Trestle tables stood everywhere in the yard, carpenters hewing and planing huge lengths of wood. A pile of perhaps fifty trunks of young oak was stacked against the abbey wall, and sawdust lay everywhere. Other workmen were carving ornamental cornices in complex designs, the colours bright in the dull afternoon.
Barak whistled. ‘God’s wounds. What are they planning here?’
‘Some spectacle the like of which I’ve never imagined.’
We stood a moment longer watching the extraordinary scene, then I touched Barak’s arm. ‘Come. We have to find the man in charge of the accommodation. Simon Craike.’ I smiled. ‘I knew him, a long time ago.’
Barak shifted the weight of the panniers on his shoulders. ‘Did you?’
‘He was a fellow student at Lincoln’s Inn. I haven’t seen him since, though. He never practised, he went into the royal administration.’
‘Why’d he do that? The pay?’
‘Ay. He had an uncle in royal service who got him a post.’
‘What’s he like?’
I smiled again. ‘You’ll see. I wonder if he’s changed.’
We led the horses over to the manor house, which seemed to be the centre of all the great bustle; people were running in and out, officials standing on the steps giving orders, arguing and looking over plans. We asked a guard where Master Craike might be found, and he told us to wait, calling a groom to take the horses. As we stood there a high officer of state in a green velvet robe waved us out of the way, then another barged between us, as though we were dogs in his path.
‘Arseholes,’ Barak muttered.
‘Come, let us get out of their way.’
We walked to the corner of the manor house, near to where two women were arguing with an official who held a floorplan of some sort. He was bowing and scraping almost to the ground, risking his plan falling in the mud, as the more richly dressed of the two ladies berated him loudly. She was in her thirties, with brown hair under a French hood set with pearls, and a high-collared robe of red silk. A woman of status. Her square plain face was red with ill-temper.
‘Is it too much for the Queen to know how she may leave her lodgings in the event of a fire?’ I heard her say in a deep, sharp voice. ‘I ask again, which is the nearest door and who has the key?’
‘I am not sure, my lady.’ The official turned his plan round. ‘The privy kitchen may be nearest –’
‘I’m not interested in may be.’
The other woman saw us looking and raised her eyebrows in an affronted stare. She was slim, with a face that might have been attractive but for its cold, haughty expression. The brown curly hair beneath her plain hood was unbound, signalling unmarried status, though she too was in her thirties. She wore an expensive-looking engagement ring, however: a diamond set in gold. She frowned again and I nudged Barak out of hearing. Then I smiled at the sight of a man in a brown robe who had come out of the manor house and stood on the steps, staring round him. A little portable writing desk was tied round his neck with blue cord. An inkpot and a quill were set there, and a thick sheaf of papers was pinned to it.
I remembered Simon Craike by his anxious, harried air. But for that I might not have recognized him, for the years had changed my old fellow student greatly. The good fare of court had given him a plump face and wide girth, while the shock of fair hair I remembered was mostly gone, leaving only a yellow fringe. As he turned at my call, though, his careworn features lit up. Barak and I doffed our caps as he crossed to us, one hand on the little desk to keep it steady. He shook my hand with the other.
‘Master Shardlake! I recognized you at once. The years have dealt kindly with you, sir. Why, you still have your hair. Not even grey.’
I laughed. ‘’Tis a wonder, given some of the affairs I have had to deal with.’
‘By Our Lady, it must be near twenty years.’ Craike smiled sadly. ‘The world has seen many changes since then.’
‘Truly it has.’ I thought: a revolution in religion, the end of the monasteries and a great rebellion. And my father now dead, I remembered with a sudden stab. ‘So,’ I said. ‘I hear you are in charge of accommodating the gentlemen in York.’
‘Ay. I have never had such a task as this Progress. Everywhere I have been going ahead to work with the harbingers to ensure everyone has accommodation at each stop. The problems with the rains, the King ever changing his plans.’
‘You have been with the Great Progress from the start?’
‘Ay. There has never been one anything like so large.’ He shook his head. ‘The problems, you cannot imagine. Dealing with the waste has been the worst thing. Everywhere we stop vast pits have to be dug. With three thousand people, five thousand great horses, you may imagine?’
‘Cannot the local people use the dung for manure?’
‘There was far more than they need. And the stink, you can imagine…’
‘I can.’
‘Even with the pits, all the road from London to Hull is littered with rubbish. It has been a nightmare, sir, a nightmare.’ He shook his head. ‘And my poor wife left behind in London.’
‘You are married?’
‘Ay. Seven children we have.’ He smiled with pride. ‘And you, sir?’
‘No, I have never married. This, by the way, is my assistant. Master Barak.’
Craike studied Barak solemnly with his pale-blue eyes. ‘You will need him, all the work there is here. As for me, I am surrounded by incompetents. So much to be got ready. Indeed I fear I cannot spare much time now, though I am glad to see you again. But I will show you your quarters.’
I nodded at the manor house. ‘That is a fine building.’
‘Ay. It was the abbot’s house. The King will be staying there when he arrives – it has been renamed King’s Manor in his honour.’
‘Perhaps we may have an opportunity to meet later, discuss old times.’
‘I should like that, sir. I will if I can –’ He broke off, as the two women came round the corner, and a hunted look came into his face. ‘God’s death,’ he muttered, ‘not Lady Rochford again.’
I started, for that was a name whose mention could send a shudder through any group. The three of us bowed hastily. As we rose I looked more closely at the square-faced woman. Her high-coloured features were still set in an angry frown, and I noticed she seemed strung tight with nervous tension. Her companion, who was holding the plan the official had been showing them, saw me studying her mistress and gave me another disapproving look.
‘Master Craike!’ Lady Rochford snapped. ‘Your churl of a planmaster cannot answer the simplest question. I want to know, sir, is there a privy way out of this house on this side that the Queen might take? She is terrified of fire, when she was a girl in Horsham the house near burned down –’
‘I am sorry, my lady –’
‘Pox on sorry! Jennet, the plan! Hurry, woman!’
Her companion held it up. Craike laid it out on his desk, studied it a moment and then pointed out a door. ‘There. The privy kitchen is nearest.’
‘Is it guarded?’
‘No, madam.’
‘Then I will need a set of keys. Arrange it. Jennet, come on, do not stand there like a lost sheep!’ And with that, Lady Rochford snatched the plan and the two women left, holding their skirts up above the muddy ground.
Craike wiped his brow. ‘By heaven, that woman’s an ogre.’
‘Ay. I know her history. Who is her sour-faced companion?’
‘Mistress Jennet Marlin, a maid in waiting. She has cause to look sour. Her fiancé is in the Tower, accused of a part in the conspiracy.’