The Chalice (31 page)

As they climbed the path up Tower Hill, I could see what a month in prison had wrought. The marquess, who came first, had lost much weight. He had not been permitted to wear a doublet, despite the cold. He was dressed only in dark hose tied with rope around his waist and a white chemise. His shirt was already drenched with rain, making it cling to his skin. Right behind him walked Baron Montagu, wearing a similar chemise shirt and hose. His face was so gaunt he seemed a spirit floating up the hill. As he came closer to me, I saw his chemise was torn in front, exposing a chest of gray hair. It was sickening to see them so attired.

A priest walked up the stairs of the scaffold first, followed by two sheriffs. The fourth man stomping up the stairs was
the executioner. I had never seen him who wields the scaffold ax before. He was burly, wearing all black, as well as a mask that fitted over his head except for two slots for eyes. Like the spawn of a fevered nightmare.

Now it was time for the two men to ascend.

Henry Courtenay mounted the stairs, slowly, as hundreds watched. Three steps from the top, he halted. Baron Montagu climbed quickly to follow. He tapped his friend on the elbow. Henry nodded and resumed his climb, though his hand shook on the railing when he reached the scaffold’s top.

I thank God and the Virgin that Gertrude is not here to see this.

Courtenay and Montagu handed the executioner their coins—for a man must pay to be killed on the block—and took their places at the front of the scaffold.

I sucked in quick shallow breaths. Snatches of prayer careened through my mind. I had tried to steel myself. Yet now that it was happening, I struggled to control the waves of fear and pain and sorrow.

Henry Courtenay, my cousin, stepped forward.

“See me, Henry,” I whispered. But his glassy gaze skipped over the crowd.

He coughed and then said, “Good Christian people, I come hither to die and by law I am condemned to the same. Pray for the king, your just and merciful sovereign lord. And trust in God, to whom I now commend my soul.”

No one ever declared innocence or spewed bitter words at the end—that was unthinkable, moments before meeting eternity. And I knew why Henry, in particular, would praise the king. He sought to protect Gertrude and Edward.

Henry Courtenay knelt and put his head on the block.

To my shame, my eyes closed. I was a wretched coward. Beads of sweat sprang out on my forehead.

There was a thud. The ax struck Henry’s neck so hard that the ground shivered below my feet.

“Jesu,” whispered the Earl of Surrey behind me. “Thank Christ it took only one swing,” his father responded.

I opened my eyes. The headless body of Henry Courtenay lay next to a blood-drenched block. The yeoman warders carried it to the back of the scaffold and lowered it into a long box. A second empty box stood next to it.

A man lifted a burlap sack to the edge of the scaffold and pulled the severed head into it. As the man turned around, cradling the sack, I saw it was Charles, the Courtenay steward.

I looked up at Baron Montagu. He did not weep nor tremble.

A sheriff said something to him, but he did not move.

Now it was his turn to die, and I understood everything. Henry was the kinder man, a better man if all were considered. But Montagu was stronger. I had no doubt that he had insisted Henry die first. To have to watch that butchery knowing you would follow—it called for a toughness that I doubted many men possessed.

Montagu finally stepped forward. His eyes roamed until he found Norfolk—and then me. We locked eyes and in that moment my breathing calmed; the sweat dried on my brow.

I knew my purpose.

I did not recite a psalm or mourning prayer for the dead. I opened my mouth and it was the Dominican daily blessing that emerged: “May God the Father bless us.”

Montagu nodded as if he could understand me.

“May God the Son heal us,” I said, louder.

Norfolk turned toward me, his hand was out, but I stepped forward quickly. I headed straight for the scaffold. The duke did not follow.

“May the Holy Spirit enlighten us and give us eyes to see with, ears to hear with, and hands to do the word of God,” I continued, my voice ringing out.

Men parted to make way for me as I drew closer to the blood-soaked
scaffold. “Feet to walk with, and a mouth to preach the words of salvation with,” I said. I knew they must have all been watching: Norfolk and his son, Cromwell and Wriothesley, Ambassador Chapuys, and the whole wretched court. I didn’t care.

I was just a few feet from him now; I tilted my head back as far as possible so I could look into the face of Baron Montagu.

