The Bishop of London and the Duke of Lancaster sat on the dais, deep in discussion, both looking uncomfortably tense. The hall’s long central tables were already set for the feast to follow Mass, the plate and glass filling the great chamber with a lustrous glow. At the west end the company had arranged itself around several trestle tables angled out to make room for games. Four men played dice off in the far corner, two went at Nine Men’s Morris on a specially carved bench, and the remainder toyed at chess or engaged in idle conversation nearby.
There was a loud clap. Oxford had mounted a table. His hood, lined with ermine, was caught back from his hair in a way that framed a bashful smile. ‘Good friends,’ he called out to the company, ‘I give you Lady Katherine Swynford.’
Oxford held out a hand. With a light step that I could only admire given the circumstances, Swynford joined the earl on the table. A smile as modest as she could manage warmed her face.
‘Your ears, if you please.’ Her voice was steady, though to me she seemed ill at ease.
On the dais Lancaster and Winchester had stopped talking, the bishop aghast at the sight of the duke’s mistress calling for attention in his own hall. Gaunt wore that embarrassed but carnal smile he tended to show whenever he and Swynford appeared together in public. Oxford, I realized, had made a shrewd calculation: by recognizing Lancaster’s mistress in this way he was granting her a certain unspoken status among the higher aristocracy, mimicking Lancaster’s own habit of leading Swynford’s horse on occasion. A friendly gesture on its face, in the conciliatory spirit of the day.
‘For our amusement before the Mass,’ Swynford said, ‘we will have a game.’
‘What game, Lady Katherine?’ someone called from a bench.
‘Prince of Plums.’
There were whispers as the guests decided whether to go along or turn away with courtly indifference.
‘And the rules of this game, Lady Katherine?’ the same voice inquired. It was Thomas Pinchbeak, the serjeant-at-law, lending his respectability to Swynford’s provocation. It worked: she now had everyone’s attention.
‘There are seventy-four unique cards in this deck. Seventy-four guests will each take one card, and only one,’ she said, her voice buoyed by Pinchbeak’s approval – arranged, I felt certain, by Oxford. ‘He must keep it with him all through our day, from the king’s arrival through the feast after Mass. The single rule of the game is this: you may not look at your card, nor will I as I hand them out. Only at the departure of our king will each guest’s card be revealed.’
‘Let me take the first card, Lady Katherine,’ said Pinchbeak, rising from the Morris bench and hobbling over. She handed him down a card, gave the second to Oxford, then the other guests formed a line, none of them wanting to be left out now that the serjeant-at-law and the earl were in. I secured a place in the line and watched the distribution. Once the cards were nearly gone Swynford, with a brazen disregard for propriety, approached the dais. In the silence she handed a card up to the bishop, who took it from her as if it were a live river rat to be held by the tail. Lancaster was more gracious, actually standing, bowing to his consort, and taking the card from her hand.
I looked from the dais to the far wall, across a sea of two hundred eager faces. One of the men in this great chamber carried the Five of Hawks, the fateful card named in the prophecy, though how Swynford’s game would turn out was anyone’s guess. With a studied indifference, I strolled out the buttery door and into the foreyard, where I stopped below a high wall that separated this small plot of grass from the kitchen gardens beyond. After a glance back over my shoulder, I discreetly removed my card, my eyes closed as I held it at my waist. Holding my breath, I looked.
Seven of Thistles.
I tucked the card away, strangely relieved. When I turned again, my aim to make my way back into the hall, a peculiar sight froze me in place. Through a long aperture formed by a rose arbour and the forked branches of a pear tree, I saw Ralph Strode, standing at the buttery door. From a distance of nearly eighty yards he was watching me across the lawn, dark pouches framing his sunken eyes, his hair lifted by the May breeze, his mouth a rigid line set in the great plane of his face. I raised a half smile, gave the common serjeant a nod. Yet Strode simply stared, a look of cold appraisal that I took as a silent intimation of my own blindness.
