Roses Have Thorns: A Novel of Elizabeth I

THIRTEEN

Autumn: Year of Our Lord 1577

Blackfriars, London

Year of Our Lord 1578

The Palace of Whitehall

Hampton Court Palace

Blackfriars

None came to see me, and every day I expected a messenger from Her Majesty either recalling me or stripping me of my titles and rents. Neither happened. I ate but little at first, but then I missed my monthly flux and, with a bittersweet realization, understood that I was with child. There was no way for me to share the glad tidings with Thomas so I asked the Lord to, instead.

“Lord Jesus, please,” I begged in prayer. “Will you not assist us?” The wry thought occurred to me that, as in the case with my queen, I was seeking comfort and absolution after the event rather than guidance and permission before taking the course of action. Perhaps I’d been unwilling to risk hearing “No” from either sovereign. I did not think I would act differently, though, if given another chance.

After some time in quiet, I heard the whisper of Holy Writ in my heart. Can a woman forget her sucking child, that she should not have compassion on the son of her womb? Yea, they may forget, yet will I not forget thee.

Within days, I knew what to do: write to my Lord Sussex, brother to my friend Mary Radcliffe, kinsman to Thomas, friend to me. He had been kindness itself when we stayed in his home upon our arrival from Sweden, a gentleman, still schooled in chivalry. I wrote him a letter and had it sent as quickly as I may.

I urgently ask you (if sincere sorrow and contrition of heart, apart from any discomfort and inconvenience, is a sufficient punishment for an offense) if it might please you, in your merciful kindness, to help get back to the court. For if my cruel fate would add so much grief on me, neither the long suffering, prayer, repentance, or else can make good it, oh, my lord, in which utter despair I happen not then? Where should I direct my complaint? I cannot see any hope or consolation, but only utter despair on all sides. Therefore, if your worship pities me, an abandoned and banished creature, I beseech you to present my sad plight of Her Majesty.

From my lonely abode in Blackfriars, the 19 October, the most unfortunate Helena Northampton.

I signed it with William’s surname, of course. Even though I was married, until and unless the queen stripped it from me, I retained my title and rank.

Sussex arrived several days after I’d sent a note pleading for his visit. I welcomed him with wine and comfit cake into the large reception room. He held me close for a moment. “Helena,” he said.

I nearly broke down at the kindness in his voice. “You know I am exiled and that Thomas is—”

“Imprisoned,” he said. “Yes, all know. Why did you not seek Her Majesty’s permission for the marriage?”

I was able to be more honest with myself, and with others, after I’d had some weeks to reflect. “She would have denied it outright, and I deemed it safer to ask forgiveness than leave,” I said. “It’s apparent, now, how deep was my error.”

“How can I assist you?” he asked.

“The queen trusts you well. She knows you are true to her and have served her faithfully. You’re Thomas’s friend and kinsman, and, well, you and your kind wife have been compassionate and benevolent to me since I arrived in this realm. Can you . . . speak for us?”

He shook his head. “I shall try,” he answered. “She will not hear your name spoken. She truly loves you and grieves your absence more than any of her ladies, save perhaps Lady Knollys.”

“What can I do?” I asked. “Am I lost? I can serve her at court; it need not be any different.”

“But it shall be,” he said. “And she knows it well. I will ask her to receive you.”

“And then I will reassure her of my constant love and presence,” I said, taking both of his hands in my own. “Thank you, my Lord Sussex.”

“It’s my pleasure, Marchioness.”

Before he left, he turned to me and added something. “I’ve served the queen since she was but a child, and then a young woman, imprisoned in the Tower herself. During those years she, too, had to be abject and obedient to her brother, first, and then to her sister, who badly mistreated her. That is the way of rule. She does not ask of us what she has not required of herself, first.”

“Yes, my lord. I understand.”

As soon as he left, I fled the room and retched into the close stool, from anxiety or from the child, I knew not which.

• • •

The queen called me to court within a week. I put on a modest but becoming gown and applied some red to my white cheeks so I did not appear as careworn as I felt. The queen may have wanted to see that I was contrite, but she did not prefer the suggestion of ill health about her.

There were others in the room this time; Anne Dudley gave a smile and it built my courage because she would know if the queen was going to dress me down, and would have warned me, I felt.

When the queen spoke her first words, my knees buckled in relief. “My good lady marquess,” she said to me. “Come hither.”

I came near and sank to my knees. She lifted me and indicated that I was to sit on the low stool next to her.

“Why did you not ask our permission for your marriage?” she said. “Have we so ill used you? Do you love us so little that you cannot bring yourself to be honest with us? To trust us to guide in your best interests?”

“Truly, Majesty, I trust you. You have never ill used me; on the contrary, you have offered nothing but kindness. I thought . . . I thought that the subject of marriage was one that brought you pain. So I did not raise it. When you raised the subject during our game of chess, and then indicated that each player may have two knights, I thought you were quietly sanctioning my second marriage, to Thomas.”

