Warwick was now put out of the way, in obedience to the King of Spain. But remorse gnawed the tyrant's heart. His father confessor, though doubtless an astute courtier, failed to soothe his conscience. He sought the help of wizards and quacks. But his superstitions gave him little consolation. The Spanish Ambassador noticed the change that had taken place in Henry's appearance since the murder of young Warwick. Don Pedro de Ayala had been in Scotland during the interval. The King had come to look many years older in a single month. Dark thoughts were haunting his mind. His eldest son died, and an anonymous writer has recorded that he showed some feeling, and exchanged words of consolation with his wife.[[46]] This is quite in keeping with one side of his character. The other side is shown in his harsh treatment of Catharine of Aragon, in his monstrous proposal to marry her when his wife died, in his disgusting inquiries respecting the young Queen of Naples, and in his revolting offer for the hand of Juana (la loca). But the necessities of his position gave him little time for the indulgence either of such grief as he was capable of feeling or of the other less creditable sentiments that are revealed in his correspondence. His son's death must have seemed to him the Nemesis of his crimes. Yet within a month he was beheading Tyrrel, and fabricating a story to account for the disappearance of his wife's brothers.
We can never know how much that wife suffered. No doubt she was kept in ignorance of the fate of her brothers. But she knew they were not killed by her uncle. She saw her mother immured in a nunnery for life. She saw her brother, the Marquis of Dorset, committed to the Tower. She saw the sister, nearest to her in age, hurriedly married to old Lord Welles. She must have suspected much, even if she knew nothing. She could not have been kept in ignorance of the cruel imprisonment of her young cousin Warwick. She must have shuddered at his murder. She would have been less than human if she did not loathe the perpetrator of these deeds, even though he was the father of her children. The unhappy wife was released from companionship with the murderer of her relations on February 11, 1503.
Death of the Earl of Suffolk
Another crime was contemplated by the miserable usurper, to make his position safe. But he could not get the Earl of Suffolk into his clutches without giving a solemn promise to spare his life. He evaded the promise by advising his son to commit the crime after his death.[[47]] Murderous designs thus occupied his mind, even on his death-bed.
Yet one of Henry's last acts was an act of restitution. He restored in blood, and to all his estates, the son of his accomplice, Sir James Tyrrel, on April 6, 1507, feeling no doubt that the greater criminal of the two remained unpunished, except by his own remorseful conscience.
Henry became haggard and restless. Prosperous and successful as the world deemed him, we may rely upon it that his crimes were not unpunished. His cowardly nature was peculiarly susceptible to the torturing pangs of remorse. He died, full of terrors, prematurely old and worn out, at the early age of fifty-two, on April 21, 1509. He was successful as the world counts success. He accumulated riches by plunder and extortion. He established a despotic government. He cleared his path of rivals. We are told that he inaugurated a new era—era of 'benevolences' and Star Chamber prosecutions. In all these things he succeeded. He, and the writers he employed, were pre-eminently successful as slanderers. They succeeded in blackening for all time the fame of a far better man than Henry Tudor.
Things unexplained
Hitherto we have been engaged in the investigation of positive evidence. There is, however, another side to the question—a negative side. We must now examine Henry's omissions. According to his story he found the two boys missing when he arrived in London after the battle of Bosworth. If Henry's story was true, it must have been well known to every official in the Tower that Sir Robert Brackenbury gave up charge to Sir James Tyrrel and that the boys had never been seen since. If Henry made any enquiries he must have heard this, and the whole story would have come out. Why were not Tyrrel, Dighton, Green, and Black Will arrested, tried, and hanged? Why was not King Richard accused of murdering his nephews in the Act of Attainder? It is very improbable, though just possible, that Henry might have failed to ascertain the details of the story, assuming it to have been true, when he first arrived. Still, if the boys were missing, it is certain that he would have accused Richard of their murder in the Act of Attainder. His omission to do so amounts to a strong presumption that they were not missing. According to the story, Tyrrel and Dighton confessed the murder in 1502. Why were they not tried and executed for it? This must have been done if there ever was a confession. It was clearly not made under the seal of confession, according to the story, but under the pressure of official examination. Tyrrel was actually beheaded, in great haste, on a frivolous charge, and his capture was a breach of a royal promise given under the privy seal. Surely this would have been avoided if there had been any other way, and there was another way. There was every possible reason for trying him for these horrible murders and executing him for them. Why was not this done? There can be only one answer. There was no confession. Henry's treatment of Dighton is still more extraordinary. It is alleged that he also confessed the murder. Yet he was not only unpunished, but allowed to live at large in Calais. When we find that Henry gave rewards to Tyrrel, Dighton, Green, and Black Will, the conclusion is inevitable that there was no confession to the King in 1502, because it was quite unnecessary. The confession was due from Henry himself.
Another omission in Henry's conduct is equally incriminating. If the children of Edward IV. were legitimate, why was not the Act of Richard III. published, which alleged their illegitimacy, and its falsehood fully exposed by evidence? Why was such extraordinary anxiety shown to conceal its contents, and violence threatened against anyone who preserved a record of them? Why were absurd, improbable, and contradictory tales invented, in substitution of the statements made in Richard's Act? There can be only one answer. The statements in the Act were true.