The Deception of Consequences

by Barbara Gaskell Denvil

  Frowning, “But you don’t know when.”

  “Sadly, no. It might be next year, brought about by our own hard work and a Spanish invasion. But it might take five years. Ten years. Twenty.” Macron’s shoulders sank, but he looked up again. “I see a great woman, a royal lady of renown, who will help lead the cause. And a Spanish prince of loyal faith.”

  “Humph,” decided his lordship. “The Lady Catherine, the true queen, is now dead two months and more.”

  “Her daughter, perhaps?”

  “Nothing but a weak woman,” Staines answered, but was interrupted.

  A thump on the outer door shook the foundations and a voice shouted, “Open up in the name of the king,” and once again something hammered on the door.

  Lord Staines and Michael Macron stood very still, staring at each other, white faced. It was the third demand that moved them. Lord Staines ran for the window, peering out. He blanched, and retreated. “The king’s guards,” he whispered. “The window’s overlooked. Do you have a back door, man?”

  Macron shook his head, speechless.

  Staines was bolting for another room, when the door cracked and split, and five heavily booted guards pushed their way through the gaping and broken planks. Macron had still not moved, as though his legs had frozen or turned to water, and was grabbed immediately. But the guards heard noises beyond, and their leader ordered a search of the building. Staines was hauled back in, his face flushed, his hat lost and his cape a torn twist in the hands of his captives.

  The captain of the guard grinned. “Well, reckon I knows you, my lord, and have a warrant for your arrest right here.” And patted his ample chest. “To the Tower, my lord. And this other little liar, to Thomas Cromwell hisself for immediate questioning.” He pushed both men into the arms of the guards. “Accused of high treason by order of the king, signed yesterday.”

  A dark stain leaked down the inside of Lord Staines’ hose. He stood bowed, his hair in his eyes and each arm gripped by a guard. Macron twisted, cursing. “I have the power of foreknowledge, you fools,” he shouted. “I can see your failure. I see my own victory.”

  “Then,” grinned the captain, “I reckon you can see your own hanging, Master Macron, dangling from the rope afore being cut down for disembowelling. A fair treat, that will be, and a picture for you to dream on whilst you awaits your trial.”

  Leaving the building and marching out into the windy street, the small group headed east towards the great walls of the Tower.

  In the opposite direction, heading west and beyond London’s other great stone city walls, beyond the Ludgate, along the busy thoroughfare of The Strand and in one of the smaller houses on the left facing the river, a happier crowd of people sat at ease.

  Edward Thripp leaned back on a wide cushioned settle, one leg stretched out on a small stool, and his arm bountifully filled with the partly dressed body of the young woman cuddled on the settle beside him. Elisabeth’s bedrobe, diaphanous, swept across her knees leaving her legs only superficially covered, and Edward’s hand wandered occasionally to her breast before, glimpsing his daughter’s frown, he removed the twitching fingers with a simper.

  “Done it,” he said, satisfied.

  Katherine sat straight backed on a stool in the corner beside the light from the window, her gaze fixed on her needlework. It was a tight linen seam, hemming a new shirt for Master Thripp. But with a small click of the tongue, although without looking up from her work, she said softly, “I believe, sir, Jemima is hoping to discuss something rather more imminent than your testament. And I doubt she intends discussing personal matters while Master Cuthbert is present.”

  “I’ll have you remember that I am family too, mistress, whilst you are not.” Master Cuthbert sniffed loudly. “I have conceded my earlier mistake. But I am still a Thripp by name and blood.”

  Jemima glared. “I refuse to call you cousin.” She was standing beside the empty hearth, where a large jug had been filled with dried country flowers and grasses. “And I wouldn’t be surprised if you murdered those poor women up in the attic. We’ve never solved that. Richard thought it might be his father, but I must admit he stopped investigating. Well, rather a lot of other things happened to interrupt. But it’s still a puzzle, isn’t it. I thought at one time – well, I won’t say what I thought. But now I think it was you.”

  “I was hardly ever here,” replied Cuthbert, astonished, defiant and defensive. He crossed his arms and breathed deeply. “I was very young. Besides, I was hardly ever welcomed here.”

