A Column of Fire (55 page)

Swithin ate a hearty breakfast and acted as if nothing had happened.

As soon as he left the table, Margery told the servant to leave the room and went to sit next to Stephen. ‘Swithin came to my room last night,’ she said in a low voice.

‘What for?’ he said.

She stared at him. He was a priest, but he was twenty-eight years old and had been a student at Oxford, so he could not be completely innocent.

After a moment he said: ‘Oh!’

‘He forced himself on me.’

‘Did you struggle?’

‘Of course, but he’s stronger than I am.’ She touched her swollen face with her fingertips, careful not to press. ‘I didn’t fall out of bed. His fist did this.’

‘Did you scream?’

‘I threatened to. He said he would tell everyone that I seduced him. And that they would believe him and not me. He was right about that – as you must know.’

Stephen looked uncomfortable.

There was a silence. At last Margery said: ‘What should I do?’

‘Pray for forgiveness,’ said Stephen.

Margery frowned. ‘What on earth do you mean?’

‘Ask forgiveness for sin. God will be merciful.’

Margery’s voice rose. ‘What sin? I haven’t committed a sin! I am the victim of a sin – how can you tell me to ask forgiveness?’

‘Don’t shout! I’m telling you that God will forgive your adultery.’

‘What about his sin?’

‘The earl’s?’

‘Yes. He has committed a sin much worse than adultery. What are you going to do about it?’

‘I’m a priest, not a sheriff.’

She stared at him in disbelief. ‘Is that it? Is that your response to a woman who has been raped by her father-in-law? To say that you’re not a sheriff?’

He looked away.

Margery stood up. ‘You worm,’ she said. ‘You utter worm.’ She left the room.

She felt like renouncing her religion, but that did not last long. She thought of Job, whose tribulations had been a test of his faith. ‘Curse God, and die,’ his wife had said, but Job had refused. If everyone who met a pusillanimous priest rejected God, there would not be many Christians. But what was she going to do? Bart was not due back until tomorrow. What if Swithin came again tonight?

She spent the day making her plans. She ordered a young maid, Peggy, to sleep in her room, on a palliasse at the foot of her bed. It was common for single women to have a maidservant with them at night, though Margery herself had never liked the practice. Now she saw the point.

She got a dog. There were always a few puppies around the castle, and she found one young enough to be taught to be loyal to her personally. He had no name, and she dubbed him Mick. He could make a noise now, and in time he might be trained to protect her.

She marvelled over Swithin’s behaviour during the day. She saw him again at dinner and supper. He hardly spoke to her, which was normal; and he talked to Stephen Lincoln about current affairs: the New World, the design of ships, and Queen Elizabeth’s continuing indecision about whom she should marry. It was as if he had forgotten the wicked crime he had committed during the night.

When she went to bed, she closed her door firmly, then, with the help of Peggy, dragged a chest across the doorway. She wished it was heavier, but then they would not have been able to move it.

Finally, she put a belt on over her nightdress and attached a small knife in a sheath. She resolved to get herself a bigger dagger as soon as she could.

Poor Peggy was terrified, but Margery did not explain her actions, for that would require that she accuse the earl.

She got into bed. Peggy blew out the candles and curled up on her mattress. Mick was evidently puzzled by his new quarters but took the change with canine stoicism, and went to sleep in front of the fireplace.

Margery got into bed. She could not lie on her left side because contact, even with a feather pillow, hurt her bruised face too much. She lay on her back with her eyes wide open. She knew she was not going to sleep, as surely as she knew she was not going to fly out of the window.

If only she could get through tonight, she thought. Tomorrow Bart would be home, and after that she would make sure she was never left alone with Swithin. But even as she said that to herself she realized it was not possible. Bart decided whether or not she would accompany him, and he did not always consult her wishes. Probably, he left her behind when he planned to see one of his mistresses, or to take all his friends to a brothel, or to indulge in some other entertainment at which a wife would be an embarrassment. Margery could not go against his wishes without a reason, and she could not reveal her reason. She was trapped, and Swithin knew it.

The only way out was for her to kill Swithin. But if she did so, she would be hanged. No excuses would help her escape punishment.

Unless she could make it look like an accident . . .

Would God forgive her? Perhaps. Surely he did not intend her to be raped.

