Virgin Earth Read Online Free PDF Page B

that I heard and thought I should tell you.”
    Cecil was instantly awake, as if he had never dozed at all. “What thing?” he asked softly.
    “It was Lord Wootton’s man, he suggested that now there is peace with Spain the Roman Catholics will come back to court, that there will be new rivals for you at court, and in the king’s favor. He knew that the queen has become a Roman Catholic. He knew she takes Mass. And he named his own lord as a man who worships in the old way when he can, when he is abroad, and avoids his own church when he can at home.”
    Cecil nodded slowly. “Anything else?”
    John shook his head.
    “Do they say I am in the pay of Spain? That I took a bribe to get the peace treaty through?”
    John was deeply shocked. “Good God, my lord! No!”
    Cecil looked pleased. “They don’t know about that yet then.”
    He glanced at John’s astounded face and chuckled. “Ah, John, my John, it is not treason to the king to take money from his enemies. It is treason to the king to take money from his enemies and then do their bidding. I do the one; I don’t do the other. And I shall buy much land with the Spanish gold and pay off my debts in England. So the Spanish will pay hardworking English men and women.”
    John looked scarcely comforted. Cecil squeezed his arm. “You must learn from me,” he said. “There is no principle; there is only practice. Look to your practice and let other men worry about principles.”
    John nodded, hardly understanding.
    “As to the return of the Catholic lords,” Cecil said thoughtfully, “I don’t fear them. If the Catholics will live at peace in England, under our laws, then I can be tolerant of some new faces in the king’s council.”
    “Are they sworn to obey the Pope?”
    Cecil shrugged. “I care nothing for what they think in private,” he said. “It’s what they do in public that concerns me. If they will leave good English men and women to follow their own consciences in peace and quiet, then they can worship in their own way.” He paused. “It’s the wild few I fear,” he said softly. “The madmen who lack all judgment, who care nothing for agreements, who just want to act. They’d rather die in the faith than live in peace with their neighbors.”
    The boat nudged the landing stage and the rowers snapped their oars upright. A dozen lanterns were lit on the wooden pier and burned either side of the broad leafy path to the house to light the lord homeward. “If they attempt to disturb the peace of the land that I have struggled so hard to win… then they are dead men,” Cecil said gently.

October 1605

    The peace Cecil worked for did not come at once. A year later in mid-autumn John saw one of the house servants picking his way down the damp terrace steps to where he was working in the knot garden. Cecil had finally agreed that he should take out the gravel and replace it with plants. John was bedding in some strong cotton lavender which he thought would catch the frost and turn feathery white and beautiful in the winter, and convince his master that a garden could be rich with plants as well as cleanly perfect in shapes made with stones.
    “The earl wants you,” the servant said, emphasizing the new title, reflecting the pleasure the whole household felt. “The earl wants you in his private chamber.”
    John straightened up, sensing trouble. “I’ll have to wash and change my clothes,” he said, gesturing to his muddy hands and his rough breeches.
    “He said, at once.”
    John went toward the house at a run, entered through the side door from the Royal Court, crossed the great hall, silent and warm in the afternoon quiet after the hubbub of the midday dinner, and then went through the small door behind the lord’s throne which led to his private apartments.
    A couple of pageboys and menservants were tidying the outer room, a couple of the lord’s gentlemen gambling on cards at a small table. John went past them and tapped on the