upwards. While Perez passed from the service of Gomez to that of
Philip, in 1572 Escovedo was appointed secretary to the nobly
adventurous Don John of Austria. The Court believed that he was
intended to play the part of spy on Don John, but he fell under the
charm of that gallant heart, and readily accepted, if he did not
inspire, the most daring projects of the victor of Lepanto, the Sword
of Christendom. This was very inconvenient for the leaden-footed
Philip, who never took time by the forelock, but always brooded over
schemes and let opportunity pass. Don John, on the other hand, was all
for forcing the game, and, when he was sent to temporise and
conciliate in the Low Countries, and withdraw the Spanish army of
occupation, his idea was to send the Spanish forces out of the
Netherlands by sea. When once they were on blue water he would make a
descent on England; rescue the captive Mary Stuart; marry her (he was
incapable of fear!); restore the Catholic religion, and wear the
English crown. A good plot, approved of by the Pope, but a plot which
did not suit the genius of Philip. He placed his leaden foot upon the
scheme and on various other gallant projects, conceived in the best
manner of Alexandre Dumas. Now Escovedo, to whom Don John was
devotedly attached, was the soul of all these chivalrous designs, and
for that reason Philip regarded him as a highly dangerous person.
Escovedo was at Madrid when Don John first went to the Low Countries
(1576). He kept urging Philip to accept Don John's fiery proposals,
though Antonio Perez entreated him to be cautious. At this date, 1576,
Perez was really the friend of Escovedo. But Escovedo would not be
advised; he wrote an impatient memorial to the King, denouncing his
stitchless policy (_descosido_), his dilatory, shambling, idealess
proceedings. So, at least, Sir William Stirling-Maxwell asserts in his
_Don John of Austria_: 'the word used by Escovedo was _descosido_,
"unstitched."' But Mr. Froude says that _Philip_ used the expression,
later, in reference to _another_ letter of Escovedo's which he also
called 'a bloody letter' (January 1578). Here Mr. Froude can hardly be
right, for Philip's letter containing that vulgar expression is of
July 1577.
In any case, in 1576 Philip was induced, by the intercession of Perez,
to overlook the fault, and Escovedo, whose presence Don John demanded,
was actually sent to him in December 1576. From this date both Don
John and Escovedo wrote familiarly to their friend Perez, while Perez
lured them on, and showed their letters to the King. Just as Charles
I. commissioned the Duke of Hamilton to spy on the Covenanted nobles,
and pretend to sympathise with them, and talk in their godly style,
so Philip gave Perez orders to entrap Don John and Escovedo. Perez
said: 'I want no theology but my own to justify me,' and Philip wrote
in reply, 'My theology takes the same view of the matter as your own.'
At this time, 1577, Perez, though a gambler and a profligate, who took
presents from all hands, must have meant nothing worse, on M. Mignet's
theory, than to serve Philip as he loved to be served, and keep him
well informed of Don John's designs. Escovedo was not yet, according
to M. Mignet, an obstacle to the amours of Perez and the King's
mistress, the Princess d'Eboli. Sir William Stirling-Maxwell, on the
other hand, holds that the object of Perez already was to ruin Don
John; for what reason Sir William owns that he cannot discover. Indeed
Perez had no such object, unless Don John confided to him projects
treasonous or dangerous to the Government of his own master, the King.
Now did Don John, or Escovedo, entrust Perez with designs not merely
chivalrous and impracticable, but actually traitorous? Certainly Don
John did nothing of the kind. Escovedo left him and went, without
being called for, to Spain, arriving in July 1577. During his absence
Don John defeated the Dutch Protestants in the battle of Gemblours, on
January 31, 1578. He then wrote a letter full of chivalrous loyalty to
Escovedo and Perez at Madrid. He would make Philip master indeed of
the Low Countries; he asked Escovedo and Perez to inspire the King
with resolution. To do that was impossible, but Philip could never
have desired to murder Escovedo merely because he asked help for Don
John. Yet, no sooner did Escovedo announce his return to Spain, in
July 1577, than Philip, in a letter to Perez, said, 'we must hasten to
despatch him before he kills us.' There seems to be no doubt that the
letter in which this phrase occurs is authentic, though we have it
only in a copy. But is the phrase correctly translated? The words
'_priesa á despacherle antes que nos mate_' certainly may be rendered,
'we must be quick and despatch _him_' (Escovedo) 'before he kills
_us_.' But Mr. Froude, much more lenient to Philip than to Mary
Stuart, proposes to render the phrase, 'we must despatch Escovedo
quickly' (_i.e._ send him about his business) 'before he worries us to
death.' Mr. Froude thus denies that, in 1577, Philip already meant to
kill Escovedo. It is unlucky for Mr. Froude's theory, and for Philip's
character, if the King used the phrase _twice_. In March 1578 he wrote
to Perez, about Escovedo, 'act quickly _antes que nos mate_,--before
he kills us.' So Perez averred, at least, but is his date correct?
