“He is the Kings man.”
“So are we all.”
Apsley lowers his eyes.
Ralegh speaks to the others, tone of command.
“Gentlemen, the Lord Lieutenant has offered me the kindness of a cup of wine and a few private words in his dwelling. Pray wait here for us. It will be a short time, not even long enough to catch a cold.”
And with that he is off toward the Queen’s House, limping. Apsley has no choice but to follow or be left with the others. Catches a glimpse of Wilson’s puzzled frown (lost his smile at last!) before he hurries to catch up with Ralegh and, shortly, to open the door for him.
Into a chamber with beamed high ceiling, the hall, where they pause by the fireplace. Ralegh extends his arms, flexes long fingers close to the flames.
Apsley calls for a servant to bring spirits to the upper chamber.
Ralegh, turning his back to the fire, looks at his hands, clenching and unclenching them.
“I feel stark naked without a ring for my fingers.”
“If you will pardon me the liberty,” Apsley says. “It might be wisdom to dress yourself with more care.”
“You are much concerned with the wisdom of this world, Apsley. It is not to be despised, mind you, but it does not become you to offer counsel to those who have studied it more.”
“I only spoke in your interest.”
“Well, you are right, Apsley. And I am glad you did so. For unless I am in my dotage already, they will all expect me to demonstrate just such wisdom and to appear before them like a waxwork courtier of the last age.
“I have often acted imprudently, with little wisdom. So I suppose I must continue, for the sake of custom. Old customs are as slow to die as the widows of kings. I sometimes think it is our climate, our wretched weather, that keeps custom alive here. Just as the same weather preserves the red and white of a lady’s flesh.”
He looks up, smiling now, at Apsley and beyond and behind him. Aspsley turns to see what has caught his stare.
Set in iron brackets on the wall rests the ceremonial ax of the Tower. Which, according to custom, is to be borne by the Lord Lieutenant, to and from Westminster in a case of high treason. Gilded, it shines against the wall.
“Is it heavy to carry?” he asks.
“What’s that, sir?” Apsley asks.
“Your ax, man. What we are looking at.”
“Ah …”
Apsley turns away from it.
“Not so much as a fearful heart,” he says. “Let us go up now.”
Touches Ralegh’s arm to direct him toward the stairs.
“It’s a pretty thing,” Ralegh says. “But I’ll wager could not cut a Cheddar cheese.”
The upper chamber is more private and more amiable, having been repaired in recent times. They move to stand by the fireplace. Which is also remade to fit with new fashions. Set back deep and narrow and the hearth now bricked over, concealed and disguised by an ornamental chimney piece.
From a servant they accept delicate long-stemmed Venetian glasses, Apsley’s best, filled with seeming smoke.
Ralegh looks at the little memorial set on the wall by Sir William Waad, once among his judges on the commission at Winchester and later his quarrelsome keeper here for a time, to honor the King’s Providential Escape from the Gunpowder Plot. A wooden bust of the King. On tablets the names of the conspirators together with a Latin inscription composed by Waad. His lips move as he translates: “… illustrious for piety, justice, foresight, learning, hardihood, and other royal virtues … author most subtle, most august and auspicious … apple of the eye … Roman Jesuits of perfidious, Catholic serpent-like ungodliness … William Waad … his great and everlasting thanks.”
Next to the memorial a painted portrait of the King, done in Dutch style. The King with cock feathers, brave and smart, worn on his hat. The hat worn square set on the head. As if it grew there. No ruff, but, instead, a wide delicate falling band. And the King was full-bearded then, his sad, slightly bulging eyes saying nothing.
“He wears a somewhat pained expression.”
“Sir?”
“I say,” Ralegh continues, “that our King is here most justly portrayed as a man of contradictory feelings.”
“I am bound His Majesty’s loyal servant …” Apsley begins.
“I am not jesting at His Majesty’s expense,” Ralegh says. “Far from it. But I understand his feelings. Who would not be pleased, even a king, to have a servant erect a memorial in his honor? Yet to mangle it with wretched Latin, corrupt in grammar and confused in the sense!”