As she contemplated the situation, the door handle rattled.

Mick barked nervously.

Someone was trying to get in. In a frightened voice Peggy said: ‘Who can it be?’

The handle was turned again, then there was the sound of a bump as the door hit the chest that was an inch away.

Margery said loudly: ‘Go away!’

She heard a grunt outside, like that of a man making an effort, and then the chest moved.

Peggy screamed.

Margery leaped off the bed.

The chest scraped across the floor, the door opened wide enough for a man to enter, and Swithin came in in his nightshirt.

Mick barked at him. Swithin kicked out and caught the dog’s chest with his foot. Mick gave a terrified whimper and darted out through the gap.

Swithin saw Peggy and said: ‘Get out, before I give you a kicking too.’

Peggy fled.

Swithin stepped closer to Margery.

She drew the knife from her belt and said: ‘If you don’t go away, I’ll kill you.’

Swithin lashed out with his left arm, a sweeping motion that struck Margery’s right wrist with the force of a hammer. The knife went flying from her grasp. He grabbed her upper arms, lifted her off the floor effortlessly, and threw her back onto the bed. Then he climbed on top of her.

‘Open your legs,’ he said. ‘You know you want to.’

‘I hate you,’ she said.

He raised his fist. ‘Open your legs, or I’ll punch you in the same place again.’

She could not bear for her face to be touched, and she felt that if he punched her she would die. She began to weep, helplessly, and parted her thighs.

*

R
OLLO
F
ITZGERALD
did all he could to keep tabs on the Kingsbridge Puritans. His main source of information was Donal Gloster, Dan Cobley’s chief clerk. Donal had a dual motivation: he hated the Cobley family for spurning him as a suitor for their daughter, and he was greedy for Rollo’s money because Dan underpaid him.

Rollo met Donal regularly at a tavern called the Cock at Gallows Cross. The place was in fact a brothel, so Rollo was able to rent a private room where they could talk unobserved. If any of the girls gossiped about their meetings, people would assume they were homosexual lovers. That was a sin and a crime, but men who were on gossiping terms with prostitutes were not generally in any position to make accusations.

‘Dan is angry about Dean Luke being made bishop,’ Donal said one day in the autumn of 1563. ‘The Puritans think Luke turns whichever way the wind blows.’

‘They’re right,’ Rollo said contemptuously. Changing your beliefs with every change of monarch was called ‘policy’, and people who did it were ‘politicians’. Rollo hated them. ‘I expect the queen chose Luke for his malleability. Who did Dan want for bishop?’

‘Father Jeremiah.’

Rollo nodded. Jeremiah was parson of St John’s in Loversfield, a southern neighbourhood of Kingsbridge. He had always been a reformer, though he had stayed in the Church. He would have made an extreme Protestant bishop, highly intolerant of people who missed the old ways. ‘Thank heaven Dan didn’t get his way.’

‘He hasn’t given up.’

‘What do you mean? The decision is made. The queen has announced it. Luke will be consecrated the day after tomorrow.’

‘Dan has plans. That’s why I asked to see you. You’ll be interested.’

‘Go on.’

‘For the consecration of a new bishop, the clergy always bring out St Adolphus.’

‘Ah, yes.’ Kingsbridge Cathedral had possessed the bones of St Adolphus for centuries. They were kept in a jewelled reliquary that was on display in the chancel. Pilgrims came from all over Western Europe to pray to the saint for health and good fortune. ‘But perhaps Luke will leave the bones where they are this time.’

Donal shook his head. ‘Luke is going to bring them out for the procession, because that’s what the people of Kingsbridge want. He says no one is worshipping the bones, so it’s not idolatry. They are just revering the memory of the holy man.’

‘Always a compromiser, that Luke.’

‘The Puritans think it’s blasphemy.’

‘No surprise.’

‘On Sunday they will intervene.’

Rollo raised his eyebrows. This was interesting. ‘What are they going to do?’

‘When the bones are elevated during the ceremony, they will seize the reliquary and desecrate the remains of the saint – all the while calling on God to strike them dead if he disapproves.’

Rollo was shocked. ‘They would do that to relics that have been cherished by the priests of Kingsbridge for five hundred years?’

‘Yes.’

