by Mary Hooper
At six o’clock a turnkey came in with my breakfast, which, as it was my last, was red herrings, anchovies, and fresh-baked bread. I felt hungry and was pleased to see such things, but as soon as I put them in my mouth they turned to ashes and refused to be swallowed, so I had to discard them.
At seven o’clock my sister, mother, and father were allowed into my cell, and my heart leaped with joy to see them—but fell again as I remembered what they were there for. We wept and held each other, and it seemed to me the first time we had ever done such a thing, for we weren’t a family given much to the linking of arms or the kissing of cheeks. Even my father shed tears, which made me exceedingly sorrowful.
My mother, who is ever a sensible woman, recovered first and said that I should now prepare myself and try to have as respectable a death as possible, for she wouldn’t like to think of me going wailing and screaming to meet my maker in front of the crowd that would be gathered outside in the yard. And I said that I’d do my best to compose myself and go with grace to meet him.
“But it surely won’t come to that—for it must be seen that a mistake’s been made,” said Jane, a tone of yearning in her voice. “A pardon will come for sure!”
My mother shook her head. “We mustn’t think on that. Who in the world would be trying to obtain a reprieve for us? No, ‘tis only the gentry who can make representation to the law and get things changed.” She took my hand and held it tightly. “We must prepare ourselves for the worst, Anne.”
“Although afterward I intend to pursue the whore-son young master of that house and lay your death at his feet!” my father said with some anger. “Yes, e’en if I have to go to Northumberland or whatever fartling place they’ve hid him.”
“Stay,” my mother said. “What good would that do?”
“’Tis what a father should do!”
My mother sighed. “So I’d be left without a husband as well as without a daughter? And then where would I be?”
“Tush!” went my father, muttering under his breath.
“Where are my brothers?” I asked after a moment.
“They’ll be there in the yard,” said Ma, “and more neighbors and friends from home as well.”
My heart felt like a stone. “And all coming to see me die . . .”
“Not only for that,” Ma said soothingly, “but to be with you at your last. To support and pray for you, and to help guide your soul to paradise.”
I began weeping. “My soul may not get there, for my body . . . my body will be cut into pieces!”
“Hush,” Ma said. “I have spoken to the doctor, and he’s promised to take the utmost care of your body and to treat it with respect. And . . . and . . .” But she turned away here with a sob, and couldn’t continue.
“When you’re brought home and put in the churchyard, I’ll put flowers on your grave every day!” Jane said, and then she too burst out crying.
And so the minutes went on, and with each of them my mood changed: first fear and trembling, then bewilderment and disbelief, then sorrow, then railing against my fate, and then a return to fear again. And by and by the cleric came in and spoke to my mother and father and knelt with them in prayer, and again addressed me, although of course I still would not admit guilt, for which he seemed very sorry.
Jane washed my face for me and brushed out my hair, and had brought a red ribband, which color she said I must wear to show that I was brave, and with this we tied back my hair so that it would be out of the way of the hangman’s noose and not get caught up. And the four of them kept asking how I was feeling, and if I would be strong, and each time I answered yes, although indeed I didn’t feel well or strong, but just wanted the whole matter over with, for being dead could surely not be as bad as waiting to die and seeing your family suffer beside you.
I was worried about how they would be after, for my ma and pa looked very old and sad, and I tried to speak to Jane to tell her to mind them well and be a good daughter, but each time I got three words into the saying of this I’d break down and be unable to finish saying what I had started. During this time all of us were crying and shivering by turn, for the fire had gone out and it was a cold and dark gray morning, with sleet dripping from the sky, and it truly felt as if the end of the world was nigh.
I knew it was near my time when the prison governor came in with a sergeant at arms. Both spoke to me quite kindly and said that I had nothing to fear, I’d feel no pain and die quickly. And the soldier said that when I was pushed off the ladder, my father and brothers should hang on my legs if they had a mind to, for that would speed my end. The governor asked what were my worldly goods, and to whom did I wish to leave them, and I told him of all my clothes, including the bodice, and said that I wished to leave them to my mother to do with as she thought fit. He asked me to disrobe so that my clothes would not be spoiled, and I undressed down to my shift and gave my gown and cloak to Ma, although I was exceeding cold.
