‘Yes. I received a missive from him, telling me of you and of London. Tell me, Crispin. Do you have this book?’
He lowered his face and rubbed his hands over his knees. ‘In truth, my lady, I do have this book, but I fear it is not something … not something that would compare with your philosophy. I fear you have come a long way for nothing.’
‘I suppose only I can be the judge of that.’
Jack returned and stood back in the shadows when Crispin looked up. ‘Jack, get the book.’
‘Get the book?’
‘Yes, man, get the book!’
‘Right, sir. I’ll … get it.’ He scrambled toward the stairs and took them two at a time.
‘While my apprentice retrieves it, I must tell you about it. Then it will be up to you to decide.’
A knock on the door again brought Jack to the gallery railing above. He had pressed the book to his chest but stared at the door. Crispin motioned for him to stay as he was and rose himself to answer it.
When he cast it open, Hugh Ashdown himself was at the threshold.
‘Master Guest, please don’t throw me out.’
‘Give me one good reason why I shouldn’t?’
Ashdown glanced past Crispin’s shoulder. ‘The reason lies beyond your door, sir. For here is my patron lady.’ He nudged Crispin aside and stretched on to his knee before Dame Julian. ‘My lady, you are here! It’s a miracle.’
‘Not so much a miracle. Perhaps a bit of the mason’s art to free me from my cell.’
‘But here you are. And there above, Master Tucker with the book I told you of.’
‘Dame Julian,’ said Crispin. ‘How well do you know this man?’
‘He has been in my service for some years, being my eyes in the world. He is sometimes a foolish man, but loyal and faithful to God above.’
This somehow did not fit Crispin’s perception of him. He felt he was proud and pompous, but perhaps to Dame Julian he was softer and humbler.
‘But how well do you know him? Where does he come from? What are his credentials?’
‘Crispin, I don’t ask a faithful man whence his faith derives. For I know it.’
‘Master Ashdown,’ said Crispin, bearing down on him and forcing him up against a wall. ‘If your patroness were so accessible to you and you had the book, why didn’t you merely give it to her yourself? Men have died for your folly.’
Julian gasped. ‘Master Ashdown! Is this true?’
‘I only had the book briefly. It was given to me with instructions to hand it over to someone who could keep it safe until I could get it to you, my lady. I knew that someone to be Master Guest.’
‘But who has died?’ she implored.
Crispin bit down on the words he wanted to say. ‘The men who helped me to translate it.’ He turned back to Ashdown. ‘Who gave it to you, Ashdown?’
‘I don’t know. A lordly man. It was he who told me you would know how to translate it and keep it safe.’
‘Describe him.’
‘A big man with hair almost as ginger as Master Tucker’s, and a little older than him too. I know he was an important man because his own men kept referring to his father, the duke.’
An image of Bolingbroke flashed in his mind. ‘Did they call him “Henry”?’
‘Why yes. I think they did.’
‘Henry Bolingbroke!’ cried Jack.
Crispin rubbed his face with his palms.
‘Do … do you know him, Master Guest?’ asked Ashdown.
‘Yes, I do. But how I wish you would have simply sent it on to your … patroness.’
‘My apologies, Master Guest. I see now …’ He looked around, as if seeing the ghosts of these problems. ‘I see now how I have erred. My dear lady, forgive me.’
‘I am very distressed that there are deaths associated with this book. Tell me, Crispin. Tell me what the book contains.’
‘Simply put, it is a hidden gospel, a Gospel of Judas. Who tells us that he was the closest friend to Christ, not Peter, not John. That he was the only one to understand His true purpose. And that salvation comes from within us, and not through the sacrifice on the cross.’
‘You see,’ said Ashdown. ‘I told you, Dame Julian. It is not a book fit for you.’
‘Master Ashdown,’ she said softly. ‘I cannot judge the worth of the writing until I read it myself.’
‘But that is the danger of it. To read it is to absorb its vileness.’
‘You think I am incapable of making up my own mind as directed by God Himself?’
