The King's Examiner: A Tudor Felony (Tudor Crimes Book 6)

by Anne Stevens

  “Lord Harry Percy swore on the holy bible, before the Arch Bishop of Canterbury as I recall, that he never knew Lady Anne, and the king accepted it,” Cromwell explains. “Henry cannot now change his mind. It would upset the other nobles, and make him look indecisive.” He frowns, and ponders on the question. The slightest hint, he feels, and Henry would act.

  “We dare not mention Wyatt,” Mush says. “What about the father, or the brother?”

  “How so?” Cromwell says, then smiles. “Yes, we find something about George that might threaten Henry’s honour. If it is bad enough, the king will not want the scandal. He can hardly marry the sister, having executed the brother.”

  “His wife claims he does not sleep with her,” Mush offers. “She once offered me her favours.”

  “And you turned her down?” Tom Wyatt shakes his head in disbelief. “You lie, sir. The woman is passing handsome … if not pretty.”

  “I was spending my nights with Lady Mary at the time,” Mush tells the poet, “and had not the strength for a second dalliance.”

  “Yes, I remember now,“ Cromwell says. “She once told me he prefers … other ways to …” the Privy Councillor cannot bring himself to suggest the thing, but Will saves his blushes.

  “The fellow prefers boys,” he says. “That might become more commonly known. If Henry hears of it, he will want to know the truth of things.”

  “Then we can have the King’s Examiner look into George Boleyn’s sexual preferences,“ Thomas Cromwell says, thinking out loud. “He will find the entire family to be tainted in some way, and recommend the king look elsewhere for a bride. Henry hates sodomites more than anything, and will not want to be connected to the Boleyn clan. Lady Anne will be quietly pensioned off, with a big house, and a few thousand silver marks a year.”

  “Then I could marry her,” Tom Wyatt says, grinning.

  “Really, Tom?” Will asks. “Might that not be difficult, seeing as you are already married?”

  “Ah, yes,” the poet says, ruefully. “I forgot!”

  It will take a certain cunning, Cromwell thinks, to make Henry believe the idea of an investigation is his own. The direct approach will not work. Perhaps, when he hands the king Martell’s sealed papers, the chance might arise. His mind is too fuddled with drink to work out the finer details, but somehow, over the next few weeks, he will insinuate the idea, and let it fester.

  15 Whispers

  “Is Charles Brandon in London, Richard?” Rafe Sadler asks Thomas Cromwell’s nephew. He asks because he is compiling a secret list for Cromwell, and wonders if he should place the dissolute Duke of Suffolk’s name on it.

  “I am quite sure he is,” Richard Cromwell replies, after a moment‘s thought. “He will not want Henry out of his sight, coming up to Christmastide, for fear of missing out on a fine present.”

  “Might he travel with the king, when he goes over the Channel?” Rafe asks.

  “He might, I suppose. Though four days stuck in Calais is no prize,” Richard says, chuckling at the thought. “The place is worse than Cheapside on a wet day, and smells as bad as an over full privy.”

  “I will put him down,” Rafe decides. He dusts the ink with sawdust, and blows away the surplus. Then he puts the paper to one side, so it may dry properly. Once approved, it will be used to select those who will be part of Thomas Cromwell’s latest plan. Each person will be primed, without them realising it, and aimed at the king.

  “Is it done, Rafe?” Cromwell asks, as he comes into the study. He glances at the document, without smudging it, and nods his head in satisfaction. “Good. Let it start at once, and continue right to Calais. Once there, I will draw the king into speaking to me about his future brother-in-law.”

  “He will be angry, and worried,” Rafe says, “providing our unknowing agents do their work well enough.”

  “I will use his mood against him,” Cromwell says. “I shall be merry, and ask why his mood is so glum. He trusts me, and will take me into his confidence.”

  “Do not close the net too quickly, else he will wonder at your eagerness,” Richard tells his uncle. It is a failing of his that he constantly offers advice to his uncle, where it is obviously not needed. His uncle accepts that Richard is a little slower than most, when it comes to political intrigue, and makes a generous nepotic allowance for him.

