Philippa Carr - Lion Triumphant

“She has had her share of the treasure you have brought home,” I said.

“So she has and so she remembers. She wanted a private interview with me and there she laughed with me and she made it clear that she liked what I was doing, liked it very much. She is the Queen and at this time it is amusing and necessary to deceive the Spaniards. ‘Not always so, my good Captain,’ she said. ‘There’ll come a day…’ And in the meantime she commands me to go on … just as I have been doing and the more Spaniards I blow into the sea and the more treasure I bring back to England, the better she likes it. Why, Cat, she loves her roving adventures and she made me feel Captain Jake Pennlyon was by no means the least of them.”

He could not stop talking about the Queen.

“When she was born,” I said, “there was a great to-do because she was not a boy. They say Queen Anne Boleyn would never have lost her head if Elizabeth had been a boy. Yet could there have been a better Sovereign?”

Jake conceded that there was no Sovereign nor ever would anywhere in the world to match up to Our Lady Elizabeth.

My lying in chamber was prepared and I was ready and waiting. It was not a difficult labor. I awoke in the morning to find the child on the point of being born. The midwife was in the house. She had been there for two weeks, so eager were we that nothing should go wrong.

In the early afternoon of an August day in the year 1570 my child was born.

I lay there exhausted, then suddenly I was filled with joy for I heard the cry—the lusty cry—of a child.

I closed my eyes. I had succeeded. My child was alive and well.

The midwife came in and Jake was with her. I smiled at him, but immediately I saw the blank disappointment that was almost rage in his face.

“The child … ?” I began.

“A girl,” he shouted. “Just a girl.”

Then he went out.

I said to the midwife: “Bring my child to me,” and she was brought and laid in my arms. I loved her small, red, crumpled face. From the moment I held her in my arms I wanted her just as she was.

Jake’s brooding anger continued. He had been so certain that the child would be a boy. I knew he had pictured himself bringing up a child that would be like himself and taking him to sea with him. He had wanted that boy as he had rarely wanted anything.

He did not come near me for two days. I did not care. I had my little girl.

“She’s a bonny child,” said the midwife. “I’ll swear she knows you.”

I wondered about a name for my little girl. If it had been a son it would have been Jake, of course. She reminded me in those early days of a little bird nestling against me, I called her my little Linnet. I decided this should be her name.

A month or so after the birth of Linnet, Jake was ready to sail away. For all I knew he might be away for two years. Before he left I decided to speak to him about Romilly. The girl was growing up and was now marriageable. I thought that she and Mr. Merrimet might have a fancy for each other. Romilly was often in the schoolroom and helped him there and they were suited to each other. Would there be any objection to my making a match for them?

Jake shrugged his shoulders. “If they wish it let them,” he said.

“They could stay on here. Mr. Merrimet can take on the education of Linnet and other children we will have.”

“It’s a capital plan,” said Jake. “Get them wed. I feel a duty toward Girling and I’d like his daughter to remain one of the family. The Court’s big enough to hold them.”

On a glorious October day, as a fresh wind was billowing the sails of the Lion and the other two ships which accompanied her, we stood on the Hoe until the ships dropped below the horizon.

Almost immediately I set about arranging the match for Romilly. I spoke first to her. She was a demure girl and had grown quite pretty. Her green eyes had taken on a fresh sparkle.

I said to her: “Romilly, it is time you thought of marriage. Have you done so?”

“I … I have thought of it,” she admitted.

I smiled. “Well, you are no longer a child. I have seen you in the schoolroom and I believe you and Mr. Merrimet are quite good friends.”

She blushed. “Yes, we are good friends.”

“Perhaps you might feel he would make a good husband. I see no reason why he should not.”

She was silent.

“Of course,” I went on, “if you do not wish this, then we will drop the matter.”

“Has the Captain said aught of this?” she asked.

“As a matter of fact, he has. I discussed it with him before he left. Like myself, he thinks it is time you married and he thinks, too, that Mr. Merrimet would be a suitable husband. If you married him you might stay here in the house and Mr. Merrimet could continue to teach. The boys will need him for some time and then Linnet will be ready. The Captain feels a duty to your father and is happy at the thought of your remaining under our roof.”

She was still silent and I went on: “Perhaps I have been too precipitate.”

“If I could have time to consider…”

“But of course. There is no hurry. It is entirely a matter for you to decide. But when you have made up your mind tell me and then we can sound Mr. Merrimet.”

This seemed to meet with her approval and we shelved the matter.

It must have been about a month later when I made a discovery which rendered the plan impossible.

Jennet, whose duty it was to bring water to my bedroom, did not appear and I went to the servants’ room. There was only one maid there. All the others were about their duties.

“Where is Jennet?” I said.

The girl looked scared.

“I don’t know, Mistress.”

“Did she get up at her usual time?”

The girl looked embarrassed. It took me some time to get the truth from her, which was that Jennet rarely slept in the servants’ room. She was almost always with a lover. This was no surprise to me. I knew that one of the grooms was her lover, and she would always have her lovers.

I guessed she was in one of the rooms over the stables and had no intention of going there. I would severely reprimand her when I saw her. Perhaps I would send her to my mother, but she would want to take Jacko with her and Jake would never allow that. He was fond of Jacko. So I could not separate a mother from her son.

