Elizabeth (9 page)

But he could not allay his fears, because she would not let him. He could not talk to her on this one subject, by far the most important and the most dangerous at that time, however close they were on things connected with the State. He threw down his pen in despair.

Her throne was trembling under her; nothing could keep her on it if anything happened to Amy Dudley and she married Amy Dudley's husband. The whole country would rise against her, and the Queen of Scots, still smarting from English interference in her kingdom across the Border, would descend upon them with the full support of France to claim the English throne. And not even Philip of Spain's Francophobia would make him protect the interests of a woman who had connived at murder to satisfy a personal lust.

“Sir William!”

“What is it?”

One of Cecil's private couriers stood in the doorway, covered with dust.

“I've just come from Cumnor, Sir. Lady Dudley is dead. She was found at the foot of the stairs with her neck broken this morning.”

Cecil found the Queen in her Privy Chamber. She was seated in the middle of a circle composed of Mary Sidney, who was Dudley's sister, Kate Dacre, and several young gentlemen of her household. They were all laughing, Elizabeth holding both hands wide in illustration of some story she had been telling them.

He stood without speaking, looking at her until one by one the heads turned and the laughter died away, and at last she saw him.

“Cecil? What are you doing here …?”

She saw the accusation in his eyes, and the colour of his face; it was as white as his collar. In the two years of their association she had never seen him look at her like that, as if he hated her.

In a moment she stood up.

“Leave us! All of you!”

The rest of them dispersed like leaves before a gust of wind, bowing and curtsying and backing out. When the door closed and they were alone, Cecil still did not move towards her.

“What are you standing there for? What is the matter? Jesus, man, have you gone dumb?”

“I wish I had,” he answered. “I wish I were both deaf and dumb and blind, Madam, before I saw a day like this one.”

Elizabeth stepped close to him. She was very pale, but her eyes glittered and her thin lips were set like a trap.

“I asked you once what was wrong. I shall not ask again!”

“Lady Dudley has been murdered,” Cecil said.

She spat out such a quarter-deck oath that he was startled. “Murdered? What are you talking about—are you sure?”

“Quite sure. My courier has just reported it. She was found at the foot of some stairs with a broken neck. I came to tell you before the whole world hears the news.”

“Who did it?”

She had not turned away from him; there was no sign of guilt or discomfort in her white face: it might have been sculptured from stone instead of flesh and blood. The unfathomable eyes, so black and opaque in spite of their brilliance, stared into his without a flicker. But then she was a mistress of control; no secret, no emotion escaped her unless she meant to show it. If she had killed Amy Dudley with her own hands she would look at him as coolly as she was doing then.

When Cecil did not answer, she said slowly: “Did Robert kill her?”

“You know that, Madam, better than I.”

“Are you suggesting,” the voice stabbed at him like a dagger, “that I had any knowledge of this woman's death? Is that what I see in your face, Cecil?”

He turned away from her suddenly, sickened with her and himself, his anger already changing to despair.

“What do you see in your own heart, Madam? What will the world see? That is what matters! Lady Dudley is dead, and dead by foul means, that's obvious. What will you do now—marry him, as everyone prophesied you would when he was free?”

“You must be mad to talk like this. I shan't listen to you, and be thankful I shan't hold your impertinence against you. Cecil, you may go!”

“No, Madam, I can't go. Not until you tell me what you mean to do. I can't be dismissed like a subject this time, for I cannot let you destroy yourself and your country and your friends without telling you what you are doing. Before the God who made us all, Madam, swear to me that you did not know this was going to happen!”

“Before God, I knew nothing about it. I give you my oath, as Queen of this realm, that my way with rivals is not to remove them by pushing them down a flight of stairs. If I wanted Amy Dudley's life, I have a perfectly good executioner who could take it for me. I might do that if the need arose, but never this. Are you satisfied; do you believe me?”

“I believe you. And I ask your pardon.”