This time Perez did act, and Escovedo was butchered! If Perez tells
truth, in 1577, Philip meant what he said, 'Despatch him before he
kills us.'
Why did Philip thus dread Escovedo? We have merely the published
statements of Perez, in his account of the affair. After giving the
general causes of Philip's distrust of Don John, and the ideas which
a deeply suspicious monarch may very well have entertained,
considering the adventurous character of his brother, Perez adds a
special charge against Escovedo. He vowed, says Perez, that, after
conquering England, he and Don John would attack Spain. Escovedo asked
for the captaincy of a castle on a rock commanding the harbour of
Santander; he was _alcalde_ of that town. He and Don John would use
this fortress, as Aramis and Fouquet, in the novel of Dumas, meant to
use Belle Isle, against their sovereign. As a matter of fact, Escovedo
had asked for the command of Mogro, the fortress commanding Santander,
in the spring of 1577, and Perez told Philip that the place should be
strengthened, for the protection of the harbour, but not entrusted to
Escovedo. Don John's loyalty could never have contemplated the use of
the place as a keep to be held in an attack on his King. But, if Perez
had, in 1577, no grudge against Escovedo as being perilous to his
alleged amour with the Princess d'Eboli, then the murderous plan of
Philip must have sprung from the intense suspiciousness of his own
nature, not from the promptings of Perez.
Escovedo reached Spain in July 1577. He was not killed till March 31,
1578, though attempts on his life were made some weeks earlier. M.
Mignet argues that, till the early spring of 1578, Philip held his
hand because Perez lulled his fears; that Escovedo then began to
threaten to disclose the love affair of Perez to his royal rival, and
that Perez, in his own private interest, now changed his tune, and, in
place of mollifying Philip, urged him to the crime. But Philip was so
dilatory that he could not even commit a murder with decent
promptitude. Escovedo was not dangerous, even to his mind, while he
was apart from Don John. But as weeks passed, Don John kept insisting,
by letter, on the return of Escovedo, and for _that_ reason, possibly,
Philip screwed his courage to the (literally) 'sticking' point, and
Escovedo was 'stuck.' Major Martin Hume, however, argues that, by this
time, circumstances had changed, and Philip had now no motive for
murder.
The impression of M. Mignet, and of Sir William Stirling-Maxwell, the
biographer of Don John, is quite different. They hold that the
Princess d'Eboli, in 1578, was Philip's mistress; that she deceived
him with Perez; that Escovedo threatened to tell all, and that Perez
therefore hurried on his murder. Had this been the state of affairs,
would Escovedo have constantly accepted the invitations of Perez to
dinner? The men would necessarily have been on the worst of terms, if
Escovedo was threatening Perez, but Escovedo, in fact, kept on dining
with Perez. Again, the policy of Perez would have been to send
Escovedo where he wanted to go, to Flanders, well out of the way, back
to Don John. It seems probable enough, though not certain, that, in
1567, the Princess and Philip were lovers. But it is, most unlikely,
and it is not proved, that Philip was still devoted to the lady in
1578. Some of the Princess's family, the Mendozas, now wanted to kill
Perez, as a dishonour to their blood. At the trial of Perez later,
much evidence was given to show that he loved the Princess, or was
suspected of doing so, but it is not shown that this was a matter
about which Philip had any reason to concern himself. Thus it is not
inconceivable that Escovedo disliked the relations between Perez and
the Princess, but nothing tends to show that he could have made
himself dangerous by revealing them to the King. Moreover, if he spoke
his mind to Perez on the matter, the two would not have remained, as
apparently they did, on terms of the most friendly intercourse. A
squire of Perez described a scene in which Escovedo threatened to
denounce the Princess, but how did the squire become a witness of the
scene, in which the Princess defied Escovedo in terms of singular
coarseness?
