Note (Back to Main Text) — Chapter II · THE SPANISH MARRIAGE.

All that the court had gained by his previous confessions was now more than lost. London rang with the story that Wyatt, in dying, had cleared Courtenay and Elizabeth.[308] Gardiner still thundered in the Star Chamber on the certainty of their guilt, and pilloried two decent citizens who had repeated Wyatt's words; but his efforts were vain, and the hope of a legal conviction was at an end. The judges declared that against Elizabeth there was now no evidence;[309] and, even if there had been evidence, Renard wrote to his master, that the court could not dare to proceed further against her, from fear of Lord William Howard, who had the whole naval force of England at his disposal, and, in indignation at Elizabeth's treatment, might join the French and the exiles.[310] Perplexed to know how to dispose of her, the ambassador and the chancellor thought of sending her off to Pomfret Castle; doubtless, if once within Pomfret walls, to find the fate of the second Richard there: but again the spectre of Lord Howard terrified them.