Bring Up the Bodies (18 page)

‘Give it to me. I will have it sent to your house and you can wear it on your return.' When you are out of mourning, he thinks. ‘Look…I will not raise your hopes about Mary.'

‘You being an Englishman, who never lies or deceives.' Chapuys gives a bark of laughter. ‘Jesu-Maria!'

‘The king will not permit any meeting that could strengthen Mary's spirit of disobedience.'

‘Even if her mother is on her deathbed?'

‘Especially then. We do not want oaths, deathbed promises. You see that?'

He speaks to his bargemaster: I shall stay here and see how it goes with the dragon, whether he eats the hunter or what. Convey the ambassador up to London, he must prepare for a journey. ‘But how will you get back yourself?' Chapuys says.

‘Crawl, if Brandon has his way.' He puts his hand on the little man's shoulder. Says softly, ‘This clears the way, you know? For an alliance with your master. Which will be very good for England and her trade, and is what you and I both want. Katherine has come between us.'

‘And what about the French marriage?'

‘There will be no French marriage. It is a fairy tale. Go. It will be dark in an hour. I hope you rest tonight.'

Already, twilight steals across the Thames; there are crepuscular deeps in the lapping waves, and a blue dusk creeps along the banks. He says to one of the boatmen, do you think the roads north will be open? God help me, sir, the man says: I only know the river, and anyway I've never stirred north of Enfield.

 

When he arrives back in Stepney torchlight spills out of the house, and the singing children, in a state of high excitement, are carolling in the garden; dogs are barking, black shapes bobbing against the snow, and a dozen mounds, ghostly white, tower over the frozen hedges. One, taller than the rest, wears a mitre; it has a stub of blue-tinged carrot for its nose, and a smaller stub for its cock. Gregory pitches towards him, a swirl of excitement: ‘Look, sir, we have made the Pope out of snow.'

‘First we made the Pope.' The glowing face beside him belongs to Dick Purser, the boy who keeps the watchdogs. ‘We made the Pope, sir, and then he looked harmless by himself and so we made a set of cardinals. Do you like them?'

His kitchen boys swarm about him, frosted and dripping. The whole household has turned out, or at least everyone under thirty. They have lit a bonfire – well away from the snowmen – and appear to be dancing around it, led by his boy Christophe.

Gregory gets his breath. ‘We only did it for the better setting forth of the king's supremacy. I do not think it is wrong, because we can blow a trumpet then kick them flat, and cousin Richard said we may, and he himself moulded the Pope's head, and Master Wriothesley who was here looking for you thrust in the Pope's little member and laughed at it.'

‘Such children you are!' he says. ‘I like them very much. We will have the fanfare tomorrow when there's more light, shall we?'

‘And can we fire a cannon?'

‘Where would I get a cannon?'

‘Speak to the king, sir.' Gregory is laughing; he knows the cannon is a step too far.

Dick Purser's sharp eye has fallen on the ambassador's hat. ‘Might we borrow that? We have done ill with the Pope's tiara, because we did not know how it should look.'

He spins the hat in his hand. ‘You're right, this is more the sort of thing Farnese wears. But no. This hat is a sacred charge. I have to answer to the Emperor for it. Now, let me go,' he says, laughing, ‘I must write letters, we look for great changes soon.'

‘Stephen Vaughan is here,' Gregory says.

‘Is he? Ah. Good. I have a use for him.'

He tramps towards the house, firelight licking his heels. ‘Pity Master Vaughan,' Gregory says. ‘I think he came for his supper.'

‘Stephen!' A hasty embrace. ‘No time,' he says. ‘Katherine is dying.'

‘What?' his friend says. ‘I heard nothing of this in Antwerp.'

Vaughan is always in transit. He is about to be in transit again. He is Cromwell's servant, he is the king's servant, he is the king's eyes and ears across the Narrow Sea; nothing passes with the Flemish merchants or the guilds at Calais that Stephen does not know and report. ‘I am bound to say, Master Secretary, you keep a disorderly household. One might as well eat supper in a field.'

‘You are in a field,' he says. ‘More or less. Or you soon will be. You must get on the road.'

‘But I am just off the ship!'

