Tombland (The Shardlake series Book 7)

by C. J. Sansom

  ‘I know,’ Kenzy said. ‘I think everyone round this table would at least agree the rise in prices is a serious problem.’ He looked around. ‘But what is the cause, hey? Merchants withholding goods so prices rise, yes, but the real problem is the debasement of the coinage. It is no accident we have had two re-coinages this year alone, and that prices rise faster than ever. The root problem is the waste of money on that war in Scotland, which can never be won. The six-year-old Mary, Queen of Scotland is gone to France, now she will never marry King Edward, and there are French troops in Scotland too. I believe that is all the Protector cares about, fighting this unwinnable war to the cost of everyone.’

  Nicholas spoke up from his end of the table. ‘But sir, England must protect itself. Every time we have gone to war with France, the Scotch have attacked us in the rear. If we take control of Scotland, we shall have secured our back door.’

  ‘But the Protector’s campaigns have been disastrous,’ Kenzy replied, irritably. ‘His chain of Scottish forts have fallen one by one, support from Scotch Protestants is non-existent, and our soldiers are deserting. That is the root cause of our troubles, Master Overton. Silver taken out of the coinage and used to finance a failed war. King Henry started this ruination of the coinage, but that is nothing to what the Protector has done since.’

  ‘I disagree the war has failed,’ Nicholas persisted. ‘A fresh campaign is being prepared even now.’

  Ethelreda said, ‘I saw a troop of Switzer mercenaries passing through London last week, mounted and in armour and carrying arquebuses.’

  ‘I saw them too, madam.’ Nicholas’s face was alight with the youthful enthusiasm for war. ‘A remarkable sight.’

  ‘A fearsome sight,’ Ethelreda answered quietly. ‘What if they turn on us?’

  ‘They are pledged to the King.’

  I said, ‘They will pledge themselves to anyone for money. On this matter at least I am with Master Kenzy.’

  ‘An honourable nation should never be afraid of war,’ Nicholas said firmly.

  I looked at Beatrice, sitting opposite him. Until the talk had turned to the war, she had been talking with Ethelreda Coleswyn, turning her head away to rebuff Nicholas’s attempts to join in the conversation. It looked to me like a womanly tactic, so he would be grateful when she did deign to converse with him. I said, ‘Good Mistress Beatrice, what think you of the war? Do you agree with Master Nicholas, or your father?’

  Beatrice looked disconcerted. She blushed and turned to her mother. Laura Kenzy smiled. ‘My daughter has no views on such things. She has been taught to concern herself only with matters appropriate to a young lady.’

  Beatrice looked relieved. ‘You see, Nicholas,’ she said, ‘what a poor girlish wit I have.’ She gave me a sudden look of pure anger before turning back to Nicholas. ‘Let us talk no more of war,’ she said lightly. ‘Though you will be gone north yourself next week. I shall fear for you.’

  ‘Only to Norfolk, Mistress Beatrice, it is very far from Scotland.’ Nicholas spoke reassuringly, though I was sure Beatrice was perfectly aware Norfolk was a long way from Scotland. Nicholas touched her fingers with his. She smiled round the table, as though to say, how stupid I am.

  But, I thought, you are not.

  ‘I wish you were not going,’ she told Nicholas. ‘Perhaps when you come back you will be speaking the local tongue, and I shall not understand you.’

  ‘Well, at least we have taught our daughter to speak properly,’ Laura Kenzy said. I looked at her, realizing she was humourless as well as a snob. I caught her husband’s eye, and he winked.

  I said, ‘Norfolk people cannot be so different. Norwich is the second city in England, after all.’

  ‘And has some of its finest buildings,’ Edward Kenzy said. ‘The great cathedral, the fine guildhall.’

  ‘You know it?’ I asked.

  ‘Yes. I once had a case which took me there, although that was many years ago. I hear its economy is greatly decayed since then.’

  Just then Philip reminded us that curfew time was near, and no one was supposed to be out after ten. We parted, none of us altogether sorry to end the rather fractious supper. It was almost dark now, and candles had been lit during the meal. Philip sent his steward out to fetch some link-boys to guide us home with their torches. We waited for them outside in the balmy evening. I stood next to Edward Kenzy. ‘An interesting evening, Brother Shardlake,’ he said. ‘I am glad we agree on the debasement, but tell me, would you really have the social order overturned? Do you not, like all gentlemen, fear the rabble, feel easier when accompanied in the streets by your assistant with his sword? Do you not turn your eyes away in disgust from the hordes of beggars as they thrust their hands at you, showing welts and sores that half the time are painted on?’

