Jonson nodded. “I understand your motive now. Pocahontas was the intermediary between Powhatan and John Rolfe, who brought tobacco to England.”
“. . . and so inspired the poisoning of myself and hundreds of other Englishmen,” said Harriot. “Have I murdered Pocahontas? Let us say that she and myself have merely exchanged poisons.” Harriot grimaced. “She deserved to be slain, as surely as her father slew the Lost Colony.”
“Only one piece of the conundrum yet eludes me,” said Ben Jonson. Now he gestured extravagantly, indicating the garden and the manor beyond. “Your patron the Earl of Northumberland calls this place Syon House. Many leagues south of here, in Sicily, the Knights Templar perform their unholy rituals in the Priory of Sion. Might there be some link a-tween these?”
Thomas Harriot nodded. “Word has lately reached me that the Templars even now are dismantling their priory, this very month. It soon shall be as dead as Pocahontas.”
“Aye, dead by your hand. You have done murder, sir,” said Ben Jonson. “D’you think you can play gleeks with human lives? And play jackdaw with souls?”
“Ben Jonson, do your masque-plays have such ripe dialogue?” asked Thomas Harriot, seeming unimpressed. “Quit you these metaphors! You cry me killer, but I am not the only murderer here. As you have detected me, in the like manner I have detected you.” Harriot raised his pencil, and aimed it at Jonson’s left hand. “Mark of Cain! You bear the Tyburn brand.”
The playwright Ben Jonson extended his left hand, displaying the T-shaped scar at the base of his thumb. “Yes, the fruit of the hangman’s tree,” he acknowledged. “It is a matter of publick record, so I freely own of it. Nineteen years ago, whilst fighting a duel at Hogsden Fields, I killed an actor named Gabriel Spenser. Some actors are in need of killing, and he was one of them. I ‘scaped the gallows by pleading benefit of clergy, reading a Latin neck-verse, forfeiting all my property, and . . . as you see . . . submitting to the branding-iron.”
Thomas Harriot grinned, and his ulcer-pocked face twisted grotesquely. “Very well, then. Now that we have exchanged confessions, what justice do you contemplate for me?”
“None,” said Ben Jonson. “As you have murdered the woman who brought tobacco to England, so the tobacco has murdered you.” As Jonson spoke, Harriot stifled another cough. “That ripe sore on your face steadily prospers, rougue Harriot. I doubt that you will live another five years. In the remainder of your time, try to achieve something to count against the evil you have done.”
“I have achieved much already,” said Thomas Harriot. “Not all of it murderous.”
“True,” said Ben Jonson. “I have apprised this in my inquiries. Your patron the earl, when I visited him in the Tower of London, made free to boast of your achievements.” Jonson drew forth another sheet of paper now, and consulted the list which he had written: “You were Walter Ralegh’s navigator in his voyages, and derived new methods for ascertaining latitude at sea. A shipwright you are, a keeper of accounts, and a land-surveyor. In your journeys to the New World with Ralegh and Francis Drake, you made copious notes of the Virginia savages and their diets and customs, as well the botanies of their native land. You have discovered laws of refraction and opticks, and o’erthrown Aristotle’s fallacies in the laws of projectiles. You are the first astronomer in England to make use of the telescope, and you have charted comets and eclipses. ’Twas you who discovered that the very face of the sun is spotted like a pudding.” Ben Jonson put away the list, and confronted Harriot again. “Even now, I see that you are scribing the countenance of the moon.”
Harriot bowed once more, less theatrically this time. “I would that my own face were only half so cratered as the moon’s.” He coughed again, and in the moonlight Jonson saw that the cankerous flesh of Harriot’s nose was now cracked and bleeding. “As you say, Jonson, I have achieved much. Of a certainty, I am full worth a dozen or more of any Pocahontas.”
“In that you are wrong, man,” said Ben Jonson. “Despite your voyages to Virginia’s new lands, and your inspections of the comets and heavens, there is one place you have never journeyed.” Ben Jonson’s scarred left hand now touched the left side of his jerkin, at his chest. “’Tis here. The heart. Pocahontas, in her brief life, has touched men’s hearts, and caught the fancy of their humours. She lies dead in Gravesend, but in Englishmen’s hearts she lives and breathes as the ripening she-child of a virgin land. She symbolizes all that’s new and wondrous. Depend on’t, rogue: in years and centuries to come, Pocahontas will live, and stand remembered, whilst Thomas Harriot falls dead of canker . . . and all your achievements lie forgotten.”
