A Parliament of Spies (36 page)

Authors: Cassandra Clark

BOOK: A Parliament of Spies

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Medford stood over him when he was still. ‘Dean Slake. I’ve said it before, you’re a hasty fellow. Now we’ll never know what he wanted to tell Hildegard.’

‘Slake has blocked off the trail that leads from Scarborough by way of Bishopthorpe and Lincoln.’

Edwin and Thomas were gaping at her as she told them what had happened. She began to believe they thought, as Jarrold had, that she was mad, but then Edwin got up to pace about Thomas’s chamber and he was firm. ‘I didn’t tell anybody how Martin was murdered. And of course His Grace would not do so.’

‘It sounds as if Jarrold has got his just desserts.’ Thomas made the sign of the cross. They had told him about their meeting with Harry Summers and now he asked, ‘Jarrold seemed about to tell you he was acting on instructions from someone you know, Hildegard. So who was it? Someone who was at Scarborough Castle the same time he was working there?’

‘Was it the unnamed guest in the chamber with His Grace when Standish had his outburst and pushed Harry down the stairs?’

‘Can we find out?’ Thomas looked from Edwin to Hildegard and back.

‘By necromancy probably.’ Edwin got up hurriedly and went to the window. ‘I can’t see me going up to His Grace and asking outright.’

‘Best to leave it for now,’ Thomas suggested. ‘Maybe we’re not meant to know.’ He looked troubled.

Hildegard persisted. It was no time for avoiding the truth. ‘Jarrold was adamant he was not acting on Swynford’s instructions. He took pleasure in hinting that it was someone else. It was his big secret. But who was it? Things happened too quickly. I’d no idea Medford and Slake were listening in. It was stupid of me. I should have expected that.’

‘Only someone as devious as they are would think along those lines,’ Thomas assured her. ‘Did Medford give any excuse for what Slake did?’

‘He tried to suggest that he acted on impulse. To protect me. Impetuous Slake.’

Edwin gave a snort. ‘Like hell he is. I hope Harry’s going to be safe. He didn’t say anything that would make him seem dangerous, did he?’

Hildegard shook her head. ‘Medford thinks he’s a fool. Slake said, “I do believe I could beat that fellow at chess,” and Medford replied, “I’m sure you could. And so could a babe in arms.” He’s safe, Edwin.’

‘I’m going to call in at Northumberland’s place and warn him anyway. He’s one of the best. A bloody good chess player as it happens.’ He stared moodily into the fireplace. It contained a small lick of flame, the most the monks would permit.

Thomas looked at him with kindness. ‘Don’t despair, Edwin. Trust in God. Things are not always what they seem.’

‘I’ll be glad to get back home to Yorkshire. I’m sick of this snakepit. You can’t trust anybody.’

Medford had shattered his illusions, Hildegard realised. She put a hand on his shoulder. There might be an even worse disillusionment to follow.

Edwin was about to continue when the door opened and a page thrust his head round it.

‘His Grace, Abbot de Courcy of Meaux.’

Hildegard stiffened in alarm. But then Hubert came striding into the chamber, coming to an abrupt halt when he saw Thomas had visitors.

‘Brother, forgive me – I had no idea—’ He broke off as his glance raked the room and came to rest on Hildegard. His eyes lit up. ‘My messenger surely can’t have reached you already? He must have wings!’

‘Messenger?’ She remembered to make a small obeisance.

Hubert’s face was sparkling with pleasure. ‘I sent him out straight after tierce with instructions to inform you we have a judgement.’

‘Judgement?’ It seemed she could only repeat his words like a fool.

‘On your divorce.’

She held the word back and simply stared at him. She had forgotten that.

He came over to her and she was aware that Edwin and Thomas had tactfully turned away to continue a separate conversation.

Hubert looked carefully into her face. ‘You look ill,
Hildegard. I hope you haven’t been worrying about this issue?’

‘No.’

There was a pause. She could think of nothing to add.

He lowered his voice. ‘You’re being very brave about it. The Chapter took their time, I’m afraid, but they agree that it should be possible. They say you’re free of any promises made to Ravenscar. You’ll have to reaffirm your vows to us. But that should be no hardship.’

She could only stare at him. Hubert had none of the louche sensual pragmatism of Rivera. His austerity, his air of authority and straight dealing were like fresh rain on the confusion that had gone before. He was smiling with great warmth, plainly concerned by her appearance, searching her face for an explanation. She felt suddenly tired. She swayed and he jerked out a hand. ‘Are you ill?’

‘I fear so.’

‘Thomas!’ he called over his shoulder. ‘Have you no page in attendance? Can’t you see Hildegard needs help?’

Thomas sprang to his feet, winced when he leant too heavily on his injured leg, then plumped down again as Edwin got up instead, saying, ‘Let me.’

He gave Hubert a reproachful look. ‘You cannot know what Hildegard has been through, My Lord Abbot.’

‘There was no need to tell Hubert all that, Edwin.’

‘He would have had to discover it some time and it was best coming from me.’

‘My gratitude, then.’ The abbot had said nothing
when Edwin told him about the mob’s violent attack and the subsequent beheading of one of Swynford’s spies. He had looked at her with concern when the clerk had gone on to tell him about Jarrold’s gutting, right there in front of her, and his anger was at once obvious, forcing Edwin to remind him, with many apologies for being so forthright, that even he could not stand against the King’s secretary without calling down trouble on his own head and probably that of his Order.

‘He will claim that the Cistercians are traitors and only here on sufferance. He’ll persuade the King to clear you out, just as they’ve cleared out so many other alien monastics.’

‘Close St Mary Graces?’ replied Hubert robustly. ‘I’d like to see him try.’ But it was true. They all knew Medford could persuade the King to do it in the interests of the state.

