The chimney at Esher continues to smoke. He goes to the Duke of Norfolk – who is always ready to see him – and asks him what is to be done about the cardinal's household.In this matter, both dukes are helpful. ‘Nothing is more malcontent,’ says Norfolk, ‘than a masterless man. Nothing more dangerous. Whatever one thinks of the Cardinal of York, he was always well served. Prefer them to me, send them in my direction. They will be my men.’He directs a searching look at Cromwell. Who turns away. Knows himself coveted. Wears an expression like an heiress: sly, coy, cold.He is arranging a loan for the duke. His foreign contacts are less than excited. The cardinal down, he says, the duke has risen, like the morning sun, and sitteth at Henry's right hand. Tommaso, they say, seriously, you are offering what as guarantee? Some old duke who may be dead tomorrow – they say he is choleric? You are offering a dukedom as security, in that barbaric island of yours, which is always breaking out into civil war? And another war coming, if your wilful king will set aside the Emperor's aunt, and install his whore as queen?Stilclass="underline" he'll get terms. Somewhere.Charles Brandon says, ‘You here again, Master Cromwell, with your lists of names? Is there anyone you specially recommend to me?’‘Yes, but I am afraid he is a man of a lowly stamp, and more fit that I should confer with your kitchen steward –’‘No, tell me,’ says the duke. He can't bear suspense.‘It's only the hearths and chimneys man, hardly a matter for Your Grace …’‘I'll have him, I'll have him,’ Charles Brandon says. ‘I like a good fire.’Thomas More, the Lord Chancellor, has put his signature first on all the articles against Wolsey. They say one strange allegation has been added at his behest. The cardinal is accused of whispering in the king's ear and breathing into his face; since the cardinal has the French pox, he intended to infect our monarch.When he hears this he thinks, imagine living inside the Lord Chancellor's head. Imagine writing down such a charge and taking it to the printer, and circulating it through the court and through the realm, putting it out there to where people will believe anything; putting it out there, to the shepherds on the hills, to Tyndale's ploughboy, to the beggar on the roads and the patient beast in its byre or stall; out there to the bitter winter winds, and to the weak early sun, and the snowdrops in the London gardens.