Under the Hog: A Novel of Richard III

by Patrick Carleton

  “I have,” said Mr. Kendal, sanding a slip of parchment.

  The Duke, his Secretary and Dr. Beverley, Rector of Middleham, were discussing details of the College of six canons and a Dean Duke Richard meant to found in Middleham Church to the honour of Christ and his mother and St. Alkelda, and for the offering of prayers and Masses for the good estate of his brethren, himself and his wife and son. Dr. Beverley was delighted with the idea. He hoped he had Christian humility enough not to be moved by the prospect of a Deanery for himself: but he loved his little church with its tiny hospital adjoining it and its brand-new chantry of the Virgin that Mr. John Cartmell — might he have his reward for it — had founded: and now, thanks to the Duke, the little place was going to be splendid as the College of the Blessed Virgin and St. Alkelda of Duke Richard of Gloucester in Middleham. He knew it was the Duke’s joy at having a son and heir at last which had moved him to this piece of piety, and he felt very glad that he had prayed so hard for the Duchess during her pains last year.

  Duke Richard stood up. He glanced over Mr. Kendal’s shoulder at the papers on the table, nodded and stepped down from the dais of the Chamber of Presence. He had been very busy lately, Dr. Beverley understood, over a nasty case of piracy, the seizing of a Dutch merchantman at Hartlepool by that ungodly person, Sir Thomas Lumley. No doubt he had seen justice done. Justice had become almost a matter of course in the North, these days. He turned now to Dr. Beverley with one of the smiles that were more a movement of the puckered eyelids than the lips.

  “Well, there’s all our morning’s business done, sir. Come down and tell me the parish gossip. Any more children for you to make Christians of?”

  “Only one, your good Grace: Joanna at Westwood’s daughter has a daughter of her own now.”

  “I did not know Joanna’s daughter was even married.”

  “I’m afraid she isn’t, your Grace. It would be harvest-time last year, as near as I can reckon, and your Grace knows that harvest-time …”

  “Surely: see if you can find the name of the man. If he’s one of our own people, I’ll have a word with him. See my almoner if the family need anything, and mind you give the girl a stiff penance. Harvest-time indeed! Well, we’re all sinners.”

  Very humble and proper in a great Lord, thought Dr. Beverley. He knew Duke Richard kept one of his own bastards, a likely boy named John, about the household. It pleased him that the Duke did not throw up his hands to find that poor men had the same fleshly failings as the nobility.

  “And otherwise the parish does fairly well?”

  “More than fairly: we may say more than fairly, your Grace; and thanks to you.”

  “I don’t see why you thank me, but I am pleased to hear it: no sickness or no too great poverty?”

  “As I am a clerk, my Lord Duke, they were never better.”

  “Good.” The Duke, who had been drumming his fingers on the big mantelshelf of the Chamber of Presence, turned toward Dr. Beverley. His expression was oddly naïf, like a bright child’s. A kind of honesty and wonder seemed to be behind the puckering of the eyes and the set of the mouth, as though the thought in his mind were so simple that he expected nobody to understand it. “I want the people about me to be happy,” said Duke Richard.

  *

  Not summer yet, the Windsor weather was cold at night: big stars in the sky between the rainfalls, a cold little wind going along the ground. Sir John Fogg, accompanied only by two torches and two men who tramped behind him, drew his big cloak of martens round him and cursed the cold. The hard bulk of the Curfew Tower pushed up above him into the air, and lights still burned in many windows of the Palace, telling him other people had an easier time of it. This was a job worth money, but unwelcome on an ugly night.

