Roses Have Thorns: A Novel of Elizabeth I

FIVE

Years of Our Lord: 1567, 1568

The Palace of Whitehall

Windsor Castle

Hampton Court Palace

At the new year the queen’s principal councilor, William Cecil, had drawn up a memorandum titled Certain Cautions for the Queen’s Apparel and Diet and circulated it among courtiers and ladies. The document suggested ways in which Elizabeth could guard against being poisoned. In it, he spoke against accepting gifts from strangers, which I found odd, as all gifts that came to Her Majesty were entrusted to Lady Knollys, and warned of perfume or scented gloves appointed for Her Majesty’s savor. That concerned me, as I knew better than most how vulnerable the queen was to using sweet scents to avoid rank ones. She’d insisted upon rose water in the palace privys for years.

I was a welcomed maid of honor and the queen treated me with politeness, though she kept me at some distance. This was frustrating, as the others followed her lead. It pained me to admit that it was exactly as Princess Cecelia had predicted: I was daughter to no one, sister to no one, as yet wife to no one, mother to no one, and apparently friend only to Anne Dudley and William. I missed the companionship of my sisters and of Bridget. I longed to rectify that and had been seeking a manner in which I might make myself even more valuable to the queen. The queen often appointed me to sew new taffeta into the gowns she wished remodeled so she could pass them along to her ladies and maids, or even the underprivileged, but I wanted to be more helpful. And personal.

After the queen had left for a meeting with her councilors, I approached Mistress Blanche with what I hoped was a wonderful idea that would help me please the queen and earn friends. “I wonder if I might offer my assistance in helping blend perfumes and pomanders,” I said, my voice trembling a little with hope and the fear of being told no. “In light of Cecil’s concerns, I could provide sweet-smelling respite for the queen while protecting her person from harmful fumes given as gifts.” I waited and held my breath till she answered.

“That is a splendid idea, Lady Helena,” Blanche said. “I shall instruct Mrs. Morgaynne to provide you with whatever herbs and oils you need, and you may also select plants from any of Her Majesty’s gardens.”

“Thank you!” I said, reaching over to hug her, and she laughed lightly before shrugging me off. Within the week I had prepared some herbal blends and placed them into small, pink satin pouches. I approached Her Majesty as she was relaxing after a midday meal.

“Majesty, I have prepared some pleasant-smelling pomanders, some samples to choose among. Please, tell me which you prefer and I will blend some fine sachets for you.”

“Come, Helena,” the queen said, calling me forth to the sumptuously covered chair she reposed upon. I knelt before her, and she indicated that I should instead seat myself at the low stool to the side of her.

I held up the sachets one by one and I could tell from the look on her face which she preferred. Marjoram, of course, and those of rose, and some lavender that had been imported from France. The queen favored all things French.

“I shall personally blend these for you, Majesty, and the sachets will be stitched and laced by my own hand,” I said proudly. “Is there any other way I can be of service?”

I was still holding her favorite sachet in my hand, and rather than nod me away, she closed her own hand around mine for just a moment as a gesture of affection and acceptance. “No, my lady. How does Lord Northampton?”

“He is well, madam. He is preparing to undertake the diplomatic journey you’ll send him on with the Earl of Sussex. I pray that their, and your, mission meets with success.”

She smiled at me. “They are found faithful, as are you, Lady von Snakenborg. Come, tell me about your time thus far in my court.”

She indicated that a cushion should be brought for me, and placed near her, and I chatted about my apartment and my readings and the hawking and chess that William was helping me improve at. She shared with me some Greek translations that she was working on, some of which she found vexing.

“I should not have expected you to find anything vexing,” I said with admiration.

“Ah, but we do,” she disagreed with me. It made her all the more likable.

She offered some kind words and advice of her own, and invited me to dine with her and William, privately, when they returned from their journey. “I shall look forward to your company and pleasant conversation,” she said. “And your herbal preparations, of course.”

