The Tapestry: A Novel

by Nancy Bilyeau

  “The man who wrote you the letter?”

  “Yes, a single letter, and that is the difficulty. He confirmed that Edmund saw him and that afterward he sent him to the Black Forest. But he won’t respond to any of the other letters I’ve sent subsequently—more than a dozen—or to correspondence sent at my request from the master at Cambridge. Did he return to Austria? Did he go somewhere else in Germany? We have no idea. Many letters have been sent, without leading to answers. That’s what Geoffrey plans to do: go to Paracelsus, find out any details he can, and then pick up the trail. Last year Edmund wrote me he would be gone three months at most and yet—”

  “Edmund writes to you?”

  “Yes, or rather he did. The letters stopped, and that is why I am so greatly concerned.”

  I don’t know why it should have hurt me so, that Edmund wrote to John Cheke and not to me after that first note he left me in Dartford, saying I would not see him again. I took a moment to be sure my voice was steady before I said, “Paracelsus is such an odd name.”

  “He is a physician of great renown. Or perhaps I should say notoriety. Many do not agree with him. He is sometimes chased from town to town by those who fear and hate his beliefs.”

  “Which are?”

  “That the mysteries of nature can heal us, and more than that—that they hold the answers to all existence. He writes that a work of nature constitutes a visible reflection of the invisible work of God.” He paused. “Those who believe as Paracelsus does say, ‘As above, so below.’ Whatever occurs on any plane of reality, corresponds on another. Everything is connected.”

  My head hurt from trying to understand such beliefs, which seemed, at the least, heretical. What attraction did they hold for Edmund?

  The boat slowed as we approached the landing on the other side of the Thames. Against the inky black sky, the stone palace possessed an unearthly white glow, even in the middle of the night and with only a few candles burning in all of those windows.

  I said, “I cannot comprehend why should Edmund go all the way to Austria to speak with a physician who has such bizarre opinions. He is an apothecary himself, and knows more of healing than most physicians who practice.”

  John Cheke said, “One of Paracelsus’s areas of knowledge is the use of opium, the drug of the red poppy. I believe that’s why Edmund went to him, in a desperate quest for help from his affliction.”

  I suddenly felt so very tired. I did not say another word to Cheke as he helped me from the boat because I was gripped with the pain of remembering my wedding day. The last time I saw Edmund his eyes were blank and sleepy, his words slurred. How cruel, that my final memory of Edmund Sommerville was seeing him enslaved by opium.

  John Cheke said, “It was all my fault, Joanna. I pushed you to leave, to allow me to cope with Edmund that night. But I believe that if you had remained, and been the one to console him when he recovered from the opium—or chastise him—then he would not have left Dartford, covered with shame. He needed you. I didn’t understand that.”

  I shook my head. “Edmund made his own choices, Master Cheke. Do not take this upon yourself.”

  John Cheke said nothing more but walked me through the dimly lit palace to Catherine’s rooms. Her servant Richard slept before the door, as he always did. I nodded my thanks to John and slipped inside. Catherine’s maid Sarah, too, was sound asleep on her pallet on the floor.

  I changed into my shift and curled up in bed. I meant to stay awake for the return of Catherine, but in a few moments I was asleep. My dreams were stalked by ghouls: a woman who crawled out of the river, a skeleton that reached for me, grinning. A girl wailing as she struggled to free herself from a rock.

  I woke up with a start, sitting upright in the bed. Sunlight flooded the room; it looked to be midmorning.

  Catherine’s bed was untouched, the blanket neatly turned over. She had never returned.

  18

  It took me a few moments to realize that there was more to this than Catherine’s failure to come home last night. Her clothes and jewels were gone and so was her maid, Sarah. While I slept, all had disappeared.

  I got dressed as quickly as I could. I’d send word to the Earl of Surrey to discover what happened to Catherine. I could see the hand of his father, the Duke of Norfolk, in this.

