C Sansom: Sovereign

‘Sir, I must speak with you.’ He glanced at my clerk Skelly, who sat copying, his glasses glinting in the light from the window, then jerked his head towards my office. I nodded.

‘A messenger came while you were out,’ he said when the door was closed behind us. ‘From Lambeth Palace. Archbishop Cranmer himself wants to see you there at eight tonight.’

I sat down heavily. ‘I thought I was done with visits to great men.’ I looked at Barak sharply, for our assignment for Cromwell the year before had made us some powerful enemies. ‘Could it mean danger for us? Have you heard any gossip?’ I knew he still had contacts in the underside of the King’s court.

He shook his head. ‘Nothing since I was told we were safe.’

I sighed deeply. ‘Well then, I shall have to see.’

That day it was hard to keep my mind on my work. I left early, to go home for dinner. As I walked towards the gate I saw, coming in, a tall, thin figure in a fine silk robe, blond curls peeping out from under his cap. Stephen Bealknap. The most crooked and covetous lawyer I ever met. He bowed to me.

‘Brother Bealknap,’ I said politely, as the conventions of the inn demanded.

‘Brother Shardlake. I hear there is no date for the hearing of our case in Chancery. They are so slow.’ He shook his head, though I knew he welcomed the delay. The case involved a little dissolved friary he had bought near the Cripplegate. He had converted it into tumbledown tenements without proper sewage arrangements, causing great nuisance to his neighbours. The case turned on whether he was entitled to rely on the monastery’s exemption from City Council regulations. He was backed by Richard Rich, as Chancellor of the Court of Augmentations that handled the property of the dissolved monasteries, because if he lost the case, the sale value of those properties would fall.

‘The Six Clerks’ Office seems unable to explain the delays,’ I told Bealknap. I had sent Barak, who could be intimidating when he chose, to harangue them several times, but without result. ‘Perhaps your friend Richard Rich may know.’ I immediately wished I had not said that, for I was effectively accusing the Chancellor of Augmentations of corruption. The slip showed the strain I was under.

Bealknap shook his head. ‘You are a naughty fellow, Brother Shardlake, to allege such things. What would the Inn Treasurer say?’

I bit my lip. ‘I am sorry. I withdraw.’

Bealknap grinned broadly, showing nasty yellow teeth. ‘I forgive you, brother. When one has poor prospects in a case, sometimes the worry of it makes you forget what you say.’ He bowed and walked on. I looked after him, wishing I could have planted a foot in his bony arse.

AFTER DINNER I DONNED my lawyer’s robe and took a wherry across the river and down to Lambeth Palace. London was quiet, as it had been all summer, for the King and his court were in the north of England. In the spring news had come of a fresh rebellion nipped in the bud in Yorkshire, and the King had decided to take a great progress up to awe the northmen. They said he and his councillors had been sore alarmed. As well they might be; five years before the whole north of England had risen in rebellion against the religious changes and the Pilgrimage of Grace, as the rebel army had called itself, had raised thirty thousand men. The King had gulled them into disbanding with false promises, then raised an army to strike them down. But all feared the north might rise again.

Throughout June the King’s purveyors had roamed all London, clearing shops and warehouses of food and other supplies, for they said three thousand people would be going north. It was hard to comprehend such numbers, the population of a small town. When they left at the end of June it was said the carts stretched along the road for over a mile, and London had been strangely quiet all through that wet summer.

The boatman pulled past the Lollards’ Tower at the north end of Lambeth Palace and in the failing daylight I saw a light shining from the window of the prison atop the tower, where heretics in the Archbishop’s custody were held. Cranmer’s eye on London, some called it. We pulled up at the Great Stairs. A guard admitted me and led me across the courtyard to the Great Hall, where he left me alone.

I stood staring up at the magnificent hammerbeam roof. A black-robed clerk approached, soft footed. ‘The Archbishop will see you now,’ he said quietly. He led me into a warren of dim corridors, his footsteps pattering lightly on the rush matting.

I was taken to a small, low-ceilinged study. Thomas Cranmer sat behind a desk, reading papers by the light of a sconce of candles set beside him. A fire burned energetically in the grate. I bowed deeply before the great Archbishop who had renounced the Pope’s authority, married the King to Anne Boleyn, and been Thomas Cromwell’s friend and confederate in every reforming scheme. When Cromwell fell many had expected Cranmer to go to the block too, but he had survived, despite the halt to reform. Henry had placed him in charge in London while he was away. It was said the King trusted him as no other.

In a deep, quiet voice he bade me sit. I had only seen him at a distance before, preaching. He wore a white clerical robe with a fur stole but had cast off his cap, revealing a shock of greying black hair. I noticed the pallor of his broad, oval face, the lines around the full mouth, but above all his eyes. They were large, dark blue. As he studied me I read anxiety there, and conflict and passion.

‘So you are Matthew Shardlake,’ he said. He smiled pleasantly, seeking to put me at ease.

‘My lord Archbishop.’

I took a hard chair facing him. A large pectoral cross, solid silver, glinted on his chest.

‘How goes trade at Lincoln’s Inn?’ he asked.

I hesitated. ‘It has been better.’

‘Times are hard for those who worked for Earl Cromwell.’

‘Yes, my lord,’ I said cautiously.

‘I wish they would take his head from London Bridge. I see it each time I cross. What the gulls have left.’

‘It is a sad thing to see.’

‘I visited him, you know, in the Tower. I confessed him. He told me of that last matter he engaged you in.’

My eyes widened and I felt a chill despite the heat from the fire. So Cranmer knew about that.

‘I told the King about the Dark Fire quest. Some months ago.’ I caught my breath, but Cranmer smiled and raised a beringed hand. ‘I waited until his anger against Lord Cromwell over the Cleves marriage faded, and he’d begun to miss his counsel. Those responsible for what happened walk on eggshells now; though they denied they were behind it, they dissembled and lied.’

A chilling thought came to me. ‘My lord – does the King know of my involvement?’

He shook his head reassuringly. ‘Lord Cromwell asked me not to tell the King; he knew you had served him as well as you could, and that you preferred to stay a private man.’

So he had thought of me kindly at the end, that harsh great man facing a savage death. I felt sudden tears prick at the corners of my eyes.

‘He had many fine qualities, Master Shardlake, for all his hard measures. I told the King only that servants of Lord Cromwell’s had been involved. His Majesty left matters there, though he was angry with those who had deceived him. He told the Duke of Norfolk not long ago he wished he had Lord Cromwell back, said he’d been tricked into executing the greatest servant he ever had. As he was.’ Cranmer looked at me seriously. ‘Lord Cromwell said you were a man of rare discretion, good at keeping even the greatest matters secret.’

‘That is part of my trade.’

He smiled. ‘In that hotbed of gossip, the Inns of Court? No, the Earl said your discretion was of rare quality.’