I could see the puzzled look on her face as she sifted through memories. And then she laughed, not harshly, but neither with delight. “My good lady marquess, we were speaking of the proposal our counselors have urged us to consider for renewing the negotiations with the Duke d’Anjou for my hand,” she said. “And how could we have possibly been speaking of Thomas Gorges? He is not even a knight!”

I flinched, then, at that insult, and was pleased Thomas wasn’t there. It was then I knew that she disapproved of my marrying a man of so low rank, which she had, in fairness, made clear to all many times. Perhaps, I thought, she was angry at those who married for love, despite rank, because she herself could not do so, though she wished to.

“I beg your forgiveness, Majesty,” I said. “I am as contrite as I may be, God as my witness.”

She nodded and placed her hand upon mine. “We recognize this, Helena.” She drew me near; perhaps the others could hear her, perhaps not. “I should be desolate without your companionship. Married women have children. My beloved stepmother, William’s sister Queen Kateryn Parr, died a brutal death after delivering her child, as did my brother, Edward’s, mother. Northampton, I knew, had not sired children, and therefore you were in no danger marrying him. But Thomas . . .”

“I understand, Majesty.” This was not the time to tell her I was with child. I recalled Machiavelli, and the question he’d posed: Which is better? By loving me, she’d risked her heart.

She kissed me on the brow, a lovely, welcome, perfect gesture. “This is to send you off in your new marriage.”

Tears coursed down my face, and I spied some in her eyes, too. And then, one by one, she kissed my cheeks. “We shall welcome our cousin Gorges back to court, whence you both may continue to serve us well, as you always have.” She then smiled at me and quoted my phrase as I spoke it to Mary Radcliffe regarding Eleanor Brydges. “We, too, are able to turn the other cheek. Once.”

• • •

Thomas was freed and welcomed back at court; Elizabeth had given him more responsibilities, which was a doubled-edged sword. It raised his income and his significance, but it would keep him increasingly busy at home and abroad for the queen. Given the choice, he would have chosen a player’s life, I suspected. But which of us has such a choice?

We entertained some of his family before the Accession Day celebrations. He had joined me in my apartment at the palace, as my rooms were thrice the size of his, and more comfortably furnished.

I enjoyed meeting his Gorges relatives; William’s sisters had both died before I came to England, and although the Herberts were, in a way, relations, they were nothing like the sprawling mass of Gorgeses, a few of whom were often at court.

After dinner, Thomas’s brother William excused himself, and as soon as he’d left the room and but a few remained, Cousin John Gorges spoke up. I think he’d drunk too much wine, and I indicated to my servants to clear the goblets and bottles from the room.

“Well, Thomas, since you’re highly placed now, I wonder if you can confirm something we’ve just heard: that Parliament desires to impose stunning fines for recusants and enforce that everyone in the realm partake of Protestant communion once per year. Truth?” He nervously twisted the ring on his finger; it was a strange design—I’d never seen one like it—a row of black beads encrusted upon a circle of gold.

Thomas nodded. “They did request that, but Her Majesty forcefully rejected it. She’s said it before, and I’m sure need be she’ll say it again: she has no desire to make windows into men’s souls.”

John covered his mouth with his fist, burped, and continued. “But the council has sent circulars to every diocese in the country asking them to name those known to be recusants.”

“True, I’m afraid,” Thomas said, quickly turning the conversation. “And now, my wife looks to be weary; I’ve heard that carrying a child will do that, and glad I am that I’ll never know!”

At that, those remaining in the room broke out in laughter and relief. The servants tidied up and spread the ashes in the fire, and Thomas and I retired to our bedchamber.

We lay abed, his hand resting on my stomach, caressing our child though we could not, of course, feel him or her yet.

“And so, all is well with you and Her Majesty?” he said. “No residual storm from last month?”

“No,” I answered. “And yet . . .”

He cocked his head at me.

“What is it?”

“I confess, I do love her as much as ever, and I know she senses that. But where I’d once thought her to be like the goddess Idun, now, perhaps, I think upon the tale of Frigga.”

He turned toward me, player inside, courtier out, and urged me on. “Do tell the story, Lady Gorges!”

“Frigga is stately, majestic. She loves to dress in fine gowns and has exquisite taste in clothing and in her jewels. She inspires awe, both fear and love in those around her. But she is the goddess of the heavens, sometimes garbed in swan white, and sometimes deepest black, depending on her quickly changing moods.”

He nodded his understanding. “Yes, yes, my love, ’tis apt. At least her clothing gives the standers-by a bit of a warning.”

I smiled at that before continuing. “She’s served by a number of maidens,” I said, “but she’s closest to her sister, Freya. Freya always helps Frigga as she prepares for the day, assisting with her ointments and cosmetics. She has charge over her jewels and golden shoes. She sometimes quietly advises Frigga on how to assist the mortals who apply to her for aid.”

He rolled over. “And I suppose you, my love, are Freya?”

I smiled. “Elizabeth has many ladies who help her and whom she loves well. But only one of us is a Swede, so perhaps I may be as Freya to her.”

He kissed me and then said quietly, “You’ve grown up, my love, as has your picture of our mistress, which is meet. Better to love the flesh-and-blood woman and not the taled goddess.” He paused. “Do you think she has given me new tasks and undertakings for my sake, or for yours?”

