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At first sight the Queen looked like a young woman; one felt some miracle of preservation had kept her as a maid of 30. But when she turned her head towards the window one could see the lines under the talcum and the borax. She was wearing a dark auburn wig, and her gown of white silk embroidered with great pearls was cut low, showing as much white bosom as Lady Jael ever did. Two pearls in the ears, a necklace which glinted fire at every move, a small becoming crown.

“Nevertheless, in the month now past, when the Realm was in perhaps the greatest peril of all the perils of Her Majesty’s reign, your service to her was wanting. Captain Alexander has reported on arriving at Pendennis on the 31st October that there was not half a barrel of powder in the castle, that all fortifications were neglected, the guns in poor condition, the musters unsummoned. Further that your deputy captain was away and such servants as you spared for the defence of the fort were in liquor. What say you to all this?”

My father began a long and rambling defence, which was part justification, part denial. He referred to the many letters he had sent to the Privy Council asking for more arms. He spoke of the difficulties and jealousies he had had to contend with nearer home, when others in their reports and in their positions were judged to be before him. He would have gone on much longer but suddenly stopped. A white gloved hand at the top of the table had been raised.

“What is this young man doing here, Mr Killigrew?”

“He is my eldest son, your majesty. A base son but one I esteem. I ventured to ask him here so that in some part his words might be accepted as bearing out my own. If it so “

“Go on, my Lord Archbishop.”

The archbishop turned over a parchment. For a few moments I had met the eyes of the Queen.

“A second charge. Two weeks ago today at Dartmouth, in the examination of one Nicholas Franklin before George Carey of Cockington and Thomas Holland, mayor of Dartmouth, Franklin being aboard the Bear of Amsterdam, one of the Spanish navy forced in by stress of weather and interned … Franklin, a mariner, testified to hearing one Captain Elliot talking with officers, Captain Elliot being a known traitor and a long partner with the Spaniards. Witness says Captain Elliot said in June of last year, he being with his ship in Falmouth haven and much in the company and confidence of one John Killigrew, captain of the castle, was there surprised by one of the Queen’s ships Crane and escaped up river. Whereon Mr Killigrew suborned Captain Jonas, commander of Crane, with the gift of œ100 to sail out of the haven and so give Elliot time to escape. This money Captain Elliot repaid to Mr Killigrew, and this Mr Killigrew accepted, knowing it to be gold from Spain …”

The peacocks were screaming. The new Earl of Nottingham brushed the end of his pen lightly over his beard.

“Your majesty,” Mr Killigrew said, “my lords, this is an outrage l This is infamy ~ You, madam, who have honoured me with your confidence for so long, can you accept such a calumny? I, who have laboured all these years …”

“Mr Killigrew,” said the Queen gently. “Do not protest. Say if you did or if you did not.”

“I did not! On my immortal soul and on my hopes of its redemption through the love of Christ, I swear I did notl”

The Lord Treasurer said: “I think you have admitted on some former occasion to an acquaintance with this man.”

“Indeed, yes. My river is an open haven. It is not discriminate in whom it gives protection to. But I was no more inward with Captain Elliot than with a hundred other mariners who from time to time have come to the harbour and dropped anchor there.”

Lord Bathurst said: “Could we not have Captain Jonas called? “

Sir Robert Cecil said: “Captain Jonas has already been examined … Not unnaturally he denies all knowledge of this. There is some corroborative testimony from a Coxswain Lloyd who was aboard Crane at the time mentioned. But Lloyd, it must be said in fairness, is not an entirely trustworthy witness.” Cecil had a delicate voice, careful and low, but every word could be heard.

There was a pause. The Queen glanced at the clock and then turned again to the Archbishop.

“There is a third charge,” said the Archbishop. “This is contained in an examination of one, William Love, of Weymouth, lately hanged for piracy. Love’s statement asserts ‘that in the Armada lately sent against us, Captain Elliot, Captain Burley, Captain Lambert, were pilots royal of Spain, all with instructions to land and deal with John Killigrew of Pendennis and Arwenack, with whom they are close acquainted. And in this as in all other respects Killigrew without doubt was faulty and in the payment of Spain’.”

I stared down along the surface of the table at the hands and the pens and the paper and the wax.

The Queen said: “It seems, my lords, that in this some excess of zeal has robbed us of a valuable witness.” You could see the ironical lift of an eyebrow.

Mr Killigrew said: “Your majesty, my lords, this too is calumny without truth! If this is how I am regarded, then I regret that some few of the enemy did not land so that Icould give the lie and my blood to this base slander. Your majesty, this my son was aboard one of the Spanish ships, having been taken prisoner after Cadiz. He spoke with Elliot and others and can bear witness that my name was never spoken by them except as an enemy of Spain to be overcome on landing never as a traitor, never as a traitor I “

They were waiting for me. This might be the crux of it all. I moistened lips suddenly very dry.

“Your majesty, because I speak Spanish I was used on this voyage to interpret between the Spanish and some Irish volunteers. I was aboard the San Bartolomeo galleon and I was one of the few survivors when she foundered in the storm. I saw Captain Elliot three times. He knew me for a Killigrew and used me the worse for it. He did not regard my father as a friend of the Spaniards but as their first enemy to be overcome on landing. Before the Armada sailed I was kept in prison for many months in conditions in which many of my companions died. Later I was in solitary confinement and for a time lost my reason. This would not be the treatment given to the son of someone they counted as their friend.”

A gleam of sunlight filtered through the windows and fell on a dark auburn wig.

One man said: “Of what value is a son’s testimony on behalf of his fathers I would have lied to save my father’s head.”

“Some sons,” said the Queen, “would lie to see their fathers looped. It does not follow, my lord North.”

The Archbishop folded his hands on the parchment. “This is not the court of the Star Chamber, Mr Killigrew, and we permit ourselves only to deal in summary justice. Now we have before us three charges, the first proven, the latter two disputable; but all taken together there is a heavy inference of treason. We have heard your defence, your denials, but “

A page came quietly across and whispered in the Queen’s ear. She looked up, her narrow lips pursed. “Yes, he may come in.”

We all waited. She made no attempt to explain to her Council who asked permission to enter. There was a heavy clanking step that I recognised before I saw the man bending over the Queen’s hand.

“Sir Walter,” she said. “We gave you leave to take the waters.”

“Your precious majesty.” His eyes travelled over her face. “I had urgent business in London so returned briefly.”

“You are recovered?”

“More in two minutes for the refreshment of this reception than for all the time in Bath.”