‘But the conspiracy was betrayed.’
‘There was an informer, yes. We do not know who. And after the leaders were taken someone must have been tortured into revealing that a cache of papers proving Edward Blaybourne was Edward IV’s father existed. But whoever talked did not know my identity. And why should anyone suspect a respectable old lawyer? But Broderick knew. It was he who came to me and told me to bring the papers to London, try to make contact with sympathizers there. He didn’t have names, but I had to look at Gray’s Inn.’
‘Now he is dead.’
‘There are others in London. I will find them before I die. That is my final task.’
‘You must have lived in constant fear that Broderick would talk.’
‘I knew what manner of man he was. Far braver than me. I knew it would take the utmost torture to make him talk. It was my duty to help him die. I am not ashamed; you should be more ashamed of helping keep him alive against his will. I was deeply shocked when you told me Cranmer gave you that task.’
‘Perhaps you were right to be,’ I said slowly.
Wrenne’s keen eyes narrowed. He leaned back in his chair. ‘That is my tale, Matthew. I regret nothing. Believe me, though, when I say I never meant to kill you at King’s Manor. Only knock you out, as I did Radwinter. Sometimes one must do unpalatable deeds for a higher end. I hated deceiving you. Sometimes it brought me to tears.’
Another shiver ran through me, followed by a hot flush. I felt sweat on my brow. I was catching a fever.
‘But it was for a higher end,’ I repeated. ‘The overthrow of the King.’
‘You have seen him. You have seen Yorkshire. You know he is the Mouldwarp, the Great Tyrant, cruelty and darkness personified.’
A heavy splash of rain from outside, as a gutter flooded over, made me start.
‘Yes,’ I agreed. ‘He is a monster.’ I rubbed at my wrist, where the manacle was chafing again.
‘And no rightful King, a pretender to the throne as his father was. He does not have the royal blood that God ordains for Kings.’
‘A few drops from the Tudor side. But none from the House of York, no. There too you are right.’
He patted his pocket. ‘I have the papers here. Tomorrow I take them into town. I will find the men I seek. I will have those papers printed and posted all over London. With the arrest of the Queen there will be more discontent. What better time could there be to start a new rebellion?’
‘Your last chance.’
‘Come with me, Matthew, be a part of it. A part of the new dawn.’
‘No,’ I said quietly.
‘Remember how he mocked you at Fulford. A casual piece of cruelty that people will gossip about behind their hands for the rest of your life.’
‘There is far more than my feelings at stake. Whom would you make King in Henry’s place?’ I asked quietly. ‘The only Clarence left, if she still lives, is a female child. And the law is not even clear a female can inherit. The people will not rally to a little girl.’
‘We shall offer a regency to the next living Clarence. Cardinal Pole.’
‘A papist bishop?’
‘The Pope would let him renounce his office to take the throne. Come with me, Matthew,’ he said intently. ‘Let us destroy these brutes and vultures.’
‘And Cranmer?’
‘The fire,’ he said with certainty.
‘No,’ I told him again.
For a moment he looked deflated, then a calculating look came into his eyes. I thought, what will he do? This was why I had wanted Barak back; to provide force if it was needed to keep Giles Wrenne here.
‘You are still a reformist at heart?’ he asked. ‘You oppose the restoration of true religion?’
‘No. I am beyond allegiance to either side, I have seen too much of both. I oppose you because your belief in the rightness of your cause blinds you to the reality of what would happen. I doubt your rebellion would succeed but whether or not it did there would be bloodshed, anarchy, protestant south against papist north. Women left widows, children orphans, lands laid waste. The Striving of the Roses come again.’ I shook my head. ‘Papists and reformers, you are so alike. You think you have a holy truth and that if the state is run by its principles all men will become happy and good. It is a delusion. It is always men like Maleverer who benefit from such upheavals while poor men still cry out to heaven for justice.’
‘We shall have true faith back again,’ he said with a sudden cold fierceness. ‘True faith and a rightful monarch.’
‘And the fire for Cranmer. And how many more? Even if you win you will create a mirror-image of the world we have, perhaps a worse one.’
‘I should have realized.’ Wrenne sighed deeply. ‘You are not a man of faith. But knowing the King is not of royal blood, does that count for nothing with you?’ His tone was almost pleading.
‘Not enough to countenance drowning England in fire and blood, no. Not enough for that.’
‘Then let me go quietly. I will not trouble you again. I will leave you to your peaceful life.’ There was angry bitterness in his voice now.
‘If you give me the papers,’ I said, ‘I will let you walk free.’
He leaned back in his seat, casting his eyes down. He seemed to be reflecting. But I knew he would never give up the documents, not having come so far.
He looked at me again, his eyes still fierce though his voice was quiet. ‘Do not make me do this, Matthew. I cannot give you the papers. It has taken me so long -’
‘I will not join you.’
Then in a movement I had been half-expecting, but more speedily than I could have imagined him capable of, Wrenne leaped up, grasped the bowl of pottage and threw it in my face. A terrible growling noise came from his throat, fury and sorrow somehow mixed together. I cried out, jumping up. Half-blind, I grabbed at Giles but he twisted away and tumbled out of the door. I heard his heavy footsteps as he went out to the hall in a sort of shambling run, then a curse as he hauled uselessly at the locked front door. He turned again, gasping as he ran for the door to the garden. I felt a gust of cold air as it was thrown open.
I stepped into the hall. The garden door yawned wide, giving on to a blackness through which a curtain of rain fell. Apart from the rain there was silence. Joan must be asleep in her room at the front of the house. I stared out into the darkness and the hammering rain.
Chapter Forty-eight
LITTLE WAS VISIBLE beyond the doorway, the light from the parlour window showing only the rain, still falling hard and straight as ever, and the dim shapes of bushes and trees. My face smarted, but the pottage had not really scalded me. It had been standing for some time and had cooled. My hand went to my dagger. I pulled it from my belt. I shivered again, violently.
‘Giles!’ I called out. ‘You are trapped! There is no way out of the garden except the gate to the orchard, and the door from the orchard to Lincoln’s Inn is locked at night! Surrender yourself, it is all you can do.’ There was no reply, only the relentless sound of the lashing water.
‘For pity’s sake, man,’ I called. ‘Come out of the rain!’
I could wait, here in the doorway, till Barak returned. But what if Wrenne managed to climb the orchard wall? He was old and ill but he was also desperate. If he got away with those papers – I stepped outside.
It was hard to see. I kept to those parts of the garden where there was some illumination from the windows and the open door, watching lest he run at me out of the darkness. The rain appeared to be lessening at last but it was still hard to see and I stumbled and nearly fell against a bench. I walked to the back of the garden, feeling my boots squelch into mud as I approached the orchard gate – the water was now seeping under the wall, as I had feared. I saw the gate was open; large footprints in the mud showed that Giles had gone through. I saw the key was in the lock and pulled it out. Passing through, I locked the gate behind me, put the key in my pocket and stood with my back against it, inside the orchard. I began to shiver again.