Ben Jonson drew his cloak about himself, and turned away. Once again he strode past the bush of poisonous monk’s hood, giving it a wider berth this time. And then he was gone in the moonlight.
Thomas Harriot frowned. The night had suddenly grown cold. He took up his pencil once more, and turned again to his unfinished sketch of the lunar mountains. But in the darkening sky overhead, the position of the moon had shifted . . . and now his vantage was spoilt.
A DEAD MAN’S WISH
JOHN T. AQUINO
One of the unforgiveable acts during James’s reign was the execution of Sir Walter Ralegh. Note the spelling of his name. Although we tend to spell it as Raleigh these days, it was never spelled that way during his life time. It was also pronounced “Rawley”. Just why Ralegh was executed and the real story behind it is the subject of John Aquino’s tale.
Aquino (b. 1949) is a writer, editor and media-law attorney. He is also the editor of the Waste Age and Recycling Times’s Recycling Handbook (1995) and the author of Truth and Lives on Film: The Legal Problems in Depicting Real Persons and Events in a Fictional Medium (2005).
The life-beaten face of Sir Walter Ralegh looked up at Henry Bagnet and said to him softly but firmly, “I’ve asked you here to find out who killed me.”
Bagnet, sometimes investigator for Sir Francis Bacon as well as those of less renown, held his breath. The quick answer to the old knight’s assignment was simple enough. “You’re to be executed in eight hours on a warrant from the king. So the king has killed you. That’ll be £10. Payable now, if you please.”
But Bagnet knew that was not what Ralegh meant. Since his return to England and his imprisonment in the Tower in August, Ralegh had been the talk of London as he proceeded, inch by inch, closer to the block. There were hearings in August and September of a commission of privy councilors, with Bacon and Sir Edward Coke momentarily burying their loathing of one another to please the king by working together. In early October, Coke, having failed to convince anybody of Ralegh’s current crimes, had recommended execution based on the old death sentence of 1603. But not feeling comfortable with using the 15-year-old order, the commissioners insisted that hearings be held, and there were three of them, one in private on 22 October, and two others on the 24th and four days later, the afternoon of the day when Ralegh asked for Bagnet’s help.
Bagnet had been in the crowd as Ralegh was led on the long final walk from the Tower, through Eastcheap and Cheapside, near the Mermaid’s Tavern where the late Master Shakespeare had dined, and passed St Paul’s. It was then that Bagnet saw Ralegh’s eyes fill with tears, not only as the shadow of the ancient church consumed him, but at the sights and sounds of the shops and homes he had just walked by, the London of his fame and triumphs, now all gone. This feeling of loss was driven further home as the procession of Ralegh and his 60 armed-guard escort passed Durham House, and he craned his neck to see his study or any familiar site of what had been one of his homes until his imprisonment in 1603 when the bishop got it back. But it is likely that the gathering crowd gradually convinced Ralegh that his reputation was stronger than it had been, perhaps stronger than ever, as they cheered a bit, touched him when they could snake their hands through one of the 60 guards, and shouted words of encouragement as he walked down Fleet Street and the Strand to Whitehall and then Westminster where he was to appear before the
King’s Bench. Enough was enough, they seemed to say, and you have to admire his salt.
The hearing began, and just half an hour later Ralegh was walking to the Abbey Gatehouse where he would stay the night before execution. Sir Henry Montagu, the chief justice, had not unkindly told him that Sir Edward Coke had been right, that Ralegh, having been sentenced to death in 1603, was a “dead man in the law” and had been spared only by the King’s whim. That whim having ended, the treason for which he had been sentenced could not be pardoned. Montagu praised Ralegh as a valiant and good Christian before informing him that he would be actually as well as legally dead in the morning.
