Sovereign

by C. J. Sansom

  ‘I’ll have to come too then. Be your chaperone. It’s all right. I could do with getting out of here too.’

  NEXT MORNING DAWNED fine and sunny, but with a chill wind. The King, they said, had gone hunting again. We set off into the city. It was market day and York was busy; we passed officials from St Mary’s arguing with some merchants, evidently buying up more stores.

  Tamasin had told Barak she and Mistress Marlin would be visiting a shop in Coneygate that sold fine fabrics. We arrived in St Helen’s Square shortly after ten. I glanced down Stonegate towards Oldroyd’s house, remembering the day the glaziers had surrounded us there. We might have come to grief if Master Wrenne had not happened along then. On the other side of the square people were going in and out of the Guildhall.

  Barak nodded at St Helen’s church on the corner. Where the churchyard faced the street, a bench had been set under a tree.

  ‘Let’s sit there for a bit,’ I said.

  ‘You’ve taken a fondness for sitting under trees.’

  ‘Your back is safe against the bark,’ I said quietly. ‘And you can see who’s coming.’

  ‘They have to pass this way to return to St Mary’s,’ Barak said. ‘It’ll look as if we’ve just stopped for a rest.’

  We entered the churchyard and sat on the bench. The graves were covered with fallen leaves, red and yellow and gold. It was a restful spot.

  Barak nudged me. ‘There’s the Recorder waving at us,’ he said.

  I looked up. Recorder Tankerd had come out of the Guildhall. Seeing him reminded me of Fulford. I waved back and he came over to us.

  ‘Taking a rest, sir?’ he asked. His look at me was curious, appraising. Perhaps he wanted to report back to his colleagues about how I looked after being mocked by the King. Well, no doubt I looked tired and strained, though there were other reasons for that.

  ‘Ay. We have a morning’s leisure before tackling the rest of the petitions this afternoon.’

  ‘Have the hearings gone smoothly?’

  ‘Very well. Brother Wrenne knows what he is doing.’

  ‘No lawyer in York is more respected. But he is taking on no new work, I hear. Perhaps he is retiring at last.’

  ‘He is ripe in years,’ I answered evasively.

  ‘And has begun to look his age recently.’

  I did not reply, and Tankerd smiled uncertainly. ‘Well, I must be off. The council has been asked to press the Ainsty farms to deliver all their produce to St Mary’s, even the seed corn. But they are offering a good price. It looks like it may be a while before the Scotch King comes. Well, good day.’ He paused a moment, then said quietly, ‘What the King said to you was shameful, sir. I am not the only one who thinks so.’

  I looked up in surprise. ‘Thank you.’ I paused. ‘They do not all laugh, then, at the Guildhall?’

  ‘By no means, sir. It was a cruel jest, it has not improved the King’s reputation.’

  ‘Thank you, Brother Tankerd. That is good to know.’

  He bowed and left us. I sat watching him go.

  Barak nudged me. ‘Here they come.’ I looked up to where Mistress Marlin and Tamasin were walking slowly up the street. Behind them an armed servant carried a large box, full of sewing materials no doubt.

  ‘Good morning!’ I called.

  The sun was behind us, and Jennet Marlin squinted frowningly for a moment before recognizing us. She hesitated.

  ‘May we rest here a moment, mistress?’ Tamasin asked sweetly. ‘I have been standing all morning, I would be glad to sit down.’ She certainly had skills in diplomacy.

  Mistress Marlin looked at us, perhaps guessing this meeting was no accident. She hesitated, then nodded. ‘Yes. Let us rest a few minutes.’

  I stood up and bowed her to sit there.

  ‘There is not room for all of us,’ Tamasin said. ‘Come, Master Barak, let us sit under that tree. I will show you the fine stuff we have bought.’

  ‘Eh? Oh, yes.’ Barak followed Tamasin as she led the way to a secluded spot under an oak. I was left with Jennet Marlin. The servant went and sat down on the grass at a respectful distance. I smiled at her uncertainly. ‘Well, Mistress Marlin. How do you fare?’ She looked tired and preoccupied, her large eyes unhappy. Untidy brown curls had escaped from her hood and she brushed them from her forehead. ‘Have you any news from London?’

  ‘No. And still no word of when we may leave this wretched city.’