  One of the two silent, experienced men slid past him and unlocked a door at the base of the tower. The other took both torches from the torch-bearers. “Get out of this,” Sir John Fogg told them; and they went reluctantly, guessing what was going to happen under the roots of the tower there. Sir John Fogg wished they might have his work to do and learn when they were well off. The steps into the dungeon were narrow, and a cold struck out of the place past anything Sir John could have conceived. He should have questioned the wise woman of Bath, Ankarette Twynyho, immediately, instead of waiting to improve his position with her. He had gathered that she was skilled in peculiar arts, a prophetess, that she had been a chamber-woman to the late Duchess of Clarence, and that the Duke had consulted her in various queer matters and had asked her to resolve some indiscreet questions about the crown of England. That should have been enough for him. He should have threatened to denounce her as a sorceress and got what he wanted out of her. She would be alive now if he had done. It was last month that a body of eighty men, some of them armed, had burst into the unfortunate woman’s manor of Cayford, seized her in the name of Duke George of Clarence, dragged her through three several counties to Warwick, charged her at the Guildhall there with having poisoned her late mistress, the Duchess Isobel, and hanged her out of hand on Mytton gallows, although several of the jury, after her apology for a trial, had come and asked her forgiveness for having delivered a verdict contrary to their conscience, to which, they said, they were driven by their terror of the Duke of Clarence.

  To Sir John Fogg, the matter was as plain as need be. Duke George had trumped up a charge against the woman to keep her mouth shut; must have learned somehow that she was being asked questions. But holy God, he thought, he must have been drunk when he did it: to abuse the King’s privilege, subvert the law of the land, so blatantly. Even King Edward’s England, even King Edward, would not stand that. Duke George had played into their hands superbly. The Writ of Certiorari had reached Warwick too late; but there were inquiries on foot now. He had his part in them.

  The dungeon beneath the Curfew Tower was an enormous place. Light of two torches was not enough for it. But they showed all that Sir John Fogg wanted to see: the queer black bundle on the floor that had been there six hours. It looked like a kind of box at first; resolved itself then, the torches coming nearer, into the shape of a man kneeling on his hams, but in an unnatural posture, his breast shoved close down on his knees, his arms bent at his sides like the wings of a trussed bird, face on the ground. As the two torturers came up on either side of him, the reason for his position appeared: glints of metal round him in odd places. The man had been crammed into an iron framework that misplaced every joint in his body, crushing his neck down so that his head was lower than his rump, twisting his arms up: the device known, after its detested inventor, as the Duke of Exeter’s daughter.

  The torturers stuffed their flambeaux into iron holders; brought up the things that had been put ready in the dungeon: a table, stool, brazier, bucket of water, rods. Sir John sat at the table, laying penner, inkhorn and some sheets of paper on it; rubbed his thin hands. The silence in the dungeon was wonderful. The torturers had learned, apparently, to control even their breathing. The man on the floor made no sound. The insidious damp and cold seemed to crawl up the legs like centipedes. Sir John twitched his shoulders.

  “God’s cross, light that brazier, can’t one of you?”

  They lit it, muttering and pushing each other’s hands aside like children; brought it, crackling, and put it near Sir John’s stool. The blue-and-yellow flames, as solid as rags, popped in and out, licking the coals as though they were not sure whether they would make a meal of them. Sir John stretched his arms and breast out to them for a minute; got no warmth yet; was aware of the two men looking at him with dull servants’ eyes, waiting for him to do something; said crossly:

  “Well, has he still his wits about him?”

  One of the men gave the prisoner a little push on the side. Pinned as he was, he rolled over helplessly, eyes and mouth opening in a white face.

  “Aye, he has, sir.”

  “Mr. John Stacy.”

  “Yes.”

  The voice coming out of the cramped dummy of a man who could no
t move anything except his lips and eyelids was more normal than would have been expected; was almost polite.

  “I ask you whether you are prepared to give me the information I have required of you.”

  “No.”

  “You are not, Mr. Stacy?”

  “No.”

  “That is foolish of you. Let me rehearse what you have already said. It might help your memory. You are John Stacy, a Baccalaureus Artium of Oxford, and employed as Secretary by his Grace the Duke of Clarence. Well, Mr. Stacy, that is true, is it not?”

  “Yes.”

  “You have found his Grace a good master?”

  “Yes.”

  “Are you loyal to him, Mr. Stacy? I ask you that. Are you loyal to him?”

  “Jesus, would I bear this …”

  “Are you loyal to him?”

  “You whorson devil, isn’t this proof enough? You’re killing me.”

  “So it is for your master’s sake you obstinately refuse to answer?”

  “I never said it.”

