Iris Collier: Day of Wrath

When he caught up with her, she’d tied Harry to a tree outside a small gate, and together they went into the first of the gardens. The wall which surrounded the garden had mellowed since he’d built it eight years ago, and today it was bright with valerian and the delicate white flowers of climbing bedstraw which grew profusely out of the crevices.

‘How beautiful,’ she said. ‘How perfectly beautiful.’

‘I suppose it is,’ he said, suddenly seeing the garden through her eyes. ‘I call it my “pleasance”. Mary designed it and I simply tell the gardeners to keep it as she would have liked it. They seem to have done just that.’

He saw the smoothly cut turf, sparkling with daisies and buttercups which the careful scything of his gardeners had not been able to eliminate, and the neatly trimmed hedges round the rectangular beds. In these beds every type of herb was growing in profusion, including great clumps of lavender whose shafts of purple were just about to burst into bloom. Sage bushes, with their delicate grey-green leaves creating their own back-drop for their purple flowers, scented the air. Thyme grew out of the sanded walks, and rosemary, mint, marjoram, birthwort, tall heads of fennel and dill, lovage and a mad riot of marigolds burst over the confines of their beds and made a jewelled carpet for them to walk on.

Dizzy with the mixture of intoxicating scents, brushing aside the swarms of butterflies, they walked across to the far wall where another door led into another garden. Nicholas opened it and beckoned Jane in. He watched her face light up in wonder, and he thought how happy he was at that moment. He pushed out of his mind affairs of state and the Sheriff’s sad investigation, and wanted only to look at Jane’s lovely face glowing with pleasure.

The second garden was part orchard, and part wild garden where the grass had been left uncut and ox-eyed daisies and scarlet poppies grew beneath the fruit trees now in full blossom. Honeysuckle hung over the surrounding walls, the lush apricot-coloured flowers filling the air with their sweet scent. Gently, Nicholas shook the low branch of a cherry tree and the delicate blossoms showered down on Jane, spattering her hair and dress with petals.

‘What a wonderful place,’ she said.

‘There’s more. Come with me through the next door.’

Reality receded. He forgot about Matthew, the Sheriff and a household waiting for his orders, and, feeling as if someone had waved a magic wand over them and they had become an enchanted couple in a mediaeval romance, he took Jane into the third and last garden. Here nature had been tamed and ordered. In the centre was a square of smoothly cut grass, and in the centre of this was a marble fountain shaped like a great fish arching out of the sea, with water spouting out of its mouth. The water trickled out of the basin and into a second pond where fish fled for shelter under the flat leaves of water lilies at their approach. Behind this was an arbour which contained a seat with vines trailing over it, which met in the centre with climbing roses and honeysuckle. There was another pond to the right of the arbour and standing in the centre of the pond was a marble statue of a woman carrying a water pot on her shoulder. Fronds of hair drifted over her delicate breasts, and her eyes were modestly lowered. Between the arbour and the end wall were rows of vines, now vigorously sprouting delicate green leaves.

‘There, Jane, do you like my gardens? They are my chief joy now that Mary’s gone. After all the horrors I’ve seen around me, the filth and the pestilence in the streets of London, the selfish greed of powerful men, the agony of Tyburn, I come here to wander round and relax in the scent and sight of so much beauty. And you, Jane Warrener, are the fairest flower of them all.’

She blushed, and dropped her eyes. Not wanting to embarrass her, he took her arm and led her back into the orchard garden. ‘You can come here, Jane, whenever you like. Help yourself to whatever herbs you require, and if I’m not here, find Giles and he’ll give you what you want. Mary always gathered herbs and dried them for winter use. She and I went to Italy, you know, and we bought that statue, and the fountain. Poor soul, she was never strong and she found the journey very tiring. Then she became pregnant and it was all too much for her. She wanted so much for us to enjoy these gardens, but I haven’t much time these days. We brought the water for the ponds and the fountain down from the spring and I love the sound of water. Paradise, according to the Arabs, is full of fountains and rivers, and I can go along with that. I want to do nothing else with my life but to tend these gardens and plan others like them. I wish to God that we lived in some other, less troubled times.’

‘My Lord … I mean Nicholas, you’ve made a paradise here, but you can’t escape from reality. Terrible things have happened. I’ve heard that your steward’s been murdered. Do you know who did it, and why? We all respected Matthew. Now you must turn your mind back to him. There’ll be a time for enjoying your gardens when we find out who murdered him and why.’

She was right, of course, thought Nicholas. He was as bad as the Prior. He was living in the past. Time to wake up. He had forgotten Matthew. He’d lost himself for a few moments in the beauty of a young woman and a garden in May.

‘I’m sorry, Jane. You’re right. This is no time for dreaming. No, I don’t know who murdered Matthew. And I ought to get back to see Landstock. We think at the moment that Matthew probably disturbed thieves and they decided to kill him rather than let him live and to witness against them.’

‘Thieves, you say? I don’t believe that. Matthew was murdered because he knew too much. He had to be silenced.’

Nicholas turned and looked at her in astonishment. There was a firmness in her voice that took him by surprise. She looked so demure standing there covered in cherry blossom, and yet she was expressing opinions about a murder with all the certainty of a criminal investigator.

‘Jane, what are you saying?’

Jane shrugged her shoulders and her eyes met his unwaveringly. ‘Only that Matthew was a frequent visitor to Mortimer Hall.’

‘So? You’re not suggesting that Sir Roger…?

‘No, not that. Matthew was courting Bess Knowles – Lady Mortimer’s personal maid. Bess and I are good friends. Now Bess said that she and Matthew were talking together in the parlour when in came some friends of Sir Roger’s. Bess and Matthew ducked down behind one of the big settees and heard things that they shouldn’t have. You know, political matters about Sir Thomas More and the King’s plan to close down the monasteries. Matthew was very upset when he heard this and I had to tell him to keep his opinions to himself. You see, he was very loyal to the King, hated the monks and wanted to see the Church reformed. Bess said he went to see Sir Roger and asked him, as a Member of Parliament, not to oppose the King’s legislation. I think it was then that Sir Roger decided to get rid of him in order to shut him up. As you know the Mortimers are very traditional, and don’t want any changes. The conspirators must have…’

‘Jane, for God’s sake, stop,’ said Nicholas thoroughly alarmed. ‘Don’t say another word. Thank God we’re out here in the garden where we can’t be overheard. Don’t ever mention the word conspiracy again. Think of Sir Thomas in the Tower, facing execution on Tower Green. And why? Because he opposed the King over the matter of the Royal Supremacy. If you say or do anything against the King’s wishes you run the risk of being arrested and I will have to sentence you to a terrible death up on Marchester Heath. And that would break my heart. Now, if what you say is true, and there is a conspiracy abroad in West Sussex, and Matthew got mixed up in it, then you must steer clear of it. We have a ruthless King on the throne, Jane, with a ruthless servant only too eager to carry out his wishes. Don’t ever say that word again. Don’t even think of it.’