The White Rose

SUMMARY:
A bizarre series of murders inside the court of Henry VIII is the center of this dramatic and colorful mystery in the tradition of Ellis Peters. In 1517 the English armies have defeated and killed James IV of Scotland at Flodden, and James's widow queen. Margaret, sister to Henry VIII, has fled to England, leaving her children behind and her crown under a Council of Regency. Sir Roger Shallot, a bon vivant with the sharpest wits and fastest legs in Christendom, and his friend Benjamin Daunbey, nephew to Cardinal Wolsey, are ordered to restore her to her throne. They encounter a murder conspiracy and bloody intrigue on every side. Dr. Selkirk, a half-mad physician imprisoned in the Tower, has information they need, but he is found poisoned in a locked chamber, guarded by soldiers, the only clue a poem of riddles. Other gruesome murders soon follow: at a haunted manor house in England; in the dark recesses of the Tower. The assassin is unknown, but always leaves a white rose - the mark of Les Blancs Sangliers, the secret society that plots the overthrow of the Tudor Monarchy.

We went back to Selkirk's deserted chamber in Broad Arrow Tower . . . Benjamin began to study the walls carefully. Now and again he would find a place where the mortar had been chipped away. We poked and probed each of the crevices but found nothing except a trickle of sand or a few pebbles. I remembered how tall the dead man had been and, at my insistence, we both climbed on the desk and began to examine the holes and gaps high in the wall. After an hour we were successful. We found a gap between the bricks and Benjamin drew out a small, yellowing, twisted piece of parchment. . . Decades later I still recall the lines of that doggerel verse which contained so many secrets and was responsible for such bloody murder.

Three less than twelve should it be,

Or the King, no prince engendered he.

The lamb did rest

In the falcon's nest,

The Lion cried,

Even though it died.

The truth Now Stands,

In the Sacred Hands,

Of the place which owns

Dionysius'bones.

'Hell's teeth, Master!' I whispered. 'What does it mean?'

Also by Michael Clynes

The Poisoned Chalice
being the second journal of Sir Roger Shallot

The Grail Murders
being the third journal of Sir Roger Shallot

A Brood of Vipers
being the fourth journal of Sir Roger Shallot

The Gallows Murders
being the fifth journal of Sir Roger Shallot

The Relic Murders
being the sixth journal of Sir Roger Shallot

The White Rose Murders

HEADLINE

Copyright © 1991 Michael Clynes

The right of Michael Clynes to be identified as the Author of the Work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

First published in 1991 by HEADLINE BOOK PUBLISHING

First published in paperback in 1992 by HEADLINE BOOK PUBLISHING

10 9 8 7 6 5 4

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means without the prior written permission of the publisher, nor be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

All characters in this publication are fictitious and any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

ISBN 0 7472 3785 9

Printed and bound in Great
Britain by Clays Ltd, St Ives pl
c

HEADLINE BOOK PUBLISHING A division of Hodder Headline PLC 338 Euston Road London NW1 3BH

Foreword

In 1485 Richard III, the last Yorkist King, was killed at Bosworth by Henry Tudor. Twenty-four years later the Tudor's son, Henry VIII, began his reign: hailed as the 'golden boy', he promised to be a dazzling King but soon the dark clouds of conspiracy, treason and murder were visible. The bloodletting prophesied by seers and magicians was about to begin, and the world was now ready for Roger Shallot.

To My Father, Michael

Historical Personages Mentioned in this Text

Richard III
- The last Yorkist king, called the Usurper or Pretender. He was defeated by Henry Tudor at Market Bosworth in August 1485. He was the wearer of the White Rose, his personal emblem being
Le Blanc Sanglier -
the White Boar.

The Princes in the Tower -
Nephews of Richard III,
allegedly murdered by their uncle in 1484.

Henry Tudor
- The We
lshman. The victor of Bosworth,
founder of the Tudor dynasty and father of Henry VIII

and Margaret of Scotland. He died in 1509.

Henry VIII
- Bluff King
Hal or the Great Killer, he had
six wives and a string of mistresses. He is the Mouldwarp

or the Dark One as prophesied by Merlin.

Catherine of Aragon -
A Spanish princess, Henry VIII's
first wife and mother of Mary Tudor.

Anne Boleyn
- Daughter
of Sir Thomas Boleyn: 'A truly
wicked man'. Second wife of Henry VIII and mother of

Elizabeth Tudor.

Mary Boleyn
- Anne's sister, nicknamed the English Mare at the French court, she had so many lovers.

Bessie Blount —
One of the more dazzling of Henry VIII's mistresses.

Margaret Tudor
- Henry VIII's sister, married to King James IV of Scotland and later to Gavin Douglas, Earl of Angus: 'Trouble in petticoats'.

