After Jessica had left, Bagnet looked around the empty and silent streets and absorbed the pointlessness of his task. There was no way he could refuse a man in Ralegh’s position. But from midnight to dawn and the world asleep, how could he succeed? Who would be around for him to talk to?
Bagnet sighed and heaved his chest and eyes up and then saw that candles were burning in the Abbey’s buildings’ windows. Then it became clear that by happenstance or Providence, he did have a chance after all. This was not just any execution. This was to be the execution of a famous and infamous man. And it was an execution fifteen years in coming and the subject of months of recent conniving by Bacon, Coke, and those who served them. Of course, these people would be up at midnight, if only to savor the expectation of the end of years and years of effort. Knowing Bacon, Bagnet was sure that there was a campaign being developed to scotch the image that Bagnet had felt among the crowd that afternoon of Ralegh being a martyr to the ideals of days gone by. There would plenty of people around for Bagnet to interview.
The only ones Bagnet was sure would not be around were Count Gondomar, whom Ralegh said had been returned to Spain, and the King himself, who, rumour among the crowd had it, had left that morning for a spot of hunting and to work on writing a meditation on the Lord’s Prayer.
As Bagnet approached the side entrance, the door was opened as if he had been expected by Weddington, or perhaps his brother, he could not tell them apart. It turned out he was expected, but only to be turned away. The door to Sir Francis’s chamber was opened a crack, and he heard him call out in his Lord Chamberlain’s voice and authority, “I know why you are here, Henry Bagnet, and I respect it but will not see you. I made a vow after our last unpleasantness to stay clear of you. Besides, I have more important things to do than waste it with a fool dead man’s errand.” The door was yanked shut from within with a gush, enabling Bagnet to smell something sweet. His first thought was to remember Bacon’s penchant for Welsh serving boys and to assume that the aroma was of some tempting treat.
He was taken from his lurid thinking by a noise. Bagnet turned and out of the corner of his eye glimpsed a man retreating behind a curtain. He saw enough of him to say, “Sir Edward Coke.” A tall, well-kept noble with beard and ruffles underneath emerged. “You are out of office, are you not? And yet you are here.”
The former attorney general bowed. “Your friend Sir Francis has seen to my dismissal. But the king needed me to put your client on the block. I have been given access. Excuse me,” he bowed with a flourish and turned to leave.
“Sir Edward, you quarrelled with the King because you believe you are above the law.”
“No,” he said sharply. “That is your patron Sir Francis talking. I believe the law is above the king.”
“As you heard, he is no patron of mine. But having had Sir Francis manipulate your position against you, it would be good to have found an opportunity to regain the King’s favour. Sir Walter’s failure gave you that opportunity.”
The noted attorney smiled broadly. “So, I stand accused without evidence of what – arranging the ruin of Sir Walter’s mission to Guiana?”
“What an interesting idea. I do not believe I said that, but it is interesting that you thought it –”
“Come, man. How could one do that?”
Bagnet walked close up to Sir Edward to face him directly. “It is widely said, Sir Edward, that you will do most anything to stay in power. You and Sir Francis have been jockeying for position, he gets you dismissed, you arrange to have your daughter marry the brother of the King’s new favourite, the Duke of Buckingham. And when she and your wife object and go to Sir Francis for help, you have your daughter kidnapped, wedded, and bedded against her will. Surely anyone who would do this –”
“That is a family matter, sir. Things family members do to one another are one thing. But I am a loyal servant of the crown. Good night.” Sir Edward Coke sweepingly bowed again and left.
“A lawyer’s trick,” Bagnet whispered to an empty corridor. “Defending his patriotism when I did not dispute it. It is your ambition, sir, that is at issue.”
Bagnet returned to the street and saw a man quickly entering a gold-decked carriage. Bagnet shouted after him, “Diego Sarmiento de Acũna, Count Gondomar, I believe.”
A man who did indeed bear a slight resemblance to a toad wearing a cloak leaned out of the carriage. “You have the advantage of me, Señor, although you have the good taste to refer to me by my name and not my territory.”
