Sovereign

by C. J. Sansom

  ‘Then I am sorry for you, mistress,’ I said evenly. ‘But that has nothing to do with me. Do not dare to assume you know my mind or history. That is an insolence and I will not have it. I will not be your scapegoat!’ And with that I turned and walked away, leaving her standing alone in the street.

  I RETURNED TO St Mary’s half an hour later. The tent was up again, workmen brushing it down by candlelight to remove every speck of mud. I went into the manor house. It was very quiet there now, everything standing ready for the King’s arrival, the few servants and courtiers walking with an air of quiet reverence, practising the demeanour they must use when the King was in residence. A guard took me up to Maleverer’s office. He was still working, his big black-bearded face white in the candlelight. He looked up angrily.

  ‘What now?’

  ‘I thought of something, sir.’

  ‘Well?’

  I told him of my work in Ashford, my recollection of the name Blaybourne. ‘I thought you should know, sir. With so many Kentishmen among the guard.’

  He grunted. ‘So he was from Kent, was he? Well, that fits with what we know. Interesting.’ His mouth twisted into a sardonic smile. ‘But not useful. Edward Blaybourne died long before you or I were born, Master Shardlake. I have been with the Privy Council this afternoon. I have learned much about him.’ He shot me a hard look. ‘Secret matters.’

  ‘Then I am sorry to disturb you.’

  ‘Someone from the Privy Council has been deputed to see you tomorrow. To go over what you know, remind you to keep silence, twist your tail for your foolishness.’ He seemed to have recovered his confidence; no doubt he had been able to convince the Privy Council that everything was my fault.

  ‘You still have charge of Broderick. Visit him before you go to bed. I want you to see him at least once every day, check on his welfare. Get one of the guards to take you to his cell.’

  ‘Yes, Sir William.’

  ‘And I have had words with Master Radwinter, told him to make no more mistakes.’ He waved a hand in dismissal and gave me a look of amusement, a cruel look.

  A GUARD LED ME deep into the complex of monastic buildings grouped round the church. Here the monks of St Mary’s had lived and worked; now the rooms were mostly empty and stripped of furniture, though some had been fitted out with beds to accommodate the host who would be coming tomorrow. The guard led me down a narrow, stone-flagged corridor at the heart of the warren, stopping at the end where a wisp of candlelight came though a barred window in a stout door. Two of Sergeant Leacon’s men, who had accompanied us to the castle earlier, stood guard.

  ‘How does he fare?’ I asked.

  ‘Just lays there quietly, sir. The physician has been again, says he is improved.’

  ‘Thank Jesu for that. Where is Radwinter?’

  ‘With him now, sir. Shall I let you in?’

  I nodded. He unlocked the door. Broderick lay on his blankets, asleep. Radwinter sat on his haunches beside him, looking into the prisoner’s sleeping face, his expression one of concentrated, malevolent anger. He looked round when I entered, then rose to his feet with a suppleness I envied.

  ‘I hear he is better,’ I said quietly.

  ‘He sleeps. And I have to sleep with him. I must even share his pisspot. ’Tis Sir William’s way of showing his discontent.’

  ‘Has he said anything?’

  ‘No. He was conscious earlier. I asked him what happened, but he only repeated his nonsense about the King having poisoned him. If only I had a free hand, I would have the truth out of him, I’d have him humbled.’

  ‘If it was that easy, they would not be taking him to London.’

  He gave me that icy, glittering-eyed look of his. ‘There is a way to scare and humble every man, Master Shardlake. It is merely a question of finding it.’

  I MADE MY WAY back to our lodgings. Again a few clerks sat playing cards. I nodded at them curtly, then knocked at the door of Barak’s cubicle.

  ‘Ay?’

  ‘ ’Tis I. I would talk.’ I went into my cubicle and sat down on the bed, suddenly exhausted. Barak entered. He had a jaunty air about him.

  ‘You’re back, then,’ I said. ‘I thought you might have found a quiet spot with Mistress Reedbourne.’

  ‘Not with Mistress Marlin guarding her. She had a fierce look after you left her. I wondered where you had gone, so suddenly.’

  ‘I have been to see the prisoner while you have been dallying.’

  ‘How is he?’