  ‘I turn away with shame, Brother Kenzy, not disgust. But I do turn away, so perhaps indeed I have no right to preach. Still, I would see the wrongs of the common people righted.’

  Kenzy did not reply, merely rocked a little on the balls of his feet as he smiled and inclined his head to where Nicholas was bowing over Beatrice’s hand, making an elaborate farewell.

  ‘Young Nicholas is a good lad, if a little brash.’ He looked at me, keen eyes glinting in the candlelight from Philip’s window. ‘My wife is dazzled by the range of your contacts at court. You once worked for Lord Cromwell himself, did you not?’

  ‘Those contacts were never easy, Master Kenzy. Only the Lady Elizabeth is left, and I am only assistant to her Comptroller, Master Parry.’

  ‘That’s enough for Laura.’ He chuckled, and I realized Kenzy did not really care whether the relationship between Nicholas and Beatrice prospered or not, so long as it kept his wife from bothering him. I looked again at the young couple. Laura Kenzy was saying that she hoped Nicholas would come to dine with the family when he returned from Norfolk. ‘Oh, yes,’ Beatrice agreed, looking up at Nicholas with her large eyes. I saw something false in her fond look that he did not see. But who can see clearly when they are in love?

  Chapter Nine

  Next day was Whitsunday, the ninth of June. From that morning all church services were to be from the new Prayer Book. I dressed in my robe and serjeant’s cap, took my copy of the Prayer Book, and set out for St Paul’s. I was alone; Nicholas avoided church services so far as possible, and though I had asked John Goodcole if he and his family wished to attend with me, he’d replied apologetically that he and his wife would be attending their own church. I did not press them. For myself, I wanted to see a historic occasion.

  As I passed under Temple Bar I considered whether my thoughts about Beatrice Kenzy had been unfair. I hardly knew the girl, and it was not really my business to approve or disapprove Nicholas’s choice. However, if the opportunity came while we were in Norfolk, I would raise the matter with him gently.

  I passed under the Ludgate, the great spire of St Paul’s Cathedral looming ahead. Around the gates were the usual group of beggars, children holding out stick-like arms, men with missing limbs calling out that they had been injured in the wars. Remembering my discussion with Edward Kenzy the evening before, I reached for my purse and gave a shilling to an emaciated little girl. As I walked on I heard others call, ‘Sir, spare something for us, we starve!’ I quickened my step, fearing they might follow, and aware I was alone.

  *

  I WAS EARLY for the service, but the great cathedral was already crowded. I noticed that members of the King’s Yeomen of the Guard lined the walls at intervals. All the great men of the city were there – Lord Mayor Amcoates and the London aldermen resplendent in red, the heads of the trade guilds in their colourful coats, and many of the Royal Council in furred robes and bright gold chains – Richard Rich was there in his Lord Chancellor’s robes, a severe expression on his thin features, William Paget, recently ennobled, with his hard, square face and long forked beard, looking plumper now, Catherine Parr’s brother, the Marquess of Northampton, a thin-faced man in his thirties with an auburn bea
rd. Parr was glancing idly through the pages of his Prayer Book. I thought how unlike his late sister he was. His reputation was of a man of polished manners but little ability, his rise to the Council table a consequence of his relationship to the late queen. Then I saw William Cecil, his narrow face alert, protuberant eyes roving over the crowds. He caught my eye and nodded briefly. I nodded back, remembering that cold and frightening day in January. I saw Philip Coleswyn and his family, but he was on the far side of the nave, a crowd of people between us.

  Heads turned as a procession of clerics entered at the main door and processed up the nave. At their head was Thomas Cranmer, Archbishop of Canterbury, with his long white beard and large, keen blue eyes, his sallow face set in an expression of calm authority, the Prayer Book in his hands.

