Heartstone

Queen Catherine Parr sat in the centre of the room, on a red velvet chair under a crimson cloth of state. Beside her a girl of about eleven knelt stroking a spaniel. She had a pale face and long auburn hair, and wore a green silken dress and a rope of pearls. I realized this was the Lady Elizabeth, the King's younger daughter, by Anne Boleyn. I knew the King had restored Elizabeth and her half-sister Mary, Catherine of Aragon's daughter, to the succession the year before, it was said at the Queen's urging. But their status as bastards remained; they were still ladies, not princesses. And though Mary, now in her twenties, was a major figure at court and second in line to the throne after young Prince Edward, Elizabeth, despised and rejected by her father, was hardly ever seen in public.

Warner and I bowed deeply. There was a pause, then the Queen said, 'Welcome, good gentlemen,' in her clear rich voice.

Before her marriage Catherine Parr had always been elegantly dressed, but now she was magnificent in a dress of silver and russet sewn with strands of gold. A gold brooch hung with pearls was pinned to her breast. Her face, attractive rather than pretty, was lightly powdered, her red-gold hair bound under a circular French hood. Her expression was kindly but watchful, her mouth severe but somehow conveying that in a moment it could break into a smile or laugh in the midst of all this magnificence. She looked at Warner.

'She is outside?' she asked.

'Yes, your majesty.'

'Go sit with her, I will call her in shortly. She is still nervous?'

'Very.'

'Then give her what comfort you can.' Warner bowed and left the room. I was aware of the girl studying me closely as she stroked the spaniel. The Queen looked across at her and smiled.

'Well, Elizabeth, this is Master Shardlake. Ask your question, then you must go to your archery lesson. Master Timothy will be waiting.' She turned back to me with an indulgent smile on her face. 'The Lady Elizabeth has a question about lawyers.'

I turned hesitantly to the girl. She was not pretty, her nose and chin too long. Her eyes were blue and piercing, as I remembered her father's. But, unlike Henry's, Elizabeth's eyes held no cruelty, only an intense, searching curiosity. A bold look for a child, but she was no ordinary child.

'Sir,' she said in a clear, grave voice, 'I know you for a lawyer, and that my dear mother believes you a good man.'

'Thank you.' So she called the Queen mother.

'Yet I have heard it said that lawyers are bad folk, with no morals, who will argue a wicked man's case as readily as a good one's. People say lawyers' houses are built on the heads of fools, and they use the tangles of the law as webs to ensnare the people. What say you, sir?'

The girl's serious expression showed she was not mocking me, she truly wished to hear my answer. I took a deep breath. 'My lady, I was taught it is a good thing for lawyers to be ready to argue the case of any client, indifferently. A lawyer's duty is to be impartial, so that every man, good or bad, may have his rights faithfully argued before the King's courts.'

'But lawyers must have consciences, sir, and know in their hearts whether the cause they argue be just or no.' Elizabeth spoke emphatically. 'If a man came to you and you saw he acted from malice and spite against the other party, wished merely to entangle him in the thorny embrace of the law, would you not act for him just the same, for a fee?'

'Master Shardlake acts mostly for the poor, Elizabeth,' the Queen said gently. 'In the Court of Requests.'

'But, Mother, surely a poor man may have a bad case as easily as a rich one?'

'It is true the law is tangled,' I said, 'perhaps indeed too complex for men's good. True also that some lawyers are greedy and care only for money. Yet a lawyer has a duty to seek out whatever is just and reasonable in a client's case, so he may argue it well. Thus he may indeed engage his conscience. And it is the judges who decide where justice lies. And justice is a great thing.'

Elizabeth gave me a sudden winning smile. 'I thank you for your answer, sir, and will think well on it. I asked only because I wish to learn.' She paused. 'Yet still I think justice is no easy thing to find.'

'There, my lady, I agree.'

The Queen touched her arm. 'And now you must go, or Master Timothy will be searching. And Serjeant Shardlake and I have business. Jane, will you accompany her?'

Elizabeth nodded and smiled at the Queen, looking for a moment like an ordinary little girl. I bowed deeply again. One of the maids came over and accompanied the child to the door. Elizabeth walked with slow, composed steps. The little dog made to follow her, but the Queen called to it to stay. The maid-in-waiting knocked on the door, it was opened, and they slipped through.

The Queen turned to me, then held out a slim ringed hand for me to kiss. 'You answered well,' she said, 'but perhaps you allowed your fellow lawyers too much latitude.'

'Yes. I am more cynical than that. But she is only a child, though a truly remarkable one. She converses better than many adults.'

The Queen laughed, a sudden display of white even teeth. 'She swears like a soldier when she is angry; I think Master Timothy encourages her. But yes, she is truly remarkable. Master Grindal, Prince Edward's tutor, is teaching her too and says she is the cleverest child he has ever taught. And she is as skilled at sporting pursuits as things of the mind. Already she follows the hunt and she is reading Master Ascham's new treatise on archery. Yet she is so sad sometimes, and so watchful. Sometimes frightened.' The Queen looked at the closed door with a pensive expression, and for a moment I saw the Catherine Parr I remembered: intense, afraid, desperate to do the right thing.

I said, 'The world is a dangerous and uncertain place, your majesty. One cannot be too watchful.'

'Yes.' A knowing smile. 'And you fear I would place you again amidst its worst dangers. I see it. But I would never break my promise, good Matthew. The case I have for you is nothing to do with politics.'

I bowed my head. 'You see through me. I do not know what to say.'

'Then say nothing. Tell me only how you fare.'

'Well enough.'

'Do you find any time to paint nowadays?'

I shook my head. 'I did a little last year, but just now—' I hesitated—'I have many demands on me.'

'I read worry in your face.' The gaze from the Queen's hazel eyes was as keen as Elizabeth's.

''Tis only the lines that come with age. Though not on yours, your majesty.'

'If you ever have troubles, you know I would help you all I can.'

'A small private matter only.'

'An affair of the heart, perhaps?'

I glanced over at the ladies at the window, realizing that all the while the Queen had kept her voice raised sufficiently for them to hear. No one would ever be able to report that Catherine Parr had had a privy conversation with a man the King disliked.

'No, your majesty,' I answered. 'Not that.'

She nodded, frowned thoughtfully for a moment, then asked, 'Matthew, have you any experience with the Court of Wards?'

I looked at her in surprise. 'No, your majesty.' The Court of Wards had been founded by the King a few years ago, to deal with the wealthy orphan children throughout the land who came under his control. There was no court more corrupt, nor one where justice was less likely to be found. It was also where any documents certifying Ellen's lunacy would be kept, for the King had legal charge of lunatics too.

'No matter. The case I would like you to take requires an honest man above all, and you know the sort of lawyers who make wards their speciality.' She leaned forward. 'Would you pursue a case there? For me? I wish you to take it, rather than Master Warner, because you have more experience in representing ordinary people.'