This was the first in a series of questions, and years, I suspected, where I would have to intercede with my queen for my husband, or the other way round. “Both,” I said. “She awarded Hurst Castle to you and the chancery before she knew we were in love, is that not true?”

He nodded, happy.

That New Year’s, the queen received us both warmly. She gave me a gift of forty-two ounces of gilded silver, and Thomas, eight. The difference was certainly to be expected, but I could see it unsettled him.

• • •

Having reconciled herself to my own forthcoming child, the queen sent me to represent her at the christening of a courtier’s child in February, a child to whom she’d promised to stand as godmother. As I was well ranked, I was welcomed as her deputy, and as I wouldn’t attend, by custom, the christening of my own children, I was pleased to participate. ’Twas always a delight to present expensive gifts, too, especially when they hadn’t been purchased from my own purse!

I knew the birth of babes reminded her of her own barrenness; she’d spoken of it to me. My gowns covered my growing child, and though I knew she was pleased for me, it was also a bit of ash in her eye. What made it worse were the whispers round court that her Robin was planning to marry her cousin Lettice some months hence, when her two years of widowhood were complete. She may see and say nothing, but she certainly heard all.

My Lord Sussex and other courtiers were with the queen and me one evening as we gambled. Suddenly, the conversation turned serious. Sussex was pressing the suit of the Duke d’Anjou again. Lord Robert, to no one’s surprise, was against it.

“Majesty,” Sussex said. “It is natural for us to wish for an heir from your own self. How glorious! How magnificent! How natural!”

At that, his sister and my friend Mary Radcliffe snickered. “Yes, brother, do tell, it is natural. I know it’s been said that spinsters like myself are supposed to be paired up with apes in Hell; as for me, I shall take my chances on if that be true or not. For one thing is certain, to be partnered here on earth would be to assure such a husband!”

Sussex blushed; only his virgin sister could get away with that stinging rebuke. We ladies hid our smiles behind our hands, and the queen quickly raised her white feather fan to hide her smile as well, rattling the long chain upon which it was clasped to her girdle.

“That’s not what I mean,” Sussex said.

“The people won’t have it,” Lord Robert declared, raising his voice.

“You mean you won’t have it, Leicester, and your opinion in this matter concerns me not in the least!” Sussex shouted.

“Her Majesty will not partner herself with a French fop!” Lord Robert retorted.

Sussex looked Lord Robert up and down, noting his fine purple attire. “Nor an English one, apparently.”

“Gentlemen,” the queen said quietly. “I shall consider all you’ve said. And now, if you don’t mind, I wish to play cards. Who will gamble against me this night?”

A cadre of her men agreed, and I thought, in cards and in life, it was the fool who gambled against Elizabeth.

Within days, the queen had signaled her approval for the negotiations to begin again between herself, at forty-four years of age, and Anjou, a man of but twenty-three who had, apparently, a novice’s poverty of looks but a prince’s riches in charm. She insisted in dressing again in the French fashion, which she much preferred anyway, perhaps as a token of affection to her mother.

Was it the rumors of Robin and Lettice that had made her turn aside from her declaration to me that she would remain married only to her realm? Or was it her realm that she was thinking to protect by aligning herself with France against Spain? A French husband would be a powerful antidote to the Scots’ poison for her throne. In any case, I had learned to watch what she did, not what she said. Walsingham, too, was against the marriage. He was perhaps the most formidable foe any of the queen’s enemies had, slithering as he did through country and court.

“I suspect Walsingham of fomenting public opposition to the French marriage,” Thomas told me one night after he’d returned from a mission to the north for the queen. He loved when we could share a meal together in private, so I’d had one specially prepared and delivered to our quarters.

“Surely not!” I said. “That would border on treason.”

“That’s not how he would view it,” he said. “But I am remiss to speak of matters of the realm. I’m more interested in the matters of my own hearth. How comes our child?”

“She comes soon,” I said. “I sense her shifting within me.”

“Her?” he noted with surprise.

“I’m certain it’s a girl,” I answered him. “Her Majesty has already agreed to stand as godmother and to allow us to name her Elizabeth, if that be all right with you.”

I retired to Blackfriars with our own servants the middle week of May, and I didn’t have to wait long until our insistent, red-haired daughter pushed herself out into the world. For nigh on twelve hours I cried out into a rag that I’d moistened with the helpful lady’s bedstraw until the midwife held her, bloody and wailing, in the air in front of me.

“A daughter, my lady. Will your husband be disappointed?” she asked me.

I shrugged. Truly, I did not know. I’d been afraid to ask. The babe wailed for nigh on an hour and I could do nothing to stop her. But when she was cleaned and wrapped and Thomas brought in, he took her in his arms and she settled right away.

“You know how to charm the young ladies,” I teased him as he bent over to kiss my sweaty brow.

“Seems I do,” he agreed, and smiled back at me. “But I’m only interested in young, beautiful ones who favor you.” I looked at them together and I knew that no matter what we’d risked to marry, it had all been worth it. Nothing and no one would separate us now.