The Mirror and the Light

As the duke stands up, he stands up too. The servants flatten themselves against the wall. There is a red blink in the corner of his eye. There is the knife at his heart: cold under his coat, ready in its sheath, and his hand moves to it, as if it acts by its own will.

But Gardiner steps between them. ‘No fists today, my lords.’

Fists? he thinks. You don’t know me. I could carve him like a goose, before you were out of your seat.

Smiling as if it were a ladies’ bowling match, Gardiner flings his hands in the air. ‘Well, my lord Norfolk, if you must leave us, you are a busy man.’ He smiles. ‘We will give your dinner to the poor.’

When the duke has made his noisy exit, shouting for his guard and his bargemen, they sit down again, and Stephen reaches across the table and pats his arm.

‘Say it, Stephen.’ He is glum. ‘“Cromwell, you forget yourself, we’re not in Putney now.”’

Stephen signals for the wine jug. ‘Insult is a fine art. I wondered for a moment if he knew who Pandar was. I thought you might have been too subtle.’

‘No, not today,’ he says. ‘I’m not feeling subtle at all. Forgive me. I see we must make efforts towards each other, and I can do better, and will. I am sure I have things you want, where I could oblige you, and there are things I want –’

‘You want Barnes let out,’ Gardiner says. ‘Is he reformable, do you think? I am always sorry to see a Cambridge man go into the fire. I spoke for him, you remember, years back, when he came before Wolsey.’

‘If you say so.’

‘Otherwise he would have gone straight to the Tower. Which would have saved time, I suppose. I see no good he has brought to England, for all his traffic as ambassador. The king repents him that Barnes was ever employed.’

They bring in pickled greens, and pears in an aromatic syrup, and quince marmalade. Stephen says, ‘Norfolk is precipitate, but he is right. Don’t you feel the wind changing? You told the king that without the Germans he was destitute of friends. And that was true. But once the alliance melts away, Henry will be courted again, by France and Emperor both.’

‘I do not understand how Norfolk thinks he can see the future. When usually he cannot see the end of his nose.’

‘You forget, it is only weeks since he was in France himself. I believe that François made overtures of friendship that were – I will not say hidden – but they were private. Entrusted to the duke, but not to you.’

So, he says.

‘I know you have people of yours in every man’s service, at home and abroad. I know they are spying and prying and copying and purloining from chests and thieving keys. I have suffered from them in my own house.’

‘As I have suffered, Stephen. From your men.’

‘But you are not omniscient. Nor are you omnipresent. Have you been thinking you were? Did you think you were God?’

‘No,’ he says. ‘God’s spy.’

‘Then spy out the facts,’ Stephen says. ‘If the king believes he does not need the friendship of Cleves, then considering his intractable dislike of the lady, there is only one course, which is to work out how to free him.’

He pushes his glass away. Like Norfolk, but less hastily, he extracts himself from the table linen. Gardiner is no fool. A demon, but no fool. ‘Good marmalade,’ he says. ‘I think it is Lady Lisle’s recipe? The king often praises it.’

‘She sends it to us all,’ Gardiner says, as if excusing himself.

‘To all those she wishes to please. Does she wrap letters around it?’

Gardiner looks at him with appreciation. ‘By God, nothing gets by you, does it? Not even the preserves.’ He sighs. ‘Thomas, we both know what it is to serve this king. We know it is impossible. The question is, who can best endure impossibility? You have never lost his favour. I have lost it many times. And yet –’

‘And yet here you are. Looking to be back on the council.’

Stephen ushers him out: the open air. ‘You know what the king wants. That we should sink our differences in service to him. That we should declare ourselves entire perfect friends.’

They touch palms, coldly. As he runs down the steps to the wharf, Stephen calls, ‘Cromwell? Mind your back.’

It is a raw day of splintering sunlight, the first sign of the season changing. His barge takes him back across the river. On his flag, little black birds flutter: the cardinal’s choughs, dancing about their pole.

His bargemaster says, ‘We saw the duke’s barge, and we said, by the Mass, pity my lord – Norfolk and Gardiner, both?’

He says, ‘I feel to my master the king as I do to Christ, hanging between two thieves.’

He takes off his glove, slides a hand inside his garments. When his hand appears again, his knife is in it. ‘Christophe?’ he says. ‘This is yours now. Try not to use it.’

Christophe turns the knife over in his hands. ‘I shall stand taller for owning it. Why do you part with it now?’

‘Because I almost stuck it in Norfolk.’ From his crew, a subdued cheer. ‘You can tell Mr Sadler I have surrendered it.’ Rafe wanted me to grow up, he thinks, before I grow old.