Robin Tremayne / A Story of the Marian Persecution

by Emily Sarah Holt

“I could not have a better, methinks,” she responded, with a rather sorrowful smile. “I would right fain come to you, if that might be.”

“Then it may be, dear heart!” said Isoult, much moved by her urgency. “I would fainer have you than any which I do know, unless it were Annis Holland, that I have known from the cradle. But should it like you to follow me into Devon? for we do look to return thither when the troubles are past.”

“I will follow you any whither,” answered she. “I care nothing where I am, only this,—that I would liefer be out of London than in it.”

So Esther came, and took up her quarters at the sign of the Lamb. Every house in London had then its sign, which served the purpose of a number.

Meanwhile the clouds gathered more darkly over the only man in power (excepting the boy-King himself), who really cared more for the welfare of England than for his own personal aggrandisement. And it was not England which forsook and destroyed Somerset. It was the so-called Lutheran faction, to the majority of whom Lutheranism was only the cloak which hid their selfish political intrigues. There had been a time when Somerset was one of them, and had sought his own advancement as they now did theirs. And the deserted regiment never pardons the deserter. The faction complained that Somerset was proud and self-willed: he worked alone; he acted on his own responsibility; he did not consult his friends. This of course meant in the case of each member of the faction (as such complaints usually do), “He did not consult me.” Somerset might truthfully have pleaded in reply that he had not a friend to consult. The Court held no friend to him; and, worst of all, his own home held none. He had, unquestionably, a number of acquaintances, of that class which has been well and wittily defined as consisting of “intimate enemies;” and he had a wife, who loved dearly the high title he had given her, and the splendid fortune with which she kept it up. But neither she nor any one else loved him—except One, who was sitting above the Water-floods, watching His tried child’s life, and ready, when his extremity should have come, to whisper to that weary and sorrowful heart, “Come and rest with Me.”

But that time was not yet. The battle must be fought before the rest could come.

On Friday, the 5th of October, a private gathering of nineteen of the Council was held at Lord Warwick’s house in Holborn—that Lord Warwick of whom I have already spoken as John Dudley, the half-brother of Lady Frances Monke. No man on earth hated Somerset more heartily than Warwick, and perhaps only one other man hated him quite as much. While they were yet debating how to ruin Somerset, a letter came in the King’s name from Secretary Petre, inquiring for what cause they thus gathered together: if they wished to speak with the Protector they must come peaceably. This letter sealed the fate of the conference—and of Somerset. The victim, it was evident, was awake and watching. Ruin might have served the original purpose: now only one end would serve it—death. But Warwick was one of the few who know how to wait.

In this emergency—for he manifestly feared for his life—Somerset appealed to the only friends he had, the people of England. And England responded to the appeal. Hour after hour thickened the crowd which watched round Hampton Court, where the King and Protector were; and in the middle of Sunday night, when he thought it safe, Somerset hastened to take refuge with his royal nephew in the strong-hold of Windsor (Note 4), the crowd acting as guards and journeying with them.

It was a false move. The populace were with Somerset, but the army was with Warwick. The crowd melted away; the Lords held London; and on every gate of the city a list of the charges against the Protector was posted up. The bird, struggling vainly in the toils of the serpent, was only exhausting its own life.

These were the charges (in substance), which Isoult Avery found Dr Thorpe carefully reading when she came home from the market on Monday morning. The old man was making comments as he proceeded, not very complimentary to my Lord of Warwick and his colleagues.