A Column of Fire (96 page)

Mary was pale and shaking. ‘Am I to be executed?’ she said in a trembling voice.

Alison wanted to cry.

Paulet looked at Mary contemptuously. After a cruelly long pause he answered her question. ‘Not today.’

The arresting party got ready to move off. One of them kicked Mary’s horse from behind, causing the beast to start, jolting Mary; but she was a good rider, and stayed in the saddle as the horse moved off. The others went with her, keeping her surrounded.

Alison cried as she watched Mary ride away, presumably to yet another prison. How had this happened? It could only be that Babington’s plot had been uncovered by Ned Willard.

Alison turned to Paulet. ‘What is to be done with her?’

‘She will be put on trial for treason.’

‘And then?’

‘And then she will be punished for her crimes,’ said Paulet. ‘God’s will be done.’

*

B
ABINGTON PROVED ELUSIVE
. Ned searched every London house where the conspirator had lodged without finding any clues. He set up a nationwide manhunt, sending a description of Babington and his associates to sheriffs, harbourmasters and lord lieutenants of counties. He dispatched two men to Babington’s parents’ home in Derbyshire. In every communication he threatened the death penalty for anyone helping any of the conspirators to escape.

In fact, Ned was not particularly concerned about Babington. The man was no longer much of a danger. His plot had been smashed. Mary had been moved, most of the conspirators were now being interrogated in the Tower of London, and Babington himself was a fugitive. All those Catholic noblemen who had been getting ready to support the invasion must now be putting their old armour back into storage.

However, Ned knew from long and dismal experience that another plot might readily grow in the ashes of the old. He had to find a way to make that impossible. The treason trial of Mary Stuart ought to discredit her in the eyes of all but her most fanatical supporters, he thought.

And there was one man he was desperate to capture. Every prisoner interrogated had mentioned Jean Langlais. All said he was not French but English, and some had met him at the English College. They described him as a tallish man of about fifty going bald on top: there seemed nothing very distinctive about his appearance. No one knew his real name or where he came from.

The very fact that so little was known about someone so important suggested, to Ned, that he was extraordinarily competent and therefore dangerous.

Ned now knew, from interrogating Robert Pooley, that both Langlais and Babington had been at Pooley’s house minutes before the raid. They were probably the two seen, by the men-at-arms, running away from the neighbouring church, their escape aided by an obstructive flock of sheep. Ned had just missed them. But they were probably still together, along with the few conspirators remaining at large.

It took Ned ten days to track them down.

On 14 August a frightened rider on a sweating horse arrived at the house in Seething Lane. He was a young member of the Bellamy family, well-known Catholics but not suspected of treason. Babington and his fellow fugitives had turned up at the family’s home, Uxendon Hall near the village of Harrow-on-the-Hill, a dozen miles west of London. Exhausted and starving, they had begged for shelter. The Bellamys had given them food and drink – compelled to do so under threat of their lives, they claimed – but had then insisted that the runaways leave the house and travel on. Now the family were terrified they would be hanged as collaborators, and eager to prove their loyalty by helping the authorities catch the conspirators.

Ned ordered horses immediately.

Riding hard, it took him and his men-at-arms less than two hours to reach Harrow-on-the-Hill. As the name suggested, the village was perched on top of a hill that stuck up out of the surrounding fields, and boasted a little school started recently by a local farmer. Ned stopped at the village inn and learned that a group of suspiciously bedraggled strangers had passed through earlier, on foot, heading north.

Guided by young Bellamy, the party followed the road to the boundary of the parish of Harrow, marked by an ancient sarsen stone, and through the next village, which Bellamy said was called Harrow Weald. Beyond the village, at an inn called The Hare, they caught up with their quarry.

Ned and his men walked into the building with swords drawn ready for a fight, but Babington’s little group offered no resistance.

Ned looked hard at them. They were a sorry sight, having cut their hair inexpertly and stained their faces with some kind of juice in a poor attempt at disguise. They were young noblemen accustomed to soft beds, yet they had been sleeping rough for ten days. They seemed almost relieved to be caught.

Ned said: ‘Which one of you is Jean Langlais?’

For a moment no one answered.

Then Babington said: ‘He’s not here.’

