‘I am happy as we are.’
I sipped my wine slowly, feeling a little sad. Wealth was one thing, happiness and peace of mind another. Never mind that the King was infatuated with one favourite one day and that same favourite could be out of favour the next. Recently, I had heard rumours of his many infidelities to the queen he had once loved with the devotion of an honourable knight.
I whispered, with a catch in my throat, ‘Beware of the insouciance of kings. I like not the way he treats Queen Catherine. The merchant wives love her dearly and they dislike how he has set up Henry Fitzroy as if he is a true-born son.’
‘Lizzie, the King needs a son and it seems that the Queen will never give him another child. It is why he loves this little boy. The Cardinal says that the baby looks just like the father.’
‘Cardinal Wolsey has seen him?’
‘I helped the Cardinal to arrange the child’s future household.’
‘You have seen him too?’
‘No, I am not so privileged.’ His grey eyes had hardened in the candlelight.
I turned towards the painting of the Virgin that still hung in our bedchamber alcove. ‘I remember the Queen every day in my prayers. I pray for Princess Mary too.’
‘As well you do. She is a beautiful, clever child, and, according to the Cardinal, my master, the King is devoted to her.’
‘That is something,’ I said. ‘But be careful of the nobility. You know they are untrustworthy.’
‘Some are, others aren’t, Lizzy. I am always cautious.’ His eyes shone with chill determination.
If eyes are a route into the workings of a man’s soul, that night I saw naked ambition in Thomas’ soul.
The King wanted money for a war with France. He wanted glory. So much for the Field of Cloth of Gold of three years before, a peace to last between our two countries, a bond of friendship between our King and King Francis. Thomas said King Henry should focus on our borders with Scotland, make those safe rather than seek wars with France. I agreed.
‘The talk in this Parliament all goes around and around like a whirlpool.’
‘An undecided pool.’
‘Aye, Lizzy, and nothing is clear or agreed. Thomas More must be fed up with them all.’
‘Be careful, Tom,’ I warned again, concerned that somehow he was being used by the Cardinal to whose service he was devoted. I thought this devotion odd because Thomas had on many occasions voiced his cynicism at the greed of churchmen and he Cardinal was the greediest of them all. Somehow, he was exempt from Thomas’ censure. Perhaps it was because the shrewd, ingenious, self-made Cardinal was not of noble birth. His father, like my Thomas’ father, had been a tradesman. The Cardinal was ambitious and I had to accept that my husband was, too.
As the sun climbed the cloudless sky, Thomas helped us carry boughs of yew and spring flowers into the house to decorate the hall and parlour. I bustled about my morning tasks of folding linen and supervising the cooks and maids set the trestles, enjoying the scent of lilac that came wafting through the hall, determined to enjoy this day. Before the dinner hour, Thomas set off for York House to help transport costumes and props along the river for the pageant that the Cardinal was organising at Greenwich for the King and Queen’s pleasure.
Our household was as excited as children receiving treats at Christmastide. May was a much beloved holiday. A Fair would stretch as far as the eye could see all along the Cheape and our girls, dancing around the trestles in anticipation of treats, were hardly able to eat their dinner. I had promised them a trip to the Maypole where the Cheape joined Cornhill to watch the dancing and sword fighting, followed by supper with Meg at the Cornhill house.
We would dine on rennet and moulded cream hedgehogs stuck with slivered almonds as a special treat, and sugar, rosewater and Russian isinglass, which when left to cool and set firm could be cut into squares. Meg gilded these shapes with little gold flowers and served them with thickened cream. It was a great May Day treat. How my own sweet tooth craved a bite of these dainties, and just thinking of them I could taste the gold flowers melting in my mouth. She promised fools, fruits swirled into mounds of cool cream, and pastries.
After our servants cleared away our dinner, I said, ‘Bessie, help the children’s nurse get them ready. Make sure they wear their boots. The streets are full of muck after the April rains. Come up to my chamber. I’ll need help with my bodice laces.’
