The Tapestry (30 page)

“This is madness,” exploded Geoffrey. “We should be safely out of Brussels in a week at the latest, not a month. And while here, you must be discreet, not presenting yourself to the queen.”

“I don’t have a choice and you know it,” I said. “If I fail to appear at the palace, word will spread. The English ambassador will no doubt write to the king.
That
would be a disaster.”

I found them bittersweet, the three weeks leading up to my presentation to Queen Mary. I was frightened by the attack on the ship, and nervous about the journey to come, yet I also found myself dazzled by this city. The glittering brick buildings, meticulous gardens, vast cobbled squares—for the first time in my life, I felt a provincial person. London lacked such glamour. Brussels, smaller than Antwerp, possessed quite a different character from that city as well. The latter was a sprawling port, awhirl in the sights and sounds of the world, in particular the smells: the tart spices of the Indies mingling with the bitter odor of printer’s ink. Brussels was more insular, subtler, and capable of deeper pleasures.

My official duties as tapestry mistress came off better than might have been expected. When I arrived at the appointment with the head of the largest workshop, I braced myself for skepticism that a female had replaced Master Moinck. But the distinguished man seemed oblivious to my sex or my years of experience. He was keen to know just one thing—would King Henry VIII continue to be the leading purchaser of tapestries in all of Christendom? Once he’d ascertained that the answer was yes, I conducted my business without any prejudices or obstacles whatsoever.

I found the answer to a problem I’d thought unsolvable while touring the vast tapestry workshops, the heart of the industry in all of Christendom.

One of five men who lived in Brussels worked in the tapestry business, I was told. At the top of it were the ten most prestigious workshops, each employing at least fifty skilled weavers to produce elaborate tapestries for the courts of Henry VIII, King Francis, and the Emperor Charles. Rivals in Europe, the three rulers were willing,
if not eager, to lavish fortunes on the most luxurious tapestries.

I inspected the series of tapestries that King Henry craved:
The Triumph of the Gods
. Zeus was complete, two goddesses nearly so, and the one of Hercules a month from being finished. In the Hercules tapestry, a series of feats were depicted, from wresting with a lion to abducting a woman to balancing the entire planet on his shoulders. There were no mythological complexities to be deciphered. Each of the figures simply displayed godlike qualities in the most luxurious threads known to the world. I knew King Henry well enough to understand that this was exactly what he desired.

“
The Triumph of Venus
is our next challenge, and it shall greatly overshadow the one being completed in Paris,” announced the master of the workshop.

“So a separate tapestry is being woven, not part of this series, but of a goddess who could take her part in this grouping?” I said, my mind racing with a new possibility.

“Yes, to create a tapestry of Venus is the rage now. In the tiny workshop of Cologne, and in Paris, too, they are racing to complete an image of her. But none of those workshops can offer you the craftsmanship you will find here, Mademoiselle Stafford,” he sniffed.

I could not wait to tell Geoffrey my idea. “Remember how we couldn’t think of an explanation for Sir Andrew Windsor and King Henry of why I needed to leave Brussels for an extended period but was not returning to England? Now I have it. I shall say I must go to these other workshops to see the other images of Venus. Cologne is in the German lands. And then of course there is Paris, quite a distance from here. I will write to him that I fear his series won’t be complete unless he secures the best Venus as part of his
Triumph of the Gods
. It will account for the additional time out of England.”

Geoffrey had to admit that my idea had merit. He, on the other hand, was finding it impossible to form a travel plan to Salzburg. Everyone was quite adamant that it would be impossible for an Englishman and woman to ride through that long a stretch of the German lands without a guide and armed protectors, yet there were none
willing to be hired. The land was too hungry, too volatile.

We still had no idea how to accomplish our goal when I arrived at Coudenberg Palace, a sumptuous castle of the Hapsburgs.

Mary of Hungary was the sister of the Emperor Charles, and thus first cousin to the Lady Mary of England. After her young husband, the king of Hungary, was killed in battle, defending his country against the Turks, Mary became her brother’s representative in the Netherlands. The Hapsburgs’ domains around the world were so vast that one man could not govern them. The whole family must leap to it.

I suspected that this summons was issued because the Lady Mary wrote to her, suggesting it, and within the first five minutes of meeting the queen, I was proved right.

