"I have not read those depositions, as there was no one present when Don Miguel died save I—his murderer—and God!"
As Wessex made this last bold declaration, the Queen's Serjeant turned towards His Eminence as if expecting guidance from that direction, but as nothing came he continued—
"I would have thee weigh well what thou sayest. Thine answers and confessions, if spoken truthfully, will do much to mitigate the severity of the punishment which thy crime hath called forth."
"I will make mine own confession," retorted Wessex, with a sudden quick return to his own haughty manner. "I pray you teach me not how to answer or confess. But because I was not cognizant whether my peers did know it all or not, I have made a short declaration of my doings with Don Miguel. That is the truth, my lords," he added, addressing his triers and judges on the bench, "everything else which hath been added contrary to mine own confession is a lie and a perjury, as God here is my witness."
"Thy confession is but a brief record of the fact, as the Clerk of the Crown will presently read. There is neither circumstance nor detail."
"And is it for circumstance or detail that I am being tried?" rejoined Wessex, "or for the murder of Don Miguel de Suarez, to which I hereby plead guilty?"
The Queen's Serjeant looked to Sir Robert Catline for guidance. The Lord Chief Justice, however, was of opinion that the prisoner's confession must be read first, before any further argument about it could be allowed.
The Clerk of the Crown then rose and began to read:—
"The voluntary confession of Robert Duke of Wessex, now a prisoner in the Tower, and accused of murder, treason, and felony: made at the Tower of London on the fifteenth day of October, 1553. I hereby acknowledge and confess that on the fourteenth day of October I did unlawfully kill Don Miguel, Marquis de Suarez, by stabbing him in the back with my dagger. For this murder I plead neither excuse nor justification, and submit myself to a trial by my peers and to the justice of this realm. So help me God."
The bench, the entire hall, was crowded with the Duke's friends; with the exception of a very small faction, who for reasons they deemed good and adequate desired the Spanish alliance, and the death of the man at the bar, not a single man or woman present believed that that confession was an exposé of the truth. The Serjeant himself, the Clerk of the Crown, the Attorney and Solicitor-General who represented the prosecution, knew that some mystery lurked behind that monstrous self-accusation. But it was so straightforward, so categorical, that unless some extraordinary event occurred, unless Wessex himself recanted that confession, nothing could save him from its dire consequences.