  “Nor are you now.”

  “My dear little dove,” clucked Edward, “patience, patience, my dear. Cuthbert has explained and apologised regarding his misunderstanding of my testament. A shoddy solicitor, it seems.

  “A fraudulent solicitor,” Jemima objected, “paid and instructed by Cuthbert to cheat me out of my home, just when I was too weak to fight. I thought you dead, Papa, and I was so horribly miserable. Dearest Katherine took me in. I was so busy crying, I didn’t have the time to realise Cuthbert was so wicked.”

  “A mistake, a simple mistake,” Cuthbert interrupted. “I never intended – ”

  He was also interrupted. “Well now,” smiled Edward, his smile spreading as he twirled Elisabeth’s ribbons. “Nice to know myself so missed, m’dear. Apologies for the inconvenience.”

  “Just shows you,” Elisabeth giggled, “how well you are loved, Eddy dearest. Your sweet daughter, of course. But also every mistress you had for more than a week – six of them all announcing their adoration and swearing to your innocence. Even though you’d thrown each and every one of them from your house in the past, they all remained loyal. Now that proves what a special gentleman you are, Eddy.”

  ‘Humph,” muttered Katherine from her corner. “Not a gentleman at all, it seems.”

  “And,” insisted Jemima, “it is only my kind Richard and his friend Thomas who showed me how Cuthbert had swindled me. But then I found you were alive anyway, so it didn’t matter. But it does matter because it still means my horrid cousin is a thief and a liar and a pig.”

  “Well, really,” Cuthbert sniffed, “an unfair insult, I must say, from a female without scruples who has been living in sin with a man arrested for treason,” but was ignored.

  “The fact is,” said Jemima in a rush, “I’m marrying Richard. I think he’s mad to want marriage and after all, I am the daughter of a pirate. But I said I’d be his mistress and I don’t mind if he accepts that. Marriage would be rather nice, of course, but it will be quiet. He won’t be asking the king’s permission, and he isn’t titled so it’ll be alright. Besides, the king is busy with something else.”

  The philandering whore,” muttered Cuthbert.

  Jemima looked up, glaring. “Richard says she’s innocent. It’s all a fraud to get rid of her.” She looked away, shaking her head. “Everyone lies. Everyone cheats.”

  “Except your sainted self?” Cuthbert said, half whisper. “And Richard Wolfdon, recently escaping execution at the Tower?”

  “Richard is clearing up matters at Holborn Hall,” Jemima said, leaning over and taking her father’s hand. “When that’s done, we’re going down to his estate in Wiltshire. I doubt I’ll see you very often, Papa. But you’re rich now. You can do whatever you want.” She looked back at Cuthbert. “Which ought to include throwing that beast from your home. If you want to employ dear Thomas Dunn, he can prove Cuthbert was trying to steal your house, and have him thrown into Newgate.”

  “Rather think,” grinned her father, “that might lead to me being thrown in beside him, m’dear, for debt to Lord Staines, falsifying my death, and piracy. I think we should forget the law and the courts of justice, little dove.”

  “And the three corpses in the attic?”

  “Ah well, no one knows, do they?” Edward Thripp continued to smile. “Too long ago, too hard to prove anything, so I understand. Even your clever fiancé couldn’t find the culprit. The mystery, I believe, will remain unsolved.” He
shook his head without noticeable concern. “They don’t even know who the young females were.”

  “But we know they were murdered.” Jemima stared at her father. “Don’t you care?”

  “Might have been a hundred years gone,” Edward sighed. “Hard to care for such ancient history.”

  “So we’ll never know,” she said, “which is sad. But I’m leaving anyway, Papa. I’m going to stay with Richard until he sorts out the estate, and we can travel down to Wiltshire. I’ll come with Richard to say goodbye, but you should do something with all your loyal women in the meantime. They can’t stay in Holborn anymore, and most of them don’t have any other home to go to now. You’ve chosen Elisabeth. I presume you don’t want the other five all sleeping here and squabbling and getting jealous.”