“Sir William never made claim to be a scholar.”
“Ah, but Lieutenant Apsley, the King does. And therein lies the source of his expression.”
Ralegh twists the stem of the glass in his fingers, raises it to sniff.
“Scotch aqua vitae,” he says.
“It is strong stuff, good against the cold.”
“Then let us drink it in honor of the King who came down to us from Scotland. And to his good health.”
Ralegh swallows it in a gulp.
“Will it please you to refill your glass?”
Walter Ralegh shakes his head. “I thank you for it, and for the comfort of your fire, but that is not why I asked for these moments with you.”
Apsley nods and waits.
“I have nothing but respect and warm feelings toward you,” Ralegh says. “My words out there … I saw I must prick your pride to have this privacy. If I imagined you were a coward, I should not have wasted time upon you.”
Soft voice and light smile. Crafty deceiver. Master of equivocation and of sly and oblique flattery. This angers Apsley, but he struggles to check anger.
“I know the truth of myself,” Apsley says. “I do not need the confirmation of praise or blame, sir,”
“Don’t be a fool,” Ralegh snaps back at him. “Why should I trouble to flatter you? You flatter yourself to think so.”
“I meant no disrespect …”
“Pray be silent. I am too old and too tired for a lengthy prologue. Let me be simple. I have a favor to ask you. Not a grand one, nothing uncommon. But it may take a backbone more sturdy than silk ribbon. It may require a spice of courage.”
“What do you wish me to do?”
“Our friend Wilson has shown a considerable interest in my books and instruments. He will have them if he can, if I lose the power to keep them myself. I wish that you would see that he does not take them,”
“I cannot stop him if he has a proper writ.”
“He will have no writ. He will have no paper to show you.”
“But if he has the King’s command …”
“He will not have that either, though you can wager your daughter’s dowry he will say he does.”
“I have no wish to offend Sir Thomas Wilson any more than I have already.”
“You would prefer the risk of offending me?”
“I did not say so.”
“Mark this, Apsley. There is no way Wilson can harm you. That is the truth. But if I live, and that is possible, I can work harm you’ll remember.”
“I do not doubt that.”
“And, alive or dead, I can do you some service. You have a daughter …”
“So you mentioned.”
“If you will stand firm about my books and papers and the instruments I have here, there are those who will reward you for it in my name. The choice is simple enough. You have nothing to lose.”
“I shall think on it,” Apsley says slowly. “But I can promise you nothing.”
“There is no danger from Wilson.”
“So you say.”
“Very well,” Ralegh says. “Think on it. That is enough. But also remember that once I am delivered out of your keeping, the power of Wilson’s commission is gone. When he comes to you again—and he will come here if things go as he wishes—he will have no more rights in this place than that Chadwick farmer we met on the path. Though he struts and bluster
s, he’ll be no more than a penny visitor.”
The servant takes the glasses from them. Slowly Walter Ralegh descends the stairs, speaking as he goes down.
“It is true. I look for all the world like some poor knave who first lost his pride and then his wits. I believe I could set out upon the highway and make my bread as an Abraham man.… And in a sense I am only a poor comedian. But though I begin this day like old Will Kemp—and by heaven I’d dance all the way to Norwich myself if I had my freedom and a pipe and drum …! Though I begin this way, I shall soon enough be a darker sort of fool. Like the player Robert Armin. He will run with a quick jest to the very edge and rim of the grave, and teeter there, able to fall either way.…”
They are now in the lower hall again. Ralegh looking once more at the fire.
“I will most gladly give you a hat to wear,” Apsley says.
Ralegh shakes his head.
“Answer me this, Apsley. Am I not now known to be the vainest strutting peacock ever penned within these walls?”
“You have a style, sir, and are admired for it.”
“Vanity! It is mere vanity. Yet grant me this much. Though I am old and troubled enough, I am as clear and sound of mind at this moment as I have ever been.”
“I do not doubt it.”