*

N
ED WAS FRUSTRATED
to breaking point on the first day of February, 1587. He told Sylvie he was thinking of leaving the service of the queen. He would retire from court life, continue as member of Parliament for Kingsbridge, and help Sylvie run her bookshop. It would be a duller but happier life.

Elizabeth herself was the reason for his exasperation.

Ned had done everything possible to free Elizabeth from the menace of Mary Stuart. Mary was now imprisoned at Fotheringhay Castle in Northamptonshire and, although in the end she had been allowed to have her servants with her, Ned had made sure that the flinty Sir Amias Paulet also went with her to impose strict security. In October, the evidence he had assembled had been presented at Mary’s trial, and she had been convicted of treason. In November, Parliament had sentenced her to death. At the beginning of December, news of the sentence had been broadcast all over the country to general rejoicing. Walsingham had immediately drafted the death warrant Elizabeth would need to sign to authorize the execution. Ned’s old mentor William Cecil, now Lord Burghley, had approved the wording.

Almost two months later, Elizabeth still had not signed it.

To Ned’s surprise, Sylvie sympathized with Elizabeth. ‘She doesn’t want to kill a queen,’ she said. ‘It sets a bad precedent. She’s a queen herself. And she’s not the only one who feels that way. Every monarch in Europe will be outraged if she executes Mary. Who knows what revenge they may take?’

Ned could not see it like that. He had devoted his life to protecting Elizabeth, and he felt she was rejecting his efforts.

As if to support Sylvie’s point of view, ambassadors from both France and Scotland came to see Elizabeth at Greenwich Palace on 1 February to plead for Mary’s life. Elizabeth did not want to quarrel with either country. She had recently signed a peace pact with King James VI of Scotland, who was Mary’s son. On the other hand, Elizabeth’s own life was still under threat. In January, one William Stafford confessed to plotting to poison her. Walsingham had publicized this, making it seem closer to success than it had ever really come, in order to bolster public support for Mary’s execution. Exaggeration aside, it was still a chilling reminder that Elizabeth could never feel truly safe while Mary lived.

After the ambassadors had left, Ned decided to present Elizabeth with the death warrant again. Perhaps today she might be in the mood to sign it.

He was working with William Davison, who was standing in for Walsingham as secretary of state because Walsingham himself was ill. Davison agreed to Ned’s plan – all Elizabeth’s advisors were desperate for her to get it over with. Davison and Ned inserted the death warrant into the middle of a bundle of papers for her to sign.

Ned knew that Elizabeth would not be fooled by this little subterfuge. But she might pretend to be. He sensed that she was looking for a way to sign and then claim she had not intended to. If that was how she wanted it, he would make it easy for her.

She seemed in a good mood, he saw with relief when they entered the presence chamber. ‘Such mild weather for February,’ she said. The queen was often too hot. Sylvie said it was her age: she was fifty-three. ‘Are you well, Davison?’ she said. ‘Are you getting enough exercise? You work too hard.’

‘I’m very well, and your majesty is most kind to ask,’ said Davison.

She did not banter with Ned. She was aware that he was annoyed with her for prevarication. He could never hide his feelings from her. She knew him too well, perhaps as well as Sylvie did.

She had remarkable intuition, and now she gave a demonstration of it. Still addressing Davison, she said: ‘That bundle of papers you’re grasping to your bosom like a beloved child – does it include the death warrant?’

Ned felt foolish. He had no idea how she could have known.

‘Yes,’ Davison confessed.

‘Give it to me.’

Davison extracted the paper from the bundle and handed it to the queen, bowing as he did so. Ned half expected her to berate them for trying to slip it past her, but she did not. She read the document, holding it at arm’s length to compensate for her weakening eyesight. Then she said: ‘Bring me pen and ink.’

Astonished, Ned went to a side table and picked up what she needed.

Would she really sign it? Or was she still toying with him, the way she had toyed with all those European princes who had wanted to marry her? She never had married: perhaps she never would sign the death warrant of Mary Stuart.

She dipped the quill he gave her in the inkwell he held out. She hesitated, looked at him with a smile he could not interpret, then signed the warrant with a flourish.

Hardly able to believe that she had at last done it, Ned took the document from her and handed it to Davison.

She looked sad, and said: ‘Are you not sorry to see such a thing done?’

