The Mer- Lion

by Lee Arthur

  "Why do you wrinkle your nose like—ah, you smell the stink already. We're near the Tower. Just be glad the wind's behind us. No, don't look like that. That's not rotting men you smell, it's rotting fish from Billingsgate. Gads, earlier this summer the smell 'twas so bad, it wouldn't wash off. Had to wear off, it did. Only thing more foul is the tongue of a Billingsgate fish-hag. She'll scorch the stench off your back. So rank are some they could make a stone statue blush. The time to really see the fish market at Billingsgate is first thing in the morn. If you're lucky, you'll be housed in a cell overlooking the market. Wake you up early when the river teems with wooden fish bearing the catch up from the mouth of the river. On the banks, fish flop and people too. Slipping and sliding on the offal thrown on the ground. Enjoy it if you see it Might be the only laugh- you'll have before your own head goes flopping about on the Tower green."

  De Wynter had finished eating, not a bit perturbed by the macabre talk of his warden, and now calmly wiped the crumbs from his lips on the sleeve of his shirt. The captain watched him admiringly. His tale flowed freely, for it was well rehearsed, having been delivered to all those he'd escorted to the Tower. Many it had sickened, and rare was the man who didn't turn white between the assault on his sensitivities and the offense to his senses. De Wynter was that rarity. Of course, the captain had no way of knowing that he addressed a survivor of the siege of Naples, a hell which made Dante's pale by comparison. The Scot's equanimity impressed the captain. Was the man really amused as he looked? Gad, that was gutty. He decided to ' confide in him, "There, see those wood things over there? Starlings they're called. They's be supposed to break the rush of water on London bridge but, God's truth, many's the careless boatmen broke on those piers. So I leave not the shooting of the bridge to just anybody. Meself takes the sweep to steer it through. As for you, you'll arrive at the Tower nice and dry. On the word of Thomas Notte, Captain of King Henry's Yeoman Guard. I suggests if you don't look down the shoot of the bridge, look you to either side but don't look up. There on the middle of London Bridge, that's where they hang traitors' heads to cure in the sun. Someday, I vow, the head of the Boleyn, she'll hang there. But I hope next time I pass, yours I'll not see. Fare you well, Scot, and if you should see at the Tower a Yeoman Warder, a Beefeater they's called, looks like me, that be me brother John. Usually I commend prisoners to him, but you're not like them, Scot, so don't you be taken in; me brother's not to be trusted. 'Course, none of the others is either. Well, good luck, your lordship. I wish you well." With a grin and a wave of his hand, Notte was gone, back aft to steer his barge safe just as he'd tried to do with his prisoner.

  De Wynter, looking after him, feared anew for the safety of his Anne. If men like Thomas Notte were against her, she must tread the straight line. De Wynter's thoughts were stilled by the sudden sinking of the boat underneath him as the prow leaped into space and fell down the cascades between the piers of the bridge. For a long moment he exalted: the tower would not claim him. Then his hopes were dashed. The boat righted itself. He was not about to die. He would live to see the feared interior- of those forbidding walls that had for four centuries dominated London.

  CHAPTER 17

  After successfully shooting the bridge's narrows, the barge plunged, yellow spray flying, into the Pool of the Thames, where the waves surged and heaved like the river it was. De Wynter did not see Nottle again, at least not to talk to. The barge instead quickly threaded its way between wherries and other craft—hundreds of them, including one that could have been a king's flagship. Their destination dominated all, the sombre walls and the quadragon on the White Tower with its four dark cupolas, looking forbidding and impervious to escape.

  At last the barge made fast at the base of St. Thomas's Tower with ks infamous Traitor's Gate, that wood-toothed, yawning hole connecting the Thames to the Outer Ward of the Tower. As the yeomen struggled with the landing plank, de Wynter assessed his prison more closely. The Thames had been diverted round Tower Hill, creating a moat. Within that watery barrier rose outer walls better than five-men tall, broken here and there by towers and bastions. Eight of them he could see from where he stood, not including the keep atop the hill, their roofs bristiing with pikemen, their sides studded with cannons. Up close, escape looked impossible. This was a fortress easily made fast from those without and probably from within.

