He is amused. ‘Do they say which one?’
‘They reason, how else to explain your talent for ruling men?’
Walter ruled with his fist, he thinks.
‘Well, however that may be,’ Edward says, ‘I shall talk to my sister, and know her mind. And the queen, she will have a view, of course. I don’t know what I shall say to the Earl of Oxford …’
‘I’ll talk to him.’
‘Would you?’ Edward grasps at that. ‘We have come a long way together, my lord,’ he says, embracing him, ‘since we welcomed you to Wolf Hall.’
He goes home and tells Gregory, ‘I have found you a bride.’
‘Very well,’ Gregory says. ‘I shall contain myself in patience till you mention who.’
He hurries on. There are six bishops here to see him, and a delegation from the French embassy. But that night my lord Privy Seal sleeps soundly, under his canopy of violet and silver tissue, beneath a ceiling dusted with gilded stars.
On St George’s Day, at the chapter of the Order of the Garter, the king selects the Earl of Cumberland to fill a vacant stall, in exchange for his offices on the Scots border. It is the first, my lord Privy Seal hopes, in a series of tacit bargains that will free up posts in the north country for keen young men he will choose, whose loyalty is not to great families but only to himself and the king.
Cumberland’s grandfather was known as the Butcher, and the family has not mellowed since. Generations of raw dealing made his tenants smart; no wonder they turned on him, in the late rebellion. But such magnates, even in our day, are best controlled by offering them rewards. And the Garter is Europe’s most ancient order of chivalry, the highest honour the king can bestow.
Mr Wriothesley edges up to him: ‘Shall I tell your lordship what the heralds are saying?’
He waits.
‘They say that the king is disappointed he must give the Garter to Cumberland. He would rather have filled the vacancy with one he holds more dear.’
The dear one should not have long to fret. Harry Percy has requested the loan of his old house in Hackney; he wants it to die in. The doctors say he will not last the summer, and when he goes, that will free a Garter stall. And when Lord Darcy comes to execution, that will make another vacancy. Mr Wriothesley looks coy. ‘Better order your mantles, sir.’
Your mantles of cerulean velvet: sky blue lined with white damask. Hans busies himself at once with new and better designs for Garter insignia: he never lets slip a chance to market his genius. ‘I am not your enemy, you know,’ Hans says to him. ‘Even though I did paint you.’
As Jane lets out her bodices and appears unlaced, she yearns for cherries and peas, but there are none yet. She asks for quails, and the Lisles send them from Calais by the crate. They are fed on the boat and killed at Dover, to keep them as fat as possible, but even so they dwindle on the road, and Jane complains she must have more, and fatter. She eats them rubbed with spices and basted with honey, cracking and sucking the tiny bones. ‘She sets into them as if they had done her an injury,’ Gregory says. ‘Though she looks as if she would only eat curds and whey.’
The king says, ‘I like to see a woman show her appetite. The late Katherine, God rest her, when first we were married –’ he corrects himself, ‘when first we were thought to be married – she would make short work of a duckling. But then later,’ he glances away, ‘she began to undertake special fasts and penances. Always some strict practice, above the misery prescribed. It was her Spanish blood.’
He thinks, she was praying for us. Offering up her hunger pangs for England.
John Husee brings the quails at seven in the morning. Jane sends word from her suite: roast half for dinner, and we’ll have the rest for supper.
He asks Husee, ‘Is there no child yet? The king is keen for the outcome. It will warm his heart if Lisle has a son and heir.’
Husee shakes his head. He looks harassed, but then he always does.
‘Perhaps Honor has mistaken her reckoning,’ Fitzwilliam says. ‘What do the doctors advise?’
‘They advise patience.’
Fitzwilliam says, ‘By the time it is born it will know its letters, and be fit to gnaw a marrowbone and wave a wooden sword.’
In return for quails, and cherries when they are ripe, Jane agrees she will give a position in her household to one of Lady Lisle’s daughters. Jane asks them to send two, and whichever she rejects she will place in the train of some other noble lady. She kindly says that the girls may wear out their French apparel, even though English fashion has changed since last year.