“When you and the others entered my chamber, I had not yet fixed upon the costume I would wear. Seeing this business is to be brief and with little ceremony, I made my choice. I am now most properly attired for the spirit of the occasion.”
“As you will, sir.”
Apsley moves to open the door.
“The ax,” Ralegh says. “Won’t you need the great ax?”
“I have no instructions on that.”
“A good sign,” Ralegh says. “Let us both go lighthearted, then.”
Outside they join the others and walk to the gate of square St. Thomas Tower, facing the river. The gate is up and river water flowing into the moat.
Moving on under the low archway, a long flat arch without an apparent keystone. Like the hood of a huge fireplace. The walls within with loopholes where some may watch all comings and goings in secret.
A loyal heart may be landed at Traitor’s Gate.
A plain unmarked barge, low, long, and lean, waiting for them, moored and bobbing. Bargemen, eight oarsmen, and a coxswain, wearing no blue uniforms, but dressed in the manner of London’s watermen. A rented barge? Perhaps, but these have the look of men in costumes, ill at ease. In unison, the group approaching, they raise their oars. Blades shining, dripping.
The two officers step aside. Argue something between themselves. Ralegh ignores them, looking across the wharf to where a small ship is taking on barrels of powder from the Tower stores. Above the wharf and the masts of the ship gulls soar and cry. One rises higher than the others, sails in a circle above the towers, riding easy on the level air.
Light fog lifting. A weak sun coming. Pale gull in pale sun.
Apsley touches his arm to direct him toward the barge. A quick glance back. The yeoman, returning to the Tower by way of St. Thomas Tower. Exactly … They are then under instructions to bring him to Westminster as quietly as possible.
Stepping careful, a helping hand from the coxswain, into the stern. To stand near the small covered place for passengers. Padded chairs for comfort. Stands while the others board. Looking toward the lightening sky eastward downriver. Seeing a delicate forest of mast tops, masts, nests, and geometry of rigging. Leafless trees, against that sky. No sails, for there’s less breeze now than the breath of a kitten. Movement, though, the incoming tide slowly overwhelming the flow of the river. But water calm as oil. Masts tilt and bob as ships are tugging at line and anchor.
They push off and ease out of the inlet of the water gate.
Now nearby along the wharf a clustering of boats. Boats to hire. At your service the celebrated watermen of London. Watermen wearing their tough linen blouses, canvas sailor’s doublet and puffed baggy short breeches to match. And mostly these days the high-crowned wide-brimmed hats. Set squarely on the head, pulled down to the ears. His Majesty the King can look no better.
Hard-faced, scar-faced, sun- and wind-burned faces watching. Not deceived by a plain barge or an odd crew of oarsmen. Eyes colder than mirror glass, glinting no questions, telling no secrets. Skeptical hard eyes of Southwark. Prideful tip and tilt of chin. Lips drawn tight, but ever ready to purse and spit in contempt or to savor the salty telling of outrageous lies. Ready to brawl for a fare and to bawl for a tip above the established fare with the raucous clamor of Old Testament prophets crying for justice, calling down grief and woe.
Surly, proud, bold, and tougher than tanned leather. Scum of the earth, but beholden to no man. Not fearing to charge full fare and to expect a gratuity from the devil himself with hooves and horns, and his spiky tail.
Full of more gossip than a street of fishwives and widow women. More tales and wonders to tell than any town crier. To be delivered with more authority than a royal herald. Timber of their voices brassy enough to serve for trumpet calls in absence of musicians.
Proud and rude and as armored in arrogance as the barons of old. And well may they be so. For no one place in England, save the city of London herself, has furnished more soldiers for the wars than rowdy Southwark. But these watermen are mostly old sailors. Men who have seen the Indies, the coasts of Africa, or even Muscovy. Men who have sailed once or more with Drake and Hawkins and Frobisher and Sir Humphrey Gilbert. Some who sailed in the season of ’88 or have been with Ralegh and Essex at Cadiz and the Azores.
