Bring Up the Bodies (17 page)

They tie up at the king's landing stage. Chapuys says, ‘Your winters are so long. I wish I was still a young man in Italy.'

The snow is banked up on the quay, the fields are still blanketed. The ambassador received his education in Turin. You don't get this sort of wind there, shrieking around the towers like a soul in torment. ‘You forget the swamps and the bad air, don't you?' he says. ‘I'm like you, I only remember the sunshine.' He puts a hand under the ambassador's elbow to steer him on to dry land. Chapuys himself keeps a firm hold on his hat. Its tassels are damp and drooping, and the ambassador himself looks as if he might cry.

Harry Norris is the gentleman who greets them. ‘Ah, “gentle Norris”,' Chapuys whispers. ‘One could do worse.'

Norris is, as always, the pattern of courtesy. ‘We ran a few courses,' he says, in answer to enquiry. ‘His Majesty had the best of it. You will find him cheerful. Now we are getting dressed for the masque.'

He never sees Norris but he remembers Wolsey stumbling from his own home before the king's men, fleeing to a cold empty house at Esher: the cardinal kneeling in the mud and gibbering his thanks, because the king by way of Norris had sent him a token of goodwill. Wolsey was kneeling to thank God, but it looked as if he were kneeling to Norris. It doesn't matter how Norris oils around him now; he can never wipe that scene from his mind's eye.

 

Inside the palace, a roaring heat, stampeding feet; musicians toting their instruments, upper servants bawling brutish orders at lower. When the king comes out to greet them, it is with the French ambassador at his side. Chapuys is taken aback. An effusive greeting is
de rigueur
; kiss-kiss. How smoothly, easily, Chapuys has slipped back into his persona; with what a courteous flourish he makes his reverence to His Majesty. Such a practised diplomat can even cajole his stiff knee joints; not for the first time, Chapuys reminds him of a dancing master. The remarkable hat he holds by his side.

‘Merry Christmas, ambassador,' the king says. He adds hopefully, ‘The French have already made me great gifts.'

‘And the Emperor's gifts will be with Your Majesty at New Year,' Chapuys boasts. ‘You will find them even more magnificent.'

The French ambassador eyes him. ‘Merry Christmas, Cremuel. Not bowling today?'

‘Today I am at your disposal, Monsieur.'

‘I take my leave,' the Frenchman says. He looks sardonic; the king has already linked his arm with Chapuys's. ‘Majesty, may I assure you in parting that my master King François has knit his heart to yours?' His glance sweeps over Chapuys. ‘With the friendship of France, you may be assured you will reign unmolested, and need no longer fear Rome.'

‘Unmolested?' he says: he, Cromwell. ‘Well, ambassador, that's gracious of you.'

The Frenchman skims by him with a curt nod. Chapuys stiffens as French brocade grazes his own person; snatches his hat away, as if to save it from contamination. ‘Shall I hold that for you?' Norris whispers.

But Chapuys has fastened his attention on the king. ‘Katherine the queen…' he begins.

‘The Dowager Princess of Wales,' Henry says sternly. ‘Yes, I hear the old woman is off her food again. Is that what you're here about?'

Harry Norris whispers, ‘I have to dress up as a Moor. Will you excuse me, Mr Secretary?'

‘Gladly, in this case,' he says. Norris melts away. For the next ten minutes he has to stand and hear the king lying fluently. The French, he says, have made him great promises, all of which he believes. The Duke of Milan is dead, both Charles and Francis claim the duchy, and unless they can resolve it there will be war. Of course, he is always a friend to the Emperor, but the French have promised him towns, they have promised him castles, a seaport even, so in duty to the commonweal he must think seriously about a formal alliance. However, he knows the Emperor has it in his power to make offers as good, if not better…

‘I will not dissemble with you,' Henry tells Chapuys. ‘As an Englishman, I am always straight in my dealings. An Englishman never lies nor deceives, even for his own profit.'

‘It seems,' Chapuys snaps, ‘that you are too good to live. If you cannot mind your country's interests, I must mind them for you. They will not give you territory, whatever they say. May I remind you what poor friends the French have been to you these last months while you have not been able to feed your people? If it were not for the shipments of grain my master permits, your subjects would be corpses piled from here to the Scots border.'

