Just a Queen Read online

  I was applauding the magician’s latest trick when Cecil approached. ‘Your Majesty, important news from Scotland.’

  There was only one thing that this could mean. I turned towards Cecil and leant closer. He told me succinctly and I slumped back in my chair. Then I commanded the magician to finish his trick, the musicians to stop playing and for the assembled company to be silent. Once all was quiet, I stood and pushed my chair back from the table. To my horror, my eyes filled with tears. To forestall them spilling, I blurted out the news.

  ‘The Queen of Scots is lighter of a fair son, and I am but barren stock.’

  The birth of Prince James changed everything. He was a boy, he was healthy and his mother still lived. The future of Scotland was now a little more certain. Nothing in this dangerous world is ever certain for long, however. Babies can and often do die. My own father was a second son; his brother Arthur was the one destined for the throne. Arthur lived long enough to be invested as Prince of Wales and marry Katherine of Aragon, although she bitterly disputed it. He died at fifteen, leaving his little brother Henry the heir to his father’s throne. Kings, princes, queens and princesses die all the time. Indeed, the younger they are the more likely. My father sired many, many children who either died in the womb or very soon after they were born. From six wives (and who knows how many concubines) he managed only three children who lived into their teens and I am now the only one of his offspring still on this earth. I am also the one who has lived the longest. I am the same age now as my father was when he died.

  Oh, it confounds me to think of such a thing! He seemed so old to me and though I know the mirror tells me that my age does not sit as lightly upon me as I would wish, I do not feel myself to be as old as he seemed. I am still nimble on my feet and do not have to be pushed through my palace on a chair with wheels. I stand straight, my back does not stoop and I do not huff and puff at the merest exertion. My knees may ache – a little – and the joints in my fingers are stiffened with being curled up around a pen for so many hours. (What is a monarch but a glorified clerk? We wield a pen far more often than a sword and spill more ink than blood.) I do not stink of putrefaction, nor do my legs carry huge oozing ulcers that must be dressed painfully every day. My sister, brother and I used to hear the king’s bellowing and cursing down the corridors as Queen Catherine Parr tended his wounds. We shuddered at the sound then, and I shudder at the memory now.

  At the time of James’s birth, my battle with the smallpox was still quite fresh in men’s memories. Whenever I as much as sneezed I sensed fear among those who surrounded me. But it was not only the fragility of my hold on life that exercised men’s minds in those early days after Prince James entered the world. The gender of Mary’s child changed everything, both for her and for me.

  Men will always prefer another man to rule over them, even if that man be a mere suckling babe hardly a few hours old, no more aware of being boy, girl or turnip. From the moment of his birth, men began to turn their imaginations to the future of the baby prince and consequently away from the present of his mother.

  Within days of his arrival, my advisors and – even less tolerably – those impertinent ruffians in parliament increased their demands that I should marry and bear a good English prince.

  ‘The House of Commons are threatening to refuse to approve your supplies, Your Grace, unless you either settle this question of your marriage or name a successor.’ The pre-eminent nobleman of the land, Thomas Howard, Duke of Norfolk, proffered a document as he spoke.

  ‘Who are they to question their queen?’

  ‘They are merely expressing the fears of many of your subjects, Your Grace, including many gathered here today.’ The noble duke took a step forward to emphasise his point, while behind him many of the members of my privy council began nodding.

  ‘My subjects have no right to any “fears”, as you call them, my lord. It is my task to care for the future of this kingdom, not theirs, not yours, nor anyone else’s.’

  The lords of my council ceased their nodding and Thomas Howard took a step back. ‘Your subjects daily hope and pray that you will wed and produce heirs from your own body, Your Majesty, and of your own blood. It is the natural way of things. You are still young and may yet prove as fertile as the Queen of Scots. But, if God does not see fit to bless you with your own issue, the new Prince of Scotland is a logical heir and should be so named.’