But when the girls arrive, Jane looks at them and says, ‘Oh, no, no, no, no. I will have that one, but take her away and bring her back dressed more seemly.’
Anne Bassett must have finer linen, so fine the skin shows through. She needs a gable hood, and a girdle sewn thickly with pearls. When she reappears by the queen’s side, it is with her hair hidden, her skull squeezed, and in a gown belonging to my lady Sussex.
When next he sees John Husee and hails him, Husee shoots off in the other direction.
Whitehall: he arrives outside the Lady Mary’s presence chamber, Gregory attending him. Some grand arrival is in the air. Household folk crowd him, chattering: ‘Who is it, Lord Cromwell?’ Mary’s silkwoman has brought a basket. A boy has come to tune her virginals. A little dwarf woman called Jane is waddling around the chamber: ‘Welcome, one and all.’
‘Dodd!’ He greets Mary’s usher. ‘Big fish today.’ He speaks for everyone to hear. ‘A Spanish gentleman has come from the Emperor, to assist Ambassador Chapuys in wooing the Lady Mary.’
One of the queen’s ladies, Mary Mounteagle, has coins in a net purse; the queen lost at cards last night, and now pays her debts. Another lady, Nan Zouche, escorts her, as if she might be robbed. Both of them hang on his elbows: ‘A Spanish gentleman? Is not Dom Luis a Portuguese?’
‘Though it is all the same,’ Nan Zouche says. ‘All the Emperor’s cousins.’
Mounteagle asks, ‘Does Dom Luis speak English? If not, Lord Cromwell will have to kneel at their bedside, interpreting.’
‘I do not speak Portuguese, so they must make shift,’ he says. ‘Does the Lady Mary always collect her winnings?’
‘Always,’ Nan says. ‘And she is such a gambler! One day she bet her breakfast on a game of bowls.’
The little woman says, ‘I hope the ambassador does not bring her comfits. Her teeth are not sound.’ She shows her own. ‘Me, I can crack nuts.’
The great men enter to the sound of giggling. The new envoy, Don Diego de Mendoza, is followed by Chapuys, followed in turn by his Flemish bodyguard. Don Diego is one of those men who requires a big space around himself. Chapuys looks jittery: he backs away to allow the new man to be admired, in his plumes and black velvet. Prominently and reverently, Mendoza carries a black-ribboned letter, sealed with the double-headed eagle. ‘Lord Cremuel,’ he says. ‘I have heard a great deal about you.’
‘And I,’ he says pleasantly, ‘feel I know you already. For you must be related to that Mendoza who was ambassador in the cardinal’s time?’
‘I have that honour.’
‘The cardinal locked him up.’
‘A violation of every agreed principle of diplomacy,’ Mendoza says. The chill in his voice would blight a vineyard. ‘I did not know you were at court then.’
‘No. As I was the cardinal’s man, I have inherited his concerns.’
‘But not his methods,’ Chapuys says quickly.
It is evident that Eustache is keen to make a success of the encounter. ‘You have much in common, gentlemen. Don Diego has been in Italy. At the universities of Padua, and Bologna.’
‘You were there, Cremuel?’ Mendoza asks.
‘Yes, but not at the university.’
‘Don Diego knows Arabic,’ Chapuys offers.
He i
s alert. ‘Does it take years to learn?’
‘Yes,’ Don Diego says. ‘Years and years.’
He asks, ‘Have you brought Dom Luis’s portrait for my lady?’
‘Just this,’ the ambassador says, showing his letter.
‘I thought perhaps you had it in miniature, and carried it next to your heart.’
It is obvious that Don Diego is carrying something of which he is painfully aware: as you might be aware if someone slid a hot iron under your shirt. No doubt it is a second letter, perhaps in code.
‘There are presents, of course. Which follow by mule,’ says Mendoza.
‘Because they are large,’ Chapuys says.
‘Good. Lady Mary has lavish tastes. That’s why her father has brought her to court. He could not maintain her in a separate household. She wrote for more money every week.’
‘She is generous with her small means,’ Chapuys says. ‘Charitable.’
