Sovereign ms-3

by C. J. Sansom

  ‘The figure we encountered in the chapterhouse was real enough, Sir William. I do not understand how Broderick was reached in the castle, but events here show the attacker has the run of the site, including King’s Manor. Strangers are not allowed to enter St Mary’s without authority. We are dealing with someone people would be expecting to see walking round both the house and grounds, someone whose presence would not be remarked.’

  ‘Then that means danger for the King.’

  ‘But if someone had secreted themselves at the manor with the aim of harming the King, would they then advertise their presence by attacking or killing people at St Mary’s?’

  Maleverer nodded, stroking his black beard again, then gave a little grunt of laughter. ‘You have some brains, lawyer. I’ll give you that. Though after losing those papers your name will be mud among those who rule us. There may yet be repercussions for you.’ He smiled coldly. ‘You would probably rather go back to London, I imagine.’

  ‘Yes,’ I replied.

  ‘Afraid whoever knocked you out may try again, perhaps. Well, too bad, you’ll stay here unless I am told differently. And you’ll stay in charge of Broderick.’ There was a spatter of rain at the window and Maleverer looked out irritably. ‘The King will not wish to ride in this, he and the Queen will be in their litters, it will slow everything down. Ellerton!’ He shouted for a clerk, so loudly I jumped, and ordered the man to have his horse made ready. ‘You,’ he addressed us, ‘tell Leacon to arrange a guard of men to bring Broderick over. They’re to take a cart, tie him inside and cover it. I don’t want him seen in the city. You two can accompany him, see him to the cell. And as few as possible are to know he has been brought here.’

  WE LEFT, DESCENDING the staircase to the Great Hall. Here, amid the glowing tapestries, painted ceilings and buffets shining with gold plate, cleaners were at work. With brushes and pans they cleared the last wood shavings and dust away, making sure the place was spotless. I saw Master Craike standing by the wall, shuffling papers piled on his portable desk. I could not help reflecting that if there was anyone whose wanderings about the precincts of St Mary’s would attract no notice, it was him. And no one would have easier access to keys, to the monastic church or anywhere else.

  ‘Good day, sir,’ I called to him. ‘All is ready?’ ‘Ah, Master Shardlake, and young Barak.’ He looked at us a little uneasily, I thought. ‘Jesu, sir, you have a great bruise there.’

  ‘Ay, tho’ ’tis my neck that hurts.’

  ‘I am sorry for that, sir. Do they know who did it?’

  ‘Not yet. How does your work proceed?’

  He sighed. ‘It is all a nightmare. I have been up since three finalizing all that must be done before tomorrow. Master Dereham, the Queen’s secretary, says he has been allotted a place at York’s best inn.’ He pulled a document from the desk and held it up. ‘It turns out not. There will be a great brabble about it.’

  ‘Master Dereham? A tall young popinjay in gaudy clothes? We saw him yesterday.’

  ‘He is a ruffian, but an old friend of the Queen’s from her youth in Horsham. She wanted him as her secretary. And what the Queen wants, she gets.’

  ‘You sound disapproving, sir.’

  He shrugged. ‘Queen Catherine is a giddy girl. Too young and silly for the high office she has been called to, in my opinion. Kindly enough, but concerned with naught beyond clothes and jewels. The King though, he is besotted.’

  ‘You have met her?’ I asked.

  ‘No. Only seen her.’

  ‘They say the conservative party in religion hoped much from her marriage to the King, and are disappointed now.’

  Craike nodded. ‘She is no Jane Seymour to whisper in the King’s ear how much better the old ways were. So they say, at least,’ he concluded, perhaps deciding he had said too much.

  ‘DO YOU TRUST HIM?’ Barak asked as we crossed the hall. ‘I do not feel I can trust anyone here now.’ In the doorway a blast of rain-laden wind hit us. In the

  courtyard, there was pandemonium. One of the three tents had blown over. Heaps of magnificent gold-leaf tenting billowed in the wind, the fine damask curtains and carpets inside now exposed to the elements. Workmen tried frantically to lift the tenting, as a young man who must be the King’s designer Lucas Hourenbout stood looking on, shouting, then almost dancing in frustration as a man stepped on a piece of priceless tapestry, leaving a muddy footprint on it.

