The Constable of the Tower by W. Harrison Ainsworth

This was the evening of the Friday before Candlemas-day, 1547. About two hours before midnight, but not till then, the Earl of Hertford, who was in an agony of impatience for an audience, was permitted to approach the king. He found him lying on the couch, propped up by immense pillows. On regarding him, Hertford felt sure that the king was rapidly sinking, though his eye was still keen, and his voice strong and sonorous as ever. No time must be lost—no risk heeded—if the great stake for which he was playing was to be won.

“Let the chamber be cleared,” said Henry. “Our discourse must be strictly private.”

This being precisely what Hertford desired, he took care that the king’s behests should be promptly obeyed.

“We are alone, sire,” he said, as soon as all the attendants, including Doctor Butts and the chirurgeon, had withdrawn.

“Hertford,” said Henry, as the earl approached him, “you gaze on me as if you thought me worse. Deny it not, man—I can read your true opinion in your looks. No wonder I should appear greatly disordered. Last night was a dreadful one to me, Hertford. Not to purchase a fresh term of sovereignty would I endure such another. I cannot recall it without horror. I underwent the torments of the damned; and prayed—unavailingly prayed—for release from suffering. Thou knowest I am not idly superstitious—nor a believer in old wives’ fables. Prepare then to credit what I shall relate, however surprising and improbable it may seem to thee; and deem not that my nerves are shaken by sickness.”

“Whatever your Majesty shall tell me I shall infallibly believe—doubt it not,” replied Hertford. “And I am well assured that your nerves are firmly strung as ever.”

“Thou liest!—thou dost not think so—but they are. To my narration, however—and give the more heed to it, inasmuch as thou wilt find it concerns thee as well as myself.”

“Is there a ghost in the story, my liege?” inquired Hertford.

“Be silent, and thou shalt hear,” replied Henry, sternly. “Last night, during a brief interval of ease between my fits of agony, I was trying to court slumber, when I heard the bell toll midnight—I heard it distinctly, for I counted the strokes—and as the last vibration of sound died away, I turned to Butts to bid him give me a potion. He was gone, while Ferrys, who should have been watchful, had sunk within the chair nigh which thou standest, apparently overcome by sleep. I was about to awake and chide him—and should have done so, had not all power of speech and movement suddenly left me, as I saw a phantom—a grisly, ghastly phantom—glide towards my bed. Whom thinkest thou I beheld?”

“Nay, I cannot guess, my liege,” replied Hertford.

“Surrey, new-risen from his bloody grave—his noble features livid and disfigured—his locks clotted with gore—his stately neck sundered by the axe—yet, marvellous to say, set again upon the shoulders—a spectacle horrible to look upon—yet I instantly knew him. His eyes seemed to have life in them, and to fascinate like the basilisk, for, as he fixed them upon me, I could not avert my gaze. Then his lips moved, and with a gesture of menace such as I had never brooked from mortal man, and in accents more terrible than had ever reached my ears, he told me he came to summon me before Heaven’s Judgment-Throne; and that I must appear there ere the bell should again toll forth the hour of midnight.”

“Let not this weigh upon your mind, my gracious liege,” said Hertford, not wholly devoid of superstitious fear himself, though he strove thus to reassure the king. “I was in your chamber last night at midnight, and long after, and I saw and heard nothing such as you relate. ‘Twas an ill dream—but only a dream. I pray you, therefore, dismiss these fancies. They are engendered by the sickness under which you labor.”

“No, Hertford,” replied Henry, in a tone of profound conviction, “it was neither dream, nor product of diseased imagination. I could not have conjured up such a spectre if I would—and I would not if I could,” he added, shuddering. “I saw Surrey plain enough, standing where thou art now. I will not tell thee all the spirit uttered of vengeance and retribution—but it prophesied a bloody ending to thee and to thy brother.”