by Tracy Borman
‘Perhaps the outcome was not as we feared.’ But even as she spoke the words, she knew them to be false.
‘Sir Walter will go to his death with as merry a countenance as he showed the old Queen,’ Anne replied sadly. ‘Let us offer up our prayers that he enjoys greater fortune in the next world than he has in this.’
CHAPTER 27
29 October
Old Palace Yard was deserted when Frances arrived. The scaffold had been erected the previous night, just hours after Raleigh’s sentence had been pronounced. Thomas told her that Sir Walter had offered a spirited defence at his trial, despite being so weak with sickness that he had barely been able to stand. His courage had only faltered as the verdict had been delivered, and he had sunk to his knees, begging the King to show mercy. His pleas had fallen on deaf ears. The only clemency James had shown was to commute his sentence to beheading.
Frances had not slept that night and had risen before dawn. Raleigh would be brought here in a little under two hours’ time, as the bell of St Stephen’s tolled eight. Glancing towards the gatehouse, she saw a faint glimmer in one of the windows. The King had ordered that he spend the night there. Frances did not know if it was to save time or lessen the risk of escape. For a moment, she thought of running to the window and calling to him. But the idea faded as quickly as it had sparked. What could she say that Raleigh would be content for his gaolers to hear? Pray God he will find it in his heart to forgive me.
Thomas had begged her not to come, but she had been resolute. She had failed to save her old friend from the terror and humiliation of this death, but would be here to pray for him as the life was struck from his body. It had always been a source of shame and regret that she had lacked the strength to do the same for Tom. Looking around the courtyard now, she imagined her lover being dragged there on the wooden hurdle that had conveyed him from the Tower, his emaciated limbs jolting painfully on the cobbles. Thomas had told her that he had met his death with calm acceptance, apparently impervious to the horrors that the King’s executioner had visited upon his body. Tears pricked her eyes as she raised them to the heavens, imploring God to give Raleigh the same peace.
A few more people were filtering into the courtyard now, eager to secure a good vantage point. London was still crowded with revellers from the Lord Mayor’s Day celebration. They must consider it a boon to be witnessing this spectacle too, Frances reflected. She walked slowly to the opposite side of the scaffold, knowing that Raleigh would pass this way on the short walk from the gatehouse. Drawing up her hood against the cold, damp air, she closed her eyes in prayer.
By the time daylight broke, the courtyard was crowded with spectators, jostling and chattering excitedly. Frances judged that it could only be a few more minutes before eight o’ clock. It had seemed an age since the bell had struck seven.
‘Make way there!’
The shout rang out across the courtyard, prompting a chorus of murmurs as everyone looked towards the thickset guard who was pushing his way through the crowds. Behind him, Frances could see a procession of finely dressed dignitaries. She recognised Thomas Clinton, the new Earl of Lincoln, and Raleigh’s old patron Robert de Vere, Earl of Oxford, who had tried to stir up resistance to the Scottish King in the last days of Elizabeth’s reign. Frances craned her neck, hoping to see Bacon, but he was not among them. He had confided to her that he had no stomach for such things and that he would be spending the day in prayer for his old friend. Neither was Buckingham present, much to her surprise. She had expected him to take pride of place at the gruesome spectacle. Perhaps he meant to show, by his absence, how little Raleigh’s death mattered.
She was reflecting on this bitter thought when she saw Thomas at the end of the procession. Her heart leaped. He was staring at the ground, grim-faced, but looked up just as he drew level with her. Their eyes met for a moment before the crowds closed in behind him.
A loud cheer rose and all heads turned back towards the gateway where the lords had just entered. Frances stood on tiptoe but for several moments she could see nothing except the waving arms and hats being thrown into the air. Then at last Raleigh came into view. He was dressed all in black, and as he drew closer Frances was shocked to see that he was wearing his nightgown. A matching black velvet cap covered his scalp and he doffed it now and again, acknowledging the adoration of the crowds. It was as if they had come to see him crowned, not have his head smitten off.