I removed my blue kirtle and bodice from my clothing pole, and searched for a suitable over-gown. At length I saw one, a green flowery over skirt which hung amongst Thomas’ tawny velvet coats, the ones he wore for the Cardinal’s work. As I lifted away the over dress, a small book poking out of a wide pocket that Thomas always had set into the fabric of his velvet coats tumbled out. I scooped it up and placed it on the chest below the window wondering if it contained poems. With teaching the children their letters every day, I had been too busy to read for my own pleasure. I would look at it later.
Bessie arrived, glanced at my choice of gown and appraised it. ‘Very fine, Mistress Elizabeth. You will look a treat in that gown.’
She helped me into it and found me a pair of contrasting sleeves.
‘Hurry, Bessie,’ I said with impatience. ‘We will miss the sword-fighting, and I promised Gregory.’
‘Here, you’re done, Mistress Elizabeth.’ She tied the last ribbon and stood back to inspect me.
In my haste to dress, I left my linen work cap lying on top of the book. I changed my slippers for stouter shoes and set the slippers on the chest beside it.
Richard, my nephew, and Barnaby, who was now a journeyman, both accompanied us to Cheape Street. Barnaby carried my young son on his shoulders. Gregory happily chattered away, waving his miniature sword about, slaying imaginary dragons. We wound our way through the narrow streets and holiday crowds towards the Maypole that was covered with laurel branches and entwined with spring flowers. Cymbals clashed and bagpipes blasted out feet-tapping tunes.
‘Hurry,’ Annie said, on hearing them, tugging at Grace’s hand.
‘With speed,’ three year old Gregory shouted, his sword waving madly, a danger in the narrow crowded street.
‘Put up your sword, Green Knight,’ joked Barnaby, and Gregory lowered his wooden weapon.
The tense smell of anticipation was pervasive. By the time we had pushed into the gathering by the flowery Maypole, there was a pause in the dancing. Pie sellers and hawkers weaved through the waiting throng calling out their wares. A band of Spanish Benedictine monks watched from under a silversmith’s awning as a grand empty ring was created by uniformed yeomen around the Maypole. I could not help noticing a tall, slim, bald-headed man clad in a black tunic standing with them, a scabbard hanging from his broad belt. He leaned down and conversed with the closest Benedictine monk.
A swordsman, who by his strutting, arrogant bearing obviously thought he could fight as well as any of the King’s yeomen, stepped forward into the ring. Nervously, I bit my lip so hard that I could taste blood. If ever I watched sword-fighting, even when contestants were supposed to fight with blunted swords, I would always become gripped by fear. I could not forget how my first husband had perished, so how could I not feel concern for the safety of the May Day swordsmen?
The King’s yeomen liked to parade their skills for us ordinary people to admire. Courageous contestants hoped that their skills would be noticed at the May Day sword contests. After all, a talented young man might, if fortunate, be offered a coveted place in the King’s Guard. The King’s yeoman lifted his sword and bowed to us. As if in agreement, the crowd drew breath in unison. I forgot the peculiar stranger who had been deeply in conversation with the Spanish Benedictine monks, and the way he had glanced speculatively at the ring. The children shouted with excitement. ‘Bravo!’ The sword fights were about to begin. Gregory waved his little sword higher. Bessie, who was standing with Annie, gasped and let out a shriek.
She grabbed my arm. ‘It can’t be, Mistress Elizabeth.�
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‘What is it, Bess?’
One hand flapped over her mouth, and she let go Annie’s hand. She pointed into the ring created by the water conduit for the contestants. ‘Look who it is.’
‘Who?’
‘Toby,’ she shrieked.
We were very close to the front of the gathering. I peered hard around a couple in front of me, trying to see whom Bess was pointing to. The first contestant, a blond-haired young man, wearing brown hose and a loose cream linen shirt had just entered the centre of the ring, carrying a sword. At first, his back was to me, but as he spun around to face his opponent, a yeoman of the guard, there was no mistaking him. I found my heart leaping.
The opponents kissed their swords and began to circle each other. I knew that the contestant was indeed Toby, whom we had thought lived safely far from the City’s dangers. Thomas had never been sure of his actual whereabouts. On the one occasion he had enquired, he had been told that Toby was living with his uncle in Nottingham. This Toby was not a boy any longer.
