C.J. Sansom - Heartstone

'Will the Queen be with them?' I asked.

'No women in the party, I'm told. Now sir, if you please I have to see to these rogues from the city.' Leacon took a long, deep breath, then reached out his hand. 'This is where we must part, Matthew.'

'Thank you, George. Thank you for everything.' There was a moment's silence, then I said, 'When this is over, come to London, stay with me a while.'

'I will. My good wishes to Jack.'

'Good luck, George.'

'And you.' I looked into his drawn face. He bowed, then turned and marched quickly away, leaving me with sadness in my heart. As I walked back to the inn, I forced my mind back to the information West had given me, what it meant and where it led.

BARAK LAY ON his bed, re-reading his letters from Tamasin. I pulled off my boots and sat on the side of my own bed, wondering how to tell him what I had decided.

'George Leacon sends his good wishes,' I told him. 'I have said farewell. The King will be in Portsmouth at nine tomorrow. He is going on the ships.'

'We must be gone before then,' Barak answered firmly.

'Yes, we must.'

'Did you get on the Mary Rose ?'

'Yes.'

'What's it like?'

'Extraordinary. Beautiful and terrifying.'

'You saw West?'

'Yes.' I rubbed my neck. 'He was angry with me, he grabbed at me.'

'I told you it was dangerous,' he said impatiently.

'There were people near. In fact the purser interrupted us and ordered me away before I found out all I needed.'

'Did you get the name of that friend of his?'

'I asked him straight out if the other man was Warner, but he denied it. He gave me a name I have never heard of. I fear he was making it up. Jack, I am sure West knows Ellen is in the Bedlam.'

'If the story of the letter was true, why keep the man's name secret now?'

'Perhaps because they raped Ellen together.'

He lay back on the bed. 'More imagining.'

'If only that purser hadn't interrupted us—'

'Well, you did what you could. Now let's get back to London.'

'Tomorrow I am going first to Portchester Castle. I have to see the Queen. And Warner. She is not accompanying the King, it is an ideal opportunity. I am going to find out if Warner was at Rolfswood that day.'

He sat up. 'No,' he said quietly. 'You are going to let this go and come back to London.'

'What if it was Warner that betrayed me to Rich? An agent of Rich's in the Queen's household!'

'Even if that's true, you know everyone at court spies on each other. And if it's not true, you could lose Warner's friendship and patronage.'

'I owe the Queen. If one of her trusted advisers is in Richard Rich's pay—'

'You don't owe the Queen,' he answered with slow intensity. ' She owes you . She always has: you saved her life, remember? I wish you had never let her drag you back anywhere near the court.' His voice rose. 'Go to Portchester? It's mad. What if Rich is there?'

'All the privy councillors are going to the tents. But the Queen is staying behind, so her household will be too.'

'What would you say to Warner anyway?'

'Ask some hard questions.'

'This isn't courage, you know. It's wilful, blinkered stubbornness.'

'You don't have to come.'

He looked at me and I saw he was utterly weary, tired beyond belief. He said quietly, 'That's what you said about coming back here today. But I came, just like I've come almost everywhere on this damned journey. You know why? Because I was ashamed, ashamed from the moment we met those soldiers on the road, of how I'd dodged their fate. But I'm not so ashamed I'll follow you into that lion's den. So there, that's it. If you go to Portchester Castle, this time you go alone.'

'I didn't know you felt—'

'No. I've just been useful to have around. Like poor Leacon.'

'That's not fair,' I said, stung.

'Isn't it? You used him twice to get you to West, though he has a company of soldiers to lead. But there are only so many favours a man can call in from anyone.' He turned away and lay back down.

I sat in silence. Outside two drunks were walking down the streets, shouting, 'King Harry's coming! The King's coming, to see off the Frenchies!'

BARAK AND I SPOKE LITTLE during the remainder of the evening, only discussing the practicalities of the morrow's journey with uncomfortable, restrained politeness. Now I fully understood how reluctant he had been to support me in each successive stage of what he increasingly saw as my folly: he seemed to have given up arguing with me, which disturbed me more than any harsh words. We went early to bed, but it was long before I slept.

We had asked the innkeeper to be sure and wake us at seven, but the wretched man forgot and did not call till past eight. Thus one of the most crowded and terrible days of my life began with Barak and I struggling hastily into our clothes, pulling on our boots, and hurrying breakfastless to the stables. When we rode out into Oyster Street it was already lined with soldiers, helmets and halberds brightly polished, waiting for the King. A sumptuous canopied barge was drawn up at the wharf, a dozen men resting at the oars. Out at sea the ships stood waiting, great streamers in Tudor green and white, perhaps eighty feet long, fluttering gently from the topmasts.

To save time we avoided the main streets, riding up a lane between the town fields to the gate. It was another beautiful summer morning, Saturday, the 18th of July. All around soldiers waited outside their tents in helmets and jacks and, occasionally, brigandynes, captains on horseback facing the road in burnished breastplates and plumed helmets that reminded me of that first muster in London near a month ago.

'Is the King coming this way?' Barak asked.

'I would think he'll go down the High Street. But they all have to be ready.'

'Shit!' he breathed. 'Look there!' He pointed to a bearded man standing to attention beside a mounted captain, halberd held rigid, frowning with solemn importance.

I stared. 'Goodryke!' Barak averted his head from the whiffler who had tried so hard to conscript him, and we rode swiftly past.

WHERE THE town streets converged at the gate there was a milling throng. Many were on horseback, merchants by their look. They were trying to get through, but soldiers were pressing them back. 'I've to fetch five cartloads of wheat in today,' a red-faced man was shouting. 'I have to get out on the road to meet them.'

'It's to be kept clear for the King. No one enters or leaves till he has passed through. He'll be here in a few minutes.'

'Damn!' I breathed. 'Come, let's get to the back of the crowd.' I tried to turn Oddleg round, but people were packed too closely together. 'He's coming!' A captain shouted from the gate. 'Everyone stay where they are!'

So we sat waiting. Looking down the High Street, I saw behind the soldiers facing the road hundreds of townsfolk, some holding up English flags. Brightly coloured wall hangings and carpets hung from the first-floor windows of the houses, and there were even people standing on the roofs. I looked behind me at the crowd and saw, at the back, Edward Priddis and his father on horseback. They stared at me, Edward stonily and Sir Quintin balefully. I turned away and looked up at the walkway atop the town walls, crowded with soldiers. I patted Oddleg, who, like many of the horses in the tense crowd, was nervous.

A soldier on the walls cupped his hands and shouted down, 'He comes!' I pulled my cap forward to hide my face as the soldiers cheered. There was a sound of tramping feet and a company of pikemen marched in through the gate. A group of courtiers followed, in furs and satins, Rich among them. Then the unmistakable figure of the King rode slowly in, his gigantic horse draped in a canopy of cloth of gold. He wore a fur-trimmed scarlet robe set with jewels that glinted in the sun, a black cap with white feathers on his head. When I had seen him four years before he had been big, but now his body was vast, legs like tree trunks in golden hose sticking out from the horse's side. Beside him rode Lord Lisle, stern as when I had seen him at the Godshouse, and a large man whom I recognized from York as the Duke of Suffolk; his beard now was long, forked and white; he had become an old man.