The Tapestry: A Novel

by Nancy Bilyeau

  Cheke shuddered, and then gathered himself. “Ah, but these are becoming matters of academic interest alone, since I do not believe Geoffrey Scovill will be traveling to Germany and Austria to search for Edmund. I find I lack the funds to outlay the expense of such a trip.”

  I honestly did not know how I felt about the journey foundering. I’d been disturbed by the idea—and Geoffrey’s being the one to find Edmund made no sense whatsoever—but the thought of Edmund lost to these strange and blasphemous doctors and occultists, wandering through the forests of Germany, was terrible. Particularly since I knew that this sort of dark magic could be what Sir Walter Hungerford drew on in his May Day gathering with Culpepper and Surrey.

  The only thing I could think of to say was “It is costly to travel.”

  Cheke said, growing agitated, “I had planned to use my salary as Greek chair of Saint John’s College to pay for Geoffrey’s expenses, but it no longer seems probable that I will be appointed to the position. That’s what brought Geoffrey back to London—we met to attempt to come up with a way forward. But how can we make plans when I don’t know what sort of wages I will have? The Bishop of Winchester does not say yes or no, but continues to pose questions and to delay a decision. He disputes my writing on the proper pronunciation of Ancient Greek. I am convinced that the words from the texts of the philosophers should not be pronounced in the same fashion as someone living in Greece today, but the bishop disagrees. I am not given leave to return to Cambridge. Gardiner is the most maddening man I have ever encountered.”

  “He is that,” I agreed. “But tell me of your writing.”

  It could have been the comfrey tea, it could have been the nasty-smelling dilution of mandrake that the barber-surgeon dosed me with—or perhaps fatigue finally overtook me. But while John Cheke sat by my side and spoke of his passion for the Greek world, I slid into a dreamless slumber that went on for many hours. I opened my eyes, and it was night, not day, and Master Hans Holbein sat by my side, not Cheke.

  “How fortunate I am,” I murmured.

  “What did you say, Mistress Joanna? What did you say?”

  “My friends,” I said. “I am fortunate in my friends.”

  But before he could respond, my eyes closed once more. This time my rest was unnatural. My eyelids were heavy and my lips dry; I was not asleep all of the time. I could hear snatches of conversation in the room. I wanted to speak to my friends, but it was too hard to open my eyes; I drifted and drifted.

  And then I heard Geoffrey say, “How is her condition?”

  Holbein said, “She’s slept for a long time. The barber-surgeon said it was to be expected. But I fear it is going on too long.”

  “The hour is late, Master Holbein. Allow me to relieve you.”

  “No, I think I should stay. I am most concerned about Mistress Joanna.”

  I wanted to reassure them, but I began to spiral down again, to a deeper state in which I heard nothing around me. But just on the brink of the descent, I heard Geoffrey’s low laugh.

  “Be careful, Master Holbein. You may be at risk of developing a disease for which there is no cure.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “In just under a month, Joanna has made her mark. Yesterday I met a Master Thomas Culpepper, a young courtier who was consumed with fear for Joanna Stafford, a woman of great mystery. I tell you it was as if I looked at myself in a glass. And now you?”

  Holbein said, his voice tinged with amusement, “I cannot speak for Master Culpepper, but I have no romantic intentions toward Mistress Joanna, if I take your meaning, Constable. I am just old enough to be her father.”

  “I am not describing a romance necessarily. You’ve heard the word obsession? It means to be besieged by a feeling.”

  Still amused, Holbein said, “I know the word. When did it begin, your besieging?”

  Geoffrey said, “Almost three years ago to the day. Here in London. Or just outside London—Smithfield.”

  “Joanna said something, when she was at her most distressed yesterday, when she kept calling for you over and over, about a burning at Smithfield. Is that what you are speaking of?”

  “Joanna said that?” The weary, cynical edge had fallen away from Geoffrey’s voice. He sounded quite startled.

  “Yes, she did.”

  There was silence for a long time. I felt more alert now and I wanted to open my eyes, to put an end to this humiliating conversation, but if I did, they could realize I’d overheard them already.

  Holbein said, his voice very gentle, “Constable Scovill, you honestly can’t see that you are in love with her?”

  “No, I’m not,” Geoffrey said roughly. “Once I was—Christ, how I suffered. And others suffered, too, Master Holbein, because of it. Now, yes, I care what happens to her. I always will. I will protect Joanna with my life, if it comes to it. But love? I will never, ever endure that sort of suffering again.”

  24

  Five days after being injured in London, I left the Palace of Whitehall, stretched out in a curtained litter attached to a pair of horses on one end and a wagon on the other. I’d never been in such a conveyance before. Litters were intended for ladies of royalty or the highest nobility, or for those too ill to sit up while traveling. I fit into the latter group more than the former. Under normal circumstances, I’d certainly not be traveling so soon after being knocked unconscious and breaking my arm. But my circumstances were anything but normal.

  I saw nothing outside my narrow, rectangular litter during the entire journey. I could hear the voices of those on the road all around me, but making out words was difficult. A sentence or just a phrase from a stranger would shoot past and I’d feel the mood behind what was said—joyful, irritated, furious, and pragmatic—before each speaker was reabsorbed into the din.

