by Robert Irwin
He is taken to the Tower and later in the day when Ripley has got his barrel mostly full of sesame oil, they set about getting the redhead very drunk. Before this, Tiptoft had wanted him to be taken to one of the dungeons where he could be robustly questioned so that his identity and that of his employer would be revealed. But Ripley is insistent that the man has to be healthy in both mind and body. Indeed, he is a little worried about the broken leg. Ripley adds some tincture of opium to the last two glasses of wine that the redhead is made to drink. Thus stupefied, the man is in no state to resist being lowered feet first into the barrel.
Ripley says that they must now wait forty days. He is excited, but also anxious, for he reminds them that this experiment has never before been tried in all Christendom. Tiptoft too is anxious, since forty days is a long time and he has a hunch that things in England may soon come to a head. Edward is not yet once more secure on his throne.
Forty days pass before Ripley sends word to the King that he is ready to reveal the future. The following afternoon Edward, Tiptoft and Anthony make their way to the Byward Tower that is on the outer perimeter of the Tower of London. In an upstairs chamber there they find Ripley ready for them, standing in front of a curtain. He recites, ‘Whether there be prophecies, they shall fail; whether there be tongues, they shall cease; whether there shall be knowledge, it shall vanish away. For we know in part, and we prophesy in part. But when that which is perfect is come, then that which is in part shall be done away.’
Then he pulls the curtain away and they see the barrel and the man’s head poking above its rim. His red hair has grown back and there is the beginning of a beard. His eyes are closed.
‘He must be very uncomfortable if he has been standing in that cask for forty days,’ says Edward.
‘He is not standing,’ says Ripley. ‘The head is floating.’ And so saying, Ripley goes behind the great puncheon barrel, and getting up on a low stool, he grabs the head by its ears and raises it as far as his arms will stretch. Now they can all see a wonder, for though the head is still connected to the heart, the liver and some other vital organs, there is no flesh and there are no bones to be seen, for they have dissolved in the sesame oil. A network of veins and tendons dangle beneath the head like a giant cobweb or the ghost of a human body. As the head is raised out of the oil, its eyes open and it glares like a basilisk.
The King puts his hand in front of his mouth. He has seen enough. It is horrid Saracen sorcery. He says that he will leave the interrogation to Tiptoft and Anthony and he hurriedly leaves the Tower.
‘This is a blasphemous thing!’ says Tiptoft. Nevertheless, he is made of sterner stuff than the King and he begins the questioning, ‘What is your name?
The head is silent.
‘Who was your master before we took custody of you?’
The eyes of the head look blank and Ripley intervenes, ‘The Talking Head has no memory of past things. He can only respond to questions about the future,’ he says.
Tiptoft grunts and tries another question.
‘Will it rain tomorrow?’
The Talking Head is silent a long while and the interrogators have almost despaired of an answer when the head replies, ‘It will not rain tomorrow, though it will be cloudy all day,’ says the Talking Head.
‘Is there presently a great conspiracy directed against the King?’
This is apparently an easier question than the one about the weather, for after only a short while, the Talking Head replies, ‘There is certainly a great conspiracy against the King. It is led by the Earl of Warwick and the Duke of Clarence. In two days’ time there will be a rising in Lincolnshire headed by Lord Wells who has been suborned by Warwick and Clarence. The King’s army will easily defeat Lord Wells and his following. Wells will die. Since I have revealed to you that Warwick and Clarence were behind the uprising, the King will seek to apprehend them, but they will flee west to the coast and assemble a fleet which they will use to attack Burgundian and other ships. But Earl Rivers, who I see before me, will go to Southampton and take command of the King’s fleet and defeat the rebels in the channel and capture some of the ships and many men. He will bring the captives back to Southampton where at the King’s command, the Earl of Worcester, who I also see before me, will sit in judgement on them and he will have them, hung drawn and quartered before they are impaled. For this cruelty, he will be greatly hated.’
Tiptoft shrugs. ‘So long as I am feared,’ he says. Then he wants to know, ‘What will my end be?’
