Martin Stephen: The galleon's grave

And from out of the gloom of the Tower, a vision came to him. Not of Christ, nor even of the Devil. A vision of a man. The Duke of Medina Sidonia.

When all else fails, and all seems dark and bleak, it is not die judgement of the world I believe will matter to me when I pass into the vale of death. The judgement that must matter most to me, the crucial, the most scrupulous, the testing judgement must stand as my own judgement on myself.

Was Henry Gresham to die here on this foul contraption, venting his own piss and shit as he shrieked what his interrogators wished to hear? Die before his time, die without issue, die as a traitor to England, reviled for ever more, if even he was remembered? Could a man die with dignity on the rack?

Suddenly, the world fell into place. He was no longer in a swirling, dream-vision of hell. It was a simple, large stone chamber, with an arched ceiling and soot marks smearing the walls. The walls glistened with moisture, throwing the light of the torches back, except to his right where bricks encompassed the dull red glow of a furnace, fitted out like a blacksmith with bellows. Opposite him were manacles for feet and hands, set deep into the stone. To hang men there, until their very bones and sinews cried out for release.

He heard the shuffling before the voice spoke. Someone was coming from behind the apparatus of the rack, now that he was secure, thrusting himself into Gresham's line of vision. 'Welcome back to England, Henry Gresham,' the voice said. Cecil. Robert Cecil. Looming above him, his pinched face outlined by the ancient stone. A beatific smile on that same sour face. A smile of triumph.

'Robert Cecil,' croaked Gresham. 'What an immense surprise.' Gresham was surprised by his own control. 'As you undoubtedly intend to tear me limb from limb, perhaps you might arrange for some water to be given me? Not to keep me alive, you understand. Merely to let me speak clearly. Just think on it. My screams will be all the more clear when the time comes…'

Cecil smiled, a smile of immense cruelty. Not so the jailer. He looked worried, confused even. Men on the rack did not talk about their impending pain in this matter. Particularly young men, with fine, strong bodies, bodies that would never again delight the girls.

The water was the best thing Gresham had ever taken through his lips. He hoped they had not drawn it from the moat, though it hardly mattered. He was dead anyway. Perhaps that was why he heard the noise as of a door opening, a rustle of cloth that was unfamiliar, even a faint smell as of… perfume. In his mind, of course. 'There was this small thing between us,' Gresham managed to say in something closer to his normal voice. 'I thought we had agreed to work together.'

'I do not work with traitors,' said Cecil. He was enjoying this. 'The Spanish fleet has been sent with its tail between its legs to weather Scotland and face the rocks of Ireland as best it can. The Armada is defeated. This business is over.' There was a crowing, exultant tone in his voice. 'The Enterprise of England has failed. As all remaining spies for Spain must fail. Preferably in as much pain as possible.'

'You wish to destroy me?' asked Gresham. Had it been Cecil all along?

'You have destroyed yourself. You have no need of my help. You are a declared Spanish spy. You deserted us in Flanders, using the goodwill and influence I had given you to spy for Spain. You told me the truth about you when my spy — yes, I too can employ spies! — overheard your treasonous conversation with Parma, the conversation where he hailed you as Spain's greatest asset in its war against England! You told the truth about yourself when you took ship for Spain. You confirmed it when you sailed with the Armada, were seen conversing with its commander by no less than Drake. You were captured, with your Spanish whore, by mere accident. An act of God, the true God, as was the defeat of the Armada. Now all that remains is to extract the confession from you. A traitor, proven and confessed. Your estate to go to the Crown. How wonderful that the fabled Gresham wealth will go to repay Her Majesty for her grievous expenditure in fighting off Spain.'

Gresham was tied to the rack, and Cecil apparently in command of the jailer. And of everything else.

As if to confirm his power, Cecil motioned to the man standing by the great wheel at the head of the rack. Ropes creaked, and suddenly Gresham's arms, lying loose at his side, were pulled taut, not yet painful, merely at full stretch.

That faint whiff of perfume again. And something rotten, corrupt. Was it angels with bad breath come to take him to his rest? Yet he knew he would have to pass through Hell before he came to Heaven.

'I'm no spy for Spain,' said Gresham, thinking Christ must have felt such as this, stretched, exposed, before the first nail was hammered in. 'And you, you've no fear for Elizabeth Brooke? Your fiancйe?'

'I spit on your feeble threat!' said Cecil, ignoring his denial. And he did spit, the globule landing on Gresham's cheek. 'With you dead, your man dead, the name of Gresham a stench on the lips of every decent Englishman, will your henchmen carry out your contract? No! With you dead, they will take their money and laugh at you for thinking it worth their while to offend a man such as myself!'

'A man such as you might be,' said Gresham, surprisingly gently given his condition. His arms were beginning to ache now, the blood supply contorted. 'But are not yet. Anyway, there never was a threat. I have no quarrel with women. I set no men to murder your fiancйe.'

'You mean there were no men set to murder or disfigure my… future wife?'

'Of course not,' said Gresham. 'Only a man who would consider such a thing himself might believe it in another man. It was a threat to frighten a child. What use is vengeance to me after I'm dead? I'll never savour its taste!'

Cecil had believed it. He had believed that Gresham would kill his fiancйe. That much was clear from his rising colour, visible even in the light of torches and from the viewpoint of a man spread-eagled on the rack. 'And so you have nothing left with which to threaten me, Henry Gresham?' Cecil was crowing now, exulting in his victory.

'Only the truth,' said Gresham. 'I was no spy for Spain. I fought for England.'

'And who will believe you?' asked Cecil, actually shaking his head in his own disbelief.

'The Queen of England might believe me,' said Gresham simply. 'That same Queen who entered by the far door, outside my limited range of vision, some minutes ago, and has stood there in silence ever since. Yet I pray to her to be allowed to state my case.' He had known it from the perfume. And the stench of bad breath.

Cecil smiled across his lips, and turned towards the door, arm outflung in a gesture of disbelief. The arm hung for a moment, dropped, became part of a bow that somehow transfigured him into a man on his knees, dropping below Gresham's line of vision.

Why had the Queen come here? She hated the Tower. Loathed it for the memories of her voyage into it through Traitors' Gate, never visited it unless absolutely necessary. And as well as visit it, come to its darkest and most painful chamber? It was inconceivable. And with Walsingham dead, there was no one to tell her of the complex double and triple betrayal he had been engaged in these past three years, three years where under Walsingham's guidance he had worked his way up to becoming Spain's most trusted spy in England. In that position he had fed Spain the information Walsingham wanted Spain to hear, always with enough truth to give it the smack of reality.

The Queen swam into Gresham's view, her pasty white face peering- down clinically at Gresham. She stepped back, motioning to Cecil. He rose from his knees, head still inclined towards the Queen.