‘Perhaps in Hull we will have brick walls around us again and a fire. ’Tis a large town, I believe.’
‘I have already taken care of that.’ He winked at me. ‘Some gold has passed from me to one of Master Craike’s underlings, it has secured me a room at an inn. You and Barak too.’
‘That is generous, Giles.’
‘No.’ He smiled wryly. ‘I might as well put my money to good use. Soon enough I will have no need of it. Jesu, but I miss my fire, and Madge to wait on me.’ He looked at me. ‘I have left her well provided for in my will, she will end her old age in comfort. And you will have my library.’
‘Me?’ I was taken aback.
‘You are the only man I know who will appreciate it. But give those old lawbooks to Gray’s Inn library. I should like my old Inn to have them.’
‘But – your nephew…’
‘Martin will have my house, and everything else. I made a new will before I left York. But I want to see him, to tell him.’
I put a hand on his arm. ‘You will.’
For a moment he looked sad. Then we both jumped at the blast of a hunting horn. We saw, some way off, a procession of brightly robed riders heading for the woods, a huge pack of greyhounds loping along beside the horses.
‘The King is going hunting,’ Giles said. ‘I hear he walks and rides so badly now he has to stand in a hide with his bow and arrow, and shoot at the stags as the hounds and keepers drive them by. He that was called the greatest athlete in Europe in his youth.’
The King. The true King, I wondered again.
NEXT AFTERNOON we were told to make ready, we would be moving on to Hull the following day, the first of October. The new month came in with winds and heavy rain from the east, making it a miserable business getting the Progress together in the early morning, finding our horses and our place in the cavalcade. The fields had turned to mud, all the cart wheels and even the hems of the senior officials’ robes were spattered with it. Barak was better able to ride now, the enforced rest had helped his leg. He probably wished he was back in his covered cart, though, as we rode slowly along with our heads bent against the driving rain.
Mercifully it stopped later that morning as we approached the town of Beverley. We passed through quickly, then went on through more flat countryside, white church steeples marking the occasional villages. The road began descending slowly, past fields of rich black soil, and late in the afternoon we saw a wide grey estuary in the distance, broader than the Thames at London and dotted with sails.
‘Nearly there.’ Giles, riding beside me, spoke with relief.
‘Just the boat home now,’ I said. My own heart lifted at the thought. ‘That is the Humber, then? ’Tis wide.’
‘It is. We will sail down there, past Spurn Head, and into the German Ocean.’
‘Have you visited Hull before?’
‘Once or twice, on legal business. The last time near twenty years ago. See, there are the walls.’ I followed his pointing finger and saw, bounded by the grey estuary and a smaller river running into it at right angles, a walled town. It was smaller than I had expected, not half the size of York.
‘The walls are an odd colour,’ I said. ‘Reddish.’
‘They’re brick,’ Wrenne said. ‘All the bricks in Yorkshire come through Hull.’
As we approached the city I saw a large group of dignitaries standing outside the walls, waiting to greet the King on this his second visit. The Progress drew to a halt and we sat waiting for some time as the royal party was welcomed in. Because of the press of people ahead I could not see them. I was glad, for even the sight of the assembled dignitaries had brought Fulford back to me, the thought of which still made me hot with shame and anger. I glimpsed Dereham and Culpeper, sitting on horseback among the courtiers.
At length officials began moving to and fro among us, directing people where they were to spend the night. I saw Master Craike among them, checking queries against papers on his portable desk. It was as well they were held down with a clip, for the wind was ruffling them. He came over to where we sat.
‘Master Shardlake,’ he said. ‘You are to have accommodation at an inn. You and Master Wrenne and your man Barak. It seems someone has approved it.’ He gave us a suspicious look and I wondered if he smelt bribery. Some of the other lawyers nearby, who would be sleeping in tents in the fields again, looked on enviously.
‘I am to escort those with town lodgings into Hull now, if you would walk along. Your horses will be taken and stabled.’
So Giles and Barak and I walked into the city with Craike. We were among a fortunate group of officials, mostly far more senior than us, who had billets in Hull. As we approached the red-brick walls I saw another skeleton hanging in chains from the ramparts. Sir Robert Constable, I guessed, in whose mansion the King had stayed at Howlme. Wrenne averted his eyes, distaste clear on his face.
We walked under the gate and down a long main street Craike told me was named Lowgate. The buildings seemed in better repair than in York, the people a little more prosperous. They looked at us with a lack of interest as they stepped out of the way. This was the King’s second visit; they had seen it all before.
‘How long do we stay here?’ I asked Craike.
‘I do not know. The King wants to make plans for the new defences.’
‘Where is he staying?’
Craike pointed to our left, where a clutch of tall chimneys overtopped the red-roofed houses. ‘His manor house here. It used to belong to the de la Pole family.’
Yet another house he has taken, I thought. Craike seemed reluctant to converse, but I persisted. ‘We have to get back to London by boat. Will many return that way?’
‘No, after Hull the Progress will cross the river and ride to Lincoln. It breaks up there.’
‘We have to return to London as soon as possible.’
Craike flattened his papers with a plump hand as the wind lifted them again. He looked up at the sky where grey clouds were scudding along. ‘Then I hope the weather allows you to sail.’ He stopped before the door of an inn. ‘Well, here you are.’
Inside a number of gentlemen were already waiting. They looked down their noses at our lawyer’s robes. Craike bowed to us. ‘I must get back, my staff will doubtless have messed up the allocations. It is a nightmare.’ He turned and left.
‘Not the friendliest of men,’ Wrenne observed.
Barak, leaning on his crutch, grinned wickedly. ‘He has things on his mind.’
BARAK AND I HAD a pleasant room at the back of the inn, Wrenne the one next to us. There was a fire, and a view over red-roofed houses sloping down to the muddy banks of the smaller river. The rain had started again, large drops streaking the little diamond-paned window. Barak sat down on the bed with relief. I looked at my panniers, unsure how much to unpack. Then I heard heavy footsteps on the stairs. The door opened without a knock and Maleverer strode in. He looked around the room.
‘You’ve done well for yourself,’ he said sardonically. ‘I came to tell you Broderick is in Hull gaol. With Radwinter. One wing has been cleared of prisoners.’ He ran his hand along the edge of his coal-black beard in that habitual gesture of his. ‘I have new orders about him from the Privy Council. We don’t know when we’ll get back to London with this weather.’
‘There may be delay?’ I asked.
‘There may. So the King has ordered that Broderick is to be groped here in Hull. There’s a rack at Hull gaol. I’m supervising the racking myself.’
I had hoped, all this time, that somehow Broderick might escape what was coming to him. And now it would be done tomorrow.
‘He is weak,’ I said.
Maleverer shrugged. ‘It has to be done. We don’t think he knows exactly what was in that damned box of papers, but he may. And he may know the names of the London conspirators. We always knew there were London lawyers at the heart of the conspiracy, but we’ve not been able to lay them by the heels.’ Maleverer cracked his fingers noisily. ‘So, we’ll see what can be got out of him tomorrow. And meanwhile they’ll be getting information about Mistress Marlin’s mission from Bernard Locke, in the Tower.’