“Thank you, Majesty.” I was exultant. I had a task that set me aside from the others, and a manner in which I might serve the queen and the beginning of real friendship with her.

• • •

In February, some of the queen’s ladies were in her apartment playing gleek when a messenger arrived and burst impolitely into the chamber. The queen was taken aback, Cecil looked alarmed for her safety, and Lord Robert stood up. The messenger went directly to Her Majesty, and, kneeling before her, said, “I bring ill tidings, Majesty. Your cousin Lord Darnley, the husband of Mary, Queen of Scots, has been foully murdered!”

The room collectively gasped, and even Her Majesty, the ultimate dissembler, allowed some shock onto her face. “Is this true?” she demanded.

“I fear so, Majesty,” he said. “Lord Darnley was in a building that was exploded. However, when his body was examined it was found that he had been suffocated to death before the explosion.”

“Who has done this?” the queen demanded. “Scots rebels?”

The messenger leaned close to her and whispered, but as I was at her card table I was just able to overhear him. “Majesty, the whispering from Scotland seems to be that his wife, the queen, was involved in the plot.”

Her Majesty sat back and waved him away in utter contempt. Perhaps the messenger was familiar with the ancient story of Tigranes’s messenger having his head cut off for bearing ill news, but in any case, he stepped clear away from Her Majesty. In respect for dead Darnley, the queen canceled the card games and retired to her rooms. Another maid of honor, Eleanor Brydges, and I gathered Her Majesty’s cards from the tables.

“I hope Her Majesty is well,” I said. “She looked saddened and shocked.”

Eleanor nodded. “Darnley was her cousin, as is the Queen of Scots. It’s understandable that she be saddened. But there is no reason for shock. I do not believe that Queen Mary had a hand in her husband’s death.”

Later, after I was abed, it came to me that Eleanor could not have overheard the messenger mention that the Queen of Scots was suspected, as she had been playing gleek well across the great room.

• • •

If Her Majesty was shocked and saddened on that February eve, she was shocked and angry in May when word filtered south that Queen Mary had married the Earl of Bothwell, largely believed to have murdered Lord Darnley so he could marry Darnley’s wife, the queen.

“Has she lost all sensibilities?” the queen asked as she paced in her chamber. “She has gambled credibility as well as the affections of her people, which must never be treated lightly.”

The ambassador brought news that the Scots were arming themselves against Mary after her marriage to a murderer and that she would soon be deposed in favor of her young son.

That night, I heard whispering at the banquet tables while we ate. As few talked with me, I heard quite a lot. The queen rarely ate in public, which meant that most meals were free for courtier discussion. There was a name infrequently circulated in the banqueting hall that I did not know.

I asked Clemence that night, “Who is Amy Robsart?”

Clemence immediately stopped brushing my hair and caught my eye for a moment over the top of my head, in the looking glass. I had the sense that if she could have avoided the question altogether she would have, but William paid her handsome wages not only to attend to my physical needs but to answer questions such as I might need to know in order to better serve the queen.

“Amy was married to Lord Robert Dudley,” she answered.

“And she has now passed away?” I asked.

Clemence picked the brush up. “Yes, many years past. She was found at the bottom of a flight of stairs in a manor home, after all the servants had been dismissed for the day.”

It was my turn to be startled now. “Was she murdered?”

“The inquiry says no, ma’am, but the people . . . they think yes.”

“And who do the people say murdered Lady Dudley?” I asked.

“Why, Lord Robert himself!” Clemence said. “So as he could marry Her Majesty,” she continued, her voice lowered. “Though others say ’twas his noble enemies, because with one wife mysteriously dead, the people would never accept him as king, now, would they? When Her Majesty’s sister, Queen Mary, married a man the people did’na like, they turned against her. Though all know the queen desires to marry Lord Robert, she dares not, lest she lose the favor of her people.”

I instantly understood that night’s whispers connecting Amy Robsart to Mary, Queen of Scots, her dead husband, Lord Darnley, and Bothwell.

“Is that all, my lady?”

