Death of the Fox

by George Garrett

  There is other evidence, cloudy and contradictory. It is recorded in papers of the Tower and of the Council that not long after the trial at Winchester Ralegh was denied use of a razor to trim his beard. He wrote to assure his keepers and the Council that to take his own life he needed no razor. When he chose, he had said, he would ram his head against a wall and crack it like an eggshell. They must have believed him. His razor was promptly restored.

  Consider also his private chronicle. Time and again in war and adventures Ralegh has risked life. Apsley, the soldier, can understand that well enough. If you will call a good soldier, a courageous man whose survival, though often a testimonial to Fortune or Providence, is nevertheless the best and irrefutable witness to the wisdom of his choices, a self-murderer at heart, then what distinction between Ralegh—or himself for that matter—and any wretch who will cut his own throat, ear to ear?

  Surely the troublesome Wilson—who, as a spy, must also risk life upon the strength of wit and cunning—knew this. Yet he was, from the day he came to the Tower until now, continually concerned, watchful. Spoke of his fear that Ralegh would outwit them by self-murder.

  Perhaps, Apsley has surmised, Wilson’s fears have been grounded in something more firm—knowledge or suspicion of the true intent of the King.

  It would have been and might yet be expedient if Walter Ralegh died and spared the King the trouble of disposing of him. Perhaps the King has to believe that Ralegh will do that. Will be driven, by doubt and uncertainties and despair, to take his own life. If only to deprive the King of his royal prerogative. A last made rebellious gesture.

  But outwardly, by sign or gesture, Ralegh has never suggested any feeling toward his monarch other than respect and the ritual love a servant owes his master. Apsley knows better, or believes he does. For it is this unruffled evenness, never broken even in rage, which betrays the frost-blooded control Ralegh exercises.

  No, Apsley has thought, and thinks now as they reach the last precarious high landing and enter the shadowy tower—Ralegh hates the King of England so deeply and so well that he will not die but will rather live to spite him.

  This disloyalty, deepest and most dangerous, Apsley deplores, even as he respects the courage of the man who harbors it. Apsley, as soldier, learned not to waste imagination upon the perils of others. They must stand or fall as they will, as God wills. A man has more than enough occupation dealing with his own perils, contending, as best he can, against his own fears.

  Much as he fears that something in this affair may turn against himself, Apsley will be relieved to arrive at the ending. Allowing that he will, in truth, deliver up this prisoner today upon a proper writ of habeas corpus, he will sleep better with the old man gone from his keeping.

  Let him live or die as he will, but let it be out of the hands and sight of the Lord Lieutenant.

  Heavy footfalls, their own, in the chambers. Then the yeoman warder raps heavy-handed upon a huge door, unlocked, and, hearing the muffled reply from within, pulls it open, hinges groaning, holds it for the gentlemen to enter.

  A smoky chamber, smoke of the fire, smoke of a pipe, as Ralegh, rising from his pallet, greets them.

  Lord Lieutenant Apsley is astonished. But says nothing. Leaves it to Wilson to riffle documents and to announce the news of this morning. Apsley stands open-mouthed. For, though Ralegh is as calm and unrevealing as ever, he is unprepared. Perhaps it is the fever.…

  To Sir Thomas Wilson’s announcement Ralegh only nods. Apsley realizing that so far he has only spoken a word of greeting to the yeoman, now standing, gripping his gilt partizan, inside the doorway. Nods and knocks out his pipe in the fireplace. Turns—Apsley watching those cool veiled eyes—and stares at their boots. Sees they wear no spurs.

  “Well, then, gentlemen,” he says. “The tide will have just turned. If we must go by water, let us go now.”

  Apsley, out of the corner of his eyes, sees that the two wooden faced men from Court cannot control their own astonishment either. Only Wilson seems the same.

  Behind Ralegh his two servants (rich Devon accents) protest he must not go until he is prepared. He is sharp with them. Orders them to pack and to be ready to come to him when he sends for them.