He was so close to her now that she could have reached out and clasped his gown, as many others were doing.
‘God save you, Sir Walter!’ a bald man cried, tears streaming down his face.
Raleigh flashed him a smile, then took off his cap once more.
‘Thou hast more need of it than I,’ he replied, holding it out to the man, who gazed at it in wonder, as if it had been given to him by Christ Himself.
As the crowds surged behind her, Frances found herself being pushed forward. At that moment, Sir Walter turned towards her.
‘Forgive me,’ Frances mouthed, her eyes imploring.
He stared back at her for a long moment, then the lines at the corners of his eyes wrinkled with accustomed good humour. Reaching out, he took her hand and quickly pressed something into it. The gesture was so discreet that nobody seemed to have noticed. She looked up at him and he gave the slightest of nods before moving on into the throng. Frances glanced down and saw a tiny, exquisite prayer book. Her eyes filled with tears and she pressed her lips to it, then placed it carefully in her pocket and followed with the rest to the scaffold.
Sir Walter had already mounted the steps by the time she came within view of it. A guard stepped forward and took the black velvet gown from his back. As he stood to survey the crowds, dressed only in his linen nightshirt and breeches, his head uncovered, he looked like the frail old man she had seen on her last visit to the Tower.
‘Good people.’ Raleigh’s voice rang out across the now silent courtyard. ‘If I appear to tremble, I beg that you do not put it down to cowardice on my part, but rather to a strong and violent fever that is hindering me in what I intend to say.’
A murmur of dissent ran through the crowds. Frances heard several people around her mutter, ‘Shame,’ and ‘God save him.’ It gladdened her heart. The King might have denied Raleigh a public trial, but her friend was going to make the most of this opportunity. He had always known how to play to the crowds.
‘I thank God that I came out of the darkness of my imprisonment in the Tower to die in the light,’ he continued. ‘As for the matter that caused the King to take so great offence against me, I must confess that there was probably some cause, yet it is far from the whole truth.’
Very far, Frances mused, knowing that few of those present would guess at the extent of Raleigh’s crimes against the King. He went on to plead God’s forgiveness for the manifest sins he had committed throughout his life, then provided a fulsome account of his voyage to Guiana. Frances saw the guard behind him grow restless. He made as if to hurry the prisoner along but, sensing the mood of the crowd, kept his counsel. The tolling of the bell signalled that half an hour had passed since Raleigh’s arrival. He seemed not to heed it, but went on: ‘I confess myself to be a most wicked, sinful and wretched man, a poor worm of the earth, one who has delighted and trod in all ways of vanity. For I have been a courtier, a captain and soldier – professions in which vices have their best nourishment.’
A chill wind whipped about the courtyard. Frances noticed Sir Walter clench his fists at his sides to stop the trembling. Seizing his chance, the guard stepped forward and muttered something in Raleigh’s ear, then gestured towards the small fire that had been lit in a brazier at the back of the scaffold.
Raleigh shook his head and gave a sad smile. ‘I thank you, sir, but I have little need of its warmth any more.’ He then sank to his knees in prayer, remaining there for so long that the guard grew uneasy again. When at last he opened his eyes and tried to stand, he was shaking so violently that he wa
s obliged to take the hand of the chaplain, who stepped forward to help him. Recovering his composure, he strolled nonchalantly to the executioner, who had been standing by the block throughout the spectacle, and asked him to raise his axe so that he might examine it. The man seemed to hesitate behind his mask and turned towards the guard, who nodded briefly. Sir Walter gazed down at the blade for a few moments, as if in wonder, then slowly ran his finger along it. There was an intake of breath from the crowds as a drop of blood fell from his fingertip onto the straw beneath. ‘This will cure all of my sorrows,’ he said, with a smile, before bending to kiss it.