  ‘God’s blood, Norfolk! You may be the first lord in this kingdom, but you forget yourself. I am ruler here and I will take no counsel on a matter so intimate to my own person and happiness – from any man. Nay—’ and at this I turned from him to stare pointedly at the parliamentary petition that he still held in his hands, ‘nor from any group of men, no matter how puffed up by their own imagined importance.’

  ‘But it is natural for women to marry and bear children, Your Grace. It is the state that God ordained for them.’

  ‘You speak like a swaggering soldier, my lord duke. Hold your tongue.’

  I looked around at the men who had crowded into my chamber, their mulish expressions telling me all I needed to know. They might hold their tongues, for now, but they were of one mind. To them I was a foolish and emotional woman, skittishly refusing to accept my destiny and so refusing to secure theirs. How little they knew me. Suddenly I felt close to tears. Alone, unprotected. Was there no one to take my part? Was there no one who understood that the very thought of marriage and motherhood made my innards turn sick and the blood in my veins run cold?

  ‘And what of you, Robin? What have you to say to me? Are you willing to abandon me to the tender mercies of some unknown man? To see me suffer the same marital horrors as my sister, my cousin or—’ I stopped myself from uttering the names Anne Boleyn and Amy Robsart – my mother and Robin’s own dead wife.

  ‘Good madam, dearest queen. I would never abandon you. I swear that I am ready to die at your feet at anytime – even here and now.’

  ‘What has that to do with the matter? What good would your death do me? And what use are your chivalrous gestures? You are like the rest. You wish me to marry and you do not care how miserable it may make me to do so.’

  Now I took a step towards them and as one they stepped backwards. Those at the rear of the group found themselves pinned against the wainscoting, something I might have found funny in other circumstances. This was my privy council, the men on whom I was meant to rely, the men who were my allies and most trusted servants. I felt betrayed by them all.

  ‘The devil take you and your disloyalty – every man Jack of you! You are craven, churlish and whore-begotten. You pledge your loyalty from one side of your mouth, but in truth I am no more to you than a burdensome fool to be cajoled and flattered. You would swap me for some other prince in a heartbeat if given the opportunity. I will not be moved by your prating and I will prolong this impudent audience no longer!’ With a wave of my hand, I sent them and their cursed petition out of my sight.

  When I reached the privacy and safety of my own chambers, I threw objects around the room and stamped my feet as I ranted about the impudence of men to my startled ladies. When I paused for breath, I looked at their faces and suddenly felt as alone with them as I had with the men of my council. Kat, my Kat, the woman who had sung to me as a baby, admonished me as a child and stayed fiercely loyal to me through good times and bad, had died almost a year before and my heart still grieved for her. When she was alive, I could confide almost anything to her and she would soothe me and when we were alone put her arms around me as if I was once again a child. Kat was as good a mother to me as any woman could have been. Blanche Parry had replaced Kat as my chief gentlewoman and she was next in closeness to me, but she was not Kat and never could be. Kat was gone. (Not that Kat would have offered me much comfort. When she was alive, she was as quick as all the rest to urge me to marry and provide an heir.)

  Looking at the bowed heads of my wome
n, I felt the fury leave me, to be replaced by a weariness so profound I felt I might drop where I stood. The candlestick I had picked up to hurl across the room fell from my fingers onto the floor with a dispiriting clunk. I sank down onto a stool and put my chin in my hands. Blanche, the bravest of my women, stepped towards me, but I waved her away. ‘Get out,’ I said quietly. ‘All of you.’

  My weariness and depression of spirits did me no good. The pressure from every quarter intensified. Bitterly I wondered why the birth of a baby to another woman should have made my own life so damned uncomfortable. Once again, some other person’s decisions were affecting my own life and future. Finally because I could avoid neither the question nor the impertinent petition indefinitely, I summoned a delegation of fifty-seven members of the two houses of my parliament. Unable to bear any more earnest entreaties to either give up my unmarried state or name my own winding sheet (for so I have always regarded an acknowledged heir), I forbade them to speak. They could present me with their petition if they must, but in silence. I would speak to them; they would hold their peace.