  ‘Radwinter stands guard over him like the midwife of Hell. As for Mistress Jennet Marlin, she thinks you are after Tamasin to find a position as a court servant.’

  He laughed. ‘A murrain on her. She fears to lose Tamasin.’

  ‘Why does she value the girl so?’ I asked. ‘They seem unlikely friends.’

  ‘I asked Tamasin about that. Mistress Jennet likes Tama-sin’s merry ways, it seems. Says they take her mind from her troubles. Her swain in the Tower.’ He shrugged impatiently. ‘Who can fathom the hearts of women?’

  ‘I had the pleasure of her company on the way back. She seems to dislike me very much. Thinks I am one of those who would do anything for office and profit. She was so fierce, I am not sure she is not a little brainsick.’

  ‘I asked Tamasin about Lady Rochford,’ Barak said. ‘Apparently the women are all afraid of her, she does nothing but gossip maliciously about everyone. They say she was paid to bring gossip to Lord Cromwell about the wives she served as lady’s maid. Jane Seymour, then Anne of Cleves.’

  ‘And Catherine Howard?’

  ‘Apparently she and Queen Catherine have become close, but Tamasin says the Queen should not trust her one inch. Mistress Marlin does not like Lady Rochford either. Says she has no morals.’

  ‘Who does, in that court? Our self-righteous Mistress Marlin is a naïve woman, I think.’ I sighed. ‘Well, what will you do while I am greeting the Progress tomorrow? See Tamasin again?’

  ‘She will be busy preparing for the Queen’s arrival. I might walk into town, see the Progress enter.’ He looked at me. ‘Tamasin thought you were a little sharp with her, when we were talking about the Queen.’

  ‘I cannot forget her trickery. But also, I had had bad news.’ I told him of Giles Wrenne’s illness, his request that I help him find his nephew.

  ‘Poor old arsehole.’ Barak shivered. ‘That’s hard.’

  ‘I said you would help him too, when we get back to London.’

  ‘Ay. All right. I wish we were there now.’

  ‘Me too.’ I paused. ‘When Mistress Marlin was talking about Tamasin, she mentioned the girl had no one in the world. She said her mother was dead, but made no mention of her father. She has a little money, apparently, from her grandmother.’

  ‘Tamasin does not know who her father was. Her mother would never tell her. Someone around the court, though, for that was the only world her mother knew, working in the Queen’s sewery. She has some ideas, but does not know.’

  ‘Oh?’

  He looked uncomfortable. ‘Girlish fancies.’

  I smiled. ‘Fancies she is a nobleman’s daughter, perhaps?’ He shrugged, and I saw I had hit the mark. ‘Will you see more of Tamasin, when we are all back home?’ I asked with deliberate casualness.

  ‘Perhaps.’

  I think you will, I thought. I think you are smitten, perhaps for the first time in your roisterous life. I wondered if this meant he would stay with me.

  ‘Tamasin has seen the Queen, you know,’ he said.

  ‘Yes, she told me.’

  ‘Says she is more like a girl than a woman. There is some trouble because she has given her old friend Dereham a job and now he has come here trying to give Lady Rochford orders about the arrangements. Tamasin says it has put the old witch in a fine temper.’

  I shrugged. I was not interested in the gossip that went on in the royal household.

  Barak was silent a moment, then said in more serious tones, ‘I have been thinking about Mast
er Craike, wondering what he was up to last night.’

  I nodded slowly. ‘Yes. If anyone has a free run of St Mary’s it is him. And he was up and about when Oldroyd was killed. And in his post he could get keys easily. Like the keys to the chapterhouse.’

  ‘Yet as you said, nothing was found when he was searched.’

  ‘What if he had an accomplice? What if they spoke to Oldroyd and he refused to give up the papers? They kill him. Then I turn up with them at King’s Manor.’

  ‘And the accomplice hit you and got away, while Craike stayed there. But why not kill you, knowing you’d seen some of the papers at least?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ I said heavily. ‘And somehow I can’t see Craike involved in the conspiracy. I can’t see him having the nerve for dangerous work. And what’s the connection to Broderick? Is it the same people trying to poison him?’

  ‘Why? If they’re on the same side, the side of the conspirators?’

