Martin Stephen - The Desperate remedy

'You would find an impending marriage the heat of which wouldn't raise the temperature of a drop of Thames water by a single degree — and might even freeze it. You would find a man for whom talk with women has never been easy. You would find a lonely man, Henry Gresham, more lonely than you might imagine, who surrounds himself with young male servants who cheat him and run him riot and drink and eat him dry, but who fill the air with laughter, excitement and energy. And if some of those young men keep him company at times, then there's no force to it, no violence, and there's comfort for a lonely man and I think something not without a certain value for the young men, if they so choose. I don't mean money, Sir Henry, but something softer. Is that hard for you to understand, with your fine strong girl by your side?'

'No, Sir Francis,' spoke Gresham, softly, his gaze still locked into Bacon's, 'it's easy to understand, for I have been there also, albeit only once.' Bacon's eyebrows rose. Gresham broke the look, and got to his feet.

'You'll hear no more of this from me. I'll tell Cecil you were left in a cornfield as a child by mistake and had an unfortunate meeting with a reaper and a very sharp scythe.' Gresham applied his most serious expression to his face. Bacon, whose hazel eyes had twinkled at the thought of the reaper, assumed an equally serious expression. 'But, Sir Francis, will I get six more of your volumes if I forbear to tell Cecil about the sheep?'

Bacon's laughter followed him out of the room. A man in need of laughter, thought Gresham, and a man starved of it for too often and for too long.

A couple of young nobles had joined the supper party when Gresham returned, of families whose fathers had not gained the pox from their horses, and Jane was at the centre of a crowd of admirers. Her dark eyes sparkled more brilliantly than the jewels that adorned her, the rise of her breasts and the flick of her head to remove a ringlet from out of vision accentuating the raw sensuality she carried almost, but not quite, unconsciously. Beautiful women are so often spoilt, mused Gresham. They know their beauty, they are flattered by it and they use it, as they are made to feel superior by it. But you, my Jane, simply accept your beauty and take no credit for it. You believe in yourself, girl, but not so that others must suffer for your belief. She glanced at Gresham to gain his approval. He grinned at her, pathetically pleased that his opinion mattered to this creature who had him in her thrall.

'What, drunk again, my lady?' he riposted, and she laughed full out loud at the nonsense and the heady excitement of it all, forgetting in the face of him the icy detachment she favoured at Court.

No-one paid any attention to the King, who was following his usual practice of seeming to woo the ladies sat near to him at the same time as veering frequently into appalling rudeness and acid attacks on their kind. The Spanish Ambassador was nowhere to be seen.

Clouds of wet smoke began to drift out over the courtyards and artificial lake created by the workmen, sign that the masque was about to begin. Not all the musicians were drunk, and in the light evening air they made quite a passable noise, Gresham thought. Sufficient wisps of smoke were persuaded on to the lake for at least a suggestion of mystery to be created. A huge gate at the far end of the lake opened silently, and with no visible sign of propulsion the gilded boat drew out from the gate with the flimsily clad figure of Faith in the prow. Large towers rose up from the lake as the ship passed by — Inigo had excelled himself, as every one actually worked — and a choir joined in with the musicians to herald the progress of the boat. It was all rather jolly, thought Gresham to his surprise, as lights sprang up around and on the lake, and he found himself admiring both the ingenuity of his friend and the music, whose composer he did not know.

James, without his Queen, awaited the arrival of the first boat in a gilded palace erected at the other end of the lake. He was drunk, but not embarrassingly so, taking short but frequent sips from his jewel-encrusted goblet. There was spittle on his mouth: some said his tongue was over-large, causing him to dribble.

Inigo Jones had come to stand by Gresham.

"Not bad, eh?' he nudged, and then his face sagged. 'Oh no. Dear Christ, no…'

A whoosh of flame came from the barriers between the lake and the bonfires. Something like two dying snakes curled up and flopped over, smoking at the edges. They were the ropes destined to haul back the first boat as it sped towards the King, slowing it down and finally drawing it to a decorous halt by the landing stage under the King's viewing platform where Faith could descend and deliver a beautiful, if over-lengthy, speech to the King. Instead of slowing down it sped on with seemingly ever-increasing speed. Faith began visibly to lose faith, at least in things worldly, lost her lines and began to look round in anguish for someone to do something to stop Faith turning into Despair. This did gain the attention not only of many more of the assembled throng, but also of increasing numbers of the musicians who lost the beat and increasingly played their piece as if its finish was a race where there might be five minutes' difference between first and last.

A peasant girl would have shown more mettle in a crisis, but Lady Broadway had been slapped into playing the role of Faith by her husband, who desperately needed the King's favour. She started to scream and flap her hands, reducing most of the audience to fits of laughter. The boat crunched into the landing stage and she was flung forward through the air, landing tumbling head-first almost into the King's lap, head over heels, her masque dress over her head and showing clearly that my Lady wore no undergarments. The King, who looked fuddled, seemed hardly to notice. There was a cheer from a group of drunken courtiers as Lady Broadway, like her vessel battered but not-yet sinking, somehow rose to her feet and tried to deliver a garbled version of her speech.

To thou, Great Guardian of Our Faith, Preserver of our country's peace…'

Gresham looked down at Jane, who was laughing with such violent physical force that she looked like to burst out of her own dress.

'Well,' said Gresham, 'that was good. I wonder what comes next?'

The remainder of the masque went without interruption, the climax being the delivery of the empty-headed Queen Anne as Charity to her husband. The King clearly believed charity began at home, and left his rostrum almost as soon as his Queen had landed and delivered him an extravagant kiss.

There was a tap on Gresham's wrist. He turned, half expecting to see old Thomas. Instead it was one of the young Scots Lords, half drunk, who through an accent thick as alcohol-soaked ship's timber intimated that His Majesty wished to see Henry Gresham and his niece.

The King was in the Great Hall, rather than the Presence Chamber, a blazing fire sending most of its heat up the chimney and the chill of a foggy summer night beginning to creep into the room.

'Good evening to you, Sir Henry Gresham. I hope you and your… niece…' his gimlet eyes flickered over Jane, 'have supped and dined well?' He spoke the 'Sir' as if it were 'Sair', the accent thickening the more he spoke.

The words were slurred, but only slightly so. The man had a strange mix of muscularity — no-one who rode to hounds as often as he did could fail to be fit — and the same sense of a warped body that came from Cecil.

Gresham bowed low, to match Jane's deep curtsey.

'Your Majesty, we are humbled and inspired in equal measure by your Highness's generosity and benevolence to your humble subjects. Your Majesty affords us great honour by your hospitality.'

Well, I managed to say 'humble' twice, 'Majesty' twice and Highness once, thought Gresham. Not bad.