  “God save your scruffy skins if you drink the last of my Canary!”

  Now Apsley finds some words: “No need for unseemly haste. You have ample time to dress yourself.”

  “Surely,” one of the gentlemen suggests, “since you must appear before King’s Bench, you will wish to be … yourself.”

  “Ah, if I thought that were true, I should do so and thank you for permitting me the time,” Ralegh says. “But since I know it cannot be so …”

  Wilson rattles the papers. “But I have read these to you. It is so ordered.”

  Ralegh shrugs. “You are mistaken, gentlemen. Look to your calendars. There are no courts of law today.”

  “Calendar or no, you must go to King’s Bench this morning,” Wilson says.

  “Perhaps,” the gentleman begins again, “you may wish to fortify yourself with breakfast.”

  “Is this, then, to be my last meal?”

  “I fear we have not made our meaning clear,” Wilson says.

  “Do not deceive yourself. You are as clear as my lady’s looking glass.”

  Ralegh turns then to Apsley, close, touching his arm. He looks into his eyes. And Apsley reads the dry hard brightness of a man not so old or infirm that he has mortgaged reason or surrendered possession of the present.

  “Believe me, I am grateful for your courtesy,” Ralegh says. “But I have suffered all night from a burning fever. There’s no disguising that. And I could not keep food down if I swallowed it.”

  “You could take some of your medicines,” Wilson says.

  “Pray be silent, Mr. Wilson. I am almost done with your care and have no need for medicines.”

  “There is no need for unseemly haste,” one of the gentlemen says.

  “You talk like a parrot, young man, repeating yourself. No haste when a prisoner is called before King’s Bench! Surely the habits of judges and lawyers have changed wonderfully. I never knew a judge who could be cheerful while waiting for a tardy culprit.”

  “I only mean to say, sir, that we have come about our business early.”

  “Early indeed, and with small ceremony.”

  “You may have as much time as you wish,” the other gentleman adds.

  “As much time as I wish.…”

  Ralegh begins to laugh. Laughs until he is checked by coughing.

  “Are you ill, sir?”

  “How much time does a dying man wish for? Can you answer that riddle?”

  “My meaning is that you may have as much time as is needful.”

  “See, Apsley, this man eludes my question with equivocation. I say he will go far in this world where men must equivocate to prosper. I have myself been said to practice the craft of equivocation, do you know that?”

  No answer, though one of the gentlemen suppresses a slight smile.

  “As much time as may be needful. Just so …” Ralegh continues. “God himself gives no man more than that.”

  “We have all heard of your skeptical opinions,” Wilson says.

  “Indeed, Mr. Wilson, you have news of everything except what you were sent to hear,” Ralegh says. “You should not strive to be impudent or over-bold. I may forget to pity you.”

  Stung, Wilson puffs and touches the hilt of his sword.

  Apsley steps between the men, turning his back to Wilson.

  “You might do well to reconsider,” he says.

  “Many’s the cold morning I have been up before cockcrow …” Ralegh begins. Then abruptly checks himself.

  “And I am as ready as I shall ever be,” he says. “Lead on, gentlemen.”

  He seizes a knotty walking stick, hefty as a cudgel, straightens his shoulders, lifts his head, and takes a long stride toward the door.

  The yeoman warder backs toward the low do
or, banging the point of his partizan, then gripping it to steady himself. The officers swinging about face to face in near collision. Wilson hanging back, an unhappy dog.

  Apsley steps forward, motioning with his arm. As if inviting Ralegh to join him on a stroll.

  “Your cane, sir.”

  That is Ralph, the servant It is Ralph’s walking stick Ralegh has taken.

  “Yours suits me better,” Ralegh says. “You keep mine.”

  At the door he stops and turns back to them.

  “Be ready to come at once. And mind you, not a drop of my Canary!”

