There is no Purgatory for Packington. He will rest quiet till, at the end of time, he takes a final boat to meet his God. A pity to have survived so many sea crossings, and Thomas More’s persecutions, and the simmering fury of the London clergy, only to come to grief outside your own front door. There is no time to mourn, though the dead man has been his friend these many years. By ten o’clock the mist has dispersed, a pale sun shining from a clear sky. By the Angelus bell it is grey again, but for an hour the air is sprinkled with flakes of gold, as if Heaven has thrown some lustre on dead Packington. Funeral in two days, the family are told, three at most. Father Robert Barnes to preach. It’s what the dead man would have wanted.
It’s a miscalculation. Barnes’s sermon is so inflammatory that he has no choice but to take him into custody. Better in my hands, he says, than in the Bishop of London’s prison. The city has not forgot the case of Richard Hunne. It may be twenty-five years, or nearly that, but the shame is still fresh. This godly merchant, shut up in the Lollards’ Tower, was found hanged: never was there such a hanging, with blood on the flags and blood on the walls. The authorities claimed Hunne had killed himself, in despair at his own heresies. The stool on which he was supposed to have balanced was well beyond reach of his feet.
At Windsor he stands at a casement with Henry, watching the rain. The wind moans in the chimney. The room seems drained of light, as if each window were a device for sucking it out and dribbling it feebly into the day outside.
The king says, ‘Brighter? In the west? Do you think?’
‘Not really.’
Henry sighs. ‘The eye of faith, it must be.’
It occurs to him that he has answered absently, as if to a child or a member of his own household. Henry is fretful, his mind hopping here and there, and when he is in this humour it is best to keep your head low, like a birdcatcher. ‘Do you know what I liked best this summer?’ the king says. He corrects himself: ‘I mean the summer before? I liked Wolf Hall. Once in a while every prince wishes he could lay aside his duties, and live for a year as a private gentleman. Because a gentleman bides content; he dances in the great barn decked with garlands, he sees the harvest home and knows every harvester by name.’
He says nothing. He has the boy Rob in his service, down in Wiltshire reporting on who comes and goes. Not that he suspects the Seymours, but it is no harm to have a source. The king says, ‘I was innocent in those days. I did not understand the Boleyns and their treason. But once I did understand it, and cleared them out of the court, I thought everything would be better. Yet here I am, one summer passed and one winter passing, my son Fitzroy is dead, I have bastardised both my daughters, I have no heir and, as far as I understand, no hope of one. My subjects are in rebellion, my coffers are empty, and my cradle empty too. So tell me, Thomas, how is this better? How am I better off than this time last year? Last year, my subjects were not shot down in the street.’
Still he says nothing. We must trust the gale of self-pity will blow itself out, and presently it does. Henry straightens up. ‘There are thirty thousand loyal men advancing on the town.’ Pontefract, he means. ‘Fear not, my lord. It will soon be back in our hands.’
Henry puts a hand on his shoulder. In that anointed palm there is vertu. Once consecrated, a king can heal. So why does he not feel healed?
As they bow themselves out Mr Wriothesley says, ‘You were at a loss there, I think. You did not utter, sir.’
He says, ‘Leave the king long enough, and he will start to cheer himself up. You must not crowd him, Call-Me. Did he not tell you so?’
When he goes to the Tower to see Barnes, it is without the body armour: it will stop a dagger, but it would not have saved Packington, and why would it save him? No breastplate but Jesus, and Thomas Avery as clerk. It is another foggy day, and it has not lifted by afternoon: rain just holding off, but the air as damp as if the afternoon had been rubbed with snails.
Barnes is at his books, but at the sound of the key he jumps up in alarm: a volume skitters away from him, he tries to catch it, picks it up from the floor and comes upright with his face red.
‘Are they looking after you?’
Barnes falls back to his stool. ‘Every time I hear footsteps in the passage, my heart …’ He taps the table, a broken rhythm. He sees Lord Cromwell is not alone: ‘Who is this?’