The guard stepped forward to guide the prisoner to the block, but Raleigh was there before him. Frances watched as he lowered his neck onto it, turning his head this way and that as if to test for the most comfortable position. His lips were bleeding where they had touched the axe.
‘You should face towards the east, sir.’ Though he spoke quietly, the executioner’s words could clearly be heard. The hundreds of onlookers seemed to be holding their breath as their eyes were fixed upon the scaffold, waiting for the final act in this macabre spectacle.
‘It matters not how the head lies, so long as the heart be right,’ Sir Walter replied, with a smile, turning to face the opposite way.
The masked man knelt for his forgiveness, which the prisoner, raising himself, bestowed with a warm embrace. He then held out a blindfold, but Raleigh shook his head.
‘I pray you, wait for my signal before dispatching me,’ he said, then lowered his neck onto the block once more.
Frances’s eyes darted across to her husband, desperate for reassurance, but he was staring resolutely at Raleigh, his gaze unflinching. What comfort could he offer anyway? she reasoned, trying to push down the feeling that he had abandoned her somehow.
‘Into God’s hands I commit my body and my soul.’
Raleigh’s words echoed across Old Palace Yard, bringing her attention back to him. She watched, as if in a trance, as he slowly raised his right hand, then brought it swiftly down to his side. But the executioner made no move. Frances could see the axe tremble in his hand. An agonising few moments passed and still he hesitated.
‘What do you fear?’ Raleigh called in a loud voice, as if reprimanding a lazy servant. ‘Strike, man!’
With that, the executioner raised his axe. Suddenly unable to bear the sight for which she had spent the past few hours trying to prepare herself, Frances closed her eyes. A moment later she heard a sickening thud. There was an anguished cry from the crowd and she felt the man next to her begin to sway in a faint. She took a deep breath and opened her eyes. It took her a moment to realise that Raleigh’s head had not yet been smitten off. Blood was spurting from a deep gash in his neck, and his head was bent forward at a sharp angle. Horror-struck, she stared as the executioner raised his axe again, bringing it down with such force that the blade embedded itself into the block after slicing through what remained of Raleigh’s neck.
The guard stepped forward and plucked the head from the straw, holding it aloft by the thick silvery hair at its base.
‘So perish all traitors!’ he cried. After the words had echoed into silence, the only sound was of the blood dripping steadily onto the wooden boards below.
Frances stooped and cupped another handful of water, splashing it over her face and neck. She shivered as it ran between her shoulder blades, but welcomed its cleansing coolness, wishing she could submerge herself completely in the dark depths of the river.
She knew that Thomas would be waiting for her in their apartment, but could not bear to return to the palace just yet. Accounts of Raleigh’s execution would be on everyone’s lips, his courage twisted into cowardice, his final words into treason. She knew that the horror of what she had witnessed would never diminish, but prayed that in time whenever she heard his name it would be his handsome face and smiling eyes that she saw, not the ragged, blood-smeared head that had been thrust in front of the silent crowd.
The tears flowed freely now, unchecked by her determination to turn steadfast eyes towards her friend if he saw her from the scaffold. She wept at the thought of everything he had been – might yet have been, if God had only smiled upon his endeavours. She wept, too, at the thought of his grieving widow Bess – of how she had bent to kiss the red velvet bag in which they had placed her husband’s head. And she wept for herself, for the loss of a friend with whom she had shared so many confidences and hopes.
Reaching into her pocket for a kerchief, her fingers closed instead over the prayer book Raleigh had given her. She wondered that she could have forgotten it. Taking care to dry her hands and face so that she would not spoil the gilded binding or the delicate pages within, she slowly opened it.
Carefully, she leafed through the first few pages, stopping now and again to read the prayers or gaze at the beautiful illuminations between each one. Then, as she turned another page, she stared. At the end of the chapter was a verse written in an elegant script. Her eyes flicked to the bottom and she saw that it was inscribed: ‘By me, Sr Walter Raleigh, this 28th Day of October 1618’. She felt the tears well again but took a deep breath and began to read.