  As I awaited their delegation, I sat in state, elevated on my throne and dressed carefully for the occasion. Truth be told, I was feeling vulnerable to the logic of their pleading. I knew that an heir was a reasonable thing to ask of me as their prince, but it was the one thing I would never give them. To mask my insecurity, therefore, I wished to awe them with the trappings of my royal status, to blind them with my flashing and glittering jewels and the magnificence of my robes. I planned every detail of the audience to communicate how presumptuous they were to seek to influence me upon any matters at all, let alone those that pertained intimately to my person.

  The great oaken doors at the end of the room were thrown open and the delegation made their way up the long gallery, past the gathered courtiers and court functionaries, to the foot of my dais.

  I signalled to a servant to accept the petition from the speaker and bring it to me. Once I had read enough, I let the cumbersome document fall to the floor and stood. Some of them gasped as they looked at my silver gown emblazoned with myriad exotic flowers in pearls, emeralds and rubies. I looked at the delegates slowly and deliberately for a full minute before I began to speak.

  I called them unbridled and accused them of playing a traitorous trick. I beseeched them to tell me whom I had oppressed and whom I had enriched to another’s harm (knowing full well they were forbidden to answer). I told them that I had already promised to marry and that I would never break my word as a prince, particularly when I had promised publicly.

  ‘I am your anointed queen,’ I said, as they clasped their doffed hats and looked up at me. ‘I will never be constrained to do anything. I thank God I am endowed with such qualities that if I were turned out of the realm in my petticoats I would be able to live in any place in Christendom.’

  In other words, I conceded nothing.

  Ten

  ‘Majesty! Your Majesty! Are you unwell? Unbar the door and let us enter!’

  I am woken by a wild banging on my chamber door and loud voices calling out to me. I shake my head to banish the sleep that must have crept upon me unawares. My back is stiff from sleeping upon this cushion propped against the wall.

  ‘What ails you?’ I shout back to them. ‘Did I not tell you to leave me in peace until I sent for you?’ I hear mutters, rustlings and footsteps in response to the sound of my voice. There must be quite a crowd gathered outside my door, especially at so ungodly an hour.

  ‘But, good madam—’ It is Blanche Parry’s voice. She speaks through the keyhole. ‘You did cry out. Such terrible cries that we feared you had been taken ill or met with foul play.’

  And then I remember and a cold sweat breaks upon my brow. I dreamt my old dream, the one that plagued me so often in my youth. The dream where I am again a small child held in the arms of a great lady. She wears a beautiful golden gown studded with precious stones that flash and wink at me in the candlelight. I turn my head to look up at the face of the woman who holds me with such affection. She is crooning a French song to me. My eyes travel up the expanse of her gown, and when they reach her décolletage I see the thin trickle of fresh blood that runs from the base of her neck down between the cleft of her breasts. As always, there is no wound that I can see; the blood simply oozes out of the pores of her skin, bubbling out of her of its own accord. I can smell her phantom blood still; the meaty, metallic whiff of it lingering in the night air. As my gaze rises, I am suddenly gripped by a great fear of whose head I will see upon the phantom lady’s slender neck.

  Inside my dream I struggle like a butterfly on a pin; I do not want to see, I do not want to see! It is as if I no longer have eyelids, or no longer any that I can close. My dream is inexorable. I must see that the head the phantom wears is my own.

  That is when I must have screamed and brought my attendants scurrying to my locked door.

  ‘I am quite safe,’ I say to them now, my voice hoarse and thick with tears. ‘It was merely a bad dream that caused me to cry out. Phantoms conjured by the cheese I ate for supper, no doubt. Return to your beds; all is well.’

  ‘May we not see you, Your Grace, to reassure ourselves that you are not ill or feverish? We are concerned for you, good madam, and yearn to see your face again.’