At all events, when Philip consulted the Marquis of Los Velez on the
propriety of killing Escovedo rather than sending him back to Don
John, the reasons, which convinced the Marquis, were mere political
suspicions.
It was at that time a question of conscience whether a king might have
a subject assassinated, if the royal motives, though sufficient, were
not such as could be revealed with safety in a court of justice. On
these principles Queen Mary had a right to take Darnley off, for
excellent political causes which could not safely be made public; for
international reasons. Mary, however, unlike Philip, did not consult
her confessor, who believed her to be innocent of her husband's death.
The confessor of Philip told him that the King had a perfect right to
despatch Escovedo, and Philip gave his orders to Perez. He repeated,
says Perez, in 1578, his words used in 1577: 'Make haste before he
kills us.'
As to this point of conscience, the right of a king to commit murder
on a subject for reasons of State, Protestant opinion seems to have
been lenient. When the Ruthvens were killed at Perth, on August 5,
1600, in an affair the most mysterious of all mysteries, the Rev.
Robert Bruce, a stern Presbyterian, refused to believe that James VI.
had not planned their slaughter. 'But your Majesty might have secret
reasons,' said Bruce to the King, who, naturally and truly, maintained
his own innocence. This looks as if Mr. Bruce, like the confessor of
Philip, held that a king had a right to murder a subject for secret
reasons of State. The Inquisition vigorously repudiated the doctrine,
when maintained by a Spanish preacher, but Knox approved of King
Henry's (Darnley's) murder of Riccio. My sympathies, on this point,
are with the Inquisition.
Perez, having been commissioned to organise the crime, handed on the
job to Martinez, his steward. Martinez asked a ruffianly page,
Enriquez, 'if I knew anybody in my country' (Murcia) 'who would stick
a knife into a person.' Enriquez said, 'I will speak about it to a
muleteer of my acquaintance, as, in fact, I did, and the muleteer
undertook the business.' But later, hearing that a man of importance
was to be knifed, Enriquez told Perez that a muleteer was not noble
enough: the job 'must be entrusted to persons of more consideration.'
Enriquez, in 1585, confessed for a good reason; Perez had absurdly
mismanaged the business. All sorts of people were employed, and, after
the murder, they fled, and began to die punctually in an alarming
manner. Naturally Enriquez thought that Perez was acting like the
Mures of Auchendrane, who despatched a series of witnesses and
accomplices in their murder of Kennedy. As they always needed a new
accomplice to kill the previous accomplice, then another to slay the
slayer, and so on, the Mures if unchecked would have depopulated
Scotland. Enriquez surmised that _his_ turn to die would soon come; so
he confessed, and was corroborated by Diego Martinez. Thus the facts
came out, and this ought to be a lesson to murderers.
As the muleteer hung fire, Perez determined to poison Escovedo. But he
did not in the least know how to set about it. Science was hardly in
her infancy. If you wanted to poison a man in Scotland, you had to
rely on a vulgar witch, or send a man to France, at great expense, to
buy the stuff, and the messenger was detected and tortured. The Court
of Spain was not more scientific.
Martinez sent Enriquez to Murcia, to gather certain poisonous herbs,
and these were distilled by a venal apothecary. The poison was then
tried on a barndoor fowl, which was not one penny the worse. But
Martinez somehow procured 'a certain water that was good to be given
as a drink.' Perez asked Escovedo to dinner, Enriquez waited at table,
and in each cup of wine that Escovedo drank, he, rather
homoeopathically, put 'a nutshellful of the water.' Escovedo was no
more poisoned than the cock of the earlier experiment. 'It was
ascertained that the beverage produced no effect whatever.'
A few days later, Escovedo again dined with the hospitable Perez. On
this occasion they gave him some white powder in a dish of cream, and
also gave him the poisoned water in his wine, thinking it a pity to
waste that beverage. This time Escovedo was unwell, and again, when
Enriquez induced a scullion in the royal kitchen to put more of the
powder in a basin of broth in Escovedo's own house. For this the poor
kitchenmaid who cooked the broth was hanged in the public square of
Madrid, _sin culpa_.
Pious Philip was demoralising his subjects at a terrible rate! But you
cannot make an omelet without breaking eggs. Philip slew that girl of
his kitchen as surely as if he had taken a gun and shot her, but
probably the royal confessor said that all was as it should be.
