The permission was granted and, with great relief, Elizabeth retired from imminent danger.
There was one way of escape from ever-threatening danger. Often she thought of it; always she rejected it.
The King of Denmark had offered his son, Philibert Emmanuel, the Duke of Savoy, as a husband for her. Spain favored such a match, and therefore it received due consideration by the Queen.
While she lived her quiet life in her house at Ashridge, Elizabeth was filled with apprehension. If a stranger rode up she would be on the alert for a messenger from the Queen bringing a summons for her to appear at Court, which might be followed by imprisonment and death. Only by marrying a foreign Prince could she escape that constant fear. But to abandon fear was also to abandon her most cherished dream. As the Duchess of Savoy she would never hear those magic words which, perhaps next year, or the year after that, or in five or ten years’ time, could ring in the ears of the Princess Elizabeth: “God save Queen Elizabeth!”
No, here she was, and here she would stay. All her hopes were in England, and if at times she felt she would never succeed in climbing the slippery path which led to the summit of ambition, well then, she would rather fall in the attempt than give up the climb.
Emphatically she refused the offer from the Duke of Savoy.
The Queen and her ministers were annoyed, but mildly; and temporarily the matter was allowed to drop.
She lived quietly in the country for a few weeks, eagerly learning all she could of what was happening at Court from her friends who were still there.
News came—wild news, news which might lead to triumph or disaster. Wyatt had risen in protest against the Spanish marriage. Letters asking for her support had been sent to her, but she would have nothing to do with such a rebellion. She knew that her hope of success lay in waiting. She knew that Courtenay was concerned in the Wyatt plot, and handsome as he was he was weak and untrustworthy; and if the plot were successful, the Duke of Suffolk, who was also one of the leaders, would surely hope to bring his own daughter Lady Jane Grey to the throne rather than help Elizabeth.
No! Rebellion was not for her.
And she was soon proved to be right, for Courtenay turned traitor in a moment of panic and confessed the plot to Gardiner, so that Wyatt was forced to act prematurely. The rebellion failed and Wyatt was under arrest; Courtenay and Suffolk were sent to the Tower, and the order went forth that Lady Jane and Lord Guildford Dudley were to be executed without delay. Unfortunately for Elizabeth, letters written by Noailles and Wyatt, intended for her, were intercepted and put before the Queen.
When the summons came, Elizabeth knew that in all the dangerous moments of a hazardous life, there had never been one to equal this.
There was one thing she could do. She could go to bed. Alas, she declared, she was too ill to travel; and indeed, so terrified was she, that her illness on this occasion was not altogether feigned. She could neither eat nor sleep; she lay in agony of torment—waiting, listening for the sound of horses’ hoofs in the courtyard which would announce the arrival of the Queen’s men.
It was not long before they came.
They were not soldiers come to arrest her, but two of the Queen’s physicians, Dr. Wendy and Dr. Owen.
Her trembling attendants announced their arrival.
“I cannot see them,” said the Princess. “I am too ill for visitors.”
It was ten o’clock at night, but the doctors came purposefully into her chamber. She looked at them haughtily.
“Is the haste such that you could not wait until morning?” she asked.
They begged her to pardon them. They were distressed, they said, to see her Grace in such a sorry condition.
“And I,” she retorted, “am not glad to see you at such an hour.”
“It is by the Queen’s command that we come, Your Grace.”
“You see me a poor invalid.”
They came closer to the bed. “It is the Queen’s wish that you should leave Ashridge at dawn tomorrow for London.”
“I could not undertake the journey in my present state of fatigue.”
The doctors looked at her sternly. “Your Grace might rest for one day. After that we must set out without fail for London on pain of Her Majesty’s displeasure.”
Elizabeth was resigned. She knew that her sick-bed could give her at most no more than a few days’ grace.
She was carried in a litter which the Queen had sent for her; and the very day on which she set out was that on which Lady Jane Grey and her husband Lord Guildford Dudley walked the short distance from their prisons in the Tower to the scaffold.
Some of the country people came out to watch the Princess pass by, and she was deeply aware of their sympathetic glances. They thought of the lovely Jane Grey, who was only seventeen; she had had no wish to be Queen, but the ambition of those about her had forced her to that eminence. And perhaps at this moment she was saying her last prayers before the executioner severed that lovely head from her slender body. The people could feel nothing but pity for that young girl; and here was another—this young Princess who might be on her way to a similar fate.
For once Elizabeth was desolate and afraid. She was delaying the journey as much as possible because she believed that Mary’s anger might cool if given time. Therefore each day’s delay was important. She spent the first night at Redbourn and her second halt was at St. Albans. Oh, that she might rest a little longer in the comfortable hospitality of Sir Ralph Rowlett’s mansion! But they must go on to Mimms and to Highgate. She made a point of resting as long as she possibly could at these places, and the journey took ten days, far longer than was really necessary.
When Elizabeth reached London it was to find a subdued City in which many gibbets had been erected. Men were hanging outside the doors of their houses; there was a new harvest of heads on the Bridge. London had little heart to welcome the Princess who was sadly conscious of her own uneasy head.
But as she passed through the Capital, which had always been friendly to her, she roused herself from her melancholy. She had the litter uncovered that the people might see her all in white, a color which not only set off the glory of her hair, but seemed to proclaim her spotless innocence; she sat erect and proud, as though to say: “Let them do what they will to an innocent girl.” And if the people of London felt that at such a time it would be unwise to cheer the Princess, they did not refrain from weeping for her; and they prayed that she might not suffer the fate which had befallen the Lady Jane Grey.
She was taken to the Palace of Whitehall.
It was on the Friday before Palm Sunday that Elizabeth, in her closely guarded apartments at the Palace, heard from her attendants that Bishop Gardiner with some members of the Queen’s Council was on his way to visit her.
At length he stood before her—the great Bishop of Winchester, one of the most powerful men in the kingdom and her declared enemy.
“Your Grace is charged,” he said, “with conspiracy against the Queen. You are charged with being concerned in the Wyatt plot.”
“This is a false accusation.”
“Letters are in the Queen’s possession which will prove that you speak not the truth, and it is Her Majesty’s pleasure that you should leave this lodging for another.”
Elizabeth could not trust herself to speak; that which she had most dreaded was upon her.
“Your Grace is to be removed this day to the Tower.”
She was terrified, yet determined not to show her fear. She boldly answered: “I trust that Her Majesty will be far more gracious than to commit to that place a true and innocent woman who never offended her in thought, word, nor deed.”