Some mischievous quirk of fate led me to the tutor’s room. I had for some time wanted to have a word with him about Roberto. I knocked lightly on his door. There was no answer, so I went in. The sun was shining full on the crumpled pallet, and fast asleep lay Jennet and Mr. Merrimet, naked and clasped in each other’s arms.

I said sharply: “Mr. Merrimet! Jennet!”

He opened his eyes first and then I heard Jennet gasp.

I said quickly: “I will speak to you later,” and shut the door.

The result was that I dismissed Mr. Merrimet immediately. I thought that a man who could indulge so blatantly in sexual adventure with one of the maids was no fit tutor for the boys. I had suspected him of a certain amount of levity but not to an unseemly extent; and I had been of the opinion that marriage would have a sobering effect on him. How mistaken I had been! Now I imagined his initiating the boys into certain practices at a too early age and I did not hesitate.

He left the next day. I sent for Jennet, who was her usual coy self—like a girl caught in her first indiscretion.

She had the usual reply that “’twere all natural-like and Mr. Merrimet being such a gentleman…”

I told her she was a slut; she was a disgrace; and I was thinking of sending her to my mother, and should do so did I not have such concern for my mother and her household. She must mend her ways or she would find herself on the roads yet begging her bread.

“There’s Jacko,” she told me slyly.

“He shall go with you.”

“Oh, Mistress, the Captain be mortal fond of Jacko. You’d have to answer to him for that.”

“I answer to no one,” I cried. “I manage my own household.”

She was silent, remembering that the Captain was away and that I was not to be lightly flouted. She wept and said that there was some wickedness in her that would not let her deny comely gentlemen and she thought there had been little harm done and she would serve me true and faithful forevermore.

I was fond of Jennet, so I contented myself with getting rid of Mr. Merrimet and engaging a new tutor for the boys. This was Robert Elmore, a gentleman of Plymouth who was a scholar fallen on evil times and glad to have a home. He was middle-aged and of great seriousness. I felt I had made a good change.

Linnet flourished. She was a contented baby with great wondering eyes and a ready chuckle.

Everyone in the household adored her, particularly Romilly, who was a great help with the children.

I was disturbed at the behavior of Mr. Merrimet and I wondered what effect this would have on the girl who had such a short time ago implied that she would be ready to marry him. There was a change in her, I fancied. It must have been a blow to discover that the man who may well have made advances to her had at the same time been spending his nights with such a practiced slut as Jennet.

At first she did not appear to be greatly upset, and then suddenly I knew that something was wrong and immediately suspected that her relationship with Merrimet had not been an innocent one; indeed, was it possible that it could have been with such a man?

It was some three months after the departure of the tutor when I tackled her with this. She burst into tears and told me that she was pregnant.

I cried: “What a rogue that man is! All very well for him to take Jennet to his bed. She is as practiced as a woman can be in such matters and I doubt not has had a hundred before him. But an innocent young girl … under the protection of myself and the Captain! He is a rogue and a villain.”

She went on sobbing.

I said: “You should have told me before.”

“I daren’t,” she said. “What can I do now?”

“You can do nothing. I can’t find a husband for you now. You will just bear your shame and the child.” I was sorry for her, so I put my arm about her. “You have been a foolish girl, Romilly. You have listened to promises no doubt, and now this has happened to you.”

She nodded.

“But it is not the first time it has happened to a girl. You are fortunate, for the Captain admired your father and wished to repay him for his services. You shall have your child here and it will be part of our household. Now don’t fret. It’s bad for the child. You did wrong and must needs bear the consequences. It is the fate of women. The man plants his seed blithely and departs. It is happening all over England … all over the world.”

I was sorry for the girl. She was so young; and so very grateful to me for the attitude I had taken. But she was an adaptable creature and in a very short time she had forgotten her unhappiness. She settled down to making garments for her baby and helping with mending the boys’ clothes, for she was good with her needle.

In June her child was born. I had sent for the midwife who had attended me, so she had the best attention we could give her. She had a son—a healthy, lusty boy.

I went in to see her—she looked so young and frail and her green eyes shone more brilliantly than ever.

She thanked me affectingly for my goodness to her and I stooped over the bed and kissed her.

“A woman’s lot can be a hard one in this life,” I said, “and it is our duty to help each other.”

“He is a bonny boy, my son,” she said.

“The midwife praises him continually.”

“I have so much to be grateful for. What would have happened to me if the Captain had not come to St. Austell and brought me here?”

“He was concerned, for your father had died in his service.”

“I want to show my gratitude to him … and to you. Would you allow me to call my child Penn?”

I said: “That is a small favor to ask.”

So Romilly’s lovely little boy was christened.

IT HAD BEEN A year of exciting events. In January the Duke of Norfolk was brought to trial. He had been intriguing with the Scottish Queen and had hoped to marry her and set her on the throne after having deposed Elizabeth. He had little chance of survival if such were proved against him.

In May there had been a rumor of another plot, in which the Spanish ambassador was concerned, to kill the Queen and her minister Burleigh. As a result the Spanish ambassador was ordered to leave the kingdom.