“And the angel of peace to watch over us and lead us at last, by our Lord’s gift, to the Kingdom,” I said.

The blessing was finished.

Baron Montagu looked past me, at the crowd. The rain had stopped. A breeze stirred his hair.

“Long live the king,” Lord Montagu cried, so loudly it echoed across the hill.

The crowd waited. But there was no more.

Montagu whipped around and in one graceful move was on his knees. He laid his head on the block. His eyes found me again, and he said to me, as if no one else were at Tower Hill, “Joanna, look away.”

B
aron Montagu closed his eyes, but I did not close mine. The executioner lumbered forward. I could see his eyes through the hood—darting this way and that as he picked a spot. He planted his feet and lifted his ax high over his head. Its bloody edge glinted in the dull light. The ax crashed down in one sure arc.

What I saw next was seared into my soul forever.

Afterward, a stranger gathered Montagu’s severed head. Guards dragged the body to the back of the platform. The stair boards creaked as the sheriffs and the priest and the executioner all descended. Other men went up, to collect the boxes with the headless bodies. I knew that it was all happening around me, but it was at a distance. I felt like one of the gray gulls that banked and soared above the Tower of London.

Charles, the loyal Courtenay steward, nudged me. “Mistress Joanna?” he said. From the tone of his voice, it was apparent he repeated my name.

I could not speak.

“We’ll be burying them now. We’ve received permission from the sheriff. Do you wish to come?”

“What?” I said.

“The church back there”—he pointed in the direction of
the city—“All Hallows Barking. That’s where they will rest for a time.”

With all the effort I could summon, I nodded.

Surrey was the next person to speak to me. “Joanna, we need to—Christ, you’ve got blood on you.”

He drew me a few feet back from the scaffold and searched his doublet for a cloth. The young earl cleaned my face myself, his eyes full of pity. Behind him, men stared at me, in horrified fascination. Whispers encircled us; I heard someone say, “Stafford.” He ignored them, wiping the blood from me. If I had been able to feel anything, I would have regretted what I was about to do to Surrey.

“Let’s be off,” shouted the Duke of Norfolk from twenty feet away.

“No,” I said.

The duke approached with reluctance. I saw his eyes flick up at the scaffold. The boxes were being brought down the stairs, containing the headless bodies of Courtenay and Montagu.

Norfolk said to his son, “I go to court directly. The king must see me present. Take her back to Howard House, then join me.”

“No,” I repeated.

The duke said, “You’ll do what I say. Tomorrow my men take you to Stafford Castle.”

I reached for the Earl of Surrey’s slashed brocade sleeve. “I need to tell you something, my lord. It’s about your aunt, about Margaret Bulmer. You in particular must know this. There is a reason she went north. It has to do with your father.”

Norfolk lunged forward to drag me a short distance, waving off Surrey.

“Have you gone mad, bringing up her name now—and
here
?” he said, quivering with rage.

“Your son hates it when people whisper that you’re a procurer,”
I said. “How would he feel if I tell him you tried to force Margaret into the king’s bed, to become his mistress—that that is why she fled the court?”

The horror written large on his face must have been very much like what I exhibited when Gertrude Courtenay said the name of George Boleyn.

“Untrue,” he said.

My poor father told me Margaret’s secret, days before he died. But I would not speak his name to Norfolk now. Keeping my voice steady, I spun my falsehood.

“I had a letter from Margaret telling me of it,” I said. “I never showed it to anyone, I wished to protect her memory. But I will make its contents known if you do not leave me behind today.”

The Duke of Norfolk actually smiled at me—such a dangerous smile. The grief in his eyes over the executions that occurred moments before had turned to murderous rage.

“That was why the king commanded such a merciless death for Margaret,” I continued, forcing down my fear. “But none of it would have happened but for you. She’d never have gone north, become involved in the Pilgrimage of Grace, if it weren’t for you. You killed Margaret before she ever rebelled against the king. And I think your son—and your wife—should know that.”

Norfolk leaned over to say to me with utter clarity, “Do you not know whom you’re opposing?”

