The Gallows Murders Read Free

venomous temper which would drench his kingdom in rivers of blood: that was still a few years off. Henry was more concerned about his pleasures. He wanted to be a great wrestler, the keenest of archers, the best dancer, the most ferocious j ouster. Henry believed he was a fairy-tale prince, and those who danced with him little suspected that the nightmare would soon begin. By 1523, the worms were eating their way into the marrow of his soul. Henry's wife - plump, sallow-faced Catherine of Aragon - had not produced a living male heir, and the gossips were beginning to titter and chatter behind their hands. Some said Henry's seed was rotten (they were probably right). Others uttered darker words, that Henry was a Tudor: his father might have been a Welsh prince but his grandfather was a Welsh farmer, so what right did he have to the Crown and Empire of England? Henry heard them and, worst of all, Henry was growing old. I suppose Bacon was right when he wrote, 'Golden boys and golden girls must, in their turn, turn to dust.' Henry's body was beginning to betray him. An open ulcer on his leg, a belly like a beer-barrel. Phlegm stuck in his throat and nose, so thick and hard it turned him deaf. Henry himself was growing concerned. Oh, he had a daughter, pale-faced Spanish Mary, as well as the bastard offspring of golden-haired Bessie Blount. Nevertheless, in his bed at night (or so the Beast later told me), Henry began to wonder if God had turned his hand against him.
    Nobody in the palaces of Whitehall, Windsor, Hampton Court or Sheen could guess what was coming. It was like one of those masques, so beloved of Will Shakespeare nowadays, when all the players gather on the stage. (Like his most recent one, Othello, about the blackamoor general hired by Venice.) Everything is colour and light. Beautiful people sweeping backwards and forwards, glorious speeches about fame, honour, glory and love. Nonetheless, the audience holds its breath and waits for black-hearted Iago to slip amongst them and bring it all crashing down with rape and horrible murder.
    Henry's Iago had yet to appear: Anne Boleyn, more bewitching than beautiful; petite Anne with her long dark hair and fiery eyes. Trained at the court of France, a consummate lover, she would ensnare Henry's heart. Of course, poor Anne did not survive long. One daughter (the great Elizabeth), three miscarriages, and one stillborn son and she was finished. They accused her of having three teats (and she did have). Men cursed Anne but I found her dark, fiery eyes irresistible. Do you know, when Anne was executed she refused to be blindfolded? The executioner found her eyes so disarming that he got someone to distract her whilst he took off his shoes and stole up behind her to cut off her head. I was there. He did a good job! Anne asked me to be present to make sure he did. She had hired an executioner specially from Calais and, on her last night in the Tower, asked me one favour.
'Roger, make sure the sword is sharp!'
    Oh yes, the Tower. I will come to that by and by, and the horrid scenes enacted there, long before Anne Boleyn took her final morning walk to the execution block.
    Now, as I said, old Tom Wolsey, Cardinal Archbishop and Chancellor of England, ruled the kingdom. Everything in the garden was still rosy. Henry played Robin Hood, or King Arthur of the Round Table, whilst the real power lay in Wolsey's hands. The Cardinal's cronies whispered how Wolsey controlled the King through a witch Mathilda Brigge: they claimed Wolsey had hired her and, in return for gold, Brigge fasted from all food and drink for three days a week and summoned up demons to do her will.
    Now there was little in life Wolsey really loved, except for his beloved nephew Benjamin Daunbey. However, in the summer of 1523, the Cardinal left us alone to enjoy our golden youth in the manor he had given us at Ipswich. Our youth might have been golden; we were not. Benjamin was tall, rather swarthy, a good-looking