“Yes, Clemence. And please rest assured that I will hold to faith anything you say to me. I shall not share what I learn with others, nor speak of our talk.”

She relaxed then and smiled at me before helping me polish my skin with a paste of ground almonds and water.

• • •

In August William left with the Earl of Sussex to Austria, to present the Order of the Garter to the emperor; in truth, they were also going to offer the queen’s hand to the archduke. Within months came a response to Her Majesty that while the archduke was eager to marry Her Majesty, he could not in good conscience agree to forgo his Catholicism and embrace Protestantism, a requirement she was not willing to negotiate. With regret, the discussions concluded without good fruit. Her Majesty sorrowed for days and I noticed her occasionally stroking her stomacher, as if mourning a lost child not yet conceived, perhaps an heir.

William returned home, and we hosted an evening at his manor in London. The queen attended, as did most of the nobility. I had been in England for better than two years, but had not yet eaten of the lingonberries that my sister had pressed on me as I’d left Sweden. I instructed William’s cooks to prepare them into a compote with sugar and water. They, like my life in England, were a mixture of sweet and bitter.

Although everyone was unfailingly gracious, few offered me a hand or a smile of friendship, save the queen. She sampled the lingonberries after the others had passed them by. “These are delightful, Lady von Snakenborg!” she declared. “I shall have a second serving.” She turned to His Grace the Duke of Norfolk. “Have you eaten of these, Norfolk?”

Norfolk had not, of course, but at that point he had little recourse but to eat them and declare them to his liking. Several other ladies did likewise, and while I appreciated the assistance Her Majesty sought to offer, I found compulsory compliments and feigned affection sharp in my ears. Lady Eleanor Brydges was the only person to offer genuine warmth to me. I made cheerful talk with her and sent some specially prepared comfit cake back to her lodging hoping that would be the flint to a friendship. I wondered aloud that night, to William, if things might be different if I were his wife. He promised to press the matter again.

Before Christmas, final word came that there was no prospect of annulment. William was legally married until death did them part.

I was shocked. I sorrowed. In my rooms at court, I angrily packed up all the gowns and jewels he had given me into a large casket to return to him and shouted in German, and then in Swedish, which I knew no one could understand. Clemence, ten years older than I and familiar with tempers, wisely absented herself.

William should have told me this at the outset! And now here I was, alone, adrift, unprotected.

Later I unpacked them all again. He had acted in good faith. He was kind and noble. He had treated me with affection and dignity. But I would need to think upon this in a different manner now. I would not speak to him of it until my thoughts were clear and a decision made. What would I do should I remain in England an unmarried maid? I did not mind serving the queen, and I appreciated her friendship, but I would never have chosen an unmarried life.

William bought me a magnificent horse as a Christmas gift and a fine necklace of emeralds set in gold, and I bought him some falcons that I arranged to have sent from St. Botolph’s fair in Lincolnshire. But our inability to marry was a devastating blow to both of us. Letters still made their way irregularly, and I prayed that I would not hear from my mother and be forced to respond with this ill news. I did not wish to give her information to pass along to Princess Cecelia for her evening’s amusement.

• • •

In January the Spanish ambassador reported to Her Majesty that Philip of Spain, husband to the queen’s dead sister, Mary, had arrested his own son, Don Carlos, and thrown him into prison for treason. Don Carlos starved himself in retaliation. We ladies were gathered in the Privy Chamber, where I sat mending one of the queen’s delicate ruffs, when Lady Knollys delivered yet more strange news.

“Lady Katherine Grey Seymour is also refusing to eat, Majesty. She is said to be near death, and in fact, those waiting upon her have said she speaks of going toward God as quickly as she can and begs you to care for her sons.”

