‘Oh, I remember,’ he says. ‘It was William Parr’s niece, Kate. Lady Latimer, as she is now. Unfortunately.’
‘We agreed a husband is no obstacle,’ Gregory says. ‘Though is not Latimer her second? She does not keep them when they are worn in, I warrant. What did she say to your suit?’
‘She asked him to dine,’ Rafe says. ‘We were witness.’
‘She took his hand,’ Richard says. ‘She drew him aside, most tender.’
‘I think,’ Mr Wriothesley adds, ‘she would have kissed him, if we had not been right behind them gaping and nudging each other, and grinning and mincing like apes.’
‘I have come,’ Lady Latimer had said, ‘to see the new queen. I have come to introduce my sister Anne Parr, and ask if she can have a position.’
‘I am glad to see you back at court, my lady. If your sister is as handsome as you, she will do well.’
There is a stifled giggle from his attendants. He pretends not to hear it. Kate Latimer is a sweet-faced, snub-nosed young woman, five-and-twenty. Her family are courtiers by blood. Maud Parr, her lady mother, served Queen Katherine for many a year; William her uncle is an Esquire of the Body.
‘I will speak to Lady Rutland for your sister, though I don’t know if Jane can take anyone else. Lady Lisle sends me a reminder by every boat. If her daughters are not placed, I shall soon feel her wrath, blowing out of Calais on a cutting wind.’
‘Oh, the Bassett girls.’ Kate bites her lip: considers the applicants, as if they were parading before her. ‘The queen should not feel obliged to take more than one. Put in a word for my sister, will you? And come and dine this week at Charterhouse Yard. Lord Latimer is here under sufferance, and chafing to get back to his summer’s sport. I want some conversation, before he can gallop me back north.’
Latimer is a papist, he suspects: but, so far, loyal. ‘How do you like Snape Castle?’
She wrinkles her nose. ‘Well, you know. It’s Yorkshire.’ She touches his sleeve, nods towards a window embrasure. ‘We seem to be amusing your boys.’
‘Oh, they are a foolish set of youths. They cannot keep their countenance at the sight of a pretty woman.’
Out of line of sight, she drops her head, as if they were going to discuss her velvet shoes. ‘Tyndale?’ she whispers.
For a moment he thinks he has misheard. Then, ‘Still alive,’ he says.
‘But out of hope.’ She nods. ‘We hear you have done what is possible. Now he must suffer, as the godly must. Till they go to a better world than this.’
He looks at Lady Latimer with new eyes. ‘I beg you to trust no one here at court.’
‘And you, trust no one in Yorkshire.’
He breathes in the warm scent of her skin: rose oil, cloves. He looks out of the window. ‘I never did.’
‘If the king intends to crown Jane, he should do it in York. Show his power there. It would be timely.’ For the benefit of passers-by she raises her voice. ‘Advertise us which day you will come. We should like to do all honour to you.’ She glances over her shoulder. ‘Send one of those silly fellows with a message.’
She seems to have caught on to the joke, because she turns at the end of the gallery and blows him a kiss.
August, he is in Kent; his duties follow him, the boy Mathew bundling up his papers as he did at Wolf Hall, and Christophe riding at his elbow, a club slung at his saddle to beat off assailants. ‘Have you heard of fire-pots?’ he demands, as they pass under the dripping trees. ‘One fills them with ardent substance and then launches them in a sling. Such a weapon might reach Gardineur, who knows? Flying across the sea to ignite him.’
He says, reminiscing, ‘We made those in Italy when I was a boy. We used to seal the sulphur in with pig fat. I dare say there are better ways now.’
‘Pig fat is king,’ Christophe says. ‘When are we making them?’
At Allington Castle, the master looks as if he has only weeks to live. ‘This last summer,’ Sir Henry says, ‘I could not sleep for the thought of my boy lying at the Tower. I knew you would not suffer him to be mistreated. But you could not watch over him all the hours, with great business of state toward.’ His hand trembles; a drop of wine falls on the ledger before him. ‘Oh, by the Rood!’ Sir Henry dabs at the page.