He fell on his knees in front of her, overcome with relief. He knew she was innocent of the low, cowardly murder of a defenceless enemy. He should have known better; Dudley, for all his open braggadocio, would resort to the methods of a sneak thief, because he was a sneak thief. There was an inherent, noble courage in Elizabeth which had nothing to do with compassion, but was incapable of committing a major crime under a despicable covering.

Human life and human suffering meant little to her; he knew that; but her own Royal, ruthless nature acquitted her of the crime of Amy's murder, simply by the manner of it.

“How do you know?” she said, recalling him to reality. “How can you be sure that it was not an accident?”

“Even if it was,” Cecil answered, “the world will still say that Dudley caused her death, through an agent. No, Madam, it was no accident; the courier told me enough to be sure of that. The stairs are not steep enough. It's more likely someone threw her over the banisters; the fall would certainly kill her.”

“How could he have done it?” Elizabeth muttered, more to herself than to Cecil. “How could he have been such a criminal fool as to kill her …?”

“I'm not concerned with him,” Cecil said roughly. “I'm only thinking of you and the position you are in. If Dudley murdered her, and it is proved against him … you know what must be done.”

“I know.” Her back was towards him; he could see her hands wrenching at the long silk scarf which hung from her sleeve, pulling and twisting in the attempt to tear the material to shreds.

“I know what must be done. And I'll do it. Send him to me, Cecil. And make the summons public.”

When she was alone, she gave a violent wrench, and the silk scarf ripped down the middle. She was trembling with shock—with rage and fear which overwhelmed her now that Cecil had gone and she had wiped his mind clear of suspicion against her. She had fallen in love—a little—perhaps a great deal. She had given herself to a man—not completely, but far beyond normal limits. And this was the result. A murder.… And the cause of it all was her supposed lover, the man who had taken her so seriously, in his ambitions or his desire, that he had killed his own wife.… And in that moment of devastating truth she admitted that ambition was the motive controlling Robert Dudley. He had murdered Amy Dudley; she knew that as surely as if she had witnessed the crime. But he had killed her to be King of England. Not for love or for lust or for any other reason. He had a handsome body, a persuasive tongue and magnetic charm, but no heart. And no brain either, she said suddenly out loud. No brain at all, to do what he had done and think he could succeed, could put his bloody hands on her, and jeopardize her throne and her life by a scandal of his own needless making.

She rang for her women, and hurried into her robing room. When Robert Dudley came to his audience, he found her standing in the middle of the Presence Chamber, dressed from head to foot in black.

He had been down at the archery butts behind the Castle, practising with a crowd of onlookers, when Cecil himself delivered Elizabeth's message. Dudley had walked back to the Royal apartments whistling and swinging his doublet as if he had not a care in the world. He knew there would be a scandal and he expected Elizabeth to make a scene. He had had several hours to rehearse what he was going to say and do, because his personal servant Blount had already told him of Amy's death.

He had expected trouble, but he was unprepared for the expression with which the woman, whom he thought so much in love with him, met him as he came and knelt to kiss her hand.

No hand was offered him; the fierce, stony, black eyes glared at him. Her whole face was pinched and cruel; she looked suddenly ugly and almost old. He knew as he looked into that face that, if she were pressed too hard, Elizabeth Tudor would be capable of anything. And for the first time he felt a queasiness in his stomach which was very like fear.

“What have you done, you unspeakable fool?”

“Done? Madam, I come here in answer to your order and you almost spit on me.…”

“I wouldn't waste my own spittle.…” Her voice was as harsh and ugly as her expression. “You know why you are here. Don't try and lie. Your wife is dead, my Lord!”

“I know,” he answered coolly. “I heard early this morning, and I sent Blount on to find out what happened, since it seemed she had some kind of accident. Did you expect me to grieve, Madam? I'm no hypocrite and I doubt if you'd have been pleased to see me weeping tears over another woman.”

To his surprise she made a gesture of contempt and turned away from him.

“By God, you're as vain as you're stupid, if that were possible. You commit this crime and involve me in it and have the temerity to talk on personal levels about jealousy and other women? Do you think I care about such trifles at this moment? Do you think I am a treacherous, trivial fool like you?”

Dudley's lips tightened.