“I’m fond of my poor cousin—she’s had such a hard life with that horrendous man as a father,” said Queen Mary with a forthrightness I enjoyed. I detected little physical resemblance between the English princess and the Hungarian queen. My hostess could be judged a plain woman, with a protruding chin and sallow skin. But she spoke with incisiveness and radiated an energetic confidence that the Lady Mary sadly lacked.

“I am also kept well informed by Eustace Chapuys, one of my brother’s most erudite ambassadors,” said the queen. “As your mother was Spanish, I assume you are acquainted?”

Trying to keep my face as neutral as possible, I said, “Yes, Your Highness. I have that honor.”

“Chapuys has never understood, and nor have I, the English king’s refusal to settle on Mary as his heir—there are examples, in my own family, of strong female rule.”

None more so than yourself, I thought. Everyone admired the energetic rule of Queen Mary of Hungary.

She tilted her head, regarding me with those large brown eyes. “I find it interesting that Henry the Eighth entrusts you, a relation of his, with his tapestries. Perhaps this is the beginning of a new age, of women taking on responsibility. Were he alive, Cornelius Agrippa
himself would be proud. Don’t you agree?”

32

I
found it impossible to hide my astonishment over hearing that name from the lips of the queen.

Smiling, she said, “I see you have heard of Heinrich Cornelius Agrippa. Probably that he is an occultist, yes? Oh don’t believe that such nonsense is all he is capable of. Agrippa wrote a wonderful book called
The Declamation on the Nobility and Preeminence of the Female Sex
. He forwards the theory that we possess no less excellent faculties of mind, reason, and speech than men. I could have a volume sent to you. Yes, he’s a fascinating thinker, why else would Chapuys have been such a close friend?”

This was another jolt to absorb. I managed to say I had no idea that the ambassador esteemed the German so highly.

“Yes, I think Chapuys stood as godfather to one of Agrippa’s sons,” she mused.

At the conclusion of my audience, Queen Mary inquired on my planned date to return to England. When I told her I was considering a trip to Cologne and other tapestry workshops to inspect their work—following the story that Geoffrey and I had worked out—she was most startled.

“To travel by sea, yes, that I can understand, but over land, now, when the German and Flemish country is in misery?”

I did my best to insist that yes, this was my plan.

The queen said, “Well, I think I shall supply you with a ‘safe conduct,’ in case you should run into any difficulties.”

Queen Mary did not seem to actually request that such a document be prepared, but magically, after I curtsied to her and withdrew
from her chamber, a scroll was slipped into my hand bearing the seal of the Hapsburgs, the most prestigious family in the world.

Geoffrey turned it over in his hands when I showed him the document. He had news for me as well. He’d found a way out of Brussels. A party of merchants would leave in two days’ time in a string of three covered wagons, heavily guarded. It was the last such party scheduled to leave Brussels until next spring. The wagons would travel east until finding the Rhine and then follow it southeast for a long time, many days. Our destination was Regensburg, a city on an ancient north-to-south trade route. From there we would have to find new transport to Salzburg, which was not too much farther.

“It’s incredibly costly,” Geoffrey said. “I had to pay them all the money before we left and it came to half that John Cheke gave me for the entire enterprise.”

“Half?” I said, dismayed. “Why do they demand so much?”

“We will need to bring a lot of food with us. Then there are all the men. We shall have a small army surrounding us. And also, I had to pay more than anyone else.”

“Because we are English?”

“No,” said Geoffrey. “Because I am insisting on discretion, on extra lengths being taken to hide our names, in the recording book, in case anyone arrives to search for us. There’s another reason, too.” He hesitated as if trying to decide whether to tell me something and then said, shortly, “The man in charge, Jochen, believes you’re bad luck.”

Geoffrey looked away as my throat tightened. Was Jochen the only one who thought I brought bad luck?

It wasn’t until the day we left Brussels that Geoffrey explained. He would ride ahead on horseback, but I must ride in the wagon, with two old, stout merchants. Others filled in the next two wagons, a party of nine passengers in total. By day we’d ride as far as Jochen and his team instructed; at night we’d sleep on the ground or in the back of the wagon. Geoffrey hastened to emphasize that should I wish to sleep in the wagon, he would sleep outside it, even though we posed as a married couple. Geoffrey told me that within a few sec
onds of meeting Jochen, he knew that the safest guise for me would be as his wife.