  The Romans were first to occupy this hill. The Saxons' King Alfred built upon their ruins. These then were the foundation of the first Norman Castle built by William the Conqueror. And here it still stood: the White Tower, so named for its coat of whitewash. From the day the first stone was laid for the keep, no monarch, including the current one, had failed to further fortify this already formidable stronghold. Over the years it had grown from fortress to fortified palatial prison.

  The heavy gates swung open quietly. The demeanor of de Wynter's greeters, their total nonchalance, warned him that the charging of prisoners was routine for them. Through the arch beneath St. Thomas's Tower he was led, another portcullis swinging silently open before him within the Bloody Tower, and so through to the Inner Bail and Tower Green.

  Dusk was upon them and torches flared here and there. Even so, it was light enough for him to make out the headman's block with its chiseled hollows for chin and chest, leaving a thin, neck-wide strip of stone to await the headsman's sword. In the dim light he couldn't be sure whether it had been fashioned out of mottled stone... or had those streakings come later? The thought did not rouse his spirits. Instead, he grew more pensive with every step taken toward that white hulk looming a full hundred feet in the air.

  At the last moment, his escort veered left. Now he was surprised. His quartering was not to be in the White Tower itself, but in another, smaller, semicircular tower in the west wall of the Inner Ward. Up a narrow, winding stairway the strong hand on his arm propelled him, into a room on the first landing, not overly large, which took up all else of the first floor except the stairway. They left him there in the dark, to compose his soul or whatever, it being too cold and dank to do much else.

  Feeling his way about the room, he discovered from barked shins and stubbed toes that he had table, stool, pallet on legs, and what would appear to be a fireplace. Retreating to the pallet, he hugged knees to his chest to conserve warmth and huddled upon the bare planks awaiting the pleasure of his keepers. Muffled noises outside aroused him, and shortly thereafter the door to his prison opened. The uneven light of the torch made the Yeoman seem grotesquely misshaped, but the identity of the bags and parcels could not be mistaken. His baggage had arrived. What of his companions? He prayed.they had made good their escape.

  The light hurt his eyes. Between his squinting and the torches flaring, the men who stood there seemed surrounded with a mystical aura. One figure among them separated itself from the group. Unlike the Yeoman Warders in their crimson skirts and sleeves oudined in gold, this man wore points and hose and jerkin and—more important to de Wynter—a mantle lined with marten. The closer he came, the less distinct were his features.

  "Welcome, Your Lordship, to the Tower of London. Is there aught I can do to add to Your Lordship's comfort during your stay here?"

  "Indeed. You might begin by lending me your cloak."

  "A man with a sense of humor. Good, you will need it here."

  "Where, if I may ask, is 'here'?"

  "Beauchamp Tower, my lord. Now, the hour grows late and I have others to visit. Shall we proceed to business? As a prisoner of state, your charge for your keep, per day, is one and six. Considering the hour, we shall forgive today and commence tomorrow. If, however, you prefer ale to water, potage to soup, and wish to wash more than once a week, we charge accordingly. Is there anything I've left out?"

  "The small matter of how I shall pay you. I am penniless." Not yet and not just for food did de Wynter plan to sacrifice one of his two pearls.

  "Penniless? You have nothing? Not even in your luggage?" "Come now, my Lord Gaoler, did not your searchers tell y
ou as much?"

  "And you have nothing on your person?" "Nothing. They roused me from my bed. If you will lend me pen and paper however, I shall write to friends—" "No, no writing."

  He was to be kept incognito. The thought drove home the seriousness of all this, but he masked his concern, affecting cheerfulness instead. "Then I guess I shall just have to starve, if I do not freeze first"

  "There was some mention of a silver collar..."

  "My herald's collar? Gladly would I relinquish that, but unfortunately, I shall probably have need of it at my trial. I am to stand trial, am I not?"

  "Suppose I lent it back to you if you should have some future use for it, in return for..." He considered a moment. "Your tabard?"