  “I understand. Your uncle is not such an old fool as you think, nephew,” Thomas Cromwell replies. “I will affect a look of complete surprise, and laugh the matter off.” He raises his hands in mock horror, and demonstrates his acting skills. “I mean to say, sire, George Boleyn, the brother of Lady Anne Boleyn, a practicing sodomite? Preposterous! Is it not just idle gossip, My Lord?”

  Both Rafe and Richard smile at the cleverness of it, and the sharpness of the mummery.

  “I will hint that his newly appointed Special Examiner is the man to speak to.”

  “Yes, Will is the king’s man, not yours,” Rafe says. “He will confide his worries to him, and set him on the trail. Though I have doubts. What if Boleyn does not like his wife, but swives other women?”

  “Then Will shall find other things. Once Henry agrees to the investigation, no stone shall be left unturned. The fellow is corrupt, and Henry shall hear the full tale. Will can even hint at Anne’s past, and suggest she is less of a maiden than the king might wish. Henry will come to me, and demand a solution. I will wring my hands, and say how fortunate he is to find out before any wedding. Imagine the scandal across the courts of Europe. It will be enough to rid Henry of any tender feelings he has towards that damned woman.”

  “Will Lady Anne go quietly?” Rafe asks. “Might she not counter such an action by threatening to reveal Henry’s most private secrets?”

  “She will not want her brother brought up on charges of sodomy. I once mentioned it to her, and she paled in fear. The sentence for such behaviour is horrendously painful, and it would ruin her family. She will take what I offer, and leave Henry to marry where he will.”

  “Colonel Draper, it is a pleasure to meet you again, and in such improved circumstances.” Charles Brandon notes the smart cut of the younger man’s tunic, and the elegantly embroidered cuffs, and estimates the outfit to be worth twenty five pounds of any man’s money. It is a while since their last meeting, and the duke is not sure where he stands with the fellow.

  “My Lord Suffolk,” Will bows. “It pleases me that you are back in the king’s favour once more. I was sorry to hear of your wife’s illness.” Mary, once Queen of France, and sister of Henry, has been Brandon’s loyal wife for many years, and is rumoured to be dying of a wasting illness at Westhorpe Hall in Suffolk.

  “The king took his sister’s malaise very hard,” Brandon replies. “It is why I have stayed away these six months. I did not wish to be a constant reminder of Mary’s illness. Though now, he bids me come to court again. Our friendship is as strong as ever.”

  “Thank God, My Lord, for he is in need of friends. There are those about him these days, whom I would not name so.” Will Draper goes as if to move on, but the Duke of Suffolk places a restraining hand on his arm. His curiosity is aroused, and he will hear more, if it can be drawn out of the fellow.

  “Do you recall when we first met, sir? You brought news of Cardinal Wolsey’s most lamentable passing to me. Then, later, we met here at court, Colonel Draper.” he says. “I was sitting in an alcove … perhaps this very one … and you sought me out, to return a purse of silver to me. I know you to be an honourable man, though of lower birth, and it worries me that you fear those about Henry.”

  “No, sir, I do not fear.” Will pauses, as if considering whether he should add anything more. “It is merely the rather sordid morals of some that irk me.”

  “Gentlemen will have their ladies, Will,” Suffolk jests. He has a mistress, whom he has kept this last six months, to warm his bed. “It is the natural order of things. You cannot stop them.”

  “Some will not have their ladies, sir,” Will replie
s, dropping his voice to a stage whisper. “I know of one who likes a more boyish look.”

  “Who, sir?” Suffolk looks about him, as if an army of leering sodomites were about to surround him. “Name the disgusting beast.”

  “That is not my place to say,” Will replies, dropping his voice even lower. “Though soon, you and he may be related through marriage.”

  “Dear Christ, George Boleyn is a …” Suffolk shakes his head. “It cannot be. Henry loathes the thought of such perverse creatures. Have you any proof?”

  “Nothing but a vague rumour,” Will replies. “Would that I could look into it closer, but my hands are tied. As the King’s Examiner, I answer to none but he, and he remains silent.”

  “A pity, sir,” Charles Brandon mutters. “I must bid you good day. Are you going to Calais with the king?”