Jochen, who rode a chestnut stallion, pulled up next to our wagon shortly before we set out. It was impossible to know how old he was; his face was scarred and lined but his hair, tied in a knot, was sleek and black as onyx. He said nothing to us; he glanced at Geoffrey and then scrutinized me. Whatever he saw made him shake his head, lips tight with anger, and kick his horse, to gallop to the front of the line.

Geoffrey said, “He thinks you’re bad luck because you used to be a novice in a priory.”

“How does he know so much about me?”

Geoffrey said, “After your appointments with the tapestry men, and your audience with the queen, half of Brussels knows details of you. I am certain he doesn’t believe we are married, but he declines to challenge me on it.”

After that unpleasant news sank in, I said, “Does he hate Catholics?”

“I wish it were that simple,” Geoffrey said. “Jochen was a mercenary in several Imperial armies, and I have a suspicion that he encountered nuns in the past.”

“Encountered?”

“Joanna, please, let’s leave it at that.” After a moment he said, much more gently, “I will protect you; no one will touch you, I swear it.” Although his statement was meant to reassure me, it stirred the first sensation of real fear on the journey.

As the wagons rumbled along the road leading into the countryside, the charm of Brussels fell away and misery took its place. It was the end of September, yet still very warm, like the peak of summer. But the grass was flat and brown, as it would look after emerging from a hard winter, and the trees stood bare, for the drought had already stripped all their leaves. They lay in dead piles below the bare branches. I saw no signs of harvesting crops. I did glimpse people, on the side of the road. They stood in clusters, watching our wagons and
surrounding soldiers pass through their devastated land. Geoffrey, I noticed one day, carried a sword on horseback. I said a fervent prayer for peace on our journey.

And I remembered again the words of the old boatman of the Thames, that spring night after the bishop’s banquet:
It will be a time of want and pestilence. The lady of the river told me
. Followed by John Cheke: “As above, so below.”

On the tenth day we reached our first German city, a small but prosperous one with churches and guild halls fashioned of dark red brick. I watched Jochen pay for our entry. This must be one of the reasons the trip was so costly. We took rooms in an empty inn, and I sat down to an extraordinary supper.

We’d survived on smoked meat, dried cod, and nuts, washed down with warm ale, and I could not complain of the monotony. So many others I glimpsed on the side of the road, faces gaunt and eyes hollow, were on the verge of starving.

But in this inn, an older woman set a cast-iron pan on my wooden table.
“Rheingauer Hühner,”
she said. Steam rose from the dish, prepared in the pan itself. Thin, delicate cakes embraced a dense mixture of chicken and pear slices, with honey, cinnamon, and another spice I wasn’t sure of. Anise?

“Thank you,” I said to the woman when she came to clear the pan, and she smiled.

The next morning, Geoffrey told me he’d gone to a bathhouse, a German custom, and then spent hours in a tavern, finding enough people who spoke French for interesting conversation. He was intrigued by the men’s views of England and enjoyed the friendly argument that ensued over our king’s faith, even laughed off their ridicule over Henry VIII’s five wives.

But a day later, back on the road, we suffered an attack. After staring at the brilliant stars through the branches of a desiccated oak, I fell asleep. I’d entered my first dream—I was hurrying to Vespers in the priory—when the peal of the bells summoning us to prayers became the screams of men.

“Wake up, Joanna, wake up,” Geoffrey shook me hard. “Get under the wagon.”

I crawled under our wagon and watched, in horror, as Jochen and the soldiers beat the men they’d found crawling into our camp to try to rob us. They were easily vanquished, but Jochen didn’t send them fleeing. The invaders were punched and kicked by our “protectors” as they cursed and even laughed.

After it was all over, Geoffrey stalked over to Jochen. I heard fresh shouting, and Geoffrey returned tense with anger.

He rustled around inside the wagon and then emerged, holding something: a knife.

“Joanna, keep it with you in the wagon and everywhere you go.”

I shook my head. “If there is another attack, surely Jochen and his men can defend us. It would take an army to defeat them.”

Geoffrey continued to press the weapon on me. “Keep it with you at all times.”

After staring at him for a moment, I said, “You think it’s Jochen I should be most afraid of.”

“He blames you for what happened.”

“How can that be?”

