“The man is indiscreet, which has its advantage, for we always know
whither an indiscreet man is heading. His zeal for his master blinds him
and makes him rash. It is better, perhaps, than if he were secretive and
crafty.”
With such arguments I appeased his wrath against the secretary. But I
knew that his hatred of Escovedo, his thirst for Escovedo's blood, dated
from that moment in which Escovedo had forgotten the reverence due to
majesty. I was glad when at last he took himself off to Flanders to
rejoin Don John. But that was very far from setting a term to his
pestering. The Flanders affair was going so badly that the hopes of an
English throne to follow were dwindling fast. Something else must
be devised against the worst, and now Don John and Escovedo began to
consider the acquisition of power in Spain itself. Their ambition aimed
at giving Don John the standing of an Infante. Both of them wrote to me
to advance this fresh project of theirs, to work for their recall,
so that they could ally themselves with my party--the Archbishop's
party--and ensure its continuing supreme. Escovedo wrote me a letter
that was little better than an attempt to bribe me. The King was ageing,
and the Prince was too young to relieve him of the heavy duties of
State. Don John should shoulder these, and in so doing Escovedo and
myself should be hoisted into greater power.
I carried all those letters to the King, and at his suggestion I even
pretended to lend an ear to these proposals that we might draw from
Escovedo a fuller betrayal of his real ultimate aims. It was dangerous,
and I enjoined the King to move carefully.
“Be discreet,” I warned him, “for if my artifice were discovered, I
should not be of any further use to you at all. In my conscience I am
satisfied that in acting as I do I am performing no more than my duty. I
require no theology other than my own to understand that much.”
“My theology,” he answered me, “takes much the same view. You would have
failed in your duty to God and me had you failed to enlighten me on the
score of this deception. These things,” he added in a dull voice, “appal
me.”
So I wrote to Don John, urging him as one who counselled him for his
good, who had no interest but his own at heart, to remain in Flanders
until the work there should be satisfactorily completed. He did so,
since he was left no choice in the matter, but the intrigues continued.
Later we saw how far he was from having forsaken his dreams of England,
when I discovered that he had engaged the Pope to assist him with six
thousand men and one hundred and fifty thousand ducats when the time for
that adventure should be ripe.
And then, quite suddenly, entirely unheralded, Escovedo reappeared in
Madrid, having come to press Philip in person for reinforcements that
should enable Don John to finish the campaign. He brought news that
there had been a fresh rupture of the patched-up peace, that Don John
had taken the field once more, and had forcibly made himself master
of Namur. This was contrary to all the orders we had sent, a direct
overriding of Philip's wishes. The King desired peace in the Low
Countries because he was in no case just then to renew the war, and
Escovedo's impudently couched demands completed his exasperation.
“My will,” he said, “is as naught before the ambitions of these two.
You sent my clear instructions to Escovedo, who was placed with Don John
that he might render him pliant to my wishes. Instead, he stiffens him
in rebellion. There must be an end to this man.”
“Sire,” I cried, “it may be they think to advance your interests.”
“Heaven help me!” he cried. “Did ever villain wear so transparent a mask
as this dog Escovedo? To advance my interests--that will be his tale, no
doubt. He will advance them where I do not wish them advanced; he will
advance them to my ruin; he will stake all on a success in Flanders that
shall be the preliminary to a descent upon England in the interests of
Don John. I say there must be an end to this man before he works more
mischief.”
Again I set myself to calm him, as I had so often done before, and again
I was the shield between Escovedo and the royal lightnings, of whose
menace to blot him out the fool had no suspicion. For months things hung
there, until, in January of '78, when war had been forced in earnest
upon Spain by Elizabeth's support of the Low Countries, Don John won the
great victory of Gemblours. This somewhat raised the King's depression,
somewhat dissipated his overgrowing mistrust of his half-brother, and
gave him patience to read the letters in which Don John urged him to
send money--to throw wood on the fire whilst it was alight, or else
resign himself to the loss of Flanders for all time. As it meant also
resigning himself to the loss of all hope of England for all time,
Escovedo's activities were just then increased a hundredfold.
“Send me money and Escovedo,” was the burden of the almost daily letters
from Don John to me, and at my elbow was Escovedo, perpetually pressing
me to bend the King to his master's will. Another matter on which he
pressed me then was that I should obtain for himself the governorship of
the Castle of Mogro, which commands the port of Santander, an ambition
this which intrigued me deeply, for I confess I could not fathom what it
had to do with all the rest.
And then something else happened. From the Spanish Ambassador at the
Louvre we learnt one day of a secret federation entered into between Don
John and the Guises, known as the Defence of the Two Crowns. Its object
was as obscure as its title. But it afforded the last drop to the cup
of Philip's mistrust. This time it was directly against Don John that
he inveighed to me. And to defend Don John, in the interests of common
justice, I was forced to place the blame where it belonged.
“Nay, Sire,” I assured him, “these ambitions are not Don John's. With
all his fevered dreams of greatness, Don John has ever been, will ever
be, loyal to his King.”
“If you know anything of temptation,” he answered me, “you should know
that there is a breaking-point to every man's resistance of it. How long
will Don John remain loyal while Escovedo feeds his disloyalty, adds
daily to the weight of temptation the burden of a fresh ambition? I tell
you, man, I feel safe no longer.” He rose up before me, a blotch on his
sallow face, his fingers tugging nervously at the tuft of straw-coloured
beard. “I tell you some blow is about to fall unless we avert it. This
man this fellow Escovedo--must be dispatched before he can kill us.”