‘You will lose your head,’ is the reply.
‘Now that I am forewarned, I will take care to keep it on my shoulders,’ Tiptoft says, but he looks disconcerted. Then he looks to Anthony as if daring him to ask how and when he will die. But Anthony is not interested, for he has died once already and he knows how it will be. Instead he asks, ‘Who will be King after Edward dies?’
‘Richard the Third,’ is the reply.
Anthony and Tiptoft look at one another. Richard of Gloucester! That pious cripple! Most extraordinary! And a little unlikely, for George of Clarence is older than Richard.
‘What will happen after the rebel fleet has been defeated? Will Warwick and Clarence be among the captives?’
‘Warwick and Clarence will escape to France where Louis will give them welcome.’
‘What will happen then?’ Now Tiptoft is excited, since knowledge of the future is like a drug. At first one has only a little, then one acquires the taste and needs more and more.
But the head closes its eyes and there is no reply.
‘The Talking Head needs to sleep,’ says Ripley. ‘He likes his sleep.’
As they walk out after the first afternoon’s interrogation, Tiptoft asks Ripley how it is that the head knows what will happen in the future.
‘He goes to the Secret Library and there he looks for the right book,’ says Ripley.
Naturally Tiptoft, who is mad for literature, wants to know what the Secret Library is.
‘I think it is a library of books that have not yet been written,’ says Ripley, and hearing this, Tiptoft is excited by the idea of delving into the literature of the future.
‘Where is it?’
‘Who knows?’ Then Ripley adds, ‘Let us be satisfied with what we have. Through the Talking Head we are the lords of all knowledge. He is a great thing and he gives us power over all the Kingdom.’
Tiptoft grunts.
‘But how can there be a library full of books that have yet to be written?’ he wants to know.
‘These words from Boethius’s Consolation of Philosophy may answer you, “Nunc fluens facit tempus, nunc stans facit aeternintatum”: “The now that passes produces time; the now that remains produces eternity”. Under the eye of God all time is coexistent and thus the future is here in the present. That is how it is in the nunc stans.’
Tiptoft nods distractedly. Now he must hurry away and acquaint the King with what he has learnt from the oracle about conspiracy. Later he is determined that he will discover the whereabouts of the Secret Library. Back at the Woodville townhouse Anthony tells his mother about what he has seen and heard that day. Jacquetta screws up her face as she hears about the latest occult horror. Then when Anthony tells her about Tiptoft’s wanting to be told how he would die, she fearfully wants to know if he asked how he, or his sister or his mother would meet their ends. When he says he did not, she is greatly relieved and adds, ‘Never seek to ask after your own fortune, for there is a saying that a man’s fate follows the mouth of his astrologer.’
The following morning as Anthony rides over to the Tower he notes that it is cloudy, but there is no sign of rain. He walks in on Ripley who is reading to the Talking Head.
‘You are early,’ says Ripley. ‘The Talking Head gets bored in his barrel. So I read to him from interesting books.’
Anthony notices that the book does have an interesting title, How a Woman Who Is So Big Penetrates the Eyes Which Are So Small.
‘And he
has not been fed yet,’ continues Ripley and with that he puts down the book and goes over to a box in a corner from which he fishes out some handfuls of fruit and nuts. These he feeds to the Talking Head, resembling as he does so a mother tenderly caring for her small child.
He stops when Tiptoft comes storming in.
‘What and where is the Secret Library?’ he demands of the Talking Head.
‘I cannot take you there. There is no name for its place in our present tongue and it cannot be found on your maps.’
Tiptoft growls. Ripley begs him to desist from enquiring further into this matter and he adds that the Talking Head can only answer a few questions each day.
‘So what will happen after Louis has welcomed Warwick and Clarence to his court?’ asks Tiptoft.
The response is swift, ‘Louis will reconcile Warwick and Clarence with Margaret of Anjou and they will agree to support the cause of Henry of Lancaster.’
