by C. J. Sansom
I raised my eyebrows. ‘Prior Mortimus, how is it that you were moved by the death of a servant girl, yet show no sorrow for the death of a brother you must have worked with many years?’
‘I said before, a monk’s obligations in this life are clear different from a mere woman’s.’ He gave me a steely look. ‘One of those obligations is not to be a pervert.’
‘I am glad you are not a judge in King’s Bench, Brother Prior.’
HE TOOK ME BACK down the stairs to the nave and through another door, to where a long spiral staircase led up to roof level. It was a long climb and I was breathless by the time we came out on a narrow wooden passageway leading to another door. An unglazed window gave a dizzying view out over the precinct and beyond, white fields and the forest in one direction and the grey sea in the other. It must have been the highest point for miles. A freezing wind whined mournfully, ruffling our hair.
‘It’s through here.’ The prior led me through the door into a bare, wood-floored chamber where thick bell ropes hung to the floor. Looking up, I could see the dim outlines of the huge bells above. In the centre of the room, railed off, was a large circular hole. I looked over the rails and had another view of the church floor; we were so high now the men below seemed like ants. I could see the basket hanging twenty feet underneath, the outlines of tools and buckets visible inside it under a large cloth. The ropes led up through the hole into the room, where they were secured to more enormous rivets driven into the walls.
‘But for the hole the sound of the bells would deafen those working the bell ropes,’ the prior observed. ‘They have to plug their ears as it is.’
‘I can imagine; they almost deafen one at ground level.’ I noticed a flight of wooden steps. ‘Do those lead to the bell tower itself?’
‘Yes, they’re used by the servants who go up to clean and maintain them.’
‘Let us go up. After you.’
The stairs led to another room, where a rail surrounded the bells themselves. They were indeed enormous, each larger than a man and fixed to the roof with huge rings. Nothing was hidden up here either. I went over to the bells, taking care not to go too close to the edge, for the railing was low. The nearest bell was covered with ornate metalwork and had a large plaque fixed to it, inscribed in a strange language.
‘Arrancado de la barriga del infiel, año 1059,’ I read aloud.
‘Taken from the belly of the infidel,’ Prior Mortimus said. I started; I had not realized he was so close.
‘Commissioner,’ he said, ‘I would ask you something. You saw the abbot earlier?’
‘Yes.’
‘He’s a broken man. He’s not fit for the office any more. When it comes to a replacement, Lord Cromwell will want a hard man who’ll be loyal to him. I know he’s been promoting supporters in the monasteries.’ He looked at me meaningfully.
I shook my head in surprise. ‘Prior Mortimus, do you really think this house will be allowed to continue? After what has happened here?’
He looked taken back. ‘But surely – our life here – it can’t really end. There’s no law to make us surrender. I know people say the monasteries will come down, but that can’t be allowed, surely.’ He shook his head. ‘Surely not.’ He took another step closer, pressing me back against the railing, his foul body odour rancid in my nostrils. My heart began thumping wildly.
‘Prior Mortimus,’ I said. ‘Please stand away.’
He stared at me and then stepped back.
‘Commissioner,’ he said intently, ‘I could save this house.’
‘The future of the monastery is something I must discuss only with Lord Cromwell.’ My mouth was dry, for a terrible moment I had thought he was about to push me over. ‘I have seen all I need. There is nothing hidden here. Let us go down now.’
We descended in silence. I was never so glad to stand on firm ground again.
‘Will ye be leaving now?’ the prior asked.
‘Yes. But Mark Poer carries my authority while I am away.’
‘When ye talk to Lord Cromwell, will ye mention what I said, sir? Please. I could be his man.’
‘I have many things to tell him,’ I said shortly. ‘And now, I must go.’
I turned and walked quickly away to the infirmary. The shock of Gabriel’s death had suddenly caught up with me; my head spun and my legs threatened to give way as I walked though the infirmary hall to our room. Mark was not there, but a pannier had been made up containing my papers, some food and a change of shirt. I pushed it aside and sat on the bed, letting myself give way to a trembling that shook me from head to toe. I found myself suddenly weeping uncontrollably, and I gave way to it. I wept for Gabriel, for Orphan, for Simon, even for Singleton. And for my own terror.