After the hearing, Bagnet had stayed in town with his wife Jessica. In tribute to a fellow soldier whom he had met but once five years before in investigating Prince Henry’s death, Bagnet planned to attend the beheading. They dined at the Mermaid’s, and Bagnet reminisced about the recent Ralegh events, describing what she already knew but doing so simply because he enjoyed telling stories on the pretext that since she was from Italy he would need to explain it more carefully. Loving him, Jessica indulged him. He recalled how at a September commissioners’ hearing Bacon had pressed the French ambassador to explain what would have happened had Ralegh gone to France when he returned from Guiana in February rather than staying in England for certain arrest. The Frenchman rejected any suggestion that Ralegh would have stayed and worked on behalf of France by answering, “Il mangera, il boire, il fera bien – He would have eaten, drunk wine, and had a good time.” It was then that Bagnet felt a hand on his shoulder and feared that his words had been overheard and misunderstood. He looked up and saw that the hand belonged to one of the two Weddington brothers who worked for Bacon. Jessica brought her cupped hand to Bagnet’s cheek just as he was ushered out, desperately looking back for one last glimpse of her red hair. The small Weddington, who was built like a rook on a chessboard although not as gracefully designed, prodded Bagnet toward Westminster, but rather than to Bacon’s chambers or the King’s Bench they veered toward the gatehouse, and Bagnet knew he had been summoned by a dead man.
As they approached the entrance around midnight, a cloaked woman was leaving. Bagnet knew without seeing that it was Ralegh’s wife, Bess. He stopped, and Weddington sympathetically let him stop. Bagnet bowed his head. Bess Ralegh slowed in her steps, curtsied of a sort, her gloves and handkerchief at her face, and in the slowing down one of her gloves fell to the street. “Wait,” Bagnet shouted, and Weddington reached for his blade. The glove was white and light of lace. He held his hand up to show Weddington what he was doing, bent, retrieved the glove, and brought it to her. She turned, accepted it with a timid smile, and then he saw her face. Her eyes were light brown surrounded by some lines caused by the strain of marrying a buccaneer who had been dead-alive for 15 years awaiting execution in the Tower of London. But surely they were not the eyes of a woman over 50 whose skin was white like porcelain newly made. He remembered the words that Ralegh wrote that all of London said were about her,
Nature that washed her hands in milk
And had forgot to dry them.
No wonder Ralegh had risked the ire of the late Queen Elizabeth by wooing and winning her lovely lady-in-waiting.
She accepted her glove, smiled, and walked to her waiting carriage as Weddington seized his arm and dragged him to the room in the gatehouse where Ralegh asked for his help. They were already building the scaffold where Ralegh would stand and kneel in less than eight hours, and the hammering provided an obbligato to Ralegh’s proposal.
“Oh, I know,” Ralegh said. “I know what you are thinking. As Sir Edward Coke insisted and insisted and as Sir Henry agreed, I have been a dead man for 15 years. If anyone killed me, I killed myself by not reporting rumors of attempts on King James’ life, things that I would not have minded had they happened. I am paying for my arrogance and momentary lack of patriotism, and that is fine. I have been expecting any moment for 15 years for the King to simply decide in a bad mood to go ahead and behead me.” Ralegh noticed that Bagnet was standing and not a young or lean man. He started to rise to offer the chair to him, but Bagnet placed his hand on Ralegh’s shoulder, seeing the old knight’s weakness. Ralegh nodded in thanks and continued, “But what I mean when I ask you to find out who killed me, is this, Bagnet. I had it set. I am a resourceful man, always on the scramble. To secure my release, I offered to go back to Guiana to find gold because the King’s coffers are bare. He could not refuse my offer. All I had to do was find the gold of El Dorado in the spot where the old Indian told me and Keymis,” and here Ralegh misted a bit but continued, “told us it was. Also I was not to fight with the Spaniards, damn them because James and the Spanish ambassador toad Gondomar are still trying to arrange a wedding of state between Prince Charles and the Spanish princess. That Gondomar had it in for me for past adventures against his lying, thriving people. But even he could not touch me if I brought back the gold.”
“Everyone knows what happened, Sir Walter. You sailed for Guiana, you became ill, Keymis took a party to find the gold, he did not find it, and in returning to you he fired on the Spanish-held town of San Tomé, during which encounter several Spaniards died along with your son,” Bagnet slowed his recital here out of respect, “Walter.”