  Past Wilson’s face, all clouds like a man in need of physic, the faces of two servants identically and purely wrinkled with puzzlement. They nodding as if puppet heads were jerked by a single string.

  “Go and eat. Find yourselves some comfort and a quart of sack.”

  Tossing a coin to them as he turns away, lowers head and shoulders to go through the doorway.

  The coin glitters in candlelit, fire-colored air. Like a huge spark. Falls to the stone, rings matin, rolls.

  Ralph, younger, snatching it up. Holds it close to the light of a candle squinting. Pinches, then bites it.

  Smiles now. The coin like a bitten wafer still touching the edge of his lower lip.

  “It’s gold.”

  “The old man has lost his wits,” the other mutters.

  “Thanks be to God for the blessing of that.”

  “How do you say so, Ralph?”

  “Why, it will make the work of the headsman that much easier. One or two good strokes, and he who was master shall be in eternal service. A proper servant of the Lord.”

  “Watch your tongue—for your own sake, lad.”

  “God’s tooth! That is the proper wish of every Christian, is not? To be taken up into Paradise and be a servant of the Lord?”

  “And so?”

  “And so it seems to me that in precedence it must surely fall upon those who have most skill and practice at service to be closest to high table in heaven.”

  “Shame on you!”

  “I believe we shall be Stewards and Carvers there. While many who were high and mighty shall be placed in the kitchen to scour the pots. ’Tis said so in Scripture.”

  “Lad, you shall be lucky to be a turnspit in hell.”

  Ralph shrugs. “Better the cook than meat on a fire.”

  “Amen to that.”

  “I know the keeper of a tavern, sign of A Running Hare, not far from here.”

  “But, lad, that’s almost as far as All Hallows Barking.”

  “A walk will settle your humors.”

  “Or kill me. I’m cold as a church key.”

  “Then we should both have a swallow or two of good medicine. To wit, our master’s precious Canary.”

  Ralph winks. The older man will not wink back, but cannot prevent a ragged, motley smile of black and yellow. And he nods. They drink.

  From his cell among the old royal chambers Ralegh walks with Apsley and they pass through St. John’s Chapel. The Norman chapel, massive as if the house of God should be a fortress place to endure in this world. Huge, squat, round columns in a file upholding arches like horseshoes. Hints of first light from rounded, deep-set windows. Ceiling still lost in shadow. But, dark or light, the pavement, curling in a geometry, as if stone could be a turkey carpet, of colored stones. A simple and beautiful place where once kings and queens, great men and their ladies, in joy and in despair, offered up their prayers.

  Gripping the cudgel for support, Ralegh lowers himself to kneel on those stones. The others wait while he says the Lord’s Prayer.

  Apsley knows they do not approve of kneeling and will misconstrue it. Smacks too much of old ways and customs. So be it, then. A man of any faith and persuasion would feel an urge to kneel in this place.

  Clinging to the cudgel, he rises. All move in quickstep through the presence chamber and, following the yeoman, through the long council chamber and down the turning inner stairs.

  Feeling his way more carefully now. Needing the staff to steady himself.

  It would have been quicker to descend by the scaffold of wooden stairs outside. But they go down the old stairway.

  Past the armory, where useless armor rusts and cannon from the time of Henry VIII—Great Harry, Long Meg, Seymour’s Gun—lie idle, oddly comic in repose.

  Down and across the hall and at last outside.

  Dawn air chill, ghosting breath, but sweet after the sorrows of old stone. Breathing it. Taste and odor, in keen chill, of October’s falling, dying leaves, of woodsmoke and coalsmoke from houses and towers. And always faint salt of the river and the sea. All around the yard is sprinkled, leaved with October blood. From houses and walls and in the yard there are watchers. Who have turned to stone.

