Dark Fire

'Matthew, Matthew!' Cromwell said enthusiastically. He shook my hand with his powerful grip, then went and sat behind his desk. I studied him. He was dressed soberly in a black gown, though the Order of the Garter awarded to him by the king swung from his dark blue doublet. Looking at his face, I was shocked by the change in his appearance since I last saw him three years before. His hair was far greyer, and his strong, coarse features seemed pulled tight with strain and anxiety.

'Well, Matthew,' he said, 'how are you? Your practice prospers?'

I hesitated, thinking of my lost cases. 'Well enough, thank you, my lord.'

'What's that on your robe? It's on your doublet too, Jack.'

'Dust, my lord,' Barak replied. 'They're bringing down the Whiteys' chapter house and nearly brought us down with it.'

Cromwell laughed, then gave Barak a sharp look. 'Is it done?'

'Ay, my lord. Forbizer gave no trouble.'

'I knew he wouldn't.' Cromwell turned back to me. 'I was interested to learn of your involvement in the Wentworth case, Matthew. It occurred to me then we might be of help to each other for old times' sake.' He smiled again. I wondered uneasily how he had heard; but he had eyes and ears everywhere and certainly at Lincoln's Inn.

'I am most grateful, my lord,' I said carefully.

He smiled wryly. 'These little crusades of yours, Matthew. The girl's life matters to you?'

'Ay, it does.' I realized that these past days I had thought of little but Elizabeth's case. I wondered why for a moment. It was something to do with her wounded helplessness, lying there in that filthy Newgate straw. If Cromwell wished to use her life as a rope to bind me to him, he had chosen well.

'I believe she is innocent, my lord.'

He waved a beringed hand. 'I'm not concerned with that,' he said bluntly. He fixed me with a serious look; once again I felt the power of those dark eyes. 'I need your help, Matthew. It's an important matter, and secret. The bargain is I'll keep the girl alive for twelve days. We have only that for my task. Less than a fortnight.' He nodded abruptly. 'Sit down.'

I did as bidden. Barak went and stood against the wall, folding his hands across a large gold-coloured codpiece. Glancing at Cromwell's desk, I saw among the papers a miniature painting in a tiny silver frame, an exquisite portrait of the head and shoulders of a woman. Following my gaze, Cromwell frowned and turned it over. He nodded to Barak.

'Jack's a trusted servant. He's one of only eight that know this story, including myself and Grey here and his majesty the king.' My eyes widened at that name. I still held my cap, which I had removed on entering the church, and involuntarily began twisting it in my hands.

'One of the other five is an old acquaintance of yours.' Cromwell smiled again, cynically. 'It's not a matter to irk your conscience this time – you needn't crush your cap into a rag.' He leaned back and shook his head indulgently. 'I was impatient with you over Scarnsea, Matthew. I saw that later. None of us could have known how complex that affair would turn out. I have always admired your mind, your skills at teasing out the truth in men's affairs. Ever since the old days when we were all young reformers. Do you remember?' He smiled, but then a shadow crossed his face. 'Days with more hope and less care.' He sat silent for a moment and I thought of the rumours of his troubles over the Cleves marriage.

'May I ask who this old acquaintance is, my lord?' I ventured.

He nodded. 'You remember Michael Gristwood?'

Lincoln's Inn is a small world. 'Gristwood the attorney, who used to work for Stephen Bealknap?'

'The same.'

I remembered a small, scurrying fellow, with bright sharp eyes. Gristwood had once been friendly with Bealknap and, like him, forever on the lookout for new money-making schemes. But he had none of Bealknap's calculating coldness and his schemes never came to anything. I remembered he had once come to me for help in a property case he had taken on. A mere unqualified solicitor, he had got hopelessly out of his depth. The case was in a dreadful tangle, and he had been fulsomely grateful for my help. He had bought me a dinner in hall, where I had listened, half-amused, as he offered to involve me in a number of hare-brained schemes by way of thanks.

'He had a falling out of some sort with Bealknap,' I said. 'He hasn't been around Lincoln's Inn a long time. Didn't he go to work for the Court of Augmentations?'

Cromwell nodded. 'He did. To help Richard Rich pull in the proceeds of the dissolution.' He made a steeple of his fingers and looked at me over them.

'Last year, when St Bartholomew's priory in Smithfield surrendered to the king, Gristwood was sent to supervise the taking of the inventory of chattels to go to the king.'