The Cardinal's Court Read online

  ‘I have an affection for the Irish, you know,’ she said pleasantly. ‘My nephew, not the emperor, but his younger brother, the archduke, he loves the Irish. His ship went ashore at a place called Kinsale and he was very kindly treated. He was very taken by the young girls, there and their fine linen smocks.’ Her eyes twinkled a little and I smiled back. The traditional léine softened by much wear and washing would be very much more revealing than the stiff formality of the boned and corseted court clothing worn by the young ladies that the archduke would meet in Spain or in England. The queen must have a good relationship with her young nephew if he had confided this piece of information to her and I could see amusement in her eyes but then they sobered. ‘I’m sorry to hear that young James Butler’s name, or so I understand from one of my ladies-in-waiting, has been connected to this affair. And our good cardinal so wished him to be betrothed to Sir Thomas Boleyn’s younger daughter.’ She sighed heavily, fiddled for a moment with the silver spoons and forks laid out in front of her and then turned to me in a confidential manner, tilting her heavy, square-shaped hood towards me so that it made a barrier between us and the rest of the table. When she spoke then she slightly lowered her voice.

  ‘It is all so difficult when there is not a male heir,’ she said, and there was a note of sadness in her voice. ‘This affair of the Ormond inheritance, just two daughters, equal heirs of course. The eldest girl, Anne St Leger, was a lady-in-waiting to me at one time. She inherited her mother’s fortune many, many years ago, all the land in Devon. That is her son, Sir George St Leger,’ she nodded in the direction of St Leger whose bushy beard was now angled towards the ear of the king’s serjeant. ‘Margaret, I did not know so well. She married Sir Thomas Boleyn. I have his two daughters here in court with me: Mistress Mary Carey and, of course, Mistress Anne Boleyn who may, we hope, change her name to Butler.’

  ‘Mistress Anne Boleyn,’ I said with a certain amount of spite, ‘does not seem to want the match.’ I looked down the table. The young lady had initially been placed between the thirteen-year-old Earl of Derby, promoted to the cardinal’s chamber in the absence of James, and Thomas Arundel. She had, as I watched, instantly swapped places with her pliable sister and was now smiling up into the face of Harry Percy. Her very black eyes seemed to glitter in the candlelight and the boy was not eating, just gazing down into the flower-like face tilted up towards him. As I watched, I saw his hand go to the pulse in his throat and pull impatiently at the lace-edged neckline of his shirt as though he felt stifled. ‘She may, I suppose, wish for better,’ I said, watching the heir to the Earl of Northumberland bend his head to drop a kiss on the lady’s hand.

  ‘Nonsense,’ said the queen stoutly. ‘She will do as she is bid. This is a good match. My dear old chamberlain, the Earl of Ormond, God rest his soul, would be pleased to know that two branches of his family were to be united like this.’ She sipped meditatively at her white wine and I took a vigorous swallow, feeling, somewhat more hopeful than I had felt for hours. And the cardinal’s wine, as always, was superlative. A deliciously rounded white wine from Burgundy. I took a tiny sliver of salmon pie between my left finger and thumb, dropped it on top of the rysmole on my spoon and swallowed. Excellent. I turned to the queen.

  ‘A secret and unlawful killing is not something that James Butler would ever do,’ I said emphatically.

  ‘But why is he involved. Explain it to me.’ The queen had now turned her back on the cardinal and was giving me her full attention.

  ‘The man was killed with an arrow and the arrow was marked with James Butler’s initials.’ I looked at her carefully. She did not appear to be too shocked, so I added, ‘But he didn’t do it; I feel sure of that.’

  ‘But these arrows …’

  ‘Yes,’ I said hastily. ‘The arrows were toy arrows, would not kill a fly, but a real arrow was used in the killing of the instructor of the wards. James didn’t do it,’ I reiterated firmly.

  ‘And yet his name is on the arrow.’

