"There's no doubt,"
Said Ben, "the headsman waits behind all this For Raleigh. This is a play to cheat the soul
Of England, teach the people to applaud
The red fifth act."
Without another word we drifted down
For centuries it seemed, until we came
To Greenwich.
Then up the long white burnished reach there crept
Like little sooty clouds the two black boats
To meet us.
"He is in the trap," said Ben,
"And does not know it yet. See, where he sits
By Stukeley as by a friend."
Long after this,
We heard how Raleigh, simply as a child,
Seeing the tide would never serve him now,
And they must turn, had taken from his neck
Some trinkets that he wore. "Keep them," he said
To Stukeley, "in remembrance of this night."
He had no doubts of Stukeley when he saw
The wherry close beside them. He but wrapped
His cloak a little closer round his face.
Our boat rocked in their wash when Stukeley dropped
The mask. We saw him give the sign, and heard
His high-pitched quavering voice—"in the king's name!"
Raleigh rose to his feet. "I am under arrest?"
He said, like a dazed man.
And Stukeley laughed.
Then, as he bore himself to the grim end,
All doubt being over, the old sea-king stood
Among those glittering points, a king indeed.
The black boats rocked. We heard his level voice,
"Sir Lewis, these actions never will turn out
To your good credit." Across the moonlit Thames
It rang contemptuously, cold as cold steel,
And passionless as the judgment that ends all.
* * * *
Some three months later, Raleigh's widow came
To lodge a se'nnight at the Mermaid Inn.
His house in Bread Street was no more her own, But in the hands of Stukeley, who had reaped
A pretty harvest ...
She kept close to her room, and that same night,
Being ill and with some fever, sent her maid
To fetch the apothecary from Friday Street,
Old "Galen" as the Mermaid christened him.
At that same moment, as the maid went out,
Stukeley came in. He met her at the door;
And, chucking her under the chin, gave her a letter.
"Take this up to your mistress. It concerns
Her property," he said. "Say that I wait,
And would be glad to speak with her."
The wench
Looked pertly in his face, and tripped upstairs.
I scarce could trust my hands.
"Sir Lewis," I said,
"This is no time to trouble her. She is ill."
"Let her decide," he answered, with a sneer.
Before I found another word to say
The maid tripped down again. I scarce believed
My senses, when she beckoned him up the stair.
Shaking from head to foot, I blocked the way.
"Property!" Could the crux of mine and thine
Bring widow and murderer into one small room?
"Sir Lewis," I said, "she is ill. It is not right!
She never would consent."
He sneered again,
"You are her doctor? Out of the way, old fool!
She has decided!"
"Go," I said to the maid,
"Fetch the apothecary. Let it rest
With him!"
She tossed her head. Her quick eyes glanced,
Showing the white, like the eyes of a vicious mare.
She laughed at Stukeley, loitered, then obeyed.
And so we waited, till the wench returned,
With Galen at her heels. His wholesome face,
Russet and wrinkled like an apple, peered
Shrewdly at Stukeley, twinkled once at me, And passed in silence, leaving a whiff of herbs
Behind him on the stair.
Five minutes later,
To my amazement, that same wholesome face
Leaned from the lighted door above, and called
"Sir Lewis Stukeley!"
Sir Judas hastened up.
The apothecary followed him within.
The door shut. I was left there in the dark
Bewildered; for my heart was hot with thoughts
Of those last months. Our Summer's Nightingale,
Our Ocean-Shepherd from the Main-deep Sea,
The Founder of our Mermaid Fellowship,
Was this his guerdon—at the Mermaid Inn?
Was this that maid-of-honour whose romance
With Raleigh, once, had been a kingdom's talk?
Could Bess Throckmorton slight his memory thus?
"It is not right," I said, "it is not right.
She wrongs him deeply."
I leaned against the porch
Staring into the night. A ghostly ray
Above me, from her window, bridged the street,
And rested on the goldsmith's painted sign
Opposite.
I could hear the muffled voice
Of Stukeley overhead, persuasive, bland;
And then, her own, cooing, soft as a dove
Calling her mate from Eden cedar-boughs,
Flowed on and on; and then—all my flesh crept
At something worse than either, a long space
Of silence that stretched threatening and cold,
Cold as a dagger-point pricking the skin
Over my heart.
Then came a stifled cry,
A crashing door, a footstep on the stair
Blundering like a drunkard's, heavily down;
And with his gasping face one tragic mask
Of horror,—may God help me to forget
Some day the frozen awful eyes of one
Who, fearing neither hell nor heaven, has met
That ultimate weapon of the gods, the face And serpent-tresses that turn flesh to stone—
Stukeley stumbled, groping his way out,
Blindly, past me, into the sheltering night.
* * * *
It was the last night of another year
Before I understood what punishment
Had overtaken Stukeley. Ben, and Brome—
Ben's ancient servant, but turned poet now—
Sat by the fire with the old apothecary
To see the New Year in.
The starry night
Had drawn me to the door. Could it be true
That our poor earth no longer was the hub
Of those white wheeling orbs? I scarce believed
The strange new dreams; but I had seen the veils
Rent from vast oceans and huge continents,
Till what was once our comfortable fire,
Our cosy tavern, and our earthly home
With heaven beyond the next turn in the road,
All the resplendent fabric of our world
Shrank to a glow-worm, lighting up one leaf
In one small forest, in one little land,
Among those wild infinitudes of God.
A tattered wastrel wandered down the street,
Clad in a seaman's jersey, staring hard
At every sign. Beneath our own, the light
Fell on his red carbuncled face. I knew him—
The bo'sun, Hart.
He pointed to our sign
And leered at me. "That's her," he said, "no doubt,
The sea-witch with the shiny mackerel tail
Swishing in wine. That's what Sir Lewis meant.
He called it blood. Blood is his craze, you see.
This is the Mermaid Tavern, sir, no doubt?"
I nodded. "Ah, I thought as much," he said.
"Well—happen this is worth a cup of ale."
He thrust his hand under his jersey and lugged
A greasy letter out. It was inscribed
The Apothecary at the Mermaid Tavern.