  It was there! All was not lost! "Nay, that too I'll need. What of my crimson hat?" The gendeman gaoler, who planned to have all eventually, hesitated briefly, then struck the bargain. He and his guards withdrew but only temporarily, returning with lackeys bearing wood and bedding, a platter of food, and a large tankard of ale. Soon, de Wynter was ensconced as comfortably as this dreary prison would allow.

  "And the collar?"

  "Help yourself," he replied, his mouth full of thickly buttered bread. "And the hat?" "And the hat."

  Straight to the right parcel the man went, swiftly extracting the collar and hat. De Wynter pretended deep engrossment in his food, but actually he watched carefully for a glimpse of brilliantly embroidered fabric—his tabard with its jewel-concealing cuffs. Other than the sight of that, nothing else offered him much consolation, especially if he were unable to communicate without the walls. Anne was his best, his only hope.

  The next morning brought light but no sun to this westward-facing prison. From the slit windows he could make out much of London, secure within its city walls. And on the Thames, the fishing boats Nottle had talked about. The Thames teemed with them as if boats had taken to spawning. The view from the other narrow opening was more grim, and its significance not lost on him. It was of Tower Hill with its dyester poles hanging heavy with rotting human fruit.

  Turning inward, he examined his own surroundings more closely. He soon found traces of former occupants. Besides names and dates rough scribed on the walls, scratched in the chimney face and signed Burley was "Take no thought for the morrow, the morrow shall take thought for itself." In a recess made by the chimney, an unknown prisoner wrote with gallows humor, "This ill life we must endure,' my poor grave be more secure." A third left him perturbed: "Timor mortis conturbat me." To put memories to rest, be started pacing, considering how best to make use of his two jewels... how to find out about his companions... how to learn the rate ofFionn and his whereabouts. Soon his feet settled down to a steady rhythm: ten steps north, five south, four west, eight east, four west, five south, and repeat again. With a shudder he realized he was inscribing a cross, but vary his pattern how he might, he always unconsciously came back to that.

  For five days he existed so. Each day the gaoler arrived and silently directed the warders to supply the table, the hearth, and the bed. One of the men with him looked familiar, and de Wynter wondered whether he might be the John Notte of whom his brother had spoken. But de Wynter had no chance to question him, and the gaoler did not encourage talk. He did, however, accept a fine Hnen handkerchief in exchange for a nail. Then de Wynter could alternate his exercise with adding his own witness to the walls:

  How slow ye move, ye heavy hours,

  As ye were wae and weary!

  It wasna sae ye glinted by

  When I was with my dearie.

  His sixth day in prison was that seventh day of the week which God blessed and sanctified, forbidding that anyone should work, and the routine changed. This time when the keeper arrived, he brought barber and soap and water. Once clean-shaven, de Wynter was urged to hurry his dressing. Taking no chances, he donned his tabard, then reminded his keeper, "My collar, my Lord Gaoler. A herald looks but half dressed without it... and you did have the payment of one hat."

  "The problem is, Your Lordship, the hat looks not right without matching gloves." The two men locked glares, but de Wynter had no choice except to acquiesce. If his stay went on much longer, he feared the keeper'd have him stripped to breeches and hose. Once the gloves were turned over, the collar was produced from some hidey-hole on the gaoler's person. Clamping it about his neck took but a minute, and then de Wynter was ready to go.

  Down the stairway they went and into the sweet fresh air of the green, the warmth of the sun stroking his shoulders and head. Again he was urged to move faster. In the daylight, de Wynter discerned another scaffold to his left, this one vacant of fruit. The headsman's block, he felt sure on second look, might once have been pristine; now it was deep-stained. The keeper would not let his prisoner tarry, but herded him forward toward the White Tower. When William the Conqueror built his keep, he made it a mighty pile. The windows were set high in walls surmounted with turrets at angles. It was at least a hundred feet long, maybe more, and as much in width. De Wynter had in his time seen the castles of France and Italy and many a pile in Normandy, but none filled him with so much foreboding as did this plain, white mass of stone before him. They entered through a door in the south wall, turning at immediate right angles to mount a high winding staircase cut within the fifteen-foot-thick wall. Eventually they came out into a chapel. After the constriction of the stair, the chapel with its wide triforium, its barrel-vaulted ceiling, and its apse uplifted by stilted round arches would have seemed spacious if not for the massive, cubical-capitaled pillars breaking ft up into so many aisles. Down the center they marched, their footsteps echoing eerily, bouncing from wall to wall. Although at no time during the past six days had his legs been shackled or his arms bound, de Wynter felt the pressure of history closing in about him and constraining his movements.

