The Man On a Donkey

by H. F. M. Prescott

  ‘Well,’ said Ned Bangham, ‘it’s the King’s matter, and the Cardinal’s, the two of them, but certainly not ours.’ And Wat Clifton, who was a cautious man, asked whether it were not better for a wise man to keep his mouth shut.

  ‘Ah!’ cried Aske. ‘Wise!’ in an angry voice, but all the same he did shut his mouth, and keep it shut, till they came to Westminster and parted.

  May 12

  Gib Dawe lived now in Thames Street at the house of a pastry-cook, who had for his sign King David with his harp. Brother Laurence had brought him here from the very wretched hovel outside Ludgate where he had used to lodge, saying it was not fitting he should be there, but among friends, and honest, good folk.

  Gib’s new landlord was one of those called among themselves ‘known men’ or ‘brothers in Christ’. He longed as greatly as Gib to change things in the Church, and indeed some he wanted to change which Gib would have retained, so they had great arguments in the evening when work was done and they sat on the doorstep in the twilight. They grew very hot in their disputes sometimes, for though Gib could have borne that people should go to Church on any day of the week but Sunday (which alteration the pastry-cook believed would bring with it a notable minishing of superstitions); and though he now thought it well that all holy water, and candles, and crosses should be done away with, yet he could not agree that every man was priest as truly as those who had been anointed as he had been.

  So they were arguing it this evening, about and about, looking down the street to the apple blossom in the orchards of the great merchants on the other side of Thames Street, and growing hotter and hotter. Then the cook, a lean man and irascible, drew his knife, but Gib caught his wrist and prayed over him so eloquently that the cook wept, and fell on Gib’s neck. Gib was satisfied that he had demonstrated the potency of priesthood, but he did not say so to the cook. Brother Laurence, when he came to bring Gib more copying of forbidden books to do, was pleased to see the two men so friendly. From each of them he had heard complaints, and feared that Gib and his host would soon part. But this evening, a fair and mild one, dying gently in a clear sky, they talked amicably of the great iniquities of the rich, about which they all agreed, till you could hardly see the colour of the apple blossom in the Thames Street gardens, and till the cook’s wife called them in to supper.

  July 1

  When William Cheyne came out of his chamber this morning he locked the door behind him, and dropped the key of it into his pouch. Then he called down the stairs to the servants who were setting the tables for breakfast in the Hall below that they should bring his meals upstairs that day. They came up with plates and cups and food for two, but he sent down all but what he needed for himself.

  The servants, of course, talked. One of them had heard the mistress calling out, very angry, from the bed-chamber, and beating on the door. But the master had only laughed, and cried out to her that if she fasted to-day, fasting would make continence more easy. ‘And as for me, Sweet,’ he said, ‘it comes of you that I am a lame man now, and only able to have an eye on you if I keep you under lock and key.’

  But if he was cheerful in the morning by the time it was dusk he had sunk into a sour, self-pitying mood. Julian had been able to keep out of his way all day, but at supper-time the maids told her that since it was her sister’s carryings on that were the cause of them having to bring up the master’s food, wine, and candles, she should bear her share. So they pushed the candles into her hands, and sent her before them into the upper room.

  Master Cheyne sat with his chin sunk on his chest, and the staff, on which he leaned ever since his fall downstairs, between his knees.

  He looked up at July, and his lips moved so that she saw his teeth, as if a dog were snarling.

  She came near and put down the candles where he pointed, but before she could get away he caught one of her wrists and held her, so she stood still, with her heart beating right up into her throat, because she was so frightened of him.

  ‘You’re her sister,’ he said, and then let her go, and spoke as if July were not there. ‘God forgive me,’ he cried, ‘and have mercy on me that ever I married a whore.’

  When July found herself free she got away from him to the wall beside the door, and stood there clutching the painted hangings with both her hands behind her back. When the maids had set down the dishes she scuttled away after them.