  Two days earlier, Geoffrey Scovill found an opportunity to speak with me again alone, and what he said frightened me more than anything that had come before.

  When I first looked at Geoffrey, fear was not uppermost in my thoughts. The conversation that I’d heard between him and Master Holbein left me shaken, humiliated, and sad, too. I knew I’d hurt Geoffrey in the past and more than anything, I didn’t want that to continue.

  I said too stiffly, “I’ve reconsidered my course of action, and perhaps I should stay in Whitehall and you should return to Dartford. I do not wish to be a burden.”

  As if I had not even spoken, Geoffrey said, “Joanna, I need you to tell me everything you remember about the day you rode into London.”

  Not this again.

  I murmured, “It is a day I’m desperate to forget.”

  “I would not ask if it weren’t terribly important.”

  A closer look at Geoffrey revealed a new grimness. I knew that he had spent hours each day in London, searching for clues to the identities of who’d killed Richard and attempted to ambush me. Whether the underconstables of London still combed the area I didn’t know. Clearly the criminals had not been apprehended by anyone.

  I forced myself to re-create for him the details of that morning’s ride: how the manor houses on the Strand turned into shops and taverns and tiny churches and narrow homes as we veered away from the Thames and into the heart of the city. And then came the chaos caused when the players put on their show. My heart thudding in my chest, I told Geoffrey about listening to the beginning of the performance and how the man with a feather in his cap cried out in imitation of Henry II, then I looked for Richard but did not see him in the mob, until I spotted a man wearing a Howard tawny-colored doublet entering that fateful lane.

  “You know the rest,” I said.

  “Did you ever notice someone following you, anyone watching you?” he asked, very intent. “I am not talking about riding into the lane, or even the period immediately preceding when you observed the men on the stage. Before that, in the course of the day, did
you notice anything or anyone that suggested you were followed?”

  I stared at Geoffrey, and then said, “No, not that day.”

  “But you have noticed it at other times?” he said quickly, seizing on the manner in which I answered him. “You must tell me. Please, Joanna, this is critical.”

  Although I’d attributed my feelings to nothing but fancies—or to the lingering wariness that came from being trained as a spy by Jacquard Rolin—I told Geoffrey about the times that I’d sensed someone watched me: when I rode into London in April and, weeks later, when I approached the tournament grounds. He listened to every word very carefully, so much so that it made me uncomfortable.

  “What are you making of this?” I asked. “Why do you ask?”

  Instead of answering, Geoffrey said, “Is there anything else that struck you as odd or frightening since you came to Whitehall? You are observant, Joanna, more so than I’ve given you credit for, perhaps. Search your mind, through every day of every week, Joanna.”

  “There was an episode on the stairs in the palace gatehouse,” I said slowly. “But I am quite sure it is not connected to what happened to me in London.”

  “Dismiss nothing,” he said. “Tell me.”

  Feeling even more uncomfortable, I told Geoffrey of my hearing soft footsteps above while leaving Master Holbein’s studio later than usual that day, and my breaking into panic when I thought someone was moving toward me.

  “But there was no one on the stairs when the manservant lifted the candle, and so my fears were without foundation,” I insisted.

  Geoffrey clasped his palms together and stared at the floor, tapping his forehead.

  “Tell me, please,” I cried. “Tell me what you are thinking.”

  Continuing to look at the floor, he said, “Joanna, despite all of my efforts and the efforts of half a dozen men of the law in London, men who know the city extremely well, the players acting out the murder of Becket have not been found.”

  I didn’t understand the importance of their disappearance and told him so.

  Geoffrey said, “I found Richard bleeding to death at the side of their stage. They were so close to it all. Questioning them could have helped me learn who lured Richard off his horse. Two underconstables searched for the company of players at Blackfriars.” At my startled look, he explained, “Since the king suppressed it, that vast monastery, now empty, and the liberties surrounding have served as a hive for companies of strolling actors and all manner of disreputable men.”

  A wave of sadness washed over me. The largest English monastery of the Dominican Order, the place where Edmund and I once went in our quest to learn the meaning behind prophecy, was now a refuge for men of light morals.

  Geoffrey was saying that he, too, searched through Blackfriars, questioning everyone he could. He met those who put on performances all over London, miracle and mystery plays mostly. The life of Saint George or Saint Nicholas. The Expulsion of Adam and Eve. The Raising of Lazarus. Such stories had diverted Londoners for hundreds of years. But in the last ten years, it had become steadily riskier to put on such tableaus in public. After all, Cromwell and Archbishop Cranmer, the arbiters of faith in England, called for an end to the veneration of saints. Even a New Testament story could offend. A play actor never knew now when a performance could lead to not a shower of coins but a stay in the stocks. That is why the choice of the story of Henry II and Becket left them flabbergasted. It was so dangerous. No one had ever acted out the murder of Thomas Becket before in London, and not one of those Geoffrey spoke to, experienced in the life of the stage, were acquainted with the company of strolling actors who had brazenly performed it.

  “What does this mean?” I asked, puzzled.

