The Virgin's Lover Read online

  “I should like to,” Elizabeth said. “You must have ridden your horses into the ground. You went backward and forward from Edinburgh to Newcastle, didn’t you?”

  Cecil nodded. “I wanted to confer with your uncle, and I needed to keep an eye on Monsieur Randan. It was a hard ride and a poorly kept road, especially in Scotland.”

  She nodded.

  “And what of you?” Cecil lowered his voice. The ladies walking behind them were out of earshot; Sir Nicholas was walking with Catherine Knollys. “How have things been with you these last two months, Princess?”

  For a moment he thought she would turn the question aside with a laugh, but she checked herself. “I was very afraid,” she said honestly. “Kat thought that my health would break under the strain.”

  “That was my fear,” he said. “You bore up wonderfully.”

  “I couldn’t have done it without Sir Robert,” she said. “He can always calm me, Spirit. He has such a wonderful voice, and his hands …I think he has magic in his hands …it’s why he can do anything with his horses. As soon as he lays his hand on my forehead I feel at peace.”

  “You are in love with him,” he said gently.

  Elizabeth looked quickly up at him to see if he was accusing her; but he met her eyes with steady sympathy.

  “Yes,” she said frankly, and it was a relief to her to be able to tell her counselor the truth at last. “Yes, I am.”

  “And he with you?”

  She smiled. “Yes, oh yes. Think of the misery if he was not!”

  He paused, then he asked her: “Princess, what will come of this? He is a married man.”

  “His wife is ill, and could die,” Elizabeth said. “And anyway, they have been unhappy for years. He says that his marriage is no more. She will release him. I can grant them a divorce. Then he will marry me.”

  How to deal with this? She will not want wise counsel; she will want to be confirmed in this folly. But if I do not speak, who will? Cecil drew a breath. “My queen, Amy Dudley, Amy Robsart that was, is a young woman; there is no reason to think that she will die. You cannot delay your marriage waiting for a young woman to die. And you cannot possibly grant him a divorce; there are no grounds for a divorce. You danced at his wedding feast yourself, when they married for love with the blessing of their parents. And you cannot marry a commoner, a man whose family has been under the shadow of treason, a man with a living wife.”

  Elizabeth turned to him. “Cecil, I can, and I will. I have promised him.”

  Good God! What does she mean by that? What does she mean by that? What does she mean by that?

  None of Cecil’s horror showed in his face. “A private promise? Love talk? Whispered between the two of you?”

  “A binding promise of marriage. “A de futuro betrothal before witnesses.”

  “Who witnessed?” he gasped out. “What witnesses?” Perhaps they could be bribed into silence, or murdered. Perhaps they could be discredited, or exiled.

  “Catherine and Francis Knollys.”

  He was shocked into silence.

  They walked, not saying a word. He found that his legs were weak beneath him at the horror of what she had told him. He had failed to guard her. She was entrapped, and the country with her.

  “You are angry with me,” she said in a small voice. “You think I have made a terrible mistake when you were not here to prevent me.”

  “I am horrified.”

  “Spirit, I could not help myself. You were not here, I thought that at any moment the French would invade. I thought I had lost my throne already. I had nothing left to lose. I wanted to know that at least I had him.”

  “Princess, this is a disaster worse than a French invasion,” he said. “If the French had invaded, every man in the country would have laid down his life for you. But if they knew you were betrothed to marry Sir Robert, they would put Katherine Grey on the throne in your place.”

  They were approaching the stables. “Walk on,” she said quickly. “I dare not meet him now. He will see I have told you.”

  “He told you not to confide in me?”

  “He didn’t have to! We all know you would advise me against him.”

  Cecil led her by another path into the garden. He could feel her trembling.

  “The people of England would never turn against me just for falling in love.”

  “Princess, they will not accept him as your husband and your consort. I am sorry; but the best you can do now is to choose your successor. You will have to abdicate; you will have to give up your throne.”

  He felt her stagger as her knees gave way.

  “Do you want to sit down?”

  “No, let’s walk, let’s walk,” Elizabeth said feverishly. “You don’t mean it, Spirit, do you? You’re just trying to frighten me.”

  He shook his head. “I tell you nothing but the truth.”

  “He is not so hated in the country? There are just a few who wish him ill at court—my uncle, of course, and the Duke of Arundel, those who are jealous of him and envy him his looks, those who want the favor that I show him, those who want his wealth, his position…”

  “It’s not that,” Cecil said wearily. “Listen to me, Elizabeth, I am telling you the truth. It is not a little jealousy at court, it is an opinion which runs very deep in the country. It’s his family and his position and his past. His father was executed for treason against your sister; his grandfather was executed for treason against your father. He has bad blood. Princess, his family has always been a traitor to yours. Everyone remembers that if the Dudleys rise high they abuse their power. No one would ever trust a Dudley with great position. And everyone knows that he is a married man, and no one has heard anything against his wife. He cannot just cast her aside; it would be an unbearable scandal. Already the courts of Europe laugh at you, and say that you are shamed by your adulterous love for your horse master.”

  He saw her flush at the thought of it.

  “You should marry a king, Princess. Or an archduke at the very least, someone of good blood whose alliance will help the country. You cannot marry a common man with nothing more to recommend him than his good looks and his handling of his horse. The country will never accept him as your consort. I know it.”

  “You hate him too,” she said fiercely. “You are as unkind to him as the rest of them.”

  Inveterately, he acknowledged to himself. But he smiled his gentle smile at her. “It would not matter how I felt about him, if he was the right man for you,” he said gently. “I hope I would have the sense to advise you as to your best course, whatever my preferences. And, as it happens, I do not hate him; I rather like him. But I have long feared your particular favor to him. I have been afraid that it would come to a point. I never dreamed he would take it to this.”

  Elizabeth turned her head away; he saw her picking at her nails.

  “It went further than I meant it to,” she said, very low. “I was not thinking straight and I went further…”

  “If you can escape from your promise of betrothal now, your reputation will have been stained, but you will recover, if you give him up and go on to marry someone else. But if you go through with it the people will throw you from your throne rather than bow the knee to him.”

  “Mary had Philip even though they hated him!” she burst out.

  “He was an anointed king!” Cecil exclaimed. “They might hate him but they could not object to his breeding. And Philip had an army to support him; he was heir to the empire of Spain. What does Dudley have? Half a dozen retainers and the huntsmen! How will they serve him in the first riot that breaks out?”

  “I have given my word,” she whispered. “Before God and honorable witnesses.”

  “You will have to withdraw it,” he said flatly. “Or this peace will be as nothing, for you will have won peace for England and Queen Katherine Grey.”

  “Queen Katherine?” she repeated, aghast. “Never!”

  “Princess, there are at least two plots