Court of Traitors (Bridget Manning #2) (17 page)

He jerked his head toward the archway and then shepherded Will through it, his hand firmly placed on the back of the young man’s neck. The door crashed shut behind them, and Bridget and Joanna both exhaled deeply and sank into chairs.

“My God
, Bridget, I have never been so fearful of anyone in my life as when I had to approach Lord Cromwell and tell him what was afoot. His expression . . . it turned, well, murderous. I almost fled, but I thought that Will may be in real peril, and you along with him, and Lord Cromwell would be the only man, under those circumstances, capable of saving you both. Did I make the right decision in bringing him here? I know you told me to, but I thought you were going to faint when you saw him looming up behind me.”

Bridget patted her hand in reassurance. “Do not fret, you did the right thing, and as you say, you were o
nly doing as I bid you to. Lord Cromwell says that the guard is back in command and now all we can do is wait and see what the outcome of this incident will be. What will the king do? A man has been killed; blood has been spilled in the confines of his palace. A very harsh reckoning must be in store for someone. I just hope that Will is not that someone.”

As events turned out, there was no recko
ning, at least not immediately. There was, in fact, a concerted effort to hush things up: the blood was cleaned away, the victims were speedily buried and, for the perpetrators, life continued on. It was a strange reaction to a strange event but perhaps the king, and Cromwell, thought it best to maintain the normal veneer of the court, at least for the present, because they had another, much more serious situation to grapple with. The declining state of the king’s health.

His leg grew worse and worse. It pained him constantly, and the doctors could offer no solution. The abscess that had caused him so many complications had closed over, and as a consequence the king’s body had filled up with evil humours that had no means of escape. It was said that his blood had become so infected that he had gone black in the face and could barely open his mouth wide enough to breathe. The confident expectation of all was that he would die.

Accordingly, the palace seethed with rumour and speculation. There was even a whisper, a very strong one, that His Majesty had in fact already died and the death was being covered up until the Lady Mary could be transported to court, under cover of darkness, to ascend the throne. The tale proved to be false, but for a couple of hours, the Seymours and their adherents scrambled to protect the inheritance of their heir, the seven-month-old Prince Edward, while the men of the White Rose kept close to each other and waited for their long anticipated moment.

Sir Richard was almost constantly in or about the king’s rooms, along with Will, and when they emerged from the inner sanctum their expressions were always grave. The doctors talked, hovered, paced up and down and shook their heads together in resignation. Bridget and Joanna were standing in the Watching Chamber, waiting for any news or to catch a glimpse of Sir Richard, when a group of physicians came out and walked past them, their voices low and melancholy.

“It is quite hopeless I am afraid
,” one doctor whispered to another. “His Majesty’s leg is poisoning his whole body. The infection spreads further and further every day, and no remedy we attempt seems to make any difference. All that the ones we have tried do is to make the king to scream with agony. I fear, unless the Lord heeds our prayers, that we will soon have a babe-in-arms as our king.”

Bridget and Joanna glanced at each other as the knot of sorrowing doctors passed them. The prospect of the king dying, with only an infant or a single woman to succeed him, was a sobering one. The accession of Prince Edward, as Will had said, would mean in practice the accession of another Edward—his uncle Seymour. What would that mean for the country? Lord Hertford was a reformer, not a traditionalist in his beliefs as the king was. Would that mean the eradication of every vestige of the old ways in England, not just the monasteries and nunneries, but every tenet of the faith? Further change away from Catholicism would invite a response from the conservatives, many of whom represented the remains of the Plantagenet dynasty, the White Rose faction, who had a better claim to the throne than any Tudor. Bridget thought back to the discussion at Austin Friars about the Exeters, the Lady Mary and Cardinal Pole. Marrying Pole to Mary would combine the forces of religious conservatism and dynastic right, and once that happened, it would be hard to see any other outcome than civil war. England had already been through a civil war in the not-so-distant past, a war which had been brought to a bloody end on Bosworth Field by the present king’s father. A return to it was a terrible fate to imagine.

Bridget was contemplating all these things when her husband came out into the chamber, walking just behind the Marquess of Exeter and Sir Edward Neville. Those two gentlemen were quite animated and seemed keen to engage Sir Richard in their conversation. He, however, was the picture of reluctance, probably because the same thoughts were revolving in his mind as in Bridget’s, but at the same time, he had to hedge his bets. These men were higher in rank and may soon occupy positions of influence. He therefore nodded meekly along with them without opening his mouth.

The marquess, who was a cordial man, saw Bridget standing there and acknowledged her presence. “Your husband comes, my lady,” he indicated over his shoulder. “He has been doing stalwart service these last few hours in the king’s sick room, but there is no way but one with His Majesty. Is that not right, Neville?”

“Oh, yes,” Sir Edward agreed with his usual breezy incautiousness. “God is readying himself to take the king to his bosom, and we shall all be ruled by my lord Hertford in the name of his bawling nephew. I am afraid we shall have to make ourselves as ridiculous at the court of the Seymours as we have been forced to do at the court of the Tudors.”

“But what of my lord of Exeter’s kinsman, Cardinal Pole? I am sure I remember you saying that he would come home, marry the Lady Mary and thereby secure the succession from the clutches of knaves and heretics.”

Bridget regarded her husband’s outburst with open astonishment
, and even Sir Edward Neville seemed blindsided by such a bold statement. It did not take him long to recover his equilibrium, though, and he confirmed Sir Richard’s words with a firm nod of his head.