‘I suppose she lives as befits a princess?’ Don Diego says. ‘You would not expect her to do other?’
‘Ordinarily,’ Chapuys advises, ‘Lord Cremuel would kick your shin if you spoke her proper title. They call her by her plain name, Mary. But behold – when they are offering her in marriage, we call her “princess” and suddenly,’ he smirks, ‘Cremuel does not mind at all.’
The door of the chamber opens and out issues Mary’s chaplain, in conference with her doctor, a Spaniard. To the chaplain he says, ‘How do you, Father Baldwin? How does my lady?’ The doctor he greets in his best Castilian: suck on that, Mendoza. ‘I will give you a quarter of an hour, ambassador. Then I regret I shall interrupt you.’
Chapuys protests: ‘It is hardly time enough for them to pray together.’
‘Oh, will they do that?’ He smiles.
Dodd the usher bows Mendoza into the presence chamber. ‘Has she attendance?’ Nan Zouche says, and the two ladies exchange a glance and slip in after the ambassador. The door closes.
Chapuys mutters something. It sounds like, ‘Hopeless.’
‘I’m sorry, ambassador?’ he says.
‘I think those ladies are your friends, who have just intruded on the Lady Mary.’
Mary Mounteagle is Brandon’s daughter, from one of his many early marriages; yes, he would say they were friends. Nan Zouche – Nan Gainsford, as she was – gave him matter to use against Anne Boleyn.
‘How is the queen?’ Chapuys says. ‘The king must be very anxious.’
‘She gives no reason for anxiety.’
‘But even so. Given his past losses. They say Edward Seymour is certain of a prince, that he is walking around with his head swelling like a yeasted loaf. Of course, if she has a boy, the Seymour brothers will be promoted – they may come to rival you.’
He cannot see Tom Seymour running the Privy Seal’s office. He says, ‘I’ll have to watch that, won’t I?’
‘But then I am sure they will be wary,’ Chapuys says, ‘remembering what you did to the brother of the other one. If I were them, I would hurry back to Wolf Hall and be forgotten.’ He chuckles. ‘They should become shepherds, or something of that sort.’
He says, ‘Don Diego is not very friendly. I thought it was an ambassador’s duty?’
‘He is fastidious,’ Chapuys admits.
He laughs. A hiatus. From behind Mary’s closed door, voices too faint to be useful. Chapuys says, ‘Mr Call-Me is much in your confidence.’
‘Yes, he is growing into consideration.’
‘He opens your letters.’
‘Someone must. There are too many for one man.’
‘He was Gardiner’s man,’ Chapuys says.
‘Gardiner remains in France.’
‘And loyalty is to the proximate,’ Chapuys says. ‘I see.’
He looks over his shoulder. ‘A word to the wise?’ The ambassador approaches. ‘Aske implicated you.’
‘What?’ Chapuys says.
‘Under questioning. And we have letters you sent to Lord Darcy. Going back three years.’
‘I protest,’ Chapuys says swiftly.
‘You claim they are forgeries?’
‘I make no claim. I say nothing to them.’
‘I know how it is, Eustache. You come to my house and you sit down to supper and you say to me, peace. You go home and light your candle and you write to your master, war.’ A pause. ‘Lucky for you, I am more clement than the cardinal. I shall not lock you up.’ He gestures to the closed door. ‘I think that’s ten minutes.’
He is as good as his word: kicks his way in like a drunken horse-boy. Gregory and the ambassador are at his heels. As they enter, they hear a scream. A large green parrot is bouncing up and down on its perch. When they wheel around, it laughs.
‘It is a present,’ Mary says. ‘I apologise.’
‘Does it speak?’
‘I fear it may.’
Mary, he notices, has not asked Don Diego to sit. The ambassador draws up his person: ‘My lord, go out, we are not done.’
The parrot sways on its perch, and squeaks like an unoiled wheel. He says, ‘I come to remind you of your urgent next engagement.’
Don Diego looks for a second as if he will try to face him down. But Chapuys clears his throat. The moment passes. The Spaniard says, ‘My lady, for now we must part.’