This was not the kind of scene he had imagined; there were no tears, no questions, no signs of any emotions except anger and contempt.

“What crime, Madam—what do you mean?”

Elizabeth sneered as she spoke. “Don't waste my time and your own. You killed your wife. Don't argue and don't deny it. You killed her. That is not important. Understand that, my Lord Dudley, your life and her life and the lives of fifty like you do not matter a tinker's curse. What does matter is the scandal which affects
me
. The world will say that I was your accomplice, and I could easily lose my throne if my guilt were believed.—This is your crime. And by the God above, I'll see that you expiate it.”

He was losing all the way; he had been defeated before he spoke, accused, judged and condemned by the one person for whom he had committed the offence. The woman who had told him to come back to her when he was free—who had dangled the prize of the most brilliant marriage in Europe in front of his eyes—was now cursing and threatening him for having followed her hints to their logical conclusion.

“And if I did do it,” he said, “what of it? I love you; loved you more than you ever loved me, it seems. She wouldn't let me go; she swore she'd keep me bound to her forever. I didn't tell you this before. She said you had taken me from her, but you'd never have me for anything but a lover as long as she lived. That was her answer when I went to Cumnor!”

“And yours was to have some hireling throw her down the stairs,” Elizabeth remarked.

“I've admitted nothing!” he retorted. “But if I did do it, you of all people should support me. Because it was done for love of you!”

She went and sat down in the high-backed chair by the fireplace. He stood where she had left him; his handsome face slowly losing the angry colour which had blazed into it. Through one of the communicating rooms he could hear the distant notes of a lute; someone was picking over the strings, improvising on an old love song. The whole scene: the room, the sunlight streaming through the windows making patterns on the wood floor, and lastly the figure in black, relaxing in her chair, watching him as if he were a stranger … it was all unreal. More unreal than the flash of imagination which overtook him and showed him Forster stunning Amy, before he heaved her unconscious body over the banisters.

He put his hands to his eyes suddenly to shut it out.

“What is the matter, Robert—conscience?” Elizabeth's voice mocked him. “You gambled. You gambled high, but you lost.”

“What have I lost, Madam?”

“You killed her for nothing, my poor Robert. I will never marry you now. I could not, even if I wished. You will always be tainted with her blood, even if you are acquitted. I feel that will be a worse punishment to you than anything the law may inflict on you. Don't come any nearer.”

He stared at her, his hands held out to touch her fell to his sides.

“What law … what are you saying?”

“My law,” Elizabeth answered. “The law which requires punishment for crimes of murder. For your own sake, Robert, I hope it can't be proved against you. For if it can, I shall send you to the scaffold without a moment's hesitation. You are under arrest, and confined to your own house at Richmond until this matter is resolved. Leave Richmond or attempt to disobey me and you will find yourself in the Tower.”

In that moment he would gladly have struck her as he had struck Amy, but he did not even clench his fist. If she had leant forward and spat in his face he would have stood there motionless, not daring to retaliate. At that moment Dudley learnt the most important lesson of his life: that Elizabeth was not a woman like other women. No matter what they did together in their private intercourse, she was immune from liberties which she did not actually invite. The man who forgot that would be struck down without mercy; indeed he would need to be a madman to attempt it. If the Tudors were famous for anything, he thought suddenly, it was for the ease with which they abandoned their friends and their lovers.

He bowed to her, and walked out of the room.

A week after Amy Dudley's death, the inquest opened at Abingdon. Robert had sent his confidential servant and kinsman Blount down to Cumnor to find out what he could, and Blount had reported a curious tale of how Amy spent the last morning of her life. In her entourage there were her maid and the women, Odingsell and Owen and Mrs. Forster; they all told how their usually mild mistress seemed distracted and ordered them to go to Abingdon Fair and leave her alone in the house. When Mrs. Odingsell protested, she had insisted with some violence; at her request they left her at Cumnor, and on their return they found her dead. That was Blount's story, and he saw to it that it was repeated through the county and the jury told beforehand that Lady Dudley had forced her attendants to leave her alone and seemed in a disordered state of mind that morning.