  “Oh, you did, Mr. Stacy, but plainly. Come now. Isn’t it that you know some small thing envious people might misuse against his Grace, God defend him? Isn’t that why you are silent? You’ve told me as much. I admire you, Mr, Stacy. You are a brave man. As God sees and judges me, you’re a very brave man. But the folly of it: we mean nothing against his Grace. Look you, I’m King Edward’s commissary. Is it likely that our Lord King would contrive anything against his brother? It is for the Duke’s own sake, to quell these mischievous slanders against him, that he has ordered this inquiry: so that the Duke may clear himself. Now, Mr. Stacy, you are a learned man and the Duke’s friend. Will you not help us?”

  “God damn you.”

  “Mr. Stacy, why was the woman Ankarette Twynyho hanged?”

  “She poisoned my Lady.”

  “She poisoned the devil’s grandmother. Why was she hanged?”

  “I’ve told you. You bastard, may you rot in hell. You’re killing me.”

  “Why was Ankarette Twynyho hanged?”

  “I had no part in it, Jesus Christ help me. I had no part in it. For God’s love, Sir John, let me out of this brake. I’m dying.”

  “Why was she hanged?”

  “I don’t know. I don’t know.”

  “Then it was not for poisoning the Duchess?”

  “I tell you I know nothing of it.”

  “Mr. Stacy, if you will answer me this one question you shall be taken out of here. You shall have a room with a bed and a fire, some wine. Was not Ankarette Twynyho hanged because the Duke of Clarence had spoken to her of a matter of which he should not speak?”

  “No.”

  Sir John Fogg looked at the torturers. They stood just on his side of the thin grey film dividing the torchlight from the dark.

  “Strip his back.”

  One of them stooped, pulling Mr. Stacy to his knees again, and began to drag his shirt and doublet over his head as far as the iron bands of the brake would let him. The other took up a rod. It was not a birch, though of the same shape and size; was made of long iron wires bound together at either end, the handle-end being wrapped in cloth to give a grip.

  “Mr. Stacy, I am asking you one last time whether the Duke of Clarence asked Ankarette Twynyho to prophesy if he should be King of England.”

  Mr. Stacy, bunched and clamped on the floor, blood oozing from his nose, as it did often with men kept too long in his case, did not make a sound. Sir John Fogg looked sideways at the brazier. It would brighten and begin to warm him soon. He shuffled his feet on the cold floor and nodded to the man holding the rod, who touched Mr. Stacy very lightly on the back with it and then swung it up behind him to the full stretch of his arm.

  He brought it down almost slowly, with a long, smooth movement suggestive of great power. The sound of it striking Mr. Stacy’s flesh was like the splash of a bucket of water thrown at a wall. He immediately lifted his arm again and brought it down again. At the third stroke, a noise like a cat’s mew came from Mr. Stacy. Sir John Fogg held up his hand.

  “Did the Duke ask Ankarette Twynyho to prophesy whether he should be King of England?”

  There was no answer. Sir John looked at the torturer with the rod.

  “Use your strength, fellow. He’s not felt you yet.”

  After each blow, the same mewing gasp came from the man on the floor, until the tenth. Then there was silence. The torturer struck five times more. Mr. Stacy’s back was covered with short deep cuts. Blood streamed from them.

  “Mr. Stacy.”

  There was no answer. The other torturer kicked the kneeling man in the ribs, knocking him sideways again.

  “Swooned,” he said.

  Sir John Fogg held his hands over the brazier. It had grown hot. He twisted his upper lip in boredom. This was going to be a long job, difficult: stubborn pig. It was not easy to do work of this kind at all in England. In France he could have strapped his man to a bench with the poire d’angoisse, the hollow wooden gag, between his teeth and poured water, bucket upon bucket of water, down his throat until he talked: or in Germany he could have hung him by dislocated shoulders from the ceiling with stone weights on his feet; burned the hair on his belly and under his arms with pitch. But torture was looked sideways upon in England; was used only where the charge was one of witchcraft or high treason. Its very lawfulness was rather more than questioned. Sir John Fogg’s only warrant, he was aware, for laying so much as a finger on his prisoner was the old mandate of Edward II directing torture to be used on the Knights Templar, “without mutilation or permanent weakening of any limb and without violent shedding of blood.” If the man should happen by ill-luck to die on him, he would be not much safer than a murderer.

  “Take him out of the brake,” he ordered.

