Edward Marston - The Mad Courtesan

‘Firethorn will be outlawed and his company disbanded.’

‘Banbury’s Men will be unrivalled.’

‘Yes,’ he said, looping an arm around her. ‘One day will change both our lifetimes. A queen will die and a new king will attend his coronation in the theatre. We will stay together for ever and rule the whole city.’

Beatrice Capaldi smiled with determined pleasure.

‘I expect no less …’

London awoke at first light to begin the fateful day. The markets were erected and filled with bustling urgency by noisy stallholders. Butchers set out their meat, bakers their bread and fishmongers the latest catch. Farmers streamed into the city with their animals and produce to increase the pungency of the odours and swell the general pandemonium. Careful housewives were up just after dawn to find the best bargains. Children, dogs, beggars and masterless men filtered into the throng. Major streets were turned into human rivers that ebbed and flowed with tidal force. Market time was one long continuous act of collective lunacy.

Cornelius Gant was among the first visitors to the maelstrom. Though nobody knew him by sight, he heard his name on dozens of tongues as the miraculous Nimbus was discussed. Bills had been posted up to advertise the attempted flight to the top of St Paul’s but it was word of mouth which would bring in the bulk of the audience. Gant would be ready for them. Aided by a boy with a handcart, he bought up baskets of doves, pigeons and any other birds he could find. When the baskets were piled high on the cart, he and the boy pushed its cooing, cawing, fluttering cargo in the direction of the cathedral. Gant was keeping an appointment with the verger.

Further downriver, another market was being held. The unintentional vendor was Queen Elizabeth herself and the commodity on sale was nothing less than her crown. Whitehall Palace was no seething mass of urgent bodies but the figures who glided about in profusion were no less intent on making a profit on their transaction. A buoyant Lord Westfield was there with his entourage and a chastened Earl of Chichester loitered with his adherents. Other alliances stood in other corners and eyed the competition with resentful enmity. It was a market where most would be turned away disappointed. There was only one item for sale and its price was rightly exorbitant.

The Earl of Banbury scurried in with high hopes that were dashed instantly by the leader of his campaign. News of the arrest of Harry Fellowes had been communicated to the Master of Ordnance. Chichester had funded his enterprise with tainted money. The consequences were too frightful to reflect upon. His reputation would never survive the scandal and all who were associated with him would be stigmatised. The watching Lord Westfield saw the face of his rival turn puce as he received the intelligence. It was worth getting up at such an ungodly hour to observe the priceless discomfiture of the Earl of Banbury. Dreams of endless bounty from the gracious hands of Queen Arabella vanished at once.

Word arrived that an official announcement was to be made about the Queen in one of the larger chambers. Every room, corridor and staircase in the Palace emptied its occupants and they converged on a moment of history. Lord Westfield looked around at the distinguished gathering. All the royal favourites were there with their retinues of hopeful supporters. Essex posed, Oxford twitched, Raleigh was pensive, Mountjoy was sad and the others composed their features into what they felt was the appropriate face for such a solemn occasion. A staff was banged once on the floor to command immediate silence then a door opened and two rather decrepit old gentlemen came in.

Their laboured gait and their sense of effort was reminiscent of Josiah Taplow and William Merryweather but these were no tired watchmen. They were trusted servants of the state who were bowed down with grief. Lord Burghley hobbled along with the aid of a walking stick and Dr John Mordrake looked in need of some similar assistance as well. They climbed awkwardly up onto the dais and turned to face the whole court. It should have fallen to the Lord Treasurer to make the grim announcement but he deferred to the old astrologer who was now bent double by the weight of his medallion. Dr John Mordrake cleared his throat.

‘She is gone,’ he said.

A wave of pain hit even the most cynical listeners and a loud murmur started up. Mordrake quelled it at once with a skeletal hand. Having been in at the death, he wanted the privilege of describing it.

‘I was called in too late,’ he continued. ‘Had they let me see her earlier, I might have prolonged a life that was a joy to all who came into contact with her. I count myself lucky to have been her friend and her adviser for many a year and her memory is engraved on my old heart. When I made my examination of her, I knew the worst. She had less than forty-eight hours to live. And so it proved.’ Tears welled. ‘Forgive these moist eyes of mine but we shared a special bond. She was godmother to my only son. Moreover …’

The silence which had fallen on the chamber was charged with mild hysteria. Dr John Mordrake was not talking about Queen Elizabeth at all. As he burbled on about a dear lady with high principles and a love of duty, it was evident that the deceased was Blanche Parry. The astonishing woman who had been at Her Majesty’s side for over three decades as her closest friend had finally passed away, taking with her the scholarly enthusiasm and the love for ostentation which she had shared with the Queen. In the circumstances, it was not surprising that the sovereign had retired into seclusion to watch over her beloved gentlewoman during her last days and the presence of the astrologer now made more sense. Dr John Mordrake had been introduced to the Queen by none other than Blanche Parry herself. The bottle he had borne away from the Palace had contained the specimen from a blind old lady.

Muttering broke out as relieved courtiers heard that their sinecures would continue and fraught politicians realised that all their machinations had come to nothing. Lord Burghley came forward to make a crisp announcement to the effect that Her Majesty would hold court later that morning. Those closest to him caught the whisper of a smile on the face of the old fox. His gout improved.

Lord Westfield was amongst the first to recover. His own support of King James of Scotland as the next monarch had foundered but it could be revived at a later date. The campaign of the Earls of Chichester and Banbury had run aground permanently and there would be corrosive letters from Hardwick Hall to endure. Others, too, had showed their hand in a way that they now regretted and the heavy murmur was largely produced by earnest disclaimers from embarrassed nobles. Saturday at Whitehall was yielding rich rewards for Lord Westfield. Not only did he find a Queen whom he loved alive and well, not only could he watch loathed enemies wince and squirm, he could take real pleasure from the element of intrigue. It was all deliberate.

Blanche Parry was dying and the Queen wished to be with her but she turned the occasion to full political advantage. By retiring to her apartments and maintaining a steadfast silence, she knew that she would create alarm and spread false hope. The question of the succession would bring all the swirling enmities out into the open as the courtiers who had been dearest to her wooed other possible claimants with undue haste and zeal. Long days in hiding had acquainted Queen Elizabeth with the darker truths of her position. She would henceforth reign with an even firmer grip.

Lord Westfield turned to his companions.

‘Can you not see it, sirs?’ he said jovially. ‘Blanche Parry was but the excuse to make examination of her court. Her Majesty wanted to see which way her royal favourites would scatter if she died. She was toying with them.’