  When I yanked open the door to the passageway, I was surprised to find Thomas Culpepper talking to Catherine’s servant Richard. My mind was still thick with traces of sleep and I was certain I looked the worse for the night before, but as always, Thomas Culpepper was meticulously groomed and composed.

  “Good morning, Mistress Joanna, and I am afraid you don’t have much time,” said Culpepper.

  “For what?”

  “The king wishes you to meet this morning with his keeper of the wardrobe to discuss your duties as tapestry mistress.”

  A wave of dread washed over me. So much had happened at the bishop’s banquet, I’d thrust out of my mind the king’s pronouncement. It hadn’t seemed real, somehow. Much more like another piece pushed forward on the chess board by the king to impress or confound others—in this case, the imperial ambassador, Eustace Chapuys. But now, looking at Thomas Culpepper’s serious young face, the gravity of it hit.

  I said to him quietly, “The truth is, I am not suitable for such a position.”

  “It is for the king to decide who is suited to perform which duties at court, and he has decided on you for this,” he said.

  Glancing at Richard, whose stolid expression had given way to something approaching interest, I said, “First I wish to speak with you on another matter in private, Master Culpepper.”

  He joined me inside Catherine’s room, the door left open a few inches for propriety’s sake.

  Before I could even ask, Culpepper said, “She has been moved to Howard House.”

  I was relieved by this explanation. I’d feared something much more reprehensible happened to Catherine last night than her being taken to the London house of the Duke of Norfolk. It raised certain questions, however.

  “How can she serve the queen if she doesn’t lodge in the palace?” I asked. “Or is Catherine no longer a maid of honor?”

  The shutter of grim disapproval came down. “It would be accurate to say that Catherine now serves the king, not the queen,” he said.

  “No,” I said, so loudly that Richard stuck his shaggy head in the room to inquire after my well-being.

  Culpepper said, “Mistress Stafford has just received a piece of unpleasant news, you may continue to wait outside.”

  Richard retreated, and I said, struggling for calm, “The appointment with the Keeper of the Great Wardrobe shall have to wait. I must go to Howard House at once.”

  “It’s too late for that.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I mean that the act that you sought to prevent has occurred, Mistress Stafford. Catherine Howard is now the king’s mistress.”

  Horrified, I turned away from Culpepper. If anyone would know such a thing, it would be this gentleman of the privy chamber. And so I had failed. My efforts to prevent this seduction were nothing pitted against her family’s ambition and the king’s lust. It was almost as if Whitehall itself, this vast stone city within a city, had willed it to happen. Yet I could still feel her fingers digging into my arm as we walked to the river landing. I’d missed what could have been my only chance to rescue Catherine from disaster.

  Culpepper said, “She is now under the total and absolute control of the duke, his stepmother the dowager duchess, and the other Howards. Her submission was sealed with gifts. The goods and chattel of two men of Sussex, indicted before the coroner, have been seized by the Crown and deeded to Mistress Catherine Howard.”

  “What was their crime?” I whispered.

  “Murder.”

  My stomach turned over, and for a moment I thought
I would be sick. After sucking in three deep breaths, it passed.

  “Mistress Stafford, listen to me, please,” said Culpepper. “You must come with me to the Keeper of the Great Wardrobe. It’s time to take up your duties.”

  I whirled around, enraged. “Have you lost your wits? You expect me to serve the king now?”

  “Yes, I do, and for two reasons,” he said, undaunted. “First, you should remain at court to be of support to Catherine when the king discards her. You can be sure that her family will not care what happens to her then.”

  “So you are not among those who think Catherine could become his wife?”

  “A fifth queen?” Culpepper said. “It is unheard of for a king, for any man, to take that many wives. And, even more important, Anne of Cleves cannot be dislodged. The king used an affinity to annul his first marriage—Catherine of Aragon was married to his older brother. Even with that in his favor, it took him years to rid himself of her. He has no such legal grounds for annulment now. Anne of Cleves would never go the way of Anne Boleyn, either. Her conduct is absolutely blameless, and her family in Germany is too powerful to let her be charged with trumped-up crimes.”