  ‘Another reason why I know that he is innocent, Your Grace.’ Her whole attention was on me and I made the most of it while the cardinal chatted with the Duchess of Suffolk and her husband, Charles Brandon. ‘James is a clever boy, Your Grace,’ I said earnestly. The cardinal will tell you. Wise and discreet, that’s what the cardinal says about him. Why shoot a man in the middle of a crowd of people with an arrow marked with your own initials? Some one used that arrow on purpose. Someone wanted him to take the blame.’ I kept my voice low, but looked straight into her eyes. For a Spaniard she was very fair, with light-coloured eyes and her hair, though turning grey in streaks, was of a reddish brown shade.

  ‘And there is something else,’ I said emphatically. ‘I remember seeing in Ireland, a day after a battle, dead bodies with arrows in their hearts, lying around the fields, seeing bodies piled on carts and still the arrows remained even after the bodies lost their stiffness. But the body in the hall, Your Grace, apparently its arrow fell out almost immediately, although, according to reports, it was stiff as a board.’ I took a deep breath. ‘The physician here at Hampton Court is an old man and he has seen little or no violent death, Your Grace. It worries me. I’m finding it impossible to get permission to view the body.’ I had no wish to offend the cardinal who had been so kind and so hospitable to me, but this was an opportunity that I could not miss. ‘I was wondering whether …’

  She turned away from me for a moment, frowning slightly. One of the gentlemen ushers came forward and deftly refilled her silver cup with wine. She sipped it meditatively and then put it down and turned to the cardinal. ‘We talk of the death of your instructor of the wards. Has the body been examined by a doctor, Your Grace? Does he give a time of death?’ She listened politely to his reply and nodded many times. He spoke low and into her ear so I could not hear him. And then after a while she said in her authoritative tones. ‘I will ask my own doctor Dr Ramirez, to examine the body, if you wish for that, Your Grace. Only with your permission, of course. This, of course, is an affair of great importance and may cause a terrible scandal.’ She listened to his reply, her head nodding vigorously and then she turned back to me.

  ‘Well, that is settled. Now eat some of those shrimps. They are very good and you will need your energy. Later I will introduce Doctor Ramirez to you and you can talk over the affair with him. You will find him to be a most intelligent man. He is Spanish.’ She gave another one of her nods then as though she had said the last word about this doctor’s intelligence and discrimination. ‘We must find out the truth about this matter.’ She directed her glance down the room. Harry Percy and Mistress Anne Boleyn had both leaned towards the salmon-shaped pie, which was now, like ours, neatly cut into bite-sized portions. Her left hand and his met together mid-air. For a moment they stared at each, their fingers intertwined and then they released the grip. The boy was blushing. There was a three-tiered candlestick, filled with nine candles, quite close to him and his face and eyes glowed in their light. She, Anne Boleyn, was quite self-possessed. With dainty finger and thumb she picked out a morsel of salmon and without transferring it to her plate, or even to her right hand, she parted her lips and, still keeping her black eyes fixed on the boy’s face, she placed the piece of salmon within her mouth and then slowly and caressingly, she licked her thumb. A parting of cherry red lips, a flash of white teeth, and a glimpse of a pink tongue, all lit up by the tall candelabrum in front of her, and in a minute she had lowered her eyes again to her plate. I found myself thinking of the marriage contract that I had drafted so carefully, all the clauses that took care of the wife’s property and of the husband’s property, of each partner’s right to divorce. I might as well tear it up and throw it in the fire when I went back to my lodgings. There would be no marriage for Anne Boleyn with James Butler. A very much bigger fish had swum into the lady’s net. From beside me I heard a sharp click of the tongue as the queen gave vent to her opinion of her maid-in waiting’s conduct.

  ‘In our country, Y
our Grace, we have a legend that Finn McCool, a giant from ancient times, burned his thumb on the magical Salmon of Knowledge. For ever afterwards, when he wished to know anything, all he had to do was to suck his thumb.’ I made the remark in a neutral tone of voice and I kept a smile on my face. It would be important not to arouse any suspicion that James Butler had been pressurised or in despair in any way. After a minute, the queen giggled, an attractive sound and I began to think that I liked her much better than her mercurial husband.

  ‘My daughter Mary, she is six years old now, but when she was a baby she used to suck her thumb,’ she confided.

  ‘Well, there you are, Your Grace. The cardinal tells me that she is the wisest child in Christendom,’ I said lightly.

