‘Well, he does offend,’ Henry says. ‘And I perceive that you, Riche, do not know what a king is. A king is made by God, not Parliament. Parliament proclaims his title, furbishes his authority – but where in the scriptures does it mention Parliament?
‘And would you pardon them, sir?’ Mr Wriothesley asks.
‘Stand further off, Call-Me,’ the king snaps. ‘I don’t like to be crowded.’
Mr Wriothesley’s mouth drops open. Call-Me? How has this private joke rolled into the public sphere? Henry is displeased; he signals to them to fall behind, and limps on alone, into the darkening afternoon.
‘I perceive your fingers were a-twitch for pen and paper,’ he says to Riche. ‘But he has said it all once, and he will say it again.’
There are things the king has not voiced, yet must suspect: that behind the banner of the Five Wounds, there are other invisible banners, sewn with the emblems of the Courtenays and Poles. Gentlemen of ancient houses have turned out to defend the Tudor – but they must be watched closely, their deeds as well as words. Some captured rebels have freely confessed that they hope the Pope will send another king, Reginald Pole by name, who will wed the Princess Mary, and turn her father Henry out to beg. The Pilgrims claim they crusade for the Virgin in her innocence and purity. But knowingly or not, they serve the pride of Gertrude Courtenay and Margaret Pole – the young woman who would like to be queen of England, the old woman who deems she already is.
‘Sir,’ Richard Riche pulls at his elbow, ‘I have notification – that is, I am required – I am advertised that I could be useful, that I should go up to York, that I should show myself –’
‘Why don’t you do that?’ he says. ‘York might be safer than here.’
Mid-October: at Lincoln Richard Cromwell is now encamped with Fitzwilliam and Francis Bryan. He is called into every council, and gives Fitz credit for it. Other lords would prefer to keep him out, but Fitzwilliam stands our fast friend, he writes: no one may speak ill of Cromwells, in his presence. He writes that Bryan hopes to encounter Aske in single combat: two one-eyed men grappling for glory, as in tales of old. He writes he misses his home and his uncle: ‘Comfort my poor wife.’
He wonders, should he bring Frances under his own roof? He is not short of roofs; she might go to Stepney or Mortlake. If any malcontents should penetrate London, they would attack Austin Friars. God knows what they would expect to find. A great heap of treasure: confiscated chalices winking with gems. Precious relics, such as twigs from the burning bush, and a box of the manna that fell on the Israelites in the desert.
He writes to Richard in his own hand: here we are all well if not contented, Mrs Richard is impatient for your return as am I but the king must be served, temperately, carefully. At idle times, while you are waiting for action to begin, do not let your companions draw you into games of chance. If you refuse they will jeer, look at Cromwell’s nephew, he is not good for the money: but if you take part, they will find some excuse to brand you a cheat. We are agreed Norfolk and his son must join the campaign; but if you come in young Surrey’s path, get out of it, he will work you a mischief if he can. Do not be drawn by any slander to myself. They will say what they must to provoke you, at a time when every man’s weapon is ready in his hand.
He ends each day buried under a weight of dispatches; with every piece of news that comes in, he seems to know less. If Aske were fighting in your own cause, you would call him a robust captain, and godly too, because he directs his ragbag army to pay for what it takes from the country people. But do his soldiers heed him? Or have they run beyond his control? Loyal gentlemen fleeing the north bring their reports. Aske says, hold back: his sergeants say, march. Aske says, don’t ring the bells, his soldiers ring the bells; he says, don’t fire the beacon, and they fire it. His own brothers have deserted his side and galloped for sanctuary. And yet they say his rise was foretold in a prophecy. The north has long been expecting him, a one-eyed messiah. How did he lose his eye? No one knows.
Henry says: ‘Vile blood: what is it, that these rebels cry it down? There have always been mushroom men.’ Grown up overnight, he means. ‘Both my father and my grandfather would agree, a common man can be as good a servant as a duke. Being humble-born, they have no interests of their own – only solicitous to serve their master, from whom they derive all their fortune.’