I was feeling calmer, washing my face in the water bowl, when there was a knock at the door. I hoped it might be Mark come to say farewell, but it was Alice, looking curiously at my flushed face.
‘Sir, the servant has brought your horse round. It is time to leave for town if you are to catch your boat.’
‘Thank you.’ I took my pannier and rose to my feet. She stood before me.
‘Sir, I wish you would not go.’
‘Alice, I must. In London I may find some answers that can end this horror.’
‘The sword?’
‘Yes, the sword.’ I took a deep breath. ‘While I am away, don’t go out if you can help it, stay here.’
She did not reply. I hurried past her, for fear that if I hesitated a moment longer I might say something I would regret. Her look as I passed was unfathomable. At the front door the stable boy stood with Chancery, who waved his white tail and whinnied as he saw me. I stroked his flank, glad for at least one being that greeted me with affection. I mounted with my usual difficulty and headed for the gate, which Bugge held open. I stopped and looked back over the white courtyard for a long moment, I know not for what. Then I turned, nodded to Bugge and led Chancery out onto the Scarnsea road.
Chapter Twenty-seven
THE JOURNEY TO LONDON was uneventful. There was a favourable wind and the little cargo boat, a two-masted crayer, followed a strong tide up the Channel. It was even colder out at sea and we travelled over leaden waves under a grey sky. I kept to the little cabin, only venturing out when the tang of hops became too strong. The boatman was a sullen creature of few words, aided by a scrawny youth; both rebuffed my attempts to draw them into conversation about life in Scarnsea. I suspected the boatman was a papist because once when I came on deck I found him mumbling over a rosary, which he quickly pocketed when he saw me.
We were two nights at sea and I slept well, wrapped in blankets and my coat. Brother Guy’s potion had made a real difference, but also away from the monastery I realized how oppressive that life of constant fear and turmoil had been. I reflected how in that atmosphere it was no wonder Mark and I had quarrelled; perhaps we could yet repair things when all this was over. I thought of Mark, no doubt establishing himself now in the abbot’s house. I was sure he would ignore my instructions about Alice; his words had implied as much. I guessed she would tell him that I had revealed my own feelings for her, out on the marsh, and felt a hot flush of embarrassment. I worried for their safety, too, but told myself that if Mark kept to the abbot’s house, no doubt with visits to the infirmary, and if Alice went quietly about her duties, surely nobody would have any motive to harm them.
WE ARRIVED AT Billingsgate in the afternoon of the third day, after a short wait at the mouth of the Thames for the tide to turn. The banks of the estuary were covered with snow, though I fancied not so thickly as at Scarnsea. Standing on the deck, I made out a slushy growth of ice on the far bank. Following my glance the boatman addressed me almost for the first time on our journey.
‘I fancy the Thames may freeze again, like last winter.’
‘You may be right.’
‘I remember last year, sir, when the king and the court rode across the frozen Thames. Did you see it?’
‘No, I wa
s in court. I am a lawyer.’
I remembered Mark’s description of it, though. He had been working in Augmentations when word came that the king was to ride across the ice from Whitehall to the Christmas celebrations at Greenwich Palace, with all the court, and he wanted the Westminster clerks to follow too. It was all political, of course; a truce had been called with the northern rebels and their leader, Robert Aske, was in London to parley with the king under a safe conduct. The king wanted to provide a spectacle to show Londoners that rebellion would not interfere with his celebrations. Mark never tired of telling how all the clerks were sent out with their papers to the riverside, forcing their reluctant horses onto the ice.