“I have been to Gondomar,” Bagnet said quietly. “I know what it is.”
“As a soldier, no doubt.”
“No doubt because you know exactly who I am from your friends at court.”
“But how did you know who I am? I am –”
“– supposed to be in Spain, yes. But I felt in my heart of hearts you could not miss this event. And I knew Sir Francis was with someone when he would not open the door. I could also detect the smell of something sweet which I now think were cakes from Gondomar, Ribadavia wine, and Galician ham since I have heard you have them shipped here along with casks of water and bring money and presents to Sir Francis to arrange a marital alliance.”
“You have me with the wrong suitor, but you are right about my victual preferences. Wretched country with your terrible water and burned churches. It has been my duty to serve here –”
“– turning Elizabeth’s and Ralegh’s suspicions about Spain to James’ unbounded love.”
“For the benefit of both our countries.”
“So you say. You opposed Sir Walter’s voyage to Guiana and relented only –”
“– only when the King assured me no Spaniards would be harmed.”
“And they were. Just as you predicted. Or arranged?”
“I arranged? I?”
Bagnet grabbed onto the side of the coach and hauled himself in, plopping down across from Count Gondomar, pushing aside sausage and bottles of wine and banging his knees against casks in the process. “Ralegh says he found the gold of El Dorado.”
“Nonsense.”
“You still have troops there. Have you ever thought of looking, just to see? Of course you have! With Keymis dead and Ralegh dead this morning, few would know the secret. And by keeping the gold away from King James the stronger his need for an alliance with Spain and an arranged wedding that you support. Added in is the pleasure of having your enemy Sir Walter Ralegh finally executed.”
“That pirate! That butcher!” Count Gondomar hissed. “But it was not a personal matter between him and me, never!”
Bagnet asked quietly, “Then why are you here, Count Gondomar, and not in Spain? Why did you return? You did know that you are here in time for the execution?”
It was four o’clock, three hours before dawn when Count Gondomar’s carriage pulled away in haste after Bagnet disembarked. Bagnet was familiar enough with Italian through Jessica to guess what the barrage of Spanish words beginning with “M” that Count Gondomar spat at him meant. The departing carriage rode low with the weight of the sausage and wine. Having been so close to them, Bagnet believed that they were not the sweet scent he had detected in Bacon’s apartments after all and so returned to his suspicions about the Welsh serving boys. Bacon was a sneaky, twisted man, as Bagnet well knew, and was more than willing to take lives for his benefit and for what he believed was England’s. Still, there was Coke. Both of them were willing to share Gondomar’s bed, Coke only figuratively, if it brought them closer to James’ favour. What had Count Gondomar said about Bagnet linking him to the wrong suitor? And what of Gondomar himself? Plots and counterplots. Webs of deceit. Oh, this England!
His deductions were stopped with the rushing sound of carriage wheels and a mass of horse and dark vomited from the night and on top of him before he could move.
The inn where Bagnet and Jessica were staying was a short distance from Westminster. When he stumbled into the room, Jessica was there lying on the bed, his arm over her eyes.
“Oh, you’re back,” she said, jumping up. Then she saw his right arm hanging loose and blood dangling from his limp fingertips in drops.
His large form filled the chair as she bandaged his forehead and gently jammed his arm into a sling. “At least it is nice to finally sit down,” he said.
“Do not joke with me,” she scolded. He saw she now had blood on her face, which he wiped away with his thumb. “For five years now I have patched your battered body up, and each time you vow that you are nearing 60 and too old for taking risks.”
“I did not have a great deal of choice, my dear. The carriage ran me down. What is that wonderful smell in your hair?”
“Never mind that.”
“Besides I thought you were staying with Bess Ralegh?”
“She sent me home. In fact, she drove with me in her carriage. É fredda. Come un cetriolo.” Jessica sometimes used her Italian for colloquial expressions. She found it easier.