This is how Stephen manifests his friendship: constant complaints, carping and grumbles. He turns and issues orders: feed Vaughan, water Vaughan, bed down Vaughan, have a good horse ready to go at dawn. ‘Don't fret, you can sleep the night. Then you must escort Chapuys up to Kimbolton. You speak the languages, Stephen! Nothing must pass in French or Spanish or Latin, but I know every word.'

‘Ah. I see.' Stephen draws his person together.

‘Because I think that if Katherine dies, Mary will be desperate to take ship for the Emperor's domains. He is her cousin, after all, and though she should not trust him, she cannot be convinced of that. And we can hardly chain her to the wall.'

‘Keep her up-country. Keep her where there is no port in two days' ride.'

‘If Chapuys saw an exit for her, she would fly on the wind and set to sea in a sieve.'

‘Thomas.' Vaughan, a grave man, lays a hand upon him. ‘What is all this agitation? It is not like you. You are afraid of being bested by a little girl?'

He would like to tell Vaughan what has passed, but how to convey the texture of it: the smoothness of Henry's lies, the solid weight of Brandon when he shoved him, dragged him, manhandled him away from the king; the raw wetness of the wind on his face, the taste of blood in his mouth. It will always be like this, he thinks. It will go on being like this. Advent, Lent, Whitsuntide. ‘Look,' he sighs, ‘I must go and write to Stephen Gardiner in France. If this is the end of Katherine, I must make sure he knows it from me.'

‘No more grovelling to Frenchmen for our salvation,' Stephen says. Is that a grin? It is a wolfish one. Stephen is a merchant, and he values the Low Countries trade. When relations with the Emperor founder, England runs out of money. When the Emperor is on our side, we grow rich. ‘We can patch all the quarrels,' Stephen says. ‘Katherine was the cause of all. Her nephew will be as relieved as we are. He never wanted to invade us. And now he has enough to do with Milan. Let him scrap with the French if he must. Our king will be free. A free hand to do as he likes.'

That is what worries me, he thinks. This free hand. He makes his apologies to Stephen. Vaughan stops him. ‘Thomas. You will wreck yourself with this pace you keep up. Do you ever consider, that half your years be spent?'

‘Half? Stephen, I am fifty.'

‘I forget.' A little laugh. ‘Fifty already? I don't know you have changed much since ever I knew you.'

‘That is an illusion,' he says. ‘But I promise to take a rest, when you do.'

In his cabinet it is warm. He closes the shutters, insulating himself from the white glare without. He sits down to write to Gardiner, commending him. The king is very pleased with his embassy to France. He is sending funds.

He puts down his pen. Whatever possessed Charles Brandon? He knows there has been gossip that Anne's child is not Henry's. There has even been gossip that she is not with child at all, only pretending; and it is true she seems very uncertain when it will be born. But he had thought these rumours were blowing from France into England; and what would they know at the French court? He has dismissed it as empty malice. It is what Anne attracts; that is her misfortune, or one of them.

Under his hand there is a letter from Calais, from Lord Lisle. He feels exhausted at the thought of it. Lisle is telling him all about his Christmas Day, from his first waking in the frosty dawn. At some point in the festivities, Lord Lisle received an insult: the Mayor of Calais kept him waiting. So he, in his turn, kept the Mayor waiting…and now both parties are writing to him: which is more important, Master Secretary, governor or mayor? Say it is me, say it is me!

Arthur Lord Lisle is the pleasantest man in the world; except, clearly, when the mayor cuts across him. But he is in debt to the king and has not paid a penny in seven years. He should perhaps do something about that; the treasurer of the king's chamber has sent him a note about it. And on that subject…Harry Norris, by virtue of his position in the king's immediate household, by some custom the origin and use of which he has never fathomed, is in charge of the secret funds which the king has stashed in his principal houses, for use in some exigency; it is not clear what would free up these funds, or where they come from, or how much coin is stored, or who has access if Norris were to…if Norris were to be off duty when the need arose. Or if Norris were to meet with some accident. Once again he lays down his quill. He starts to imagine accidents. He puts his head in his hands, fingertips over tired eyes. He sees Norris flying from his horse. Sees Norris tumbled in the mud. Says to himself, ‘Get back to your abacus, Cromwell.'

His New Year gifts have started to come in already. A supporter in Ireland has sent him a roll of white Irish blankets and a flask of aqua vitae. He would like to swaddle himself in the blankets, drain the flask, roll over on the floor and sleep.