His own horse nearly threw him as the king himself rode past, a massive figure on a huge warhorse, Queen Jane on her palfrey tiny at his side, and behind them all the ladies and gentlemen of the court, then the household servants. Finally Mark and the other clerks and officials joined the end of the great train that went hallooing and shouting across the ice, horses and carts slipping and slithering, watched from their windows by half London. The clerks were there only to contribute to the spectacle; they were sent back across London Bridge again that night, clutching their papers and ledgers. I remember discussing it with Mark months later, after Aske’s arrest for treason.
‘They say he is to be hanged alive in chains at York,’ Mark had said.
‘He was a rebel against the king.’
‘But he was given safe conduct; why, he was entertained at court for Christmas.’
‘ “Circa regna tonat.” ’ I quoted Wyatt’s lines at him. ‘Around thrones the thunder rolls.’
The boat lurched; the tide was turning. The boatman steered into the middle of the river and soon the great spire of St Paul’s, and the huddle of ten thousand white-covered roofs, came into view.
I HAD LEFT Chancery stabled in Scarnsea and when I disembarked I walked home as the sun began to set. The sword from the pond knocked uncomfortably at my leg; I had put it in Mark’s scabbard, which was too small for it, and I was unused to wearing a weapon.
This time it was a relief to be back in the London throng; just one more anonymous gentleman, instead of the focus of all that fear and hate. The sight of my house uplifted my sore heart, as did the welcome I had from Joan. My return was unexpected and she had only a poor fowl, an old boiled crone, for my supper, but I was happy to sit again at my own table. Afterwards I went to bed, for I had only one full day in London and much to do.
I LEFT THE HOUSE early, before the winter sunrise, on an old ambling nag we kept. Cromwell’s office at Westminster was already a hive of candlelit activity by the time I arrived. I told Chief Clerk Grey I needed an urgent appointment. He pursed his lips and glanced towards Cromwell’s sanctum.
‘He has the Duke of Norfolk with him.’
I raised my eyebrows. The duke was the leader of the anti-reformist faction at court, Cromwell’s arch-enemy and a haughty aristocrat; I marvelled at him deigning to visit him at his office.
‘Nonetheless, it is urgent. If you could take a message, saying I need to see him today.’
The clerk eyed me curiously. ‘Are you well, Master Shardlake? You look very tired.’
‘I am well enough. But I do need to see Lord Cromwell. Tell him I will wait on him whenever he wishes.’
Grey knew I would not interrupt his master without reason. He knocked nervously at the door and went in, reappearing a few minutes later to tell me Lord Cromwell would see me at eleven at his house in Stepney. I would have liked to have gone over to the courts, to see what news there was among the lawyers and soothe myself with familiar scenes, but other matters needed attention. I adjusted the sword and rode away through the pink icy dawn to the Tower of London.
I HAD ORIGINALLY thought of visiting the swordmakers’ guild, but all the guilds lived among mountains of paper whose contents they guarded with jealous secrecy and it could take all day to prise information from them. I had met the Tower armourer, a man named Oldknoll, at a function some months before, and remembered that he was said to know more about weaponry than anyone in England. He was, too, Cromwell’s man. My letter of appointment as commissioner gained me entrance to the Tower, and I found myself passing through the gate under the looming mass of London Wall. I crossed the bridge over the frozen moat into the great fortress, the bulk of the White Tower dwarfing the lesser buildings around it. I never liked the Tower; I always thought of those who had come across that moat and never left alive.
The lions in the Royal Menagerie were howling and roaring for their breakfasts and I watched as a pair of wardens in their scarlet and gold coats scurried across the snow-covered Tower Green bearing great pails of offal for them. I shivered, remembering my encounter with the dogs. Leaving the nag in the stables, I climbed the steps to the White Tower. Inside the Great Hall soldiers and officials milled about, and I saw two guards leading a crazed-looking old man in a torn shirt roughly towards the steps leading down to the dungeons. I showed my commission to a sergeant, who led me to Old-knoll’s room.
The armourer was a gruff, hard-faced soldier. He looked up from a sheaf of paper he was studying gloomily, and bade me sit.
‘God’s wounds, Master Shardlake, the paperwork we have these days. I hope you have not brought me more.’
