A Fine Madness by Alan Judd (best classic books TXT) 📕

and meanwhile bring their plot to early fruition. Killing the Queen and restoring the old religion was now their best – perhaps only – route to long-term safety. Or so Poley said he said. Babington agreed, allegedly, and Poley left the house pleading other business, though in fact to report to me and Mr Secretary.

We learned later from Babington’s many examinations – I think he was interrogated nine times – that Poley had urged him to flee, saying he would do the same himself. This was no doubt to preserve his reputation among the plotters and with Thomas Morgan and others on the Continent. He could have suggested it to Mr Secretary, who might have agreed so long as we had sufficient notice to apprehend the plotters, but as so often with men like Poley their complications serve but to confound themselves. It was because this cover story was not planned and properly disseminated that we had later to protect Poley’s reputation by imprisoning him for a period.

The plotters scattered, two to Cheshire, one to Worcestershire, but the rest never got far from London. They fled north of the city to St John’s Wood where they hid for about ten days. Finding country living hard and unforgiving, as any animal could have told them, they finally tottered into the town of Harrow, ragged, filthy, starving scarecrows. Begging for food brought them to notice of the authorities and they took their next meal in the Tower, which must have been a relief, at first.

They did not need racking. In their weakened state they talked readily in exchange for food and rest, Babington no less than the others although he was shown the rack before questioning, to encourage him. This meant I was again distracted from my cipher work since I had to prepare questions and evidence for them to swear. I had personally to confront Babington with the cipher he used in his correspondence with the Queen of Scots. Indeed, I had to help him through it since he was far from expert in these matters. In the presence of a notary public he confirmed that it was the alphabet ‘by which only I have written unto the Queen of Scots or received letters from her’. Asked to recall from memory the last letter he had had from her – not knowing of course that we had added the forged paragraph to it – he stated that she had ‘required to know the names of the six gentlemen: that she might give her advice thereupon’. This was very satisfactory, to me especially, since it showed that our forgery was swallowed whole. Although I was relieved when it was not included in the trial of the Queen of Scots – who would rightly have denied it, of course – I suspect it would have stood the test.

I have said that Christopher had no further involvement in the case but he was greatly curious about the Tower and the details of examination and torture, especially the circumstances in which torture licences were granted. He wanted to know how prisoners responded, at which points they talked. He even wanted descriptions of the cellars and chambers in which such examinations were conducted. Most people were rightly fearful of such things and preferred not to hear about them lest they had nightmares. But Christopher wanted to know it. He was like that about everything. He wanted to know everything.

‘Is this for your plays?’ I asked. ‘You want to have someone racked on stage?’

‘One day, maybe. Torture is so terrible, it fascinates me as much as it frightens me.’

‘Yet you want to witness what frightens you. You enjoy it?’

‘I want to confront my demons. Don’t you?’

‘I have seen enough of racking and torture and do not like it. No demons beckon me to it.’

‘You are a simple man, Thomas. Simplicity is a virtue.’

Christopher was very persuasive. When he wanted something his eyes shone with wanting, like a child’s. And, like a child, he persisted until his whole being seemed suffused with longing. Eventually, swallowing my aversion, I took him to witness one of the interrogations of Babington. He was not being racked, which was a relief to me, so it was not in a cellar but in a large upper room in the Tower with windows overlooking the river. When we arrived the examining officials and lawyers were still waiting for him to be brought up from the cells. They talked among themselves with some good humour, like men before a market. When brought in in chains he made a pale and pathetic figure, gazing in wonder at so many of importance gathered to hear him. He was eager to speak and several times answered so fully and repetitively that he had to be stopped. Presumably he hoped to ingratiate himself by being helpful.

‘He hopes for mercy,’ Christopher whispered to me. ‘Will he get it?’

‘No.’ I had heard from Mr Secretary that the Queen had ordered her would-be murderers to be executed in the most prolonged and painful manner the law permitted, that their suffering should be an example to all. ‘Unless from God.’

‘He hopes in vain then.’

We sat through the full examination, two hours during which Babington confessed enough to have himself hanged, drawn and quartered several times over. That was the purpose of his repeated examinations, to ensure that he gave evidence sufficient to condemn himself and all his colleagues, especially Ballard. In fact, they all condemned themselves readily enough, though Ballard only after significant persuasion. When the time came to take Babington back to the cells he had to be helped to his feet – he had been permitted to sit after the first hour – and I remember still the slow clank of his chains as he shuffled away, a bent and sorry figure. At the door he stopped and turned back to us all, saying in a weak hoarse voice, ‘Gentlemen, I am truly sorry to have caused you trouble. We never