by C. J. Sansom
Cranmer said, ‘Your efforts to serve her majesty will not be forgotten.’
It was a dismissal. I adjusted my posture a little, so I could bow to them without pain, for I was still suffering from when Nicholas had thrown me to the ground, to save me from the man with the gun. But the Queen rose from her chair. ‘Matthew, before you go I would talk a little with you again. Come, you have seen my Privy Gallery, but not by daylight. Let us walk there. Mary Odell can accompany us.’ She nodded to Cranmer and Lord Parr, who bowed low. I followed the Queen as she walked to the door, silk skirts rustling.
WITH DAYLIGHT COMING in through the high windows, showing the gorgeous colours to full effect, the Queen’s Privy Gallery was magnificent. The little birds in their cages hopped and sang. The Queen walked slowly along; I kept a respectful pace or two away, while Mary Odell, summoned from the gallery, brought up the rear. The expression on her plump face was neutral, but her eyes were watchful, I saw, as I glanced back.
The Queen halted before an alcove in which a jewelled box was set atop a marble pillar. Within were coins of gold and silver, showing portraits of long-dead kings and emperors. Some were worn almost smooth, others bright as though new-minted. She stirred them with a long finger. ‘Ancient coins have always interested me. They remind us we are but specks of dust amid the ages.’ Carefully, she picked up a gold coin. ‘The Emperor Constantine, who brought Christianity to the Roman Empire. It was found near Bristol some years ago.’ She lifted her head and looked out of the window; it gave on to the Thames bank below the palace, exposed now as the tide ebbed. I followed her gaze, my eye drawn to a heap of rubbish from the palace that had been thrown onto the mud: discarded vegetable leaves, bones, a pig’s head. Gulls swooped over it, pecking and screaming. The Queen turned away. ‘Let us try the view on the other side,’ she said.
We crossed the gallery. The opposite window looked down on another of the small lawned courtyards between the buildings. Two men I recognized were walking and talking there. One was Bishop Gardiner, solidly built, red-faced, dressed again in a white silk cassock. The other, younger man was sturdy, dark-bearded, saturnine: John Dudley, Lord Lisle, who had commanded the King’s naval forces at Portsmouth last year. His defensive strategy had done much to ward off invasion. So the other senior councillor who favoured the radicals was back from his mission abroad. All the chess pieces were in place now. Gardiner, I saw, was talking animatedly, his heavy face for once wearing a civil expression. Something in their postures suggested Gardiner was on the defensive. Lord Lisle inclined his head. This, I thought, was how the real power-play went: conversations in corners and gardens, nods, shrugs, inclinations of the head. But nothing in writing.
The Queen joined me. An expression of distaste and fear, quickly suppressed, crossed her face at the sight of Gardiner.
‘Lord Lisle is back,’ I observed.
‘Yes. Another ally. I wonder what they are discussing.’ She sighed and stepped away from the window, then looked at me and spoke seriously. ‘I wanted you to know, Matthew, the depth of my gratitude for the help you have given. I sense it has cost you much. And my uncle can be – less than appreciative. But all he does is for my interest.’
‘I know.’
‘It looks as though my book will never be found. It saddens me to think it may be on some rubbish tip, for all it may be safer there. It was my confession of faith, you see, my acknowledgement that I am a sinner, like everyone, but through prayer in the Bible I found my way to Christ.’ She sighed. ‘Though even my faith has not protected me from terrible fear these last months.’ She bit her lip, hesitated, then said, ‘Perhaps you thought me disloyal, earlier, for repeating words spoken to me by the King. But – we needed to know what this visit from abroad signifies.’
I ventured a smile. ‘Mayhap a turn in fortune for you, your majesty, if the meeting went badly.’
‘Perhaps.’ She was silent again, then said with sudden intensity, ‘The King – you do not know how he suffers. He is in constant pain, sometimes he near swoons with it, yet always, always, he must keep up the facade.’
I dared to say, ‘As must you, your majesty.’
‘Yes. Despite my fear.’ She swallowed nervously.