“’Tis time to go,” the governor said, on hearing the clock strike. “If you please, mistress . . .”
“Oh, give us just a little longer,” pleaded my ma, holding on to me tightly and looking at me with something like hunger in her expression.
He shook his head. “We have two hangings today,” he said, “and this is listed to be the first.”
“Then, by your leave, let our Anne be the second,” Pa begged. “Allow us a little more time together.”
The governor shook his head. “‘Twill be easier now—the waiting is the worst part, and the crowd outside will have grown in an hour’s time.” He regarded me with some sympathy. “’Tis more of an ordeal when it’s a big crowd. More ‘prentices to shout and throw rubbish.”
And so it was determined that I should go, and I kissed my family with a passion. My manacles were knocked off, and the governor led me outside, telling me to put my hand on his shoulder to help support myself, for every part of me was trembling so violently I would otherwise have fallen. He led me along an open passageway and into the prison yard, which was bleak and desolate, with not so much as a blade of grass, a tuffet of green moss, or a bird to be seen, but just ugly gray stone buildings running with rain and a strange and eerie feeling of anticipation in the air, as if the world was holding its breath.
The scaffold rose in front of me and, seeing the ugly reality of it, I swayed and almost fell, but the governor and sergeant caught me between them and held me upright. Standing beside this crude wooden structure, I looked around me and saw that the crowd consisted of perhaps eighty people. These included my brothers, some gowned scholars, learned men of the university, merchants, towns-people, the two carters who’d brought me in, the Reverend Coxeter, a governess from a dame school I once attended, several old neighbors, the squire from Steeple Barton, and also a group of my fellow servants from Dun’s Tew. Indeed it seemed very marvelous to me that almost everyone I’d ever known in my life was collected before me, and I was able to pick out each of their faces as if they were portraits in the long gallery at the manor house. I saw Sir Thomas there too, and quickly turned away, for within his countenance I could see the hated face of Master Geoffrey.
As I turned from Sir Thomas my eyes alighted on John Taylor, and for a brief moment my heart again leaped with joy, for his face was neither accusing nor vengeful but was filled with compassion. This gave me some small peace, for it told me that he’d forgiven me and that, at some passing time, he had even loved me. I smiled at him, though my head was swimming and I felt as if I was in a strange daydream, for ’twas the most curious thing to think that in a short moment I would cease to exist.
Beside the gibbet stood the hangman, wearing heavy clothes and a blanket against the weather, also a leather facemask so that he would not be recognized after. He was big and burly, looking very like the bogeyman that your ma tells you will come after you if you sin. And so he had.
“You must now kneel and make your peace with God,” said the cleric, and he bade me kneel down beside the scaffold. The Rev
erend Coxeter pushed his way through the crowd and knelt with me too, and close by were the scribes, holding their parchments under their capes to shield them from the rain and waiting to hear what I had to say. First the two clerical gentlemen and I sang a psalm together, which was number twenty-three and which I knew from long ago; then he asked me if I would confess my sins, for I had not much time now before I entered into Christ’s kingdom and came face to face with the Lord God.
This was a truly mighty thought and filled me with awe, and I could not but glance up to the solid gray sky and think about what he might be like and how he might receive me. I urged my mind upward while the rain pattered down on my face, but was offered no trace of the heaven beyond.
“You must now confess all,” said the cleric.
“I will, and truly,” I answered up. “I am guilty of the wicked sin of fornication.”
“Anything more?” he asked, urging me with his eyes to say what he wanted to hear.
I nodded. “I am guilty of causing my family suffering.”
“And of what else?”
