by Robert Irwin
Anthony’s thought is that, if he can persuade Scoggin to ride with him back to London, then he will kill him on the road.
But Scoggin replies, ‘The King does not have it in his power to give me anything that I covet. When I danced and capered attendance at court I was like the lapdog and the harlot who used to get presents from the King, while poorer folk were turned away from his door. I have renounced my former profession, seeing that the world is made for weeping, not for joy. My trade was to mouth scandalous and shameful things. But now I, who was once the King’s fool, am become God’s fool. Laughter shall only be my reward in heaven. As Ecclesiasticus has it, “Let no corrupt communication proceed out of your mouth, but that which is good for the use of edifying, that it may minster grace unto the hearers”. Mockery is a wicked thing.’
And now Scoggin looks sternly at the boys, before continuing, ‘It is reported of Elijah: “And he went up from thence unto Bethel: and as he was going up by the way, there came forth little children out of the city, and mocked him, and said unto him, ‘Go up, thou bald head; go up, thou bald head.’ And he turned back, and looked on them, and cursed them in the name of the Lord. And there came forth two she bears out of the wood, and tare forty and two children of them”.’
Anthony looks at the boys. They seem very solemn. They are waiting for something.
Scoggin continues, ‘Look at me. I have lost my teeth, my hands tremble and I cannot leap about as I used to. You may think that God cannot love such a one as me. I tell you He can. Though I am in the winter of my years, I am once more in love – in love with Him and the beauty of His Creation.’
He raises his arm in a preacher’s gesture, ‘I have heard of a certain hermit who dwelt on the island of Patmos where he devoted himself to prayer, fasting and all forms of pious austerity, and in time, God noted this man’s devotion and decided that he should be rewarded. So He sent an emissary angel to him and the angel spoke to the hermit and said, “Behold, the Lord God has decreed that you should be rewarded for your piety and I am commanded to offer you the choice between the gift of beauty or that of stupidity.” The hermit thought for a long while and then spoke, “I choose stupidity.” The angel was astounded by his choice and said so. “Ah, but you see,” said the hermit, “beauty fades.” ’
They all laugh, including Anthony. All of a sudden he is suspicious and Scoggin, seeing this, shouts, ‘Get him!’ Two men seize Anthony’s arms. He manages to wrest his left arm free and is reaching across for his sword when a member of the Coterel family (and that is why the face seemed a little familiar) knees him in the groin and then belts him across the face. His left arm is seized again and pinioned against his back and his sword is taken from him.
After the Coterel man has delivered a few more punches, Scoggin forces some kisses on Anthony.
‘The mouth of the spouse is the inspiration of Christ; the kiss of the mouth is the love of that inspiration,’ declares Scoggin grandly. Hands on hips, he struts before Anthony and declares, ‘You see how the wheel of fortune has turned. I am going to make you my wife. See boys, what a pretty wife I shall bed!’
‘But not tonight,’ insists the Coterel. ‘Tonight we are looking at Philip.’
Scoggin shrugs and cups a hand to an ear.
‘There is laughter in heaven,’ he says. ‘I think that I can hear the angels laughing now.’ Then to Anthony, ‘I shall see that you die laughing.’
Anthony’s legs and arms are tightly bound with thick ropes before he is dragged to the brewhouse and locked in.
Night has fallen and it is late, when Anthony hears scuffling outside the brewhouse. He tenses himself for what may be coming. The lock turns, the door opens and a candle advances into the darkness. Five of the boys crowd into the brewhouse. Two of them have kitchen knives.
‘You are our only chance,’ whispers one of them. Two of the others set to cutting Anthony’s bonds. Then he is handed his sword, belt and scabbard.
‘We must rescue Philip.’
The boys lead Anthony to the church. Inside it is brightly lit. The boy is seated naked on the altar and clutches a rose. He is terrified. The monks sit on stools just below the altar and gaze intently at him. Anthony cuts down one of the monks before he can rise from his stool. It is not a fair fight for only Anthony and the boys are armed. The monks all try to flee. Anthony picks out Coterel and hacks him to the ground. The other monks all rush out through the door, though one of them is severely wounded by a boy with a knife. Outside Anthony gives chase. If Scoggin can no longer caper, still less can he run and he is soon caught. The others make their escape.