  ‘And you, you are a judge, a judge in Irish Law, is that not right.’ Queen Katherine was one of those women, just like my Aunt Saoirse, who always like to find out everything to be known about a man when she meets him.

  ‘That’s right, Your Grace. Whenever I get a chance. My father is a judge and both my uncles are judges, also. We are a legal family, the Mac Egan family. I qualified as a Brehon from the law school, but I haven’t found a position as Brehon to any great lord. My father is Brehon to Piers Rua Butler, James’s father, and I do work for him. Sometimes I do some teaching in our legal school, sometimes I work in a court as a lawyer, and occasionally as a judge, sometimes I go abroad as an envoy to the earl, as we call him. I have no settled position.’ I found myself pouring out all my troubles to her as though she were, indeed, my Aunt Saoirse. ‘And I am thirty years of age,’ I finished.

  ‘You will find a position,’ she said. ‘Why don’t you stay here and qualify as an English lawyer. You could attend lectures at Lincoln’s Inn, like our cherished Thomas More, so valued by the king. And there is our dear cardinal, here. He is involved in so many legal matters and he can do with good legal advisors. Ireland is, will be, of great importance. You could be an advisor to him. You would enjoy that, wouldn’t you?’

  ‘I would find that very interesting,’ I said cautiously. It was true. I enjoyed the society, the sharp wits here at Hampton Court. And the cardinal’s wine and food were both superlatively good. Kilkenny Castle had appalling food, and appalling wine until I had started to take a hand in the ordering of it and riding down to the port myself to make sure that we got the barrels that had been paid for. James’s mother, Margaret, was a woman who loved gardens, loved the outdoor life of horses and dogs, but she had no interest in food and each new cook seemed worse than the last. I enjoyed everything about Hampton Court. The new building work that the cardinal was undertaking was fascinating to me. I had been to Italy, to Spain, to France, and to Burgundy, had seen the wonderful rebirth of the old civilisations. The New Learning, they were calling it. The cardinal was rich enough to employ artists, paints, stonemasons and designers from Italy and from the Netherlands, rich enough to buy pictures and tapestries. This house of his at Hampton was going to be a palace to rival any king’s establishment. The queen’s suggestion that I should attend lectures in the Temple Inns in London was a good one. It probably would not take me long to pass the examinations – I had a very good memory, had been trained in the Irish law from the age of five years. Of course, I didn’t like the English system of justice, especially the savage punishments, but then I could fight on behalf of those wrongly accused and save them from a terrible death, perhaps, and also influence my colleagues into a contemplation of an older and more merciful law. In any case, I had enjoyed the position of an aigne – a defending lawyer, I mentally translated – more than that of a Brehon or judge. I imagined myself standing up in the Star Chamber at Westminster and making an impassioned speech on behalf of some poor person threatened with the axe or disembowelment. All London would come to listen to my speeches. I could perhaps make a real and vital difference in the law system of this country.

  And then the thought of Westminster reminded me of James and I turned back to the most powerful woman in England.

  ‘I’ve known James Butler since he was a small child and I have never known him to lie or to misuse his strength or his position,’ I said earnestly. ‘I do believe, Your Grace, that he is wrongly accused. And,’ I added, ‘the cardinal will tell you that James is wise and discreet. These were his very words, Your Grace. A wise and discreet man would not shoot down an enemy in public with an arrow marked with his own initials.’

  ‘Then you must find out who did this deed,’ she said briskly, almost as though she were sending me off to fetch something from her rooms. She turned back to the cardinal, speaking to him earnestly and in a voice too low for me to hear what she was saying. George, good fellow, was keeping Lady Willoughby happy by questioning her about her three-year-old daughter, who was, according to her proud mother, the most stubborn child in England. She had named her after the queen and I pondered for a while on her majesty, Catalina of Spain, now Katherine of England. The cardinal had said to me that all her ladies-in-waiting were devoted to the queen – that was, of course, the ladies-in-waiting that she had brought with her from Spain, and people like Margaret Pole, daughter of the Duke of Clarence, the present king’s great-uncle. And I looked down again at the pale oval of Mistress Anne Boleyn’s face. She was wearing a gown of red silk that shimmered in the candlelight and her dark hair was gathered loosely into a gold net and it perfectly framed the pale oval of her face. Perhaps attracted by my steady gaze, she glanced up towards the top table, the candlelight flashing a gleam from those very dark eyes. It was at the queen that she looked and there was none of the usual deference of a lady-in-waiting to be observed in her expression. Instead she wore a defiant look. As a child, Anne had been sent to the court of Margaret of Austria, whose motto was ‘Groigne qui groigne: Vive Bourgogne!’ This young lady might well have the motto: ‘Groigne qui groigne: Vive Boleyn!’

