The Mercy Seller: A Novel (v5)

by Brenda Rickman Vantrease

  So. He was devout. And he practiced the Roman religion. That was a disappointment. She’d thought them kindred spirits. After all, he had asked for an English gospel. Why would he have commissioned one, if he were not a seeker after a greater truth than the Church taught? But as she’d already reminded herself, VanCleve was really of no importance to her.

  By the time Anna had eaten her supper and copied a page, most of her carefully hoarded candle was spent. The darkness hovered outside her circle of yellow light, making the room seem lonelier. She had heard no tread in the hallway. VanCleve must have lingered long over his devotions. His door was close to hers and she’d have heard him return. But what business was it of hers, anyway? Why was she even listening?

  She was thinking she should just go to bed—it would be an extravagance to light another candle—when she heard a gentle tap at her door. She opened it warily at first, only a crack, then wider.

  VanCleve filled up the narrow doorway, his short, blond hair gleaming in the torchlight of the flickering wall sconce.

  “I hope you were not already abed. I did not want to waken you. But I thought I saw a glow from beneath your door.”

  “No, I was—”

  His glance over her shoulder took in the quills, the paper, the open book on her bed. “You are working. May I come in? I promise not to waken your son,” he said softly, glancing at the pile of blankets on the little pallet beside Anna’s bed. She’d not yet removed them, and the way the coverlet lay, in the dim shadow of the room, it looked as though there might be a child huddled beneath. She started to explain, but what would she say? She was too tired to explain her circumstances to him now, too tired to think how much to trust him.

  “It is late. And the landlord—”

  He laughed. “The landlord is French. He pays no attention.”

  This made her blush. She hoped he would not notice in the dim light.

  He held out a small, neatly wrapped package. “I brought you candles.”

  His wheedling voice reminded her of Martin. Were all men the same? She had loved it when Martin flirted with her, but Martin had loved her. She hardly knew this man.

  “Please, sir. You are generous in the extreme. But I am—”

  She had only half stepped aside, but he pushed his way into the room.

  “I see what you are doing. You are reading from the English Bible.” His harsh tone and cocked eyebrow suggested disapproval.

  “Not reading it. Copying it. For you. The Gospel of Saint John, remember?” Her voice was soft, complicit in his presumption of the sleeping child.

  “I remember. May I see the Bible?”

  But he did not wait for permission. He was already picking up the book, turning its pages. His manner irritated her. She supposed as a prosperous merchant he was used to having his way.

  “I thought you said you were a poor widow. This is very impressive work. And it is a very expensive book.”

  That irritated her more. His visit to the cathedral had done nothing for his demeanor. He seemed less agreeable, more authoritarian. Or maybe it was just her imagination, and she was looking for something to pick at because she had seen him enter the cathedral. She could hardly order him out of her room when his generosity had paid for it—unless of course his behavior was dishonorable in some way. She should have known better than to accept gifts from a stranger.

  “I am a poor widow,” she said, chagrined at having to repeat the lie. “The book belonged to my grandfather. It is his work. He was a scribe and a renowned illuminator.”

  He was frowning at the book as though it were something different than the “impressive work” he had pronounced it. As though it offended him. But that was probably her imagination also. After all, he had asked her to copy one for him.

  “I wonder that you do not fear for your grandfather’s safety. You should be more careful. It is unlawful to own such a Bible.”

  “My grandfather is dead. Where I come from there are many who read the Word for themselves.”

  The candle guttered. He opened the package and lit another one. Replaced the spent end. Then he sat on her bed, as easily as if she had invited him. Anna remained standing.

  “Having this in your possession is very dangerous, Anna. The Church condemns it.”

  “But you—”

  “That’s different. I am a man of some influence. You are a woman alone.”

  Anna felt her temper rising. “Do you know why the Church condemns it? I’ll tell you why. Those who read it for themselves might find that what the friars preach is nothing more than a pack of lies perpetrated out of greed and lust for power.”