‘They used to beat us and then cuddle us.’
‘I preferred the beating to the cuddling.’
‘They said they were preparing us for a special sacrament.’
‘They called us girls and gave us girls’ names.’
It is Scoggin’s turn to spend time in the brewhouse. In the morning, he is brought out and hoisted onto the back of Black Saladin. The horse is led into the orchard and a rope brought down from one of the branches of an apple tree and a noose placed round Scoggin’s neck.
Scoggin cries out, ‘Spare my life, my lord, and I will tell you a story that will amaze you.’
Anthony snorts and slaps the flank of the horse to get it to move forward. He has had no practice in tying a hangman’s noose and Scoggin’s death is a slow one. He wheezes, chokes and spins. Finally Anthony has to step forward and pull at the legs. At last the jester’s neck snaps and then his head comes off.
On an impulse Anthony finds a bag and puts the head in it. He thinks that he will find a place for it in the Museum of Skulls.
As he rides back to London he reflects that it is right that death should be the penalty for murder, treason or false coining. But can it be right that death is the penalty that every one of us must ultimately face?
Chapter Sixteen: Compostella
Edward is a little sad to hear of Scoggin’s death. ‘I have missed his witty quips.’
Not only is the King sad. He also does not look well. By now he is florid and horribly overweight. And Anthony has added to his worries. Although the monastery at Pirbright was not a true Cistercian monastery at all, but an unlicensed imposture, the Archbishop of Canterbury fears that the killing of false monks may in some way set a precedent for the killing of real monks in the future. Then a more serious concern is that the Coterels will seek vengeance against Anthony. Edward proposes to send his officers into Southwark to end the reign of the gang there. But that campaign will take time to organise and in any case it is likely that a few will escape and remain at large for a while. Edward suggests that it might be better after all if Anthony went abroad until things had settled down.
Anthony’s departure is delayed by his mother’s funeral. He is escorted to the churchyard of St Andrew-by-the-Wardrobe at Castle Baynard by Amyas and Hugh and a dozen knights, watchful lest the Coterels should mount an ambush. There is a detachment of royal archers with Edward and Elizabeth. Gloucester and Clarence also arrive with small retinues.
Ripley, who had been with Jacquetta in her last hours, is already beside her grave. He has difficulty in standing upright and must be drunk. A white dog sits beside him. Ripley keeps glancing at it and then looking around in every direction. Who or what is he afraid of? Does he fear that Jacquetta will claw her way out of the coffin and rise from the grave to reclaim her spells? In the last few days Ripley has been diligent in spreading the story of Anthony’s confrontation with the Pirbright Horror. The story is that every night Black Masses were celebrated there by unfrocked priests who substituted urine for the wine and a black turnip for the host. These devil worshippers went about the countryside kidnapping boys, and as soon as one of these boys had his throat slit on the altar, the horned demon Baphomet descended and graciously presented his arse to be kissed by the devil worshippers. But Anthony burst in on their dark conventicle and slew them all, and seeing this Baphomet soared shrieking into the air and was
soon seen to shrink to the size of a gnat.
It is hard to concentrate on the funeral rites. A high wind shakes the branches of the yew trees in the churchyard and summons up dust devils in front of the church’s door. Just outside the churchyard there seem to be small children hiding in the bushes and whispering. As the service proceeds, curious citizens gather to watch the interment. Though they are mostly shopkeepers and suchlike, there is one lady, dressed from head to foot in crimson, who looks as though she may be of noble birth. When Clarence notices Ripley’s presence, he pleads with Edward to have the alchemist sent away, but Edward refuses. Ripley pulls a face at Clarence before staggering over to Anthony. He points at the chain round Anthony’s neck on which the manikin hangs. Then he tugs hard at it, saying as he does so, ‘The charm dies with its enchantress. This will no longer protect you. It is a useless piece of lead.’ The chain snaps and Ripley throws the manikin into the open grave.
‘He will belong to her.’
