This Heart of Mine (21 page)

The gentlemen mounted their own horses, and together the two couples began the short ride to Tilbury Plain. A quarter of a mile from the encampment they met with the queen’s party, and Velvet detached herself to join the other Maids of Honor. Bess, looking pretty and spirited in her scarlet gown, greeted her gaily.

“Is it true?” she demanded.

“Is what true?” Velvet replied.

“Is it true about Angel? That your brother has taken her for his mistress? ’Tis all over the court this morning!”

Velvet was shocked. “My brother, the Earl of Lynmouth, and Angel Christman were
wed
last night.”

“Is that what they told you?” One of the Maids of Honor, Leonore D’Arcy, rumored to be a particularly promiscuous girl, laughed. “Lord bless me, Velvet, you are still a country mouse if you believe that! One can hardly blame Mistress Christman as your brother is wealthy and handsome. With no fortune or great name such as we have, the poor girl could hardly be expected to make an advantageous match.” She laughed again.

“I would not speak that way before the queen if I were you, Mistress D’Arcy, for my brother and his bride were married in the queen’s own presence by the queen’s own chaplain,” snapped Velvet. How she disliked these catty young courtiers. “I should know for I was there!”

“They were?”
This was chorused by all the Maids of Honor who now crowded around Velvet’s mount.

“Indeed they were,” replied Velvet sweetly. “The Earl of Leicester was also there, as was my brother’s friend, Lord Gordon. Angel Christman is now Angel Southwood, the Countess of Lynmouth.”

“God’s nightcap!” said Bess, who rarely swore. “How did this all happen?”

“For Robin, it was love at first sight. He saw Angel for the first time several weeks ago at his fête for the queen, and he would not rest afterward until he had made her his wife.”

“Oh, how romantic!” Bess said soulfully. “How very fortunate they do not have to worry about offending the queen, for if they were married by her own chaplain then she must approve the match.”

“Why, Bess, do you have some secret love who is the queen’s favorite perhaps?” mocked the D’Arcy girl. “You daren’t set Water afire, I’m told.”

Bess Throckmorton whitened and glanced forward to where the queen rode with Leicester and Essex. She was terrified lest Elizabeth Tudor hear the thoughtless words of Leonore D’Arcy. Bess was hopelessly in love with Walter Ralegh, and he with her, but neither dared to jeopardize their position at court, for their very livelihoods depended upon the queen’s favor and goodwill.

“I wonder if Her Majesty knows that you’ve been tumbling Anthony Bacon?” murmured Velvet innocently, never even glancing at the D’Arcy girl.

“That’s a foul lie!”

“Not according to the Earl of Essex, my dear. He says you are a most prodigiously hot piece, but you sell your favors far too cheaply considering your ancient and powerful name.”

The other girls in the queen’s train began to giggle. This was a delicious piece of gossip, and Leonore D’Arcy wasn’t particularly well liked while Bess Throckmorton was loved and respected. Most had guessed Bess’s secret, but never discussed it amongst themselves, fearing to spoil what they all considered a sweetly tragic romance. Silently they applauded Velvet’s wickedly sharp words, though none would have dared to challenge the D’Arcy heiress themselves.

“I’d expect you to defend Bess,” sneered Leonore D’Arcy. “She may be poor, but her family is influential, and yours is certainly not, though they be vulgarly rich. You need her influence here at court, for your own father is of little importance, and your mother, I am told, is a common Irish pirate forbidden to even come to court.”

“You confuse my mama with our cousin, Grace O’Malley, who is most definitely not common, though she be called a pirate,”
Velvet said brightly. “As to needing anyone’s influence, I don’t. Money, dear Mistress D’Arcy, is the mightiest influence. I choose my friends for their amiability. Since I am a great heiress, I have that option.”

“Please,” pleaded Bess, “let us not quarrel amongst ourselves in this time of such great mortal danger for our dear queen and our beloved England.”

