The Coming of the King: Henry Gresham and James I (The Henry Gresham Series Book 3)

by Martin Stephen

  His heart sank at the thought. The Tower of London held bitter memories.

  ‘Is that wise?’ asked Jane. ‘They’ll condemn Raleigh, you know they will. And then it could be your turn. Your having visited Raleigh will be held against you, used to cite you as a co-conspirator.’

  ‘I have to go,’ Gresham said simply. Jane lowered her eyes, silent.

  It took an hour for Gresham to get to the Bloody Tower, where Raleigh was imprisoned. He had ridden over the stinking moat, and argued his way past three different sets of guards. Eventually, the Keeper of the Tower, Sir John Peyton, was summoned. A decent soul, he agreed to Gresham meeting his friend, but only if Gresham suffered a body search and the ignominy of handing over anything that could be used as a weapon.

  ‘Excuse me, Sir Henry. It’s not your violence I fear. It’s Sir Walter grabbing any weapon you have and turning it on himself.’ Interesting. Peyton at least appeared to believe Raleigh’s suicide attempt had been in earnest.

  Raleigh was seated in a corner of the furthest room, a single candle doing little to brighten the surroundings. Gresham was shocked. Raleigh, a big man, was cadaverously thin, a large bandage wrapped round his chest and working as his shirt, with a stained and creased doublet carelessly thrown on. He looked up as the servant, one of two he was allowed, opened the door, and smiled thinly.

  ‘We seem to be making a habit of visiting each other in captivity,’ said Raleigh, with a trace of his old humour.

  ‘Is there anything I can do?’ said Gresham, getting straight to the point.

  ‘Do? I doubt it. Can you stop that bastard Cobham lying through his teeth and implicating me in what I hear they know call the Main Plot? I think not. Can you stop the little rat Cecil, a man I counted as my friend and whose child I looked after, sending me to the scaffold? I think not. Can you find a single juror who has not already pronounced me guilty, for fear of the King’s disfavour? I think not. Can you stop my beloved wife and child being cast on to the streets to beg for their bread while every inch of land I own is taken from me? I think not.’

  ‘And can I stop Sir Walter Raleigh, once upon a time a great man, wallowing in self-pity?’ replied Gresham. ‘I think not.’

  ‘How dare you!’ said Raleigh. ‘What do you know of losing everything, of ending everything a man has fought for in ignominy and shame?’

  ‘A lot,’ said Gresham, ‘on several occasions. And on each one I seem to remember my major concern was to keep my dignity and my pride. Which you, old friend, are in danger of losing.’

  Raleigh reached out a hand, and with a snap of his fore-finger and thumb snuffed out the candle flame.

  ‘That’s it isn’t it?’ said Raleigh, ‘that’s life, fame, honour, glory and all the rest of it. Alight for a brief moment, enflamed by random winds, snuffed out in a second ...’

  ‘It might once have been a good poetic image, several hundred years ago,’ said Gresham, ‘but now it’s simply a cliché, and beneath you. I doubt many things about you, but never that you’re a brilliant poet. If you’re thinking of writing rubbish like that down in verse, no wonder you tried to commit suicide.’

  At last something flickered round on Raleigh’s lips.

  ‘What a comfort you are to a condemned man!’ said Raleigh, a little more strength in his voice.

  ‘It’s not comforting you need,’ said Gresham, ‘but a bloody good kick up the arse. What prompted you?’

  ‘To kill myself? Simple, really. I’m a dead man. Do I let others, my enemies kill me? Or do I show even at the end that I’m in control of my life, and do to myself, at my command, what they would wish to do to me?’

  ‘So why did you fail?’ Raleigh had killed men. He and Gresham knew that plunging a knife at the ribs, as Raleigh had done at supper with Peyton, was a useless blow. Flesh would tear and blood would flow, but the blade bounced off the rib cage. The killing thrust was up and under the rib cage. Raleigh had chosen the non-lethal blow.

  There was silence for a moment. Gresham’s heart lurched as he saw a tear fall out of Raleigh’s eye.