Ashdown squirmed, longing, it seemed, to naysay her again.
Crispin wanted to punch him in the face.
Jack descended the stairs, book still clutched to his chest. He walked like a man to the gallows, shuffling along the floor till he reached Dame Julian. He offered the tome to her and she took it, laying it on the table before her. She opened the cover and ran her hand over the rough surface of the papyrus.
‘What strange writing,’ she murmured.
‘I have been told it is Coptic, Dame, a language spoken in the Holy Land by early Christian fathers.’
‘Is it?’ She beamed and carefully turned each page, poring over the faded ink. With hands laid flat on the pages she looked up. ‘Who helped you to translate it, Crispin? One of the murdered men?’
‘Yes. He was a barber. And … also a rabbi, one of the leaders of secret Jews still living in London.’
‘Master Crispin!’ gasped Jack.
‘My apprentice admonishes me for revealing this dread secret. But I feel I can trust you, Dame, that you will not reveal what I have told you. Nor your man here.’
‘This is true,’ she said. ‘You would not have told me if it were not true. Master Ashdown, I must have your word that you shall never repeat this information. The innocent must not die.’
‘I will do as you bid. But … my lady, is it not better to flush out these people, to force them to baptism?’
‘Master Ashdown, baptism cannot be forced. It is something freely given. A babe takes baptism as he takes milk from his mother, for it is milk from his Mother Jesus. But a grown man must live in his conscience and cannot accept that which is forced upon him. Speak no more of it, Master Ashdown.’
He bowed and stepped back. Crispin studied his lowered face. He began to wonder if Ashdown had not followed Crispin from bookseller to goldsmith to barber.
She turned again toward Crispin. ‘These are strange words from a stranger gospel. But I see no contradiction as you seem to see it, Crispin.’
‘Don’t you? If salvation comes from within, then there is no need for Church at all.’
‘I suppose some might see it that way. But it tells me that only a deeper knowledge of all that the Church teaches, coupled with a deep inner knowing, is what can bring us to salvation. Our Lord’s precious blood needed to be spilled for us, so that we might take up all that His Church has given. And this, too,’ she said, patting the open pages. ‘I should like to get this translated. To understand it more fully. May I borrow this book for a while?’
‘I give it to you freely,’ said Crispin. ‘Only … only there is a bishop who seeks the book to destroy it. He does not like these ideas in the world.’
‘He wishes to destroy it?’ She glanced down at it and closed the cover protectively. ‘No. He shall not have it. I will take it. You may tell him so.’
‘But … my lady, he is a bishop. If he should order you to turn it over to him …’
‘Oh, Crispin, I don’t think he shall ever say so to me. Do you?’
There was something about her. It was as if a glow was shining around her, but it was not so. A trick of the light from the open shutter, perhaps. ‘No, my lady. I cannot imagine he would have the nerve.’
‘Well, then. It’s all settled. Master Ashdown, will you take this and wait outside with my footman?’
He took the book she offered and smiled, passing that smile over Crispin as if to say, ‘See? I told you’, before he went
outside.
Dame Julian reached her hand up to Crispin. He took it, feeling that tingle again. ‘And now, Crispin, I want you to hear my words. I have heard of the many relics that have reached you. I have also heard how skeptical you are of them.’
‘My lady,’ said Crispin, genuinely perplexed. ‘How could you have ever heard that?’
‘Never mind. Be certain that I have. What I must say to you is this: God does not want us to be burdened because of sorrows and tempests that happen in our lives, because it has always been so before miracles happen. You, my friend, have had your share of tempests. Now you must wait for the miracles.’ She smiled again. There was the merest of dimples in one of her cheeks. Without looking away from Crispin’s face, she said, ‘Master Tucker, be so good as to call my ladies. We must be on our way.’
‘Oh! My lady, we can give you hospitality. There is no need for you to rush off. You have not eaten.’