“That is not what happened! I mean, yes, yes my beloved Walter boy is dead, but everything else –”
“Then tell me.”
“And I will be quick,” Ralegh panted as if his fever were returning or he was on fire mentally in remembering the events, “for you do not have the time for a long discourse. We sailed from Plymouth, were held in Falmouth, and then blown to Cork, where we lost two months. We left Ireland full of supplies and enthusiasm, and yet from that moment on everything went wrong. I became ill, the men disgruntled as if enflamed by wild rumors, and when we landed I had to send Keymis and Walter on without me. But, and here is the wrong part, Walter sent word back that they had found the gold and all was well. And then, when Keymis arrived, he said my son had been mistaken, there was no gold, that a fool one of us had set fire to San Tomé, and that Walter had died leading a charge, which makes no sense because Walter was not in my image that way, if you know what I mean.”
“Perhaps,” Bagnet said gently, “he portrayed a heroic death for your son to –”
“Comfort me, yes I know. But Walter said that he had found the gold, and when Keymis returned he said one thing and then another, contradicting himself –”
“He had been in a battle and lost you your son –”
“– and I persisted, demanding the truth. He ran to his cabin, locked the door, I heard a shot, and when I broke in the door, Keymis was on the floor, a knife slipped under his bloodied ribs and into his heart.”
“The common thinking is that he shot himself with a pocket pistol that broke his ribs but did not penetrate and that then he stabbed himself out of grief and shame.”
“Yes, I know,” Ralegh panted, in some pain. “Very tidy. Bagnet, you were a soldier I have heard, as am I and as was Keymis. If you were going to shoot yourself with a pocket pistol, would you aim at your ribs or your head?”
Bagnet nodded uneasily and shifted his weight to continue standing. “But if he was distracted –”
“– because he lost me my son, yes, I know. And when we came to England, and it became clear the King would not listen, that he intended to carry out the old sentence, Bess and I had chance after chance to escape,” Ralegh said louder, pounding his fist into his hand for emphasis, “and they knew. They knew where we were going, what we were going to do.”
Bagnet stood stiffly. “And so you feel you were entrapped –”
“And made to fail – meaning I would be beheaded.”
“In spite of your success.”
“Keymis found the gold. He must have. Walter said he did.” Ralegh, having recounted it all, stretched back in his chair with his arms high and dangling as if relieved of a great weight. “This has troubled me. It will be easier to d
ie if I know. Find out if you can who has killed me. Not that I am loathe to die. I am content. And I am especially pleased that Gondomar has left for Spain and that I will not have to die with that wretched man gloating up at me.” He was silent for a moment, thinking of a somewhat sad thing. “I just said goodbye to Bess. She’s a beauty and rock, that one. Enduring so much, doing so much. She raised the money for my ship the Destiny, and she has fought the king for money and Sherbourne and Durham. She can take care of herself. She told me she has already arranged to dispose of my body. I told her that that was good since she had not always the disposing of it while I was alive. I will miss her until I kiss her in heaven. But she is better off.”
“I take it given my escort that Sir Francis –”
“– is aware and does not care. I know it is past midnight, Bagnet, and that your chances of uncovering all of this are few. I would give you more time if I had it. Just try. If you do not return, I will understand.” Ralegh nodded as if dismissing him and pulled his chair to the table that was the only other furniture in the room where there was paper and pen waiting for him. “There is so much I would like to write,” he said aloud to no one in particular. “A poem for her. A treatise on this gatehouse, which used to be the monastery of St Peter’s, a fitting place to absorb the remnants of holy thoughts. But I must settle my affairs. Perhaps I will find time for the poem. Perhaps not.”
Weddington brought Bagnet outside and left him. Jessica was waiting and ran to his arms. He was upset that she had been standing alone in the dark of London after midnight, but he admitted to himself she was good to hold again. He explained what Ralegh had asked of him and told her that Weddington had said that Bess had been taken home by Ralegh’s cousins the Carews. He urged her to stay with Bess until morning.
The Mammoth Book of Jacobean Whodunnits Page 23