  Everything he said made sense. “What is the second reason for your thinking I should serve the king?” I asked.

  He said earnestly, “Because you should seize this opportunity in order to look after yourself, Mistress Stafford. The king intends to pay you significant wages—you will be able to hire servants and create a household. Your future will be assured.”

  “None of that means anything to me,” I said. “I know this may be hard for you to understand, Master Culpepper, but I wish only to lead a quiet life. If I cannot serve God in a priory, then I will follow my calling as best I can outside monastic walls, as others do who once were nuns or monks or friars.”

  “What about your family?” he persisted. “Wouldn’t your filling a court position help the Staffords, who have been so eclipsed in the affairs of the kingdom?”

  Arthur.

  I heard his name as clearly as if someone shouted it from atop Whitehall Palace. Culpepper was right, this position could assure my standing. I’d finally be able to persuade my cousin to send Arthur Bulmer back down. I’d have the money for a tutor and the connections to help him regain his family honor, when the time came. For Arthur’s sake, I must continue to stomach this life at court.

  “Very well,” I murmured. “Lead the way to the Keeper of the Great Wardrobe.”

  As we walked down the passageway, Thomas Culpepper explained that certain arrangements had been made concerning my situation. It was not yet settled if the king wished me to form a part of the permanent royal household, moving with the court among his principal residences. Perhaps a home in London would suit. But until such decisions were made, I must live at Whitehall. Catherine’s maid, Sarah, would stay close to her at Howard House, naturally. And Richard had been reassigned to serve me, and would run ­errands and sleep outside the rooms, as a protector. Culpepper said that word protector with great emphasis. Now I understood why Richard had taken new interest in my welfare. But I still felt uneasy.

  “Who made these decisions?” I asked.

  “The Duke of Norfolk—and myself,” he answered, his cheeks reddening ever so slightly.

  “Why would Norfolk wish me protected?” I demanded. I was certain the opposite must be true; the duke would relish my coming to harm, or at the very least rejoice to see me banished from court.

  “It’s true that the duke bears little fondness for you,” Culpepper admitted. “He is a practical man, however. He sees you high in the king’s favor, and so would not gainsay my proposal that Richard be transferred to your staff.”

  I glanced sideways at Culpepper. His solicitude on my behalf was most kind—certainly no one else was looking out for my interests in such a way—and we both knew that the mystery of who attacked me the first day in Whitehall, and why, was unsolved. However, I felt certain that representing me in negotiations went beyond what a gentleman of the privy chamber should do for a woman he was not related to. Some sort of gentle reproof was called for.

  The passageway we hurried down had become quite crowded, though, and this was not the time or place to take the matter up, even if I knew what to say.

  The Keeper of the Great Wardrobe, the man who directed all of the purchasing and maintaining of the king’s clothing, armor, furs, velvets, canopies, and tapestries, occupied a large chamber, crammed with men, off the Great Hall. I felt a fool, remembering how the man impersonating the page had persuaded me that such an important office would be located in a small building on the outskirts of the palace.

  I was not sure which one of the men was the keeper, for in the center of the room stood a foursome of finely attired older men studying a series of books spread open. A line of a half dozen other men, looking like grooms or clerks, waited to gain the attention of those huddled at the table. Others busied themselves with duties, rushing in and out.

  Thomas Culpepper commented, “There is much work to do, with the tournament next week.”

  “A tournament?”

  Culpepper laughed. “Mistress Stafford, you amaze me. You must be the only living being at Whitehall unaware that the king ordered a tournament joust on May Day, the first to be held in four years. Everyone else thinks of nothing else.”

  A shiver ran up my spine. “May Day?” I asked carefully. “So that is the day of a joust? Nothing else?”