“What did you say: ‘she is a cool one, like a cucumber’?”
“Si.”
“Unusual, given the fact that her husband will be executed soon.”
“Well, some women – come se dice? – keep it in.”
“That is true. And she has to endure a great deal, as he himself said.” Bagnet felt that he was sitting on something, reached, and pulled it out.
“Whose glove is this?” Bagnet asked his wife, knowing the answer.
“Oh, it is hers. She must have dropped it in the carriage, and I kicked it when I stepped out. I will send it back in the morning.” When he did not respond, she asked, “What is it?”
“I looked into her face seconds after she left her husband for the last time. And her eyes were dry.”
“As you say, some women –”
He seemed miles away as he musingly finished her sentence. “Steel themselves. Does that mean they become steel or just act as if they are?”
It was just five when Bagnet arrived at Ralegh’s room. A Dr Robert Tounson was there, evoking the Scriptures, and berating Ralegh for not seeming particularly repentant.
“But I am an innocent man,” Ralegh was protesting in laughter.
“Men in these days do not die in innocence. By pleading innocent you are taxing the endurance of Divine Mercy.” The reverend stopped on Bagnet’s appearance. “Sir, go away, I am ministering to a dying man –”
“He is a dead man, and he will need your ministering in earnest soon, but not now,” Bagnet said as he pushed Dr Tounson outside.
“What have you found out? Do you know –”
“– who killed you? I think so. But the only way to prove it to you in the minutes we have left is to ask you to go back in time in your mind. You say that after you left Cork everything went wrong.”
“That is right. And what happened to your arm?”
Bagnet ignored the question and deliberately stood behind Sir Walter, putting his hand on his shoulder. “Close your eyes.”
“What?” The old knight started to turn around.
“No, look ahead and close your eyes. Go back to the dock at Cork as you were leaving. Tell me what you see.”
“Well,” Ralegh started, with his eyes obligingly shut tight. “I see thin Keymis, who was unusually nervous for some reason, and my son Walter, who was nervous too. I told them there was nothing to worry about, the wind was fair, provisions full –”
“Look around you on the dock,” Bagnet persisted. “Do you see anything unusual?”
Ralegh chuckled. “I’ve left for sea thousands of times, Bagnet. What does one seek on the dock? Shards of burlap, rotten fruit, and –” Ralegh’s eyes opened in fright, and he stopped speaking.
“Tell me what you see, Sir Walter.”
But the old knight shivered, his mouth open, unable to talk.
It was ten o’clock, and Bess Ralegh was sitting alone in the front room of when Bagnet arrived. It was a small area. The walls were stark white, bowls of pale blue lavender were on white stools, and there was one table where Bess was seated knitting. She turned at the sound of his step but did not see him drop a small bag near the door.
“I remember you. You are –”
“The man in the street this morning. The husband of Jessica Bagnet, who stayed with you for a while and whom you brought home in your carriage, and the man whom your late husband asked to find out who had killed him. I am sure he told you.” Bess nodded at the word “late,” and Bagnet added, “I am also a witness to his execution and the one entrusted by Sir Francis Bacon to return his remains to you. They are in a wagon outside.”
She did not move at the news but stared ahead. “Thank you. May I ask, did he die as he wanted?”
“And more so.”
Bess nodded, rose, and started for the door. “I will attend to his body. You have my eternal gratitude, Master Bagnet for all you did or attempted to do. I am sorry that my husband sent you out on a fool’s errand and that you wasted this last night –”
Bagnet stepped away from her and placed his free hand on her empty chair, steadying his battered body and hoping to sit there when the occasion allowed him. As he stood, he gingerly slipped his battered arm out of Jessica’s sling, as if to have it ready. “Oh, I did not waste my time. I completed my mission and told your husband before he died who had killed him.”
“Oh,” she said slowly, still near the door. “What did you tell him?”
“Actually, I asked him to tell himself. I asked him to look into his memory for anything unusual on the dock last year at Cork which is when he said everything started to go wrong.”