I looked at him, at the duke who led men to battle. He’d ordered the deaths of men and women—and, yes, even children.

I said, “To make me come with you, you’ll have to beat me and then drag me, Your Grace. But is it wise to draw attention to you when the high nobility of this kingdom is under suspicion? Montagu said it. You are the last.”

Norfolk’s lower lip shook. It took tremendous control for him not to kill me with his bare hands. Over his shoulder I could see his son watching us.

“I will never tell your son or any living soul the truth about Margaret—you have my word before God on that,” I said. “But only if you leave me here. I will attend the burials. And then I will go to Dartford. You will not see me again. I’ll have no further dealings with you again, nor with any of the noble houses or the court.” I paused. “But I will stop at Winchester House first and collect Brother Edmund. You must send word to the bishop he is to be released today.”

The Duke of Norfolk turned to look at his son and then back at me. He said, very quietly, more quietly than he had ever spoken to me before, “This is not over.”

With that, he left, snapping his fingers for his son and heir to follow. Surrey went with him. I always knew that he would.

I made my way through the thinning crowd to All Hallows Barking Church at the edge of Tower Hill. There were a dozen Courtenay servants there. A trio of men who’d served Baron Montagu had gathered as well. No relations or friends for either man attended, apart from myself. This was the place where traitors of esteem were first buried: Cardinal Fisher, Sir Thomas More. Sometimes, after his vengeful rage had cooled, the king would grant permission for families to inter their loved ones elsewhere. Sometimes he wouldn’t.

A melancholy priest said a few words over the two fresh graves.

I bade the mourners farewell and I left Tower Hill. At London Bridge, the hunchbacked man who offered help with transport, the one who took coin to betray me to Norfolk, did not notice me. I paid my pence and shuffled across the bridge, hewing to the side of the horses and wagons. The vigorous churn of the water below my feet sounded strange; the shouting and laughter of the other passengers was alien to me, too. There was no triumph over freeing myself of Norfolk. I felt a choking sadness that I must live in a world so dark and pitiless.

I never entered Winchester House. I planted myself outside
the courtyard, on the Southwark street that led to the Bishop’s Palace. I told the boy posted there my name and nothing else.

No one came out for a long time. The rain fell again, softer. I did not seek shelter from the sodden drizzle. Men who came to do business at Winchester House edged around my immovable body to enter.

Finally a priest walked halfway across the courtyard, his face stony. He looked me up and down and then turned to give a signal.

Brother Edmund appeared in the entranceway, under the stone arch carved with the letter
W
. He walked slowly across the cobblestone courtyard to the street. My dark haze lifted at the sight of Brother Edmund, though guilt clawed as well. I regretted pulling him into my troubles—but most of all I regretted shaming myself that night at Blackfriars.

“Sister Joanna,” he said when he reached me.

“Brother Edmund,” I said.

His face was pale with deep shadows under his eyes, but he appeared unharmed. As his eyes traveled down my dress, he winced. “Is it blood?” he asked.

I looked down. I had not noticed until now, but there were dark red splotches on the left side of my cloak.

“They died this morning,” I said.

He nodded, took my arm, and led me away.

“How is my freedom made possible?” he asked.

“I threatened the Duke of Norfolk that I would disclose something that he does not want disclosed if he did not release both of us,” I answered.

Brother Edmund stopped walking. “You
threatened
?” he asked, startled. And then, “What was it?”

“I can’t tell you.”

His voice lowered, he said, “It has nothing to do with the prophecies?”

“Of course not. I would never say a word.”

“I think you should take me into your confidence, so I am better prepared, Sister Joanna.”

“I can’t,” I answered. “I took a vow before God that I would tell no one.”

Brother Edmund nodded. “Ah, then, we shall speak of it no more.”

We resumed our walk. At the mouth of the street I saw a gang of ruffians pummeling a beggar.

“Bishop Gardiner questioned me himself,” said Brother Edmund. “I told him nothing, but I fear that he suspects that something deeper than a need for prayer led us to Blackfriars.”

My heart jerked faster. This was something I had not anticipated. The bishop was so cunning and knew Brother Edmund and me so well, he of all people had the ability to find out about the prophecies and my role in them.