‘A good Christian. So be at your ease.’
‘Ease?’ Barnes laughs.
Avery says, ‘This custody is for your protection.’
‘You think it is I who needs protection? What about Cromwell here? Perhaps we should all take each other into custody?’
‘As soon as my lord has the city quiet, you will be free.’
Barnes is himself again, tidying the papers before him. ‘Most men would not believe you. But your master said the same when he locked up Wyatt – you will soon be free. And he kept his word. Though why he would extend himself for such a saucy fellow, I cannot imagine. Wyatt is hardly a promoter of God’s cause.’
‘But he is no papist,’ Avery says. ‘He saw their manners in Italy.’
‘The Pope will unleash his terror now,’ Barnes says. ‘This is only the beginning. Where is that ingrate Pole? Or have you lost sight of him?’
‘Still in Rome. They say Farnese lodges him above his own chamber, and means to make him a cardinal.’
‘He should refuse,’ Barnes says.
‘Did anyone ever refuse to be made a cardinal?’
Barnes says, ‘I thought you would have worked him some mischief weeks back, when he was in Sienna. If Thomas More can reach out his hand to strike at Tyndale, being himself dead, then I think that you, being a quick and vigorous man, should be able to strike down Reginald.’
He says, ‘I like my life to be full of interest, Father Barnes. Nothing about killing interests me. And Reynold’s heart was not always cankered.’
As soon as he unravels the conspiracies of such people – unknotting them with a casual hand, and deliberately looking the other way – they insist on entangling themselves again, and whistling and shouting till they get his attention. Margaret Pole, the renegade’s mother, is in her castle at Warblington: too near the coast for his comfort. He imagines her in a tower with a mirror, signalling to boats at sea, which land and discharge the enemy. If it takes just one man to shoot dead a member of Parliament, it takes just one to shoot dead a king; his heart can burst like a common heart. The spot where Packington died is five minutes from the gate of Margaret Pole’s town house; for all we know, the killer issued from behind her wall.
Barnes says, ‘I hear that Henry put on a bold face with the Pilgrims’ delegates. But that in private, he is very much afraid.’
In truth, it was all he could do to stop Henry apologising to the envoys, who came to Windsor and will travel back under safe-conduct. The king declared to them that, contrary to their belief, he had as many noble advisers now as at the beginning of his reign: he offered to name them, earl by earl, baron by baron, so the north country men could count up for themselves. That is not the way forward, he had thought. But at the king’s command, he withdrew and left the field clear for his sovereign to exercise his charm.
He says to Barnes, ‘The king believes his subjects are loyal for love of him. He is not by nature inclined to believe they conspire.’
‘But you are training him to believe it?’
‘Only a fool sees plots where there are none. Any crime may begin in impulse – a rash man, an angry man, a fool the worse for drink. But an impulse will not sustain rebellion. Nor can anyone rebel alone. It needs forethought. It needs confederacy. By the nature of the thing, there is conspiracy.’
‘Then Henry must learn to help his good nature,’ Barnes says. ‘Unless you teach him to deploy it towards our German friends. Or the Swiss pastors. Thomas, all their goodwill is wasting away. They are tired of talks without result. Every chance of
alliance is there, if we strike agreement on doctrine. But without a helping hand, England will go down.’
Picture Albion: a lonely ship on the ocean, the feet of her crew perpetually damp. The wind adverse, the storm blowing, the ports closed against her by chains stretched across the harbour mouths. The ignorant and fantastical people of the north say Henry is the Mouldwarp, the king that was and the king to come. He is a thousand years old, a rough and scaly man, chill like a brute from the sea. His subjects drive him out, and he drowns in his own tidal waters. When you think of him, fear touches you in the pit of the stomach; it is an old fear, a dragon fear; it is from childhood. He says to Avery, ‘Would you leave us? It is for –’
‘My own safety. I know.’ Avery bows; pulls the door behind him as he goes.
‘A good young man,’ he says to Barnes. ‘I trust him with my life, but some things he should not hear.’