Mary Tudor
- Daughter of Catherine of Aragon and Henry VIII, nicknamed Bloody Mary because of her persecution of Protestants.

Elizabeth I
- Queen of England, daughter of Henry VIII and Anne Boleyn, nicknamed the Virgin Queen though Shallot claims to have had a son by her.

Catherine Howard
- Henry VIII's fourth wife. Executed for her extra-marital affairs.

Francis I, King of France
- Brilliant, dazzling and sex mad.

Will Shakespeare
- English playwright.

Ben Jonson
- English playwright.

Christopher Marlowe
- En
glish playwright and spy killed
in a tavern brawl.

Jamss IV of Scotland
- First husband of Margaret Tudor.

Suleiman the Magnificent
- Turkish Emperor.

Thomas Wolsey
- Son of an Ipswich butcher, he went to Oxford and embarked upon a brilliant career. He became Cardinal, Archbishop and First Minister of Henry VIII.

Mary, Queen of Scots
- Granddaughter of Margaret Tudor and mother of James I of England and Scotland.

Darnley
- Husband of Mary, Queen of Scots.

Bothwell
- Lover of Mary, Queen of Scots.

Thomas More
- Humanist, scholar. Minister of Henry VIII, later executed for opposing Henry's divorce from Catherine of Aragon.

Edward VI
- Son of Henry VIII and Jane Seymour, a sickly boy who died young.

The Earl of Surrey
- One of the Howard clan. He fought for Richard III, was pard
oned and proved to be Henry VIII’
s most capable general.

Prologue

Murder raps on my door every night. When the sky is dark and a hunter's moon hides behind the clouds, Murder sweeps up to this great manor house to kill my sleep and plunder my dreams with ghosts spat out by Hell and images of bloody and horrible death. Oh, yes, I hear them coming in the darkness outside as the wind rises to moan through the trees. I hear the clip-clop of spectral hooves on the pebble-strewn path in front of the manor door. I lie awake waiting for them and, at the first ghostly moon, I rise and stare through the mullioned glass at men and women from my past whose souls have long since slipped into the darkness of eternity.

They gather under my window like some ghastly chorus, grey shapes still displaying horrible wounds; the hideous faces of those I have worked with, played with, wenched with, dined with - as well as those I have killed. (May I say, always in fair fight.) The moon slips between the clouds and bathes their blue-white faces in a silver light. They stare up, black-mouthed and hollow-eyed, stridently baying at me, asking why I do not join them. I always smile and wave down at them so their howling increases. They slide through the walls and up the great, oak-panelled staircase along the wainscoted gallery and into my chamber to stand, an army of silent witnesses, around my bed. Hell has cast them out to bring me back. I just stare, each face a memory, a part of my life.

My chaplain, the vicar of the manor church, says I eat too much and drink too deeply of the rich claret but what does he know, the silly fart? I have seen them, he hasn't.

Doesn't he believe in demons, sorcerers, ghosts and ghouls? I do. I have lived too long a life with the bastards to reject them. A fool once told me about Murder, a little dwarf woman, who dressed in yellow buckram and burgundy-coloured shoes with silver buckles. She was the jester at Queen Mary's court. You know - pale-faced, red-haired Mary, who married Philip of Spain and thought he would give her a baby. Her belly grew big though no child was there. Poor, bloody Mary, who liked to put the Protestants in iron baskets and turn them to spluttering fat above roaring fires at Smithfield next to the meat shambles. Anyway, this jester, God knows I forget her name, she claimed the sky turned red at night because of the blood spilt upon the earth since the time of Cain, the first murderer. Another man, a holy vicar (a rare thing indeed!), once wondered whether the souls of murdered men and women hung for all eternity between heaven and earth. Do they, he wondered, float in some vast, endless, purple-coloured limbo, like the fireflies or will-o'-wisps do above the marshes and swamps down near the river?

Oh, yes, I often think of Murder as I he between my gold-embroidered, silken sheets with the warm, plump body of Fat Margot the laundress lying hot be
side me. She shares my bed to ke
ep the juices running though, of course, the vicar objects.

'You are past your ninetieth summer!' he wails. 'Turn to God, give up the lusts of the flesh!'

I notice his lips appear more thick and red whenever he drools on about the lusts of the flesh. (Have you ever observed that? Most of the snivel-nosed bastards can tell you more about the lusts of the flesh than I could.) Nevertheless, I keep my vicar in line. A good rap across the knuckles with my stick soon diverts his thoughts from the rich, creamy plumpness of Margot's tits. Moreover, I know the Bible as well as he.

'Haven't you read the Scriptures?' I bawl. 'Even the great King David had
a handmaid to sleep with him to
keep his body warm at night. And that was Jerusalem which is a damned sight warmer than bloody Surrey!'