  ‘I lost my nerve, Henry. I was a ... coward. At the last second, I moved the knife up. I couldn’t do it. Feeble, isn’t it? To end my life as a coward too cowardly to take his own life ...’

  ‘It’s not cowardice,’ said Gresham. ‘It’s guts. You’re a dead man, in all probability, you’re right. But you’re a fighter. It’s your greatest strength and your greatest weakness. When you pulled that blow, your mind told you that this wasn’t the way to go, a knife blow in a stinking stone room at dinner with one of the King’s lackeys.’

  ‘So what is the way to go?’ asked Raleigh, interested despite himself.

  ‘You’ll have a show trial,’ said Gresham. ‘And you’ll be condemned. But you’re the best showman of them all. Play your lines well, and you’ll go down in history, as the victim of the most transparently unjust act of justice in history. Better to be infamous than not known at all. Do you just want to vanish into history as yet another popinjay rebel outplayed by his King? Or be remembered as the brave, innocent and heroic Sir Walter Raleigh, who outfoxed his opponents and made then look idiots?’

  ‘You assume I’m innocent.’

  ‘I don’t, actually. I rather think you’re guilty, on balance, at least of idiocy if not conspiracy.’

  ‘Idiocy?’

  ‘You played with conspiracy. You cast round like a hound looking for a scent for someone who could help you restore your fortunes, thinking you could always run free if you wished, not realising that you’d already given the power over your life to fools like Cobham. You didn’t realise that the trap you set for Cobham could just as easily be used on you. But that doesn’t matter anymore. What matters is that you stirred up so much mud in the pond that no-one, now or in the future, will ever be able see the truth.’

  Raleigh thought for a few moments.

  ‘So I give the performance of a lifetime? Leave a blaze of memorable glory in my wake?’

  ‘Something like that,’ said Gresham. ‘Think of it like a play. It’s got brilliant potential. Great man brought to edge of destruction by false witness and devious plotting from the ruler of the land. Alone, allowed no lawyer or even a friend, testifying for his life. Ill, pale, weakened by imprisonment. Stands up against these impossible odds, causes chaos and confusion among his enemies ... there’ll not be a dry pair of trousers in the house.’

  ‘And I end up dead,’ said Raleigh.

  ‘We all do that,’ said Gresham. ‘At least this way you make it your death, not just death inflicted on you by someone else.’

  ‘And will you help with this ... script?’ asked Raleigh.

  ‘Of course. Unless the need is for you to help me with mine. You see, it’s my plan as well, if I’m the person on trial. My biggest and best disputation ever.’

  ‘Why should it be you in the dock?’

  ‘You tell me,’ said Gresham.

  ‘I don’t understand,’ said Raleigh, who in the dim light seemed to be going red.

  ‘I think you do,’ said Gresham. ‘Cecil visited you yesterday, and stayed for an hour.’

  ‘So?’

  ‘So it’s not difficult to guess at the conversation. Cecil fears you, as he feared Essex and others as a threat to his power. Now Essex is dead, and you’re a spent force, if only because your power only ever came from the fact that Elizabeth was half in love with you. So he can afford to let you live, particularly as many of the common people hate you.’

  ‘Where is all this leading to?’

  ‘I’ve got something Cecil wants deeply, the problem being I don’t know what it is or where it is. In all probability it’s somewhere in College, but that’s as far as I can get. If Cecil can get me on a treason charge, as long as he knows long enough in advance, he can lock me in this very same T
ower, but far deeper and darker than you, seal me off from all my property, seal off the College and deny me the chance to find, reveal or destroy whatever it is he wants.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘You know. I think it would be better for our friendship if you told me.’

  Raleigh looked straight into Gresham’s eyes.

  ‘If I accuse you of plotting with the Spanish to put Arbella Stuart on the throne, Cecil offered me my life. He said I’d serve two, three years in prison, with the comforts you see here, and then be pardoned. Banned forever from London, but allowed to see out my final years on my estates at Sherbourne, God willing, with Bess and Wat.’

  ‘It sounds a very good deal to me,’ said Gresham lightly.

  ‘In what way?’