A murmur of assent arose from the other girls, and, outnumbered, Leonore D’Arcy ceased her sniping. Velvet looked fondly at Bess and, leaning over, patted her friend’s hand. Bess smiled gratefully back at the younger girl.

Ahead, Elizabeth Tudor rode like an Amazon queen. She was mounted upon a huge white gelding with dappled gray hindquarters. The animal had been a gift to her from Robert Cecil, Lord Burghley’s younger son. Cleverly the queen had chosen to wear virginal white. The velvet gown had a satin underskirt embroidered with silver Tudor roses, and the sleeves were festooned with white silk bows that had Indian pearl centers. As her hair was beginning to thin, she wore a fiery bright red wig into which she had stuck two white plumes. Because of her council’s fear of assassination, she also wore a decorated silver breastplate over the bodice of her gown, and in her right hand she carried a silver truncheon chased in gold. There was no doubt that she was a most inspiring and queenly sight to all who saw her, and the men cheered and shouted themselves hoarse, particularly when they saw that she meant to come amongst them without fear, accompanied by only a few gentlemen. The rest of her train had now stopped, remaining on the edge of the vast crowd of soldiers.

Erect and proud upon her beautiful mount, Elizabeth Tudor advanced, reining her horse in every now and then to accept their wild and fiercely loyal acclaim. Finally, deep within the center of her army, she stopped. Around her was a sea of English faces, faces representing every walk of life from the highest to the lowest. Great lords rubbed elbows with merchants and butchers, farmers with cobblers, blacksmiths with rich landowners. There were old and young faces that looked adoringly up at her, and the queen felt a surge of pride for these wonderfully loyal Englishmen who were assembled to defend her, to defend their homeland. She let them cheer for several long minutes, then, with a dramatic gesture, she held up a gloved hand, the sunlight flashing off her truncheon.

On Tilbury Plain it grew deathly quiet, and the Queen of England spoke from her heart to her army.

“My
loving people, we have been persuaded by some that are careful of our safety, to take heed how we commit ourselves to armed multitudes, for fear of treachery; but I assure you, I do not desire to live in distrust of my faithful and loving people.”
Elizabeth paused and glanced with some amusement at her breastplate.
“Let tyrants fear! I have always so behaved myself that under God, I have placed my chiefest strength and goodwill in the loyal hearts and goodwill of my subjects; and therefore I am come amongst you, as you see, at this time, not for my recreation and disport, but being resolved, in the midst and heat of the battle, to live or die amongst you all; to lay down for God, my kingdom, and for my people, my honour and my blood, even in the dust. I know I have but the body of a weak and feeble woman; but I have the heart and stomach of a King, and a King of England too, and think it foul scorn that Parma or Spain, or any Prince of Europe, should dare to invade the borders of my realm; to which, rather than any dishonour should grow by me, I myself will take up arms, I myself will be General, Judge, and Rewarder of every one of your virtues in the field.

“I know already for your forwardness you have deserved rewards, and crowns; and we do assure you, on the word of a Prince, they shall be duly paid you. In the meantime, my Lieutenant General shall be in my stead, than whom never Prince commanded a more noble or worthy subject; not doubting but that by your obedience to my General, by your concord in the camp and your valour in the field, we shall shortly have a famous victory over these enemies of my God, my Kingdom, and of my People!”
*

As she finished, she thrust her truncheon upward and the field erupted in a roar of cheers. Hats were thrown skyward, men clapped each other on the shoulders, thrilled by Elizabeth Tudor’s words. Now even the poorest, weakest Englishman could face the proudest Spaniard and totally destroy him. There wasn’t a man there that day who would not have willingly laid down his life for the queen. Religion played no part in this for any of them. Catholic or Protestant, they adored her to a man. That day more than any day in her reign, Elizabeth Tudor was England!