“It is ludicrous, yes. Bad luck? Almost no one in the city even saw you, you went straight to bed. If anyone should be blamed, it’s me, talking to a room full of men in a tavern. They all knew strangers were in their city.”

The wagon kept going, east and then south, and the mighty Rhine, forlorn from drought, sometimes flashed into view. We entered no more walled cities, both for fear of enticing thieves and because disease galloped through some of those cities. One day I saw dead animals on a field, with people standing in a circle around them, helpless. Holbein’s drunken wailing about the end of the world seemed more possible than I wanted to admit to myself.

I lost track of the number of days, but I knew we’d traveled several weeks by the thickness of Geoffrey’s beard, for he had not shaved since going to the city bathhouse. The air finally began to
cool, and we endured a few days of rain. The thirsty ground soaked in every drop. It was too late for the growing season; all the rain did was soften the roads, slowing our pace of travel. Geoffrey told me one evening that his chief worry was that by the time we reached Salzburg, it would be winter and we would be trapped there until the spring thaw. Our quest to find Edmund stretched out as endless, devouring our time, our money, our very future.

Although the nights grew colder, I still preferred to rest on the ground. It was difficult to sleep soundly, for I did nothing but sit in the wagon all day, conversing with no one. My fellow passengers understood French, but Geoffrey and I agreed that due to the threat that still hung over me, that even here, a hundred miles deep, I should tell no one anything, for someday, when we reached the large cities in the southern German lands, news of my whereabouts could travel. And so my mind was left to turn in on itself, worrying about Edmund and wondering who sent that man to kill me, and fearing for Catherine Howard and Thomas Culpepper and my other friends in faraway England, at the mercy of the king. What would King Henry do if I disappeared for more than a few months, the expected span of time to look at a few tapestry workshops? Time and again, my thoughts circled back to Arthur, too. I felt so far away from my little cousin; I longed to hug him. But when would I ever see him again?

Which is why one night, in a clearing of the forest of the prince elector Palatine, I was awake when the men came.

I jumped to my feet at the first scream, before Geoffrey, before any of the others. The fires had died. I could not see anything in the darkness except for human forms darting here and there—Jochen’s men, I assumed. But as I squinted in the moonlight, it seemed there were other men among them, with swords and knives. I was surrounded by shouts and curses, and the sound of steel hitting steel.

Geoffrey pushed me against a tree next to the wagon, and stood in front of me, a sword in his hand, as the fighting reached a pitch.

“What’s happening, Geoffrey?” I shouted.

“I don’t know,” he shouted back.

At that moment a man rushed toward Geoffrey, his own sword flashing. As they fought, I cried, “No, no, no, no, no.” I couldn’t bear this—it was impossible to live if Geoffrey should be killed.

I raised my knife in my right hand and sprang forward, to stand next to him, to do something.

Boom.
There was a deafening explosion, like thunder, followed by a second and a third. An acrid smell filled the air. I gasped from it, choking, as I realized that the men attacking us had backed away. Then they were running, calling to one another, melting into the forest. I couldn’t see Geoffrey in the smoky darkness.

“Geoffrey, where are you?” I screamed.

In seconds, he was beside me.

“Are you hurt, Joanna?”

“No,” I said, weeping as I clung to him. He was damp with sweat but he was standing, and he seemed uninjured. “I thought they would kill you,” I cried.

“Well, I’m not dead, I’m not even hurt,” he said, breathless, and wrapped both of his arms around me. Gratitude and a fierce joy charged through me, and I kissed him on the cheeks.

His beard scratched my cheeks, and suddenly his lips were against mine, and my mouth opened as I kissed him. Geoffrey’s hands ran up my back and in another instant his fingers tore through my hair, hanging loose over my shoulders. He pulled my hair so hard it hurt, but I welcomed the pain and pressed up against him even harder.

There was a flash of bright light and we sprang apart. Someone had lit torches.

Two men slowly approached us, a boy ahead of them holding a torch. The men held long sticks in their arms that whispers of smoke curled from. I had never seen them with my own eyes, but it seemed to me that these must be guns, and I had heard their firing. Which is how they frightened off the men who attacked us, even though there were so many of them. By the torchlight I saw men lying everywhere, dead or injured. One of them, I realized with a jolt, was Jochen. I saw bright blood on his chest. Jochen could be dying. Our wagon had
no leader. And we had no one who could speak for us. We’d have to represent ourselves.