‘Things about our dread sovereign,’ Barnes says. ‘Do you dread him? I do. As much for what he will not do, as what he might. For his hesitations, which ruin us.’
‘I think I make an advance. When I was first in his service he thought of our Zürich friends as no more than blasphemers who eat sausage in Lent. And Luther, he believed he was the son of a demon, who foams at the mouth when Mass is said. But what you must remember about the king – he was brought up to heed priests and to ask forgiveness for everything he does. You may kick out the confessors and tell him he is justified, but he still has a priest in the head.’
‘He must be enraged with you,’ Barnes says bluntly.
‘Yes, though he tries to disguise it. He is angry that he has to defend me for my vile blood. But he cannot cast me off. Or it will seem as if he has allowed rebels to dictate to him.’
‘That is poor security. To think you hold office at their pleasure.’
‘It’s all I have, Rob.’ He gets up, stretches. ‘I am going to see Tom Truth now.’
‘Oh yes,’ Barnes says, ‘the fornicator. What I hear is, he makes extravagant promises to any keepers who will bring him to Margaret Douglas and leave him there an hour. But the keepers laugh at him. They don’t trust his money.’
‘I ought to get myself locked up,’ he says. ‘Then I might learn a thing or two.’
‘Don’t say it.’ Barnes touches his crucifix. ‘Shall I bless you?’
‘Oh,’ he says, ‘don’t put yourself out.’
He bursts out laughing: he feels light, no plate armour, no chain links, only the knife under his shirt. He has removed Margaret Douglas to the convent at Sion, put her under the care of the abbess. But perhaps her lover does not know that.
His old friend Martin is waiting to escort him. ‘Lord Thomas sets up for a poet, Martin. What do you think?’
‘Not one-tenth of Mr Wyatt’s wit. Nor his application to the page.’
‘You are becoming acquainted with the highest in the land.’
‘Amongst whom I count yourself,’ Martin says reverently. ‘Though I trust it shall be many a day before I see you here.’
‘Why not trust it will be never?’ Avery says.
Martin is startled. ‘I meant no ill-will. I am ever grateful to his lordship.’
Thomas Avery disburses the customary coins, for Lord Cromwell’s godchild.
Tom Truth, unshaven for two days and unprepared for visitors, doesn’t know whether to spit at him or kneel to him. It has perplexed better men. ‘Sit down,’ he tells him. Avery looks into his portfolio and passes him a paper. ‘From Lady Margaret. May I read?
‘And tho that I be banished him fro’
His speech, his sight and company,
Yet will I, in spite of his foe,
Him love, and keep my fantasy.’
Tom Truth lurches at him. He straightens his arm and fends him off.
‘Give me that!’ Truth comes at him again. He grips a handful of the lover’s jacket and dumps him down on a stool.
‘Do what they will, and do their worst,
For all they do is vanity,
For asunder my heart shall burst,
Surer than change my fantasy.’
He passes the paper back to Avery. ‘By her “foe”, do you think she means me? I hope not, considering I saved her life. She told me she was done with you, my lord, but it seems not.’
Lord Thomas jumps up. He is ready for him. Again he puts him down. ‘Wait – I have also a verse from you to her.
‘Thus fare ye well, my wordly treasure,
Desiring God that, of his grace,
To send in time his will and pleasure,
And shortly to get us out of this place.’
He raises an eyebrow. ‘Are you going somewhere?’
Truth is winded. That was a hard dunt in the belly.
‘Well,’ he says, ‘let us say you simply wanted a rhyme.’
‘The king should release me.’ Truth rearranges himself, his crumpled person. ‘As matters stand in the north, he needs every man.’
‘Every man he can trust.’
‘The Yorkshiremen have you on the run. Their abbots will curse you.’
‘Curses with me have none effect, because I give them no credit. They may curse till they combust.’
Truth says, ‘My brother Norfolk will speak for me to the king.’
‘I think the duke has forgot you. He is busy with the rebels. Not fighting. Bargaining.’
‘Is he?’ Truth looks mortified.
