that we could make a sharp profit if we were not too particular at taking advantage of a fool in trouble. William saw, as I did, the profit that could be made from it, and he bought it for me at a knockdown price, and swore it would be the greatest house in the North of England, and it would be our new home.
When the new queen, Mary Tudor, came to the throne – and who would have thought she could defeat the good Protestant claimant, my friend Jane Grey? – they accused my poor Cavendish of defrauding his office, of taking bribes, and of stealing land from the Holy Roman Catholic church – which now rose again from the dead like Jesus Himself. Shameful accusations and frightening times: our friends held in the Tower for treason, dearest little Jane Grey facing death for claiming the throne, the reformation of religion utterly reversed, the world turned upside down again, the cardinals returned and the Inquisition coming. But the one thing that I was sure of, the one thing that comforted me through all the worry, was the knowledge that he would know to a penny how much he had stolen. They might say that his books at the palace did not account for the huge fortune he had made, but I knew that he would know; somewhere there would be accounts that would show it all, good and clear, theft and profit. When he died, my poor husband Cavendish, still under suspicion of theft, corruption, and dishonest accounting, I knew that he would make his accounts in heaven, and St Peter (who I supposed would be restored also) would find them exact, to the last penny.
In his absence, it fell to me, his widow, all alone in the world, to defend my inheritance on earth. He had left me everything in my own name, God bless him, for he knew I would keep it safe. Despite every tradition, custom and practice which makes widows paupers and men the only heirs, he put every penny in my name, not even in trust, not to a kinsman. He did not favour a man, any man, over me, his wife. He gave it wholly to me. Think of that! He gave everything to me.
And I swore that I would not betray my dearest Cavendish. I swore, with my hand on his coffin, that I would keep the sacks of gold under the marriage bed, the lands that I had inherited from him, the church candles on my tables and the pictures on my walls, and that I would show my duty to him, as his good widow, by fighting to prove their title as my own. He left his fortune to me; I owed it to him to see that his wishes were honoured. I would make sure that I kept everything. I made it my sacred duty to keep everything.
And then, thank God the claims against me were cut short by another royal death. God Himself preserved my Protestant fortune. Queen Mary the Papist would have clawed back all the church lands if she could have done. She would have had monasteries rebuilt and abbeys re-dedicated, and certainly everything taken back from good officers who were only doing their duty – but God quickly took her to Himself and she died before she could dispossess us all, and the new ruler was our Elizabeth.
Our Elizabeth, the Protestant princess who knows the value of good property as well as the rest of us, who loves, as we do, peace, the land, and a reliable currency. She understands well enough the price of our loyalty to her. We will all be good Protestants and loyal subjects if she will leave us with our stolen Papist wealth, and make sure that no Papist ever gets the throne and threatens our fortunes again.
I had placed myself close to her from the earliest years, both by calculation and preference. I was raised in a Protestant household, in service to the great Lady Frances Grey, I was companion to Lady Jane Grey, and I served a God who recognises hard work. I was at Hatfield when my friend Robert Dudley himself brought the news that the old queen was dead and Elizabeth was the heir. I was at her coronation as a beautiful and wealthy widow (God bless my husband Cavendish for that) and my next husband, Sir William St Loe, was her chief butler of England. I caught his eye on the night of her coronation dinner and knew that he looked at me and saw a pretty woman of thirty, with great lands that marched temptingly beside his own. Dearest Cavendish had left me so prosperous that perhaps I could have made a deal for an even better husband. Sir John Thynne of Longleat was mentioned as one, and there were others. But to tell truth, William St Loe was a handsome man and I liked him for himself. Also, although Sir John has Longleat, which is a house any woman could covet, William St Loe’s lands were in my home country of Derbyshire and that made my heart beat faster.
With him as my husband, and a good Protestant queen on the throne, I knew there would be no questioning the history of a pair of gold candlesticks that once stood on an altar and now my best table. No-one would worry about some three hundred handsome silver forks, a couple of dozen golden ewers, some exquisite Venetian glass, and chests of gold coins which suddenly appeared in the accounts of my household goods. Surely, to the Protestant God whom we all worship and adore, no-one would trouble a loyal widow who has done nothing but love things of beauty that have come her way? There would be no great anxiety about lands that had once belonged to the church and now belong to me. And nor should there be. ‘Thou shalt not muzzle the ox that treads the corn,’ my Cavendish used to say to me and sometimes, only half in jest, ‘the Lord helps them who help themselves.’
But neither of us – I swear to Our Lady – neither of us, at our most acquisitive, would have taken Tutbury Castle even as a gift. It will cost more to put right than it would to pull down and start again. I can just imagine my Cavendish looking it over and saying to me: ‘Bess, beloved, a castle is a very fine thing, but where is the profit in it?’ And the two of us would have ridden away to a better investment: something that we could buy cheap and make better.
When I remember Cavendish, I have to marvel at my new husband, the earl. His family have owned half of England for centuries, and leased this property of Tutbury forever; but they have let it get so run down that it is no good for them, nor for any fool that might have taken it off their hands. Of course, my husband the earl has no mind for detail, he has never had to trouble himself with the vulgar questions of profit and loss. After all, he is a nobleman, not a merchant like my Cavendish. He is not on the rise as my Cavendish had to be, as I was then proud to be. My husband the earl has such great lands, he has so many people as servants and tenants and dependants, that he has no idea what profit he makes and what are his costs. Cavendish would have been sick to his heart to do business like this; but it is the noble way. I don’t do it myself; but I know enough to admire it.
Not that there is anything wrong with Tutbury village. The road that winds through it is broad enough and well-enough made. There is a moderately good ale house and an inn that once was clearly a church poorhouse in the old days before someone put in their bid and seized it – though looking at it and the fields around it, I doubt there was a great profit. There are good farms and fertile fields and a river that runs deep and fast. It is low-lying land, not the countryside I love: the steep hills and low valleys of the Derbyshire Peaks. It is all rather flat and dull and Tutbury Castle sits atop its own little mound like a cherry on a pat of syllabub. The road to the castle winds up this little hill like a path up a midden and at the top is a handsome gateway built of good stone and an imposing tower which makes you hope for better; but you are soon disappointed. Inside the curtain wall to the left is a small stone house which all but leans against the damp wall, with a great hall below and privy rooms above, a kitchen and bakehouse on the side. These, if you please, are to be the apartments of the Queen of Scots, who was born in the Castle of Linlithgow and raised in the Chateau of Fontainebleau and may well be a little surprised to find herself housed in a great hall which has next to no daylight in winter and is haunted by the lingering stink of the neighbouring midden.
On the opposite side of the courtyard are the lodgings for the keeper of the castle, where I and my lord are supposed to huddle in a part-stone, part-brick building with a great hall below and lodgings above and – thank God – at least a decent fireplace big enough for a tree at a time. And that is it. None of it in good repair, the stone outer wall on the brink of tumbling into the ditch, the slates loose on every roof, crows’ nests in every chimney. If the queen takes herself up to the top of the tower at the side of her lodgings she can look out over a country as flat as a slab of cheese. There are some thick woods and good hunting to the south but the north is plain and dull. In short, if it were a handsome place I would have pressed my lord to rebuild it and make a good house for us. But he has taken little interest in it and I have none.
Well,
