The other queen

1569, DECEMBER, COVENTRY: GEORGE

The queen is housed in the best house in town and that is not good enough for her. Bess and I are quartered next door, goods piled up in the rooms, servants sleeping on benches. The grooms are sleeping in the stables with the horses, Hastings’ men pushed into the houses of poor people all around the town. The market has run out of food and the stink of the streets and the drains is unbearable. We will have to move on, whatever the danger, or illness will break out in these cramped quarters. Hastings has written to Cecil but the reply comes to me in our poor quarters, carried by yet another of his young nameless men. That I am now his chosen correspondent and Hastings is ignored tells me everything at once. Cecil must be in despair. Cecil has brought his queen to the brink of defeat and now he needs me to negotiate with the other queen.

Your friendship with the Queen of Scots must serve us now. I have certain information that the rebels have taken the port of Hartlepool to serve as a beachhead for a Spanish landing. The Spanish fleet will come from the Netherlands and land their army to support the army of the North. We have no force that can match them, nor can we raise one.

In this event, you are to protect the Queen of Scots at all costs and start negotiations with her to reach a settlement. Tell Bess, Devereux, and Hastings that they must keep her safe at all costs. Whatever plans we had before are now urgently changed—make sure that they understand this. Far from being our danger, she is now our only hope for a truce. She must be kept safe and if possible turned into a friend and future ally.

Find out what she will accept. We would support her return to the throne of Scotland and guarantee her as heir to the throne of England, if we have to. She would have to guarantee freedom of religion but she could practice her own faith as queen. She would have to choose any future husband on the advice of her Privy Council. She can have Norfolk if she still wants him.

You see from this that I judge our situation to be grave, extremely grave. I am anticipating our defeat by the army of the North and we have to persuade Queen Mary not to overthrow Queen Elizabeth. We are counting on you to come to an agreement with her that leaves Queen Elizabeth on her throne. When the Spanish armada sails into our port and lands their army, we are lost. We cannot muster a defense against such a force. We cannot even muster against the army of the North. Everything will depend on the agreement you can make with Queen Mary. Please use your best endeavors, Shrewsbury. We may have had our differences in the past but please put them out of your mind now.

This is to save the life of Queen Elizabeth and her throne, and everything we have done for her and for God.

This should come as no surprise. After all, I have been on the lookout for an overwhelming enemy for days, but even so, I am shocked, so shocked that I can hardly hold the letter in my hands. My fingers are trembling.

I shall have to do as he commands. As soon as the Spanish are landed I shall have to start to talk to Queen Mary as a supplicant talks to a victor. I shall have to beg her for the life and freedom of Queen Elizabeth. I shall have to see if I can persuade her to be generous. But, in all honesty, I cannot see why she would be merciful when no mercy has ever been shown to her.

When Queen Mary commands the army of the North and Spanish army together, then she commands England. I cannot think why she would not simply take her throne. And then she will be Queen Mary of England and Scotland, and Elizabeth will become the other queen and a prisoner once more.