“I would not like to speak too
loudly, or too far, of the cardinal’s intentions, but ’tis true that such a union would solve most of the problems that so bedevil the kingdom. The Church’s lands and position would be restored to it, and the monks and nuns could go about their proper business again instead of shamefully begging in the streets, as many have been reduced to do. And, as for those knaves, as you so rightly call them, who run the court and consider themselves so high and mighty . . . well, they would receive their just desserts.” He rubbed his hands together. “I can assure you of that. God almighty, when I think of what a fool I have made myself amongst them! What idiocy I have been constrained to participate in just to pass the time and to keep my place. I long for the hour when I can get my own back, especially on that shearman’s son—”

At last, the marquess intervened and quietened his companion. “Yes, we all hope to live to see a better world,” he remarked diplomatically, “but Prince Edward
is
the heir and the cardinal is a prince of the church and therefore cannot marry anyone, let alone the Lady Mary. Sir Richard,” he glanced at him, “I would counsel you not to pay too much attention to what Neville says. He has been abused and demeaned by the rogues and base-born scoundrels who surround the king too many times, as we all have, and it has caused a certain . . . resentment to fester in him and in us. ’Tis only natural that we should look forward to the day we may give them all a buffet, but we ought to,” he looked at Neville “choose our words very carefully. And our deeds.”

With
that, he put his arm around Sir Edward and hustled him out of the chamber.

“My lord
,” Bridget said sharply, “what made you say such a thing to Sir Edward? Everything that he has just uttered has been either treason, plain and simple, or perilously close to it. Why would you seek to place yourself, not to mention him, in such danger?”

“Wife, do you not recall our dinner at Austin Friars with Lord Cromwell? Do you not recall what he said about the scions of the White Rose, Exeter and Pole?” Bridget confirmed that she did. “Well, something happened after that discussion, once we were back at court. He asked me to find out more of their views which has proved an easy task. I have known them for some time, meaning they are prepared to speak fairly unguardedly to me, though it must be said that Sir Edward is prepared to tell anyone who will listen his true thoughts. For a nobleman, he is a born fool.”

Bridget was silent for a moment as she allowed her husband’s words to sink in. When she did speak, it was with a contemptuousness that Sir Richard shrank from. “I knew that you were frightened by the discussion at Austin Friars, but I did not imagine that would cause you to become one of Cromwell’s informers, another strand in his web of intrigue. You do realise that you may be helping him to place those two men upon a scaffold and do not,” she held up her hand to ward off Sir Richard’s objection, “trick yourself into believing that it is not Cromwell’s ultimate objective. Let me give you an absolute assurance that it is.”

  Bridget’s words hit home, and the flames of red hot guilt, flooded Sir Richard’s weathered features. But the stain of his embarrassment soon faded when Thomas Cromwell himself walked into the chamber. They exchanged a smile, and Sir Richard made to walk across to his new patron. As he did so, he dropped his voice and hissed to Bridget, “I realise it well, wife. And do you know my response? Better them than me, my dear. Better them than me.”

Chapter Twelve

Against all the odds, to the deli
ght of some and the chagrin of others, the king rallied. He fought his way back from the valley of the shadow of death and was up and about again by the end of May 1538, his troublesome leg much improved and hardly causing him any discomfort at all.

It was from that point that the presents started. Bridget and Joanna had returned to Thorns during the time of the king’s illness on the orders of Sir Richard. “If the worst does occur, if His Majesty does not survive, then I do not know what may happen after that. The likeliest scenario is that Lord Hertford will take over as regent, but equally there could be a move to place the Lady Mary on the throne. Either way, I want my family well clear of the maelstrom. Go back to Thorns and I will write to you when all is settled.”

In truth, neither Bridget nor Joanna, minded going home. It was nice to be away from the oppressively uncertain atmosphere of the court and back with the abbess and Sister Margaret again. The abbess’s mood had undergone a welcome change; she had shaken off the pall of depression that had enveloped her earlier in the year and she now presided over the Manor of Thorns as if it was a miniature version of the abbey. The house was in its best state of repair for many years and the gardens, once so overgrown and neglected, now swept down to the Thames in a smooth sea of emerald green. Even the small orchard located at the side of the house looked as if it had been ruthlessly organised and whipped into the shape. All the trees sported new leaves and their branches hung heavy with ripening fruit.

“Mother, you have wrought a small miracle here!” Bridget exclaimed, as t
he abbess proudly showed off all the improvements. “I barely recognise the place!”

The
abbess laughed and shrugged her shoulders in mock humility. “Well, I realised after the little affair of the letters, shall we call it, that you were right. The past is the past, and I must forge a new existence for myself. There is no going back. Breathing some new life into Thorns could be one way of going about that. It is still very much a work in progress, but I am pleased with what has been achieved so far. The house looks as though it has emerged from a long period of hibernation and I feel the same way. I think I can forge a proper role for myself here, not just in regards to the house, but also with the needy inhabitants of this part of the city. To that end, I have let it be known that there is bread and ale available, for the most indigent, just as we used to provide for the poor at Rivers. I must give Sister Margaret her share of the credit—the meals were her idea and she presides over the distribution of them all.”

The abbess went on to explain that all leftover food was now given to the poor, the food being doled out twice a week, primarily by Sister Margaret. She had taken up her sewing again and had even made some rough woollen cloaks for those who had nothing to keep out the harsh winter chill. Bridget was delighted that they both had found such a renewed purpose in life again, but she cringed inwardly at what Sir Richard’s reaction would be when he found out. He was quite likely to put a stop to his sister’s projects at once. Sir Richard was not the most charitable of men; he liked to keep a tight hold of every single penny. However, with any luck, he would not find out what the abbess was up to – he was hardly at home these days. If and when he did discover what was going on, it would not be from her. Relations between them, never very close, had cooled even further since he had thrown his lot in with Cromwell against Exeter and Neville. One side of her understood the cold necessity of it, but that did not mean she had to like it. Another advantage of being back at Thorns was that she could put some distance between herself, her husband and the machinations of the court.