Grace clung to her nurse, stuck her thumb into her mouth, and stared at the circling swordsmen. Bess grasped Annie’s hand again. I watched dumbstruck with shock. Vendors stood still, the smells of their pies drifting through the crowds of excited spectators.
Toby moved like lightning that descended without warning from a summer sky. He fought well. The crowd was stunned into silence by the speed with which he had his opponent on the ground and his blunted sword at his foe’s chest. A moment later they both rose and bowed. The audience cheered. Barnaby leaned down to me and said one word. ‘Toby.’ His face was bemused. ‘Where has he sprung from?’
I nodded. ‘By the sainted virgin, it is indeed he.’
Annie looked up at me. ‘Mama, who is Toby?’
I protectively drew her close to me. ‘Someone we knew long ago before you were born, sweeting.’
Another guardsman challenged Toby, moving into the centre of the ring, as the crowd cheered him on. The crowd was mesmerised by the way the pair parried, ducked and exchanged places over and over. The playacting had begun all over again. This rival was more challenging competition and we could see that Toby was tiring.
‘He won’t win this time,’ Richard said from Barnaby’s other side.
‘At least the swords blades are blunted,’ I remarked.
Toby swiftly side-stepped his opponent. He fought bravely. From the corner of my eye, I saw the tall bald-headed man step from the gaggle of monks by the silversmith’s shop. They turned into a clattering of dark jackdaws as they egged him on. Touching his scabbard, the swordsman slid serpent-like through gaps in the mass of people, and advanced on the ring. I saw him glance over straight at us as if he knew whom I was. A curl of a smile played about his thin lips. I felt fearful. Who was he?
Memory is evasive but I was sure that if I had known that man before I would recollect him. As I searched through my memories, an inner voice seemed to whisper to me, ‘As you sow, so shall you reap.’ Realisation descended. It was the fire in Wood Street. He was the cloaked man who had spoken to me in the yard as we watched my property burn and who had vanished without trace. Today, his appearance and raiment was that of the nobility. It had been dark with smoke that night and the man who had whispered to me had been shadowy. Glancing back over my shoulder towards the Silversmith’s, I wondered why the foreign monks were forming a clerical retinue for him. As he reached the edge of the ring, the monks began to frantically converse again, their looks sliding from the bald-headed man to Toby as he waited his turn.
I concentrated on the sword play. After another round of dodging and attacking, Toby had the yeoman up against the maypole with his sword at his throat. The yeoman raised his arms and dropped his blunted sword. The clang of metal on the cobbles was followed by a great cheer. Toby had again earned the crowd’s appreciation. An aproned innkeeper ran forward and thrust a pitcher into Toby’s hands. Toby drank thirstily. At once, the dark-clad man stepped boldly into the ring, withdrawing a sword from his scabbard. He removed his scabbard and belt, throwing them to the ground. There was no sword-kissing ceremony this time. Toby’s new foe hardly gave him time to draw breath or even hand the pitcher back. He silently stalked him.
It all began over again, but this time Toby really appeared tired, and his opponent was clearly an accomplished swordsman. He moved stealthily. As he raised his sword to strike Toby, I observed what I had always feared to see on such occasions, a sharpened blade gleaming in the sunshine as it was raised. Everyone else saw it, but nobody stopped the fight. Nobody could. It was all happening too quickly. This time the fighting was intense and faster than before, a whirl of weapons with clashes that pierced the fetid air every time the blades made contact.
Annie clung to Bess and me, clutching both of our skirts; Grace cried out and ducked behind her nurse. Gregory screamed. Even he felt the crowd’s horror as they realised that this fight would not end until one of the adversaries died. The fight went on and on with grunts and shouts. I prayed hard for God to spare Toby’s life. This swordplay was unfair and it was a cruel turn of fate that Toby was disadvantaged rather than the stranger.
Toby was fighting for his life, caught in a never ending repetitive spiral of evading and deflecting. This was becoming a cruel dream. His opponent knew him and I wondered if Toby recognised his enemy. The man in black was playing cat and mouse with him.
Blood spurted Toby’s arm where the sword’s point had nicked through his shirt. A moment later, Toby was down, crawling about in the dirt, trying to scramble to his feet. Sword raised, his adversary waited. He was laughing.
