Dark Fire (31 page)

The steward led me up a broad flight of stairs to a room where bowls of hot water were set out on a table with a pile of towels. The bowls, I saw, were gold.

‘You will wash your hands, sir?’

‘Thank you.’

Three men were already standing washing; a young fellow with the Mercers’ Company badge on his silk doublet and an older man in a white clerical robe. The third man, who looked up with a
beaming smile on his broad face, was Gabriel Marchamount. ‘Ah, Shardlake,’ he said expansively, ‘I hope you have a sweet tooth. Lady Honor’s banquets positively drip with
sugar.’ Evidently he had decided to be affable tonight.

‘Not too sweet, I must watch my teeth.’

‘Like me you still have a full set.’ Marchamount shook his head. ‘I cannot abide this fashion for women to blacken their teeth deliberately so people will think they live off
nothing but fine sugar.’

‘I agree. It is not pretty.’

‘I have heard them say the pains in their mouth are worth it, if people respect them more.’ He laughed. ‘Women of Lady Honor’s class, though, women of real estate, would
disdain such effect.’ He dried his hands, replacing the showy emerald ring on his finger and patted his plump stomach. ‘Come then, let us go in.’ He took a napkin from a pile and
flung it over his shoulder; I followed his example and we went out to the banqueting chamber.

The long room had an old hammerbeam ceiling. The walls were covered with bright tapestries showing the story of the Crusades, the papal tiara carefully stitched out where the Bishop of Rome was
shown blessing the departing armies. Big tallow candles, set in silver candleholders, had been lit against the dark evening and filled the room with a yellow glow.

I glanced at the enormous table that dominated the room. The candlelight winked on gold and silver tableware and serving men scurried to and fro, placing dishes and glasses on the broad buffet
against one wall. As was the custom, I had brought my own dining knife, a silver one my father had given me. It would look a poor thing among these riches.

The salt cellar, a foot high and particularly ornate, was set at the very top of the table, opposite a high chair thick with cushions. That meant nearly all the guests would be below the salt
and therefore that a guest of the highest status was expected. I wondered if it might even be Cromwell.

Marchamount smiled and nodded round at the company. A dozen guests were standing talking, mostly older men, though there was a smattering of wives, some wearing heavy lead rouge to brighten
their cheeks. Mayor Hollyes himself was there, resplendent in his red robes of office. The other men mostly wore Mercers’ Company livery, though there were a couple of clerics. Everyone was
perspiring in the oppressive heat despite the open windows; the women in their wide farthingales looked especially uncomfortable.

A boy of about sixteen with long black hair and a thin, pale face, badly disfigured with a rash of spots such as boys sometimes have, was standing by himself in a corner, looking nervous.
‘That’s Henry Vaughan,’ Marchamount whispered. ‘Lady Honor’s nephew. Heir to the old Vaughan title and to their lands, such as they have left. She’s brought him
down from Lincolnshire to try and get him received at court.’

‘He looks ill at ease.’

‘Yes, he’s a poor fellow; hardly cut out for the rumbustuous company the king likes.’ He paused, then said with sudden feeling, ‘I wish I had an heir.’ I looked at
him in surprise. He smiled sadly. ‘My wife died in childbirth these five years past. We would have had a boy. When I began my petition to establish my family’s right to a coat of arms,
it was in hope my wife and I would have an heir.’

‘I am sorry for your loss.’ Somehow it never occurred to me to see Marchamount as a man who could be bereaved and vulnerable.

He nodded at the mourning ring in the shape of a skull I wore. ‘You too have known loss,’ he said.

‘Yes. In the plague of ’thirty-four.’ Yet I felt a fraud as I spoke, not just because Kate had announced her betrothal to another shortly before she died but because these last
two years I had thought of her less and less. I thought with sudden irritation I should stop wearing it.

‘Have you resolved that unpleasant matter we discussed earlier?’ Marchamount’s eyes were sharp, all sentiment gone.

‘I make progress. A strange thing happened in the course of my investigations.’ I told him of the books that had gone missing from the library.

‘You should tell the keeper.’

‘I may do.’

‘Will your investigation be – ah – hindered, without the books?’