  August 25

  There had been no train of mourners at the burial, no file of poor folk bearing candles, no singing men and boys to bring music to the very threshold of silence. The body had not lain last night under a herse stuck over with many lighted candles, and to-day, now it was laid by, there would be no great dinner, no great dole for the crowds that should have come to such a burial. All had been done quietly, quickly, almost in a secret huddled way, because, in a time of pestilence, Lady Elizabeth Nevill, second wife of Thomas, Lord Darcy of Templehurst, had died, suddenly and with the marks of the sickness upon her.

  So now only my Lord himself and Lord Sandys of the Vine, Lady Elizabeth’s brother, stood together in the Friars’ Church at Greenwich looking down at the green-and-silver pall that covered the hole in the paving into which the coffin had been lowered. One or two of the Friars moved and stood further off, and, unostentatiously beside a pillar, a couple of masons waited with their bags of tools, for the grave would be closed at once. At the door of the Church my Lord’s gentlemen and servants hung about; they looked sadly, for Lady Elizabeth had been a good mistress and a great lady, and besides they were conscious of a lurking fear that dogged any household where one had died of the pestilence; yet there was upon them a sense of relief; it was grievous that a life was finished; it was well that the empty shell which had held the life was put away. When they saw my Lord move and come slowly down the Church towards them, they turned their faces, almost with eagerness, to the open air, the grey light and whirling dust of a dry but blustering and threatening day.

  Back in the house at Stepney the two lords sat together in my Lord Darcy’s Privy Chamber, and heard the twigs of a wind-thrashed tree outside tap and whine upon the glass. For a long time they sat almost in silence. Then Darcy said, ‘I always thought to be buried with my father and his father at Templehurst. But now I shall choose to be laid beside her.’

  And after a while, in which he had looked about the room as if he were learning it, like a strange room, he said, ‘I see now why the dead are commonly buried with such state. It is to make the living think that death is – something.’ He met Sandys’ eyes, and then again looked about the room from which she had gone, and from which the careful servants had removed all traces of her – the bits of embroidery, a book she had read, her lute – so that her husband’s heart should not be wrung. ‘Whereas,’ said Darcy, ‘it is far worse than anything. It is... it is the nothing of it that...’

  He did not try further to put into words the plain desolation of that one absolute negative, but Sandys understood, and nodded, and they sat again in silence, letting the knowledge of loss flow over all that was in their memory and find its way down every passage of their thought.

  At last Lord Darcy stood up.

  ‘I shall walk in the garden,’ he said, and they went out together into the restless tumult of the wind, on which now and again came a spitting rain. There in the orchard they walked up and down, clutching their hats to them, and with the wind flapping and tugging the skirts of their coats and beating back the breath into their mouths. But each felt better, nearer to life, and nearer too, in a strange way, to the dead, so that they began to talk about her, and even laughed, gently and lovingly, over things which Sandys now remembered of his sister when she was a little girl.

  Yet, in the end, it was the knowledge of loss that must triumph. Darcy stopped and faced his brother-in-law, and let him see the tears on his cheeks.

  ‘As long as I live I shall mourn her. She was—’ He paused to choose his words. ‘She was my truest friend, and has left me now alone.’


  ‘You have two sons, and Bess.’

  ‘And Bess is her mother’s lass, every inch. But she’s a Constable now, since she’s wife to Robert Constable’s son.’

  ‘George,’ said Sandys, in a voice that did not ring true, ‘George is a dutiful son.’

  Darcy looked up into the tossing branches. Some of the leaves, torn away by the wind, went spinning by as though it were already autumn.

  ‘George? If there were a time when George could compass his own profit by my loss, he’d do me a shrewd turn, and rejoice in it, and call it by a fine name.’

  Sandys spoke no more of George, since he thought that saying only too true. Nor could he bring himself to mention Arthur Darcy, so lightly did he regard my Lord’s younger son. But Darcy himself went on: ‘And Arthur – he means no harm nor would do none so long as to be true to his friends and his kin is as easy as playing on his virginals and his clavichords and his regals. But if it were to be a matter of strife, and blood, and danger—’

  He broke off and moved away, and Sandys heard him mutter that God should forgive him for speaking so of his own sons. ‘But it’s the truth,’ he said, and after that there was nothing more spoken between them till the horns sounded for dinner inside the house.