A moment later the pallbearers bring Jacquetta’s shrouded corpse to the grave’s edge. They are lowering her into the grave when Ripley drunkenly stumbles against one of the pallbearers, and then as Ripley seeks to recover his balance, the dog is knocked into the grave. One of the pallbearers leaps in and pulls out the dog which is sent on its way by some hard kicks. It disappears into the crowd. The whole business is most unseemly and Elizabeth is distressed. However there will be a second, more formal interment when Jacquetta’s effigy has been carved. Just before leaving the churchyard, Edward walks over to Ripley and tells him that he is dismissed from royal service.
Anthony, looking at his sister, sees that her beauty is fading fast and the lure of that beauty was only a magical semblance given to her by her mother. Only Clarence is delighted by what has happened here today and he is fool enough to show it.
So then, subject and thrall to the storms of fortune and perplexed by adversities, Anthony ships from Southampton. From Bordeaux he will travel by land to Venice and then sail to Jaffa and make his way on to Jerusalem. And he will travel further, for he thinks that there is nothing to draw him back to England. Now he should feel safe and yet he does not, for he feels that someone is watching him. Is it possible that he has been shadowed by a member of the Coterel gang? Now that he is bound at last for Jerusalem, he should feel cheerful and yet he does not, for it seems to him that death is his only regular visitor. Ever since he was a child he has thought that there is a queue for dying and that his father and mother were well ahead of him in that queue, but now that they are both dead, he feels that he has moved up among those who wait and he will not have to wait for much longer. Also, though the manikin that used to hang around his neck never spoke a word, in some odd way he was company to Anthony.
As Anthony stands on the forecastle, looking towards France, he becomes aware that he has been joined by a swarthy, bearded man. Anthony’s hand slips down to his dagger, but when the man introduces himself it is plain from his accent that he has not come from Southwark. He is a Gascon, Louys de Bretaylles, and he reminds Anthony that they have met briefly when Anthony was in The Hague and Louys was in the retinue of the Great Bastard. Louys says that he will travel on from Bordeaux to Genoa and there he will find another ship that will take him on to Alexandria where he has business, trading in precious stones. Anthony becomes excited as he discovers that Louys knows the Orient well, for he has twice been as far east as Tabriz and he has talked there with merchants and ambassadors who have come from such places as Cathay and Serandib.
Yet Louys’ report is discouraging. Though he has been in Jerusalem for the good of his soul, he has seen that Palestine is a wasteland, cursed by God for providing a place for the crucifixion of His Son. It is a fly-blown, sweaty, dusty land governed by corrupt Mameluke officers and plagued by marauding Bedouin. The Dead Sea is as hideous as its name suggests and on its shores are the ten accursed cities of ash, among which Chorazin is the most notable, for it is there that Satan will meet with his disciples. And there is nothing marvellous further to the east, but only deserts, beggars, snakes and taxmen who raise revenue through torture. One can travel for months across great empires where nothing happens and Cathay in particular is an empire of tedium. There is no such thing as the vegetable lamb, but in India they use women as firewood. The only sports that Orientals know are founded upon cruelty. At best the oriental landscape has a malign beauty which will sap the soul of any Christian. An Englishman or a Frenchman will soon weary of the relentless sun and endless blue skies and find himself longing for the clouds and rain of his native land. The supposed marvels of the Orient are no better than fairy stories.
‘England is the true land of marvels!’ says Louys. ‘Take pride in what you have, my lord: the dragon of Wantley, the tomb of Arthur at Glastonbury, the Wild Hunt, Stonehenge, Weland’s forge, the miracle-working shrine of Thomas Becket, the Welsh goblins, the replica of Jesus’ house in Nazareth which was built from a vision at Walsingham, the lost Kingdom of Lyonesse, Bran’s head under the Tower, the invisible battle of Camberley, St Peter’s candles, the phantom bulldog of the Fens, the chastity hedge of Kynisburga, the Devil’s Tower of Marston Moretaine, the warlocks of Leicester. And are not the oak and the ash, and the rose and the daisy marvels too? There is no end to England’s marvels and I am sorry to bid it farewell.’