Tiptoft and Anthony cannot believe that Warwick, of all men, should ally himself with Margaret, but the Talking Head may not be argued with.
Then Tiptoft wants to know if Henry of Lancaster will die in prison. He is told that Henry will die in prison, but not before being restored to the throne once more.
Now Anthony asks a question, ‘Will Edward and Elizabeth have more children?
‘Yes, Elizabeth will bear him two sons and they will be called Edward and Richard.’
Anthony and Tiptoft look at one another. They are thinking the same thing. So Richard of Gloucester will not become the next King after all. The gaps between questions are lengthy, as each time he is asked something, the Talking Head closes his eyes before travelling in spirit to the Secret Library where he must find the right book.
‘How will the world end?’ asks Tiptoft.
‘This is how it will be,’ comes the reply. ‘The darkness will grow apace; a cold wind will begin to blow in freshening gusts from the east, and the snow will now become heavy. The waves ripple and whisper. Beyond these lifeless sounds the world is silent. It is hard to convey the stillness of it. All the sounds of man, the bleating of sheep, the cries of birds, the hum of insects, all that is over. As the darkness thickens the flakes of snow fall more thickly and the cold is greater. One by one, swiftly one after another, the white peaks of distant hills vanish into blackness and now the sky is absolutely black. That is the end.’
Tiptoft is not pleased with this answer. Surely the Talking Head has been consulting with a lying demon? And now Tiptoft lectures the Talking Head on how the world will really end.
First the Jews will be converted to the True Faith. Then Enoch and Elijah will once more be seen among the living. The Antichrist, who will be born in Damascus, will reign in Jerusalem until he will be slain by the Last Emperor. But, who knows? Perhaps he has already been born there – a nasty little boy who now plays in the dust outside a Mohammedan temple and the horn has yet to grow out of his forehead. After the Last Battle in which he is slain, the seas will rise and then sink. The fish will be stranded and groaning. Trees and plants will be seen to bleed and buildings will collapse and rocks explode. There will be earthquakes and the valleys and mountains shall be levelled. People will lose the power of speech. Stars will fall to earth. The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse ride backwards and forwards across the face of the earth and their leader is a pale rider on a pale horse and his name is Death and Death is followed by Hell. They are all in the service of a woman arrayed in purple and scarlet who holds a cup full of abominations and filthiness of her fornications. On her forehead a name is written: MYSTERY, BABYLON THE GREAT, THE MOTHER OF HARLOTS AND ABOMINATIONS OF THE EARTH.
And the bones of the dead are joined together once more, while those that are living die and the earth will burn. The Last Trump sounds to herald the Second Coming of Christ. Everybody shall be raised up from the dust and Tiptoft anticipates encountering Aristotle, Julius Caesar, Virgil, the Black Prince and Judas Iscariot. But soon it will be time for Judgement. God, the Eternal Magistrate presides, robed in white and imperial purple and flanked by his angelic retinue. The angels have wings coloured like peacock tails. Some of the men and women who are naked will be led upwards by the angels who will garb them in light, while others who are also naked will tumble down into the eternal fires and there shall be no clothing for their sins. All this is known from our holy books.
It is a great and glorious panoply in which the good are rewarded and the wicked punished. The End of the World as envisaged by Tiptoft is brightly coloured and peopled by crowds who shout and scream and there are even those who up to the last moment are yet lustful and eager to fornicate. So it is like a vast wild party that is out of control.
The Talking Head is not impressed, ‘That is not what my book says.’
Anthony’s concerns are less grand. Momentarily forgetting Jacquetta’s warning, he wants to know, ‘Will my wife outlive me?’
‘No, she will die in four years’ time.’
‘Will I marry again?’
‘You will.’
‘Will I have children?’
‘No.’
‘What does the Secret Library look like?’ Tiptoft is grimly set upon this subject, but the Talking Head will not give way.
‘You are too stupid to understand what I would say if I were to tell you.’
Tiptoft looks amazed and he strokes his bald head. Men have called him many things, but no one has described him as stupid.