I remembered what Lord Parr had said about how the King might react to disloyalty. For all that the Queen revered her husband, her fear of him over these last months must have been an unimaginable burden. I felt a clutch at my heart that she so valued me as to unburden herself thus. I said, ‘I can only imagine how hard it must have been for you, your majesty.’
She frowned. ‘And always, always there are people ready to whisper poison in the King’s ear – ’
Mary Odell, perhaps concerned the Queen was saying too much, approached us. ‘Your majesty,’ she said. ‘You asked me to remind you to take these to the King when you see him. They were found down the side of a chair in his Privy Chamber.’ She had produced a pair of wood-framed spectacles from the folds of her dress, and held them out to the Queen.
‘Ah yes,’ she said. ‘Thank you, Mary.’ The Queen turned to me. ‘The King needs glasses now to read. He is always losing them.’ She tucked the spectacles away, then began walking down the gallery again. ‘The court will be moving from Whitehall next week,’ she said, more brightly. ‘The French admiral is to be received first at Greenwich and then at Hampton Court, so everything is to be moved.’ She waved a hand. ‘All this packed up, transported by boat, set out again in a new place. The Privy Council meeting in a new chamber. With Lisle and Hertford both present,’ she added with a note of satisfaction.
I ventured, ‘I saw Lord Hertford with his brother Sir Thomas Seymour at the palace last time I came.’
‘Yes. Thomas is back, too.’ She looked me in the eye. ‘You do not like him, I know.’
‘I fear his impulsiveness, your majesty.’
She waved a dismissive hand. ‘He is not impulsive, just a man of strong feeling.’
I did not reply. There was a brief, awkward silence, then she changed the subject. ‘You have knowledge of portraiture, Matthew. What was your opinion of the picture of my stepdaughter?’
‘Very fine. It shows the coming substance of her character.’
She nodded. ‘Yes. Prince Edward, too, is a child, well advanced for his years. There are those in my family who hope that one day I may be appointed Regent when he comes to the throne, as I was when the King went to France two years ago. If so, I would try to do well by all.’
‘I am sure of it.’ But the Seymours as well as the traditionalists would oppose her there, I knew.
She came to a halt. ‘Soon the French admiral will come, and afterwards the King and I go on Progress, as you heard.’ She looked at me seriously. ‘You and I may not have another opportunity to talk.’
I answered quietly, ‘A young courtier waiting outside said there is a vacancy on your Learned Council. Do you wish me to resign my position?’
‘The vacant post is not yours but Master Cecil’s. He asked to go. What he experienced at the docks was too much for him, not that he is a coward, but he fears if anything happened to him his wife and children would be left alone. And Lord Hertford has asked him to become one of his advisers. I consented; Cecil is a man of great loyalty and will say nothing of the Lamentation. As for you, Matthew, I wonder if it might be best for all if you were to leave as well.’
‘Yes. After all, I was supposedly appointed only to find a missing jewel.’ I smiled. ‘And sadly, it indeed seems there is no chance of finding your book. Perhaps it would be – politic – for me to leave now.’
‘So my uncle thinks, and I agree.’ She smiled tiredly. ‘Though I would still rather have your counsel.’
‘If you need to call on me again – ’
‘Thank you.’ She looked at me, hesitated, then spoke with quick intensity. ‘One thing more, Matthew. Your lack of faith still troubles me. It will eat away at you from the inside, until only a shell is left.’
I thought sadly: was the real
purpose of our talk for her to make another essay at bringing me to faith? I answered truthfully, ‘I have wished for God, but I cannot find him in either Christian faction today.’
‘I pray that may change. Think on what I said, I beg you.’ She looked into my eyes.
‘I always do, your majesty.’
A sad little smile, then she nodded and turned to Mary Odell. ‘We should go back, sit with the ladies awhile. They will think we are neglecting them.’
We walked back up the gallery. Near the door she paused at a table on which stood a magnificent gold clock a foot high, ticking softly. ‘Time,’ the Queen said softly. ‘Another reminder we are but grains of sand in eternity.’
