It seemed I’d arrived late. The speaker was nearly done and I wanted to take my leave afore any could recognize me. “There are many good priests,” he said, drawing his hand down over his priestly vestments. The crowd laughed. “But sadly the best of them cannot read Latin nor Hebrew nor Greek. We love the Church and all who serve within it. Let us seek reform from within so we may provide those good, simple priests, and the gentle souls they serve, Holy Writ in their own tongue. They, too, may then hear the voice of the Lord speaking to them directly and sweetly.”
I slipped out, my spirits dampened a bit. I had hoped for more. To see Will. Perhaps, though I would not willingly admit this to another, to see God. I believed in the priest’s good intentions, but I, who read Latin, and had read Holy Writ for myself, could not say that I’d ever heard from the Lord directly and sweetly, so it did not follow that making it available in English could help all.
I reported to Anne what I had seen and heard; naught to be of concern but perhaps the morsel about the Duchess of Norfolk.
I went back two nights hence and all was nearly the same as the first visit, except it were held in different chambers. In spite of my every attempt to locate those who might cause Anne some harm, there were no highly placed listeners other than those I knew to be her true friends. Some seemed to do nothing but grumble against all who kept to the old ways, and Rome, which impressed me not at all; many conservatives I knew to be good people with admirable motives. Some were there solely for political advancement. I’d seen them sidle up to Cromwell’s lackeys. Some were genuine seekers, thirst writ across their faces, and nearly ecstatic joy at hearing Scripture spoken in English. I envied them. None seemed dangerous. I’d determined not to visit again, but when I was about to take my leave I caught the scent of something in the room. I could not locate its wearer but I recognized its source. It was jasmine perfume.
I determined to return to the next meeting, for I knew that sooner or later I would meet with Jane Rochford, who professed to be against reformers one and all, her husband included, one presumed. I slipped along the dark hallway, skirts swishing in the rushes, and stood outside yet another, larger chamber, and held my hand up to the door to knock. Ere I did, though, I heard the voice of the speaker.
A sweet voice, a deep voice, a voice that made me wish for all things that could not be and mayhap a willingness to throw away all things that must be in order to gain them. My flesh won—or was it my spirit? In any event, I knocked on the door, gave the new password, and entered.
It was Will speaking, of course. I pulled my cloak about me, which drew no notice because many present sought to keep their identities secret either by cloak or by downcast gaze.
I dared not go into the great room. Instead, I stood behind a stone wall that still had a sword slit in it, just large enough to allow my ear to hear everything that was said whilst revealing nothing of myself. His voice was filled with both fiery rhetoric and soothing reassurance, with logic and with passion. For the first fifteen minutes I heard nothing of the meaning of the words, only drank in the voice that caressed my ears and my heart. I risked peeking through the slit and took my breath when I saw him. The sweet boy had grown into a powerful and striking man. He emanated moral, intellectual, spiritual, physical strength. The Latin came to me, unbidden.
Vires. Fortitudo.
I went back again the next night and dared to come a bit closer though I did not uncloak myself. I listened to the words this time as well as the man. Lord and Lady Carlyle recognized me, I know, as Lady Carlyle came up and bid me good evening. As the meeting was being held in her apartments I had no fear of her making me known. “’Tis because of your closeness with Anne that you must remain secret,” she suggested, and I agreed with her. She took special care to place me where I could best see and hear but not be seen nor heard.
I went back again for a fourth night and a fifth. The court was about to leave York Place and move to Hampton Court shortly, and the meetings would, of necessity, stop for a while. I saw not Jane Rochford but, on the last night, someone even more treacherous. He did not bother to cloak himself, so certain was he in his own powers and being in the protection of Cromwell, for whom he now kept close accounts.
Edmund. Edmund, certainly, was no religious seeker. He worshipped no one save himself.
I hid myself back in the corner a bit more and listened whilst Will finished reading from the Epistle of Saint Paul to the Romans. “For we know not what to desire as we ought: but the spirit maketh intercession mightily for us with groanings which cannot be expressed with the tongue. And he that searchest the hearts, knoweth what is the meaning of the spirit.” He closed Tyndale’s English translation and finished from memory. “For we know that all things work for the best unto them that love God, which also are called of purpose.”
I watched as Edmund took note of Will’s English Bible and then snuck out of the room. The rest of the crowd began to disperse, and indeed, most of them did so in a quick manner. I did not wish to irritate the scar of a badly healed wound but I knew that I must. I slipped up to Will and, after he’d finished talking, Lady Carlyle.
“Meg,” he said roughly. Lady Carlyle looked from him to me and back again. Then, in the way of women since the beginning of time, she nodded knowingly. “Mayhap you’d prefer to talk in my closet?” She indicated the small private room off to the side of the public chamber.
Will took my hand and I followed him in. “May I take your cloak?” he asked, and I nodded and shrugged it off. I was glad that I had taken a care to dress well that night; my dark blue gown showed off my russet hair to its best advantage, though some curls slipped disobediently from the hood casually holding it back. Though I could say in honesty that I hadn’t dressed for the man, I must also be honest in admitting that I was glad that I still had an effect on him. He kept a modest distance from me as he pulled his chair alongside but never took his eyes from my face. “How are you?”
“I’m well,” I said. “All goes well for Anne for the moment, and therefore for me.”
“I’m sorry to hear of your husband,” he said.
I looked up, startled. “Lord Blackston passed away some time ago,” I said. “But he was ready to meet his Maker.”
“I hear from my sister that your brother Edmund is negotiating to have you marry the baron’s nephew and heir.”
“Your sister is particularly well informed for someone who spends her time with child or languishing in a large household in Kent,” I replied somewhat tartly.
He laughed. “She was always the one that heard everything. We called her ‘hare-ears’ as a child. Always twitching to listen to others.”
I laughed with him. “And how do you?”
His face became infused with light. “I do well. I have been in Antwerp helping with translations, with printing. We have now moved some printing here, to England, and I am come to assist with the setup. I am passionate about my work. And about sharing it with others. It has the power to transform the mind, you know.” He looked sheepish. “Epistle to the Romans. Chapter twelve. I’ve been studying it quite a bit.”
I envied his study and his transformed mind. “Your rhetoric is as sharp as ever,” I said. “I heard you speak from the Gospel of Saint Matthew last night, about our being the bride of Christ and He our bridegroom.”
He blushed at the mention of the topic of brides and bridegrooms, as I’d intended him to do. I felt pleased, not in an unkind manner, that I could still provoke him thus.
“How many nights have you come?” he asked.
“All,” I replied simply. I would not lie to save my pride.
“The test of a speaker is not in carefully chosen words nor in the fine rhetoric of delivery, but in the effect he has upon the hearts and minds of those listening.”