  ‘The Recorder says they are buying up still more provisions.’

  ‘The men will be getting restless in camp, breaking out at night as they did at Pontefract.’ She sighed deeply. ‘By our Lady, I wish I had never been persuaded to come on this enterprise.’ She looked at me seriously. ‘Bernard, my fiancé, was supposed to accompany us.’ She hesitated. ‘In fact, he was to have the job you have now. Working on the petitions.’

  ‘Ah. I did not know.’

  ‘First Bernard was arrested, then his first replacement died. Yours is an unlucky post.’

  No wonder she had been so hostile at first. She seemed to have accepted me now, though, even to see me as a confidant. That pleased me; in an odd way it was as though little Suzanne and I had made friends again. I thought, I must stop seeing people as substitutes. Mistress Marlin for Suzanne, Giles Wrenne for my father.

  ‘It was one of his friends persuaded me to come away,’ she said. ‘Another lawyer of Lincoln’s Inn. When Bernard was taken to the Tower in April I visited him every day. But his friends said I might attract suspicion to myself, it might be better if I came away on the Progress. And Lady Rochford was very insistent. She is used to me dealing with her clothes for her.’

  ‘I can see it must have been hard leaving London.’

  ‘If there are any developments, I have leave to return to London. But nothing has happened for almost three months. Forgive me, sir,’ she said suddenly, ‘I must bore you with my talk.’

  ‘No, no. I sympathize, madam.’ I looked at her. ‘How does your fiancé fare in the Tower? His friends will visit him?’

  She twisted at her engagement ring. ‘Yes, they bring him food and clothes, and he has a cell that is less miserable than most, above ground. We had to pay the gaolers well for that,’ she added bitterly.

  ‘I can imagine.’

  ‘And yet I fear for his health in there. Winter draws near.’

  ‘Perhaps he will be freed ere winter.’

  She only sighed.

  ‘His friends,’ I asked. ‘They are all from Gray’s Inn?’

  She looked at me sharply then. ‘Why do you ask?’

  ‘I wondered if he might know the nephew of a friend of mine. Another Gray’s Inn lawyer from the north.’ I told her of Giles’s determination to find his nephew, my offer to help.

  She considered. ‘ ’Tis true the northern lawyers at Gray’s Inn tend to stick together. Most of them are traditionalists in religion.’

  ‘I believe this man is. Martin Dakin.’

  ‘I do not know the name.’

  ‘Have any other Gray’s Inn lawyers been arrested? There was suspicion of them in 1536.’

  ‘Not that I know of.’

  ‘That is reassuring. Thank you. What chambers did your fiancé practise in at Lincoln’s Inn?’

  ‘Not did, sir, does. He will be free. The name of his chambers is Garden Court.’

  ‘I am sorry. Thank you.’

  She was silent a moment, then turned those large sorrowful eyes on me again. ‘Do you know what my Bernard is accused of?’

  ‘No, mistress.’

  Her look was penetrating. ‘I thought you might have heard, since it is common gossip.’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Of knowing two Yorkshire gentlemen who were part of the conspiracy. But they were both old friends, of course he knew them.’

  ‘Did they say he was involved?’

  ‘No, though they were tortured. They are dead now, their remains were on the Fulford Gate till it was cleaned up for the King.’ She clenched her hand
s into tight little fists in her lap.

  ‘Then there is no evidence.’

  She looked at me. ‘There was a letter that one of them sent to Bernard at Gray’s Inn, at the end of last year. They say it speaks of better times coming this year. But Bernard told me it meant only hope for a better harvest after last year’s drought.’

  ‘If that is all, it seems paltry.’

  ‘It takes little to condemn a man these days. Especially if he is fond of the old ways in religion. Oh, he is no papist, far from it, and I believe I was persuading him of the truth of Bible religion – so far as any woman can influence a man. But he was known as a traditionalist and that is enough to condemn him. If poison is whispered in the right ears.’ She looked at me, her eyes sharp and focused now.

  ‘Whose ears?’ I sensed she had wanted me to ask.

  ‘Bernard bought the land of a small dissolved abbey up here,’ she said. ‘It was next to his family lands.’ Her mouth set tight and hard again. ‘But a certain other family, whose lands it abuts on the other side, wanted it for themselves. It would suit their purposes if he were attainted for treason. So that his lands would go to the King, and could be bought cheap.’ She paused. ‘The family’s name is Maleverer.’