‘Delayed a little only. There are other sources.’ I watched his face closely, but he only nodded solemnly. A serving man took up a horn and sounded a long note. The company fell
silent as Lady Honor entered the room. She wore a wide, high-bosomed farthingale in brightest green velvet and a red French hood with loops of pearls hanging from it. I was pleased to see she wore
no leaden rouge; her clear complexion had no need of it. But it was not to her that all eyes in the room turned; they fixed on the man who followed her, wearing a light scarlet robe edged with fur
despite the heat, and a thick gold chain. My heart sank – it was the Duke of Norfolk again. I bowed with everyone else as he strode to the head of the table and stood eyeing the company
haughtily. I wondered with a sinking heart whether he would remember I had been sitting next to Godfrey on Sunday; the last thing I wanted was to attract the notice of Cromwell’s greatest
enemy.

Lady Honor smiled and clapped her hands. ‘Ladies and gentlemen, please, take your places.’ To my surprise I was placed near the head of the table next to a plump middle-aged woman
wearing an old-fashioned box hood and a square-cut dress, a large ruby brooch glinting on her bosom. On her other side Marchamount sat just below the duke. Lady Honor guided the nervous-looking boy
to a chair next to Norfolk, who stared at him enquiringly.

‘Your grace,’ Lady Honor said, ‘may I present my cousin’s son, Henry Vaughan. I told you he was coming from the country.’

The duke clapped him on the shoulder, his manner suddenly friendly. ‘Welcome to London, boy,’ he said in his harsh voice. ‘It’s good to see the nobility sending their
pups to court, to take their rightful place. Your grandfather fought with my father at Bosworth, did you know that?’

The boy looked more nervous than ever. ‘Yes, your grace.’

The duke looked him up and down. ‘God’s teeth, you’re a skinny fellow, we’ll have to build you up.’

‘Thank you, your grace.’

Lady Honor guided Mayor Hollyes to a place next to the Vaughan boy, then sat herself almost opposite me. The boy’s eyes followed her anxiously.

‘Now,’ Lady Honor said to the company, ‘the wine and our first confection.’ She clapped her hands and the servants, who had been waiting still as stocks, bustled into
action. Wine was set before the guests, in delicate Venetian glasses finely engraved with coloured patterns. I turned mine over in my hands, admiring it, then the horn sounded again and a swan made
of white sugar, nestling in a huge platter of sweet custard, was brought in. The assembly clapped and the duke barked with laughter. ‘All the Thames swans belong to the king, Lady Honor! Had
you permission to take this one?’ Everyone laughed sycophantically and reached out with their knives to cut into the magnificent confection. Lady Honor sat composedly, yet her eyes followed
everything that went on in the room. I admired her skills as a hostess, wondering when I would get the chance to question her.

‘Are you a lawyer, like Serjeant Marchamount?’ the woman next to me asked.

‘I am. Master Matthew Shardlake, at your command.’

‘I am Lady Mirfyn,’ she replied grandly. ‘My husband is treasurer of the Mercers’ Guild this year.’

‘I do some business with the Guildhall, though I have not had the honour of meeting Sir Michael.’

‘They say at the guild, you have some other business now.’ She eyed me severely with little blue eyes that stood out sharply in her painted face. ‘The disgraceful business of
the Wentworth girl.’

‘I am defending her, yes.’

She went on staring at me. ‘Sir Edwin is devastated by what happened to his son. He deplores that his wicked niece should be allowed to delay justice. My husband and I know him
well,’ she added, as though that were the last possible word on the matter.

‘She is entitled to a defence.’ I noticed the duke had turned to Marchamount and was talking to him earnestly, ignoring the Vaughan boy, who sat staring down the table, quite at sea.
Thank God the duke had showed no sign of recognizing me.

‘She’s entitled to hang!’ Lady Mirfyn would not let go. ‘No wonder the City is crawling with impertinent masterless beggars when justice is seen to be evaded so! Edwin
doted
on that boy,’ she added fiercely.

‘I know it is hard on Sir Edwin and his daughters,’ I said mildly, hoping the woman would not go on like this all evening.

‘His daughters are good girls, but they cannot take the place of a son. He had laid all his hopes on the boy.’

‘But he has taught his girls to read scripture, has he not?’ I decided I might as well make the best of things: this opinionated woman knew the family, she might let something
interesting drop.

Lady Mirfyn shrugged. ‘Edwin has advanced ideas. I don’t think it serves girls to teach them religion – their husbands won’t like arguing ideas with them, will
they?’

‘Some might.’

