The rebel heart

Chapter 14

25 February, 1601 London

Gresham and Jane were sitting in the Library. Few households ate breakfast as a formal meal, preferring to grab a crust or a handful of leftovers from supper. Dr Stephen Perse at Cambridge had advised Gresham always to start the day well with food. Gresham's weakness from campaigning days was cremated bacon, burnt to a crisp on an open fire. This morning he had to force the food down his throat. Jane joined him at breakfast if he asked, but never ate.

'Why won't you take breakfast with me? I mean actually eat with me?' he had asked idly one morning.

'Because that is what a wife would do,' she had answered simply. Most men dreaded their mistress demanding marriage. Jane must be the first mistress to have turned the offer down.

The rebellion had fizzled out, of course. Essex had left it too late. If he and his men had been by St Paul's Cross at eight in the morning, in time for the first sermon, they might have started a tidal wave that would have swept through London.

As it was, they marched to the east, turned right, through streets that were increasingly empty. Sheriff Smith, whom Essex had never met, always relying on others, denied any promise of support and had fled through his back door. The City authorities drew a chain over Ludgate where Essex had entered, meaning he would have to fight to get back even to his own house. He lingered in Fenchurch Street, in the house of Sheriff Smith, stealing the supplies the Sheriff kept in his kitchen. Roused to action at last, he fought a minor skirmish at Ludgate, was beaten back and finally made it to the river. In the end Essex retreated to his house, the most dynamic thing he did all day being to ask for a clean shirt, because his own was soaked in sweat. When the Privy Council brought up cannon to demolish the house, they surrendered: Essex, Southampton and the rest.

'Do you wish you had gone to the trial?' asked Jane.

'And rub his face in the fact that I helped destroy his rebellion — a man I'd once claimed as a friend? No. And the trial was a farce, as all such trials are. A show trial.'

In response to a heated accusation from Essex, Robert Cecil admitted that he had said to Sir William Knollys that the Spanish Infanta had a claim to the throne, but in such a context as to make the statement meaningless. Both he and Knollys denied they had fixed up their story beforehand. It had destroyed any case Essex might have had, condemned him.

'But they let Southampton off,' said Jane, 'merely locked him up in the Tower.'

They said it was because of his youth and inexperience. Yet this was a man who had drunk a murdered child's blood. Gresham had talked of Essex's confession to no one. Essex had never said who the men in white with hoods were or where they came from. Were those men so powerful as to be able to protect Southampton, even if they could do nothing for Essex? Was English society corrupted to its core with Devil-worshippers? Or did the Devil really exist, and look after at least some of his own?

'Are you going to… the Tower?' asked Jane hesitantly.

'How can I deny a summons to attend the execution from the Queen? I've no option.'

'Why has she asked you?' Jane looked worried.

'They're executing him inside the Tower in case there's a riot. They've made no public announcement.' The order for Gresham to attend had come late the night before, the most strict secrecy enjoined on him. A final test of loyalty? 'They need a few eyewitnesses, and people who won't call out for Essex. I'm an obvious invitee.' The food rose in his throat as he contemplated what he must do and see. A blow struck in anger, a blow struck in the heat of battle, these had a validity, justification. The slow, cruel, methodical process of an execution, its clinical lack of emotion, its reasoned premeditated calm, sickened him to his core.

'And what of us?' he asked gazing fondly at her.

She looked up, startled.

'Are you unhappy with our relationship?'

'No,' he said, 'I'm not. I have everything — a mistress for my bed, a companion when I need one who yet knows when to leave me alone, a steward for my house. You, on the other hand, have very little, not even security. You place no restriction on me, no obligation. It hardly seems fair.'

Jane looked at him levelly, glorious eyelashes framing the unfathomable depths of her eyes.

'It's as I choose and as I wish,' she said simply. And something like a grimace crossed her face. 'The person who tries to tie you down will simply be left with a broken rope in their hands. And ropeburn.' She rose.

'Before you go,' he said, 'you should know I've arranged for an annuity to be paid to George's children.'

Lord Willoughby's estate had proven bankrupt on his innocent death as the result of a stab wound from a wild and drunken supporter of the Earl of Essex.