Ireland is quiet this Christmas, in greater peace than she has seen for forty years. Mainly he has brought this about by hanging people. Not many: just the right ones. It's an art, a necessary art; the Irish chiefs have been begging the Emperor to use the country as a landing stage, for his invasion of England.

He takes a breath. Lisle, mayor, insults, Lisle. Calais, Dublin, secret funds. He wants Chapuys to get to Kimbolton in time. But he doesn't want Katherine to rally. You should not desire, he knows, the death of any human creature. Death is your prince, you are not his patron; when you think he is engaged elsewhere, he will batter down your door, walk in and wipe his boots on you.

He sifts his papers. More chronicles of monks who sit in the alehouse all night and come reeling to the cloister at dawn; more priors found under hedges with prostitutes; more prayers, more pleas; tales of neglectful clergy who won't christen children or bury the dead. He sweeps them away. Enough. A stranger writes to him – an old man judging by his hand – to say that the conversion of the Mohammedans is imminent. But what sort of church can we offer them? Unless there is sweeping change soon, the letter says, the heathens will be in more darkness than before. And you are Vicar General, Master Cromwell, you are the king's vicegerent: what are you going to do about it?

He wonders, does the Turk work his people as hard as Henry works me? If I had been born an infidel I could have been a pirate. I could have sailed the Middle Sea.

As he turns up the next paper he almost laughs; some hand has laid before him a fat land grant, from the king to Charles Brandon. It is pastureland and woodland, furze and heath, and the manors sprinkled through it: Harry Percy, the Earl of Northumberland, has made over this land to the Crown in part payment of his massive debts. Harry Percy, he thinks: I told him I would bring him down for his part in destroying Wolsey. And by God, I have not broken sweat; with his manner of life he has destroyed himself. It only remains to take his earldom away, as I swore I would.

The door opens, discreetly; it is Rafe Sadler. He looks up, surprised. ‘You should be with your household.'

‘I heard you had been at court, sir. I thought there might be letters to write.'

‘Go through these, but not tonight.' He bundles over the papers for the grants. ‘Brandon may not get many such presents this New Year.' He tells Rafe what has passed: Suffolk's outburst, Chapuys's amazed face. He does not tell him what Suffolk said, about how he was not fit to deal in the affairs of his betters; he shakes his head and says, ‘Charles Brandon, I was looking at him today…you know how he used to be cried up as a handsome fellow? The king's own sister fell in love with him. But now, that big slab face of his…he has no more grace than a dripping pan.'

Rafe pulls up a low stool and sits thinking, forearms laid on the desk, his head pillowed on them. They are used to each other's silent company. He inches a candle closer and frowns at some more papers, makes marginal marks. The king's face rises before him: not Henry as he was today, but Henry as he was at Wolf Hall, coming from the garden, his expression dazed, drops of rain on his jacket: and the pale circle of Jane Seymour's face by his side.

After a time he glances at Rafe: ‘Are you all right down there, little man?'

Rafe says, ‘This house always smells of apples.'

It is true; Great Place is set among orchards, and the summer seems to linger in the garrets where the fruit is stored. At Austin Friars the gardens are raw, saplings bound to stakes. But this is an old house; it was a cottage once, but it was built up for his own use by Sir Henry Colet, father of the learned Dean of St Paul's. When Sir Henry died Lady Christian lived out her days here, and then by Sir Henry's will the house devolved to the Mercers' Guild. He holds it on a fifty-year sub-lease, which should see him out, and Gregory in. Gregory's children can grow up wrapped in the aroma of baking, of honey and sliced apples, raisins and cloves. He says, ‘Rafe. I must get Gregory married.'

‘I'll make a memorandum,' Rafe says, and laughs.

A year ago, Rafe could not laugh. Thomas, his first child, had lived only a day or two after he was baptised. Rafe took it like a Christian man, but it sobered him, and he was a sober young man already. Helen had children by her first husband, but had never lost one; she took it badly. Yet this year, after a long and harsh labour that frightened her, she has another son in the cradle, and they have called him Thomas too. May it bring him better fortune than his brother; reluctant as he was to come out and face the world, he seems strong, and Rafe has relaxed into fatherhood.