Toby regained his feet, and the cruel dance was about to begin all over again. I heard a shriek as a most peculiar event occurred. A hooded man, standing behind Richard, deliberately let a dog off a leash and with a command sent it for the bald-headed swordsman. The dog hurtled forward, almost knocking Richard over, barred his teeth and, within the moment it took for Toby to call out a warning, had barrelled into Toby’s enemy, causing him to lose balance and fly onto the cobbles, knocking his head hard on the maypole as he fell and once again as he made contact with the cobbles.
Toby dropped his sword and knelt to help him. He cradled the man’s head in his arms, looked up into the spectators and called out for help. The dog had vanished as if it had never been, racing along Cheape Street and into an alley. I instinctively glanced around. There was no sign of its owner. Barnaby thrust Gregory into Richard’s arms and pushed through the couple standing in front of him. The sinister-looking foreign monks elbowed the crowds out of the way and flowed forward, their dark gowns sweeping rubbish along the dusty street like besoms as they raced forward shouting ‘Murder’ and ‘God spare Sir Antony!’.
Sir Antony was dead. Barnaby called for an apothecary and a warden. Both came running, pursued by two parish sergeants. The apothecary knelt down in the dust and a moment later, he confirmed Sir Antony’s death. The sergeants set off to search for the dog and its owner, who had disappeared. The warden began to question those nearest to the circle as to what they had seen. It was clear that Toby was not responsible and he was free to leave. He had not been fighting with a sharpened blade.
The blow to the head had finished Sir Antony quicker than any sword fight would. Barnaby lifted his opponent’s sword up in both his hands and called to the crowd, ‘He had a sharpened sword.’ There was a collective murmur of agreement. Gradually, the watchers began to disperse. The Benedictines murmured prayers over the body. Their superior shouted for cloth. When, moments later, a draper hurried forward from his shop, as with one movement, the black shrouded clergy silently created a cradle and lifted Sir Antony into it. They placed his sword on his breast. There was a shout from the few remaining spectators: ‘He does not deserve such an honour.’
The Benedictines remained silent. They moved off along Cheape Street like shades, pointed hoods pulled up to cover their heads, processing with the body cradled between them towards St Mary Le Bow. No one followed.
Sir Antony was not well-liked and neither were these Benedictine monks.
Once the Spanish Benedictines were gone from the Maypole, Barnaby threw his arms about Toby. He drew him away from the Maypole. As they pushed through the departing crowd, men slapped Toby’s back and praised his courage. Barnaby guided Toby into to our small company. Toby’s face was drained of colour.
‘Toby,’ I said, my eyes still wide at the horror we had witnessed. ‘What are you doing here?’
He shook his head. I clutched both girls to me. Richard comforted Gregory, who was too dumbstruck to even set up a protest.
Barnaby said in a quiet voice, ‘I think we must get Toby away. I don’t trust the Spanish Benedictines. They may seek revenge. We should take him to Cornhill.’
I nodded and reached out to Toby who seemed unable to find his voice. ‘It’s best that we disappear, in case the monks send someone after you. They have long arms and longer memories. Did you know your adversary? I think, he was familiar to both of us.’
Toby shivered visibly. Richard gallantly removed his short cloak and draped it around Toby’s shoulders. Toby spoke at last. ‘I …had remembered him once he faced me.’ He stared at the backs of the departing monks.
The sergeant of the yeomen stepped in front of us, bowed to me, ‘Mistress Cromwell,’ he said, bowing and recognising me. ‘Good day to you.’ I nodded. He turned to Toby, ‘Had he killed you, he would have been held responsible.’
‘As well he did not. He was a superior swordsman.’
The sergeant crossed himself. ‘God intervened … a cheat, a good riddance … a cruel man. Claims he is of the knightly class. If ever evil has walked this earth, Sir Antony was that. Those Spanish Benedictines are intent on finding heretics. They would bring Castile’s inquisition to England. Those whom they accuse are innocents.’
Toby shuddered. The yeoman continued, ‘And well you may fear them for they are hated here. If you want to join the Yeomen, I have a place for you at Westminster. Seek me out … your name?’
The Woman in the Shadows: Tudor England through the eyes of an influential woman Page 28