  She could tell by the way his jaw worked she was offending him, but she could not stop herself. Others had died for this truth. She could not keep quiet to please a man who had been kind to her. Not when what she said was true.

  She pointed to the Bible. “The doctrine of Purgatory. Tell me! Where in the Bible is there any mention of such a place? You cannot, sir. Because it is a fiction! And the sale of indulgences?” She laughed at his gullibility. A man smart enough to be a successful tradesman, and he could not see beyond the end of his nose. “If the people found out that the grace of God and salvation was free for the asking, then why would they pay?”

  Her remark must have hit home for now he raised his voice in turn. “You think every peasant is learned enough to interpret the Scripture for himself?” He gave a little scornful laugh. “Most are not learned enough to cipher a bill of fare, let alone Holy Writ.”

  He slapped the Bible with his fist. Anna cringed at the sound of it. How could she have thought him such a gentle man?

  “I know whereof I speak, Anna. I have traveled among them. I have seen—” He interrupted himself. Paused as if reconsidering his words. “A merchant sees many who are ignorant.”

  She would not back down. Nor would she be intimidated by his claim to superior insights because of his social position.

  “Then give those ignorant peasants the right to choose who shall interpret Holy Writ for them. You might be surprised by how much wisdom resides in the most unlearned among them.”

  “I see that you are firmly entrenched in this belief,” he said softly.

  “And I know that, in spite of your curiosity about the English Bible, you are not. I saw you entering the cathedral at evensong.”

  He stood up. Closed the Bible with a thump. “Be careful, Anna. This is not Bohemia. Heresy is a dangerous charge and the Church—I have heard the Church is mounting a campaign to stamp it out. You have the child to think of.” He glanced at the bundle on the floor. “I shall bid you good night before we disturb him with our argument.”

  “Yes, you should go. Thank you for the warning. I will be careful,” she said stiffly. “And thank you for the candles.”

  “You are welcome on both counts,” he said. But his easy affability had vanished.

  As she shut the door, Anna wondered if he would acknowledge her with aught but a cursory greeting when next they met.

  NINETEEN

  [Our] humble author will continue the story with Sir John in it,

  … where (for any thing I know) Falstaff shall die of a sweat,

  … for Oldcastle died a martyr and this is not the man.

  —EPILOGUE, HENRY IV, PART II,

  BY WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE

  Ah, Sir John! ’Tis honey balm ye be for these old sore eyes. Come in, come in.”

  Sir John held up his arms, laughing, holding off the blowsy, full-hipped tavern hostess who was about to wrap him in her full embrace.

  “Now, Nell. None o’ that. My lady would scarce approve. You do know I’ve taken a wife since last we met?”

  She slapped his arm, only half playfully, before tucking graying strings of hair back into her rag bonnet. “I heard. Doll came round with the news. In deep mourning she was. Along with half the whores of Eastcheap. Ye’d have thought somebody died.”

  She held him out at arm’s length, surveying him with her gaz
e. “But what brings ye here? Not tiring of that fancy new wife so soon? Though it’s right glad I be to see ye. It’s not like the old times, Jack. Not like the old times at all.”

  “We move on, Nell. The world changes. How’s Pistol?”

  “Worthless as allus.”

  “I remember you didn’t think him worthless when you were chasing him.”

  “Aye, but that was afore I caught him.”

  Her face sagged with her sigh. He noticed new crow’s-feet tracking the corners of her eyes. Her hand flitted self-consciously over her smeared apron.

  “Trade has fallen off since ye left,” she said. “Pistol’s got some cockeyed notion in his pox brain to take up ragpicking. He’s got hisself a splintered barrow cart and is out wheeling through the alleys, pickin’ through the gentry’s flea-filled throwaways.” She averted her gaze. “We get by. At least the neighbors don’t complain about the rowdiness the way they used to.” She grinned, trying to recapture some of her good humor. “The way you, and Prince Hal, and Pistol, and Bardolph could swagger. I scarce ever have to call the constable now. And he doesn’t come when I do.”