Yet Anthony is not so easily dissuaded and he says that he still thinks that he will go to Jerusalem and walk where Jesus walked. Then Louys, who has noted the heaviness of Anthony’s way of speaking as well as the sombreness of his garb, presses the loan of a book on him. It is called Les dits moraux des philosophes. Louys says that in it Anthony will find much wisdom and words that give solace from such ancient philosophers as Solon, Pythagoras, Tac, Socrates, Sedechias, Plato and Salquinus.
Anthony takes it away to read in his cabin. From it he learns that ‘Plato loved to be alone in lonely rural places. One could usually detect his presence through hearing him weep. When he wept, he could be heard two miles away in deserted rural districts’. This was quite interesting. But as for the supposed wisdom of the ancients, he finds nothing but tedious injunctions to virtue by ancient wiseacres and aphorisms that manage to be both platitudes and untrue. ‘When a fool prospers, he becomes all the uglier for it.’ ‘A sage is not obstinate and a fool is not just.’ ‘He who is ashamed of people, but not of himself regards himself as completely worthless.’ And there is more of such stuff. Why are wisdom and virtue always so boring? Yet when he returns the book to Louys, he is polite about it and by the time they have disembarked at Bordeaux, they have decided to travel together for part of the way, since Louys is heading for Genoa while Anthony is still set on travelling to Venice.
They purchase horses in Bordeaux. A day out of the town they stop to rest their horses and drink from a fast-running stream. As Anthony kneels to do so, he sees himself reflected in the stream twice. That is he sees himself both kneeling at the stream and standing behind his kneeling self. His first instinct is to ask, ‘Who are you?’ but that would be foolish, for it is obvious that he is looking on himself, only perhaps a little younger and fresher faced. His double, who is dressed from head to toe in white, smiles sadly at him.
So then Anthony asks, ‘Where have you come from?’
The double gestures to Louys, who is gazing at him open-mouthed, and he signals to Louys that he should withdraw a distance so as to allow a private conversation. Only when Louys has done so does the double reply, ‘I was lately in the stories of the Austin Friar, George Ripley, but I am escaped from them.’ The double sits down beside Anthony and comfortably wraps his arms around his knees and he continues, ‘I am come to speak with you and admonish you to virtue, for I am more virtuous than you are, since I have resisted sexual temptation, witnessed the shining of the Grail and faced down the draug. Whereas you have done none of these things, but folk think that you have and so you ride about reflected in my glory.’
Anthony is about to protest, but the double raises a hand
.
‘When John of Gaunt lay dying, he summoned the young King Richard to him and displayed to him his rotting and stinking genitals, as he hoped thereby to warn the King of the penalty of lust. In a similar manner I am come to you as a warner and to list your sins which are many and heinous. As Jeremiah has it, “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?” Your sins are as follows. First, you betrayed King Henry whom you had sworn to serve and you went on to fight against his armies. Secondly, you defiled many churches by coupling with your wife in them. Thirdly, you led Beth to madness by attempting sex within a demonic pentacle. Fourthly, you left her neglected in a nunnery and rarely troubled to visit her in her sickness and sorrow. Fifthly, you murdered a man in Southwark. Sixthly, you partook of a goose while it was still living, which was a most cruel thing to do. Seventhly, you colluded in the murder of poor King Henry. Eighthly, when you hung Scoggin without a trial, that was murder too. Ninthly, you have regularly treated the poor and the crippled with contempt. Tenthly, you have made no attempt to curb your sister’s greed and extravagance. Also you consorted with the cruel torturer John Tiptoft and the bandit Thomas Malory. And there is worse. You have mutilated many horses, created warfare between Britain and Ireland and murdered your own sister’s baby boy.’
‘But that was in a story!’
‘And so you believe that you may behave how you like in a story? Your quibble is useless. Reflect on your crimes and sins. There is also jousting, though that may be accounted a venial sin, but as for the rest, how is it possible that you can think that you may escape the flames of Hell? As Jeremiah has it, “The harvest is past, the summer is ended, and we are not saved”.’
Anthony cannot bear to look at his double.
‘You are a phantom of my brain,’ he says dully.