Now Hildegard drew her horse to a halt and called Edwin to stop. ‘There’s a little chapel here,’ she told him. ‘I’d like to go inside for a moment. Do you mind waiting?’

Haskin and the two Signet Office guards drew up behind them. When Haskin saw what she was going to do he said he would come inside as well. Just to be on the safe side. He swung down from his horse.

It was a small place, dark, its coloured glass letting in little light and the frescoes of St Margaret emerging in triumph from the belly of the dragon, the Devil in disguise, visible only dimly. The colours swam out of the shadows, ochre, black, purple, and a red pigment like dried blood.

A few candles were guttering under the east window where a coffin stood with its lid closed. She went over and looked at the flames. They were dancing like things living and taunting her with their vitality.

There was an inscription on the coffin lid, written in an educated hand.
To our dearly beloved brother and martyr in Christ, Francisco Rivera.

Of its own volition her hand dashed forward, scattering the candles. Wisps of smoke rose and vanished followed by the smell of singed fabric.

Haskin touched her on the shoulder. ‘My Lady, come away now.’

The King, it was announced, was refusing to leave Eltham until a delegation of forty aldermen, including the new mayor, would come to hear his side of his grievance against the Duke of Gloucester. It was contrived, however, that the Duke with his two allies, Arundel and Edmund, another of the King’s uncles, turned up instead. Armed to the teeth. Insolent to the point of treason. Laying down the law as they intended to interpret it.

They claimed that if the King did not return to Parliament within forty days, it was written that it should be dissolved. Then he would certainly not get any money.

This was ancient law, they lied, and if he did not do their will he could be deposed and another member of the royal family would rule in his place. King or not, he had to obey the law of the land or lose his crown.

Unable to get any sort of legal advice that would have satisfied his opponents, Richard, nineteen years old, with no money and no army of his own, conceded. He arrived
in the royal barge at Westminster quay on the twenty-eighth of October, the Queen, pale and plainly ill, by his side. They held hands like children. Richard put his arm round her when she stumbled and the Bohemian, Petrus de Lancekrona, helped him carry her into the palace.

Gloucester, fox’s brush swinging on its lance, followed, smirking. The Earl of Derby was not far behind. Attired from head to foot in green and gold, looking like a king himself, he crossed the yard to a storm of applause. The cheers followed him inside, where the King would hear the level of the crowd’s support.

Later that day King Richard made a surprise announcement. He had decided to name his heir. For the security of the succession and the peace of the realm he had chosen the one who would next wear the crown. It was to be a cousin, the Earl of March, thirteen-year-old Roger Mortimer.

The severed limbs nailed to the doors of various strategic buildings and symbolising the body of the realm had been forgotten in the more pressing and unsymbolic drama taking place in Parliament. Now the mystery of the body parts was brought back into public awareness when one of the hands was discovered shortly after lauds on the feast of Saints Ethelred and Ethelbert.

It had been thoughtfully stuck on a pike above London Bridge on the side facing out across the Thames to Southwark, so that anyone entering the city as curfew was lifted that morning would be sure to see it.

News of its appearance swept through the cobbled streets where the market was being set up, and down to
Westminster almost as swiftly as a hawk could fly.

If the perpetrators of such barbarity intended to clarify their gruesome message, it was still at best ambiguous. Was it meant to represent the hand of God, the saviour who had caused the wind that drove the French from English shores? Or was it meant to affirm the power of the King – bow down all ye who enter here – and offer a warning to his enemies? Was it meant as instruction to the city men to give the King their support against his enemies? The discussions went on with varying levels of acuity in all the taverns, at all the stalls, in the streets and byways and the courts and yards and ginnels, until Hildegard thought she would be driven mad by it.

‘It’s a civic matter,’ Thomas told her with conviction on the day he happened to be allowed to walk again. He had arrived by wherry at Westminster, discovered she was still staying with Roger de Hutton, and had made his way, limping, and with waning confidence in his infirmarer, halfway up the Strand.

‘It stands to reason,’ he said over a beaker of wine in Roger’s solar, ‘the other parts have all been posted up at sites within the city walls. It’s meant to scare the apprentices into obedience. Exton has already started to root out anybody who doesn’t agree with him.’

Roger growled something about the monk’s strange idea of reason and pointed out that the rest of the body hadn’t shown up yet.

Shortly after midday his complaint was satisfied. The head, wearing a makeshift crown of willow wands, was discovered nailed to the broken gates of the Savoy Palace.

A terrified servant brought the news. ‘It’s just across
the street!’ he bawled out, tumbling over his own feet and throwing himself in front of the first figure in authority he could find. It happened to be Ulf, just then crossing the courtyard with a message to the vintner to bring up extra supplies to the solar. The steward followed him out into the street.

‘Show me,’ he commanded.

The frightened lad led him along until they reached the small crowd that had already gathered and were gaping up at the bloodied human remains with its crown awry.

‘Hildegard must not see this.’ Ulf dragged the boy back with him and handed him over to the under-kitchener. ‘Give him something to steady his nerves then tell him to shut his mouth. I’m going up to inform His Grace right this minute.’

It was impossible to keep something like this a secret for long. After a mumbled explanation to Roger, Ulf approached Hildegard where she sat in a niche. Everything about him showed that he had news he was reluctant to impart.

‘You’ll find out sooner or later, Hildegard. Somebody else is bound to recognise him. It’s Hugh de Ravenscar.’

She stood up.

Roger had sworn to kill him. Ulf too. Now they both looked stunned.

‘It’s justice,’ said Ulf. ‘Don’t waste tears on him.’

‘Tears?’ She had forgotten what tears were and now merely groped for her goblet and took a sip.

Ulf had heard a few murmurs from the onlookers outside the Savoy and now told her, ‘It’s being seen as a warning to the King’s enemies.’