  The cardinal was on his feet now. A Latin grace. I wondered whether he believed in it any more than I did, but he made a splendid show, bowing his white head and his sonorous voice uttering the Latin words: ‘Agimus tibi gratias, omnipotens Deus, pro universis beneficiis tuis, qui vivis et regnas insæcula sæculorum,’ he prayed, energetically making an enormous, wide-armed sign of the cross over everyone and then leading the way to the bottom of the room where the sweet course of the meal was laid out. This was ‘the void’, an emptying of the room, an opportunity for the sewers to remove the dishes, and the leftovers, fold up the linen tablecloths, remove the trestle tables and leave the room ready for dancing or for music. I left Lady Willoughby chatting happily with Lady Mountjoy and made my way over towards Alice who was stowing some gingerbread away in a napkin.

  ‘For my little Lily. She does so love gingerbread,’ she said aloud and then as I exclaimed loudly and threatened to fetch the sergeant-at-arms to deal with this theft, she said very low: ‘He has been promised to be bailiff and keeper of the wood and park at Ewelme in Oxfordshire.’

  ‘Disgraceful!’ I said and gave her a smile. That was interesting news. St Leger was a hanger-on of the king’s best friend, Charles Brandon who held lands in Oxfordshire. This post would be a valuable position for the king’s serjeant, yielding a good income. No doubt more would have been promised. I left her and went in search of Master Gibson. He had a smug, self-satisfied expression to his face.

  ‘I wouldn’t eat any of those wafers, or that sugary, spiced wine, either, or else I will definitely beat you at our next game of tennis,’ I warned him in a good-humoured way.

  His eyes narrowed as he nibbled a caraway comfit and swallowed a draught of Hippocras. We had first played tennis in a doubles match with John and myself against him and young George Boleyn. Later we had sought each other out and the odds were even between us both so far.

  ‘And so our little bird has flown,’ he said. His tone was aggressive, but there was something else shown in his eyes as they rested on me, a certain satisfaction. He was glad that James had flown. It was an obvious sign of guilt and would save him from the trouble o
f proving his guilt.

  ‘Well, you know what boys of that age are like,’ I said lightly. ‘James was at Westminster attending on the cardinal last week. He made a friend there at the court. I understand that she is a pretty young lady.’

  His lips parted in a sneer. ‘And so he didn’t flee, is that right? He didn’t go to Westminster out of fear. He went to meet a young lady, that’s what you say, is it? Not because he was afraid of being arrested.’ He shot out the final words in a tone of vicious triumph.

  ‘I’m sure that he did not fly for any reason. I’m certain that he trusts to your justice,’ I said evenly. ‘You will, of course, be busy during the next few days taking evidence from all who were present, the cardinal’s servants, workmen, and women,’ I added, thinking about Susannah. ‘I suppose you and your clerk already have reams of paper piled up with witnesses’ accounts. What with the music in the background and the shouts and the laughter and fruit and comfits flying to and fro it must have been a most confusing scene.’

  That slightly disconcerted him. I could see from the eye that he turned on me that he was mentally going through the new legal handbook about dealing with a murder.

  ‘I think that I have a fair idea of what happened,’ he said cautiously.

  ‘Of course you are far too experienced a man to jump to conclusions before you have all of the evidence,’ I said affably.

  It was like one of our games of tennis. I had chipped a ball to his backhand, now he volleyed it back across the court.

  ‘A judge,’ he observed, ‘would assume that the flight of a suspect was an admission of guilt.’

  ‘Oh, did you inform him that he was a suspect? It was understood that James would only be interviewed in my presence.’ I sent the ball winging up to the penthouse roof and he responded awkwardly with an aggressive side sweep.