  Sir John looked around the familiar public room of the Boar’s Head. It was more disreputable-looking than he remembered. The rushes on the floor needed freshening, and the cracked windows were grimed with streaks of dirt and slops from the emptied upstairs chamber pots whose contents missed the targeted street gutters. Filtered through the mess, the afternoon light took on a greenish hue. Mistress Quickly had always kept a clean alehouse. He wondered what Joan would think of such a place as this. No. He didn’t really wonder. He knew.

  In one corner a couple of ne’er-do-wells plotted some nefarious scheme over an empty tankard. Sir John patted the pockets of his surcoat to make sure his purse was still there. In the corner by the ash-strewn hearth, where a dying fire choked in its own residue, an old drunk slumped in a stupor.

  “I remember the last time you called the constable on me. Did I ever pay you that debt of ten pounds you were pressing suit for?” He groped for his purse, aware as he did so that the pair of miscreants on the other side of the room had ceased talking and were watching him. He moved sideways so as to hide the transaction with his girth without turning his back on them.

  “Aw, Jack. You don’t have—”

  “Then there’s the interest on the debt. Probably grown another pound in these five years.” He removed the eleven gold sovereigns, considerably lightening his purse.

  She looked hungrily at the coin in her hand.

  “Now that my credit is restored, how about a mug of your best sack?”

  Avoiding his gaze, she stuffed the coins into a pouch beneath her apron and smiled up at him. “I’ve still got yer favorite tankard. The one formed in the shape of a woman with big—” She made a weighing motion beneath her own full breasts.

  He settled his bulk onto a nearby bench as she pulled the draught from a keg into the obscene mug. “Ye’ll stay till Pistol’s come home?”

  “If he doesn’t come too late. I’m to meet someone here. A parchment maker from Smithfield by the name of William Fisher. Has he been asking forme?”

  The two miscreants at the corner table finished their plotting, and, throwing one last furtive glance at him, as if assessing whether or not they dared take on such a mountain of a man, they decided against it and skulked toward the door. They ducked past a newcomer trying to come in.

  “What does Master Fisher look like?”

  Sir John let the sack slide down his throat, smiling in satisfaction. “Don’t know,” he said, wiping the foam from his mustache. “Never met him. But the messenger said it was urgent.”

  The newcomer stood silhouetted in the open door with the sun behind him.

  “Seems you’ve a new customer, Mistress Quickly,” Sir John said to the silhouette.

  The man stepped forward out of the light and threw back his hood. “What does a man have to do to get a drink in this house?” he said.

  “Your Highness,” the hostess mumbled, dropping a clumsy curtsy even as Sir John’s memory registered the shock of recognition.

  “You’re mistaken, mistress. My name is William Fisher of Smithfield. And I’m here to meet with Lord Cobham.” The voice was low and measured. And familiar.

  Nell’s smile melted into a frown of chagrin. She looked askance at Sir John, a look that inquired if this was yet another of the elaborate tricks the pair had been known for in prior years. Sir John answered her look with a shrug and she, dropping another uncertain half-curtsy, shuffled off to draw the drinks.

  “Master Fisher, is it?” Sir John said as the two men took a table beneath the cracked pane. Nell put the mugs down in front of them, quizzing Sir John with a lift of her eyebrow before waddling away unsatisfied.

  “You bear a remarkable resemblance to an old friend I once shared many a merry jest with. His name was Hal, but now I think on it, he was more a callow youth than a man. Though I recollect he had a man’s capacity for drink.” Sir John grinned, hoping with those words to set a spark in the familiar eyes of the man sitting across from him. None appeared.

  “My name is William, not Hal, Lord Cobham. I am, as I said, a parchment maker from Smithfield.”

  Well! If that was the game his young friend was playing, then Sir John would go along.

  “From Smithfield, you say? What can I do for you Mr. … Fisher?”