  ‘From Cecil’s point of view, half of England thinks I’m a Spaniard after the escapade on the Armada. The story that I was preparing to betray England to Spain will be believed without proof.’

  Gresham had done more to stop the Armada than Sir Francis Drake, but the world had always preferred a good story over the truth.

  ‘And from my point of view ...’ said Raleigh.

  ‘Like our dear departed Queen, I seek not a window into your soul. But I can guess.’

  ‘And what do you guess?’

  ‘You’ve loved me, as I you, but in your love there’s always been a competitive edge. Gnawing at the edge of your friendship are worries. Am I a better poet than you? A better swordsman? A better seducer of women? And from the word go you’ve been jealous of my wealth. You know Bess and Wat will want for nothing if you die, and that I’ll see them right. Yet in your pride and, yes, your jealousy, even your love for Bess and Wat would not allow you to overcome your pride and ask me to support them.’

  ‘Yet I saved your life ...’ said Raleigh, quiet now, retreated into the shadows, poised like a snake.

  ‘You did indeed. You flung yourself between me and a blade that was surely going to pierce my skull, in circumstances that showed unequivocally that you were prepared to lay down your own life for your friend.’

  ‘So will I lay down my life, knowing that instead by betraying my friend I could preserve it?’

  ‘That’s fair summary of the issue,’ said Gresham. ‘With one thing to add.’

  What’s that?’

  ‘In a clinical weighing up of the relevant issues, there is the fact that, unlike you, I have no wife and no children, merely a mistress whose stunning beauty means she will never be without a home and a bed for long, and may indeed even snaffle one of the numerous members of the high nobility who so blatantly lust after her.’

  ‘Who will miss Henry Gresham?’ mused Raleigh. ‘Are you sure you don’t have that window you mentioned?’

  ‘A window into the mind or Sir Walter Raleigh would be darkened by the smoke of Hell,’ said Gresham, ‘too mired even for me to wipe clear. But who would miss Henry Gresham? A beautiful young girl, and a servant of no account. And as the Crown would undoubtedly seize my assets, or such as they could lay their hands on, betraying me would be a further reason for you to work your way into the King’s favour.’

  There was a long silence.

  ‘There’s only one reason, if one leaves such minor matters as friendship, loyalty and truth out of it, why you should refuse to betray me.’

  Raleigh raised an eyebrow.

  ‘Are you willing to believe Cecil will keep his word? He’s dangled a vision of domestic bliss in front of you at your most desperate time of need when you’re likely to grab at it without thinking. And then, when you’ve helped him get me, you’ve outlived your usefulness, and can be disposed of. No Bess and Wat, no Sherborne. You’ll have thrown away your honour and dignity for nothing. And my life, for what that’s worth.’

  Raleigh gazed at Gresham for what seemed a long time.

  ‘Will you help me prepare my trial? Help me write my lines?’ said Raleigh finally.

  ‘Without knowing whether you will choose to write a new ending, with my name in it?’

  ‘Just so,’ said Raleigh.

  ‘Yes,’ said Gresham. ‘It’ll spice up the trial nicely.’

  Chapter Ten

  September to November 1603

  The plague was still rife in London, so Raleigh’s trial was shifted to Winchester. It liked to claim it was the site of Camelot, and boasted King Arthur’s Round Table to prove the point in the Castle. Gresham doubted it. The table looked to him to show the craftsmanship of the early fourteenth century, before the Black Death ravaged England and architecture and woodworking took several steps backwards because of the dearth of skilled craftsmen.

  It had not been easy to work with Raleigh, though Gresham had managed to do so from September onwards. Those on trial for treason were not allowed legal help, to call witnesses or even to know the detail of the charges against them. There was no presumption of innocence, if anything the assumption being of guilt. The ever-present threat was that Gresham would be seen as a legal advisor, and hence banned, particularly when the easy-going Peyton was replaced by the much tougher and unscrupulous Sir George Harvey. Still, they had managed, not least of all because of the susceptibility of some of the guards to bribery, taken only of course on the days when Harvey was known to be out of town.