Though impressive in their drilling and unsurpassed in their loyalty, as it turned out Elizabeth Tudor’s soldiers were not called upon to fight the invading Spanish that day. After almost two weeks of anguishing suspense, word finally reached the queen that her navy had successfully broken the Armada in a fiery battle that had taken place on the twenty-eighth and twenty-ninth of July.

That Sunday night, a single gun had been fired from the British
flagship
Ark Royal.
Silently, manned by volunteer crews, fireships had set off from the English fleet, towing behind them the little dinghies that would evacuate the brave crews when their work was done. With wind and tide both running fast behind them, the blazing ships bore down on the Spanish, creating total panic. Though the Duke of Medina-Sidona kept his head and took orderly evasive action, the majority of Spanish captains panicked, cut their anchor cables, and fled out to sea. Many collided in the darkness and were swept onto the beaches of France, where they were plundered by English and French alike, and their unfortunate crews killed.

To the east of Calais, off the Flemish coast, lay a line of concealed sandbars, the Banks of Zeeland. It was here that the Spanish Armada had found itself at daybreak on Monday, July 29. Drake, most familiar with the area, led the attack from the west to the Armada’s rear. Again and again they passed the defending Spanish galleons, exposing them to heavy fire from the fleet’s guns. Almost half the seamen on Medina-Sidona’s flagship, the
San Martin
, were killed; the ship’s decks were strewn with the dying.

Over and over again the English pounded the Spanish: Drake in his ship
Revenge
, Hawkins in
Victory
, Frobisher in
Triumph
, Seymour in
Rainbow
, Winter in
Vanguard
, Fenton in
Mary Rose
, Lord Admiral Howard in
Ark Royal
, and that amazing old gentleman from Cheshire who had been knighted upon the lord admiral’s flagship with Hawkins and Frobisher only three days prior, eighty-nine-year-old Sir George Beeston in his ship
Dreadnought.
Fiercely, England’s brave and gallant captains, amid the dense smoke and deafening gunfire, ravaged the mighty Armada. It had been an incredible victory, and by day’s end not a single Spanish ship remained capable of fighting. The English ceased their firing, however, only because they had run out of ammunition. They had no real idea of the fantastic victory they had just won.

That night the wind shifted, blowing the Armada back onto the dreaded Zeeland banks. The Spanish were in danger of being totally wrecked. By dawn, the Spanish pilots were sounding depths of six fathoms, and all could see the waves breaking over the ever-closing shoals. In order to save the lives of the twenty thousand men still alive aboard the remaining Spanish ships, an offer of surrender had been prepared, to be carried by pinnace to the English. Close to midday, however, the wind shifted to the southwest, and the battered Spanish ships, their tattered sails filling with wind, were able to turn northward, running past the approaches to the river Thames and the port of Harwich. All the while, as the broken Armada made its escape, it was shadowed
by the English fleet. On Friday, August 2, the winds shifted to the northeast. Short on rations, practically out of water, the English turned back for home, convinced that further pursuit was unnecessary. From the bodies of the drowned livestock thrown overboard by the Spanish, it was concluded that their enemy was also crucially short of rations and water.

In England no one had any idea of the great defeat visited upon the Spanish. The English fleet had sent no word of their victory to Elizabeth, for even they were not entirely certain that they had fully overcome the Armada. No one, it seemed, wanted the responsibility of crying success lest failure overtake them yet. Instead, they had continued to pursue their enemy, driving them farther from England, farther toward their ultimate destruction, while in England preparations had continued for war, for invasion, until at last the news of her navy’s triumph reached the queen.

*
Elizabeth Tudor’s actual speech on Tilbury Plain.

W
hen the English finally learned the extent of their impressive victory over the Spanish and the great Armada, the country went wild in a frenzy of rejoicing. For a good week, bonfires blazed on every hill throughout the land during the late-summer evenings. Before leaving Tilbury, the queen rode to every corner of the encampment to bid her faithful soldiers farewell and to thank them for their loyalty. Riding through the lines of cheering men, she was accompanied by Leicester and young Essex.