  I remembered the look of hatred she had cast at him at King’s Manor when Tamasin was brought in for questioning.

  ‘By heaven,’ she said. ‘He is hungry for land.’

  ‘I know he is bidding for some of Robert Aske’s estates and – and I believe he also seeks a property in London.’

  ‘It is because he is a bastard.’ Jennet Marlin almost spat the word. ‘He believes if he can get enough land he can outrun it.’ She looked at me. ‘People will do any evil thing for money these days, there was never so much greed in the land.’

  ‘There I agree with you, mistress.’

  ‘But Maleverer will not win.’ She clenched her fists more tightly. ‘Bernard and I are destined to be together. It is meant.’ She spoke quietly. ‘People laugh at me, say I am determined to marry before I am too old —’

  ‘Mistress,’ I murmured, embarrassed at her frankness, but she continued.

  ‘They do not understand what there is between Bernard and me. He was my childhood friend. My parents died when I was small and I was brought up in his household. He was three years older, he was father and brother to me.’ She was silent a moment, then looked at me again. ‘Tell me, sir, do you believe two people can be destined to be together, that God may set their path before they are born?’

  I shifted uncomfortably. Her words sounded as though they came from some flowery poem of courtly love. ‘I am not sure I do, mistress,’ I answered. ‘People fall in and out of love, or do not speak until it is too late. As I did once, to my sorrow.’

  She looked at me, then shook her head. ‘You do not understand. Even when Bernard married another, I knew that was not the end. And then his wife died, and he proposed to me. So you see, it is as it was meant.’ She stared at me with a sudden fierceness that was unnerving. ‘I would do anything for him. Anything.’

  ‘I am sorry for your trouble,’ I said quietly.

  She stood abruptly. ‘We should be going on.’ She looked over to where Tamasin was showing a bored-looking Barak some richly dyed cloth. ‘Tamasin,’ she called. ‘We should be on our way.’

  Tamasin packed up the cloth, brushed some fallen leaves from her dress and walked across to us, Barak following. Mistress Marlin curtsied to me. ‘Good morning, sir.’ The women turned and walked out of the churchyard, the servant following. Barak shook his head.

  ‘By Jesu, Tammy can be a tease. She made me look at those damned cloths, told me all about what they were. She knew it bored me, but I was a captive audience.’

  ‘She’ll domesticate you if you’re not careful.’

  ‘Never,’ Barak said; emphatically, but with a smile. ‘Sorry to leave you with Mistress Marlin.’

  ‘Oh, it seems we are becoming friends.’

  ‘Rather you than me.’

  ‘She told me more about her fiancé. And I learned more about our good Sir William.’ I told him what she had said about Maleverer and about Bernard Locke. ‘Mistress Marlin seems to have given her whole life over to that man. Her heart and her soul.’

  ‘Is that not a creditable thing in a woman?’

  ‘What if something should happen to him? She would be quite undone.’

  ‘Maybe you could step into his shoes,’ Barak said with a grin.

  I laughed. ‘I do not think anyone could do that. Besides, Mistress Marlin’s intensity would be hard to live with.’ I looked down the road the women had followed. ‘For her sake I hope they find nothing against Master Locke.’

  Chapter Thirty

  THAT AFTERNOON we returned to the castle to deal with the last of the petitions. Aske’s bones had gone from the grass below the keep; there was nothing to show they had hung there save a thin red streak at the top of the tower. It looked like blood. Then I realized the chains must have rusted through.

  I thought Giles uncharacteristically sharp with the petitioners, and I intervened a couple of times when he became impatient with some stumbling complainant. We finished around five, and Master Waters collected up his papers and bowed to us. ‘Well, gentlemen,’ he said. ‘I bid you well on your journey to Hull.’

  ‘Thank you,’ I replied. ‘Though Heaven alone knows when we get there.’

  ‘Yes, the King appears set for a long stay.’

  Waters left the room, and I turned to Master Wrenne. He looked pale and tired, and when he stood up his big body stooped. He had brought his walking stick today and now he leaned on it heavily, in a way that reminded me for a moment, oddly, of the King.