  Edward Thripp groaned, and sank deeper back into the settle’s cushions. “May the good Lord protect me.”

  Elisabeth plucked at his sleeve. “But dearest, you’re a rich man now. You can buy little cottages for them, and they can all live happily for ever and ever without bothering us.”

  “I doubt,” said Katherine suddenly from her corner, “That Mistress Alba will be so easily disposed of. She was quite sure that Master Edward would want her back.”

  “And I want you back,” said Jemima at once. “Please Katherine, will you come down to Wiltshire with Richard and myself? As a friend, not as a nurse.”

  “I had every intention of it,” said Katherine, looking up. “How could you possibly survive without me, Jemima dear? And I can be ready to leave within the hour.”

  Delighted, Jemima straightened up, swirling around. “And you are all invited to my wedding. Except, of course,” she added quickly, “for Cuthbert.”

  Edward spoke loudly over Cuthbert’s mumbled complaint. “Not all those other wretched women too, I hope, m’dear? After all, your very proper young man won’t want arguments and fights to attend his nuptials, I presume?”

  “Only Alba, perhaps. And of course you, Elisabeth dear.”

  Katherine had tossed her sewing to the stool as she stood, brushing down her skirts. “I shall pack,” she said, “and accompany you back to the house. And I am sure I can help disperse problems when all the young women are rehoused. Ruth has already gone to her own home, of course, but,” and she turned to Edward, “a little financial help would be only civil.”

  “They all need help,” Jemima frowned. “And Richard may offer some help too. But Papa, you owe them all something you know. They all tried to help you even when they thought you were dead.”

  “As it happens,” Edward replied, his smile ever wider, “I can afford just that, and will be pleased to do so. And I have a little more tucked away, which I’ll be going down to Dover to collect some time soon. Perhaps,” he waved a casual hand, “after visiting you in Wiltshire, my love, bringing a gift for your wedding, and then getting myself an even larger gift on the way home.”

  “And there’s more of your coin, Papa, hidden in Richard’s Wiltshire estate. I had to leave it when I rushed up to London, but Richard knows where it all is.”

  Edward brightened. “Well, well, gold here and gold there. ‘Tis a nice change to be a rich man.” He remembered something and paused before adding, “Don’t suppose you brought my best knife back with you as well, little dove?”

  “It was under the mattress in the Dover Inn. I expect it’s still there.”

  “No matter,” Edward grinned. “I can afford a hundred more. Money for my daughter’s nuptials. More for each of my loyal ladies, and a cottage to set them up – though not too close to the Strand. Plenty of money for my sweet Lizzie. And money for me for the rest of my life.”

  “And remembering your nephew,” said Cuthbert hopefully. But he was once again ignored.

  Chapter Forty-Four

  She had not been surprised when they had first come for her. Those moving quietly away from her side, and the smug smiles of her enemies had told their own story for some days and the queen, unsleeping, had already guessed her danger.

  Afterwards, occupying the royal apartments, Anne remained in comfort, even though under arrest within The Tower. Her gowns were brought to her and her meals were served to her. But her mind raced and the panic stole her appetite and her sleep. The servants and attendants had been carefully chosen, including those women she already hated, and who had long been jealous of her. Gradually Anne spoke to few of them beyond ordering food and warmth, for she knew each woman would report back to Cromwell. There would be neither release nor compassion. But the great nausea of lost hope also hardened her thoughts, and finally she forced herself to eat, drink, and retire quietly to her bed.

  The trial was set for the fifteenth day of May. It was the festival of Saint Mary. Anne’s despised aunt informed her only that previous evening that the men accused of committing adultery with her, had all been found guilty and sentenced to death. This news came abruptly and shattered hope.

  The queen had expected time, advance notice, and legal help in the preparation of her defence. But none of these had been permitted and she was entirely unprepared. Anne did not sleep but she had become accustomed to this. For the day of trial, she chose dark, plain clothes, the clothes of innocence and penitence, and was helped to dress.