  He mounted the lectern and went through the Whitsunday service, every word declaimed in English in his loud, clear voice. In the new service there was no invocation of saints. People looked stealthily around, wondering whether someone might shout out in favour of the old Latin, but there were no disturbances, only a sense of growing tension as Cranmer approached the climax of the service – ‘the supper of the Lord, and the holy Communion, commonly called the Mass’, as the new Prayer Book worded it cautiously. During the preparatory prayers there were none of the old ceremonies associated with preparation for the Mass – the washing of hands, crossings, blessings. The archbishop lifted the bread and wine and chanted, not in Latin but in clear English: ‘Grant us therefore, gracious Lord, so to eat the flesh of thy dear son Jesus Christ, and to drink his blood in these holy Mysteries, that we may continually dwell in him, and he in us.’

  And so it proceeded, every word in English through to the end of the service. I saw many look almost numinously happy, some sad and frowning, but as Cranmer spoke, in that great space a pin could have been heard to drop. When the service ended and Cranmer stepped down, there was a chorus of sighs and rustling clothing, everyone looking around to gauge their neighbours’ reactions. I kept my face expressionless as I moved away with the crowd.

  I saw two men moving towards me, both dressed like me in lawyers’ robes and coifs. The smaller was Cecil, and behind him was a tall, stocky man in his mid-forties, clean-shaven, with a face whose handsomeness was marred by the haughty expression in its heavy-lidded brown eyes and downturned mouth. The tall man had the trick of looking down at you as though you were a supplicant who had wronged him, and had been brought in for correction.

  Cecil, however, smiled as he wished me good morrow. There was colour in the cheeks above the young secretary’s wispy beard, enthusiasm in his eyes. ‘Well, Serjeant Shardlake, how did you find our new service?’

  ‘A great change,’ I answered noncommittally. Cecil’s companion frowned slightly, and I guessed he was not an enthusiast. Cecil, his manner turned brisk and businesslike, introduced us. ‘Serjeant Shardlake, this is Sir Richard Southwell. He is associated with the Council, and works for the Lady Mary in her duties as feodary of Norfolk. As I believe you are going there tomorrow, I thought you might welcome an introduction.’

  I bowed to Southwell, who gave me the briefest nod in return. And I remembered Parry saying that he had spoken to Cecil. Cecil must have some purpose in making this introduction.

  Southwell spoke, his voice as haughty as his expression, ‘I gather you are retained on this business of John Boleyn. You may have a wasted journey; the word is he will almost certainly be hanged.’ I saw he clasped a pair of gloves in his large, meaty hands.

  ‘I know little as yet, Sir Richard.’ I hesitated, then added, ‘I understand you yourself own some land adjoining Boleyn’s.’

  ‘I think so.’ Southwell waved the gloves dismissively. ‘But I have over thirty manors in Norfolk, I can’t keep track of them all.’

  I smiled graciously before replying, ‘I believe some of your officials have already visited his wife.’

  Southwell frowned, looking down on me with cold appraisal through those half-closed eyelids. ‘Those are standing instructions where lands may be forfeit through a landowner’s execution. And whatever else the woman living at his house may be, she is not his legal wife. His whore, I think, would be more exact.’ He laughed harshly, showing bad teeth.

  Cecil said, ‘The discovery of Edith Boleyn’s body certainly raises legal complications.’ He turned to Southwell. ‘I am sure Brother Shardlake understands that. His enquiries are intended only to ensure justice is done as it should be.’

  ‘That’s what juries are for, Master Cecil. And now I need some fresh air, gentlemen. Perhaps we shall meet in Norfolk, Master Shardlake.’ His tone was slightly threatening. He turned on his heel and walked away.

  Cecil raised his eyebrows and smiled briefly as we joined the crowds heading for the door. He spoke quietly, ‘I apologize for Southwell’s manners, but that is what he is like. I thought you should know.’

  ‘I know Comptroller Parry’s lawyer, Copuldyke, is afraid of him.’

  Cecil lowered his voice. ‘Southwell is one of the most wealthy and powerful people in Norfolk, he runs around fifteen thousand sheep on his lands. For a long time he was a client of the Duke of Norfolk, but three years ago when the old king wanted the family gone, Southwell gave perjured evidence against them. His reward was a place as assistant executor of the old king’s will, and an alternate member of the Council should another member die. Now that the Lady Mary has bought the Duke’s land, and has the position of feodary, she has become Southwell’s patron. All in all, he is a very powerful man.’