Mary Odell went in front of us and knocked at the door. A guard opened it from the other side and we stepped through into the heavily guarded vestibule, with its doors leading to the Queen’s rooms, the King’s, and the Royal Stairs. At the same moment another guard opened the doors leading to the King’s chambers, and two men stepped out. One was the red-bearded Lord Chancellor Wriothesley, the other Secretary Paget, a leather folder thick with papers under his arm. They had probably just come from seeing the King.
Seeing the Queen, they bowed deeply. I bowed to them in turn, and rose to see both staring at me, this hunchbacked lawyer wearing the Queen’s badge, who had been walking with her in her gallery. Wriothesley stared with particular intensity, his gaze only relaxing a little when he saw Mary Odell standing by the door: her presence showed the Queen had not been walking alone with a man who was not a relative.
The Queen’s face immediately assumed an expression of regal composure; still, quiet, a little superior. She said, ‘This is Serjeant Shardlake, of my Learned Council.’
Wriothesley’s stare intensified again. Paget’s large brown eyes held mine with a forceful, unblinking look. Then, turning to the Queen, he lowered his eyes and spoke smoothly. ‘Ah yes, the man appointed to help you seek your stolen jewel.’
‘You have heard of that incident, Master Secretary?’
‘Indeed. I was grieved to hear of its loss. A present from your late stepdaughter Margaret Neville, I believe, God save her.’
‘It was.’
‘I see Serjeant Shardlake’s name has been added to the list of those on your Learned Council. And I see young William Cecil has moved to Lord Hertford’s service. He will be a loss, your majesty, he is marked down as a young man of ability.’ I thought, yes, Paget would know of all the changes in the royal household; he would inspect all the lists and ensure nothing of interest passed him by. He would have learned that trick from Thomas Cromwell, his old master and mine.
The Queen said, ‘Serjeant Shardlake is also leaving my council. My jewel has not been discovered, despite his best efforts. There seems little chance of finding it now.’
Paget looked at me again, that stony unblinking stare, and ran a hand down his long forked beard. ‘A great pity the thief could not be caught, and hanged,’ he said, a note of reproof in his voice. He patted his thick leather folder. ‘If you would excuse us, your majesty, the King has just signed some important letters, and they should be immediately dispatched.’
‘Of course.’ She waved a hand in dismissal. Wriothesley and Paget bowed low, then passed through a small door leading into the labyrinthine depths of the palace. The Queen, Mary Odell and I were left standing with the impassive-faced guards. In their presence the Queen’s face remained regally expressionless, giving away nothing of how she had felt at thus encountering Wriothesley and Paget. She knew that Wriothesley, at least, would have had her in the fire.
With a formal smile she said, ‘Farewell, then, Matthew. I thank you again.’
I bowed low, touched her hand briefly with my lips; a scent of violets. In accordance with the rules of etiquette I remained bowed until she and Mary Odell had walked back into her quarters and the doors closed behind her. Then, painfully, I straightened up.
I left my robe bearing the Queen’s badge with one of the guards before I quitted Whitehall, my relief tinged with sadness.
Chapter Forty
EARLY NEXT MORNING I SAT at breakfast, morosely studying a printed circular from Paget’s office, which had been sent to me by Rowland’s clerk. It detailed the duties of those who were to wait in the streets to welcome Admiral d’Annebault’s party when it paraded through London. Representatives of the Inns of Court were to take positions with the city dignitaries beside St Paul’s Cathedral, and cheer as the French party passed. We would be present again at the reception of the admiral given by Prince Edward near Hampton Court Palace two days later, and at the great banquet fixed for the day after. I was not looking forward to any of it, and was still in a sad humour after leaving the Queen, my mission unfulfilled. I had been terse with Martin as he served me that morning, snapping because the butter was on the turn. As usual he reacted with a deferential lack of emotion, apologized, and went to fetch some more.
He returned, laying a fresh dish on the table. I said, ‘I am sorry I spoke roughly just now, Martin.’
‘You were right, sir,’ he answered smoothly. ‘I should have checked the butter. Although Josephine set it out.’ I frowned; he could not resist the chance to criticize her. ‘A visitor has called to see you,’ he said then. ‘Master Coleswyn, of Gray’s Inn.’
‘Philip? Ask him to wait. I will be with him in a moment.’