  ‘Are you in pain, Giles?’ I asked.

  He nodded. ‘Ay. Would tha walk home with me, give me your arm?’

  ‘Of course,’ I said, touched by the way he had slipped into the old Yorkshire usage. I helped him down the stairs and out to the street, Barak following on. Giles shivered in the cold wind.

  ‘How long is the King going to let James keep him waiting?’ he said anxiously. ‘He’s not coming!’

  ‘We do not know what messages may be passing between here and the Scotch court.’

  ‘He’s not coming!’ Wrenne repeated forcefully. ‘Jesu, would you come into a foreign land and place yourself at the mercy of someone like Henry?’

  Barak looked around him anxiously; fortunately no one was within hearing distance. ‘Keep your voice down, Giles,’ I urged him.

  He spoke in lower tones. ‘I speak the truth, as tha know’st. Oh, God,’ he said with uncharacteristic vehemence. ‘I want to make it to London.’

  We left him with Madge and returned to King’s Manor. I prayed for him to be given enough strength to make his last journey of reconciliation. We had arranged to meet Tamasin for dinner. There was a casual air in the refectory as we entered, people talking and joking and eating sloppily as they had before the King came; they were used to his presence now. Tamasin was sitting at the table we had made our own, at the back with a good view of the door. She wore a fetching blue dress, her bright gold hair unbound below a small coif and tumbling to her shoulders.

  ‘Have you had a busy afternoon, mistress?’ Barak asked her fondly.

  ‘Quiet enough, the King and Queen have been away hunting for the day again. Good evening, sir,’ she said to me, smiling.

  ‘Good evening, Tamasin.’ I sat next to Barak, feeling like a gooseberry. ‘I will spend the evening in the lodging house tonight, I think,’ I said. ‘I have some papers to go over.’ I did not, but it would allow them some time together. Tamasin, realizing my purpose, gave me a grateful smile.

  ‘I had an interesting talk with Mistress Marlin today,’ I told her. ‘She told me more about her fiancé.’

  ‘Poor Mistress Marlin. She tells everyone who will listen. She should take care her accusations do not get back to Sir William.’

  ‘I doubt she cares. She seems to think of not
hing but Master Locke’s imprisonment.’

  ‘Is that not understandable?’ Tamasin asked. ‘With the man she has loved all her life in the Tower? Some of the maids make cruel remarks, and cruel remarks can hurt—’

  ‘I know that well.’

  ‘Yet she has never burst out in anger, always held herself under control. I could have wept for her sometimes.’

  ‘She told me she thinks it is destiny that she and Master Locke should be married. I am not sure that such a degree of devotion is a healthy state of mind.’

  Tamasin smiled, a smile that had something of steel in it. ‘I admire her determination.’

  There was an uncomfortable silence for a few moments. Then Barak leaned forward. ‘There is something we should tell you, Tammy. Master Shardlake was attacked again last night.’

  ‘What?’ She looked up at me and now I saw the strain in her face and the shadows under her eyes. Barak told her about the bear. When he had finished she took a long shuddering breath.

  ‘So, but for the soldiers coming, you might have been killed?’

  ‘Ay,’ Barak answered on my behalf. ‘If they had not been near, guarding the prisoner.’

  ‘The man Broderick?’ she asked.

  I looked at her sharply. ‘How do you know about Broderick? His presence here has been kept quiet.’ I turned to Barak. ‘Did you tell her? The less she knows, the safer she is.’

  He looked uncomfortable. ‘Yes. But quite a few know.’

  ‘We must be careful about what we say.’

  Tamasin gave me look of unexpected hardness. ‘I am always careful, sir. Life has taught me that.’

  ‘Tammy says Lady Rochford is watching her carefully,’ Barak said.

  ‘That she is.’ As Tamasin helped herself to pottage from the common bowl, I saw her hands were shaking, and realized again the strain she had been under since that encounter with Culpeper. She was good at hiding it but tonight it showed.

  A DAY PASSED, then another and another, and still there was no word of the Scotch King. The guards still stood before the pavilions and the tents, the surfaces of which were cleaned with fine brushes every day. One day, as Barak and I were walking in the courtyard, I saw Sir Richard Rich standing in the doorway of one of the pavilions. He was studying me coldly. We turned away.