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)

by Hilary Mantel

‘I will make sure you receive an early copy. You will do well to study the Commandments. Honour thy father. Since thy mother is departed.’

  Katherine, God pardon her. Katherine, whom God assoil. Katherine, whose children would not stay within her womb: who is responsible nevertheless for the sorry object before him, her eyes dull, her face swollen with toothache.

  He thinks of her Spanish grandmother in shining breastplate, mirror of fate to the infidel. Isabella took the field: Andalusia trembled.

  On Whitsun eve, after a voyage so long postponed, the King of Scots makes landfall on his own shore. The French bride looks as if she has heaved up her soul on the deep. She falls to the ground, observers report, scoops up two handfuls of the port of Leith and kisses the soil.

  A man called William Dalyvell, a follower of Merlin and King James, is put into the Tower. He has been spreading a prophecy that the King of Scots will swoop down from the north, expel the Tudors and rule two kingdoms. He also says he has seen an angel.

  In former ages this would have been a cause for congratulation, but times being what they are, Dalyvell is put on the rack.

  The Cornish people petition to have their saints back – those downgraded in recent rulings. Without their regular feasts, the faithful are unstrung from the calendar, awash in a sea of days that are all the same. He thinks it might be permitted; they are ancient saints of small worship. They are scraps of paint-flaked wood, or stumps of weathered stone, who say and do nothing against the king. They are not like your Beckets, whose shrines are swollen with rubies, garnets and carbuncles, as if their blood were bubbling up through the ground.

  June, second drawing: ‘The king is to stand on this carpet,’ Hans decrees. Boys spread it at their feet: his own feet of Spanish leather, the neat red boots of Mr Wriothesley, the distinguished padded toes of Lord Audley and Sir William Fitzwilliam. It is one of the cardinal’s carpets; he stoops to uncurl an edge.

  ‘All of them?’ the Lord Chancellor asks. ‘Together on this carpet? The king, the queen, and his royal parents too?’

  Hans gives him a withering look. ‘His father I will place behind him. His royal mother, behind the queen that is now.’

  He asks, ‘How will you show the old king and queen? At what age?’

  ‘In eternity they have no age.’

  ‘There are other pictures to guide you, I suppose.’

  ‘Did we not make you a gallery?’ Hans says. ‘A whole room of the lost.’

  Yes, but that was more like a game, he thinks, a game of kings, their faces like clues in a riddle. No one could point to them as a true or false likeness. They were all so old and they had been gone so long.

  Hans begins to pace out the scene. The father here, towards the centre, but Henry in the foreground. Between the two parents I shall place a column, he says, or a piece of marble –

  ‘A sort of altar?’ Lord Audley offers.

  ‘He will want verses on it, Hans. Extolling him.’

  ‘Words are for Lord Cromwell to supply.’

  ‘Mr Wriothesley,’ he says, ‘will you make a note?’ But Call-Me is already sketching out suggestions.

  They look up as the king comes in. He has to walk the length of the gallery. He seems unbalanced, as if the floor were soft. Fitz whispers something: ‘Hush,’ he says.

  ‘Ah, Cromwell,’ Henry says. ‘Lord Chancellor. I hear a rumour that François is dead.’

  ‘I fear untrue,’ he says.

  The king’s face is pale and puffy. He dare not ask if he is in pain. Henry would not want an underling like Hans to hear the question, let alone the answer.

  ‘Better light today,’ the king says. ‘Norfolk writes to me that in Yorkshire there is a hard frost every morning. When here, the roses are out!’

  Call-Me says, ‘There is always a hard frost in the region of Norfolk.’

  Henry smiles. ‘The zephyrs do not play about his person. And young Surrey, he writes, is suffering from a depression of his spirits. Myself I always thought action dispelled melancholy, and I should have thought the Howards would find plenty to do …’

  ‘The duke should stay up in Yorkshire,’ Fitzwilliam says. ‘He is as well-accepted among the northern sort as any lord can be.’

  Thomas Howard says another winter will kill him. But he can take his chances till September. He would not want to be in London, surely, with the plague’s incursions? A hundred and twelve buried last week.

  ‘And what do we hear of Harry Percy?’ The king rubs his nose, reflective. He is looking forward to the reversion of the Percy earldom to the crown. ‘Send young Sadler, will you, to see how the dying goes?’

