The Queen looked up at Gresham. Still unflinching, she raised the poor ruin of what had once been an eyebrow at him. 'Am I safe?' she said wordlessly to Gresham.
He nodded twice, very carefully. Glancing quickly behind him, he saw the two guards being bundled off by Essex's men, who had gathered now in the Privy Chamber. Gresham carefully eased the door shut as best he could. Half the Court would be here in minutes. They should not see the Queen in this state, for the sake of her dignity and that of the country. Gresham touched his sword to his forehead, and stood back, half shrouded by a tapestry.
The Queen was cradling Essex's head in her hands, with him still kneeling at her feet. Minutes, was it? Gresham was keeping no count of time. He heard the Queen speaking softly to Essex, overriding his protestations, like a mother gently chiding a child. He heard her suggest they might meet 'at a better time', when they had both washed and dressed. Stumblingly, almost in tears, Essex agreed, rose to his feet and bowed low to Elizabeth, retreating backwards. Hurriedly, Gresham realised that if Essex banged his arse on the door Gresham had just shut, it might reduce the poignancy of the event. He moved over to ease the door open. There was an expectant hush in the chamber outside. As soon as Essex had gone, Gresham closed the door again, and bowed to his Queen.
'Does he have an army with him?' The tone was clipped, almost ferocious, so totally at odds with the soft, cooing tones she had used a few seconds earlier that Gresham wondered if it was the same woman speaking.
'No,' said Gresham not raising his eyes from the floor, head still bowed in respect, 'he has no army. Just the usual suspects — Southampton, Rich, Rutland, Mountjoy — who have ridden with him. In four days. My Lord of Essex is… exhausted, Majesty.'
'You make excuses for this man?' The tone was peremptory, sharp. 'You encouraged him in this… this extraordinary intrusion? You were responsible for it, perhaps?'
Gresham was very, very tired, and his body ached ferociously in parts he never knew it had.
'I hope I'm in part responsible for the fact there's no army outside, Your Majesty, only a weeping Earl and some of his sycophants. And I entered after the Earl simply to protect you. I keep my word.'
'I think you do,' said the Queen. 'And, by God, I will keep mine. As you will keep your counsel over what you saw this early morning, if you wish similarly to keep a head on your shoulders. Here, there is a private door at the back. It leads to the dressing room, and thence out into more public areas. It will do neither of us good if you are seen to leave my room.'
So there was a secret door into the Queen's bedchamber at Nonsuch.
'Two guards saw me enter, Your Majesty.'
'Two guards who will not speak of the matter.' She paused. 'Would the Earl of Essex have come with an army? If you had not spoken to him?'
'It is easy to overrate one's influence, Your Majesty. The honest answer is, I do not know. Yet I think it was never his intention to rebel against you. To win your favour, yes. I do not think the Earl is your enemy. I think he needs you too much as his friend.'
He could not tell the Queen that Essex loved her. Not as a man loves a woman who excites him. As a man loves his mother.
'Leave now. Leave the Court.' Gresham's shoulders must have sagged. Damn! How dare his body disobey his mind! 'You are not banished. By your absence I need to make it clear that you are not part of Essex's clan. You lose usefulness for me if you are seen that way. We shall talk again when I have decided what to do with my turbulent Earl.'
Essex was outside, holding Court. His men were smiling, laughing. Their Lord had been well received by the Queen. They had talked. All would be well. The liars and the slanderers would be put in place. The true significance of the Irish treaty would be realised, the appalling difficulties of any Irish campaign understood. Essex cut a dramatic figure, still dripping and covered in mud from his four day journey.
'I have suffered much trouble and many storms abroad,' he announced to the mass of people who had now gathered in chattering excitement. 'But I find a sweet calm at home.'
With that he left to spruce himself up and prepare for the meeting at eleven o' clock he had arranged with the Queen. Clearly he had a store of clothes at Nonsuch as well as at other palaces. His audience lasted for over an hour and a half. His followers were elated, all the more so when the Earl came out smiling, happier than many of his men had seen him for months, if not years. At the meal which followed, men and women crowded round Essex. It was as it had always been — the Earl the candle around which the others flocked, the centre of attention.
Cecil attended the meal. The babble of talk dropped in volume as he appeared, then picked up again. There were a few derisory cheers and groans. Cecil was impervious. He nodded courteously enough to Essex, but seated himself as far away as the table arrangement allowed. Soon he was joined by Raleigh, Grey, Cobham, Howard and Shrewsbury.
And then the Queen asked for a second audience, later that afternoon.
‘We got a new neighbour.' Mannion had burst into where Gresham was seeing if stretching his limbs increased or decreased the pain of his recent ride. It had seemed to leave Mannion unaffected.
'And who might that be?'
'The Earl of Essex. 'E comes out of his meeting with the Queen, the one in the afternoon, looking like thunder. Before anyone can think, the order comes out that 'e's confined to his chamber. Then the Queen calls the whole of the Privy Council to Nonsuch. They 'old an 'earing. Six charges against 'im, from busting into the Queen's bedchamber to makin' a right mess o' things in Ireland. Next thing is 'e's banished from Court and 'e's in the custody of the Lord Keeper — kept in the Lord Keeper's house, in fact, right 'ere in the Strand. Two servants, that's all 'e's allowed. No visitors, not even his wife. Can't even walk in the garden. I reckon 'e's done for this time.'
'I've got an awful feeling,' said Gresham, 'that this isn't the end of anything. In fact, I wonder if things aren't just starting.'
Chapter 11
December, 1599 to January, 1601 London
London was in uproar. Huge, exaggerated versions of Essex's ride from Ireland, of his meeting with a naked Queen circulated and grew even more outrageous in the telling. Essex was banished, imprisoned in the Lord Keeper's house on the Strand, allowed only a handful of servants. No visitors were permitted. But the strain of keeping a tight rein on a man such as Essex defeated Sir Thomas Egerton, the kindly old Lord Keeper. Passers-by hurled abuse against the Queen, cries of support for Essex, then ran on, their faces hidden.
'Yet there's a strange load o' people still goin' in there,' said Mannion. 'All 'is old cronies, the ones with no money and even less sense.'
Gresham tried to visit. He was turned away. He resisted the urge to break the guard's head for him. The last thing Essex needed was a brawl on his doorstep. He smuggled a letter in. The reply was depressing.
'He's got religion again.' In courteous yet formal terms Essex's letter rejected Gresham's request for a visit. It suggested that in their wilder days they had forgotten God and Jesus, and that Gresham would need to refer to both before they could properly meet again. Even more worryingly, it was in the Earl's own hand, and sermonised Gresham for two close-written sides. It was as if the child had never existed. Perhaps Essex had made himself forget that it had.
The inns were rife with rebel talk. Essex could do no wrong. Hundreds of men from Ireland had returned to London, were swaggering and fighting in its streets and taverns, all the time professing their loyalty for the Earl, whipping up the already frothing sense of resentment and fear. Gresham had known nothing like it before, this unreasoning sense of anger centred on Essex and the perceived wrong done to him.