‘You are sweet, Master Tucker, but I have so little need of sustenance. And we must hurry back. The masons will have need to brick me up again. I must not be tempted to fly away on another whim as I have. I have a duty to God, after all. But … I am glad He allowed me this last time.’
Crispin held her hand as the nuns came rushing back into the hall. He held it still as she rose and walked with him to the door. ‘Never fear, Crispin. And his good man Jack. All shall be well, and all shall be well, and all manner of things shall be well.’ She gave one more look around his lodgings, sighed, and then passed through the door. The nuns surrounded her, seeking protection like ducklings, while the footmen carried their goods. Ashdown carried the book. They traveled up the road away from Newgate, no doubt venturing through London toward Aldgate, the road to Norwich.
Crispin glared at Ashdown who was in the rear and trotted to catch up. Crispin clasped a hand to his shoulder. ‘A word with you, if you don’t mind, Master Ashdown.’
NINETEEN
He fumbled with the book in his parcel as Crispin approached him. ‘Master Ashdown, I am curious as to your doings once you left me with the book at the Boar’s Tusk. Further, I am curious as to when exactly you told Dame Julian of this book and that I would have it.’
The man glanced back at the retreating figure of his patroness. ‘I have served Dame Julian for many years—’
‘So she has said.’
‘The lord who approached me gave me the book, told me of you. We weren’t in Norwich at the time, if that is your concern.’
‘Henry,’ Crispin muttered. That troublesome boy. But he was not a boy. He was a man, with five children already. No, six, for a girl child was born to him just days ago. Crispin had practically raised him in Lancaster’s household. They were tutor and pupil, governor and governed, and sometimes rascals together. He had grown into a powerful warrior and statesman, perhaps not as prudent and subtle as his father, but he was someone to be reckoned with. Crispin was proud of him and saddened that he saw him so infrequently. The sword that hung at his hip had been given to him by Henry, and he cherished it, as well as the memory of when he gave it to him. Crispin was a Lancaster man, true enough.
But where in God’s name had Henry got that book? And then he remembered that Henry had been in the Holy Land only last year …
What did it matter? He’d given it to this fellow to give to Crispin, only to give it back to this damned fellow. And a good jest it was. It had Henry all over it.
‘You told your patroness that I would have it and then traveled to London.’
‘Yes. He … he told me to do as much. I sent a detailed missive to Dame Julian as I left for London.’
‘I’ve no doubt that’s true. But why would she come to me? Would it not have been more prudent for me to come to her? An anchoress, man!’
‘It was her choice. We – her nuns, that is – begged her not to leave. But she insisted. It was most unusual. Her nuns told me that once she had heard your name, she made plans immediately. They said …’ He edged closer confidentially. ‘They said that she had had visions of you.’
It was as if cold water had been poured over his head. ‘Visions?’
‘Yes. Of you. And she desired to see you in person, in London.’
Crispin had been holding his breath. He slowly exhaled, thinking furiously. Visions? Of him? The cryptic and mystical words of Abbot Nicholas as he lay dying spun through his head again. What mischief had God arranged now? A shiver snaked down his spine.
‘And so I hurried here on a fast horse, Master Guest. Two days.’
‘What? Oh, er. Are they returning tonight? It is a hard road for those on foot.’
‘They have horses. And she will stay this night at an inn. I insisted.’
He shook it off. He couldn’t afford to indulge in theological meanderings. Not now. ‘What inn, Ashdown?’
‘The Horse and Dog. On Fenchurch … near Lime.’
‘I’m glad to know that.’ He got in close to the man. ‘You have been following me, Master Ashdown. Learning my habits, shadowing me.’
‘I–I needed to find a discreet way to get the book to you.’
‘Did you also follow me throughout London once I had the book? And to Westminster?’
He looked back again, but Dame Julian and her entourage were long gone amid the many citizens on London’s streets. ‘Well … yes. I needed to make certain that it was safe.’
Crispin scowled. ‘And did you make certain that no one else should know of the book?’
‘What do you mean?’
Crispin edged closer, his face close to Ashdown’s. ‘You know what I mean. Did you kill those men for the sake of your mistress, to keep her safe?’