  From Wriothesley, a stir of mute discontent: not him, Majesty, send me!

  ‘Unless you care to go yourself, my lord Privy Seal? But I think the earl fears you of old, and I do not want to be accused of frightening him to death.’

  ‘I never hurt the earl,’ he says. A picture rises to his mind of Call-Me at the deathbed, taking off his coat and turning back his sleeves, picking up a pillow …

  The king calls, ‘Hans, where are you? We are ready. Today you must finish with the drawing, or you will have to chase me. I shall not linger at Whitehall when I could be hunting.’

  The king’s tone is hearty; as if he is trying to encourage himself as well as the painter. Hans whistles through his teeth and flaps over his sheets. When stitched together they will cover the wall. The councillors fall back, making space. Fitz murmurs, ‘What’s the matter with him today? Something’s the matter.’

  He thinks, the damage has been done since last October. It is cumulative, but we are only noticing now. The rebels have knocked him out of true. He will not be the same again. The king stands alone on the turkey carpet, feet planted on the cobalt stars. His voice reaches out, as if to loop them into his plans: Hampton Court to Woking, to Guildford, to Easthampstead. ‘You will hunt with me this summer, my lord Cromwell.’

  He moves so fast that he is able to grip the king by his upper arms and steadies him as he sways. Fitz is behind him. ‘A seat for the king!’ Audley bawls. Cries of distant alarm – how news flies! – then pounding of feet, and servants and courtiers pour in. ‘Keep away!’ Fitz windmills his arms, bellows as if he were on the battlefield. Wriothesley has a stool, gliding it smoothly under his monarch’s haunches. Gingerly, they lower the afflicted man, so he sits gaping, his face working as if he might cry. He and Audley lean in, propping him up. There is a sheen of sweat on Henry’s face. He takes out a handkerchief. They huddle to shield him from the ring of faces. ‘Have you a pain, sir?’ Audley asks. ‘Where is your pain?’

  ‘Give me some air,’ the sick man says.

  They step away; but Henry takes him by the sleeve; he is reeled in. ‘My lord,’ Henry blots his face, ‘this is not the first time we have felt ourselves fall. A humour has got into our legs. A weakness. No, the doctors don’t know, any better than we know. But it will get better, it must.’

  He sees that the king is furious with himself: a low white fury that makes him tremble. ‘Send all these people away. Tell Hans to come tomorrow. Tell them it is only a – no, tell them nothing. Disperse them.’

  He thinks the king is done. He eases away from him, straightening up, but the king still holds his sleeve. ‘Cromwell, what if it is a girl?’

  His heart sinks. ‘Then boys will follow.’

  The king releases him. ‘Where’s Fitz?’ Henry says, plaintive. ‘I want Fitz, send the rest off.’

  He turns. No one dares approach. ‘Allons,’ he says. Audley falls in with him, Wriothesley treads on his boot heels. They do not speak till they reach the other end of the gallery. Audley casts a glance back. ‘We must keep this secret.’

  Mr Wriothesley says, ‘Of course, my lord.’

  He says, ‘Not a chance.’ The painter has followed them. ‘Master Holbein? Bring your drawing. The king’s face. Le
t me see.’

  Hans whistles up a boy, who scuffles through the sheets bearing the king’s head, till he finds a version the master is content to show. He, Cromwell, puts his thumb on the king’s forehead, as if he were smudging him with chrism. ‘Turn the head. Turn it full on. Make him look at us.’

  ‘God in Heaven,’ Hans says, ‘that will be frightening. Turn body and all?’

  Frowning face and massive shoulders. Bloated waist, padded cod. Legs like the pillars that hold the globe in place. Legs that could never stagger, feet never lose the path.

  As July comes in Lord Latimer is down from the north, complaining to all who will listen of his sufferings at the hands of the Pilgrims. He will be glad to see much less of Yorkshire; he knows the king’s business will force him back, but for the rest of the time he will be content to live on his property in Pershore: and so says his wife Kate.

  Lord Latimer wonders why young men hide smiles. What’s funny about his wife Kate?

  News comes from Scotland that Princess Madeleine is dead. Her triumphant entry into Edinburgh will not now take place. The banners are furled, the pageants dismantled, the silver trumpets laid in their cases.