“Nothing of any consequence,” I said. I hesitated and then made brave to answer, “And I would not be guilty of aught, except that I was led into sin in the house of my employer, Sir Thomas Reade.”
Alarm spread across the cleric’s face at this, and I wondered if his living came under the authority of Sir Thomas. He shook his head sorrowfully. “Then may our Lord God forgive you all your sins and allow you to enter into the next world without shame,” he said, and offered me his hand to help me to my feet.
I began to tremble so frightfully that Ma ran forward and tried to put a blanket over my bare shoulders and embrace me again, but the hangman pushed her away, saying it would hinder things. She had a length of cord with her, which she requested should be tied around the bottom of my shift for modesty’s sake, and he allowed her to do this. He gave me a hood, which he ordered me to put over my head, but my fingers were shaking so violently that they wouldn’t do my bidding, and the cleric had to fasten it for me. Just before he closed the flap that went across my eyes, I looked across to my ma so that her dear face would be the last that I saw, and wanted to smile at her but could not, for I was sick with fear down to my very bones.
The hangman put a heavy coil of rope over me and around my neck, and bade me go up the ladder, which stood beside the gibbet. I climbed seven steps, feeling it shaking beneath me, while the icy rain fell on my bare shoulders and trickled down the front of my shift. I braced myself for lewd shouts, or for rotten fruit to be thrown, but these did not come. I heard, though, a scream from Jane and some cries of protest from my family, and several other voices in the crowd shouting, “Shame!” although I didn’t know whether these meant shame on me for the crime I was accused of, or shame at my wretched fate.
I felt the hangman reach above my head and fix the rope that was to hang me, and someone—I believe it was one of the scribes—called to ask if I had any last words.
“I protest my innocence,” I said, although my voice was so choked that I don’t know if I was heard aright, “and I ask that God in his wisdom should let the world know this.”
“Anything else?”
“Only that all maidens who are tempted from the path of virtue should think on me and be persuaded against such a course. And I pray that my death be quick and my family not suffer too much after.”
I began saying, “And may God convey me swiftly—” but before I could add the words “to paradise”, felt a violent push at my back and fell forward off the ladder. The noose around my neck tightened, and though I’d been told that—in order to make my passing all the quicker—I must try not to breathe, I found that this was impossible and, panicking, could not help but struggle to rasp in a minute amount of air through a throat now horribly constricted by the ring of rough rope. I’d wanted to make my last thoughts simple and wholesome, but there was no room for thoughts of any kind, for my senses were immediately assailed by a pain of such intensity that my head became filled with a searing white light.
I hung for a moment, suspended, felt my legs jerk and, unbidden, my body convulse, shudder, and twist in the air so that it seemed that I was flying twixt heaven and Earth, then knew no more until I came into this drear darkness.
Chapter ~ 22
Robert, back in his lodgings, couldn’t sleep. Scarlett, too, seemed fretful, and instead of perching quietly on the wooden railing that ran along the balcony abutting Robert’s room, could be heard skittering up and down on the planks of its floor, pecking sharply at the occasional wood louse that appeared from out of the sodden wood or a blade of grass that had grown through the knotholes.
Thoughts of corpses floated through Robert’s mind. Anne Green, and that other, dreamlike one. His mother. To think that he’d recalled his mother when he hadn’t even known he’d ever seen her!
There were many answers to be sought to many questions, but his chief anxiety at that hour, that midnight hour when all ills and suspicions can seem overwhelming, was Anne Green. He somehow felt a responsibility for her well-being. Was Martha keeping watch over her? Would she call Mr. Clarke if she felt her charge was in danger? How would a housemaid know such a thing? Suppose Anne passed away in the night just for want of warmth, a rousing cordial, or because her heart had faltered at a critical moment and had not been stimulated?
I want to see her.
Robert leaped out of bed. It wouldn’t hurt to check up on her, he thought. He’d find a way in to her for sure—the apothecary’s dwelling was one of a number of shops in the High Street that had interconnecting rooms, and all shared a backyard privy.