In spite of the resources of Spanish science, Escovedo persisted in
living, and Perez determined that he must be shot or stabbed. Enriquez
went off to his own country to find a friend who was an assassin, and
to get 'a stiletto with a very fine blade, much better than a pistol
to kill a man with.' Enriquez, keeping a good thing in the family,
enlisted his brother: and Martinez, from Aragon, brought 'two proper
kind of men,' Juan de Nera and Insausti, who, with the King's
scullion, undertook the job. Perez went to Alcala for Holy Week, just
as the good Regent Murray left Edinburgh on the morning of Darnley's
murder, after sermon. 'Have a halibi' was the motto of both gentlemen.
The underlings dogged Escovedo in the evening of Easter Monday.
Enriquez did not come across him, but Insausti did his business with
one thrust, in a workmanlike way. The scullion hurried to Alcala, and
told the news to Perez, who 'was highly delighted.'
We leave this good and faithful servant, and turn to Don John. When
he, far away, heard the news he was under no delusions about love
affairs as the cause of the crime. He wrote to his wretched brother
the King 'in grief greater than I can describe.' The King, he said,
had lost the best of servants, 'a man without the aims and craft
which are now in vogue.' 'I may with just reason consider _myself_ to
have been the cause of his death,' the blow was really dealt at Don
John. He expressed the most touching anxiety for the wife and children
of Escovedo, who died poor, because (unlike Perez) 'he had clean
hands.' He besought Philip, by the love of our Lord, 'to use every
possible diligence to know whence the blow came and to punish it with
the rigour which it deserves.' He himself will pay the most pressing
debts of the dead. (From Beaumont, April 20, 1578.)
Probably the royal caitiff was astonished by this letter. On September
20 Don John wrote his last letter to his brother 'desiring more than
life some decision on your Majesty's part. Give me orders for the
conduct of affairs!' Philip scrawled in the margin, 'I will not
answer.' But Don John had ended his letter 'Our lives are at stake,
and all we ask is to lose them with honour.' These are like the last
words of the last letter of the great Montrose to Charles II., 'with
the more alacrity and vigour I go to search my death.' Like Montrose
Don John 'carried with him fidelity and honour to the grave.' He died,
after a cruel illness, on October 1. Brantôme says that he was
poisoned by order of the King, at the instigation of Perez. 'The side
of his breast was yellow and black, as if burned, and crumbled at the
touch.' These things were always said when a great personage died in
his bed. They are probably untrue, but a king who could
conscientiously murder his brother's friend could as conscientiously,
and for the same reasons, murder his brother.
The Princess d'Eboli rewarded and sheltered one of the murderers of
Escovedo. They were all gratified with chains of gold, silver cups,
abundance of golden _écus_, and commissions in the army; all were sent
out of the country, and some began to die strangely, which, as we saw,
frightened Enriquez into his confession (1585).
At once Perez was suspected. He paid a visit of condolence to young
Escovedo: he spoke of a love affair of Escovedo's in Flanders; an
injured husband must be the guilty man! But suspicion darkened. Perez
complained to the King that he was dogged, watched, cross-examined by
the _alcalde_ and his son. The Escovedo family had a friend in
Vasquez, another royal secretary. Knowing nothing of the King's guilt,
and jealous of Perez, he kept assuring the King that Perez was guilty:
that there was an amour, detected by Escovedo: that Escovedo perished
for a woman's sake: that Philip must investigate the case, and end the
scandal. The woman, of course, was the Princess d'Eboli. Philip cared
nothing for her, now at least. Mr. Froude says that Don Gaspar Moro,
in his work on the Princess, 'has disproved conclusively the imagined
_liaison_ between the Princess and Philip II.' On the other hand,
Philip was darkly concerned in litigations about property, _against_
the Princess; these affairs Vasquez conducted, while Perez naturally
was on the side of the widow of his benefactor. On these points, more
than a hundred letters of Vasquez exist. Meanwhile he left, and the
Escovedo family left, no stone unturned to prove that Perez murdered
Escovedo because Escovedo thwarted his amour with the Princess.
Philip had promised, again and again, to stand by Perez. But the
affair was coming to light, and if it must come out, it suited Philip
that Vasquez should track Perez on the wrong trail, the trail of the
amour, not follow the right scent which led straight to the throne,
and the wretch who sat on it. But neither course could be quite
pleasant to the King.