  Henry says, ‘Surely James will seek another Frenchwoman. But I do not think François will let him have his younger daughter, to be exposed to the Scottish air. There is the Duchess of Vendôme – though James turned her down once, and I do suppose her people are offended.’

  ‘The Duke of Longueville has died,’ he says, ‘leaving a widow – a very handsome woman, they say, only three years wed, yet with a son in her arms and another child in the womb. James might look that way.’

  But I don’t know, he thinks, if she would look at James. The family of Marie de Guise are such lofty people they might not know where Scotland is. Anyway, James will be mourning a while yet. A pension was to come with Madeleine, thirty thousand francs a year; it will not continue with a corpse.

  Madeleine was one month shy of her seventeenth birthday. In fairness to the French, they did advise James to choose a more robust bride.

  With Lady Oughtred, on a fine evening, he walks in the queen’s privy garden. Bess rests her hand on his arm. ‘So the marriage, when shall it be?’ she asks.

  ‘As soon as you like. But,’ he stops and turns her to face him, ‘you do like?’

  ‘Oh, yes.’ Her eyes are warm. ‘I know some would think …’

  ‘There are disparities, of course. I have talked it over with your brothers. I have not shirked the point.’

  ‘But after all, I am a widow,’ she says, ‘and not some inexperienced girl.’

  He is not sure what she means; but then, why should he expect to understand this young woman’s mind? ‘My lady, may I ask – it is perhaps too private a matter –’

  ‘Whatever it is, I am bound in obedience to tell you.’

  ‘Well then … I should like to know, do you mourn your husband still?’

  She turns her face away; he admires her: her face, like Jane’s, has a soft smooth shape, and she has the same habit of dipping her chin, as if taking a covert survey of what’s around her.

  She says, ‘I make no complaint of Oughtred. He was a good husband and I regret his passing. But you will not think me heartless if I say I could also be happy with a different kind of man?’ She turns her face up to his, earnest; he sees how she wants to please him. ‘I am quite ready to make trial of it.’

  ‘When my wife died,’ he says, ‘I missed her out of all measure. Considering what my life was then, always riding up the country, over to Antwerp half a dozen times a year, late nights with the cardinal, livery dinners and conclaves at Gray’s Inn … sometimes when I’d come in she’d say, “I’m Lizzie Cromwell, have you seen my husband?”’

  ‘Lizzie,’ she says. ‘Just as well I’m Bess these days. It is the same with all Elizabeths – as we are called, we answer.’

  He smiles. ‘I won’t confuse the two of you.’

  ‘We did suppose, myself and Jane, that you were fond of your wife, because you never took any opportunity you were offered – and Jane says you were friendly with Mary Boleyn, and could have married her if you pleased.’

  ‘Oh, that was just Mary’s whim,’ he says. ‘She wanted to upset her people. Put Uncle Norfolk in a rage. And she thought I would do a good job of that. Mary has a good heart, and they say she suits well with that fellow Stafford she wed. But I thought of her as … God love her, well-used.’

  She is anxious. ‘But you do not object to a widow?’

  ‘My first wife was a widow.’

  ‘If you had wed Mary Boleyn you would have been related to the king.’

  ‘After a manner.’

  ‘You will be related to him now. Though it has taken longer.’

  He thinks, how gentle she is, to give thought to my state of mind. How careful she is, for she has mentioned the old gossip about Mary Boleyn, but never the new gossip about Mary the king’s daughter.

  He halts; the garden’s scents rise around them; he turns her to face him, taking her two hands. ‘Let’s not talk about the dead. I would rather talk about you. We must dress you up. We must order some silks and velvets. And I thought, emeralds?’

  ‘I lent my jewel box to Jane, when she was so suddenly elevated. I suppose she will give it back now I am to be married.’

  ‘I will talk to people in Antwerp. We could go through the king’s man, Cornelius, but I know some setters who do beautiful work, and after all, you won’t want to have what your sister has.’

  She drops her eyes. ‘Jane said you would be generous.’

  ‘You must indulge me. I have no daughters. Though that is not true, I have one, you will have heard.’

  ‘Your Antwerp daughter.’

  ‘But I don’t think she cares for such things.’

