The Murder in the Tower: The Story of Frances, Countess of Essex

“Excellent … as always,” said Robert, when he had finished.

“Ah, my dear feallow, what would you do without me?”

“Bless you, Tom, where would either of us be without the other?”

Thomas was thoughtful for a second or so. “That’s true enough,” he said at length. But a doubt had entered his mind. In the Mermaid Club he dined with writers, among them Ben Jonson, and they treated him as one of them; there he could hold his own as a literary man; he was someone in his own right, not merely a ghost, a shadow of someone else. He imagined Robert Carr in such company. He would not know what they were talking about. Yet, without Robert, where would he be? What would his writing bring him in? Enough to starve in a garret?

He sighed and repeated: “It’s true enough.”

Robert did not notice the slight discontentment in his friend’s expression because he was occupied with a problem of his own.

“Tom,” he said, “here’s something else for you to do.”

Thomas waited expectantly, but Robert hesitated.

“I want you to write to a lady for me. Tell her I shall not be able to see her as I arranged. The King has commanded me to wait on him.”

Thomas took up his pen again.

“Shall I be very regretful? Is the lady becoming an encumbrance?”

“Oh no, no! Be most regretful. I would I could be with her. Say I am sorry.”

Overbury nodded. “Tell me what she looks like and I will write an ode to her beauty.”

Robert described her so accurately that Thomas said, “Could this paragon of beauty be the Countess of Essex?”

“Why, Tom, how did you guess?”

“You have made it clear to me. That is well. Now I know to whom I am writing I shall produce a finer specimen of my talents.”

“Fairest of the fair,” he wrote, “I am overcome by desolation….”

Robert watched him while his pen ran on without faltering. How clever to have such a gift of words! If he were only as clever as Overbury, he would be able to write his own letters, work out his own ideas, in fact he would be as clever as the late Salisbury. With brains and beauty he could have stood completely alone, sufficient unto himself.

He wondered why the thought had come to him at that moment as he watched his clever friend smiling over his work.

The notion disappeared as quickly as it had come; Robert had never been one to analyze his feelings.

Tom laid down his pen and began to read.

In the letter were the longings of a lover, delicately yet fervently expressed. The poetic strain was there.

Frances would be astonished; yet she would be pleased.

Dr. Forman sat at one side of the table, Frances at the other. He leaned forward on his elbows and moved his expressive hands as he talked; and his eyes, bright with lecherous speculation, never left the beautiful eager face opposite him.

In the darkened room the candles flickered.

He was a witch, of course. Frances had guessed this. She believed that he had made his pact with the devil, and should the witch finders suddenly break into the room and examine him they would doubtless find the devil’s marks on his body.

She did not care. She knew only an unswerving desire.

She wanted Robert Carr to remain her faithful lover; she wanted to inspire in him a fanatic passion to match her own; and she wanted Essex out of the way.

It was for that reason that she made these dangerous journeys to Lambeth. For the sake of what she so urgently needed she was ready to dabble in witchcraft, although she knew that the cult of witchcraft was a crime; the King believed in the power of witches to do evil and he was anxious to drive them out of his kingdom. Death by strangulation or burning was the penalty. Never mind, Frances told herself; she was ready to run any risk for the sake of binding Carr to her irrevocably and ridding herself of her husband.

Forman’s voice was silky with insinuation.

“Dear lady, you must tell me all that happened … spare no detail. Tell me how fervent the lord is in his lovemaking.”

Frances hesitated; but she knew that she must obey this man, for it was only if she told him everything that he could help her.

So she talked and answered the questions which were thrust at her; she saw her interrogator lick his lips with pleasure as though he were partaking in the exercise himself. At first she was embarrassed; then she ceased to be so; she talked with eagerness, and it seemed to her that the special powers of this man enabled her to live again the ecstasy she had enjoyed.

When it was over, the doctor bade her rise; he placed his hands on her shoulders and she imagined some of his strength flowed into her. He waved his hands before her eyes and she dreamed once more that she was with Robert in some dark chamber.

Dr. Forman drew back curtains in one dark corner of the room to disclose among the shadows what appeared