  I find it hard to resist Blanche Parry. For love of her I hoist myself to my feet, run a hand through my untidy hair and smooth down my stained and crumpled gown. Then I pull back the bolt and open the door to my private chamber. Anxious faces appear in the light of the candles they hold: Blanche, Philadelphia Carey, Bess Throckmorton and others of my entourage and, to the rear, the looming shapes of the guards who man the outer chamber. I can see they are all shocked by my dishevelled appearance. Blanche takes a step towards me, but I hold my hand up to stop her coming any closer.

  ‘No, Blanche, I am not ready for company yet, not even yours. I am well enough in body, be assured of that, but I am still dismayed in spirit. I crave solitude and the space to make sense of what as yet does not make any sense at all.’

  Then I close the door, more gently this time, and curl up once more upon my cushion. Despite my short slumber, my eyes are still sore from lack of sleep and weeping, so I close them to give them whatever ease I can. I will not sleep again (aye, and do not wish to either, given the horrors my fevered brain might conjure) but my imagination has no mercy. Sleeping or waking, faces from the past begin to appear in front of my closed eyelids.

  The first face I see is that of my dissolute and foolish cousin, Mary’s husband, Henry Darnley. I see him as I last saw him, well nigh twenty years past, a stripling still, full of excitement as he asked for permission to go to Scotland. I gave him that permission and curse myself now for my poor judgment then. If Henry and Mary had never met, could all that followed have been avoided? Would she now be sitting contentedly upon her throne, married to some other, wiser man, the mother of other, better natured children? But perhaps she would merely have married the Earl of Bothwell sooner and I cannot believe that would ever have ended well.

  The Henry Darnley I see in my mind’s eye is a physically well-favoured youth, with fair hair thick as thatch upon his head, rosy skin and full lips that would be the envy of many a maiden. He is tall and well shaped, but his physical beauty hides a darker soul.

  ‘I bid you farewell, Your Majesty, and thank you for your permission to travel to Scotland.’ Darnley kneels at my feet and kisses my hand.

  ‘I wish you well on your journey, cousin. Will you visit our mutual relative, the Queen of Scots?’

  ‘I suppose I must, for courtesy’s sake.’ He smiles charmingly as he rises to his full height, dimples forming in his downy cheeks. Such is his youth, he is still as beardless as a boy.

  ‘Is it mere courtesy you offer to queens, then?’

  ‘To all other queens but you, Your Grace. They all pale by comparison.’

  ‘
Do not say so until you have actually met other queens, my lord, otherwise I may think you full of courtesies only.’

  ‘Your wit is justly renowned, my cousin and liege lady.’ His words are flattering enough, but his smile has disappeared. It has long been my observation that men of slow wits dislike being reminded of that fact by women with faster ones.

  That handsome stripling is long dead now, as are so many others, but of all the fates that awaited so many of my kin, his was the strangest of all.

  Some time after the awful murder of my cousin’s Italian music master, Darnley fell ill with the pox. He had fulfilled the foul purpose that had caused the brutish Scots nobles to pander to him in the first place – namely the murder of the poor Italian, whom they hated for his influence on the queen and suspected was a Catholic spy. Darnley had been deserted by his former comrades and was forced to rely upon any crumbs of favour from his wife. The birth of Prince James had not raised his father’s status at all. If anything, so our spies told us, it had increased the horror Mary had of her husband and made her determined to separate him from the infant prince as much as possible. Who could blame her? This was the man who had so disregarded her pregnancy that he had led a group of ruffians into her chamber and bloodily murdered a man who clung to her skirts!

  Nevertheless, perhaps my cousin still felt some affection for her husband and felt some duty towards the father of her infant child. Perhaps she merely had a kind heart and took pity on him. Whatever her reasons, she nursed her estranged husband tenderly through his illness.

  If my cousin murdered her husband, as so many believe, surely, while she was tending him in his illness it would have been easy to put a little foxglove in his medicine and hurry him on his way? Suspicion would have clung to her, no doubt, but he could easily have died naturally from his illness and his demise would have been regretted by few except his besotted mother and deluded father. It speaks to Mary’s innocence that she resisted the easy temptation of poison.