The Poisoned Chalice (8 page)

'Master Shallot!' Agrippa repeated. 'I have asked you to leave!'

'Roger is my friend,' Benjamin answered. ‘I trust him with my life.'

' "Master Shallot is my friend!" ' Wolsey mimicked spitefully. 'My good nephew, if you wish to protect Master Shallot, the less he knows the better.' He looked round. 'This is my palace but the king is here and God knows who listens in!'

Benjamin looked at me, his dark eyes troubled. I gently prised my wrist free.

'Master,' I said softly, 'it's best if I go.'

(Quite the diplomat, you think? Oh, no, old Shallot was getting frightened. If knowledge was to be imparted that might threaten me, then it was time to show a clean pair of heels and, perhaps, indulge in some honest lechery.)

My master did not demur and I slipped quietly out of the chamber. I tried to eavesdrop but the door was too thick. So I wandered round the corridors of Hampton Court. Now this was not as magnificent then as it is today. The Great Hall had yet to be built, as had the tennis court and tilt yard. Of course, if you go there now, you can look at the great clock built by those two witches Kratzer and Oursian. You see, when Wolsey fell from power and died in Leicester Abbey, crushing my hand and whispering, 'If I had served my God as well as I served my king, he would not leave me to die like this,' Agrippa transferred his allegiance to Henry and brought those two witches over to build a special clock. It's an astronomical device based on a twenty-four-hour pattern which tells the time of day, the position of the moon, the constellations of the zodiac. You must go and see it. It's a work of art!

Nevertheless, even in my green and salad days (Master Shakespeare has asked to borrow this phrase), Hampton Court was a diamond of a residence. Wainscoted walls. New hangings replaced every week by yeomen and grooms of the wardrobe. Silk coverings on the beds. Massive cupboards which covered an entire wall, all stuffed with silver and gold plate. Fresh water was brought in through leaden pipes built by Italian craftsmen, there were even privies, and underground streams cleaned the sewers. I wandered down to the kitchens where Wolsey's chefs were busy creating subtleties, strange confectionery creations: towers and castles of sugar ready to launch their assault on valiant teeth. The French master chef, dressed in his long bespattered apron, stood by his post chopping, slicing, stirring and mixing with a vigour which drenched him in sweat whilst he swore at his apprentices for this or that. Indeed, with the great roaring fires it looked like hell and the chef, Satan, attended by an army of demons labouring over turning spits and shining platters, interlarding the dripping, roasting lambs and piglets with their own globules of sweat.

I walked up this way and down that. Now I knew the king was in residence because his gold and leopard standards had been planted all around the entrance. By chance, I found myself in the royal apartments, a long, polished gallery where the freshly waxed wood winked in the sunlight and the walls shimmered with the exquisite tapestries hung there. I thought the king was hunting with his greyhounds or Flemish falconers. There were no guards about so I tip-toed along the gallery. My ear was caught by the sweet sounds of love-making: delicious 'Oohs' and 'Ahs', interspersed with the grunts and deep groans of a voice I recognised as the king's.

Well, as you know, I am as curious as the devil. I edged along the wall and peered quickly through a half-open door. The small chamber inside was brilliant with differing hues. I saw white wool carpets on the gleaming floor and also glimpsed clothing of the costliest taffeta, lace and cambric, but my eyes were drawn to the great silk-draped four-poster bed. All I could see were a pair of white legs wrapped round a creaking great torso and the royal arse going up and down like a pair of bellows whilst the 'Oohs' and 'Ahs' were chorused by Henry's groans of lustful delight. I wondered who the young girl was, acting the doe for Henry's buck, but I decided not to wait and see and promptly fled. Nevertheless, my excitement was aroused and, when Benjamin left the cardinal's chamber, he glared at my flushed face suspiciously.

'What have you been up to, Roger?'

'Nothing, master, just a little sightseeing. And what did dear Uncle wish to impart?'

Benjamin grinned and linked his arm through mine. 'Matters of state, Roger, matters of state.' He stopped, his face long and serious. 'A dance is about to begin,' he murmured as if speaking to himself. 'The musicians in the gallery are about to put flute to lips and fingers to lyre.' He breathed out heavily. 'A sinister dance, Roger.'