  The torturers began fumbling with the locks of their device. There was a clang as the iron arms dropped apart, and Mr. Stacy fell on his face, slack-limbed like a dead body. Sir John felt in the deep sleeve of his gown and brought out a little leather bottle of German cordial. He drank some, shuddering as it warmed his throat and chest, and passed the bottle to the men.

  “Give him a sup of it.”

  One of the torturers went on his knees, lifting Mr. Stacy’s head into his lap, and the other pushed the bottleneck between his teeth, tickling his throat to make him swallow. Mr. Stacy coughed and rolled his head from side to side; then began to moan.

  “Now, you stubborn mule,” said Sir John harshly, making his voice intentionally threatening, “now you have a taste of what we do to traitors. You know what else we do to them: hang them like dogs and draw them like rabbits and quarter them like sheep. Save yourself while you can, fool. Tell me what you know. Your master the Duke has aimed at the crown. I can prove it. You have done devilries with him, invoked devils. I can prove it. You and Mr. Burdet of Arrow in Warwickshire have plotted with him, and I can prove that also. Tell me what you know, before we send you to the Guildhall to be tried for your life.”

  “Oh-h,” screamed Mr. Stacy, as the blood began to run back into his arms and legs, “oh God, Mary, Jesus.”

  “A little cramp?” asked Sir John. “You’ll have something worse than that, my friend, if you won’t unlock that mouth of yours. Now tell me why the Duke had Ankarette Twynyho made away with so suddenly.”

  “Sweet Saviour, let me die. Oh, take my soul quickly. Let me die. Oh God …”

  “All in good time: what did the Duke promise you if you would make him King of England by magic?”

  “Nothing: oh, saints and angels kill me. Jesus take my soul.”

  “Damn you for a stubborn beast!” Sir John got on his feet, banging his hands on the table. “I’ll oil your tongue for you. You men, off with his hose: he’s feeling cold; wants warming.”

  The men dragged the long hose off Mr. Stacy’s legs. He groaned and cried out from the pain of his cramped muscles, twisting his haunches from side to side. He was still not able to bend his limbs. One of the torturers to
ok a length of cord and tied his ankles with it. Sir John sat down again.

  “I am patient with you, Mr. Stacy. It is no pleasure to me to see you mishandled. Will you not be wise now? The King’s Grace is merciful. A confession could save you; might save your master too. Tell me what Duke George said to you touching her Grace the Queen. Has he never slandered her to you?”

  “Never, I swear it by the glory of God, never.”

  “You liar.”

  “It’s true, I’ll swear it on the Gospel.”

  “Confess that you and your master practised witchcraft against her and I’ll take you out of this dungeon. I’ll have a physician to you. You shall be put in a bed, no chains, and I’ll send you a good supper from my own rooms. I promise you. Don’t be such a stubborn martyr, sir. I beg you, for your own sake, confess and help yourself. I’m your friend. I want to help you if you will but let me. Think of a soft bed, Mr. Stacy, linen sheets, roast capon and demaine bread, a good coal fire. That’s better than the Curfew Tower and the brake. I have a splendid Cyprus wine in my chamber. I’ll send you up a bottle of it. Only tell me why Ankarette Twynyho was killed, whether the Duke has slandered the Queen and her kindred, whether he was aiming at the crown. I’ll make it easy for you if you’ll tell me. I’m your friend.”

  He had got up again and was standing above his prisoner. Naked from the waist downward, Mr. Stacy was lying with his head in his torturer’s lap, his arms limp on the floor, palms of the hands uppermost. His attitude recalled pictures or carvings of the descent from the cross. Round his ankles the flesh was ridged and blue, puffed up by being held in the Duke of Exeter’s Daughter. His hands were swollen. He lay with his head turned a little to one side and chest heaving laboriously, like a tired runner’s. His face was absolutely white except for the dark crusts of blood round lips and nostrils, and his short black hair, filthy from the dungeon floor, dragged on his forehead. His eyes were shut. A sudden irrational thrust of anger to see anything so hurt and brutalised and so obstinate, like the annoyance a man might feel in the company of an invalid, overcame Sir John Fogg. Stooping forward a little, he kicked him with all his weight.