  ‘Perhaps he asked for poison to be brought,’ I said slowly. ‘At the moment he is speaking in riddles. If he was given a way to kill himself, that would stop him ever talking. But how was it done?’ I sat frowning a moment. ‘These damned papers, I think they hold something of value to the conspirators. They must do, to have the Privy Council involved. People involved in the conspiracy, seeking the papers and also trying to put Broderick out of the way so he can’t tell what he knows.’

  ‘If they were conspirators, why did Oldroyd not give up the papers to them?’

  ‘Perhaps he was unsure of them. Jesu, they gave him a dreadful death. And yet spared me. By accident or design. By God, I hope they meant to spare me.’ I took a deep breath. ‘Someone from the Privy Council is to interview me tomorrow, no doubt after the presentation to the King. That I am not looking forward to.’

  ‘They might send us home,’ Barak said.

  I smiled wryly. ‘That’s what I hope. I’d not mind that, even if it’s in disgrace. I want no more of this matter. A pox on Cranmer for involving me with Broderick.’ I stretched my arms above my head. ‘Dear God, Barak,’ I said passionately. ‘I wish tomorrow was over.’

  Chapter Seventeen

  I WAS WAKENED BY cocks crowing. Not one or two but dozens, a tremendous cacophony. I lay puzzled for a moment, then realized it was the fighting cocks in the monastery church. All round the cubicles people coughed and groaned and cursed the birds.

  The sun was rising in a sky of unrelieved blue and when I opened the window I felt warm air for the first time in York. As the song had promised, the King had banished rain. So superstitious folk would say. I looked up at the great bulk of the church, realizing it was the first morning the huge spire had not been wreathed in mist. It pointed to the sky like a huge dead finger.

  I dressed in my best robe, adjusting the fur trim, then put on my coif and above that my new cap, for which I had hunted out a new pin. Arranging it carefully, the brim leaning to the left to hide my bruise, I left the cubicle.

  All around the clerks were smoothing clothes and checking their faces in steel mirrors. There was none of the usual bantering conversation today; everyone was preoccupied, serious, preparing mentally for their allotted role. Barak, dressed in a red doublet, stood leaning on the door of his cubicle, watching the clerks with a sardonic smile.

  ‘What are you doing?’ I asked.

  ‘Watching these fellows. Thought I’d wait for you, see if you wanted to take breakfast in the refectory. You should have something to eat, you do not know when you may get lunch.’

  ‘Ay, let’s eat,’ I said, touched by his concern. ‘How do I look?’

  ‘Dressy. Doesn’t suit you. But that bruise is well hidden.’

  We walked across to the refectory, which was full of clerks and minor officials, likewise snatching a meal while they could. The carpenters were no doubt all abed, their work done at last. Here too there was an air of tension, and little talk. Everyone jumped and looked round when a groom dropped a plate of cold meat and it clattered on the floor. ‘God’s body!’ he yelled. ‘There’s grease all over my damned tunic now!’

  Barak grinned. ‘It’s getting too much for some folk.’

  ‘All right for you,’ I murmured. ‘Don’t tire yourself out walking round the town,’ I added sardonically, as we parted on the refectory steps. He gave me a mock salute and I turned, joining a steady stream of the well-dressed heading for the manor house. I felt as though I were on a ship, leaving for a voyage to a far, unfamiliar shore.

  IN THE COURTYARD the rising sun was reflected in flashing streaks from the gold leaf woven into the fabric of the tents and from the polished breastplates of the soldiers standing before the pavilions, pikes raised and bright plumes in their helmets. The pennants with the Scotch and English flags waved in a warm breeze. Grooms were leading horses out of the church, saddling them and tying them up to await their masters, each with a number round its neck. I looked for Genesis but could not see him.

  By the manor house dozens of men in colourful doublets, coats and robes stood talking in groups. There was an occasional burst of nervous laughter. I went inside.

  Within, soldiers lined the walls of the Great Hall, standing rigidly to attention. At each of the two staircases a group of servants was struggling to haul up pieces of a large bed to where the King’s and Queen’s privy chambers would be. Lady Rochford and the Queen’s secretary, Dereham, were berating two men as they tried to manoeuvre an enormous, richly decorated wooden headboard into the narrow staircase on the Queen’s side. Lady Rochford wore a red brocade dress decorated with a fleur-de-lys design, a jewelled pomander dangling from her waist, and her face was painted thickly with white ceruse, hiding her high complexion.

