Revelation

'Jack says I only go to show off my best clothes.' She looked down at her apron. 'Well, 'tis true that after wearing these things all week I like to go out in something nice. But I fear if Jack absents himself continually, questions will be asked, he could be in trouble with the churchwardens. Especially as he is known to have Jewish blood.' She set her lips. 'He wanted to carry on his bloodline through our child. It comes out when he is drunk.'

'Is he drunk often?' I remembered his dishevelled look that morning.

'More and more. He goes out with his old friends and sometimes does not come back all night. That will be where he is now. And I think he goes with other women too.'

I was shocked. 'Who?'

'I do not know. Perhaps with female neighbours. You know what some of them are here.'

'Can you be sure?'

She gave me a direct look. 'From the smell of him some mornings, yes.'

I sighed. 'Is there no sign of — another child?'

'No. Perhaps I am like old Queen Catherine of Aragon, and cannot produce healthy children.'

'But it is only — what — six months since your baby died. That is no time, Tamasin.'

'Time enough for Jack to turn away. Sometimes when he is drunk he says that I would rule him, make him into some weak domesticated creature.' She looked around the room. 'As though you could domesticate anyone in this place.'

'Sometimes Jack can be insensitive. Even cruel.'

'Well, at least he does not beat me. Many husbands do.'

'Tamasin—'

'Oh, he apologizes when he is sober again, he is loving then, calls me his chick and says he did not mean his words, it is only his fury that God took our child. That I can share. Why does God do such cruel things?' she asked, in sudden anger.

I shook my head. 'I am not the man to answer that, Tamasin. It puzzles me too.'

'Sir,' she said, sitting up and looking at me. 'Can you speak to Jack, find out what is in his mind? He is so unpredictable these days, I do not know whether — whether he still wants me at all.'

'Oh, Tamasin,' I said. 'I am sure he does. And talking to him of such matters would be no easy thing. If he even discovers you have been talking to me of his marriage he will be angry with us both.'

'Yes. He is proud. But if you could try to find out somehow.' She looked at me beseechingly. 'I know you have a way of making people talk. And I have no one else to ask.'

'I will try, Tamasin. But I will have to pick my time carefully.'

She nodded gratefully. 'Thank you.'

I stood up. 'And now I should go. If he were to come in now and find you telling me your sorrows he would certainly be cross.' I laid a hand on hers. 'But if things become too much, or you want someone to talk to, a note to my house will bring me.'

'You are kind, sir. Some days I just sit staring mopishly at that damp patch for hours, I have no energy and wonder what is wrong with me. The mould will not go away. However I clean it the black spots are soon creeping over the wall again.' She sighed. 'It is not like the old days, when I worked in poor Queen Catherine Howard's household. Oh, I was only the lowest of servants, but there was always something of interest to see.'

'Danger, too,' I said with a smile. 'As it turned out.'

'I know.' She paused. 'They say there will be a new queen soon. A widow. Catherine, Lady Latimer. She will be the sixth. Fantastic, is it not?'

'Strange indeed.'

She shook her head wonderingly. 'Was there ever such a king?'

I left her. As I descended the dark staircase, I remembered when Barak and Tamasin had married, on a fine spring day the year before. I had felt envious of their content. A single man can easily assume all marriages are blissful, the couple devoted like Roger and Dorothy. But tonight I had seen the sad things that could lurk beneath the surface. I had been right to guess something was amiss, but had not known things were as bad as this. 'Damn Barak!' I said aloud as I stepped out on to the road, startling a gentleman going into the Barge, perhaps to see one of the prostitutes.

I SPENT MOST OF Good Friday and Easter Saturday at home, working on papers. I did not go to church on Easter Sunday. The weather remained unseasonably cold, with a further light fall of snow. I was in an unsettled, restless mood. On Saturday I even took out my pencils and drawing pad; this last year I had gone back to my old hobby of painting and sketching, but that day I could think of nothing to draw. I looked at the blank paper but nothing came to mind but vague circles and dark lines and a sane man could hardly make a drawing of those. I went to bed but could not sleep. I lay thinking how I might broach the subject of Tamasin to Barak without making matters worse. Then when I did get to sleep I dreamed of poor mad Adam Kite. I came into his wretched room at the Bedlam to find him crouched on the floor, praying desperately. But as I approached I realized it was not God's name nor Jesus' that he was invoking, but mine — it was 'Master Shardlake' that he was begging for salvation. I woke with a start.