Some exaggeration there. Lucky that Henry is in holiday humour. He likes feasts, pastimes, an hour in the lists, a masque in prospect; he likes even more the idea that his former wife is lying in the fens gasping her last. ‘Come, Chapuys,' he says. ‘We will have private conference in my chamber.' He draws the ambassador with him and, over his head, winks.

But Chapuys stops dead. The king must stop too. ‘Majesty, we can speak of this hereafter. My mission now brooks no delay. I beg for permission to ride where the…where Katherine is. And I implore you to allow her daughter to see her. It may be for the last time.'

‘Oh, I could not be moving the Lady Mary around without my council's advice. And I see no hope of convening them today. The roads, you know. As for you, how do you propose to travel? Have you wings?' The king chuckles. He reasserts his grip and bears the ambassador away. A door closes. He, Cromwell, stands glaring at it. What further lies will be told behind it? Chapuys will have to bargain his mother's bones away to match these great offers Henry claims he has from the French.

He thinks, what would the cardinal do? Wolsey used to say, ‘Never let me hear you claim, “You don't know what goes on behind closed doors.” Find out.'

So. He is going to think of some reason to follow them in there. But here is Norris blocking his path. In his Moorish drapery, his face blacked, he is playful, smiling, but still vigilant. Prime Christmas game: let's fuck about with Cromwell. He is about to spin away Norris by his silken shoulder, when a small dragon comes waggling along. ‘Who is in that dragon?' he asks.

Norris snorts. ‘Francis Weston.' He pushes back his woolly wig to reveal his noble forehead. ‘Said dragon is going to waggle waggle to the queen's apartments to beg for sweetmeats.'

He grins. ‘You sound bitter, Harry Norris.'

Why would he not? He's served his time at the queen's door. On her threshold.

Norris says, ‘She will play with him and pat his little rump. She's fond of puppy dogs.'

‘Did you find out who killed Purkoy?'

‘Don't say that,' the Moor beseeches. ‘It was an accident.'

At his elbow, causing him to turn, is William Brereton. ‘Where's that thrice-blasted dragon?' he enquires. ‘I'm supposed to get after it.'

Brereton is dressed as an antique huntsman, wearing the skin of one of his victims. ‘Is that real leopard skin, William? Where did you catch it, up in Chester?' He feels it critically. Brereton seems to be naked beneath it. ‘Is that proper?' he asks.

Brereton snarls, ‘It's the season of licence. If you were forced to impersonate an antique hunter, would you wear a jerkin?'

‘As long as the queen is not treated to the sight of your
attributi
.'

The Moor giggles. ‘He wouldn't be showing her anything she hasn't seen.'

He raises an eyebrow. ‘Has she?'

Norris blushes easily, for a Moor. ‘You know what I meant. Not William's. The king's.'

He holds up a hand. ‘Please take note, I am not the one who introduced this topic. By the way, the dragon went in that direction.'

He remembers last year, Brereton swaggering through Whitehall, whistling like a stable boy; breaking off to say to him, ‘I hear the king, when he does not like the papers you bring in to him, knocks you well about the pate.'

You'll be knocked, he had said to himself. Something in this man makes him feel he is a boy again, a sullen belligerent little ruffian fighting on the riverbank at Putney. He has heard it before, this rumour put about to demean him. Anyone who knows Henry knows it is impossible. He is the first gentleman of Europe, his courtesy unflawed. If he wants someone stricken, he employs a subject to do it; he would not sully his own hand. It is true they sometimes disagree. But if Henry were to touch him, he would walk away. There are princes in Europe who want him. They make him offers; he could have castles.

Now he watches Brereton, as he heads towards the queen's suite, bow slung over his furry shoulder. He turns to speak to Norris, but his voice is drowned out by a metallic clatter, a clash as of guardsmen: shouts of ‘Make way for my lord the Duke of Suffolk.'

The duke's upper body is still armed; perhaps he has been out there in the yard, jousting by himself. His large face is flushed, his beard – more impressive year on year – spreads over his breastplate. The valiant Moor steps forward to say, ‘His Majesty is in conference with –' but Brandon knocks him aside, as if he were on a crusade.