  ‘So he is no friend to the Lady Elizabeth, or the Boleyns.’ I hesitated. ‘I have wondered if he has designs on John Boleyn’s land.’

  Cecil gave me a hard stare. ‘If Boleyn is convicted and Southwell wants to buy the lands, then let him. His fondness for the old ways in religion – and he does not hide those – means he has not risen as far as he might, but he has the Protector’s confidence. The Lady Mary has refused to adopt the Prayer Book service in her household; she will need to be negotiated with, and Southwell will be important.’

  ‘It seems I am not to cross anybody,’ I said ruefully.

  ‘That is in the Lady Elizabeth’s best interest. And when it comes to Southwell, in yours.’

  ‘I heard that he was once convicted of murder.’

  Cecil glanced around him, then answered quietly. ‘Yes. Seventeen years ago he murdered a fellow Norfolk landowner at Westminster over some quarrel, stuck a knife in him, I believe, but he paid large sums to the old king to gain a pardon. And last year, by the way, he connived with a servant of his, John Atkinson, who abducted a fourteen-year-old Norfolk heiress, and put her through a form of marriage against her will. The girl’s family appealed to the Protector, and it ended up on my plate. The heiress went back to her family, and Southwell had harsh words from the Protector.’ He looked at me. ‘He is an exceptionally rough and brutal man, with powerful contacts. So yes, do not cross him.’

  ‘I have wondered,’ I replied, ‘given that he owns neighbouring land on both sides, whether he might have had something to do with this murder. And if he is capable of the things you say –’

  Cecil shook his head. ‘Southwell has had to be careful since the abduction last year.’ His voice deepened. ‘For Jesu’s sake, don’t set any rumours like that running.’

  ‘I won’t. I shall make every effort to keep out of his way. I am not going to Norfolk looking for trouble, Master Cecil.’

  Cecil smiled thinly. ‘But trouble has a habit of finding you.’ He stopped, and looked back at the pulpit from which Cranmer had spoken. ‘We took a great step today. Before long, we shall go further, and have a service that makes clear the bread and water are only a commemoration of Christ’s sacrifice.’

  ‘That is what the Protector wishes?’

  He looked at me seriously. ‘It is what the King wishes. Their minds are as one.’

  We had reached the door. Cecil turned and shook my hand. ‘Take some time to enjoy Norwich, Master Shardlake,
it is a beautiful city. And the Norfolk people mostly favour the reformed faith, Southwell and the Lady Mary notwithstanding. And keep a low profile, eh?’ He walked down the steps to where a little group of servants stood waiting for him. I stepped out into the sunshine. Philip Coleswyn came across, with Ethelreda and their two young children. Like Cecil’s, his face was alight with enthusiasm. ‘So, it is done,’ he said.

  ‘Cranmer is certainly a great preacher.’

  ‘It was good to see you at supper last night,’ Philip said. ‘I am sorry if the conversation became a little – fractious.’

  I smiled. ‘Conversations tend to, in these days. No, it was a fine meal, and interesting company. Thank you for inviting the Kenzys.’

  ‘Edward Kenzy is a man of reaction, though, oddly, I cannot help liking him.’

  ‘I like him too. He says what he thinks, with candour.’

  ‘Though his wife –’ Ethelreda stopped herself.

  Philip raised his eyebrows. ‘Perhaps the less said about her the better.’ We laughed. ‘When you return from Norfolk you must come and dine again.’

  ‘I will.’

  I watched them go, envying their family happiness, then walked away. I thought suddenly of Edward and Josephine Brown. Their child would have been born by now. I would have to seek them out when I got to Norfolk.

  I had not been concentrating on where I was going, and looked up at the sight of a crowd gathered at the head of an alley leading to Carter Lane. In the middle of the group a man was on his knees. His hands covered his face; blood seeped through his fingers and there was a bright red stain on the grey cobbles. He was surrounded by half a dozen grinning soldiers wearing white tunics with the Cross of St George. I remembered the Boleyn twins and the beggar boy they had tormented. This, though, was worse. The crowd, mostly apprentices but a few workmen and a couple of women too, looked on appreciatively and called approval as a soldier aimed a kick at the man’s side with a boot. He groaned and put a hand out to the wall to stop himself from falling.