Philippa Gregory - The Virgin's Lover

But Monsieur Randan was obdurate. He had to take instructions from Mary of Guise herself, and he could offer no peace proposals, nor answer the English proposals, without speaking with her. He had to go to Edinburgh, and he had to have safe conduct through the siege lines into Leith Castle.

“Might as well draw him a map,” Thomas Howard said irritably. “Invite him to call in at every damned Papist house on the way.”

“He has to see his master,” Cecil remarked reasonably. “He has to put our proposals to her.”

“Aye, and she is the one who is our greatest danger,” Thomas Howard declared. “He is nothing more than her mouthpiece. She is a great politician. She will stay holed up in that castle forever if she can and prevent us from talking with the French. She will get between us and them. If we let Randan speak with her she will order him to ask for one thing and then another; she will agree and then withdraw, she will hold us here until the autumn, and then the weather will destroy us.”

“Do you think so?” Cecil asked anxiously.

“I am sure of it. Already the Scots are slipping away, and every day we lose men to disease. When the hot weather comes we can expect the plague and when the cold weather comes we will be destroyed by the ague. We have to move now, Cecil, we cannot let them delay us with false offers of peace.”

“Move how?”

“Move the siege. We have to break in. No matter what it costs. We have to shock them to the treaty.”

Cecil nodded. Yes, but I have seen your plans for the siege, he said to himself. It calls for phenomenal luck, extraordinary courage, and meticulous generalship, and the English army has none of these. You are right only in your fear: if Mary of Guise sits tight within Leith Castle we will be destroyed by time, and the French can occupy Scotland and the north of England at their leisure. You are right that the French have to be frightened into peace.

Elizabeth was too weary to dress properly. Robert was admitted to her privy chamber as she sat with her women wearing a robe over her nightgown, with her hair in a careless plait down her back.

Kat Ashley, normally an anxious guardian of Elizabeth’s reputation, admitted Robert without a word of complaint. Elizabeth’s longstanding friend and advisor Thomas Parry was in the room already. Elizabeth settled herself in the window seat and gestured to Robert to sit beside her.

“Are you ill, my love?” he asked tenderly.

Her eyes were shadowed so darkly that she looked like a defeated bare-knuckle fighter. “Just tired,” she said. Even her lips were pale.

“Here, drink this,” Kat Ashley offered, pressing a cup of hot mead into her hand.

“Any news from Cecil?”

“None, yet. I am afraid they will attempt the castle again; my uncle is so hasty, and Lord Grey so determined. I wanted Cecil to promise me a cease-fire while the French commissioner was in the north, but he said that we must keep up the threat…” She broke off, her throat tight with anxiety.

“He is right,” Thomas Parry said quietly.

Robert pressed her hand. “Drink it while it is hot,” he said. “Go on, Elizabeth.”

“It’s worse than that,” she said, obediently taking a sip. “We have no money. I can’t pay the troops if they stay in the field another week. And then what will happen? If they mutiny we will be destroyed; if they try to make their own way home with no money in their pockets they will pillage from the border to London. And then the French will march freely behind them.”

She broke off again. “Oh, Robert, it has all gone so terribly wrong. I have ruined everything that was left to me. Not even my half-sister Mary failed this country as I have done.”

“Hush,” he said, taking her hand and pressing it to his heart. “None of this is true. If you need money I will raise it for you; there are lenders we can go to, I promise it. We will pay the troops, and Howard and Grey will not attack without a chance of winning. If you want, I’ll go north, and look for you, see what is happening.”

At once she clutched his hand. “Don’t leave me,” she said. “I can’t bear to wait without you at my side. Don’t leave me, Robert; I can’t live without you.”

“My love,” he said softly. “I am yours to command. I will go or stay as you wish. And I always love you.”

She raised her head a little from the gold cup and gave him a fugitive smile.

“There,” he said. “That’s better. And in a moment you must go and put on a pretty gown and I will take you riding.”

She shook her head. “I can’t ride; my hands are too sore.”

She held out her hands to show him. The cuticles all around the nails were red and bleeding, and the knuckles were fat and swollen. Robert took the hurt hands into his own and looked around at Kat Ashley.

“She has to rest,” she said. “And not worry so. She is tearing herself apart.”

“Well, you wash your hands and cream them, my love,” Robert said, hiding his shock. “And then put on a pretty gown and come and sit with me by the fire, and we shall have some music and you can rest and I will talk to you about my horses.”

She smiled, like a child being promised a treat. “Yes,” she said. “And if there is a message from Scotland…”

Robert raised his hand. “Not one word about Scotland. If there is news, they will bring it to us as quickly as they can. We have to learn the art of patiently waiting. Come on, Elizabeth, you know all about waiting. I have seen you wait like a master. You must wait for news as you waited for the crown. Of all the women in the world you are the most elegant waiter.”

She giggled at that, her whole face lighting up.

“Now that’s true,” Thomas Parry agreed. “Ever since she was a girl she could keep quiet and judge her moment.”

“Good,” Dudley said. “Now you go and get dressed, and be quick.”

Elizabeth obeyed him, as if he were her husband to command, and she had never been Queen of England. Her ladies went past him with their eyes down, all except for Laetitia Knollys, who swept him a curtsy as she went past, a deep curtsy, one appropriate from a young lady-in-waiting to a king in waiting. There was not much that Laetitia ever missed about Lord Robert.

Newcastle,

June 7th 1560

1. Assassination is a disagreeable tool of statecraft but there are occasions when it should be considered.

2. For instance when the death of one person is to the benefit of many lives.

3. The death of one enemy can be to the benefit of many friends.

4. In the case of a king or queen, a death which appears accidental is better than a defeat of that king or queen which might encourage others to think of rebellion in future.

5. She is, in any case, elderly and in poor health. Death will be a release for her.

6. I would advise you to discuss this with no one. There is no need to reply to this.

Cecil sent the letter unsigned and unsealed by special messenger to be delivered to the queen’s hand. There was no need to wait for any reply; he knew that Elizabeth would take any crime on her flexible conscience to get her army home.

The whole court, the whole world, waited for the news from Scotland, and still it only came in unrevealing snippets. Cecil’s letters, arriving always at least three days old, told Elizabeth that he and the French envoy were planning to travel together to Edinburgh, as soon as the details of the French train could be agreed. He wrote that he was hopeful of agreement once Monsieur Randan, the French emissary for peace, could get instructions from Mary of Guise. He wrote that he knew Elizabeth would be anxious about the soldiers, and about the stores, about their arrears of pay, and about their conditions, but that he would report on all of that when he had met with Lord Grey in Edinburgh. She would have to wait for news.