‘Here. Let me.’ He moves the book from danger. The old man sighs. ‘I trust Tom has learned to live quiet. I hope it will content him now, and he be well to keep.’ Sir Henry’s eyes close. ‘To be master of Allington in my stead, and all its pleasant ways and walks. My chases and woods. My flowery meads.’
Thomas Wyatt says, send me abroad. Send me abroad in the king’s service. I will go anywhere. I want to be out of the realm.
He lays the papers down and sits by the old man as he dozes. Lauda finem, he thinks: praise the end. He thinks of the lioness that stalked Tom Wyatt, out in the courtyard: where the scent of evening flowers drifts, instead of her feral breath. Sir Henry opens an eye and says, ‘He’ll gamble the shirt off his back, unless you nail it to him. He’ll sell the place off, or lose it at some gaming house. And be borrowing from you, Thomas Cromwell, before my corpse is cold.’
As he travels, he signs off on the paperwork to give Rafe a clutch of Essex manors belonging to William Brereton, deceased. In accordance with the king’s wishes, he redirects the possessions and holdings of young Richmond. Charles Brandon receives munificent grants. Henry Courtenay, the Marquis of Exeter, is given a slice of Dorset to secure his loyalties and keep his wife Gertrude content. A portion of the county of Devon goes to William Fitzwilliam, and the land and buildings of Waverley Abbey; it was the first house of the Cistercian monks when they came into England, but the site has always been likely to flood, the coffers are exhausted and there are but thirteen monks to be paid off. Fitz is granted manors in Hampshire and Sussex, set on firmer ground; he needs to support his new dignities, as he is promoted Lord Admiral.
It’s another disappointment for the Duke of Norfolk. The post had been his once. Having given it up to young Richmond, he hoped to get it back now he is dead. But the king says, William Fitzwilliam is more use to me, a steadfast man who tells me the truth.
The king’s new family must be augmented, with leases and licences. Tom Seymour sails among the ladies, scattering smiles like posies; he wears a doublet of hyacinth, a curtmantel of violet velvet. Edward Seymour seeks out the company of black-gowned savants to learn how he can be useful to the realm. All agree he is an improvement on the last royal brother – though as Gregory says, if he can only keep from tupping his sister, it puts him ahead of George Boleyn.
Edward Seymour invites him to his town house and shows him a painting that occupies a whole wall. It portrays all the Seymours that grace the records, right back to where writing began: other Seymours, imagined ones, carry the line back to paradise, situated top centre. Far-sighted ancestors wear plate armour, years before its manufacture. They carry broadswords, poll axes, horseman’s hammers and maces. Their brides are represented by their family emblems. Give or take a beard, generations of Seymours bear a marked family resemblance: that is, they look like Edward. They shelter under their coats of arms as if standing out of the rain.
As for the queen herself – Henry doesn’t know how to reward her, what to give her. She is endowed with castles, manors, rents, services, privileges, liberties and franchises. Her letters patent are inscribed in gilt, illuminated with the king’s picture: in which he is younger, fresh-faced, clean-shaven, as if Jane has wiped away the last ten years. Henry has made exhaustive enquiries into the state of her body and soul. He is satisfied that no man except a brother or close cousin has so much as kissed her cheek. When she confesses to her chaplain, it takes five minutes. She may as well be transparent, for all she has to hide. And the king takes all her attention. Katherine had her little apes, Anne her spaniels, but Jane has only her husband. She treats him with great deference, and carefully, as if he might snap; but she treats him cheerfully, as he himself, Cromwell, tries to do. Above all, she treats him as if everything he wants to do is perfectly normal. And in gratitude for the gold and precious stones, she smiles slowly and blinks at him, as if she were a lass whose lover has cut her a slice of apple, and offered it to her on the point of his blade.