Revelation

'Poor arsehole. Shouldn't think there was ever much go in him, even if he could see properly.'

'No. But he damns Goddard, more than ever.'

'Yes. Now all we have to do is find him.'

I sighed. 'Let's see what the other assistant can tell us.'

Chapter Twenty-two

WE RODE UP TO Smithfield through a countryside coming to life again after the winter, the cattle out in the meadows again after months indoors. In the fields men were ploughing while women walked behind pairs of shaggy-hoofed horses, casting grain from bags at their waists. I wondered what Lockley would be like. An ex-monk living at, perhaps running, a tavern was unusual, but with thousands thrown out of the monasteries there were many stories stranger than that.

We reached the great square of Smithfield. It was not a market day, and the big cattle pens were dismantled, stacked against the walls at the north end. To one side stood the great church of St Bartholemew's where, three years before, Barak had saved my life in the course of our first assignment together. Behind the high walls I saw all the monastic buildings had come down now. Nearby stood the great empty hospital, reminding me again of my promise to Roger. Only a few hours now to his funeral.

Barak turned to me, nodding at the church. 'Remember?' he asked.

'Ay.' I sighed. 'That was as dangerous a time as this.'

He shook his head. 'No. Then we were dealing with politicians. When they do villainy they have reasons. They don't kill in a mad frenzy.'

'As often as not it is only for their own power and wealth.'

'At least that's something comprehensible.'

We rode on, up Charterhouse Lane and under the stone arch leading into Charterhouse Square. This was a wide grassy area dotted with trees that covered the burial pits from the Great Plague of two hundred years ago. An old chapel stood at its centre. A ragged little group of beggars sat huddled outside. To the north, beyond a low redbrick wall, lay the buildings of the Charterhouse, whose monks had defied the King over the break from Rome. Most had been brutally executed as a result; Cromwell had masterminded that, along with so much else. These days the buildings were used for storage, apart from those which I had heard had been made into lodgings for the King's Italian musicians, whom he had recently brought over at great expense.

As with all the monastic houses, the monks had rented out land in their precinct. On this side of the square the dwellings were small and poor-looking, one- and two-storey wooden affairs, but opposite was a row of fine stone and brick houses. I had heard that the best one belonged to Lord Latimer, and now therefore to his widow Catherine Parr. I studied a large redbrick mansion with tall chimneys, the only house standing in its own drive. As I watched, a horseman in red livery galloped down the road fronting the houses and turned in at the drive, raising clouds of dust. More pressure from the King?

Barak brought me back to earth, pointing to a sign dangling over a narrow, ramshackle old building nearby. 'There's our place. The Green Man.' The sign showed a man clothed in vines, painted bright green.

As we dismounted outside the tavern the beggars came over to us. Maybe the chapel had been abandoned when the Charterhouse was dissolved, and they had taken refuge there. Thin, dirty hands clutched at us as we tied the horses to the rail outside the tavern.

'Piss off,' Barak said, waving a couple of the hands away as he tied up. After what had happened in the Westminster crowd we both looked warily at the pinched faces, the ragged, stinking clothes. There were several children. 'Here,' I called to a starveling lad of about ten whose head was half bald and red raw, his hair eaten away by some disease. 'Mind the horses and I'll give you a groat when I come out.'

'I'll do it better!' Other hands plucked at my sleeve. 'He's fucking useless,' another boy called out. 'Hairless Harry!'

'No,' I said, shaking them off. 'Him.'

We knocked on the tavern door and waited, ignoring fresh entreaties from the beggars. Footsteps sounded, and a woman opened it. She wore a stained apron over a creased dress and a white coif from which tendrils of black hair escaped. She was powerfully built, short and square, but her face showed the remnants of past beauty. Her grey eyes were sharp and intelligent.

'We're not open till five,' she said.

'We don't want a drink,' I answered. 'We are looking for Francis Lockley.'

She gave us a sharp, suspicious look. 'What do you want with him?'

'Some private business.' I smiled. 'He is not in any trouble.'

She hesitated, then said, 'I suppose you'd better come in.' She looked at our boots, messy with the mud of the southern precinct. 'Wipe your feet, I don't want that mess all over the floor. I've just cleaned it.'