He, Cromwell, follows on the duke's heels. If he had a net, he would drop it over him. Brandon bangs once on the king's door with his fist, then throws it open before him. ‘Leave what you're doing, Majesty. You want to hear this, by God. You're quit of the old lady. She is on her deathbed. You will soon be a widower. Then you can get rid of the other one, and marry into France, by God, and lay your hands on Normandy as dowry…' He notices Chapuys. ‘Oh. Ambassador. Well, you can take yourself off. No use you staying for scraps. Go home and make your own Christmas, we don't want you here.'

Henry has turned white. ‘Think what you are saying.' He approaches Brandon as if he might knock him down; which, if he had a poleaxe, he could. ‘My wife is carrying a child. I am lawfully married.'

‘Oh.' Charles blows out his cheeks. ‘Yes, as far as that goes. But I thought you said –'

He, Cromwell, hurls himself towards the duke. Where in the name of Satan's sister did Charles get this notion? Marry into France? It must be the king's plan, as Brandon has none of his own. It looks as if Henry is carrying on two foreign policies: one he knows about and one he doesn't. He takes a grip on Brandon. He is a head shorter. He doesn't think he can move half a ton of idiot, still padded and partly armed. But it seems he can, he can move him fast, fast, and try to get him out of earshot of the ambassador, whose face is astonished. Only when he has propelled Brandon across the presence chamber does he stop and demand, ‘Suffolk, where do you get this from?'

‘Ah, we noble lords know more than you do. The king makes plain to us his real intentions. You think you know all his secrets, but you are mistaken, Cromwell.'

‘You heard what he said. Anne is carrying his child. You are mad if you think he will turn her out now.'

‘He's mad if he thinks it's his.'

‘What?' He pulls back from Brandon as if the breastplate were hot. ‘If you know anything against the queen's honour, you are bound as a subject to speak plainly.'

Brandon wrenches his arm away. ‘I spoke plain before and look where it got me. I told him about her and Wyatt, and he kicked me out of the court and back to the east country.'

‘Drag Wyatt into this, and I'll kick you to China.'

The duke's face is congested with rage. How has it come to this? Only weeks ago, Brandon was asking him to be godfather to the son he has with his new little wife. But now the duke snarls, ‘Get back to your abacus, Cromwell. You are only for fetching in money, when it comes to the affairs of nations you cannot deal, you are a common man of no status, and the king himself says so, you are not fit to talk to princes.'

Brandon's hand in his chest, shoving him back: once again, the duke is making for the king's person. It is Chapuys, frozen in dignity and sorrow, who imposes some order, stepping between the king and the heaving, boiling mass of the duke. ‘I take my leave, Majesty. As always I find you a most gracious prince. If I am in time, as I trust I shall be, my master will be consoled to have news of his aunt's final hours from the hand of his own envoy.'

‘I can do no less,' Henry says, sobered. ‘God speed.'

‘I ride at first light,' Chapuys tells him; rapidly, they walk away, through the morris men and the bobbing hobby horses, through a merman and his shoal, skirting round a castle that rumbles towards them, painted masonry on oiled wheels.

Outside on the quay Chapuys turns to him. Within his mind, oiled wheels must be revolving; what he has heard about the woman he calls the concubine, he will already be coding into dispatches. They cannot pretend between them that he did not hear; when Brandon bawls, trees fall in Germany. It would not be surprising if the ambassador were cawing in triumph: not at the thought of a French marriage, to be sure, but at the thought of Anne's eclipse.

But Chapuys keeps his countenance; he is very pale, very earnest. ‘Cremuel,' he says, ‘I note the duke's comments. About your person. About your position.' He clears his throat. ‘For what it is worth, I am myself a man of humble origins. Though not perhaps so low…'

He knows Chapuys's history. His people are petty lawyers, two generations away from the soil.

‘And again for what it is worth, I believe you are fit to deal. I would back you in any assemblage this side of Heaven. You are an eloquent and learned man. If I wanted an advocate to argue for my life, I would give you the brief.'

‘You dazzle me, Eustache.'

‘Go back to Henry. Move him that the princess might see her mother. A dying woman, what policy can it hurt, what interest…' One angry, dry sob breaks out of the poor man's throat. In a moment he recovers himself. He removes his hat, stares at it, as if he cannot think where he got it. ‘I do not think I should wear this hat,' he says. ‘It is more a Christmas hat, would you say? Still, I am loath to lose it, it is quite unique.'