Philippa Gregory: The Virgin's Lover

“I have to go,” he said flatly. “I would rather be dead and my name cleared by my death, than live like this, an undischarged traitor from a disgraced family, in Mary’s England.”

“Why? Would you rather have Elizabeth’s England?” She hissed the treasonous challenge in a whisper.

“With all my heart,” he answered truthfully.

Abruptly, she released his hands and, without another word, blew out the candle, pulled the covers over her shoulders, and turned her back to him. The two of them lay sleepless, wide-eyed in the darkness.

“It will never happen,” Amy stared. “She will never have the throne. The queen could conceive another child tomorrow, Philip of Spain’s son, a boy who would be Emperor of Spain and King of England, and she will be a princess that no one wants, married off to a foreign prince and forgotten.”

“Or she might not,” he replied. “Mary might die without issue and then my princess is Queen of England, and she will not forget me.”

In the morning, she would not speak to him. They breakfasted in the tap room in silence and then Amy went back upstairs to their room in the inn to pack the last of Robert’s clothes in his bag. Robert called up the stairs that he would see her down at the quayside, and went out into the noise and the bustle of the streets.

The village of Dover was in chaos as King Philip of Spain’s expedition made ready to set sail to the Netherlands. Produce sellers with every sort of food and wares bawled their prices into the hubbub. Wise women screeched the value of charms and amulets for departing soldiers. Pedlars showed trays of trinkets for farewell gifts, barbers and tooth-drawers were working on the side of the street, men having their head shaved almost bare for fear of lice. A couple of priests had even set up makeshift confessionals to shrive men who feared going to their deaths with sins on their consciences, and dozens of whores mingled with the crowds of soldiers, screeching with laughter and promising all sorts of quick pleasures.

Women crowded to the quayside to say good-bye to their husbands and lovers; carts and cannon were hauled perilously up the sides and stowed in the little ships; horses jibbed and fought on the gangplanks, with swearing lumpers pushing them from behind, the grooms pulling them from before. As Robert came out of the door of his inn, his young brother caught him by the arm.

“Henry! Well met!” Robert cried, enveloping the nineteen-year-old youth in a great bear hug. “I was wondering how we would ever find each other. I expected you here last night.”

“I was delayed. Ambrose would not let me go until he had my horse reshod. You know what he’s like. He suddenly became a most authoritative older brother and I had to swear to keep safe, and to keep you out of danger as well.”

Robert laughed. “I wish you well with that.”

“I got here this morning and I have been looking for you all over.” Henry stepped back and scrutinized his older brother’s dark good looks. He was still only twenty-three and was strikingly handsome, but the spoiled gloss of a rich youth had been burned off him by suffering. He was lean now; he had the look of a man to be reckoned with. He grinned at Henry and the hardness in his face melted in the warmth of his loving smile. “Good God! I am glad to see you, lad! What an adventure we shall have!”

“The court has arrived already,” Henry told him. “King Philip is on board his ship, and the queen is here, and the princess.”

“Elizabeth? Is she here? Did you speak to her?”

“They’re on the new ship, the Philip and Mary, ” Henry said. “The queen looking very sour.”

Robert laughed. “Elizabeth will be merry then?”

“Happy as a haymaker at her sister’s distress,” Henry replied cheerfully. “Is it true, d’you know, that she is King Philip’s lover?”

“Not her,” Robert said with the certainty of a childhood playmate. “But she’ll keep him dancing to her tune because he guarantees her safety. Half the Privy Council would have her beheaded tomorrow if it were not for the king’s favor. She’s no lovesick fool. She’ll use him, not be had by him. She’s a formidable girl. I’d so like to see her if we can.”

“She always had a tender heart for you.” Henry grinned. “Shall you eclipse the king himself?”

“Not while I have nothing to offer her,” Robert said. “She’s a calculating wench, God bless her. Are they ready to load us?”

“My horse is already aboard,” Henry said. “I was coming for yours.”

“I’ll walk him down with you,” Robert said. The two men went through the stone archway to where the horse was stabled in the yard at the back of the inn.

“When did you last see her? The princess?” Henry asked his brother.

“When I was in my pomp and she in hers.” Robert smiled ruefully. “It must have been the last Christmas at court. When King Edward was failing, and Father was king in everything but name alone. She was the Protestant princess and the favorite sister. We were twins in the smugness of our triumph and Mary was nowhere to be seen. D’you remember?”

Henry frowned. “Dimly. You know I was never very good at the shifts in favor.”

“You would have learned,” Robert said drily. “In a family such as ours was then, you would have had to.”

“I remember she was imprisoned for treason in the Tower, while we were still in there,” Henry recalled.

“I was glad when I learned she was free,” Robert said. “Elizabeth always had the luck of the devil.”

The big black horse whinnied at the sight of Robert and Robert went forward and stroked his soft nose. “Come on then, my lovely,” he said softly. “Come on, First Step.”

“What d’you call him?” Henry inquired.

“First Step,” Robert said. “When we were released from the Tower and I came home to Amy and found myself a pauper in her stepmother’s house, the woman told me that I could neither buy nor borrow a horse to ride on.”

Henry gave a low whistle. “I thought they kept a good house at Stanfield?”

“Not for a son-in-law who had just come home an undischarged traitor,” Robert said ruefully. “I had no choice but to walk in my riding boots to a horse fair, and I won him in a bet. I called him First Step. He is my first step back to my rightful place.”

“And this expedition will be our next step,” Henry said gleefully.

Robert nodded. “If we can rise in King Philip’s favor we can be returned to court,” he said. “Anything will be forgiven the man who holds the Netherlands for Spain.”

“Dudley! A Dudley!” Henry sung out the family battle cry, and opened the door to the loosebox.

The two of them led the nervous horse down the cobbled street to the quayside, and waited behind the other men leading their horses on board. The little waves lapped at the jetty and First Step flared his nostrils and shifted uneasily. When it was his turn to go up the gangplank he put his forefeet on the bridge and then froze in fear.

One of the lumpers came behind with a whip raised to strike.

“Stay your hand!” Robert rapped out, loud above the noise.

“I tell you, he won’t go on without,” the man swore.

Robert turned his back on the horse, dropped the reins, and went ahead of him, into the darkness of the hold. The horse fretted, shifting from one foot to another, his ears flickering forward and back, his head up, looking for Robert. From the belly of the ship came Robert’s whistle, and the horse turned his ears forward and went trustingly in.

Robert came out, having petted and tethered his horse, and saw Amy with his bags on the quayside. “All loaded and shipshape,” he said cheerfully to her. He took her cold little hand and pressed it to his lips. “Forgive me,” he said quietly. “I was disturbed by my dream last night, and it made me short-tempered. Let us have no more wrangling, but part as friends.”