  “Not I, My Lord, My family and I shall keep Christmas at home this year. Miriam often complains I spend too little time with her as it is. though I believe Master Cromwell has been asked, and the Duke of Norfolk is to stay home, and act as regent for the week.”

  “Poor Tom Howard… king for four days,” Charles Brandon says, and strolls away, smiling to himself. He has a pretty piece of gossip, and wonders if anyone else has heard it. Passing on tittle tattle is an art form amongst bored courtiers, and it must be done with style. One must never offer proof, but drop small hints, until a subtle web of conjecture is woven.

  At some point, enough people are in on the gossip for it to adopt an air of veracity. Once this happens, the Duke of Suffolk can mention that he was the very first to suspect, and can then refer to the speculation as ‘common knowledge’.

  Cromwell knows that once something becomes ‘common knowledge’ it becomes, by general consent, the truth. If the target of the gossip denies it … well, he would, would he not? Soon, some overly officious busy body drops a hint to the king, who is always the last to know. By now, it is set in stone, and the innocent become guilty. The king, being last to know, shall be the first to act’ George Boleyn’s career will be over, and the royal marriage put in doubt.

  Charles Brandon is fascinated by what has been said, and resolves to establish the facts in the best way he knows how. It is a simple enough matter to loiter about the outer court, until he can engineer a meeting with Lady Jane Rochford, George’s sad faced little wife. She is flattered by his attentions, and agrees, despite the coldness of the day, to a stroll in the gardens.

  Once in a secluded arbour, they sit, and chatter about the forthcoming venture to Calais. Suffolk is a master of the art of courtly gossip, and soon brings up the subject of exactly who is to be allowed to travel with Henry.

  “I dare say you and your husband will enjoy the sea air,” he says, and as if by chance he moves his knee against hers. “So bracing. It instils in me a sense of great … vigour.” He gives Lady Jane a knowing look, letting her understand that for vigour, she is to read ‘lust’.

  “Not I, sir,” Jane replies, testily. “George has no need for me on the voyage.” Suffolk raises an eyebrow in surprise, and lets his fingers flutter over the back of her cold little hand.

  “Not even to warm his lonely bed?” he says. Lady Jane feels her lips parching. She has not had the attentions of a man for almost two years, and Suffolk , though an older man, is virile, and rather handsome.

  “I am not to his taste, it seems,” she says, and her lips turn down at the corners to emphasise what she says. Suffolk takes this as a sure sign that Draper was correct, and presses home his advantage.

  “Poor, sweet child,” he says, stroking expert fingers over her shoulder and neck. “Such a waste. Are you not sorely tempted to seek solace in other arms?”

  “Sorely, My Lord,” Jane mutters, and he kisses her softly.

  “Might I call upon you in your chambers this evening?” he says. His thumb runs down her throat, and strokes inside her swelling bosom. “I shall hover gently, like a bee, about a delicate bud.”

  “You honour me, sir,” Lady Jane replies. Her heart is beating, and her body is glowing with desire at this unexpected development. “Shall we say about the ninth hour?”

  “We shall.” He leans forward and whispers what he wishes to do into her ear. “Does that shock you, madam?”

  “It does not,” Jane says. “My husband once did worse.”

  “The dirty knave.”

  “He used me … in a most…”

  “Hush, child,” Suffolk tells her. “I fully understand.”

  It is dawn before Charles Brandon slips away from Lady Jane Rochford’s chamber. He has enjoyed the woman four times, and recalls an age gone by when that would have been but the start of a fine frolic. The roughly taken sex was good, but far better, he feels as though he now has an advantage over the hated Boleyn family. He imagines the look on George’s face when he finds out that his wife has been swived by Suffolk. He begins to whistle a jaunty little air under his breath, and strolls off to his own rooms.

  From the shadows, one of Cromwell’s agents watches his departure, and notes the late hour. He will eventually report these events back to his master, and another strand of the web will be in place.

  Charles Brandon tries to slip into bed without waking his latest mistress, but she yawns, and rolls over. He is surprised to see she is sleeping naked, and admires the swell of her heavy breasts, and the curve of her hips. She rubs her eyes, and demands to know where he has been all night long.