  WE FOUND SERGEANT LEACON at his lodge. I was impressed again by the young officer’s efficiency as he ordered soldiers to be rounded up and a cart fetched. While he went off to supervise matters, Barak and I waited in the gatehouse, watching the labourers collecting the materials from the tents and carry them off for cleaning.

  ‘I worry about Maleverer,’ Barak said. ‘He dislikes us. He is ruthless and has much power behind him. He’s the sort who will blame us if he can for anything that goes wrong.’

  ‘Yes. You are right.’ I broke off, for Sergeant Leacon had returned. He ran a hand through curly blond hair which the rain had plastered over his forehead. ‘Everything is being fetched round. Sir, could Master Barak help with the cart? It is very muddy down by the storehouses.’

  Barak nodded. The sergeant gave him directions and he went out into the rain cheerfully enough. I smiled at Leacon. ‘Well, sergeant, it seems service to Sir William keeps throwing us together. You are to be in charge of Broderick’s security.’

  ‘It will make a change from guard duties, sir.’

  ‘Where in Kent are you from?’ I asked to make conversation.

  ‘Waltham. But my family came from the Leacon, some miles off.’

  ‘Hence Leacon, eh? I have read that many people moved to new places after the Great Pestilence, but kept the names of their old homes.’

  ‘That is so.’

  ‘I know Kent a little. A few years ago I was engaged on a complex dispute involving the boundaries of some properties near Ashford. Different conveyances had contradictory maps attached, details of landownership locally were in a terrible muddle.’

  Leacon shook his head. ‘Strange work lawyers do, sir. I have some experience of it, I fear.’

  ‘Have you?’ I looked at him curiously.

  ‘Ay. Perhaps you might even advise me,’ he added diffidently.

  ‘If I can.’

  ‘There is a dispute regarding my parents’ farm. My family have owned the land for generations, it was gifted them by the local priory more than a hundred years ago. But since the priory was dissolved the new owner claims the land is his, that the priory’s gift was defective in some way.’

  I nodded sympathetically. ‘There have been many such claims since the dissolution. Sometimes the smaller monastic houses were not good with their documentation. But after such long usage – though I could not advise without seeing the papers.’

  ‘You would think these landowners would be content to get so much of the monks’ lands cheap.’

  ‘People who covet land are never content. Have your parents taken legal advice?’

  ‘They cannot afford it. My uncle is helping them – he can read, which they cannot. It is a worry to be posted so far away.’

  ‘Yes. I can see you would help them all you could.’ I remembered the extortionate mortgage on my father’s farm that he had not even felt able to tell me about, and bit my lip. ‘I wish you good luck.’ Then a thought struck me, and I took a sharp breath.

  ‘Have you thought of something?’ he asked eagerly.

  ‘No,’ I replied hastily. ‘My neck hurts a little, that is all.’ But it was not that. Our talk of names, and my time in Kent, had brought back the name of one of the districts I had been concerned with. Braybourne. Or perhaps, corrupted as a man’s name, Blaybourne.

  A SMALL, HIGH-SIDED cart with a big cloth cover had been provided, drawn by a pair of horses, and Barak and I and the sergeant walked alongside with half a dozen soldiers with pikes, who shoved a way though the crowds. Despite the wind and rain, the city was busier
than ever with the Great Progress’s arrival imminent.

  I had expected argument when I told Radwinter of Maleverer’s plans, but though his eyes gleamed bitterness he merely nodded. At Leacon’s direction he unlocked the long chains binding Broderick to the wall, though his wrists were kept manacled. He groaned into wakefulness; he still looked weak. When he saw the helmeted soldiers standing over him I noticed terror spark in his eyes.

  ‘You’re to be taken to St Mary’s,’ I told him quietly. ‘For your own safety.’ He gave me a bitter smile but said nothing.