  Jane visibly lost weight in the weeks before the trial. Never fat, now she looked like a young antelope after a bitter winter, hollow-cheeked and dark-eyed. She reminded Gresham of a huge, deep reservoir, the water penned in behind a beautifully-crafted masonry wall. In that water was all her intelligence, and all the passion that stirred within her, held back by a childhood where to show what one felt was to give power to the oppressor. Yet when Gresham relayed his conversation with Raleigh, the water flooded over the wall.

  ‘Are you really telling me that you’re helping that odious man knowing that he might buy his own life by betraying you? What bargain is that? What sort of ... fool sees that as a bargain?’

  Her eyes were flashing, her body tensed, her whole enflamed. Gresham thought he had never seen her look so beautiful. She had never called him a fool before. Come to think of it, she had hardly ever criticised him, without ever adopting the whimpering subservient sycophancy that so many men demanded of their women in that age. He felt his confidence crumble. Was he really a fool? Why did he believe Raleigh would not betray him?

  He had to go to Winchester, of course. It was a simple choice. Loiter in London or Cambridge, and wait for one of two knocks on the door – either Mannion telling him Raleigh had been convicted, or a troop of soldiers come to arrest him. Gresham was not good at twiddling his thumbs. As well as deciding to travel to Winchester, he made complex arrangements for him to vanish like a puff of smoke seconds after Raleigh named him, if he did, and for Jane to be spirited to a small, south-coast fishing village where a boat would wait to take them over the Channel. Privately, he doubted he would succeed. Routes from Winchester that lead to the sea were few and easily guarded. It was a fair bet that Cecil would have men stationed there in the hope Gresham would be named, men waiting to drag him off his horse and drag him triumphantly to the Tower and, in all probability, the Rack.

  He was explaining the plans to Jane, though not sharing his doubts, when she interrupted him. Again, very unusual.

  ‘I’m coming to Winchester.’ Not ‘may I?’ or even ‘I wish to come to Winchester.’

  ‘But you’ll be at risk of kidnapping, and ...’

  ‘And if the worst happens, I’ll slow you down,’ she said pertly. ‘Except if the worst happens I won’t be coming with you.’

  Gresham’s heart stopped. ‘You want to leave me?’

  She looked at him pityingly.

  ‘In a sense,’ she said. ‘Just think. Everyone knows you’re ... attached to me. Half the females at Court are pining since you stopped servicing them aft
er we … got to know each other.’

  Well, he’d never heard it called that before. And he had found it surprisingly easy to be faithful to Jane. She rushed on.

  ‘No-one will believe you’d leave me behind. So if Raleigh does his worst, we both leave the trial amidst a huge fuss. It’ll take at least a few seconds for them to get guards to arrest you, and if we sit next to a door we can get out before they’ve time to react. I clamber in our carriage, draw the blinds down and lather the horses in our speed to get back to our lodgings, pick up our horses and flee. They’ll follow the carriage, they must do! Whereas in fact you’ll have slipped away and be on the road away!’

  ‘And?’

  ‘And you get away to fight another day. Who knows what’ll happen? James isn’t secure on his throne, nor Cecil in his power. Those who live by the sword die by the sword, and those who grasp power by intrigue can lose it to intrigue. Perhaps you’ll be able to return. Perhaps you’ll start a new life in Italy. I can join you when the fuss has settled down. What matter if it takes a year, even two? It’s a small price to pay for the rest of our lives together – if that’s how you want to spend your life.’

  A surge of feeling swept through him. The strength of his love for her frightened him, a commitment too far but one entered into never broken.

  ‘You’re asking me to use you as a decoy?’ he said, his voice controlled.

  ‘As a life-saver.’

  ‘And what if they arrest you?’

  She laughed.

  ‘Henry – we’re not married! I’m simply your mistress! Your tart! The world would laugh and shudder at the same time if every mistress of a fallen great man were arrested! Can you think of any man arrested for treason who’s seen his ... bit on the side arrested?’

  ‘They could take and hold you, and use you as a lure to drag me back.’

  ‘Then I’d just have to make sure they didn’t, wouldn’t I? I’d go to The Merchant’s House, hire a small army; it’s no different from how I’ve been living these past months.’