C Sansom - Sovereign

‘I can imagine.’

‘And yet I fear for his health in there. Winter draws near.’

‘Perhaps he will be freed ere winter.’

She only sighed.

‘His friends,’ I asked. ‘They are all from Gray’s Inn?’

She looked at me sharply then. ‘Why do you ask?’

‘I wondered if he might know the nephew of a friend of mine. Another Gray’s Inn lawyer from the north.’ I told her of Giles’s determination to find his nephew, my offer to help.

She considered. ‘ ’Tis true the northern lawyers at Gray’s Inn tend to stick together. Most of them are traditionalists in religion.’

‘I believe this man is. Martin Dakin.’

‘I do not know the name.’

‘Have any other Gray’s Inn lawyers been arrested? There was suspicion of them in 1536.’

‘Not that I know of.’

‘That is reassuring. Thank you. What chambers did your fiancé practise in at Lincoln’s Inn?’

‘Not did, sir, does. He will be free. The name of his chambers is Garden Court.’

‘I am sorry. Thank you.’

She was silent a moment, then turned those large sorrowful eyes on me again. ‘Do you know what my Bernard is accused of?’

‘No, mistress.’

Her look was penetrating. ‘I thought you might have heard, since it is common gossip.’

‘No.’

‘Of knowing two Yorkshire gentlemen who were part of the conspiracy. But they were both old friends, of course he knew them.’

‘Did they say he was involved?’

‘No, though they were tortured. They are dead now, their remains were on the Fulford Gate till it was cleaned up for the King.’ She clenched her hands into tight little fists in her lap.

‘Then there is no evidence.’

She looked at me. ‘There was a letter that one of them sent to Bernard at Gray’s Inn, at the end of last year. They say it speaks of better times coming this year. But Bernard told me it meant only hope for a better harvest after last year’s drought.’

‘If that is all, it seems paltry.’

‘It takes little to condemn a man these days. Especially if he is fond of the old ways in religion. Oh, he is no papist, far from it, and I believe I was persuading him of the truth of Bible religion – so far as any woman can influence a man. But he was known as a traditionalist and that is enough to condemn him. If poison is whispered in the right ears.’ She looked at me, her eyes sharp and focused now.

‘Whose ears?’ I sensed she had wanted me to ask.

‘Bernard bought the land of a small dissolved abbey up here,’ she said. ‘It was next to his family lands.’ Her mouth set tight and hard again. ‘But a certain other family, whose lands it abuts on the other side, wanted it for themselves. It would suit their purposes if he were attainted for treason. So that his lands would go to the King, and could be bought cheap.’ She paused. ‘The family’s name is Maleverer.’

I remembered the look of hatred she had cast at him at King’s Manor when Tamasin was brought in for questioning.

‘By heaven,’ she said. ‘He is hungry for land.’

‘I know he is bidding for some of Robert Aske’s estates and – and I believe he also seeks a property in London.’

‘It is because he is a bastard.’ Jennet Marlin almost spat the word. ‘He believes if he can get enough land he can outrun it.’ She looked at me. ‘People will do any evil thing for money these days, there was never so much greed in the land.’

‘There I agree with you, mistress.’

‘But Maleverer will not win.’ She clenched her fists more tightly. ‘Bernard and I are destined to be together. It is meant.’ She spoke quietly. ‘People laugh at me, say I am determined to marry before I am too old -’

‘Mistress,’ I murmured, embarrassed at her frankness, but she continued.

‘They do not understand what there is between Bernard and me. He was my childhood friend. My parents died when I was small and I was brought up in his household. He was three years older, he was father and brother to me.’ She was silent a moment, then looked at me again. ‘Tell me, sir, do you believe two people can be destined to be together, that God may set their path before they are born?’

I shifted uncomfortably. Her words sounded as though they came from some flowery poem of courtly love. ‘I am not sure I do, mistress,’ I answered. ‘People fall in and out of love, or do not speak until it is too late. As I did once, to my sorrow.’

She looked at me, then shook her head. ‘You do not understand. Even when Bernard married another, I knew that was not the end. And then his wife died, and he proposed to me. So you see, it is as it was meant.’ She stared at me with a sudden fierceness that was unnerving. ‘I would do anything for him. Anything.’

‘I am sorry for your trouble,’ I said quietly.

She stood abruptly. ‘We should be going on.’ She looked over to where Tamasin was showing a bored-looking Barak some richly dyed cloth. ‘Tamasin,’ she called. ‘We should be on our way.’

Tamasin packed up the cloth, brushed some fallen leaves from her dress and walked across to us, Barak following. Mistress Marlin curtsied to me. ‘Good morning, sir.’ The women turned and walked out of the churchyard, the servant following. Barak shook his head.

‘By Jesu, Tammy can be a tease. She made me look at those damned cloths, told me all about what they were. She knew it bored me, but I was a captive audience.’

‘She’ll domesticate you if you’re not careful.’

‘Never,’ Barak said; emphatically, but with a smile. ‘Sorry to leave you with Mistress Marlin.’

‘Oh, it seems we are becoming friends.’

‘Rather you than me.’

‘She told me more about her fiancé. And I learned more about our good Sir William.’ I told him what she had said about Maleverer and about Bernard Locke. ‘Mistress Marlin seems to have given her whole life over to that man. Her heart and her soul.’

‘Is that not a creditable thing in a woman?’

‘What if something should happen to him? She would be quite undone.’

‘Maybe you could step into his shoes,’ Barak said with a grin.

I laughed. ‘I do not think anyone could do that. Besides, Mistress Marlin’s intensity would be hard to live with.’ I looked down the road the women had followed. ‘For her sake I hope they find nothing against Master Locke.’

THAT AFTERNOON we returned to the castle to deal with the last of the petitions. Aske’s bones had gone from the grass below the keep; there was nothing to show they had hung there save a thin red streak at the top of the tower. It looked like blood. Then I realized the chains must have rusted through.

I thought Giles uncharacteristically sharp with the petitioners, and I intervened a couple of times when he became impatient with some stumbling complainant. We finished around five, and Master Waters collected up his papers and bowed to us. ‘Well, gentlemen,’ he said. ‘I bid you well on your journey to Hull.’

‘Thank you,’ I replied. ‘Though Heaven alone knows when we get there.’

‘Yes, the King appears set for a long stay.’

Waters left the room, and I turned to Master Wrenne. He looked pale and tired, and when he stood up his big body stooped. He had brought his walking stick today and now he leaned on it heavily, in a way that reminded me for a moment, oddly, of the King.

‘Are you in pain, Giles?’ I asked.

He nodded. ‘Ay. Would tha walk home with me, give me your arm?’

‘Of course,’ I said, touched by the way he had slipped into the old Yorkshire usage. I helped him down the stairs and out to the street, Barak following on. Giles shivered in the cold wind.