  On the way down the steps to the cart, Broderick’s legs trembled mightily, his steps uncertain, and I guessed it had been long since he had walked more than a few yards. I was surprised to see that he was a small man, shorter than me. When we reached the open air he paused for a moment, bracing himself against the wind and rain, and looked up at the clouds scudding across the sky in various shades of dirty grey. He took in a deep lungful of air that almost made him faint.

  ‘Take care,’ I said, as a soldier steadied his arm. Broderick stared for a moment at his friend Robert Aske’s skeleton, swinging to and fro in the breeze, then gave me that twist of a smile again.

  ‘Who poisoned you?’ I asked him quietly. ‘Do you know?’

  He laughed weakly. ‘King Henry did.’

  I sighed. ‘Get him in the cart. He’ll catch an ague standing out here.’ Broderick had gone very pale, and was only half conscious as the soldiers raised him and laid him gently in the bottom of the cart, where someone had thought to lay some cushions. The cart smelled of apples, oddly domestic in the grim context of our business. The soldiers covered him and so we drove back, to all appearances soldiers escorting some goods of value to the abbey. I watched the rainswept crowds and wondered how many, had they known Broderick lay there, might have rushed to rescue him.

  Chapter Sixteen

  I WALKED WITH BARAK along the Fossgate, one of the main city roads, among a crowd heading for the public rehearsal for the musical entertainment that would be given before the King tomorrow evening. As night fell the wind and rain had ceased, though the street was miry, strewn with leaves and small branches, and the doorsteps and shopfronts glinted wetly in the moonlight. It was a merry crowd, the most cheerful I had seen in York, that made its way towards the Merchant Adventurers’ Hall.

  I had decided to accompany Barak to the rehearsal rather than sit alone in the lodging-house with anxious thoughts for company, listening for more nasty comments from the clerks. Barak was dressed in his best green doublet and, above it, a pretty shirt-collar decorated with lacework. Both our faces were smooth, cleared of nearly a week’s growth of beard, for that afternoon the barbers from the Progress had ridden into St Mary’s. There had been a mass shaving, so all the gentlemen should look their best when the King arrived. I had put on my best robe but donned my old cap. I had had trouble fixing the feather back properly on the new one and did not want it coming unstuck again tonight. Tomorrow I would doff it to the King. My stomach gave a strange lurch at the thought.

  We passed the Minster; it was brightly lit from within, the huge stained-glass windows a shout of colour against the dark sky.

  ‘Look at that,’ I said to Barak.

  He gave it a glance. ‘Ay. All ready for the King.’

  I jerked my robe aside as a couple of apprentices ran past, splashing us as they ran whooping through a puddle.

  Barak smiled sardonically. ‘I heard in the taverns last night that the latest instructions about clearing the middens have caused problems because people have been forbidden from dumping anything in the river – they want it smelling sweet for the King. So people without proper cesspits are having to keep everything in their backyards, which will stink to heaven at the same time they’re being told to prettify the housefronts.’

  ‘There is discontent, then.’

  He nodded. ‘Most Yorkers don’t want the King here at all.’

  ‘You kept out of trouble, then, last night?’

  ‘Ay. I attached myself to a group of carpenters. Most of the workmen came up from London but there were Yorkmen too. Paid well, so quite happy with His Majesty. We steered clear of the taverns where they don’t like southrons.’ He looked at me. ‘I saw one interesting thing though.’

  ‘What was that?’

  ‘We were passing through a poor part of town, past some alehouses the carpenters said we should avoid, and who do you think I saw down an alley, going through the door of a mean-looking little place?’

  ‘Go on.’

  ‘Master Craike. He had on a dark cloak and a cap, but I recognized that fat face of his in the moonlight. It had an odd, set look.’

  ‘Did he see you?’

  ‘No, I’m sure he didn’t.’

  ‘Craike,’ I said thoughtfully. ‘He’s the last person I’d have expected to be visiting disreputable alehouses at night. What was he up to?’

  ‘Maybe someone should ask him.’