  October 24

  It was a day of drizzling rain and a grey murk from dawn to dusk, so that no one remarked the small closely curtained barge that brought two gentlemen and two ladies, all muffled up in fustian cloaks, to the steps of York Place, the new great house built by the Cardinal, beautified and furnished by him, and now left empty, but for a few of the King’s officers and servants.

  The four who had come by water from Greenwich climbed the river-stairs, crossed the privy garden and went into the Palace by the small door that side. By this very door not a week ago the Cardinal had come out, and stood, hesitating, dazed yet by the fall from the height of his precarious greatness. ‘Which way? Which way?’ he had murmured, like a man lost, and it had needed a servant’s touch on his arm to direct him to the barge that lay waiting. Then he had gone towards it, carrying, himself, a small trussing coffer, since only few of his Household came with him to carry other of his stuff. He had not once looked back at the great Palace with its gables and many gilded weather-vanes catching the light, but had gone away and down to the barge, walking with the cautious, unsteady flat-footed pace of a very old man.

  To-day, once inside the Palace, the King and the others cast down their cloaks.

  ‘Now, Sweet,’ said the King to Mistress Anne, ‘we shall see what goods this false servant of mine hath laid by.’

  ‘There is an inventory written?’ she asked sharply.

  ‘He was bidden write it with his own hand, that nothing should be forgot.’

  They came on the inventory in a little closet of my Lord Cardinal’s own, very richly furnished, but desolate now, with the ashes of a dead fire on the hearth, and dust of the last days on the black velvet close chairs, and the cushions of velvet figury still crumpled in disorder in the window.

  The King and Mistress Anne bent over the many pages of the book; he had his arm about her and his hand over hers at her waist. With his other hand he turned the pages so that their eyes caught out, from here or there, the record of something rich and lovely.

  New hangings... 6 pieces of triumphs, counterfeit arras... the arms of England and Spain, roses and daisies.

  Three blue velvet figury hangings...

  Beds, one of rich tissue.

  Quilts sarcenet, paned, with my Lord’s arms and a crown of thorn in the midst.

  Pillow beres of black silk with fleur de lys of gold; of white silk with red fleur de lys.

  Mrs. Anne seemed to purr like a cat.

  Cloth of silver and green satin sometime the lining of two gowns...

  Blue and crimson velvet and it with green scallop shells of silver embossed with needlework and S S of gold on each of them...

  But the King grew impatient and let the pages go with a run.

  ‘Where is the plate of gold and silver?’

  He found the page.

  A gold cup of assay... a crystal glass garnished with gold... a gold salt garnished with pearls and stones and a white daisy on the knop.

  He shut the book, and, turning, shouted for one of the royal officers who had charge of the stuff. The man’s voice answered him hollowly in the great empty house.

  ‘The keys! The keys!’ the King cried, and when the keys were brought they went away with them to the chamber where all this most precious stuff had been stored.

  There it was, set upon benches and cupboards, and overflowing to the floor, the dim light gleaming on the bellies of gold cups, gold salts, silver cups, silver salts, and catching the facets of jewels.

  ‘Jesu!’ cried Mrs. Anne, and the King said, ‘Passion of Christ!’ at the sight of that sumptuous spectacle. Then they moved about, touching and lifting, here a gilt charger, there a gold cup with a cover and the top-castle of a ship on the knop.

  ‘Ah! the pretty thing,’ cried Mrs. Anne, and pointed her finger at a bowl of gold with a cover, garnished with rubies, diamonds, pearls, and a sapphire set in a collet upon it.

  The King stooped to look at it. Just near, upon the bench end, stood a tall gold salt with twined green branches enamelled upon the gold, and scrolled letters enlaced together; the letters were K. and H. He gave the salt a shove with the back of his hand and it fell from the bench and clattered to the ground.

  Mrs. Anne tittered, because she knew that K. stood for Katherine, but the King’s face had reddened with anger. He caught her by the wrist and kissed her roughly and went on kissing. As his mouth lifted from her throat or from her lips he was muttering,—

  ‘Laugh? You may laugh. And she. And the Pope. But none will laugh when it is seen what I shall do.’