Even such is time that takes in trust
Our youth, our joys, and all we have
And pays us but with age and dust
Who in the dark and silent grave
When we have wandered all our ways
Shuts up the story of our days.
And from which earth and grave and dust
The Lord shall raise me up I trust.
CHAPTER 28
31 October
Frances’s shoulders sagged and she surrendered herself to her husband’s embrace. She had shed so many tears since Raleigh’s death. The shock of his bloody end filled her mind whenever she tried to sleep. But she missed him too. Theirs had been a friendship born in treason but strengthened by mutual affection.
‘All will be well,’ Thomas murmured into her hair, smoothing some loose tendrils away from her face. She closed her eyes and pressed herself against his chest, wishing she could stay cocooned like this for ever, safe from the dangers that swirled about the court.
‘I want to go home, Thomas,’ she whispered, lifting her face to his.
He smiled sadly, then bent to kiss her. ‘As do I,’ he replied. ‘I have wanted nothing else for months now. But the King will not allow it. He would not even agree to my taking leave so that we might visit our sons. I did not trouble you with it,’ he added, ‘for I knew it would grieve you. I would suggest that you returned to Tyringham alone, but leaving court at such a time might raise suspicions against you. Buckingham would be sure to make the most of it.’ He grimaced. ‘But perhaps when the controversy of Raleigh’s death has died down I might petition His Grace again. There has been talk of another visit to Scotland at the end of the year. If that comes to pass, he can surely offer no objection.’
‘Assuming he does not command you to accompany him,’ Frances said, dejected.
Thomas was silent for a while. Eventually he brightened. ‘I have some happier tidings.’ He walked briskly to the bureau and pulled a letter from one of the drawers. ‘My agent writes that the lands surrounding Tyringham have finally been leased – and for a higher price than I dared hope. It will not settle our debts, but it is a start, at least.’
He handed the note to Frances. ‘That is good news,’ she replied flatly.
The ground crunched underfoot as Frances picked her way through the copse that lay on the south side of Hyde Park. She had woken to discover a thick covering of frost over the palace gardens. They looked breathtakingly beautiful in the early-morning sunshine, the hedges and branches fringed with glimmering white as if suspended by some enchantment. The disappointment that she and Kate would not be able to go out riding as planned was tempered by the sheer beauty of the scene. She had been glad when her young friend had agreed to a walk instead.
‘Here, let me help you,’ she said, holding out her hand.
‘This woodland is hardly made for walking,’ Frances replied. She wished her companion would not berate herself so often, as if fulfilling the role that her stepmother would usually inhabit. It was more than two years since the Earl of Rutland had brought his daughter to court – long enough for her to have grown in confidence, Frances reflected. But the die had already been cast and she feared that the young woman would always feel inferior to those around her, even though she exceeded them in goodness and virtue.
They had emerged onto the open grassland now, which was intersected with numerous pathways. Frances chose the one that followed the southern edge of the park. She glanced at her friend. ‘You are very quiet today, Kate. I hope it is not too cold for you. I was perhaps foolish to suggest we venture so far.’
‘No, not at all,’ Kate replied emphatically. ‘I longed to be free of the palace – that is, to enjoy some fresh air,’ she added. ‘There will be few such opportunities now that winter is approaching.’
‘Is there any other reason why you wish to escape Whitehall at present?’ Frances ventured.
Kate’s face reddened. ‘It would churlish of me to complain. Many young ladies long for a place at court and I am fortunate enough to be there by virtue of my father’s position, without any duties to perform.’
‘And yet?’ Frances prompted.
She sighed. ‘It is not much of a burden to bear, really, and you will think me the most ungrateful wretch for even mentioning it. It is just that the countess has required my presence a great deal lately. I should be honoured, of course, but I confess that I find her company more a trial than a pleasure.’