Steadfast affection was one of her qualities, as Kat Ashley and Parry had seen; they had betrayed her once, but she understood and forgave them; once she loved, she did not easily cast that love from her.
And Robert’s charm had by no means diminished. To him their life together might seem unfulfilled; not so to her. She had all she wanted from him—his company, his admiration, his passionate love, which must always be kept at fever heat. She could almost be grateful to Amy for preventing their marriage—first as his wife by her existence, and then as his victim by her mysterious death.
The Queen was gay during those months, enjoying the festivals which were prepared for her, delighting to honor those who pleased her—and none did that as much as Robert. They did not understand her, these people about her; when Robert knelt to her and she so far lost her dignity before a company of statesmen, courtiers and ambassadors, as to stretch out a hand and stroke the curling hair at his neck and even call attention to his well-shaped head, they thought she was so much in love with him that she would surely marry him. They did not understand her desires; and it was her delight, as well as her necessity, to keep her secrets.
There were quarrels. He was the most arrogant of men, raging to be the master. Well, she would ask herself, how could I love a ninny? How could I love a man who was afraid to cross me for fear of losing my favors? A man must be a man, and never was there such a man as Lord Robert Dudley. She showered gifts upon him, it was true; but she wished them to be the rewards of the statesman not the lover. He was indeed becoming a statesman, taking a great interest in affairs of a political nature, preparing himself for the role of King of England. She would watch him, strutting a little. And why should he not? Was it not for men to strut? Why should he not show insolence to my lord of Norfolk who thought himself more royal than the Queen herself? A pox on Norfolk! A pox on the whole Howard breed! Her father had had to lower their pride; nor would she hesitate to do the same. They thought too much of their birth; they worried too much whether a man’s ancestors were lords or farmers. They should take care, for my Lord Robert would stomach none of their insolence; and, by God, she thought, I’ll make him an Earl…the mightiest Earl in the Kingdom, one day.
But although it gave her great pleasure to see him in his manly arrogance, she too enjoyed teasing him. At times she would stamp her foot, slap his face, and would herself remind him of his humble origins. “Do not dare show your arrogance to me, my lord. Remember it is to me you owe your position here at Court.” She would pretend that he had offended her over some lack of courtesy to the Queen when in truth they both knew that her outburst was due to her having caught him smiling a little too tenderly at one of her women.
She implied that she expected fidelity from him; but in reality she did not. He must be essentially masculine; and he was. Men, she believed, were not noted for their fidelity. Not for her some sighing love-sick fool. She must have a rampaging lover, impatient, angry sometimes, wayward perhaps. Robert had all these characteristics; and he provided all the joy in her life.
He longed for rank that he might flaunt it in the faces of such as Norfolk. He wanted to take first place, not only through the Queen’s love, but in his own right of nobility.
He would come familiarly into her bedchamber, startling her ladies; and once, after he had kissed her hand, he had the temerity to kiss her cheek…before them all.
“My lord!” she reproved him with mock dignity, but her eyes sparkled and he was in no mood to be moved by her assumed anger.
“I have kissed you before them all,” he said. “So would I serve you careless of others…all through the day…all through the night…all through my life.”
“Listen to him!” she cried. “What if the whole Court came in to kiss me good morning!”
“They should never enter this chamber. My sword would prevent them.”
She looked at her women, commanding them to admire him. She knew there were several among them whose thoughts were occupied unduly with Lord Robert Dudley.
He had dared to take her shift from the hands of the woman who held it; but Kat had snatched it away from him, declaring that it was not meet for a man to know the Queen wore such a garment.
How Elizabeth loved such games! She sat there imperiously, aware of his desires, protected by her women.
“Don’t dare leave me with Lord Robert! I fear this man!” she cried.
And his answer came: “If I read your Majesty’s meaning, you have need to fear him…though he would protect your life with his.”
“I know it,” she said tenderly. “But I forbid you to come thus into my chamber…ever again.”
But he heeded not the warning; he knew that she would be dis appointed if he did not come. Kat said it was as it had been with my lord Admiral. Did Her Majesty remember? It seemed that these big and handsome men found great delight in storming her chamber.
Kat’s face was slapped affectionately; and Elizabeth was very gay that morning.
When she next saw him she reproved him, whispering to him under cover of the music which was played in the gallery.
“My lord, you go too far.”
“Nay,” he said, “not far enough!”
“In my bedchamber! And daring to hand me my garments!”
“Ere long I trust I shall be with you all through the days and nights.”
“Ah…if that might only be!”
He showed his exasperation, which set a frown between his well-shaped brows. “It could be…quite simply.”