'Lady Willoughby's also been looked after.' There was distaste in Gresham's voice. He could think of better uses for his money. 'She seemed reluctant to care for the children of a bankrupt — I didn't tell her about the annuities — so they're going to the care of Gervase Markham.'

As far as the public were concerned, Gervase Markham was a lively young man who had left the service of the Earl of Essex when it became clear that the Earl was headed towards rebellion.

'May I ask you something?' said Jane. 'Was it Spain who tried to kill you, on the boat and in Ireland? And when Cameron said he killed someone trying to kill the Queen, who was that? Was he telling the truth?"

Gresham sighed. 'Cameron told the truth about the assassination attempt on Elizabeth. It was a fool of a young Scotsman, put up to it by some hotheads in James's Court who thought that if they killed Elizabeth James was bound to inherit, and Christmas would come early to the Scottish Court. James heard about it, and simply wasn't prepared to kill a fellow monarch. He didn't have to; he knows she'll die of natural causes in a few years anyway. So James ordered Cameron to stop the assassination — to Cameron's great annoyance, I imagine. Cameron had been bought by Spain then, and a Scotsman killing Elizabeth might have done wonders for the Spanish claim. But it'd all come about too early, and Cameron daren't disobey James in case he revealed himself.'

'And on the boat?' Jane prompted, 'and in Ireland?'

'It was the Spanish on the boat. I thought they wanted the two messages from Cecil and the Queen. Oh, they'd have used the one from Cecil to blackmail him, and the Queen's message was simply to say thank you — rather grudgingly, I imagine — for stopping the assassin. But the messages would have been a bonus. It was me they wanted. I'm sure they saw me as the only person talking sense to Essex, and all their plans hinged on him leading a rebellion. So I was a real threat, and what better way to dispose of me than out of sight and out of mind at sea? It would have been just another boat that set sail and was never seen again.'

'And Ireland?' she asked.

'That's the funny bit,' said Gresham. 'When they were all set to hang me, at the Council of War, that was Cameron's doing. He and Spain wanted me dead, so what better way than to organise a judicial killing, let Essex's cronies vent their hatred of me as a rival for

Essex's favour? Cameron had been working on them for weeks, and it damn nearly worked.'

'But what about the soldiers you told me about? The ones who fired on you at the Pass of Plumes?'

'Cecil's men,' said Gresham. 'We spent a lot of money and a lot of time tracking them down. We found them eventually. Or Mannion did.'

A shudder passed through Jane's body. She did not want to know whether those two men were still alive.

'So Cecil was trying to kill you as well!'

'No,' said Gresham. 'That's the other funny bit. He was trying to kill Essex. That was what he'd paid the men to do. He'd bribed two men from my company. Why waste a chance to throw muck on my reputation? But someone had told the men it was Essex leading the charge, trying to regain his reputation. Then there's this great clatter, and amid the smoke and dust they see someone vaguely of Essex's build leading the charge on Essex's horse.'

'Essex's horse?' said a bewildered Jane.

'An accident,' said Gresham. 'His war horse and mine could be identical twins. So the soldier only had a split second. He assumed it was Essex and shot, thinking fate had given them a one-off chance to earn their pay.'

'So Cecil didn't try to kill you?' she asked incredulously.

'No,' said Gresham, almost sadly. 'For once he appears to be innocent. He gave me a package for Scotland, in good faith. He really thought I was the best person to take it. The rest of it was Spain trying to get me out of the way.'

They pondered this extraordinary fact in silence for a few minutes. Then Jane left, sensing his need to gather his thoughts alone before leaving on the fell journey to the Tower.

There were only a handful of them there to see Essex die. The Queen had sent two executioners, in case one refused. Essex was calm, dignified, perhaps almost heroic. How often had the Tower seen men who were sworn enemies to the man on the scaffold wipe away surreptitious tears as their enemy spoke his last word? Essex's last words were whipped away on the wind, inaudible to all except the executioner and the priest on the scaffold. Essex had not caught Gresham's eye, preferring to raise his eyes to heaven, if it existed. Where God, if he existed, might forgive him the sacrifice of a child. Or where Lucifer, if he existed, might claim him as his own.