‘No! Of course not!’
‘Your protestations are weak. I don’t know that I believe you.’
‘You … you must believe me. That was never my mission.’
‘But it would keep her safe, keep prying eyes away from her and her purpose.’
‘This is a despicable thing you accuse me of.’
‘Is it? I happen to think murder is despicable.’
Ashdown said nothing. He swallowed hard while keeping his eyes on Crispin’s. ‘M–may I go, Master Guest?’
‘To the inn tonight, yes. You must watch over your patroness. But I don’t want you to leave town.’
‘But … my mistress! I must go with them.’
Crispin grabbed his coat and dragged him in close. ‘I said, Don’t. Leave. Town.’ He held him a moment longer before shoving him back. Ashdown stumbled, clutching tight to the book.
He nodded and staggered away, glancing back now and then toward Crispin until he disappeared in the crowd.
‘You’ve given him the book,’ Jack remarked, leaning in their doorway, arms crossed over his chest.
‘I thought it best. After all, Dame Julian requested it.’
‘That’s all very well, but what will you do tomorrow at noon, then?’
He’d only just remembered his meeting with Bishop Becke and smacked his forehead. ‘God’s blood!’
TWENTY
‘What are you going to do, Master Crispin?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘The bishop won’t like that.’
‘No, he won’t. Jack, maybe it is best to become a tavern keeper after all.’
‘Indeed, sir. There’s many a time I’ve thought about it.’
Crispin sat, rubbing his hands over his face, for not the first time. ‘I can scarce believe that all that has transpired has happened in only two days.’
‘Aye.’ He counted it out on his fingers. ‘There’s the book, there’s the queen, there’s them murders, there’s Julian of Norwich … What else could possibly happen?’
‘Good God, man, don’t say that.’
‘Oh, right.’ Jack crossed himself and sat opposite, staring into the ashes of the hearth. ‘So Henry Bolingbroke gave that man the book. It hardly seems possible.’
‘It is strange. But not unlikely. I can well see how Henry would trust me to translate
such a book. But why not send it directly?’
‘He could have met up with this man at a tavern.’
‘Seems awfully trusting of him.’
‘I never understood lordly men.’
When Crispin looked up, Jack smirked.
‘The queen was not murdered, thank God,’ said Crispin quietly. ‘And I discovered that Richard … had not wanted to execute me.’
‘Eh? That is strange. For he always seems angry with you.’
‘Perhaps his anger is more frustration. Frustration at my actions, and that I could not see how much I had hurt him. And I hadn’t seen it.’
‘Now you’re feeling sorry for the king.’
‘I am. Oh, Jack. Treason is such a bitter betrayal. It is not just the actions of a man to flout the laws of his country, but doing away with the man who rules it. I had never thought of it that way. Not at the time anyway. My sole concern was to get Lancaster on the throne. I never thought that it would mean Richard’s death.’
‘But it didn’t have to, master. He … he could have been put away.’
‘And be the focus of an insurrection? No. Anyone who takes the throne must be willing to kill the one from whom he took it. It is simple logic and strategy. It is the fallen king on a chessboard. The king cannot be allowed to live. And I, in my youthful arrogance, never imagined it.’
‘I’m sorry.’
‘Sorry? Sorry for what?’
‘That you have had to relive it, sir. Even as an exercise. It must always weigh heavy on you, master.’
‘It did. But, strangely, it does no longer. Richard himself lightened my load.’ He passed a hand over his eyes. ‘Anyway, it was all so long ago. I was only two years older than you are now.’
‘God’s teeth,’ he muttered. It played over Tucker’s face; what he might have done in Crispin’s shoes. ‘I am glad I am not a lord.’
‘At the moment … so am I.’
Jack looked askance … before he burst out laughing.
Crispin let his cheer die down before he said, ‘We still have murders to solve.’
‘What makes you so certain that the bishop’s men didn’t kill them men?’
Traitor's Codex Page 18