Grimes’s shop and yard on Cutter Lane were empty, as she knew they would be. Eleanor peered over the streetside fence, spying exactly what she had hoped to find: a row of clothes drying on the line. She vaulted the fence, took what she needed, and stripped off her dress, bunching it into her bag for later. She pulled on a pair of breeches and a one-piece shirt of the sort favoured by the butchers. An old pair of slaughter boots, found in the corner of the first barn, completed the outfit, though as Edgar left the yard he grabbed a stained apron from a hook and wrapped it around his middle. He roughed up his hair, put on a cap, smeared a bit of ash on his cheeks and brow, then left the butcher’s precinct the way he had come, heading for the palace, and Gerald’s fate.
FORTY-NINE
Winchester Palace
The thickening crowd flowed toward the gate facing New Rents. The palace yards were festooned with banners showing innumerable colours, England’s heraldry on full display for the coming of King Richard. Winchester’s gateyard was normally ankle-deep in muck and dung from the bishop’s stables, and often it could be difficult to tell that the area was paved. Now the stones at my feet practically glistened, as if Wykeham had sent his entire household out for a week with brushes and vinegar. Even the scent was invigorating, with fresh juniper and rosemary underfoot. Over it all loomed Mark Blythe’s pearl-and-oyster reliefs, tracing a pattern that summoned one of the clearest lines in the prophecy. In palace of prelate with pearls appointed. By the next bell, I brooded, King Richard could be dead.
I fell in place beside Thomas Pinchbeak, who was speaking earnestly to Sir Howard Payne. I listened in for a while, an interested smile fixed on my face, then moved to a spot off the gateyard’s pavement to await the king’s arrival from the hunting lodges at Easthampstead, feeling alone. The sky had darkened, hints of another May shower in the air. The moist breeze deadened voices, casting a clammy pall over the hushed conversations preceding the royal entrance.
Katherine Swynford, with Philippa at her side, took a position in the rearmost echelon of ladies; no cruel whispers that day, as the duchess was absent. In the faces of those closest to the gate – Wykeham, Gaunt, Oxford, Joan of Kent – I read a dark foreboding, as all seemed to be exchanging glances of secret knowledge and hidden intent. To my mind the entire assemblage felt taut, as if a bowstring had been pulled back to its limit, the archer’s fingers on the verge of release.
If an attack on the king came, it would take place soon after his arrival. The bishop and his company were to greet the king and his court inside the palace’s great gate. Together the two companies, the episcopal and the royal, would make their way to the pavilion to hear Mass. The singing of the processional hymn would begin upon the commingling of the companies, and conclude before the introit.
From outside the walls came the loud blasts of trumpets, the call of the chief herald, the roar of the Southwark commons. Hinges groaned, heads turned. Through the wide opening on to New Rents the royals appeared on foot, having dismounted before the gate. The king’s guard had already clustered around Richard in a tight circle. Wykeham’s own guards formed a solid line marching forward. The gate closed behind them.
The greeting was swift and simple. King Richard entered the palace grounds and came to a stop before Wykeham. The two exchanged bows, then the king took the bishop’s hand and kissed his ring. Palm in palm, the two turned for the gardens as their retinues fell in behind them. With that the processional to St Dunstan began, the first stanza intoned by the Austin canons of St Mary Overey as the melody filled the courtyard.
Ave Dunstane, praesulum
Sidus decusque splendidum,
Lux vera gentis
Anglicae,
Et ad Deum dux praevie.
The singing continued as the two companies turned to process to Mass. Those who knew the tune or words joined in with singing or humming, though in those agonizing moments I forced myself to keep my attention solely on the king.
Now the second stanza. My mind Englished the lines as I followed the king’s progress. In you do we place our trust, in your sight do we lift up our hands … The crowd of guests started filling in behind as the magnates processed past the foreyard. I mouthed the next line, appropriate to the occasion: Mucrone gentis barbarae, ‘the sword of a barbarous race’. I thought of Dunstan’s famed role in prophesying the Danish invasions, of King Richard’s present role in the holding off of France. As in the De Mortibus itself, past and present here collided with the force of a hurled stone on a palace wall.
I positioned myself at the front right edge of the crowd. Here my view of the central group was now somewhat obstructed. Looking around, I saw behind me the lip of an old, disused well, long since filled in. I stepped up on the stones. The extra height gave me a clear view of the king.