  “It’s what I can do for you.”

  “And what possible need could I have for a parchment maker?”

  “Rumor says you are a great consumer of parchment, my lord. And a frequent buyer of quills and ink. Rumor says that you are engaged in the exporting of books.”

  Sir John considered how best to answer. “So then, this is a business call, William. You have come to sell me parchment,” Sir John said archly, wondering what was coming next but willing to go wherever the game would lead.

  The lad was good. He’d have to give him that. But then Hal had always been able to feign a disguise. He remembered how the pair of them would devise some gaming scheme, more for sport than gain, to separate some lout of a fellow from his purse for the price of the night’s drinks. Hal would use his wits as a bow, playing the poor fool like a fiddle. Then Sir John, as accomplice, would close for the “kill.” Ofttimes they reversed the roles just out of sheer boredom. Whatever the jest was now, Sir John would play for old time’s sake. He chose to bluff, a play he’d often used at cards.

  “Well, Master Fisher. Rumors are sometimes true. Sometimes not. Your informant has told you wrong. I am no scholar. Neither am I a book man. I have no need of parchment. You have made the trip from Smithfield for nothing.” He picked up his obscene tankard with both hands, rubbing its pink protrusions with his thumbs, waiting for his companion to make some ribald remark in recognition of it. From the corner of his eye, he saw their hostess behind the long bar watching them as she wiped mugs with her dirty apron, imparting even more grime to the already greasy vessels.

  “I’ve not come to sell you parchment.”

  This Hal who was not Hal leaned forward conspiratorially, placing both hands on the table, palms down, half rising from his seat. It was a posture Sir John remembered well. He’d seen it often enough when Hal’s quick temper and surfeit of sack had overpowered his reason. “I have come with a message from Prince Harry, who bade me give it to you out of the good regard in which he once held you.”

  “Once held?”

  There was something in the hard steel glint of the man’s eye, in the set of his jaw, that Sir John did not remember in the boy.

  Here was no jest.

  Sir John set down his cup. He suddenly wanted to be away from here. The filth and smell of stale beer and moldering ash bore little resemblance to the tavern where he’d once thought himself so merry. By this time, in the late afternoon, Joan would be in the rose garden working her embroidery or reading her English Bible. He wished he were sitting beside her on the turf bench, smelling the perfume of the rose s
he would have plucked and tucked in the neckline of her bodice.

  “And prithee tell me, just what might that message be?” he asked this stranger seated across from him. “Your note spoke of urgency.”

  “Urgent for one who holds his life dear.”

  The same deep-set eyes, the same mouth slightly petulant in the lower lip, the same brown hair, once worn fashionably curled at the shoulder, now shorn round and high above the ears like some clerics’, only without the tonsure.

  “The prince would have you know that the king and the archbishop are set to burn out any taint of heresy wherever they may find it. And they are looking with all diligence.”

  Each word punctuated with a pause, the tone husky, low, menacing.

  The same arched brows, the same prominent cheekbones. The same and yet not the same.

  “They are ever looking for such,” Sir John said, matching the prince’s measured tones. “And their diligence is equaled only by their calumny. But what has that to do with me?”

  “They are turning over every stone. Even in the castles of the nobility. They are not looking blindly. They have informants. They are building a case against all who disseminate the heretical writings both in England and abroad.”

  There was no news here. Not really. Knowing was one thing. Proving quite another. And proof they must have to charge a member of Parliament, proof they must have to charge a friend of the king.

  “And what of Prince Harry?” Sir John asked. “Rumor says that Henry Bolingbroke is on his deathbed. Prince Harry will soon be sovereign ruler of all England. Has this prince no loyalty to the former friend he once called ‘brother’?”

  There was a pause as if the answer were being worked out deliberately in the man’s head before he replied. This was certainly unlike Hal, who had always been ready with the quick answer, the rapier wit honed to a fine edge. Finally, this William answered.