I shivered and wondered if it was time for old Shallot to disappear or go ill with ague, but I remembered my promise. I was Benjamin's man and I was committed, whatever happened. It sounds so brave, doesn't it? If I'd known what was about to happen I would have fled like the wind. (My chaplain squirms on his little bum. He liked my description of royal love-making but that's nothing to what we had to face: murder; secret assassins; blood-thirsty rebels; the gleaming tusks of a wild boar; and that deadly chase in the maze at the Tour de Nesle. And yet these are as naught compared to the sheer wickedness of the Luciferi and the treachery of the masters we served.)

We spent the next day lolling round Hampton Court. Wolsey's clerks drew up the necessary letters of accreditation, warrants and bills for the exchequer. Grooms and ostlers furnished us with horses for our journey. That evening we attended a royal banquet in the magnificent setting of Wolsey's hall. There were so many wax candles you would think it was daylight and the flames dazzled the gold and silver plate stacked high in the ornately carved cupboards. The carpets on the floor were silk, the hangings on the walls fresh from the looms of Flanders, and the air was thick with the smell of red roses arranged in precious vases round the room. The table on the dais where King Henry would sit was overhung with a gorgeous cloth of state.

We sat at one of the two tables just beneath the dais. Benjamin, I remember, was on my left, some beautiful damsel on my right. I would have liked to have got to know her better but I drank too much. All the plate was of heavy gold and the table cloths were silken, perfumed sheets hung heavy with gold embroidery. The meal was delicious, the wines the best from all over Europe. There were eighteen courses, the most exotic being the confectionery. Artists had been hired especially to prepare these culinary masterpieces in the lifelike forms of birds, beasts and cattle, jousting courtiers in full armour, soldiers battling with cross-bows, knights dancing with ladies; all were vividly depicted in the gilded confections which rose over a yard high from the groaning dining tables. Each one of us was given a chess board complete with chess men made entirely of sweetmeats. This was a parting gift but I dropped mine and the bloody dogs were on it in a flash, whilst Benjamin, kind as ever, gave his to the page who served us. Sweet-voiced children from the royal choir sang madrigals and, halfway through the meal, we were escorted by torchlight to watch a Latin comedy by Platus. One thing I must mention to you. During the meal a great spider crawled on to the table cloth and I went to kill it with the leg of chicken I was gnawing, but Benjamin stopped me.

'We must not,' he whispered, 'harm such insects. They are the cardinal's spiders.'

He then explained in a hushed voice how these bloody insects roamed all over the place. God knows why but the cardinal had taken a liking to them and decreed that no one should harm them. They were known (and still are) as the cardinal's spiders. I always wondered if they were his demons or familiars which could scuttle along the walls to listen for treason and search out conspiracy. (A strange place, Hampton Court! You know it's haunted? First, by the nurse of the young Edward VI. She is said to be bricked up in her room, spinning her hand loom for all eternity.

She was a treacherous bitch who tried to kill the young king, but that's another story. The other ghost is Catherine Howard. After she had been arrested for playing the two-backed beast with Culpepper - and me, though I wasn't caught, but there again that's another tale - the king's guards came to take her whilst she was staying at Hampton Court. Catherine heard that Henry was praying in the royal chapel so ran screaming down the corridor. It didn't save her. She went to the block bravely, announcing to the world that she preferred to die the wife of Culpepper than Queen of England. That really infuriated Henry! Good Lord, he was hopping mad!

'Roger,' he whined, the tears falling down his fat, pasty face, 'how could she? How could she?'

Very well, I thought. She was marvellous but I didn't tell the fat bastard that. Anyway, as I have said, that's a tale for another time. But I have seen Catherine's ghost. A white form screaming down moonlit galleries.)

Ah, well, back to that banquet in Hampton Court where I got royally drunk. Henry was there, beginning to get a little fat but still magnificent in his jewel-encrusted cloth of gold and drenched in the perfume of his own making; he had to hide the smell of his ulcerated leg. All right, I'll tell you what happened. I was fascinated by the woman sitting opposite me: Francesca Clinton, Sir Robert's wife. She was a real beauty, or so I thought at the time. She wore her thick, black hair loose and long. It cascaded unbound below her waist. Her skin complemented her hair; she had an olive complexion which shone like burnished gold. Her lips were red, half-open as if waiting to be kissed, displaying teeth as white as ivory, though I noticed one tooth slightly out of line with the others. But like Agnes's, it was her eyes which fascinated me - large, dark, and almond-shaped. Whenever she turned, whenever she spoke, they exuded an excitement which had my young loins stirring. She hardly noticed me but I was fascinated by her. I listened to her voice, rather deep but very sensuous, and turned to Benjamin.