Perez offered to stand his trial, knowing that evidence against him
could not be found. His accomplices were far away; he would be
acquitted, as Bothwell was acquitted of Darnley's death. Philip could
not face the situation. He bade Perez consult the President of the
Council, De Pazos, a Bishop, and tell him all, while De Pazos should
mollify young Escovedo. The Bishop, a casuist, actually assured young
Escovedo that Perez and the Princess 'are as innocent as myself.' The
Bishop did not agree with the Inquisition: he could say that Perez was
innocent, because he only obeyed the King's murderous orders. Young
Escovedo retreated: Vasquez persevered, and the Princess d'Eboli,
writing to the King, called Vasquez 'a Moorish dog.' Philip had both
Perez and the Princess arrested, for Vasquez was not to be put down;
_his_ business in connection with the litigations was to pursue the
Princess, and Philip could not tell Vasquez that he was on the wrong
trail. The lady was sent to her estates; this satisfied Vasquez, and
Perez and he were bound over to keep the peace. But suspicion hung
about Perez, and Philip preferred that it should be so. The secretary
was accused of peculation, he had taken bribes on all hands, and he
was sentenced to heavy fines and imprisonment (January 1585). Now
Enriquez confessed, and a kind of secret inquiry, of which the records
survive, dragged its slow course along. Perez was under arrest, in a
house near a church. He dropped out of a window and rushed into the
church, the civil power burst open the gates, violated sanctuary, and
found our friend crouching, all draped with festoons of cobwebs, in
the timber work under the roof. The Church censured the magistrates,
but they had got Perez, and Philip defied the ecclesiastical courts.
Perez, a prisoner, tried to escape by the aid of one of Escovedo's
murderers, who was staunch, but failed, while his wife was ill treated
to make him give up all the compromising letters of the King. He did
give up two sealed trunks full of papers. But his ally and steward,
Martinez, had first (it is said) selected and secreted the royal notes
which proved the guilt of Philip.
Apparently the King thought himself safe now, and actually did not
take the trouble to see whether his compromising letters were in the
sealed trunks or not! At least, if he did know that they were absent,
and that Perez could produce proof of his guilt, it is hard to see
why, with endless doubts and hesitations, he allowed the secret
process for murder against Perez to drag on, after a long
interruption, into 1590. Vasquez examined and re-examined Perez, but
there was still only one witness against him, the scoundrel Enriquez.
One was not enough.
A new step was taken. The royal confessor assured Perez that he would
be safe if he told the whole truth and declared openly that he had
acted by the royal orders! Perez refused, Philip commanded again (Jan.
4, 1590). Perez must now reveal the King's motive for decreeing the
murder. If Philip was setting a trap for Perez that trap only caught
him if he could not produce the King's compromising letters, which, in
fact, he still possessed. Mr. Froude asserts that Philip had heard
from his confessor, and _he_ from the wife of Perez, that the letters
were still secreted and could be produced. If so, Perez would be safe,
and the King's character would be lost. What was Philip's aim and
motive? Would he declare the letters to be forgeries? No other mortal
(of that day) wrote such an unmistakable hand as his, it was the worst
in the world. He must have had some loophole, or he would never have
pressed Perez to bear witness to his own crime. A loophole he had, and
Perez knew it, for otherwise he would have obeyed orders, told the
whole story, and been set free. He did not. Mr. Froude supposes that
he did not think the royal authority would satisfy the judges. But
they could not condemn Perez, a mere accessory to Philip, without
condemning the King, and how could the judges do that? Perez, I think,
would have taken his chance of the judges' severity, as against their
King, rather than disobey the King's command to confess all, and so
have to face torture. He did face the torture, which proves, perhaps,
that he knew Philip could, somehow, escape from the damning evidence
of his own letters. Philip's loophole, Major Martin Hume thinks, was
this: if Perez revealed the King's reasons for ordering the murder,
they would appear as obsolete, at the date of the deed. Pedro alone
would be culpable. In any case he faced torture.
Like most people in his circumstances, he miscalculated his own power
of bearing agony. He had not the endurance of the younger Auchendrane
murderer: of Mitchell, the choice Covenanting assassin: of the gallant
Jacobite Nevile Payne, tortured nearly to death by the minions of the
Dutch usurper, William of Orange. All of these bore the torment and
kept their secrets. But 'eight turns of the rope' opened the mouth of
Perez, whose obstinacy had merely put him to great inconvenience. Yet
he did not produce Philip's letters in corroboration; he said that
they had been taken from him. However, next day, Diego Martinez, who
had hitherto denied all, saw that the game was up, and admitted the
truth of all that Enriquez had confessed in 1585.