C. Sansom - Lamentation

Lord Parr slammed the door shut and stood with his arms folded. He inclined his head to the apprentice. ‘Go, boy,’ he said bluntly, and the lad fled with a quick bow. Barwic faced us.

‘Michael Leeman, the thief, is discovered,’ I said, bluntly. ‘And his confederate, Zachary Gawger.’

Barwic stood there for a second, his face expressionless, his wild red hair and beard, flecked with sawdust, looking almost comical. Then, like a puppet, he sank slowly to his knees, lowering his head and clasping his work-roughened hands together. From this position he looked up at the Queen’s Chancellor, the clasped hands trembling.

‘Forgive me, my Lord. At first I only made a copy of the key lest the original be lost. It is not a good thing for a chest containing valuables to have only one key.’

‘So you made another secretly and kept it?’ I asked. ‘Where?’

‘Safe, my Lord, safe. In a locked chest to which only I have the key.’ All the while he did not shift his gaze from Lord Parr’s face.

‘Have you ever done this before?’

Barwic looked at me, then turned back to Lord Parr. ‘Yes, my Lord, forgive me. If ever I am asked to make a lock with only one key, I make a second. I can show you the place I keep them all, show you the keys. It was for security only; security, I swear.’

‘Then how did Leeman get hold of it?’ I asked.

‘Stand up when you answer, churl!’ Lord Parr snapped. ‘I will get a crick in my neck looking down at you.’

Barwic stood, still wringing his hands. ‘He came to see me, near three weeks ago. I did not know him, but he wore the uniform of the Queen’s Guard. He told me the key to the Queen’s chest had been lost, said he had heard I might have another. I–I thought he came on behalf of the Queen, you see-’

Lord Parr brought his hand down on the bench with a bang, sending the plank of wood crashing to the floor. ‘Don’t lie to me, caitiff! You know well enough a member of the Queen’s Guard would have no authority to demand a key. Especially when you kept the very existence of copies a secret!’

The wretched man swallowed nervously. ‘I let it be known, to certain people, that I made extra copies of keys. Not officially, but you see — if a key was lost, I could provide a replacement for anyone who lost it.’

‘At a price?’

Barwic nodded miserably.

‘How long have you been doing this?’

‘Since I first became the Queen’s carpenter and locksmith twelve years ago. Perhaps half a dozen times I have provided a spare key to a chest or coffer, usually to a lady who has lost hers. But always to someone who is trusted, sir, and nothing has been stolen in all that time as a consequence. Nothing.’

Lord Parr shook his head. ‘Dear God, the Queen’s household has been lax.’

‘Yes,’ I agreed, ‘and Michael Leeman, I would wager, ferreted out where the weak points were. How much did he pay you, Barwic?’

‘Ten sovereigns, sir. I–I couldn’t resist.’ I thought, the same bribe as for Gawger. ‘He told me the Queen had gone out and left the key with him for safekeeping and he accidentally dropped it through a gap in the floorboards. He did not want to have them taken up.’

‘Did you believe him?’ Lord Parr’s voice was scornful.

‘I was uncertain, my Lord. I told him to come back on the morrow. In the meantime I asked friends at Whitehall for information on Leeman — had he been there long, was he honest? I was told he was known as an honest man, godly. I wouldn’t just hand out a key to anybody, sir, I swear.’

Lord Parr gave him a look of contempt. ‘No. I imagine you would not, for fear of being hanged. But Michael Leeman was a thief. And you are deep in the mire.’ He looked at me. ‘I will have this man held close at my house for the moment. Come with us, Master Barwic. I’ll put you in the charge of a guard, as a man suspected of conspiracy to rob the Queen. And you don’t say a word about keys. Leeman, and his confederate, are discovered, but Leeman has escaped and you’ll keep all this quiet till he is captured.’