  ‘Churl! Churl!’ she shouted excitedly. ‘You’ll chip that edge! Master Dereham, you must watch them, I have to make ready!’

  ‘I am a secretary, not a steward,’ Dereham growled. On closer inspection I did not like his mien. He looked well enough in his short coat lined with beaver, an enormous gold codpiece underneath, but his narrow handsome face was shifty.

  ‘Then fetch the Queen’s Chamberlain!’ Lady Rochford snapped over her shoulder as she swept past me. I looked at the other staircase, where a group of men were struggling with the largest mattress I had ever seen, so wide and thick it threatened to fall back and suffocate them.

  I felt a sharp poke in the ribs. I jumped and whirled round to find Sir James Fealty in an ankle-length robe of fine brocade with puffed shoulders and a wide fur trim, frowning at me. Recorder Tankerd stood by him, like me in a good black robe, fiddling nervously with the buttons. A knapsack with gold edges hung over his shoulder, no doubt containing his speech. Fealty’s servant Cowfold stood holding the petitions, bound together with red tape and sealed with wax.

  ‘Why are you standing around?’ Sir James snapped at me pettishly. ‘I need everyone together! Where is Brother Wrenne?’

  ‘I have not seen him yet.’

  ‘Come outside. You should be with your horses. And Brother Tankerd, stop messing with your buttons, you will have them off. And as for your employers, I am angry to hear their news. I hope they know what they are doing!’

  ‘The city councillors are adamant they will not change clothes till they are beyond the city.’

  Fealty gave a snort, then marched to the door. I gave the city Recorder a look of commiseration as we followed. Fealty’s face brightened a little as he descended the steps, though, for Giles Wrenne was at the bottom, and a groom stood at a respectful distance holding three horses by the reins. One was Genesis, who whickered with pleasure at seeing me.

  ‘Good morning, Matthew,’ the old man said cheerfully. Looking at him today one would not have guessed he was ill. He looked well set up in his best robe; his jewelled cap was in the old high-crowned style, a touch of individuality.

  Sir James fussed about getting the petitions placed in the saddlebags on Wrenne’s big horse, his long wispy beard blowing from side to side in the light breeze. When all was settled
and we were mounted he pointed to the gate. ‘The city delegation is outside, you will ride to Fulford with them at the guards’ signal.’ He raked us with his eyes for a moment. ‘Remember all I told you, do not disgrace me.’ We waited while a little group of courtiers passed us and rode through the gate; among them I saw Lady Rochford and Rich. As we made to follow them I heard someone call ‘Good luck, Master Shardlake!’ and turned to see Tamasin Reedbourne standing on the steps, looking on. She wore yet another fine dress, a blue and orange one today. I briefly raised a hand to her. I wondered how much was left of her grandmother’s inheritance.

  ON THE OTHER SIDE of the gates, the Bootham was crowded with men on horseback, all in their best finery. I estimated there must be near two hundred of them. I recognized the mayor at the front, his face almost as red as his robes. We pulled to a halt beside them and waited. A little way up the road a crowd of thirty mounted soldiers waited, their horses resplendent in rich cloths.

  I studied Wrenne. He was looking round at everything, and had an air of suppressed excitement about him. ‘What a crowd,’ I said. ‘Who are they all?’

  ‘The city council and guild officials. And the local gentry from the Ainsty. We should set off soon.’

  ‘What is the problem with the councillors getting changed?’ I asked Tankerd.

  ‘They have been asked to meet the King dressed in dull and sombre clothes, to show their humility for their part in the rebellion five years ago. But they were adamant they would not change till they were outside the city, lest the common folk see them and mock. Sir James is worried they may mess up their robes while they are changing, as it is to be done in the fields. Mayor Hall has been in a great floughter, caught between the council and yon Fealty.’

  Something flickered in front of my vision, and I realized the wretched feather had come loose in my cap again. I pulled it off and fiddled with the pin, careful not to break the delicate feather vane. Then the guard captain called ‘Fall to! Fall to!’ and I had to jam it back on my head as everyone began to move forward. We followed the procession of councillors as they rode under Bootham Bar, the soldiers clattering behind us.