  Apsley wonders why the yeoman has chosen this way. Since that soldier has been at the Tower many years, Apsley saw no need to instruct him how to lead to Traitor’s Gate. They could have gone the covered way, less exposed to the common view. Perhaps he, too, is in Ralegh’s service. For certain the trip by water was ordered to spare them the crowds and delays of the city and to keep some measure of secrecy. Well, with half the people of the Tower observing, the news may reach Westminster before they do.

  Apsley eyes Ralegh. His stiff leg, with its old wound, still thorn-jointed, wincing from the weight of him, staff or no. Ralegh breathes deep and holds the air. Not wishing, Apsley thinks, to show a shortness of breath.

  Walking south across the yard, skirting early shadows. Aiming to pass by Garden Tower. Aiming to walk through the tunnel, Wakefield Tower, then, and cross the moat at Traitor’s Gate. Creak of leather boots. Light rattle of sword and harness.

  Here’s a warder in their path. Guiding two people. Up so early to see all the sights of London. For a penny here and a penny there they’ll have a tour of the Tower and even perhaps be shown the lions and beasts of the King’s menagerie. Where once there have been rare beasts indeed. Leopards and curious apes, apes with beards like old men, apes who bark like dogs and flash their red-colored arses, an ostrich or two, sleek cats from the Indies. Gray native wolves and one white hart. Bears from Muscovy. White dogs, or wolves, from the snowy Samoyed. Many a fine beast gone. Now some few lions, bears, and dogs. Save for the sleepy lions, more a common kennel than a menagerie.

  He’s a wide-hatted yeoman farmer of middle age, wide of beam, horn-handed. Rough clean kersey and heavy walking boots. The woman beside him in Sunday best, holding her hands demurely folded beneath a lacy apron. They stop to step aside for the group coming down the path. The farmer raises his hat.

  Wind and sun-wrinkled face. Jowls of good food and prosperity, and shrewdness about the eyes.

  Ralegh stops, leaning on his staff.

  “You have a Westcountry face,” he says. “Have you come here from Devon?”

  “Yes, sir, an’ it please you.”

  “And where in Devon would that be?”

  “Near Chadwick, sir.”

  “A pretty place there, but a mile or so too far from the sea,” he says. “Did you have a good harvest?”

  “Not for many a year,” the farmer says. “We raise sheep now.”

  Ralegh turns to the warder, draws a coin from the purse chained to his waist.

  “Show them all the sights that may be seen.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “And not another penny from them, do you hear?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “When you return home, you may say you were guests of Sir Walter Ralegh in the Tower.”

  Off again, limping, but less so now on scant grass and raw earth. Crackling leathery sound as over across the yard toward St. Peter’s a startled fountain of black ravens rises.

  Apsley glances, following the spray of flight, seeing faces pressed to leaded glass of upper windows of the houses nestling along the western side of the Inner Ward.

  Ralegh stops short, turns and grips Apsley’s arm.

  “I have changed m
y mind.”

  “Sir?”

  “I cannot eat food this morning. But I need a cup of wine to settle my stomach.”

  “Very well,” Apsley says. “I shall send for it.”

  “I was thinking I might warm my hands by your fire.”

  Apsley clears his throat, studies the man. Learns nothing from set of lips, from the eyes.

  “It might be wiser to wait until we arrive at Westminster.”

  “Surely you’ll not begrudge me such a thing,” Ralegh says. “It will delay us less time than I might have required to dress.”

  “I am not sure it is wise.…”

  “Are you so very much afraid?” Ralegh speaks in a whisper as the others wait for them.

  Apsley flushes and knows his beard does not hide it.

  “Never mind, then,” Ralegh says. “I took you for a better man than God made you.”

  “I assure you, sir, I have no desire to be uncivil.…”

  “Name of God, Apsley, who can hurt you now?” Jerks his thumb at the three curious gentlemen, the impassive warder. “Those two are mere lackeys. They do not even have names and never will. And as for yonder keeper, Wilson, he can do you no injury now or later. Believe me, you have nothing to fear.”