‘We are outnumbered in the field. He has no choice but to give way.’
‘He will not keep promises to low men,’ Truth says. ‘He will not be bound. No more will the king be bound to you, Cromwell. The harder you try to bind him by your deeds, the more he will detest you. I pity you, for there is no way forward for you. He will hate you for your successes as much as your failures.’
Truth has done some thinking, while he has been locked away. He says, ‘I make sure that my successes are the king’s, while my failures are my own.’
‘But you cannot do without the Howards,’ Tom Truth says. ‘You cannot rule without noble blood. And my brother Norfolk would rather fight in an honourable contest –’
He interrupts him: ‘Honour is a luxury, when someone is trying in earnest to kill you. Your brother knows that. As for you, your bad verse will choke you. I need not lift a finger. There are some prisoners I forbid to have paper. I might forbid you. For your own good, of course.’
He gets up. Avery steps out of his way. At the door a spirit jumps up and intercepts him: George Boleyn, arms gripping him, head heavy on his shoulder, tears seeping into his linen and leaving a residual salt damp that lasts till he can change his shirt.
By the first week of December, any sympathy for the rebels – sympathy which he has retained, for their ignorance – has melted away. Their communications from the peace talks are vomitous torrents of insult and threat. The commanders are obliged to exclude Richard Cromwell from the sessions, as the rebels will not sit down with him. All Cromwells, they declare, should be killed or banished. Parliament has no authority to dissolve abbeys – and it is not a real parliament anyway, because it is packed with the king’s sycophants and elbow-hangers.
All this – and yet they expect a general pardon. They will get it, because their numbers are so great, even though they do not spare the king himself, reminding him that a prince who rules without virtue can be deposed, and they do not find any virtue in his adherence to Cromwell. They mention Edward II, Richard II: kings murdered by their own subjects, because they kept favourites, persons of high ambition and low morals. To compare Lord Cromwell, as they do, to Piers Gaveston … when their jibes are read out, certain councillors bite their lips, others turn their faces away. Because you would not feel it safe to laugh, if you had seen the king’s white face.
Richard Riche says privately, perhaps it is an argument why the king should show himself to hi
s subjects in the north. They would soon perceive he is not the sort of man who keeps a catamite. And that, even if he were, he would not so use the Lord Privy Seal.
He says, it is not for any unnatural vice that the people hated Gaveston: it was because he was base-born, and the king made him an earl. It was because the king made him rich, and he went in silks. But then, he was not English-born: that weighed too, with the ignorant.
Do not mock Ricardo Riche. At least, not to his face. He has stood up well to the hatred directed at him in recent weeks. He understands that there are sins that governors may, perhaps must, commit. The commandments for a prince are not the same as those that govern his subjects. He must lie for his country’s good. We do not need a translation from the Italian, to understand that.
The rebels call him, Lord Cromwell, a Lollard. It is a term almost antique, though when he was young, men and women were burned for it. He hears a woman’s voice in the air, on a breeze blown from his childhood: ‘A Loller, that’s one who says the God on the altar is a piece of bread.’
He is small; his belly is empty; he is far from home. Motherly, she takes his hand as they are jostled in the crowd: ‘Stick by me, sweetheart.’ She bats at the men in front of them, their solid wall of backs, and they part for her, saying, ‘Sister, watch out, you’ll have that child trampled!’
‘Let us through,’ she says, ‘he’s come a long way. Show him how the filthy creature dies, the enemy of God, so he gets a good view and remembers it when he is a man grown.’
Some memories from his childhood he can entertain. John in his kitchen, even Walter in his forge, all accompanied by the smell of burning. But when a memory like this rises up – and in truth there is no other like this – he slaps it down like a man killing a mole with a shovel.
The king tells his council – savouring the moment – ‘I mean to invite our chief Pilgrim to join us for Christmas.’
The Mirror and the Light: 2020’s highly anticipated conclusion to the best selling, award winning Wolf Hall series (The Wolf Hall Trilogy, Book 3) Page 43