  Culpepper slowly turned toward me. “What else could there be?” The amusement died in his eyes.

  “Is that not the day something will take place that you’ve planned with my cousin the Earl of Surrey and Sir Walter Hungerford?” I asked.

  I suspected he would not appreciate the question, but Culpepper’s reaction astounded me.

  He grabbed my arm, his expression one of horror verging on panic. “How do you know about this—how?” he choked.

  “I heard you in the bishop’s garden park last night,” I whispered.

  “You must forget what you heard, and say nothing to anyone else, do you promise me, Mistress Stafford?”

  “But what—?”

  His grip on my arm tightened. “Promise me, Joanna,” he begged. “If you value my life, and your own, you must not repeat a word of it.”

  I nodded, genuinely frightened.

  Culpepper called out, “Sir Andrew Windsor, Mistress Stafford is here to speak with you, by the king’s command.”

  The heads of the gray-haired men shot up, but Culpepper did not lead me across the room to be introduced to Sir Andrew or anyone else. Instead he turned on his heel and fled, moving faster than I’d ever seen him go—and he always moved like quicksilver.

  Swallowing hard, I walked toward the quartet of court officials at the table. The closer I got, I realized two things. The first was that two of these men were very old indeed, at least seventy years of age. And the second was that they regarded me with a common distaste. I felt like a new mistress sent to take charge of a resentful flock of novices—except that these novices were my grandfather’s age.

  “I am pleased to make the acquaintance of the lady His Majesty has appointed to take charge of his arras collection, the preeminent one in all of Christendom,” said the most elderly of them all, which must mean he was Sir Andrew. The way he said “pleased” suggested just the opposite, and he used the formal term for Flemish tapestry, to drive home the prestige of the collection.

  I curtsied and told him how pleased I was, as well.

  The second elderly man said, with a foreign accent, “We understand you had great difficulty locating the chamber of the keeper of the wardrobe.”

  This must be a reference to my summons to Whitehall and what happened the first day, how I failed to find my way here after being attacked and then encountering Cromwell in Westminster Hall. I had never thought about how my actions w
ould be perceived by these men in charge of tapestry.

  My cheeks warm, I said, “I regret there were . . . complications.”

  Sir Andrew cleared his throat—a genuinely alarming gurgle—and said, “Be that as it may, we are taxed with the inventory of the Whitehall collection, Mistress Stafford. It comes at a difficult time, when we must prepare for His Majesty’s tournament, the greatest pageant the court has put on for years. Following which, the royal household departs Whitehall for Greenwich.”

  So that explained the disapproval in the air—they resented the inconvenience.

  The second man said, scowling in accusation, “Mistress Stafford, the order for inventory was in response to a remark you made?”

  “I made no such remark, or request,” I replied.

  The men looked at one another, silently dubious.

  My temper flaring, I said, “If you feel the king has erred in requesting an inventory of his own arras, I can convey that sentiment the next time I am in his presence.”

  The man who’d accused me of prodding the king recoiled, visibly shocked. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw two clerks ribbing each other. Sir Andrew said, more mildly, “You must forgive my colleague. Master Jan Moinck is the king’s agent for acquisition in Brussels, recently returned. He has a role in supervising the arras. He has labored long hours to perform the inventory, with few clerks to spare.”

  “You are from Flanders, sir?” I asked Master Moinck. If we were to work in tandem, which seemed inevitable, I must get our acquaintanceship on a better footing.

  Chin trembling, he responded, “How did you know that? Are you one who distrusts all foreigners, Mistress Stafford?”

  “I hardly think so, being that my mother was born in Spain,” I said, exasperated. I took a breath. Best to try again. “I recognized your accent and I am also aware that those from Flanders possess discerning taste when it comes to furnishings and decoration and—”

  Jacquard Rolin. That was how I pinpointed his homeland and how I knew of the Flemish reputation for excellent taste. He spoke with the same accent. I hastily shoved the imperial spy from my thoughts.