  A thin man in bishop's miter stepped form to greet them. "Archbishop Cranmer," the gaoler whispered. "Genuflect!" Afterward, de Wynter was able to study the man before him. A goodly man, harried by troubles—Harry's troubles. The feeble funning somewhat restored de Wynter's confidence. To be able to joke at all was a measure of the man. Cranmer, he thought, looked lacking in sense of humor. And lost within his rich robes. He was not one to have risen to this rank through purchase or friends, and thus must have earned it. An honest man is always dangerous.

  "Do I address James Mackenzie?"

  "Nay, My Lord Archbishop. You address James Mackenzie, Esquire, His Scottish Majesty's Envoy Extraordinary and Scots Herald Ross, the Right Honorable Earl of Seaforth." So did he offer his first gambit. Let the bishop accept this and he could claim diplomatic immunity.

  "Before God, my son, there are no honorables or envoys. Each man stands on his own, identified only by his Christian name."

  Gambit refused. What game was this English king and his archbishop playing?

  "Granted, Your Grace, but I lay claim to diplomatic immunity by virtue of my mission to the Court of His British Majesty Henry VIII, bearing messages from His Scottish Majesty, James IV."

  "My son, do you not bear us right?" Cranmer replied patiently. "We grant you your position and your immunity to civil trial. But here, my son, you stand before an ecclesiastical court."

  De Wynter was shocked. "Ecclesiastical? Why, by God?"

  "By God you shall be tried for breaking his commandments."

  "Attempted rape? What commandment does that break?"

  Cranmer ignored this. "Hear ye, James Mackenzie, the charges the Holy Mother Church has laid against you." Picking up a document heavy with wax seals and trailing ribbons, Cranmer commenced reading in that singsong, strung-together Latin used by too many churchmen. Since Latin was the language of Church, diplomats, and scholars—the universal tongue, if you would, of the Christian world—de Wynter early on had been exposed to it and later refined in it while incarcerated in Naples. Thus, though he might miss a technical word here and there, by concentrating, he could make out well.

  What he heard, he swore
he misunderstood. He was to be tried, not for rape but for adultery; not for crimes in England but in Scotland; not with Anne Boleyn as partner but Queen Dowager Margaret.

  "Your Grace, I ask the court's permission; but even if these accusations were true, what jurisdiction have you? These might be crimes in Scotland, what concern are they of England?"

  Cranmer removed his glasses the better to see the elegant man before him. "Know ye not that His Imperial Majesty is named Protector of Scotland? That the Pope has agreed to appoint no Scottish bishops without his consent and that the Archibishopric of St. Andrews has been reduced to its ancient dependence on York which I represent." Cranmer's voice had been toneless so far, as if reciting by rote. Now it took on color. "Besides, your accusers are English subjects."

  From out of the shadows stepped the young Margaret Douglas. She was as Anne Boleyn had described her and as de Wynter remembered: big boned and clumsy. Whether she had bad breath or no, de Wynter was sure he would never find out. There was a flush to her face and a vicious set to her mouth as well as a fiery look in her eye. Here was a female out to exact revenge. "On behalf of my mother, I accuse him," she said: "He took advantage of a woman's grief for loss of her husband, a queen's care for her country. He led my mother astray"—this was a fanatic who believed she spoke God's truth—"down the ways of irresponsibility, plying her with the drugs and seductions of the flesh. He made a god-fearing, loving mother and devoted wife into an avowed adulteress. Archbishop, judge you and punish him. Let him be dealt the Biblical punishment, let him be stoned to death."