REYNOLDS. The rails are an abomination! Rip them out from all the churches in the land!

ANDREWES. Dear God. Are we going to tear each other apart in this country over a minor feature of church architecture?

REYNOLDS. ‘Dear God’, indeed.

They pause.

ANDREWES. Doctor Reynolds, my point is that though you and I disagree…

REYNOLDS. Passionately…

ANDREWES.… at times passionately, we are moderate men. But His Majesty has bundled us all together as fanatics. (Lower.) He is a king and, at heart, all kings are… (Hesitates.)

REYNOLDS. Tyrants?

They look at each other.

We must ask to speak to him.

ANDREWES. But without your extremists.

REYNOLDS. And without yours.

They exit.

Scene Two

Enter JAMES clutching ANNE’s coronation dress in one hand. It trails upon the ground. In the other hand he has a flagon of wine.

GEORGE enters, also with a flagon of wine, and on an unsteady line across the stage.

CECIL lurks to overhear.

GEORGE. You peppered them!

JAMES. I did I did.

GEORGE. Peppered!

JAMES. If we had been in school, I the teacher, they the schoolboys, I’d have plied the rod on their buttocks! Thwack thwack!

GEORGE. Thwack thwack!

JAMES. I played them, I diddled and dazed.

GEORGE. You flayed their flabby behinds! It was a triumph.

JAMES stops and stares.

JAMES. ‘Triumph’? No. No… no no.

GEORGE. You are the conquering hero.

JAMES. No. These people are fractious, they will break, they will splinter, they will tear.

GEORGE. ‘Tear’…

JAMES. It’s not secure, George. The country. Not stable.

GEORGE. But you are wildly popular, thousands in the streets shouting your name, the country’s en fête… As the French have it.

JAMES. Passing show. The ground will split the length of England, a great divide, and the house the Tudors built, monarchy, Church, all of it, will fall into the abyss.

GEORGE. My dear, too much wine makes you think apocalypse.

JAMES. No. In wine, reality. (The dress in his fist.) I must talk to that woman!

GEORGE. What woman?

JAMES (raises the dress). This woman! The whore who changed England!

GEORGE. If you want to talk to her, first you’ll have to find her head. Ha!

JAMES does not find that funny.

JAMES. Get out.

GEORGE. What?

JAMES. Go!

GEORGE. My dear heart…

JAMES. I am not your dear heart, I am your dread Sovereign and Liege Majesty and I want your arse out of my sight!

GEORGE. Oh! Oh!

GEORGE turns, and runs off in tears.

JAMES. Anne. Anne. Tell me what you began and I will end it.

He turns and is going as ANNE enters. She is wearing nightclothes. They pass each other, without eye contact. He holds out the dress. She takes it.

Exit JAMES.

Scene Three

ANNE staggers and sinks to the ground, hugging the dress to her.

Enter LADY ROCHFORD, running, CELIA and JANE.

ROCHFORD. My Lady, you should be in bed…

ANNE. No, I want to go to the forest.