“No, Robert, not yet.”
“Not yet!” he cried hopefully; and he would have seized her hand but she prevented him.
“Have a care, foolish one. Do you want the whole Court to start its scandals once more?”
“They have never stopped.”
“How dare you suggest there are scandals concerning me? You forget I am your Queen.”
“Would I could forget it! Would it were not so…. Then…”
“Then you would have no need of me?”
“If you were a dairymaid I would have need of you.”
She laughed and retorted with the Tudor frankness: “Yes, for five minutes under a hedge.”
“Five minutes under a hedge and for the rest of my life.”
“Robert, when you look at me thus I believe that to be true. But we are too far apart.”
“That could be remedied.”
“It shall be, my darling.”
But later, when the papers which would have made Robert an Earl and restored the Ea
rldom of Warwick to his brother Ambrose were put before her, she was in a perverse mood.
He was with her at the time; she looked from him to the papers. If he were an Earl—and the Earldom she would grant him would be one which hitherto had been granted to none but persons of royal blood—she knew that she would be very close to marriage with him. She could not help noticing the gleam in his eyes; she remembered how she herself had coveted the crown. She pictured herself relenting—for indeed there were times when, for all her resolutions, she felt herself weak in his company. She hardly ever granted him an interview with herself alone. She was strong, but so was he. To her he was the perfect man and as such would necessarily be triumphant, and how could he be unless she surrendered? It was only because she was a Queen that she could resist him.
He should not have his earldom yet. He should remain her gay Lord Robert. So she frowned and, to the astonishment of all, asked that a knife be brought to her. When this was done she drew it across the papers, cutting them through.
“How can I heap honors on these Dudleys!” she cried. “Have they not been traitors to the Crown for three generations!”
Robert faced her, his eyes blazing. How she loved him! What a man he was! He cared for nothing.
“Madam,” he said, “I understand you not. How, pray, have the Dudleys failed to serve you?”
“What excitement is this?” she asked as she smiled at him. “How can I, my lord, grant honors to the Dudleys? Do you forget that my great father had good cause to send your grandfather to the block? Do you deny that your father rose against the Crown and tried to make your brother King?”
“If my service to Your Majesty is considered treachery…”
She lifted her hand and gave his cheek a light slap—the most affectionate of slaps—denoting familiarity and indulgence.
Those present smiled. This was nothing but a lovers’ quarrel.
She is as much in love with him as ever, they thought; but he has offended her of late because his eyes have been straying to a fair young lady of the Queen’s bedchamber. The Queen is merely telling him that there must be only one love affair in the life of Robert Dudley.
All the same he continued to be plain Lord Robert.
The Queen was tormented by thoughts of those who she feared might be deemed to have a greater claim than herself to the throne. Nobles of royal blood always haunted, like grim shadows, the lives of the Tudors. Henry, her father, had solved his problems by murder; he liked to know that those who might have ousted him were dead. That was a wise policy, Elizabeth often thought; but times had changed, and she was not the absolute monarch that her father had been; she was more dependent on her ministers. After the persecutions of the Marian reign, the people looked to Elizabeth for clemency.
There were three women who gave her cause for anxiety; two of these were the sisters of Lady Jane Grey—Lady Catharine and Lady Mary. She knew that there were some who still considered her to be a bastard and usurper; these people would like to make the Lady Catharine Queen. The grandmother of the Grey girls had been Henry VIII’s sister and there was no doubt of their legitimacy.
Elizabeth was continually afraid that there would be a rising against her. Indeed that had been her great fear at the time of Amy’s death. The Grey sisters had been carefully brought up and their conduct was not likely to give rise to scandal. There had never been any admirals in their lives to burst into their bedchambers and slap and tickle them while they were in bed. There had never been a handsome man so in love with them that he was suspected of murdering his wife. The characters of Lady Catharine and Lady Mary were quite different from that of Elizabeth. They were quiet, learned, and good Protestants. Many remembered that Elizabeth had been ready to change her religion when she deemed it expedient to do so. The Greys were gentle, pliable; Elizabeth was full of feminine vagaries. Many people in this land might think Lady Catharine or Lady Mary would make a more suitable Queen than this red-headed virago who had a penchant for goading men to scandalous behavior.
There was another, even more formidable—Mary Queen of Scots. She was a greater rival, and she was far away, so that Elizabeth could not keep a watchful eye upon her. She would have been happy to have Mary in England, nominally as an honored guest but in reality a prisoner. That was why, when Mary had left France recently on the death of her husband, François Deux, Elizabeth had refused her a safe passage. What a prize a captured Mary would have been!