Even Queen Elizabeth frowned on this kind of thing. A lot of iconoclasm had gone on during the reign of Edward VI, but Elizabeth had passed a law making it a crime to destroy pictures and objects belonging to the Church. However, the ban had been only partially successful: there were a lot of ultra-Protestants. ‘I shouldn’t be so surprised,’ Rollo said.

‘I thought you’d like to know.’

He was right about that. A secret was a weapon. But more than that, the possession of knowledge that others did not share always filled Rollo with elation. He could hug it to himself at night and feel powerful.

He reached into his pocket and handed Donal five of the gold coins called angels, each worth ten shillings or half a pound. ‘Well done,’ he said.

Donal pocketed the money with a satisfied air. ‘Thank you.’

Rollo could not help thinking of Judas Iscariot’s thirty pieces of silver. ‘Stay in touch,’ he said, and left.

He crossed Merthin’s bridge to the city centre and walked up the main street. There was a cold autumn bite to the air that seemed to intensify his excitement. As he looked up at the ancient holy stones of the cathedral he thrilled with horror to think of the blasphemy that was planned, and he vowed to prevent it.

Then it occurred to him that he might do more than just prevent it. Was there a way he could turn the incident to advantage?

Walking slowly, thinking hard, he went into Priory Gate, his father’s palace. Building it had almost broken the Fitzgerald family. But, in the end, it was the Willard family who had been broken. Now five years old, the house had lost its brand-new sheen and had mellowed. The pale grey of the stones, from the same quarry as those of the cathedral, had darkened a little in the English rain and the smoke of two thousand Kingsbridge fireplaces.

Earl Swithin was visiting, with Bart and Margery. They had come for the consecration of the new bishop. They were staying at the earl’s house on Leper Island, but spent much of their time at Priory Gate, and Rollo hoped they were here now, for he was bursting to tell Swithin the news he had heard from Donal. The earl would be even more outraged than Rollo himself.

He went up the marble staircase and entered Sir Reginald’s parlour. Although there were grander rooms in the house, this was where people gathered to talk business. Sir Reginald, old enough now to be sensitive to cold weather, had a fire blazing. The guests were there, and a jug of wine stood on a side table.

Rollo felt proud to see the earl of the county making himself comfortable in the house. Rollo knew that his father was equally proud, though he never said so – but in Swithin’s presence he became more restrained and judicious in his conversation, presenting himself as a wise and experienced counsellor, repressing the impulsive, belligerent side of his character.

Bart was by Swithin’s side, physically a younger version of the earl, though not such a strong character. Bart revered his powerful, assertive father, but he might never match him.

The old guard are still here, Rollo thought, despite Elizabeth. They had suffered reverses but they were not beaten.

He sat next to his sister, Margery, and accepted a cup of wine from his mother. He was vaguely worried about Margery. She was only twenty, but looked older. She had lost weight, there was no colour in her cheeks, and she had a bruise on her jaw. She had always been proud of her appearance, to the point of vanity, in his opinion, but today she wore a drab dress and her hair was greasy and unkempt. He had no doubt that she was unhappy, but he was not sure why. He had asked her directly whether Bart was cruel to her, but she had said firmly: ‘Bart is a decent husband.’ Perhaps she was disappointed that she had not yet conceived a child. Whatever the reason for her unhappiness, he just hoped she was not going to cause trouble.

He took a gulp of wine and said: ‘I’ve got some disturbing news. I’ve been talking to Donal Gloster.’

‘Despicable character,’ said Sir Reginald.

‘Contemptible, but useful. Without him we would not know that Dan Cobley and the Puritans are planning an outrage on Sunday, at the consecration of Luke Richards, whom they find insufficiently heretical for their taste.’

‘An outrage?’ said his father. ‘What are they going to do?’

Rollo dropped his bombshell. ‘Desecrate the bones of the saint.’

There was a moment of stunned silence.

Margery whispered: ‘No.’

Earl Swithin said: ‘I’ll stick my sword in his guts, if he tries it.’

Rollo’s eyes widened. The violence might not be one-sided: he had not thought of that.

His mother spoke up feistily. ‘If you kill a man in church, Swithin, you’ll be executed. Even an earl can’t get away with that.’ Lady Jane’s perky charm allowed her to speak bluntly.