She gave no sign during the days which followed. Robert did not come to Court, and I knew that she missed him. She became very irritable and volunteered the remark that some people imagined they could absent themselves without leave and would have to be taught otherwise.
I was with her when news came that there was trouble between the Earl of Leicester and Sir Thomas Heneage. Leicester had sent word to Heneage that he would visit him with a stick as he had a lesson to administer, to which Heneage replied that he would be welcome and a sword would be awaiting him.
Elizabeth was furious, and there was fear in her fury. She was afraid that Robert would fight a duel and be killed, and she had no intention of allowing her favorite men to behave so foolishly. She sent for Heneage and we heard her shouting at him. Did he think he could defy her? It was dangerous to talk of swordplay, she told him. If he behaved so foolishly again someone else might be talking of an ax.
I think she boxed his ears, for when he came out those appendages looked very red and he was completely subdued.
Then it was Robert's turn. I could not resist listening.
She was very angry with him—more so than with Heneage.
"God's death," she cried, "I have wished you well but my favor is not so locked up in you that others may not have a share of it. I have other servants besides you. Remember there is one mistress here and no master. Those whom I have raised up can as easily be lowered. And this shall happen to those who become impudent through my favor."
I heard him say quietly: "Your Majesty, I beg leave to retire."
"It's yours," she shouted.
And as he came from her chamber he saw me and looked at me. It was an invitation to follow him and as soon as I could I slipped away and found him in that chamber which had previously been the scene of our passion.
He seized me and held me, laughing aloud.
"As you see," he said, "I am out of favor with the Queen."
"But not with me," I said.
"Then I am not unhappy."
He locked the door and it was as though a frenzy seized him. He was mad with desire for me and so was I for him, and although I knew that his anger with the Queen mingled with his need for me, I did not care. I wanted this man. He had haunted my thoughts from the first moment I had seen him riding beside the Queen at her accession; and if his desire for me was in some measure due to her treatment of him, she was part of my need of him too. Even in our moments of extreme ecstasy it was as though she was there with us.
We lay together, knowing full well that it was a dangerous thing to do. Were we to be discovered we could both be ruined, and we did not care; and because our need for each other transcended our fear of the consequences, it heightened our passion, intensified those sensations which I at least—and I think the same applied to him—believed could come to me through no other.
What was this emotion between us? The recognition of two like natures? It was overwhelming desire and passion and not least of our emotions was the awareness of danger. The fact that each of us could risk our future for this encounter carried our ecstasy to even greater heights.
We lay exhausted, yet triumphant in some way. We should neither of us ever forget this experience. We were bound together by it for the rest of our lives and whatever should happen to us we should never forget.
"I shall see you again ere long," he said soberly.
"Yes," I answered.
"This is a fair meeting place."
"Until we are discovered."
"Are you afraid of that?"
"If I were I should count it worthwhile."
I had known he was the man for me as soon as I had seen him.
"You're looking smug, Lettice," said the Queen. "What has happened to make you thus?" "I could not say that anything has, Your Majesty."
"I thought you might be with child again."
"God forbid," I cried in real fear.
"Come, you have but two ... and girls. Walter wants a boy, I know."
"I want a little rest from childbearing, Madam."
She gave me one of her little taps on the arm. "And you're a wife who gets what she wants, I'll warrant."
She was watching me closely. Could she possibly suspect? If she did I should be drummed out of the Court.
Robert remained aloof from her, and although this sometimes angered her, I was sure that she was determined to teach him a lesson. As she had said, her favor was not so locked up in any man that he could dare take advantage of her fondness. Sometimes I thought she was afraid of that potent attractiveness—of which I had firsthand knowledge—and she liked to whip herself into a fury against him to prevent herself falling completely victim to his desires.
I did not see him as often as I should have liked. He did come once or twice unobtrusively to Court and we met and made passionate love in the private room. But I could sense that frustration in him and I knew that what he wanted above all things was not a woman but a crown.
He went to Kenilworth, which he was turning into one of the most magnificent castles in the country. He said that he wished I could go with him and that if I had had no husband we could have married. But I wondered whether he would have talked of marriage if it had not been safe to do so, for I knew that he had not given up hope of marrying the Queen.
At Court his enemies were starting to plot against him. They clearly thought he was in decline. The Duke of Norfolk—a man I found excessively dull—was a particular enemy. Norfolk was a man of little ability. He had strong principles and was weighed down by his admiration for his own ancestry, which he believed— and I suppose he was right in this—was more noble than the Queen's, for the Tudors had sneaked to the throne in a very backdoor manner. Vitally brilliantly clever people they might be, but some of the ancient nobility were deeply conscious of their own families' superiority and none more than Norfolk. Elizabeth was well aware of this and, like her father, ready to nip it in the bud when it appeared, but she could not stop the blossoms flowering in secret. Poor Norfolk, he was a man with a sense of duty and tried always to do the right thing, but it invariably seemed the wrong thing ... for Norfolk.
For such a man it was galling to see the rise of Robert to the premier position in the country, which he felt because of his birth belonged to him, and there had been one occasion not very long before this when a quarrel had flared up between Norfolk and Leicester.
There was nothing Elizabeth liked better than to see her favorite men jousting or playing games, which called attention not only to their skill but to their physical perfections. She would sit for hours watching and admiring their handsome bodies; and there was none she had liked to see in action more than Robert.
On this occasion there had been an indoor tennis match and Robert had drawn Norfolk as a partner. Robert was winning, for he had exceptional skill in all sports. I was sitting with the Queen in that lower gallery which Henry VIII had had built for spectators, for he too had excelled at the game and enjoyed being watched.
The Queen had leaned forward. Her eyes had never left Robert, and when he scored a point she had called out "Bravo" while during Norfolk's less frequent successes she was silent, which must have been very depressing for England's premier duke.
The game was so fast that the contestants had become very hot. The Queen seemed to suffer with them, so immersed was she in the play, and she lifted a mockinder—or handkerchief—to wipe her brow. As there was a slight pause in the game and Robert was sweating profusely, he snatched the mockinder from the Queen and mopped his brow with it. It was a natural gesture between people who were very familiar with each other. It was actions like this which gave rise to the stories of their being lovers.
Norfolk, incensed by this act of lese-majesty—and perhaps because he was losing the game and was aware of the royal pleasure in his defeat—lost his temper and shouted: "You impudent dog, sir. How dare you insult the Queen!"