My heart pained at this tender sentiment from a young wife who had been exiled and separated from her husband these many years—four years, I thought, before I arrived on these shores. She had married for love, but Lady Katherine had also married in folly. She had not only forgone the queen’s permission, a penal offense for those closely related to the queen and with a claim to the throne, but had admitted to the Archbishop of Canterbury that she and her husband had purposed to deceive Her Majesty. Worse, there was no proof of her wedding, as the only witness had died and the priest who had performed the ceremony could not be located. Her husband was found guilty of seducing a virgin of the blood royal, and when Lady Katherine bore a second son after trysts in the Tower, she and her husband were permanently separated.

Bad fortune had certainly chased down the ladies Grey, but if the truth be told, it was the queen’s brother King Edward and Jane Grey’s father-in-law, John Dudley, who’d set loose the hounds on the sisters by illegally bypassing Henry’s daughters for the legal succession.

“We are sorry for her ill health,” the queen stated before turning back to the manuscript she was lettering in her own hand. “But we can in no way force our good cousin to eat.”

Lady Knollys, also Her Majesty’s cousin as the daughter of Mary Boleyn, was ever reluctant to find fault with Her Grace. But even she looked shamed at this seeming lack of compassion. The lesson was clear: no courtier, nor cousin, nor lady should undertake marriage without the queen’s permission.

Another cousin, stronger and more dangerous, arrived on Her Majesty’s shores that May. Mary of Scots, fleeing the rebel lords in her own land, applied to her “good sister” the queen of England to help her back upon her throne. A pamphlet was circulated, Defense of the Honor of Queen Mary, which forcefully claimed Mary’s right to Elizabeth’s throne, as many English Catholics believed. The author was anonymous but the queen’s advisors widely believed it to be John Lesley, Bishop of Ross, and Mary’s ambassador to Elizabeth’s court, and were not afraid to say so publicly.

“Mary’s a plague upon this realm,” William told me one night as we dined together. “She murdered her husband and carries with her the vapor of death. The only question yet to be settled is whom shall the death she brings strike down.”

• • •

Lady Knollys’s husband, Sir Francis, was to meet the Queen of Scots and accompany her, with guards to protect his and her safety, to the castle in the north. Our queen had decided Mary was to be her “guest” while the matter of Mary’s involvement in her husband’s death was investigated. The queen could not send troops into Scotland to restore a tainted Catholic monarch to that staunchly Protestant nation, even if she were so inclined, which she was not.

Neither could she send Mary to France, which would be happy to receive her. France looked upon Catholic Mary as the rightful queen of England and would be only too eager to assist her in regaining the Scottish, and perhaps the coveted English, thrones. For Mary to stay in England was discomfiting as well. There were Catholic subjects in England who still regarded Her Majesty as illegitimate because they had not accepted King Henry’s marriage to the queen’s mother, Anne Boleyn, as valid. Instead, they held that of the king’s children, only Mary, born of King Henry’s Catholic first wife, Katherine of Aragon, and then Edward, born after Katherine of Aragon was dead, were legitimate heirs. The king’s will set had forth the order of succession: Edward, Mary, and then Elizabeth. After them came the descendants of his sister Mary. But he deliberately barred from succession the descendants of his sister Margaret, among whom was Mary, Queen of Scots. In some ways, I felt compassion for Queen Mary, exiled from her home in a land that was not quite welcoming to her, unable to act of free will in either place.

Lady Knollys approached the queen in the Privy Chamber. They spoke softly, and yet all could still hear.

“Sir Francis has asked if I may accompany him to Lord Scrope’s to carry out your instructions, Majesty,” she said. It was clear by the pleading look on her face and the tone of voice she used that she wished to accompany her husband. All understood why her husband desired the happy company of his wife while carrying out such an unwelcome duty.

“I value your companionship above all women, Katherine,” the queen said gently. “I cannot do without your comfort and presence just now.”

Lady Knollys bowed her head in acceptance, but her eyes, already deeply shadowed, showed her pain. I wondered if her husband or her children resented the many years she attended the queen to their benign neglect. Lady Devereux, whom I’d seen flirting with Lord Robert, bore little love for the queen and the queen for her. I, who understood the competition between sisters over the love of a mother, considered whether their ill feelings may have long centered around the division of Lady Knollys’s time and affections, and not first Lord Robert.