Davison said: ‘I prefer to see your majesty alive, even at the cost of the life of another queen.’

Good answer, Ned thought; reminding Elizabeth that Mary would kill her if she could.

She said: ‘Take that paper to the Lord Chancellor and have him affix the Great Seal.’

Even better, Ned thought; she was definitely in earnest.

‘Yes, your majesty,’ said Davison.

She added: ‘But use it as secretly as may be.’

‘Yes, your majesty.’

It was all very well for Davison to say yes, your majesty, Ned thought, but what on earth did she mean by telling him to use the document secretly? He decided not to ask the question.

She turned to him. ‘Tell Walsingham what I’ve done.’ Sarcastically she added: ‘He will be so relieved it will probably kill him.’

Ned said: ‘He’s not that ill, thank God.’

‘Tell him the execution must be done inside Fotheringhay, not on the castle green – not publicly.’

‘Very well.’

A musing mood seemed to come over the queen. ‘If only some loyal friend would deal the blow covertly,’ she said quietly, not looking at either man. ‘The ambassadors of France and Scotland would not blame me for that.’

Ned was shocked. She was proposing murder. He immediately resolved to have nothing to do with such a plan, not even by mentioning it to others. It would be too easy for a queen to deny she had made any such suggestion and prove the point by having the killer hanged.

She looked directly at Ned. Seeming to sense his resistance, she turned her gaze on Davison. He, too, said nothing. She sighed and said: ‘Write to Sir Amias at Fotheringhay. Say that the queen is sorry he has not found some way to shorten the life of Mary Stuart, considering the great peril Elizabeth is subject to every hour of the day.’

This was ruthless even by Elizabeth’s standards. ‘Shorten the life’ was hardly even a euphemism. But Ned knew Paulet better. He was a harsh jailer, but the rigid morality that led him to treat his prisoner severely would also hold him back from killing her. He would not be able to convince himself that murder was God’s will. He would refuse Elizabeth’s request – and she would probably punish him for that. She had little patience with men who did not obey her.

She dismissed Davison and Ned.

Outside in the waiting room, Ned spoke quietly to Davison. ‘When the warrant has been sealed, I suggest you take it to Lord Burghley. He will probably call an emergency meeting of the Privy Council. I’m certain they’ll vote to send the warrant to Fotheringhay without further consulting Queen Elizabeth. Everyone wants this done as soon as possible.’

‘What will you do?’ said Davison.

‘Me?’ said Ned. ‘I’m going to hire an executioner.’

*

T
HE ONLY MEMBER
of Mary Stuart’s little court who was not crying was Mary herself.

The women sat around her bed all night. No one slept. From the great hall they could hear the banging of carpenters, who were undoubtedly building some kind of scaffold. Outside Mary’s cramped suite of rooms, heavy boots marched up and down the passage all night: the nervous Paulet feared a rescue attempt and had posted a strong guard.

Mary got up at six o’clock. It was still dark. Alison dressed her by candlelight. Mary chose a dark red petticoat and a red satin bodice with a low neck. She added a black satin skirt and an overmantle of the same fabric with gold embroidery and sleeves slashed to show a purple lining. She had a fur collar to combat the chill of bleak Fotheringhay. Alison helped her don a white headdress with a long lace veil that fell down her back to the ground. It reminded Alison of the gorgeous train of blue-grey velvet she had carried at Mary’s wedding in Paris, so many sad years ago.

Then Mary went alone into the little oratory to pray. Alison and the others stayed outside. Dawn broke as they waited. Alison looked out of a window and saw that it was going to be a fine, sunny day. Somehow that trivial detail made her angry.

The clock struck eight, and soon afterwards there was a loud and insistent knocking at the door of Mary’s quarters. A man’s voice called out: ‘The lords are waiting for the queen!’

Until this moment Alison had not really believed that Mary would be killed. She had imagined it might all be a sham, a play put on by Paulet for some spiteful purpose; or by Elizabeth, who would issue a last-minute reprieve. She recalled that William Appletree, who had shot at Elizabeth while she was on a barge on the Thames river, had been dramatically reprieved as he stood on the scaffold. But if the lords were here to witness the execution, it must be real. Her heart seemed to turn into a lead weight in her chest, and her legs felt weak. She wanted to lie down and close her eyes and fall asleep for ever.