‘No, Master Oldknoll, I have come to pick your brains if I may. I am on a mission for Lord Cromwell.’
He gave me his attention. ‘Then I will do all I can to aid you. You seem under strain, sir, if I may say so.’
‘Yes, everyone is saying so. And they are right. I need to know who made this.’ I unsheathed the sword, handing it to him carefully. He bent to study the maker’s mark, gave me a startled glance, then looked more closely.
‘Where did you get this?’
‘In a monastery fish pond.’
He crossed to the door and closed it carefully, before laying the sword on the desk.
‘You know who made it?’ I asked.
‘Oh yes.’
‘Is he alive?’
Oldknoll shook his head. ‘Dead these eighteen months.’
‘I need to know everything you can tell me about that sword. What those letters and symbols signify, to start with.’
He took a deep breath. ‘You see the little castle stamped there? That indicates the maker was trained at Toledo in Spain.’
My eyes widened. ‘So the owner would be a Spaniard?’
He shook his head. ‘Not necessarily. Many foreigners go to learn weaponry at Toledo.’
‘Including Englishmen?’
‘Until the religious changes. Englishmen are not welcome in Spain now. But before, yes. Those who have studied at Toledo usually take the Moorish fortress, the Alcazar, as their mark on the sword they submit on applying to the guild for admission. That is what this man did. Those are his initials.’
‘JS.’
‘Yes.’ He gave me a long look. ‘John Smeaton.’
‘God’s flesh! A relative of Mark Smeaton, Queen Anne’s lover?’
‘His father. I knew him slightly. This sword would be the one he made to gain entry to the guild. Fifteen hundred and seven, that would be about the right date.’
‘I did not know Smeaton’s father was a sword-maker.’
‘He started out as one. A good one, too. But he had an accident some years ago, lost parts of two fingers. He didn’t have the strength in his hand afterwards for sword-making, so he turned to carpentry. He had a small works over at Whitechapel.’
‘And he is dead?’
‘He had a seizure two days after his son’s execution. I remember it being spoken of, he had no one to leave the business to. I think it was closed down.’
‘But he must have had relatives. This sword is valuable; it would have been part of his estate.’
‘Aye, it would.’
I took a deep breath. ‘So Singleton’s death was connected with Mark Smeaton. Of course, Jerome knew that somehow. That’s why he told me the story.’
‘I don’t follow you, sir.’
‘I must find out who this sword passed to after John Smeaton died.’
‘You could go to his house. He lived above his shop like most craftsmen. The new owners would have bought it from the executors.’
‘Thank you, Master Oldknoll, you have been a great help.’ I took the sword and buckled it on. ‘I must go, I am due at Lord Cromwell’s house.’
‘I am glad to have assisted. And Master Shardlake, if you are going to see Lord Cromwell—’
I raised my eyebrows. It was always the same, if people knew you were visiting Cromwell there would be some favour to ask.
‘It’s only – if you get the chance, could you ask him if he could send me less paperwork? Every night this week I’ve had to sit up making returns on the weaponry, and I know they have the information already.’
I smiled. ‘I will see what I can do. It is the temper of the times, though; it is hard to go against the tide.’
‘This tide of paper will end by drowning us,’ he said sorrowfully.
LORD CROMWELL’S house in Stepney was an imposing red-brick mansion he had had built a few years before. It housed not just his wife and son but a dozen young sons of clients, whom he had taken into his household for their education. I had visited it before; the house was like a miniature court with its servants and teachers, clerks and constant visitors. As I approached I saw a crowd of ragged people waiting outside. An old blind man, shoeless in the snow, stood with his hand out, calling, ‘Alms, alms by your mercy.’ I had heard that Cromwell got his servants to distribute doles from the side gate in an effort to gain popularity among the London poor. It was a scene uncomfortably reminiscent of the monastery dole day.
I stabled my horse and was led indoors by Blitheman the steward, an amiable fellow. Lord Cromwell would be a little late, he said, and offered me some wine.