The Autobiography of Henry VIII_ With Notes by His Fool, Will Somers - Margaret George [142]
He had said it clearly, himself, to Margaret, when she came to visit him in the Tower. “I assure thee, on my faith, my own good daughter, if it had not been for my wife and you that be my children, I would not have failed long ere this to have closed myself in as strait a room—and straiter, too.”
Now he had passed the test, forsworn—albeit belatedly—the things of this world, and could pledge his vows in blood. Undoubtedly, to one of that mind, it was a great relief. He had not disappointed or betrayed himself to a lesser life.
The execution was fixed for July 6, 1535. He told his daughter, “It were a day very meet and convenient for me—Saint Thomas’ Even.” His assignation with eternity was neatly fitted in with the Church calendar, which seemed to soothe him.
How could I feel upon receiving this news? Like a father whose daughter has chosen to marry unwisely, yet is deliriously happy in the meanwhile? Should I rejoice with her, grieving in my heart? Or should I use my authority to forbid the match?
I knew no action I could take would prevent this marriage. It had been contracted since More’s earliest days.
Yet I wanted him here with me, on earth!
Evenim in the Tower and sought to convey my anguish and love.
Aye, flattering Fortune, look thou never so fair,
Nor never so pleasantly begin to smile,
As though thou wouldst my ruin all repair,
During my life thou shalt not me beguile!
Trust I shall God to enter in a while
His haven of Heaven, sure and uniform:
Even after thy calm, look I for a storm.
So he longed always to be beyond any possible ties or recall to earthly matters.
LXIII
Fisher was executed on June twenty-second. His judges had pronounced the same sentence on him as that meted out to the Carthusian monks.
“I cannot imagine such a death,” Anne had said, upon reading the sentence.
“It is the usual felon’s death,” I replied. “Have you never known of what it consists?” Every English child had witnessed executions. Tyburn, where commoners were executed, was a popular public excursion place. People took their food and blankets and forced their children to watch, “lest you fall likewise into crime.” It was instructional. I had always thought it was a pity that hell was not equally observable.
“No. I have never watched an execution. Nor do I wish to.” She was agitated.
“Perhaps you should. As Queen, you should know to what we condemn felons.”
“It is the fire part I cannot bear!” she said. “To be burnt, to be touched by that evil, hot, licking, consuming thing—oh, they knew well what they did when they made hell a place of flames! I would never go there, never, never—”
“Then do not sin, my sweet.” I smiled. The remedy was at hand. Those who did not wish to go to hell knew precisely what they should do to avoid it. It was all laid out.
“Spare Fisher!” she said. “Do not let the flames touch him. No one deserves that!”
“A signature on a paper would have prevented it.”
“Even so ...”
I had intended all along to commute his sentence, to allow him a painless beheading. But Anne’s outburst puzzled me. It showed me yet another side of her.
“Have you long been troubled by this fear of fire?” I asked her.
“Always. Since I was a child, when once in my room a lighted piece of wood escaped from the fireplace. It landed on a stool nearby. It glowed and then subsided. I went to sleep watching it—and then awoke, suddenly, to a blaze. The horrible heat, the diabolical grin of the fire—‘I fooled you, now I have you....’ ” She shuddered. “And the crackling, the roasting ...”
“Be at peace. Fisher shall not face that,” I assured her.
Indeed, Fisher was led out onto a tidy scaffold at Tower Hill, just outside the Tower walls. He had always been ascetic and gaunt, but his fourteen months in the Tower had turned him into a “death’s-head,” est shirt, as it was the garment with which he would enter Paradise.