  Geoffrey said, watching me carefully, “The play actors did not perform the story of Saint Thomas Becket for the benefit of the London crowd.”

  “I’m afraid I don’t know enough of the lives of these sorts of people to understand why they would do it then.” I was growing frustrated. “Won’t you just speak plainly? Your gravity of manner suggests you have formed some sort of dire theory. Speak the words.”

  “Very well, Joanna. That performance was part of an elaborate trap laid just for you.”

  I burst into laughter, saying, “That is absurd.”

  “No, it isn’t. It’s extremely clever, when you work it out. Those who wish to harm you discovered that on the following day you would ride to the Great Wardrobe in London and assumed—rightly—you’d have your one servant with you. Ladies don’t ride into London alone, but you don’t have the means or the rank for a group of attendants. If you had continued along the street that Richard meant you to, you’d have soon reached the Great Wardrobe on the other side of Baynard’s Castle. That street is the obvious choice. But next to it was that lane, narrow and not nearly as populated. A perfect place to lure you in and take hold of you—if Richard could be removed from your side. So, first they’d need to block the main street, and second, prompt you to linger, attention drawn, while dealing with Richard. I think you’d agree that, considering your history, the murder of Becket is a tableau you’d have a hard time hurrying past.”

  “I don’t believe it,” I said, although a cold, sick feeling stirred. “How could anyone know that we’d pick that particular lane? Richard at first planned to ride higher up the street to find another way.”

  “But he didn’t—because the moment he looked in that direction, a crowd of loud mummers started moving toward you, making it a daunting prospect for those on horseback to ride in the opposite direction, passing through them essentially. I noticed them, too, Joanna. And I was able to find one of those mummers later in the same day, and through him spoke to the leader. A man paid him well to gather a group and move down the street, but not until the man waved a flag near the stage. Then they’d start their fuss. The timing was critical—and I believe they picked the time when you and Richard approached the stage. So the lane became the only choice. And that’s where they must have been waiting for you.”

  I resisted what Geoffrey was saying—I desperately did not want to believe in this scenario.

  “Why don’t you find that man who paid the mummers and waved the flag?” I asked. “Couldn’t he shed some light?”

  “Vanished. He paid the mummers in full before they came down the street—which is unusual.” Geoffrey took a deep breath. “And then there’s your horse.”

  “My horse was frightened by some boy who ran past and slapped her haunch to get out of the way,” I said. “Although I was grievously hurt, I suppose I should be grateful for it. Otherwise, I might have ridden farther up the lane, away from you and toward . . .” My voice died away. “I haven’t asked—who took charge of the horse after I fell? Were there difficulties?”

  Geoffrey said flatly, “Your horse is dead, Joanna.”

  “Dead?”

  “That boy wasn’t trying to get around you. In some sort of last-ditch effort to harm you, he stuck a dart into the horse that caused her great pain and panic—that’s why she kept bucking violently. A moment after you were thrown, the horse collapsed. In ten minutes she stopped breathing. I believe she was poisoned. I found a horse master who has some familiarity with their diseases and took him to examine the dead animal. He’d never seen anything like the state of that corpse. I took the dart to an apothecary and alchemist who could not identify the dried substance on its tip.”

  The cold, sick fear spread to my heart and clutched it. With some effort, I put my question into words: “Do you think that the times that I have felt myself watched—and followed on the stairs in the gatehouse—that it wasn’t fancies?”

  “Joanna, I believe you have been under nearly constant surveillance since you rode into London in the middle of April. The conditions in a palace such as this make it uniquely difficult to murder anyone. Not only has the king made any act of violence, no matter how small,
punishable with the severest of measures, but those who live within it are rarely alone. The first time you left Westminster in a month, they pounced.”

  That was when I fully capitulated to Geoffrey’s theory—one that terrified me beyond measure. Someone wanted to kill me with such determination and I didn’t know why. I agreed to return to Dartford with him as soon as possible.

  “I can’t protect you here without knowing whom to trust,” he said. “And my status in Whitehall is too uncertain, too low, to question anyone I wish. But in Dartford, I know the worth and honesty of every man and woman. I know when a stranger enters the town. I can keep you safe.”

  I was not so afraid for my own skin that I couldn’t make one last protest, remembering what Geoffrey said to Holbein while they thought I slept.

  “You can’t spend the rest of your life standing guard over me, Geoffrey,” I said. “I understand from John Cheke that you no longer intend to travel to Germany, but still you must—”

  “Joanna, you are worrying about the wrong matters,” he said. “I am the constable of Dartford and so your safety is my charge. Let us take this in stages. First I extricate you from Whitehall and return you to Dartford? Then you regain the use of your arm and your strength. Afterward, you can decide what is to be done.”

  And so I found myself heading south to Dartford, lying in a litter lent to me by the Howard family. The conveyance, and an escort of four men armed with halberds answering to Geoffrey, came courtesy of Catherine, of course. She’d been dismayed that I said I could not wait until I was stronger to leave the palace, but finally agreed.

  An hour after dawn, Catherine and Master Holbein walked me slowly to the courtyard, where Geoffrey and the litter waited. There were the warmest of embraces and promises of many letters. “You will be back soon,” Catherine kept saying.