  I nodded as we turned into the square that housed the Merchant Adventurers’ Hall. It was an impressive old building, wide and three-storied, with a cobbled space before it that was already crowded. A stage had been erected in front, covered by curtains, torches blazing around it. Guildsmen in their robes stood in little groups among the crowd, and I saw a number of richly dressed men surrounded by retainers: the advance guard of the Progress. The open space was lined with constables in York livery, and I glimpsed little groups of soldiers in the doorways, breastplates glinting in the torchlight. I remembered what Maleverer had said about increased security.

  A serious-faced young man in a lawyer’s robe came across to us and bowed. ‘Brother Shardlake.’

  ‘Brother Tankerd.’ I recognized the city Recorder, who had been at the Guildhall two days before. ‘How is it all going?’

  ‘I think all is ready at last. We have been waiting so long, I cannot believe the King will actually be here tomorrow.’ He laughed nervously. ‘And that I shall be making a speech to him. I gather Sir James Fealty is happy with the petitions.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘I confess I am somewhat nervous.’

  ‘I think everyone is.’

  ‘It will be a wondrous thing to see the King. They say in his youth he was the most magnificent prince in Christendom, tall and strong and fair of face.’

  ‘That was over thirty years ago.’

  He studied my face. ‘You have a nasty bruise there, sir.’

  ‘Yes.’ I adjusted my cap. ‘I shall have to try and hide it tomorrow.’

  He looked at me curiously. ‘And your enquiries about Master Oldroyd, how are they proceeding?’

  ‘Sir William Maleverer has taken it into his own hands.’

  Someone hailed Tankerd, and he excused himself. I turned to Barak, who was craning his neck to look over the crowd.

  ‘Where is she?’ he muttered.

  ‘Mistress Reedbourne? Over there.’ I pointed to a group of courtiers some way off. I recognized Lady Rochford, her face alight as she retailed some story to a little group of ladies. As always there was something hectic, overexcited, in her expression. Jennet Marlin stood a few paces off, Tamasin beside her. Mistress Marlin was looking disapprovingly at the stage, but Tamasin was glancing around eagerly.

  Then I drew in my breath, for I recognized a small, neat man with sharp, delicate features and a rich fur robe who stood near to Lady Rochford. He was talking to Dereham, the Queen’s young secretary. Sir Richard Rich, Chancellor of the Court of Augmentations, whom I had made an enemy of the year before, and who had backed my opponent Bealknap in my Chancery case. I had known I might encounter Rich here, but now I shrank away.

  Barak had seen him too. ‘That arsehole,’ he murmured.

  ‘I don’t want to meet him unless I have to.’

  ‘Then I’ll leave you if I may, go over and see Tamasin. Rich won’t remember a common fellow like me.’

  ‘All right.’

  ‘Take care for cutpurses,’ he warned, then thr
eaded his way through the crowd towards Tamasin. Alone, I felt suddenly vulnerable. Cutpurses, yes. And assassins.

  Musicians had appeared in the hall doorway, carrying sackbuts and lutes. A man in a chorister’s robe shepherded a group of chattering boys on to the stage. They disappeared behind the curtain.

  ‘That’s my bairn Oswald!’ a woman behind me called out excitedly. I shifted my position, wishing I could sit down for my neck hurt again. I thought about what I had remembered earlier, the name Blaybourne and the place in Kent. Should I tell Maleverer? If there was a connection between this Blaybourne and Kent he should perhaps know, for York was already full of Kentish soldiers and hundreds more would be arriving tomorrow. Yet I sensed Maleverer would not be pleased to find that I had not put that name out of my mind.

  ‘Brother Shardlake.’ I started at a deep voice at my elbow, then smiled as I turned.

  ‘Brother Wrenne. How are you, sir?’

  The old lawyer wore his cap and thick coat and, I saw, carried a cane that he seemed to lean on heavily.

  ‘A little stiff this evening. But what of you? Maleverer told me you were attacked after I left you yesterday, and that old casket you found at Oldroyd’s stolen.’

  ‘I am all right, I was only knocked out.’