  Early that morning, they came to escort her. Now Anne’s uncle stared down at her, devoid of expression, his pale eyes unblinking. She avoided his gaze. The unwavering and illustrious Duke of Norfolk already considered her guilty of the most heinous sin, that of heresy, since she had caused the fall of the Church of Rome in England. Unable to accuse her of such, he would find her guilty of all other crimes, whether he knew her innocence or otherwise. Behind him stood Thomas Cromwell, hands tucked in his sleeves, Sir William Kingston, Constable of the Tower, and the Lord Chancellor Thomas Audley.

  Norfolk stared down at his niece. “Your Majesty, in the name of his majesty the king, it is required that you accompany us. Your trial will now begin.”

  The walk was a short one to the great Hall of the White Keep within the Tower itself. Anne felt the draught of the coats and swing of silk as the most important men in the land surrounded her. She bit her lip and did not cry. Her knees buckled but she did not fain and when she tripped, she kept her balance and did not fall.

  Led into the vast chamber, already buzzing and full, she sat where indicated, with her hands clasped tightly in her lap. She lowered her eyes and welcomed the shadows. Gazing at her once more her uncle’s pale eyes remained unblinking and Anne refused to gaze back. The Duke of Norfolk sat upon his grand chair upon a grand dais, and led the proceedings. Behind solid barriers, the public squashed, eager to see and determined to hear. A resolute semblance of justice was to be witnessed.

  The interrogation began and Anne did not always hear, nor did she understand everything said to her. As the questions and the continuous unwavering severity of accusation became endlessly repetitious, she dreamed, almost, of tumbling into waves and rolling with the ocean above her head.

  Drowning. But she knew enough not to confess.

  “Your accusations are absurd, my lord. I am innocent of these preposterous charges. You may threaten as you wish but I will never admit to vile actions, which I have never committed nor ever contemplated.”

  Yet the men concerned having confessed, under torture, to adultery and the high treason that entailed, the evidence against her was unsurmountable.

  The smells swept through her mind like stories of whatever surrounded her. The mass of gaping men and women stank of sweat, eager curiosity and the grime of London’s streets. The jury sat still and quiet, smelling of herbs, lavender water and shaving soap. Her uncle smelled of nothing at all. She had long thought him inhuman and simply a fleeting fiction of someone sent to punish her. As she stared down into her lap, ignoring the slight quiver of her knees, she smelled her own fear, and the even stronger perfume of her pride, which would overcome the fear when needed.

  Anne smiled, looking up and into space, as she was a
gain announced as a creature of carnal lust who had seduced the piteous men now condemned to die for her sins, and who had indulged in conversations regarding the king’s death. She had wished for that death, witnesses said.

  Anne yearned to cry out, arguing that no sane creature would plan the death of the one man who gave her power, potency and riches. Without him she would be the queen dowager, mother of an infant princess, would lose her throne and her wealth, so why would she wish him dead? She murmured to herself, but it was not yet her turn to speak.

  The slander, the lies and the wickedness swelled like water in a flood. Incest, they called at her. A witch who had copulated with her own brother. Her brother’s wife, Lady Rochford, a woman they both disliked, pointed one shaking finger and accused her of this most terrible of sins. The court was hushed into silent horror. Poor George, Anne knew, would face trial once her own was finished. There was no doubt that she would be found guilty. And yet, the accusations were so absurd that no man or woman of sense would believe them. Yet the King’s presence, although unseen, haunted the proceedings. The guilty verdict echoed already in Anne’s ears.

  Once permitted to speak, she summoned the pride she had long nurtured. She was permitted to defend herself and spoke for some time.

  “Is it permitted to kill your queen on the random words of commoners, jealous women and men broken and terrified from torture on the rack?” But the words remained silent. Aloud Anne said, addressing principally her uncle, the chief prosecutor, and, the Attorney General, “My lords, I proclaim my innocence on all these charges. I have never wronged my sovereign lord, the king, in any manner. Since I had no prior knowledge of these charges before this day, and have been in custody and therefore unable to arrange witnesses on my behalf, and since I have been allotted no man to speak with experience and authority in my defence, I must therefore be at a disadvantage. But I am proud to speak for myself, my lords, since my absolute innocence is evident.”