  “You left me to my own devices, My Lord,” she husks, pushing her chestnut curls back from her brow. “It is not proper that you treat me so. I have certain needs … as you know only too well.”

  “My love,” Suffolk says, smoothly. “I have been gaming, but will make it up to you this instant. Come, blow your hot breath on the embers of my desire, and I will sate your passion.”

  “I no longer have so urgent a wish,” she replies. “Who was with you at the card table?

  “Oh, the usual fellows. Henry of course, Norris, Colonel Draper, and William Compton,” Suffolk says, inventing a plausible card school. “Why, one of them, Norris I think, spoke of George Boleyn. He claims that Lord George Rochford’s taste lies with pretty young men. Can you believe it?”

  “I find that most surprising,” the girl says. She fails to give a reason, for Suffolk would not like to find out that, until one short hour ago, George has been swiving her most vigorously. “I wonder how his poor wife is coping?”

  Thomas Cromwell is not an overly religious man, but he offers a silent prayer of thanks when the crossing to Calais passes calmly. It has been his duty to organise the trip, and he has had to arrange transport for almost two hundred and fifty people, in addition to those travelling privately. Many wish to be with Henry, but only those on the official list are paid for by the treasury. Those not included still travel, in the hope of some favour from Henry, but must pay their own way. In reality, this means they give Cromwell a sum of money, and he makes extra provision. It is accepted that he pockets the balance, as a fee.

  “How is the king?” he asks Suffolk, even as he steps onto the quayside. Charles Brandon has travelled on the same boat as Henry, and shared a hearty dinner.

  “Sound, Master Cromwell,” Suffolk reports. “Even the roughest seas do not upset his constitution, and he eats like a starving man.”

  “Thank God we have so strong a monarch,” Cromwell replies. “I hear the French king, Francis, is poxed, and grows more feeble with every passing day. Henry is, for all to see, a prince amongst princes.”

  “He is looking forward to tomorrow’s treaty signing,” Suffolk says.

  “It is a fair deal, and one that will further our aims,” Cromwell agrees. “The king’s presence will confirm his resolve, if any ever doubted it.”

  “Chapuys is here.” Suffolk seeks to unsettle Cromwell with this news, but he simply smiles, and nods.

  “Yes, I arranged for his passage myself,” Cromwell tells the startled duke. “I want him to report back to the Emperor Charles
that Henry is surrounded by men of nobility, with scruples that are beyond reproach.”

  “Ah… yes.” Charles Brandon gives a polite little cough. “I was meaning to have a word with you, Cromwell.”

  “About what?” Cromwell affects an air of polite, but mild curiosity.

  “About Lord Rochford.”

  “I see. Have no fear, My Lord, your secret is perfectly safe with me.”

  “Dear Christ!” Suffolk is completely taken aback. “What can you mean, sir?”

  “Why, your dalliance with Lady Jane, of course,” Thomas Cromwell says. “These affairs are common in the court, and I will never mention it to the king.”

  “I was but comforting the poor young lady,” Suffolk mumbles, his face colouring. “For it was George Boleyn himself who drove her into my arms.”

  “How so?” Cromwell smiles, as if expecting some silly jest.

  “There is a rumour, going about court,” Suffolk says, truthfully. In the last few days, he has mentioned George Boleyn’s sexual preferences to all and sundry. “Concerning his desires.”

  “His desires, sir?” Cromwell shrugs. “We all have them. Even I.”

  “Not for boys, Master Cromwell,” Suffolk explains. “Lady Jane confirmed as much to me. Everyone knows.”

  “What, it is common knowledge?” Cromwell says, playing his part well. “What does the king think of it?”

  “Dear Christ, but I have said nothing to him.”

  “But, My Lord, if this is true, Henry must be told at once,” Cromwell says. “He cannot marry into a family with such a dark secret.”

  “You mean he might throw Anne aside?”

  “He must, if George is a sodomite.” Cromwell watches as a smile spreads to Suffolk’s face. With one rumour, he can ruin the chances of the Boleyn family, and stop his friend from marrying a woman whom he detests.