Richard and Wykeham had reached the entrance to the hall, which was standing open. The uppermost members of the company positioned themselves in a wide arc around the two magnates. Oxford stood just steps from the king. Behind him walked Sir Stephen Weldon, his palm on his swordhilt.
They turned at the passage to the kitchens, heading for the pavilion and Mass. All appeared well. No attack seemed to be forming, no apparent threats to the king that I could see. Would all this worry, all the trouble of these last months, be for nothing? I realized I had been holding my breath since the song’s previous stanza. I started to exhale—
A flash of metal, in the darkened passage. The butchers. I looked around, but no one else seemed to have noticed the movement. I realized why: thanks to the well’s stone lip, I alone stood at that particular angle to that corner of the passage.
Now the hymn’s final verse, which extolled Dunstan’s role in bringing hope, peace, and light to the world.
Per Te Pater spes unica …
Movement in the kitchen passage. Yes, the butchers, huddled in a bunch, assembled to rush the king. I was sure of it now, even from forty feet away. I looked around in a panic.
The voices of the Overey canons broke into harmony as they descanted on the second line.
Per Te Proles pax unica …
I stared in a cold horror even as my ears rang with the hopeful line. The butchers of Southwark were massed less than twenty feet from King Richard. Their leader was in front. He held a cleaver in one hand, a long knife in the other. Ten butchers at least, bristling with blades. Despite the king’s guard how safe could Richard be?
‘Your Highness!’ I called out weakly over the din of the hymn, attracting annoyed looks from those nearby.
With no regard for propriety or my own fate, I started to push through the ranks, my gaze still fixed on the kitchen passage. The butchers crept forward in the shadows, still unnoticed by the crowd, all attention on the king. I pushed someone aside. ‘What in—’ Thomas Pinchbeak fell back as I passed, tripping over his stick.
Now an arm, and a leg – did no one else see them?
‘Your Highness!’ I was almost there. One of Richard’s rear guards saw me coming. He reached for his sword.
The canons descanted the third line. I pushed toward the frontmost ranks, pointing madly back at the passage.
‘Your Highness!’ I yelled. I was shoved aside, by whom I would never know, and fell against a pavilion post.
Et Spiritus Lux—
Spiritus!
‘Richard!’ I cried as I came to my feet.
The singing stopped. Heads turned, including the king’s.
‘For the commons!’ With a hoarse chorus of shouts the shadows came to life, and the butchers flew as one from the kitchen passage, twenty blades raised for the attack. For an awful moment all I saw was a tangle of arms bristling with blades, some grotesquely spiked machine of war hurtling toward the king. There was glee on their faces, a righteous madness bellowing from their opened mouths.
There was a scream. Wykeham leapt backwards. King Richard froze before his assailants.
Then, with a swift rush of air, the sky fell. A cascade of arrows took the butchers in their backs, necks, and chests. The entire group collapsed in place, most of them past agony before they hit the ground. I looked up. Royal archers, at least twenty of them, lined the inner roof on three sides, new arrows already notched.
I gaped at the spectacle. The butchers were dead or dying, pools of new blood glistening on the stone. A pile of corpses. Richard had been safe the entire time.
FIFTY
Winchester Palace
Edgar Rykener saw the shower of arrows before he saw his brother. At first he assumed Gerald was among the attackers, and the sight of his death was like an arrow in his own neck, so sudden and violent it was. Then he looked at the kitchen passage and saw Gerald’s face, pale in the shadows. His eyes were wide, registering his boyish shock at what his fellow butchers had done. Edgar’s heart soared. Gerald turned and fled.
As the crowd started to react to the attack Edgar dodged around a privet hedge and sprinted for the kitchen gate. Gerald was just disappearing through a second passageway toward the west courtyard. Edgar followed him as the shouts spread in their wake. The courtyard was deserted aside from an old horse and an empty wagon. Gerald sprinted across the space and dodged left at the wagon, angling for the west tower.
‘Gerald!’ Edgar called ahead before his brother disappeared. Gerald hesitated, turned.