The queen patted Lady Knollys’s hand fondly and rewarded her soon thereafter with the fees from a license for selling worsted cloth reverted to the crown after its owner had displeased the queen. I wondered if Sir Francis was warmed by these fees during his long, lonely journey to and stay at Carlisle Castle. That decision made it hard for me to serve the queen with anything approaching enthusiasm for several days, though I’m certain I hid it well.

Some months later, Lord Robert approached the queen in her Presence Chamber to speak to her of what had been discovered regarding the Queen of Scots.

“Come, Robin.” The queen beckoned him to her side. He drew near her, near enough to kiss, which he did not, but also near enough to share breath, and I thought that, perhaps, they did.

“They have found letters between Mary and Bothwell declaring their love, describing their physical intimacy, and slandering Lord Darnley, all dated from before Darnley’s death,” Dudley said after moving back and sitting beside her.

“Why have we not heard of this, Robin?” the queen marveled. “We instructed Norfolk to learn what he will and report back to us.”

Robert shrugged. “I’ve heard it said that Norfolk is particularly keen to keep this quiet, thus protecting Mary’s reputation from those who might otherwise be abhorred by her shameful conduct.”

At this, the queen sat up. I took the goblet from her hand; she handed it to me without acknowledging my presence. There was only one reason that Norfolk, who was rumored to be secretly practicing Catholicism while acting outwardly Protestant, had to protect Mary. He was plotting on her behalf.

“We will have the next meeting of the council here, at Westminster,” she declared. “And then Cecil will attend as well. We will not condemn a crowned queen based on hearsay.”

We women looked at one another, all thinking, perhaps, of Elizabeth’s mother, Queen Anne Boleyn, convicted and beheaded on whispers and a lone, pitiful, racked confession.

“I shall look upon this evidence myself,” she finished. Within weeks, she did, as did many of her courtiers, all of whom were shocked by the unsavory contents. To those gathered the queen sadly pronounced, “The letters contained many matters that cannot be repeated before honest ears, and may be easily drawn to be clear proof against the queen.”

She looked tired. In light of the findings, there was no way to receive Mary at court, but the queen did send clothing and finances and promised to underwrite her household expenses, which was no mean amount. It didn’t please her vanity, either, when her own courtiers seemed taken with the much younger Mary’s beauty and charm. After returning from a visit to Carlisle, one of Elizabeth’s courtiers told Cecil, when he was unaware that we ladies were nearby, “Mary has an alluring grace, a pretty Scottish accent, and a searching wit, clouded with mildness. Fame might move some to relieve her of her miseries,” he finished, “and glory might stir others to risk much for her sake.”

William told me that Norfolk had asked to take some of William’s birds on a hawking expedition he was undertaking with Maitland, who had once been secretary to Mary, Queen of Scots, but was now an emissary on behalf of the new Scottish government.

“Do you doubt Maitland?” I asked.

“I doubt him not at all,” William replied. “I am certain he is in the employ of the Scots queen and arranging with Norfolk for marriage between them, and then from there to rule England. Norfolk has already pressed the Privy Council to agree that Mary will be freed if she is safely married to an English lord. I’m certain he has just such a lord in mind.”

We talked for some time and then I grew weary. “Good night, William,” I softly said, preparing to leave for my own chamber. I’d felt increasingly odd kissing him knowing that he was still married, even though his “wife” had not spoken to him for decades and had left him for another man, and so I didn’t. He respected that but I know it pained him. He continued to treat me with the utmost respect and affection, and we spent time together at court, hawking, dancing, and studying Italian, but we’d grown distant. I sorrowed that, but I could not give my heart to a man I knew was not mine.

“Good night, Helena,” he replied.

We were in ginnungugap, the Nordic place of void and in-between. I finally determined that, should another suitor appear while William’s wife still lived, I was free to consider him. I had acted charitably and in good faith, but I couldn’t allow feelings for a married man to grow, nor set aside my own life forever.