'Is she French?'

'Who?'

'Lady Francesca,' I whispered.

Benjamin stared across the table to where Sir Robert sat, captivated by his wife.

'Of course she is,' he whispered back. 'She is Sir Robert's second wife. They have been married for two years.'

I suddenly remembered that elegant pair of legs wrapped round the royal torso.

'What does the king think of her?' I asked.

'He does not like her,' Benjamin whispered back. 'He does not like the French.'

I nodded and gazed adoringly across the table at those dark, passionate eyes. Of course, I thought, she has olive skin. The legs I saw were white. Suddenly Francesca seemed to notice me. She smiled dazzlingly.

'Master Shallot,' she called in her beautiful French voice, 'my husband says you are to join us in France.'

I just stared back. I would have joined her in Tartary! Lord, when I first met her she was exquisite. I could have sat and stared all evening but Benjamin suddenly realised the drift of my eyes as well as my lechery and, at the appropriate time, seized me by the arm and hustled me from the hall. I went unresistingly. I was drunk as a pig and insisted on stamping on every bloody spider I found on my way back to our chamber.

Chapter 4

The next morning Benjamin shook me awake. I got up, thick-headed, with a cloying mouth. But a cold wash and a cup of malmsey soon put me right. After we had broken fast in the small buttery which adjoined the kitchen, Benjamin dragged me outside to the gardens.

'Where are we off to, master?'

'To see Crispin Hollis and Francis Twynham.'

'Who the hell are they?'

'They are the two messengers, the ones who carry documents to Paris.'

We found them in the stables, tending to the horses; country lads whose constant talk was of saddles, bridles, reins and spurs; what was good horseflesh and what wasn't; what horses should be fed and when they could drink. Benjamin, with his usual charm and tact, drew them into conversation, listening to their voluble descriptions of the horses they had ridden.

'So,' he interrupted, seizing the right moment, 'you carry messages from Westminster to the English embassy in Paris?'

Hollis, a fresh-faced yokel, grinned as he cleaned the gaps between his teeth with a piece of sharp straw.

'From Westminster,' he replied, 'Greenwich, Sheen . . . wherever the court is.' 'And what route do you take?'

‘Dover to Calais, across Normandy to the Porte St Denis, and either to the Rue des Medeans or across Paris through the Porte D'Orleans to the Chateau de Maubisson.'

'And you stop where?'

'At certain taverns.'

'Nowhere else?'

'Sometimes at the Convent of St Felice.' 'Why there?'

The fellow shrugged. 'You have met Sir Robert Clinton?' 'We have.'

'And his beautiful wife, Lady Francesca?' 'Of course.'

'Well,' Twynham interrupted with a grin, 'Lady Francesca was schooled there by the nuns. It's a sumptuous place. Now and again the Lady Francesca asks us to take the good nuns gifts of embroidery.'

'And that is all?'

'Sometimes a small purse of silver from the coffers of her husband.'

Benjamin nodded and stared where an ostler was trying to calm an excited horse.

'And your two companions, the ones in France? Do
they stop there?'
'Again, sometimes. It's an ideal place.'

'But you don't stop there every time?'

'No,' Hollis replied. 'I would say one in every three times.' He smirked. 'We do not wish to lose a good, soft bed because of our greed.'

'And the pouch you carry?' I asked. 'With the letters and documents?'

Twynham's face became grave with self-importance. 'When we sleep, one of us has it chained to our wrist. No one can touch that bag.'

'But two of your companions were killed?' Benjamin added softly.

Hollis turned and spat a stream of yellow phlegm. 'Yes, I know, but the French protect and afford us every comfort. Those messengers were killed by outlaws. It sometimes happens.' Benjamin nodded and quietly turned the conversation back to horseflesh. As we walked away I looked at him sideways. He had that distant look which showed he was absorbed in solving some problem.