  She lowers her head and smiles. Suddenly she is as shy as her sister. ‘My lord, you may indulge me and I shall indulge you. But I shall hardly be your daughter.’

  He says gently, ‘I had hoped that you would see yourself in that way.’

  ‘Oh, but …’ She stops and puts her hand on his arm. ‘It is to be like that? I did not know. As you please, of course … but you are not so very old, and I had hoped to have your children.’

  ‘Mine?’

  He is shocked to the marrow. He, who has been in Rome! Who has been, frankly, everywhere … ‘Bess,’ he says, ‘we should go inside.’

  ‘Why?’

  These Seymours, he thinks, they are like something from the Greek legends. A curse will fall on them. We know Old Sir John tupped his daughter-in-law, but surely she does not think that is the usual arrangement?

  ‘It is late, you are tired, it’s cold,’ he says. ‘And we should not be alone.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘It could lead to –’ He passes his hand over his face. What could it lead to? ‘To misunderstandings.’

  She says, ‘It is barely eight o’clock, the night is warm, and I am as fresh as a milkmaid at dawn.’

  ‘Come in,’ he urges her.

  ‘In other respects I agree.’ Her voice is icy. ‘I think there has been a misunderstanding. I am offering my person to one Cromwell only, the one I marry. But which Cromwell is it meant to be?’

  His mind flies back to his conversation with Edward. It lands, light as a fly, and begins to crawl over it: over every meaningful pause, every ellipsis. Were names spoken? Perhaps not. Could Edward have supposed – could Edward have mistaken – yes, he supposes he could.

  He lets out his breath. ‘So. Well. I am flattered, Bess. That you would even consider it.’

  She says firmly: ‘I am not at fault.’

  ‘By no means.’

  ‘You are at fault. I listened to what my brother required of me. I made no objection. I never said, what age is Cromwell, and was his father not a tradesman? I just said, Yes
, Edward. For the family, Edward. Anything and anyone you command, Edward.’

  ‘I see,’ he says. ‘I begin to see.’

  ‘I know you are a busy man. But I think you might have paused to explain yourself, so Edward could explain to me. But with no elucidation, I assumed –’

  ‘But why would you? When Gregory is so likely a young man, and of an age to marry?’

  ‘I think you have no idea, my lord, how much your single state is talked of. How much the whole court looks to you to change it. How they speculate, men and women both, that a great and dangerous honour will come your way.’

  ‘It is all just gossip,’ he says. ‘And you are right that it is dangerous. Dangerous to me, dishonourable to the Lady Mary.’

  ‘Then you would do well to be clear in your mind. Who you will marry. Who you will not.’

  He begs, ‘Don’t tell Gregory. He thinks you have freely accepted him.’ A qualm overtakes him. ‘You will accept him? Because Bess – my lady – you are relieved, that it is not as you thought?’

  A pause, then: ‘My lord, I will not tell you whether I am relieved or not. You must puzzle it out. But I dare say you will be too busy to puzzle for long.’

  ‘Gregory will make a tender husband,’ he says wretchedly, ‘and he will make you proud of him. He is a kind young man and gentle, and he is a good dancer, and he cuts a fine figure in the tilt yard, as fine as the best gentleman with sixteen quarters of nobility on his shield, and the king likes him, and no doubt he will make him a baron very soon and you will once more have your title and style. He is all together better than me –’ I, he thinks, who am so soiled in life’s battle, so seamed and scarred, so numb, so unwanted, so cold.

  ‘Stop,’ she says. ‘First, too few words. Now, too many.’

  ‘But you will? You will wed Gregory?’

  ‘Tell me when and where, and I will come in my bridal finery and marry whichever Cromwell presents himself. I am an obliging woman,’ she says. ‘Though not so obliging as you thought.’

  She walks away on the grassy path, but she does not hurry. Her head is down, she appears to be in prayer. He thinks, she will be plain Mistress Cromwell, and she had not reckoned on that. Does she mind? It is not the least part of it, to find you are not only dropped down a generation, but have no title. Yet surely she would prefer the son, with all his prospects before him, to the father who – well, he thinks, I suppose there are prospects before me. No doubt Wriothesley is right, about the Garter. It seems such a thing could never happen, not to Walter’s son. Yet so much has happened already, that the most credulous child would never believe.