Mary had said—so Elizabeth had been told—when the death of Amy had been reported to her: “Ah, now the Queen of England will be able to marry her horse-master!”
“Insolence!” muttered Elizabeth. “Could she but see my ‘horse-master,’ I doubt not she would throw at him some of the languishing glances which we hear are so fascinating.”
That was another quality of Mary’s which exasperated her. Mary was reputed to be very beautiful, and it was mortifying to be reminded that she was nine years younger than Elizabeth herself. At least there was nothing of the meekness of the Grey sisters in Mary’s character.
There were many Catholics who looked on Mary as the real Queen of England.
Such thoughts of her rivals often made Elizabeth fretful; she would lose control of her temper, and many of those about her would be chastised, and not only with words. But her rages were short-lived and would give place to pleasant smiles; and when she felt that she had been unjust she would always seek to make up to her victim in some way.
One day when she was riding to the hunt she noticed that Lady Catharine Grey was not in the company. On inquiring the reason she was told that the lady was sick and had stayed in her apartments. She tried to forget the trifling incident and, if it had been any other, she would not have given it a further thought.
During the hunt she lost her temper, and as Robert was riding beside her he felt the full force of her annoyance.
She said to him quite suddenly: “I have decided that I cannot put off my marriage. I shall invite the King of Sweden to come to England without delay, that the preparations may go ahead.”
Robert was astounded. “The King of Sweden!” he cried. “That man! He is nothing more than an imbecile.”
“How dare you speak thus of your betters?”
“Not being an imbecile, Your Majesty, I do not consider that man to be even my equal.”
“Master Dudley, you give yourself airs.”
His temper was as hot as hers. Their natures were similar; therein lay the great understanding between them. Each was quick to anger and quick to forget it; both were proud of their positions yet perpetually aware of humble ancestors.
He answered: “Madam, I speak the truth—which is what I believe you have said you wished from me.”
“I would thank you to look to your own affairs.”
“Your Majesty’s marriage is my affair.”
“I do not think so.”
“Madam…”
“I command you to keep your nose out of my affairs.”
“And I insist that your marriage is my affair—mine as much as yours.”
“So you think I will marry you, do you?”
“You have led me to believe that it is not an impossibility.”
“Then you are a fool to hold such hopes. You…a Dudley…to marry with a Queen! Do you think I could so far forget my royal rank as to marry such as you!”
“Does Your Majesty mean that?”
“We do mean it.”
“Then have I Your Majesty’s permission to leave Court? I wish to go abroad.”
“Go! Go by all means. Nothing could please us more. It is with the greatest pleasure that we give you leave to go.”
He was silent. She watched him covertly. There, Master Robert, she thought, what now? That will show you who is in command.
He performed his duty with great care and detached perfection during the hunt. She was almost restored to good humor by the time they returned to the palace; but she waited in vain for him to ask her pardon.
&nbs
p; For a whole day he absented himself from Court, since there was no particular duty to keep him there. The Queen’s ministers were alert. They had heard of the quarrel. Was this the beginning of a coolness between them?
The following day Cecil said to her: “Since Your Majesty has decided on a match with the King of Sweden, it would be as well to invite him here without delay.”
She was furious suddenly: “I decide on a match with the King of Sweden! I have heard he is nothing more than an imbecile!”
“Your Majesty, he is a King and would make a worthy husband.”
“I am the best judge of who shall be my husband.”
“Then Your Majesty has no intention of proceeding with this match?”
“I have no such intention.”
Cecil retired exasperated. So her statement, during the hunt, which had been reported to him by those who worked for him, had been made with no other purpose than to anger Robert.
She waited for Robert to hear of her remarks. He would, she felt, return humbly and she would meet him halfway; there would be one of those reconciliations which delighted her. She needed such consolation after a whole day without him, for other men seemed stupid and witless when compared with him.
But he did not come; and at length, when she commanded his presence, diffidently he came.
“Why is it that you have absented yourself from Court?” she demanded.
“Because I have been making preparations to leave the country, and I thought by so doing I was obeying Your Majesty’s orders.”
She became woeful and helpless. Her eyes pleaded: So you would desert me! You would leave me to the mercy of my stern ministers. Is that all your love is worth! Do all your protestations mean nothing?
“My lord,” she said despondently, “is it your wish to leave the country? If that is what you desire, so great is our wish for your contentment that we will grant you the permission to go, even though it is against our wishes to do so.”
He was smiling as he kissed her hand with ardor. “How could I ever find contentment but in the service of Your Majesty?”
