The lady in question smiled and gave a brief, slightly ironic curtsy. Ned had found it always paid to be generous with praise, doubly so to the person providing the repast. They could all smell the venison cooking in the kitchen below. The rich aroma set one salivating in anticipation.
“Last year our company was founded by dire circumstances, when we were drawn into the plots and machinations of the powerful. Through luck, our friendship, and the grace of divine providence, we won through.”
That seemed to go over well. The others muttered agreement, though Mistress Black’s raised eyebrows caused Ned a moment’s concern. Whatever could she object to in that?
“Now I fear that due to misfortune and murder we are enmeshed once more.” Ned suppressed the overwhelming desire to glare meaningfully at Meg Black. It probably would’ve helped their present prospects if Mistress Black didn’t continue to trade in heretical literature. May as well wish for a visit to the faerie realm, since the trade had the unofficial blessing of her patron, Lady Anne Boleyn. Ned wasn’t a fool-he knew that it was that heretical connection that had saved them from Wolsey, Norfolk, and Cromwell last year. He just hoped that it was enough this year.
“As you all know, we’ve only a few more days to solve the murder of Joachim and his nephew before Mistress Black and I have to present a report of it to the Lord Chancellor.”
This was met with a pursing of lips and frowns. It was an unpalatable and inescapable fact, and despite the needs of the other problems, the prospect of having to throw themselves on the dubious mercy of Sir Thomas More, he hoped might spur everyone to greater efforts and less dalliance, like at Richmond Palace-though blisters and sore muscles aside, the trip had given Ned more time to think on the conundrum of the murders. Everything still pointed back to the ship as the source, and it was well past time that nagging problem was solved. They needed more clues-actually any clues would be a start, so he planned to ask Rob’s help for the morrow.
Ned gave a slight cough, as the muttering settled, then continued. “We also have another task of greater import, while carrying out the duties of the writ that for now protects us.”
He couldn’t resist it and gave Meg Black a significant look of disapproval, which she once more ignored. Ned slapped the table with a sudden snap of his hand. “I have discovered that Queen Katherine is engaged in a conspiracy!”
He would have expected a dramatic reaction of gasps, as well as surprise and praise for his clever work. Actually any kind of reaction would have done. However such never seemed to be his lot in life, or at least whenever it concerned Mistress Black. Emma just quirked a well shaped eyebrow while Meg Black covered a simulated yawn with waved fingers. Worse, the two who he might have expected to count on for manly support, Rob and Gruesome Roger, just looked at him blankly as if he had just told them it was a sunny day.
As his daemon had direly predicted, Margaret Black, the bane of his life, spoke up. “So what, Ned? This is common knowledge. There’s not a week goes by that Queen Katherine doesn’t plot or plan something. That’s the reason she was moved to Richmond Palace.”
Her companion in crime, Emma, gave a couple of affirmative nods in support and Ned was left for a moment speechless. Why was it that when he was given a mission, Mistress Black and her abettors always seemed to know more than he did? It was enough to drive a man to despair and believe that womankind really did consort with the devils as the priests so frequently claimed. Ned gave a silent pray for patience and tried to resume his review, a task made harder by the poorly suppressed snigger of Gruesome Roger. Once more he thumped the table with vigour, and he hoped conviction. “She’s a Spaniard and a foreigner. No doubt treachery and deviousness is as natural for them as breathing. However I have a suspicion this is more dangerous than her usual plotting.”
Meg Black made a semblance of listening attentively, or so he believed until she spoke. “Why?”
It was her dismissively questioning tone that got to him. He would have glared once more, but what was the point? Instead Ned took a deep breath and launched into a recitation of his evidence. “Firstly, one of the priests attending her was the same ragged friar I had arrested outside here two days ago, and he was clean, washed with a habit worthy of a prior. By rights he should still be in the Bread Street Compter, petitioning the Bishop of London for release and redress. But to be at Richmond, preened and scented, he must have been in the gaol and out faster than a spinning top.”
This piece of news had them all thinking. Every one knew that the clergy were almost untouchable, except when brought before ecclesiastical courts and then even there patronage could get a case dismissed. Of all his arguments, he felt that was the most telling. Any person tossed in gaol couldn’t expect to get out short of a week, what with petitions and bribes.
Meg Black ignored this common wisdom and with a flutter of her fingers waved off his words as you would with a pesky servant. “Ned, its common knowledge that the Queen has friends amongst the Bishops. Fisher for one and Stokesley of London have preached a few sermons that were close to criticising the annulment. If this friar was a servant to the Queen, as you claim, then it’s no surprise he’s out so fast.”
Ned shook his head. There were times when he suspected she was being deliberately obtuse. The ‘like you claim’ was delivered with what was damned close to a sneer. Ned fixed his opponent with singular stare. This time he was right and was determined to persevere with his explanation. Ticking off another finger he began again.
“Second, the other priest let slip that all would be ready for a great day very soon and the only one I can think of is the King’s petition to Pope Clement. We all know that every noble and churchmen in the land is to sign, so hundreds of them will be in the city.”
Ned held up a third finger. “And lastly, this plague of friars infesting the city has something to do with the Queen’s plot, I sure of it.”
Meg Black didn’t look so cocky now, and the suggested link piqued the interest of her hither too silent brother. “Ned, what could the Queen hope to achieve by disrupting the petition? From all I’ve heard, the King’s Majesty is set on it. The plan has been the talk of the city for months, and even if there where several hundred friars prattling on about doom, fire and retribution, it won’t make a difference.”
Ned paused. Rob had found the flaw in his suspicions. Preaching alone wouldn’t shift the city or Parliament. Ten thousand friars wouldn’t raise the moral standards of the city one inch and if even a fraction of the rumours were true about their personal habits, it could make the place a second Sodom. In lue of any tangible evidence he gave the one connection he still found odd. “When I was in the Queen’s privy rooms, there were two others, ladies of the old nobility. One was the Dowager Duchess of Buckingham. Rob and I saw her a few days ago in London, and the other one looked like a relation.”
To Ned’s surprise their hostess gazumped Mistress Black’s eager retort. “That would be her daughter, Elizabeth Howard. They both visit three or four times a week, though John’s been run off his feet to deal with them calling every day. He’s complained that they’ve been at him to find more oranges, as if eight hundred weight weren’t enough for anybody.”
Ned rubbed his forehead. Something was struggling through the cloying fog of his memory. “This Lady Elizabeth, would that be the wife Norfolk threw out?”