‘No, do not kneel,’ Mary says. ‘Haste away – the Lord Privy Seal is holding the door for you.’ She extends a hand for the ambassador’s kiss. ‘I thank you for your good counsel.’
He cedes the door-holding to Gregory, steps into the room. The ambassador passes out with an ill grace: Chapuys follows, making a comical face at him as he passes. He closes the door. The parrot is still scolding. ‘It has not taken to the Spaniard,’ he says.
Mary says, ‘Neither have you.’
He approaches the bird. He sees the slender gold chain that fastens it to a bar. The creature stamps, and raises its wings in threat. ‘I used to have a magpie when I was a child. I caught it myself.’
She says, ‘I cannot imagine you as a child.’
He thinks, neither can I. I cannot picture myself.
‘I tried to teach it to speak,’ he says. ‘But it flew away, first chance it got.’ But not before it said, Walter is a knave. He turns to Mary. ‘So what passed?’
She is unwilling to divulge. ‘He asked me if I meant what I said.’
‘Generally? Or specifically?’
‘You know well,’ she says. An instant flare of passion: her face is alight, as if someone had forced air into her with a bellows. But the next moment, she drops her eyes, an obedient woman, deflated: reverts to her monotone. ‘He asked if I meant it, when I said I accepted my father as head of the church, and that he and my mother were never truly married. I said I did. I said I accepted it all. I told him I had taken the advice of my uncle the Emperor, as conveyed to me by Ambassador Chapuys. I told him you, Cromwell, had stood my friend. And if he did not believe me that is not my fault.’
He says, ‘But did you tell him how you wrote to the Pope, taking back your statement, and begging to be absolved?’
Her eyes fly to his face.
‘No matter,’ he says. ‘It is another case where I forbear to bring your conduct home to you. I only mention it by way of warning.’
Panic in her voice. ‘What do you want?’
‘Want? My lady, I only want you to pray for me.’
‘Oh, I do,’ Mary says. ‘But do you know what I have discovered? The king has great power, but he has no power to know me, except through what I say and what I do.’
The parrot has put its head on one side, as if listening.
He says, ‘The previous Mendoza was never allowed to be alone with your lady mother. It was for her safety.’
‘I think, rather, it was for the safety of the state.’
‘Everyt
hing we do is for that. Without the king’s peace, my lady, we would be in the wilderness with the wild beasts. Or in the oceans with Leviathan.’
He moves about the chamber to put space between them. Zouche and Mounteagle slide back against the wall; if they could weave themselves into the arras, they would do it. The parrot swivels its head to follow him as he moves. ‘I suppose the ambassador promised to get you away from these shores.’
Mary looks down at her feet: as if to catch them going somewhere.
‘If he did not, then he will. He thinks we will force you into a marriage with the French.’
‘I trust my lord father will not do that.’
‘I myself have no such intention. I make you no guarantee, his Majesty’s will being supreme, but you are better to trust to my efforts than to scrambling down a rope ladder in the dark, and setting to sea in a sieve.’
She turns her face away.
‘Give me the letter,’ he says. ‘The ambassador’s letter.’
She takes from the table the fat ribboned packet, the seal broken, and offers it to him. ‘Perhaps you would like to read it and then take it to the king?’
‘The other letter,’ he says.
She hesitates, but only for a moment. Without a word, without glancing at his face, she slides it from her book and gives it him. It lacks a seal. But she has not had time to read it.
‘What is your book?’ He turns it up to see. It is a Herbal, with a device of a wild man and a wild woman, hairy creatures holding a shield with the printer’s initials. ‘I have one of these,’ he says. ‘It is ten years old, it could stand some correction.’ He turns the leaves, looking at the woodcuts. ‘But there will be other matter for us soon. Archbishop Cranmer is sending me a new translation of the scriptures.’
‘Another?’ she says wanly. ‘It must be the third this year.’
‘Cranmer says it is the soundest yet. He is confident your lord father will license it and set it forth.’
‘I am not against the scriptures. Do not think so.’
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 52