On retiring the previous night, Robert had, in view of the extreme chill of his room and the lateness of the hour, gone to bed in all his clothes, so only had to don his hat and shoes to be ready. He took his heavy cloak from the hook on the door as he went out and, going across the balcony, threw Scarlett a scrap of hard bread.
Fifteen minutes later, treading quietly, or as quietly as possible on the creaking oak floorboards, Robert made his way along the corridor that led to Martha’s room in Mr. Clarke’s house in the High Street. He hadn’t been challenged on his way, for it was now near two o’clock in the morning and the whole of Oxford was asleep. Neither crier, night-soil man, whore, nor late-night reveler had been encountered on his short journey.
He heard a fierce snoring coming from Martha’s room, and upon entering, Robert almost tripped over the recumbent body of Martha herself on the floor, wrapped up in what appeared to be a velvet curtain. He wasn’t surprised at this: Martha obviously hadn’t relished the thought of sleeping with such ghoulish company and had decided to leave the bed to Anne. This probably wouldn’t have been discovered, for in the morning Martha would have been up and about before any of the doctors arrived, eager to claim her five shillings.
The fire in the room had been banked up in order to last until morning but was now only glowing, and Robert, stepping over Martha’s form and lifting his candlestick so that the light would fall onto Anne’s face, approached the bed with trepidation. Looking down at her still form, however, he noted with relief that her face held the same tranquil expression, as if she slept in peace. He placed the candlestick on the night table, picked up one of her hands to count her pulse, then bent his ear to her mouth to note her breathing. When he straightened up he was smiling slightly to himself, thinking her improved; her breathing was significantly deeper and her hands were less clenched than before. She seemed a little warmer, too, in spite of Martha’s failure as a bedfellow.
“I thought you might have died,” Robert said to her in a low voice. “I couldn’t sleep, so I decided I’d come along and see how you fared.” As with Scarlett, he found himself speaking to her quite normally. Perhaps, he thought with something approaching levity, that was the answer: to try and see everyone as innocuous as a chicken or a cadaver. They weren’t about to laugh at him or try to complete his sentences.
He brought a chair close t
o the bed and sat upon it, staring at Anne. It wouldn’t hurt to talk to her, he thought. He’d been told once—by Dr. Bathurst, if he remembered rightly—that hearing was the first and last faculty a human possessed, so perhaps speaking to her would somehow penetrate the lower levels of her consciousness. Besides, he found that he wanted to speak to her for his own sake; it would be a delight to address a pretty young woman and to know she wasn’t going to stare at him as if he was a lunatic, or giggle behind her fingers.
“Are you going to live, Anne Green?” he asked and then, more reflectively, “And where have you been while you haven’t been living . . . when you haven’t been here?” Boldly, he took up her hand and stroked it. “You had many visitors yesterday. Scores of people came to stare. And today, later today, if you thrive, there’ll be more. They sent a horse to London last night to inform some very important doctors. They’ll come. Indeed, Cromwell himself may come when he hears of these happenings.”
Anne drew in a slightly deeper breath, which caught in her throat and made a soft growling sound. Robert felt her pulse; was her heart beating a little faster?
He paused and tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. “I dare say, if you knew how many men have been staring at you, you’d ask for a mirror and brush and want to arrange your locks.” He glanced toward the sleeping form of Martha. “Perhaps Martha could be prevailed upon to help brush your hair. Or maybe wash your face, for ‘tis still stained with tears from . . . from before, and they’ve poured several herbal preparations into your mouth, which have turned your lips and chin quite green.”
Anne Green slept on. Sleeping Beauty, Robert thought. Suppose she never woke? “Yesterday, watching over you, I remembered something else. A part of my past and another cadaver. But not one that I have remembered before—’twas my mother.”
How odd, he thought, that he’d discovered such a thing after so many years. No wonder Dr. Willis’s chief goal was to try and discover the secrets of the brain. It was surely a treasure house of miracles and marvels.