Observing all, expressionless as blackbirds on a limb. For once silent. Staring at the barge, its crew, and an old man standing astern as the barge eases into the flow of the tide.
Ralegh cups his hands.
“Heave and ho and rumble-o!” he calls.
Some grinning and a thorny crackle, like kindling twigs, of laughter from them. One fellow, wearing an old woolen statute cap, rises up to stand in his boat.
“I sailed with you before, sir, and by God, I would do it again for one word.”
“Bless you, but we are both of us too old for open ocean now,” Ralegh answers.
He opens his purse for another gold coin. Lofts it against the light of the rising sun. Well thrown, and the old waterman can catch it by clapping his hands.
Solemn-faced the sailor pulls off his woolen cap. And now the others are rising and lift their hats too. He waves to them and turns to his companions.
“Give me a jury of Southwark watermen and I’ll be free as a gull before dinnertime.”
Apsley and the others are still half standing by their seats.
“Pray be seated, gentlemen. I will stand awhile and see the sights once more.”
Apsley nods and they sit down.
Ralegh moves forward, braces himself by an oarsman’s bench, one hand resting lightly on the young man’s shoulder.
Above the river veils of fog are parting. There will be no blue today, but the sky and the day will brighten.
And, subtle and gentle, a scuffling ruffle of scales along the calm water, the first hint of breeze. There will be more breeze and later hauling and hoisting, unfurling of square sails to catch it, among the crowd of ships, Englishmen, Dutch, and Danes, Swedish, Genovese, Venetian, Frenchmen, also from Hamburg and Spain and even Sicily. A leafless forest of idle masts will spring into white bloom like pear trees. Flags and pennants will flutter.
Pulling away now from the Tower walls, its shadowy line of turrets and bastions and cannon. Yeomen on the walls stand watching.
Looking back and upward at them on the walls of the Outer Ward.
Farewell, then, to my home and estate. For I have lived there, spent a sum of more time than any other place I have ever owned, built upon, called my own. Money and time and labor and love wasted on the dream of Sherbourne in Dorset. Better I had spent even a tithe of that sum preparing trim chambers in the Tower of London.
There my last, now only,
child, young enough to be a grandchild, was conceived, first drew breath, and saw light, was christened in the old Chapel of St. Peter in Chains. There he, too, was almost taken from me when the Plague came prowling in the chambers and snuffed out lives as near as the thickness of one wall.
How much of the dolor of the Tower has entered your soul, poor boy? How much of the weight of sad years falls on your shoulders? Quiet child, you do not smile often, never have laughed much. We gave you silver spoons at your christening. But you took on an invisible yoke of cast iron.
Behold the old Tower of London, my son, a mighty fortress of kings gone and kings yet to come. And yet rightly you may call it your father’s home. That’s the legacy I leave you, Carew, child so quiet, so solemn, and so small. The shadow of the Tower is in your soul. Ancient cold and dust have entered your blood.
Let not your heart be troubled. Some men leave estates and some men leave the shine of honor to their sons. I leave you the Tower of London and, God willing, a good name to wear while you live.
Sad and serious boy, Carew. Whom I scarcely know at all.
I could wish it different. I pray it as I look back now.
Will look back no more.
Looks forward at the river and London.
What need to look behind, since in mind’s eye and a winking he can picture the river all the way past Gravesend and into the sea?
A soft touch of breeze teases beard and hair. His eyes narrow. He is hungry to see and to feast upon this banquet—Jerusalem or Babel and Babylon—of London awakened and coming to life.
City of sturdy wall, of stout gates, narrow streets, and long memories. Ever changing and rearranging, repairing and razing, ripping and tearing down, with license and abandon, to build out of your ruins and rubble anew. Spading up the skulls and old coins and broken shards to make room for more.
With all your history, untroubled by memory. Unhaunted by the savage ghosts of old men who wish you no joy. Believing you shall bloom and prosper with or without them.
Bubbling, fermenting, all yeasty, cloudy as strong ale.
Bursting at sleeves and button points with press of people. Multitude which even plague cannot conquer.
Death of the Fox Page 13