C Sansom - Sovereign

‘Maister!’ The boy wrung his hands together. ‘Maister, I bain’t done nowt. For mercy.’

‘Stop whining!’ Maleverer raised a big fist. ‘Unless you want some more teeth out.’ The boy gulped and fell into a tremulous silence. ‘Now then, remember these gentlemen were talking to you yesterday, before I came?’

Green cast a fearful look at us. ‘Yes, sir.’

‘The lawyer said he saw you looking at a spot on the wall in Master Oldroyd’s bedroom. Today he went back and found a hole concealed in the wall, with’ – he pointed to the casket – ‘that inside.’ The boy’s gaze swivelled round to the casket, and paled with fear.

‘I see you recognize it,’ he said sharply. ‘Tell me what you know about it.’

Green gulped several times before he could speak. ‘Maister had visitors sometimes, that he would take to his bedroom to talk in secret. Once I – I – looked through the keyhole, out of curiosity – I know it was a wicked thing, t’devil made me do it. I saw them sitting on the bed, reading a whole lot of papers. I saw the hole in the wall, and the box. I heard one of them say these would be enough to do for the – the King…’

‘Did they say the King?’ Maleverer asked, catching the hesitation.

‘No, maister. They said – they said the old Mouldwarp.’ Green shrank back in fear, but Maleverer only nodded.

‘After that I were afeard, I didn’t want to hear no more, I went away.’

‘When was this?’

‘At the start of the year. January, there was snow on the ground.’

‘You should have come to the Council of the North, if you had heard words against the King,’ Maleverer said threateningly.

‘I – I were afeard, sir.’

Maleverer sat looking at Green for a long moment, then spoke quietly. ‘Now, boy, I want you to tell me who those men were. If you lie, you can expect a good taste of the thumbscrews and the rack in York gaol. Do you understand?’

Green had turned pale and started to tremble. ‘I – I’d never seen them before. They came many times, from the back end of last year till the conspiracy was discovered in the spring. They weren’t from the town, I’d have known them. They always came after dark, when business was done.’

‘Describe them.’

‘One was tall and fair and had a harelip.’

‘How old?’

‘Thirty-five or so, maister. He had a gentleman’s voice, sir, though he dressed poorly. T’was that I found strange, it made me curious.’

‘Hm. And the other?’

‘He was a gentleman too, though he had a strange accent, as though he’d lived in the south. He sounded a little like him.’ He pointed to me with a trembling finger.

‘What was he like?’

‘The same age, mayhap a bit older. He had brown hair and a thin face. I – I am sorry, maister, that is all I know, if I knew more I would tell you, I swear.’ And then he sank to his knees with a thud and wrung his hands together, raising them to Maleverer in supplication. ‘Oh, maister, have mercy, don’t send me to t’gaol, I can’t tell you more than I know.’

‘All right. I’m letting you go, but breathe a word of this and you’ll be in irons before you can turn round. Understand?’

‘Yes, maister. I-’

‘Guards!’ Maleverer called. The two soldiers entered. ‘Take this snivelling wretch and put him out of doors.’

‘Shall we give him clean clothes and a wash?’

‘Nay.’ Maleverer gave a bark of laughter. ‘Put him out on the road as he is, bare-arsed and shitty-legged. He can make his way through the town like that, it’ll be a lesson to him not to meddle with things he shouldn’t.’ They dragged the apprentice out. A minute later he appeared in the courtyard outside. We watched from the window, Maleverer grinning broadly, as he ran for the gate, trying at the same time to pull his shirt down to cover himself as people laughed at the sight. Maleverer turned to us.

‘I’ll have him followed and watched,’ he said. He took a deep breath. ‘The fair man that Green described was the clothier Thomas Tattershall. He was executed in June, damn it, he can’t tell us any more. Who the other man might be I have no idea. The conspirators were careful – they organized themselves in cells, each man knew only two or three others and only some elements of the conspiracy, not all. But this matter of those papers went right to the top.’ He gave me a sudden evil look. ‘To have found those papers, and then lost them. If you’d left matters alone I’d have got the information out of the boy, then had the box fetched.’

‘I am sorry, Sir William.’

He looked out of the window again. ‘It seems whoever killed Oldroyd attacked you, and would have killed you if Craike hadn’t appeared – unless it was Craike. But, if not Craike, who?’

‘Someone who wants those papers, whom Oldroyd perhaps refused to give them to.’ I hesitated. ‘Someone who has the run of King’s Manor. They got the keys to the chapterhouse from somewhere.’

Maleverer turned and looked at me, for the first time, without contempt. ‘Ay. A good point. That could all incriminate Craike.’ He began pacing up and down, his big feet in their heavy boots making the floorboards creak. ‘When I reported Oldroyd’s death to the Duke of Suffolk, and mentioned the name Blaybourne, all hell broke loose. I was ordered by the Privy Council itself to take over the investigation. And keep it secret. Who or what Blaybourne is I know not, except that there is some connection to the prisoner Broderick.’

‘Does Radwinter know anything?’

‘No. Only the Privy Council, and Cranmer in London. Better Oldroyd had not mentioned that name, Master Shardlake, he threw you into a hornets’ nest. When the Privy Council hear you have been responsible for losing those papers, you may hear sharp words from them, be warned.’ He shook his head, his jaw twitching as he clenched his teeth in anger and frustration.

‘We are sorry,’ I said again.

‘Pox on sorry. Sorry does not help.’ He came up to us and stood looking down at me, so I had to bend my neck painfully to meet his gaze. I caught the ripe stink of a man who has ridden hard. ‘Did you tell anyone the glazier’s words? Of his words about the King and Queen, of that name Blaybourne?’

‘No, sir.’

He went over and picked up the box, turning it over in his big hairy hands. ‘This is old, a hundred years at least. And very finely made, valuable. Odd thing to choose as a strongbox. He frowned thoughtfully. ‘Who could have known you were here with the box? Who saw you?’

‘A hundred people in the courtyard could have seen it. But people that we knew? Master Craike, of course, whom we asked for the key. Lady Rochford and her lady Mistress Marlin in the hall. They were with a bearded young man who laughed at some plaster I had on my coat.’

He grunted. ‘That’ll be Francis Dereham, Queen Catherine’s secretary. A young fool.’

‘Then there was the young guard at the gate, Sergeant Leacon. Master Wrenne, too, and his boy.’ I hesitated, for mention of Mistress Marlin had brought the girl Tamasin to mind.

‘What?’ Maleverer asked sharply. ‘What else?’

I looked at Barak, then took a deep breath. ‘There was something we discovered this morning, sir.’ I looked quickly at Barak again. ‘I think we must tell you. It involves one of the Queen’s servants, a Mistress Reedbourne.’ Barak set his lips as I told Maleverer what we had learned about the staged robbery.

‘We’ll resolve that one now,’ Maleverer said firmly. He opened the door and spoke to the guard. Barak gave me an accusing look. I could see he was wondering, as I was, whether Tamasin might be subjected to the same treatment Maleverer had meted out to Green. The fact she was a woman would mean nothing to Maleverer. ‘We mustn’t hold anything back from him now,’ I whispered intently. ‘Nothing. Don’t you see the danger we’re in?’