Martin bowed and left. I wondered if this meant Philip had reconsidered investigating the story of Isabel and Edward’s stepfather. I wiped my lips with my napkin and went through to the parlour. Philip, his handsome features thoughtful, was looking through the window at the garden, bright in the August sunshine. He turned and bowed.
‘Matthew, forgive this early visit. God give you good morrow.’
‘And you. I am glad to see you.’
‘You have a beautiful garden.’
‘Yes, my steward’s wife has done much to improve it. How is your family?’
‘They are well. Much relieved that matters of state have – settled down.’
I invited him to sit. He placed his palms together, then spoke seriously. ‘Since our talk last week, I have struggled mightily with my conscience over what to do about Edward Cotterstoke. Considered my duty to God.’
‘Yes?’ I said encouragingly.
‘I decided I could not let the matter rest. If there is any question of my client being involved with his stepfather’s death, that would be a crime against God and man. Not only could I no longer represent him, I would be obliged at the very least to tell our vicar, who ministers to both our souls.’ He took a deep breath. ‘Last Sunday, after church, I spoke to Edward. I explained I had been told the story of his stepfather’s death, and wondered whether that tragic event was in any way connected with his feelings towards Isabel.’
‘How did he react?’
‘Most angrily. He said the old barrister I spoke to had no right to divulge information about matters on which his mother had instructed him, however many decades ago, and that I should not be listening to such tattle.’
‘Strictly he is right.’
Philip leaned forward, his expression urgent. ‘Yes. But the fierce manner in which Edward reacted – you should have seen it. He was angry, but also perturbed. There is something hidden here, Matthew, something serious.’
‘So I came to think when Isabel was my client.’ I paused, then asked, ‘Well, what next?’
‘I believe now that I should talk to the old servant Vowell. Doing so without Edward’s instruction is a breach of the rules, but nonetheless I believe it is my duty.’ He set his lips tight. ‘I will go to him today.’
‘May I come also?’
He hesitated, then nodded agreement, giving a rare slantwise smile. ‘Yes. I would welcome your presence, and if I am to break the rules by taking my ex-opponent with me, I might as well be hung for a sheep as a lamb.’ He took a deep breath. ‘Let us go now. I came by horse. We can ride there.’
I got Timothy to saddle Genesis,
then sent him to chambers with a note saying I would be in late.
IT WAS STILL EARLY, the city just coming to life, as we rode to the Cotterstoke house at Dowgate. I glanced round periodically; it had become habit since the night of the fight on the wharf. But if I were still being followed, which I doubted, it was by someone very skilled. And perhaps now that all in Greening’s group were dead, or in Vandersteyn’s case fled, there was no longer a need for me to be watched.
We passed a thin, ragged old woman going from house to house calling out, ‘Any kitchen stuff, maids?’ She was one of those who collected kitchen rubbish to sell for a few pence, for use as compost in the vegetable gardens round London. She was old for such a heavy, dirty task. As I looked at her blackened face I remembered Barak talking of seeing his mother in the street. This old woman could even be her. Family quarrels, they were hard things.
We passed the Great Conduit in Eastcheap, maids and goodwives lined up with their pails to fetch water. Some of the beggars who always haunted the conduit left off troubling the women and ran to us, one coming almost under the nose of Philip’s horse, making it shy. ‘Take care, fellow!’ Philip shouted, straining to bring his mount under control. ‘He’ll kick you if you’re not careful!’ As we rode on he said, ‘By Heaven, that fellow stank. Could he not wash himself, seeing as he is lounging by the conduit?’
‘Hard to keep yourself clean if you’re begging in summer.’
He nodded slowly. ‘You are right to reprove me. We must have charity for those who have suffered ill fortune. It is a Christian thing.’
‘Of course. But perhaps we should not give them charge of the realm,’ I added, half-mockingly. ‘As the Anabaptists would wish?’
He looked annoyed. ‘You know I do not approve those heresies.’ He sighed. ‘It is a common enough thing for papists to accuse reformers of being Anabaptists, but I am surprised you give credence to such nonsense.’
‘I do not. I am sorry.’