Barwic sank to his knees again. His voice shook. ‘Will — will I hang, sir? Please, would you ask the Queen to show mercy? I have a wife, children — it was all the expenses of being Guild Chairman, the taxes for the war — ’

Lord Parr bent over him. ‘You’ll hang if I have any say,’ he said brutally. ‘Now, come.’

Barwic was put in the charge of a guard and led away, sobbing, across Baynard’s Castle yard. Another man whose life now lay in ruins. Some men lifting bolts of silk from a cart turned to look at the weeping prisoner being taken away under guard.

‘Well,’ Lord Parr said quietly. ‘You have taken us far, Serjeant Shardlake. We have the whole story of the theft, the how and the who. But still not the why. And who has the damned manuscript now? And why are they keeping quiet about it?’

‘I do not know, my Lord. My young assistant is trying to trace the maker of that piece of torn sleeve he found near Greening’s print-shop, but for now there are no other leads. We need to catch Greening’s friends.’

He stirred the dust of the courtyard with his foot. ‘I will send Cecil a detailed description of Leeman; I’ll get it from Captain Mitchell. He can add it to those who are to be watched out for.’

‘They will likely try to leave under false names.’

‘Of course they will,’ he said impatiently. ‘But the customs house has the descriptions, and if any of them try to board a ship they will be arrested and held close till I can question them.’ He shook his head. ‘Though they may try to go via Bristol, or Ipswich.’

‘That leaves our enquiries in the Tower,’ I reflected. ‘It may be possible we could find that it was another radical who leaked the truth about Anne Askew. Possibly someone linked to the others.’

He nodded slowly. ‘I certainly smell some sort of radical conspiracy here. I wish I knew what it was about.’

‘Whatever it was, that original group has been attacked and blown apart.’ I looked at him. ‘By internal dissension, or perhaps it could even be that someone in the group was a spy, maybe for someone in the conservative camp.’

His eyes widened. ‘By God, you could be right. Secretary Paget has the main responsibility for employing spies to watch for internal dissension. But others could be doing the same, on their own account. Someone perhaps with a taste for plotting.’

He looked at me. ‘Who are you thinking of?’ I asked. ‘Sir Richard Rich?’

‘He has been assiduous in the heresy hunt.’

I paused, then said, ‘My Lord, I am worried about Greening’s neighbour, the printer Okedene.’

He inclined his head. ‘I think we have got all the information we can out of him.’

‘I was thinking of his safety. Two men have been killed already. I wondered if Okedene might also be at risk; whether our enemies, whoever they are, might try to stop his mouth for good.’

‘He has told us all he knows. He has no further use.’

‘All the same, much is owed to him. Could you not arrange some protection, perhaps a man to lodge in his house?’

‘Do you not understand?’ Lord Parr burst out. ‘I’ve already told you, I do not have the resources! I cannot help him!’ I did not answer, did not dare provoke him further, and he continued. ‘Now, the Tower is next.’

‘Yes, my Lord.’

‘Until he retired recently, the Queen’s Vice Chamberlain, my immediate junior in the Queen’s household, was Sir Edmund Walsingham. He has also been Constable of the Tower of London for twenty-five years.’

‘He combined both jobs?’ I asked in surprise.

‘Both are ceremonial rather than administrative roles. At the Tower the Constable, Sir Edmund, is a very old friend of mine; in fact he is almost as old as me.’ He smiled wryly. ‘Naturally he knows how everything works there. I have arranged to visit him tomorrow at eleven; I could not obtain an earlier appointment, though I tried.’ He looked at me. ‘Now, this is what we shall do. On the pretext that some information is needed for a legal case, we will see if you can get sight of the duty rosters that cover the period when Anne Askew was tortured. Between the twenty-eighth of June, when she was taken there, and the second of July when the rumours first began to fly around London. It will not be easy; I imagine the Tower authorities will be very reticent about what happened. My nephew William, Earl of Essex, tells me no investigation has been ordered by the Privy Council, which is strange. In any event, a good meal and good wine can loosen tongues between friends.’