C.J. Sansom: Revelation

'So people were saying at dinner last night. What do you think's going on, Jack?' Barak still had friends among those who worked on the more shady fringes of the King's court, those who frequented the taverns and alehouses and reported back on the state of public opinion. I had gained the impression that recently he had spent a lot of time drinking with these disreputable old friends.

He looked at me seriously again. 'The word is that now Scotland has been removed as a threat, the King wants to make an alliance with Spain and go to war against France. But to be acceptable to the Emperor Charles he'll have to be seen to be hard on heretics. They say he's going to try and get a law through this Parliament banning women and common folk from reading the Bible, and give Bishop Bonner encouragement to crack down on the London Bible-men. That's what they're saying at Whitehall, anyway. So I'd be careful in handling this one.'

'I see. Thank you.' This only made matters more delicate. I essayed a smile. 'The other thing they were gossiping about last night is that the King is after a new wife. Lady Latimer.'

'That's true as well, from what I'm told. But he's having trouble this time. The lady doesn't want him.'

'She has refused him?' I asked, surprised.

'So they say. Can't blame her. The King's got ulcers on both legs now, they have to carry him around Whitehall in a cart half the time. They say he gets fatter every month, and worse tempered. They say she is interested in someone else too.'

'Who?'

'That's not spoken of.' He hesitated. 'This Adam Kite looby might be better off if he stays in the Bedlam. So might you, rather than tangle with the Privy Council again.'

I sighed. 'I'm only acting as a lawyer.'

'You can't hide behind the law once these people get involved. You know that.' I could see Barak was as worried as I of going near some of the mighty enemies we had made in the past. The Duke of Norfolk and Richard Rich both sat on the Privy Council.

'It's ill luck they passed this to me instead of Herriott to deal with,' I said. 'But I've got it now, so I'll just have to handle it with care. I'll take tomorrow's papers through. Send the Kites in directly when they arrive.'

I went to my inner office and closed the door. Barak's words had unsettled me. I crossed to the mullioned window. The rain was coming down harder, splashing on the pane and distorting my view of Gatehouse Court. I shivered a little, for the sound of hard rain always brought back the terrible night eighteen months before, when for the first and only time I had killed a man. If I had not he would certainly have murdered me, yet even now his awful drowning gasps haunted me. I sighed deeply, ruefully recalling my good mood the evening before. Had my acknowledgement that I felt happy tempted a malign fate?

Bedlam, I thought. The very name brought fear and disgust in London. For a long time the Bethlehem Hospital had been the only hospital in London that treated the insane, and although mad folks were a common enough sight begging in the streets, and many people knew some friend or family member who had been touched by sickness of the mind, people avoided the mad. For not only were they feared as dangerous or even possessed, but they reminded folk that madness could strike anyone suddenly, and in a variety of terrible forms. That was why Roger feared the falling sickness so, for the fits that attended it were a fearful sight. The Bedlam, I knew, housed only severe cases of lunacy, some of them patients from rich families, others supported by charity. Occasionally, some like Adam Kite who were a nuisance to the powers that be were deposited there out of the way.

There was a knock on the door, and Barak ushered in a middle- aged couple. I was disconcerted to see that a third person accompanied them, a clergyman in a long cassock. He was tall and spare, with bushy eyebrows, thick, iron-grey hair and a red, choleric face. The middle-aged couple were dressed in sober black, and both looked deeply dejected; the woman close to tears. She was small and thin, birdlike; her husband tall and broad with a craggy face. He bowed, and his wife curtsied deeply. The cleric gave me a bold, appraising stare, not at all intimidated by being in Lincoln's Inn, or by the sight of me in my robe, in my office full of law books.

'I am Serjeant Shardlake. You must be Master and Mistress Kite.' I smiled at the nervous couple to put them at their ease, concentrating my attention on them. I knew from long experience that when clients are accompanied by a third party, the supporter is usually far more aggressive than the client. I guessed the clergyman was their vicar, and that he would be a problem.

'Daniel Kite, at your service,' the man said, bowing. 'This is my wife, Minnie.' The woman curtsied again, and smiled uncertainly. 'It is good of you to see us on a Sunday,' Daniel Kite added.

'Palm Sunday,' the clergyman said with distaste. 'At least if we are here, we do not have to see those papist ceremonies.' He gave me a challenging look. 'I am Samuel Meaphon. This afflicted family are of my congregation.'

'Please sit,' I said. They sat in a row on a bench, Meaphon in the middle. Minnie fiddled nervously with the folds of her dress. 'I have seen the papers the court forwarded,' I told them, 'but they tell only a bare story. I would like you to tell me what happened to your son, from the beginning.'

Daniel Kite cast a nervous look at Meaphon.

'I would prefer to hear it from you and your wife, sir,' I added quickly. 'No disrespect to the good reverend, but first-hand evidence is best.' Meaphon frowned slightly, but nodded for Master Kite to continue.

'Our son Adam was a good boy until six months ago,' the father began in a sad, heavy voice. 'A lively, strapping lad. Our blessing from the Lord, for we have no other children. I had him as apprentice in my workshop, out by Billingsgate.'

'You are a stonemason;'

'Master stonemason, sir.' Despite his distress, there was a note of pride in his voice. I looked at his hands: big, callused, a mass of little scars. 'I hoped Adam might follow me into the business. He was a hard worker; and a faithful attender at our church.'

'That he was.' Reverend Meaphon nodded emphatically. 'We are true Bible folk, sir.' A slight note of challenge crept into Kite's voice.

'However the sinful world may look on us,' Meaphon added, looking at me with fierce eyes under those bushy brows.

'Whatever you tell me of your beliefs will be held in confidence,' I said.

'You do not believe as we do, I see.' There was sorrow rather than anger in Daniel Kite's voice.

'It is not my beliefs that are at issue,' I replied with what I knew was a strained smile.

Meaphon's eyes swept over me. 'I see that God has seen fit to afflict you, sir. But he has done so only that you may turn to Him for succour.'

I felt myself flush with anger that this stranger should take it on himself to refer thus to my hunched back. Minnie Kite interrupted hastily. 'We only want you to help our poor boy, sir, to tell us if the law may help us.'

'Then tell me what happened, from the beginning, straight and simple.'

Minnie quailed at the sharp note in my voice. Her husband hesitated, then continued his story.

'I told you Adam was a fine boy. But about six months ago he started to become very quiet, withdrawn into himself, sad seeming. It worried us both. Then one day I had to leave him in the shop; I came back and found him crouched on his knees in a corner. He was praying, begging the Lord to forgive him for his sins. I said, "How now, Adam. God has ordained a time for prayer and a time for work." He obeyed me then, though I remember he rose to his feet with a great sigh like I'd never heard.'

'We've heard it often enough since,' Minnie added.