Lamentation

‘May now be the time to tell her you have it?’ Paget asked him, hesitantly.

‘No,’ the King answered sharply, the edge back in his voice. ‘In these days the more things I keep safe in my own hands the better.’ I realized he had kept the manuscript to himself because, until Bertano’s mission failed, there remained at least the possibility that he might still decide against the reformist faction. Then a Protestant Queen would be a liability, and the Lamentation could still be a weapon. He loved the Queen, yes, but ultimately, like everyone in the realm, she was only a pawn on his chessboard. He would have killed her if he thought he had to, little as he wished it. And it would, of course, all have been someone else’s fault.

He studied me again. ‘So, it was you that inclined the Queen to keep its loss a secret?’ A query in his voice now. I remembered Lord Parr telling me how suggestible the King was, how he believed what he wanted to believe, and also that to him disloyalty was the greatest of sins. Now, I was sure, he wanted to believe Queen Catherine had not taken the initiative in hiding the theft of the Lamentation from him. He would rather the blame fell on me, whom he despised and who, politically, counted for nothing at all. Perhaps he had already chosen me as a scapegoat, perhaps that was why he had told me so much. But after what had happened tonight, I no longer cared. ‘Yes, your majesty,’ I answered, perhaps signing my death warrant a second time.

He considered a moment, then he said petulantly, ‘But Kate still deceived me — ’

I took a deep breath. Somehow I was fluent again, fluent as at the climax of a court hearing. ‘No, your majesty. It was I who hunted for the Lamentation behind your back.’

With a struggle, the King managed to sit more upright in his chair. He was silent a moment, trying to decide just what the role of his wife had been in all this. Then he seemed to reach a conclusion. He leaned forward, eyes and mouth set mercilessly now. ‘You are an insolent, base-born, bent-backed common churl.’ He spoke the words quietly, but I could feel his rage. ‘Men like you are the curse of this land, daring to say they answer only to themselves on religion and the safety of the realm, when their loyalties are to me!’ His voice rose again. ‘Me, their King! I call it treason, treason!’ He looked at me in such a vengeful way that, involuntarily, I took half a step back.

‘Do not dare move unless I give you liberty!’ he snapped.

‘I am sorry, your majesty.’

Seeing my abject fear seemed to change his mood again. He turned to Paget and spoke scornfully. ‘How could I ever think such a poor reed of a creature could be any sort of threat to me, hey?’

‘I do not think he is,’ the Secretary answered quietly.

The King considered a moment. ‘You say one of the two men working for Shardlake is dead.’

‘By now, yes.’ Paget’s tone was completely indifferent.

‘And the other, that was brought here with him?’

‘Little more than a boy.’ Paget ventured a smile. ‘A tall young fellow, with red hair, as your majesty was in his youth, though I believe this churl is nothing like so well-looking.’

The King smiled at the flattery. And I realized that Paget was trying to soften the King’s anger, and I wondered why. There was a moment of silence as the King considered further, but then shook his head. ‘This man suborned the Queen to keep secrets from me. That is treason.’ He looked at me again, those little blue eyes buried in their wrinkles still hard and merciless. ‘And I would be rid of him, he is a pestilential nuisance.’

I bowed my head. I felt cold, my racing heart had slowed. Treason, I thought. I would be dragged to Tyburn at the tail of a horse, hanged until almost dead, cut down, and then the executioner would cut out my innards. And naked, I thought strangely, quite naked. Then finally I would be beheaded. I thought, can I face that, can I act with courage as some have? I doubted it. And when I was dead, would I go then to hell? Would I burn for lack of faith, as Philip Coleswyn would believe? I stood there, in the King’s study, quite still. The image of Barak, thrown on that rubbish heap, came to me again.

Beside me, Paget drew a deep breath. He spoke slowly. ‘Your majesty, a trial for treason before a jury would make the recent problems concerning the Queen public. And also the deaths of those Anabaptists. We do not want that getting out. Not at this time.’

‘He can be condemned by Parliament, through an Act of Attainder.’

‘That would make it all the more public.’

Henry waved a hand, as though this were a trifle, but I could see from his expression that he realized it was not. Paget took another deep breath, before pressing home his point. ‘Even if Shardlake were put quietly out of the way, it would become known, and some might see it as a move against the Protestant side. The new political balance is still very delicate. We do not want to upset it unnecessarily.’