She raised her eyebrows. ‘I never even learned to write, and I’m glad to be able to leave such things to my husband. I’m sure that’s what Sabine and Avice would prefer
too, good well-mannered girls that they are. Poor Ralph was a mischievous child, but that is to be expected in boys.’

‘Was he indeed?’ I asked.

‘They said his misbehaviour helped drive his mother to her early grave.’ She gave me a sharp look, suddenly realizing she had said too much. ‘That doesn’t excuse his vile
murder, though.’

‘No, indeed. It does not.’ I was going to add that I believed the real murderer could still be at large, but Lady Mirfyn took my words for agreement, nodded with satisfaction and
looked at Lady Honor.

‘Our hostess is a learned woman,’ she said with a note of disapproval. ‘But I suppose she has the status of a widow and may live independently if she chooses. It is not a fate
I would wish for.’

I heard a loud whisper from Norfolk to Marchamount. ‘I’ll not take the boy up unless she agrees.’ I lowered my head, trying to catch the serjeant’s reply, but he spoke
softly. ‘Damn it,’ the duke hissed, ‘she’ll do as I command.’

‘I fear she won’t.’ I heard Marchamount this time.

‘God’s death, I’ll not be defied by a woman. Tell her I’ll do nothing for the boy unless I get what I want. She’s skating on thin ice.’ I saw the duke take a
long swig from his glass, then stare at Lady Honor. He was red-faced now and I remembered it was said he was often drunk and could turn brutal then.

Lady Honor met his eyes. The duke smiled and raised his glass. She raised her glass in return, with a smile that looked nervous to me. A servant appeared by her side and whispered something. She
nodded and, looking relieved, stood up. ‘Ladies and gentlemen,’ she said. ‘Many of you have heard of the edible, yellow
things
from the New World that have been raising
eyebrows since they arrived last month.’ She paused, and there were guffaws of bawdy laughter from some of the men. ‘Well, we have some tonight on beds of marzipan. Ladies and
gentlemen, the sweetest fruit of the New World.’

She sat down and there was more laughter, and clapping, as the servants laid half a dozen silver trays on the table. There, on beds of marzipan, lay strange, pale yellow crescents. I understood
the bawdy laughter, for the things were the size and almost the shape of a big erect cock.

‘So this is what everyone is laughing about,’ Lady Mirfyn said. ‘Such naughtiness.’ She giggled, turning innocently girlish as rich matrons will when confronted with
bawdy humour.

I picked up one of the strange fruits and bit into it. It was unyielding, with a bitter taste. Then I saw people were peeling back the skins to reveal a pale yellow fruit within. I followed
their example. It was floury, rather tasteless.

‘What are these called?’ I asked Lady Mirfyn, who had also taken one.

‘They have no name I know of,’ she said. She looked down the laughing table, shaking her head indulgently. ‘Such naughtiness.’

I heard my name on Lady Honor’s lips and turned to find her smiling at me. ‘The mayor says you have a knotty case for the council, involving the suppressed monasteries,’ she
said.

‘Ay, Lady Honor. I fear we lost the first round, but we shall gain the second. It is a matter of the City’s rights to regulate these buildings for the good of all the
citizens.’

Mayor Hollyes nodded seriously. ‘I hope so, sir. People don’t understand that the regulations on cleanliness need to be enforced to keep away the foul humours that bring plague. And
so many houses are let out as poor tenements now.’ He spoke animatedly, as one who has mounted a hobby horse. ‘You heard about the house near the Joiners’ Hall that collapsed last
month? Killed fourteen tenants and four passers-by—’

‘Let them all fall!’ There was a shout from the head of the table and all eyes turned to the duke. He slurred his words and I saw that he was, indeed, drunk. His conversation with
Marchamount seemed to have put him in a foul temper. ‘The more houses fall on the diseased populace of this great cesspit the better. Perhaps that will scare some into going back to their
parishes where they belong, to work on the land as they did in our fathers’ time.’

A silence fell on the company, as deep as had fallen at the Lincoln’s Inn dinner. The Vaughan boy looked as though he wished to crawl under the table.

‘Well, we may all agree much needs amending,’ Lady Honor said. She tried to make her voice light, but it had a strained quality. ‘Did not Bishop Gardiner preach a sermon last
week, saying all must labour according to their station to keep the realm in proper order?’ As she quoted these anodyne words from the leading conservative bishop she looked round the table,
hoping for someone to help defuse the topic. She did not wish for controversy tonight, it seemed.