The Talking Head is tired and he looks as though he needs to sleep. The interrogators make to leave. But the eyes open again.
‘You have not asked me what will happen to me tomorrow,’ says the Talking Head.
Tiptoft spun round. ‘What will happen to you tomorrow?’
‘Nothing will happen to me tomorrow.’
‘Nothing! How nothing!’ The Talking Head fascinates Tiptoft, but he hates him too. ‘By God, I am tempted to pull you out of that barrel and kick you to pieces on the floor.’
‘That would be a great mercy,’ replies the Talking Head. ‘But alas, it will not happen.’ The Head looks sad. Then he resumes, ‘Nothing will happen to me tomorrow, because I am giving you forewarning now. Tomorrow a group of armed men will try to storm this tower in an attempt to carry me away, or failing that, destroy me in my barrel. But because I have forewarned you, you will have tripled the guard and prepared an ambush. So I shall be saved and nothing will happen to me.’
‘Who will send these men?’ Tiptoft wants to know.
The Talking Head looks as though he would have shrugged his shoulders, if he had had any shoulders to shrug.
‘That cannot be known, as they all died in the attempt to reach me,’ is the reply.
Once he is out of the Bywater Tower, Tiptoft sets about preparing for the morrow’s ambush. He gives orders that at all costs at least one of the assailants must be taken alive.
It is as foretold. The following morning eight men attempt to storm the Byward Tower, but they are surrounded and easily outnumbered by the guard that Tiptoft has posted. One by one they are cut down, until one man remains. He is unwounded and surrounded on all sides by the soldiers who are mindful of Tiptoft’s command. Their sergeant calls out ‘Surrender to the Earl of Worcester’s mercy’. Alas, the cornered man throws the sword at the feet of his enemies, before drawing his dagger, whereupon doubtless mindful of the Earl of Worcester’s notorious skill at working the rack and the bilboes, he slashes his left wrist before plunging the dagger into his throat.
When Tiptoft is told what has happened, he strokes his head. He is resigned, rather than angry. ‘It is as it was with Merlin and Nimue,’ he says and then he explains that Nimue, who was also known as the Lady of the Lake, studied magic with Merlin and then used that magic to imprison Merlin in a tree trunk. Of course Merlin, who had great powers of prophecy, foresaw that this was going to happen, but because he had foreseen it and knew that it was his future, he was powerless to prevent it from happening.
Then Tiptoft wonders
who knew about the man in the barrel? How was this secret discovered? It is dismaying. He tells Anthony that for now there will be no more questioning of the Talking Head. He adds that he is not agreeable to having his fate decided by a disembodied head. ‘I control my fate,’ he says and later that day he is called away to business in the West Country.
The following day Anthony returns to the Byward Tower to tell Ripley that there shall be no more questioning of the Talking Head. He finds Ripley reading to him from another strange book, this one entitled Hopeful Monsters. Anthony marvels at Ripley’s devotion to the creature in the barrel, for recently he has become difficult to feed and often spits food out and sometimes he shouts curses as he rotates in the sesame oil. At other times he just weeps for what he has lost, even though he cannot be sure what he has lost, since he has no memory. Still in the Secret Library he has read about green fields and blue skies and would like to see them in reality.
Anthony briefly contemplates his suffering with satisfaction. Then he tells Ripley that their interrogations are concluded for now. Ripley is drunk as usual, and it is as a garrulous drunk that he detains Anthony.
‘We are all characters in a story that God, the great romancer, is narrating,’ says Ripley. ‘Sometimes, as we learn from the Bible, He intervenes in the stories that He has been composing. Also sometimes His creations rebel against His will. The citizens of Sodom, the worshippers of the Golden Calf and King Saul who raised the Witch of Endor are all examples of people who sought to defy the narrative of God. ’
Now the particular reason Ripley is drunk today is that he has recently discovered that he has the same problem as God, for he is now most worried that the characters in stories that he has been making up are on the point of escaping from those stories and some of them are angry with him.
