It is obvious that Don Diego is carrying something of which he is painfully aware: as you might be aware if someone slid a hot iron under your shirt. No doubt it is a second letter, perhaps in code.
‘There are presents, of course. Which follow by mule,’ says Mendoza.
‘Because they are large,’ Chapuys says.
‘Good. Lady Mary has lavish tastes. That’s why her father has brought her to court. He could not maintain her in a separate household. She wrote for more money every week.’
‘She is generous with her small means,’ Chapuys says. ‘Charitable.’
‘I suppose she lives as befits a princess?’ Don Diego says. ‘You would not expect her to do other?’
‘Ordinarily,’ Chapuys advises, ‘Lord Cremuel would kick your shin if you spoke her proper title. They call her by her plain name, Mary. But behold – when they are offering her in marriage, we call her “princess” and suddenly,’ he smirks, ‘Cremuel does not mind at all.’
The door of the chamber opens and out issues Mary’s chaplain, in conference with her doctor, a Spaniard. To the chaplain he says, ‘How do you, Father Baldwin? How does my lady?’ The doctor he greets in his best Castilian: suck on that, Mendoza. ‘I will give you a quarter of an hour, ambassador. Then I regret I shall interrupt you.’
Chapuys protests: ‘It is hardly time enough for them to pray together.’
‘Oh, will they do that?’ He smiles.
Dodd the usher bows Mendoza into the presence chamber. ‘Has she attendance?’ Nan Zouche says, and the two ladies exchange a glance and slip in after the ambassador. The door closes.
Chapuys mutters something. It sounds like, ‘Hopeless.’
‘I’m sorry, ambassador?’ he says.
‘I think those ladies are your friends, who have just intruded on the Lady Mary.’
Mary Mounteagle is Brandon’s daughter, from one of his many early marriages; yes, he would say they were friends. Nan Zouche – Nan Gainsford, as she was – gave him matter to use against Anne Boleyn.
‘How is the queen?’ Chapuys says. ‘The king must be very anxious.’
‘She gives no reason for anxiety.’
‘But even so. Given his past losses. They say Edward Seymour is certain of a prince, that he is walking around with his head swelling like a yeasted loaf. Of course, if she has a boy, the Seymour brothers will be promoted – they may come to rival you.’
He cannot see Tom Seymour running the Privy Seal’s office. He says, ‘I’ll have to watch that, won’t I?’
‘But then I am sure they will be wary,’ Chapuys says, ‘remembering what you did to the brother of the other one. If I were them, I would hurry back to Wolf Hall and be forgotten.’ He chuckles. ‘They should become shepherds, or something of that sort.’
He says, ‘Don Diego is not very friendly. I thought it was an ambassador’s duty?’
‘He is fastidious,’ Chapuys admits.
He laughs. A hiatus. From behind Mary’s closed door, voices too faint to be useful. Chapuys says, ‘Mr Call-Me is much in your confidence.’
‘Yes, he is growing into consideration.’
‘He opens your letters.’
‘Someone must. There are too many for one man.’
‘He was Gardiner’s man,’ Chapuys says.
‘Gardiner remains in France.’
‘And loyalty is to the proximate,’ Chapuys says. ‘I see.’
He looks over his shoulder. ‘A word to the wise?’ The ambassador approaches. ‘Aske implicated you.’
‘What?’ Chapuys says.
‘Under questioning. And we have letters you sent to Lord Darcy. Going back three years.’
‘I protest,’ Chapuys says swiftly.
‘You claim they are forgeries?’
‘I make no claim. I say nothing to them.’
‘I know how it is, Eustache. You come to my house and you sit down to supper and you say to me, peace. You go home and light your candle and you write to your master, war.’ A pause. ‘Lucky for you, I am more clement than the cardinal. I shall not lock you up.’ He gestures to the closed door. ‘I think that’s ten minutes.’
He is as good as his word: kicks his way in like a drunken horse-boy. Gregory and the ambassador are at his heels. As they enter, they hear a scream. A large green parrot is bouncing up and down on its perch. When they wheel around, it laughs.
‘It is a present,’ Mary says. ‘I apologise.’
‘Does it speak?’
‘I fear it may.’
Mary, he notices, has not asked Don Diego to sit. The ambassador draws up his person: ‘My lord, go out, we are not done.’
The parrot sways on its perch, and squeaks like an unoiled wheel. He says, ‘I come to remind you of your urgent next engagement.’
Don Diego looks for a second as if he will try to face him down. But Chapuys clears his throat. The moment passes. The Spaniard says, ‘My lady, for now we must part.’
‘No, do not kneel,’ Mary says. ‘Haste away – the Lord Privy Seal is holding the door for you.’ She extends a hand for the ambassador’s kiss. ‘I thank you for your good counsel.’
He cedes the door-holding to Gregory, steps into the room. The ambassador passes out with an ill grace: Chapuys follows, making a comical face at him as he passes. He closes the door. The parrot is still scolding. ‘It has not taken to the Spaniard,’ he says.
Mary says, ‘Neither have you.’
He approaches the bird. He sees the slender gold chain that fastens it to a bar. The creature stamps, and raises its wings in threat. ‘I used to have a magpie when I was a child. I caught it myself.’
She says, ‘I cannot imagine you as a child.’
He thinks, neither can I. I cannot picture myself.
‘I tried to teach it to speak,’ he says. ‘But it flew away, first chance it got.’ But not before it said, Walter is a knave. He turns to Mary. ‘So what passed?’
She is unwilling to divulge. ‘He asked me if I meant what I said.’
‘Generally? Or specifically?’
‘You know well,’ she says. An instant flare of passion: her face is alight, as if someone had forced air into her with a bellows. But the next moment, she drops her eyes, an obedient woman, deflated: reverts to her monotone. ‘He asked if I meant it, when I said I accepted my father as head of the church, and that he and my mother were never truly married. I said I did. I said I accepted it all. I told him I had taken the advice of my uncle the Emperor, as conveyed to me by Ambassador Chapuys. I told him you, Cromwell, had stood my friend. And if he did not believe me that is not my fault.’
He says, ‘But did you tell him how you wrote to the Pope, taking back your statement, and begging to be absolved?’
Her eyes fly to his face.
‘No matter,’ he says. ‘It is another case where I forbear to bring your conduct home to you. I only mention it by way of warning.’
Panic in her voice. ‘What do you want?’
‘Want? My lady, I only want you to pray for me.’
‘Oh, I do,’ Mary says. ‘But do you know what I have discovered? The king has great power, but he has no power to know me, except through what I say and what I do.’
The parrot has put its head on one side, as if listening.
He says, ‘The previous Mendoza was never allowed to be alone with your lady mother. It was for her safety.’
‘I think, rather, it was for the safety of the state.’
‘Everything we do is for that. Without the king’s peace, my lady, we would be in the wilderness with the wild beasts. Or in the oceans with Leviathan.’
He moves about the chamber to put space between them. Zouche and Mounteagle slide back against the wall; if they could weave themselves into the arras, they would do it. The parrot swivels its head to follow him as he moves. ‘I suppose the ambassador promised to get you away from these shores.’
Mary looks down at her feet: as if to catch them going somewhere.
‘If he did not, then he will. He thinks we will force you into a marriage with the French.’
‘I trust my lord father will not do that.’