  October 27

  On this day the mermaid, (if she really was a mermaid), came to St. Andrew’s, Marrick, just as the Ladies were sitting down to their Mixtum, which to-day was of fried eggs, and salt herrings soused, because it was a Friday. There was a strong wind blowing from the west, so the sound of the pack-mules’ bells did not reach even those Messes whose chamber windows looked down the dale, until the mules were quite close. But as soon as any of the Ladies heard the bells they knew them for those on the harness of the two Priory mules, Black Thomas and the Bishop, and they knew therefore that Dame Margery Conyers the Chambress, and Dame Bess Dalton and the three servants were returning from York, where the Chambress had been to buy cloth for the Ladies’ gowns.

  Knowing this, more than one of the Ladies clapped a fried egg or a piece of herring between tranches of bread, and bearing these in one hand and a cup of ale in the other, made for the Great Court, to greet the arrival of the returning Ladies; those who had been to York had been, they considered, into the world, and brought back news of miracles, of fashions of gowns and coifs, of the Sweating Sickness, of the Scots, of the prices of cloth; and besides news on these important subjects, other news which might be called little better than tittle-tattle, but the Ladies loved it not less than any of the rest.

  Dame Christabel was eating her Mixtum with the Prioress, and the Prioress’s chamber faced up the Dale, towards Calva, humped and spined like a great beast under its brown heather and red-brown bracken. For this reason, and because of the great wind that was blowing, Christabel did not hear the mule bells; the Prioress did not hear them either, but that was because she was growing very deaf.

  The first thing which Christabel heard above the noises of the wind, which rattled the casement, and made strange whistlings among the rushes on the floor, was the clack of the latch. Then the door burst open, dry bits of rush rose and flew about, the fire swirled out from the chimney, and Christabel had to catch the edge of the boardcloth to prevent it flapping back across the dishes on the table. Dame Elizabeth Close came in, like a great ship before the wind, wind in her skirts, wind in her veil. For a moment she looked far too big. Then she caught the door and forc
ed it shut behind her, and in the restored quiet of the room became her normal size again; which was big enough, Dame Christabel thought, for Dame Elizabeth was a very large woman.

  ‘Our Lady!’ cried she, casting up her hands. ‘Our Lady! A marvel! Here’s a marvel. Jesu! it is a marvel indeed!’

  She went across to the old Prioress who was tremblingly trying to get up from her chair, for if she had not heard she had seen Dame Elizabeth’s gesture.

  ‘What is it?’ she cried in her shaking old voice. ‘Is it the Scots?’

  ‘No, no. Not the Scots. Lord! no. It’s a mermaid!’

  ‘Where?’ The Prioress looked vaguely round as if there might be one under the table.

  ‘Here, in Marrick.’

  The Prioress sank down again. She was not able to deal with such a situation. It was Christabel who asked, ‘How did she come?’

  ‘Dame Margery hath brought her from York.’

  ‘She would!’ Christabel murmured, but under her breath; and to herself she thought, ‘At least if any of them would, she would.’ But she had not expected that any of the Ladies should have had the opportunity of committing such a rare foolishness.

  She said to the Prioress, ‘Shall I go down and see?’ And the Prioress nodded more vehemently than her ordinary ceaseless nodding, so Dame Christabel went.

  The Great Court, as she went down the outer staircase from the Prioress’s room, looked as if to-day were the great spring washing day, so full was it of the flapping white of the Ladies’ veils. But besides the Ladies there were a great many of the serving women, and even some of the farm-men, and of course Jankin the porter in his green hood. And from the centre of the crowd came now and then the chime of the mule bells, or the ring of a hoof on stone as the beasts fidgeted.

  None of them, not even the youngest girl that tended the hens, took notice of anything but what was in the centre of the mob, so, though Dame Christabel came to the outskirts of the crowd, she could see nothing, nor make any way in. ‘Perdy!’ and, ‘Marry!’ cried the wenches, and, ‘By cock!’ the men. But beyond them Dame Christabel could hear Dame Margery’s taut, excited voice declaring that, ‘Yea, truly she is a very mermaid and the Skinner’s wife of York would never have sold her to us but because of the great reverence her husband and she have for St. Andrew. Two pounds I paid, and we are to pray for them both every St. Andrew’s Day.’