‘Edgar! What the—’
Gerald ran up to the next landing. It gave on to a poorly lit chamber above the bishop’s lower gallery. He turned toward Edgar, kicking up dust.
Edgar embraced him, loving him for his defiance of Grimes, and felt his brother’s hesitation before he returned the hug. ‘He’s gone now, Gerald. Grimes can’t hurt you now.’
Gerald was trembling. ‘Now I’ll only be hanged,’ he murmured.
Edgar didn’t doubt it. He looked around, casting for a plan. The space was filled with old rugs and broken furniture, muffling the urgent shouts from below. ‘Wykeham’s probably rounding up all the kitchen folks as we stand here, seeing if others are part of it,’ he said. ‘You have to get out of the palace, and right soon.’
‘How—how?’
Edgar looked at him in the darkness, asking himself the same question. Then he had it. From his side bag he removed the bundle of clothes and thrust them into Gerald’s arms. Gerald looked down. He spread out the dress, then let out a cruel laugh.
‘Oh, so now I’m to be the swerver?’
Edgar glared at him. ‘You’ve a better thought?’
Gerald hesitated.
‘It’s the only way, Gerald,’ said Edgar. ‘Otherwise you’re like to be caught and killed this very hour. Now, put it on.’
Reluctantly, Gerald eased himself out of his rough breeches, tunic, and apron then pulled the dress over his head. He tugged and smoothed until the garment, a one-piece woollen affair full of patches and stitching, sat more or less right.
Edgar stepped back and appraised him in the half light. He wet his fingertips to wipe some grime off his brother’s cheeks, then teased the strands of hair pushing out of the plain coif he had tied around Gerald’s head. His brother’s voice hadn’t yet cracked despite his age, no whiskers on him, and his thin-soled shoes could pass for a scullery maid’s. He figured it would all do for the purpose. He walked to the top of the stairs and listened. Voices, two or three men approaching the tower. He turned back and pulled on Gerald’s arm.
‘Straight for the postern, Gerald. Then the Pricking Bishop on Rose Alley.’ He handed him a few coins. ‘Give these to that old sheath on the steps, and wait for me inside.’
Gerald looked at him, and Edgar wanted to laugh despite the danger. He put a hand to the back of his brother’s head and pushed it down. ‘Eyes to
the ground and you’ll be fine.’
Halfway down the stairs Edgar gave his brother a gentle push. Gerald didn’t look back, but as he entered the west yard Edgar watched him through a narrow aperture along the tower wall. Gerald passed two guards but neither spared a glance for the ragged servingwoman coming from the tower. More guards in the yard now, searching out conspirators.
Now for his own escape. Edgar looked down at the courtyard, forming an idea. The horse-drawn cart was one of many in Southwark that doubled as a pageant wagon at festival time. Though the wagon itself was empty and wouldn’t do, its undercarriage was obscured by the frayed cloths hanging over each side. He had to get to that wagon.
He waited for the last guard to disappear into one of the surrounding buildings. When he was gone Edgar climbed on to the stone sill, threw his legs over, hung for a moment, and dropped, meeting the courtyard pavers with a painful impact. He stood, ankles still sound. He darted for the wagon and slid beneath the cloths. Wedging himself between the clouts, he took his weight off his arms and tested the fit. It would work. He waited patiently, his mind on Gerald, until the cartman returned to the courtyard. After a word with the guards, he took the horse’s reins. Edgar felt a lurch. The cart moved slowly toward the palace’s back gate.
FIFTY-ONE
Winchester Palace
The king’s guard had encircled Richard, swords drawn. The crowd, moments ago riven with cries of fright, had quieted itself to a low murmur. Most were huddled in small knots, watching ghoulishly as it became known that the danger had passed and a pile of bodies lay on the ground, and a search was on for any remaining conspirators. Hodge ordered the corpses hauled off, a swift task involving several handcarts and a dozen servants. Others brought out buckets of water and washed the blood off the pavers. The bishop spoke to the king, and it seemed the procession would continue to Mass when a loud voice filled the air.
A Burnable Book Page 33