Bess Ralegh moved toward him and asked, flatly. “And what did he see?”
“A white lace glove on the dock. He also remembered the scent of lavender, which women will crush into their gloves to be able to hold them to their faces to provide relief from the noxious smells of a city like London or a dock like Cork. Lavender such as you have here. The Carews tell me it is your favourite.”
“I – I do not understand –”
Bagnet eased himself into the chair, knowing he had a ways to go in his explanation. “You seem to have a habit of losing your gloves, especially when you are excited. I smelled the lavender on the glove you lost in your carriage that my wife brought to the inn. I also smelled the lavender in her hair from when she was here with you and in Sir Francis’ chambers when you were with him this evening before joining the Carews and when he used the same expression you just employed about your husband’s commission for me – ‘a fool’s errand’. And, of course, I smelled lavender on the glove I returned to you early this morning.”
“It is an unfortunate habit, perhaps, losing my gloves, but I do not see –”
“Your anxiety about my investigation caused you to bring my wife to the inn to check on me and to attempt to run me down with your carriage.”
“Do not be absurd –”
“It was your carriage rather than Count Gondomar’s because his was weighted down with wine and sausage and would not have cleared me, fat and old as I am. But yours was lightly loaded with only you and your coachman, and the undercarriage just grazed my arm.”
Bess Ralegh remained calm. “Hardly enough evidence to convince anyone, Master Bagnet. Wine and sausage, really!”
“Oh, it convinced your husband when I told him,” Bagnet wheezed, struggling up form the chair. “The memory of your glove proved to him you were in Cork, on the dock, unknown to him, plotting against him. And then everything came together in his mind. How they knew your every move as you and your husband tried to escape the country –”
“Damn you,” he heard her hissing behind him. He turned to see her almost on him with nails raised. “Why did you tell him? Why did you spoil his mind about me before he died?”
Bagnet painfully caught her wrists and held them tight. “Because he wanted to know! Because he had to know!” Bagnet let her arms ago and grabbed her by the shoulders to force her to look into his eyes. “Why? Why did you arrange the failure of his mission to Guiana
and guarantee his execution? Did you hate him so much?”
Bess Ralegh did not miss a beat. She matched his stare and answered. “Are you mad, man? I loved him more than any woman has loved a man. I still do.” She pushed his hands away and moved to her unfinished knitting, which she fingered as if with a wandering mind. “Do you know, the happiest times of my life were the three years he spent in retirement with me after falling out of favour with the Queen because of our marriage. Each moment was a treasure beyond worth. For me, it seems, not for him. He had to – he had to sail, to find adventure, to go to Cadiz, Guiana, and beyond. And when he returned, his boldness brought him to the Tower. It is the fate of the wife of a legend. Which I accepted. Do you know, I would have gladly spent another 15 years, staying with him in the Tower when I could, sleeping next to him in his cell or on the floor when the fever was with him, braving rats and filth. But, no, he came up with this plan to convince James to let him sail again! He must seek out adventure wherever it was. And he did not know.”
“Know what?”
“That even when he found the gold James would not have let him live. I have bargained with James. I know how he thinks. He would have killed him anyway, if only to guard the secret of the gold’s location. Walter was going to die either way, whether James thought he found the gold or not. If someone had to have the gold, would it not be better if it were we? James had already squandered Elizabeth’s treasury. How long would the gold of El Dorado last him? I told this to Keymis and my son in Cork and of my plan.”
“Your plan to work with Sir Francis on securing the gold of El Dorado for you and him, of letting it look as if there was no gold, of Keymis firing on the Spanish to doom Sir Walter –”
“Doom him?” she turned, her eyes full of anger. “Canonize him as a hero wronged. Wronged by James. Wronged by the carelessness of his men. Now at least he has died bravely, the victim of a 15-year-old charge that Coke had to dredge up and that the people know is the sign of a weak king killing a better man.”
The Mammoth Book of Jacobean Whodunnits Page 24