But this year, to save the king hard riding and so he may enjoy the society of delicate ladies, the harts are driven to the hunters where they stand against the trees, dressed in silken green, their crossbows in hand. Henry, dragging his new weight, is easily fatigued, his face furrowed sometimes by pain from his leg, which his servants bind every morning as tight as he may endure, bandaging round and round the patch of fragility where the damage strikes into the bone. The queen is silent beside him, her steady eye on the deer. If the quarry should swerve to left or right it takes discipline for the hunters to hold fire lest they wound each other; if the beast cannot be shot head on, it is better to let him break through the line, then place the arrow forward to anticipate his path. If the kill is not clean the hunter tracks the wounded hart, knowing by the quality, colour and thickness of the blood how long the pursuit will last. Hunters, it is said, live longer than other men; they sweat hard and stay lean; when they fall into bed at night they are tired beyond all temptation; and when they die, they go to Heaven.
II
The Five Wounds
London, Autumn 1536
Rumours of Tyndale’s death seep through England as smoke leaks through thatch. Are we to believe them? The privy chamber gentlemen say that the king has asked the Emperor for assurances – one sovereign to another – that this Englishman is really dead. But if such an assurance is given or denied, it is not in any document that passes across his desk. ‘I thought we got everything,’ Call-Me says tetchily.
When our people abroad write to the king, they send a copy to my lord Privy Seal – often with a covering note that says more than the original. Henry likes to treat with monarchs brother to brother; ‘Crumb,’ he says, ‘I cannot fault your management of my affairs at home, but some matters should lie between princes only, and I cannot ask my fellow kings to deal with you, because …’ The king looks into the distance, perhaps trying to imagine Putney. ‘Not that you can help it.’
Some maintain Tyndale is still alive, and his keepers are trying to torment him into a spectacular public recantation. But our Antwerp contacts are silent. Perhaps we are missing something, and news is encoded in some merchant’s invoice? Call-Me-Risley says, ‘In Venice they have men who spend every day working at ciphers. The more they do it, the better they get.’
‘I’m sure that could be arranged for you,’ Rafe says. ‘But then Lord Cromwell would put you on a per diem, and you would not get the fees from the office of the Signet, and what would Mistress Call-Me say about that? She would not put her views in cipher – they would hear her scolding in Calais.’
Henry is restless; as if trying to prolong the summer, he tows Jane from house to house. He tries to make sure either he or Rafe is by the king’s side. He says to Chapuys, ‘These talks with the Scots – they will never happen. Henry will not go further north than York. He apprehends bad food and bandits and no proper baths. And the King of Scots will not come south, for the same reasons.’
They are at Whitehall. Chapuys joins him in a window embrasure. The ambassador’s entourage backs off, but he feels them watching. ‘Is Tyndale truly burned?’
‘Henry has not spoken to you? He knows your attachment to that heretic.’
‘I couldn’t abide the man,’ he says. ‘Nobody could.’
But then, we didn’t require Tyndale for a supper guest, or a companion in a game of bowls. We required him for the health of our souls. Tyndale knew God’s word and carried a light to guide us through the marsh of interpretation, so we would not be lost – as Tyndale himself put it – like a traveller tricked by Robin Goodfellow, and left stripped and shoeless in the wastes.
Ambassador Chapuys, you notice, has not exactly said he is dead; he has only let him fall, as it were naturally, into the past tense.
He visits the convent at Shaftesbury as a private gentleman, as if attending on Sir Richard Riche, the Chancellor of Augmentations: with Christophe, as a boy attending him. Begging the favour of an interview with Dame Elizabeth Zouche, he expects to be kept waiting, and he is.
‘Laughable,’ Riche says, gloomily. ‘You the second man in the church. And me, who I am.’
‘King Alfred founded this abbey,’ he tells Christophe. ‘They are rich because they have the bones of Edward the Martyr.’
‘What tricks do they do?’ Christophe asks.
‘The usual miracles,’ Riche says. ‘Perhaps we shall witness one.’
Christophe sees to the horses and trundles out to the kitchen, seeking some young sister to feed him bread and honey. He and Riche are kept in an anteroom. Their entertainment is a painted cloth of St Catherine, suffering on her wheel. They listen to the sounds of the busy house and the town outside, till increased agitation in the air tells them their ruse is detected: scampering feet, a slamming door, a call of ‘Dame Elizabeth? Madam?’ Shaftesbury is a town of twelve churches, too many for the inhabitants. When they ring their bells, the streets quake.
‘So,’ says the abbess, ‘you have come yourself, Lord Cromwell.’
‘You know my face, madam.’
‘One of the gentlemen of the district has a portrait of you. He keeps it on display.’
‘I hope he does. It would be no good in his cellar. You visit many gentlemen?’
Her eyes flick up at him. ‘On the business of the house.’
‘What else? Did the painter do me justice?’
She surveys him. ‘He did you charity.’
‘What you have seen is a copy of a copy. Each version is worse. My son thinks I look like a murderer.’
The abbess is enjoying herself. ‘We lead such a quiet and blessed life here, I am not sure I have seen one for comparison.’ She stands up. ‘But you will want to get on. You have come to see Sister Dorothea.’
As he follows her she says, ‘Why is Richard Riche here? We are as wealthy, praise God, as any house of religion in the realm. I understood Sir Richard’s business is with houses of lesser value.’
‘We like to keep our figures current.’
‘I have been abbess for thirty years. Any question about our worth, ask me.’
‘Riche likes it on paper.’
‘I give you warning,’ Dame Elizabeth says. ‘And you can carry the warning to the king. I will not surrender this house. Not this year, nor next, nor any year this side of Heaven.’
He holds up his hands. ‘The king has no thought of it.’
‘Here.’ She pushes a door open. ‘Wolsey’s daughter.’
Dorothea half-rises. With a gesture, he bids her sit. ‘Madam, how do you? I have brought gifts.’
They are in a side room, small and sunless. He permits himself a single long look. She is not like the cardinal. Her mother’s daughter? She is pleasant enough to look at, though she cannot fetch up a smile. Perhaps she is thinking, where have you been these years past?
He says, ‘I saw you once when you were a little child. You will not remember me.’
She does not reach out for her presents, so he places them in her lap. She unties the bundle, glances at the books and lays them aside. But she picks up a kerchief of fine linen, and holds it to the light. It is worked with the three apples of St Dorothea, and with wreaths, sprigs and blossoms, the lily and the rose.
‘One of my household made it to honour you. Rafe Sadler’s wife – you may have heard your father speak of young Sadler?’
‘No. Who is he?’
He takes out of his pocket a letter. It is from John Clancey, a gentleman-servant to the cardinal, who acted for her father in placing her here. He has had the letter for some time, and he has formed the habit, not of carrying it around, but of knowing where it is.
‘Clancey tells me you want to continue in this life. But I think, you were very young when you made your vows.’
Her head is bent over the kerchief, studying the work. ‘So I can be dispensed?’