The Mirror and the Light

‘I hope I live so long,’ Mercy says. ‘I blame Thomas More for Tyndale, his nest of spies that lived on after he was dead, and if I thought the dead in their graves felt pain I would grub him from the ground and kick him up and down Cheap, for what he inflicted on men and women who are nearer to God than he will ever be.’

‘Blessed are the meek,’ he says.

‘Yes, so they claim. I notice where it gets you.’

He has often thought, these last weeks, that if you matched the king’s daughter with Tyndale – to see which was the more stubborn, the more set on self-destruction – it would be a close contest. ‘But you see,’ he says, ‘she has yielded. If we bring her to Hackney, then if it goes ill, the king can quickly be away.’

For the last year, he has been rebuilding a place made over to the king by the Earl of Northumberland. Young Harry Percy is sick, and deep in debt to the crown. He offered in part-payment the house with all its contents; Henry had said, why don’t you move in, Crumb, during the renovations, then you can keep a hand on the workmen? With young Sadler building his house just across the meadow, you can redirect the labour as needed … The king had sent seasoned oak from the royal forests, and he and Rafe had set up a brickfield, the water from the brook supplying it. Mercy had said, ‘You’ll see, Thomas, as soon as all the hard work is done, Henry will turn you out.’

Of course – but it’s the king’s house, after all. He is laying out a new garden and he has ambassadors alert for cuttings and seeds, of plants not grown in England. Light will flood the old rooms. There will be no HA-HAs, nor need he bear the arrogance of Hone’s glaziers – James Nicholson is just as skilled at a lower rate. He has walked the ground with the builders, deep in talk about pipes and culverts, the capacity of cisterns, hidden springs that can be tapped. Even in his early days at Austin Friars, he had made a bathroom, but it is hard to get piped water to more than a trickle; you need a healthy supply for a kitchen, if it has to feed a king.

‘Will you come out there?’ he asks Mercy. ‘Everything must be ready for royal ladies to lodge one night.’

‘Helen Sadler will do it. I am too old to go jolting out to the country. And as neither of us have ever been near the court, she can guess as well as I what is wanted. Mary is only human, I suppose, and a girl like other young girls.’

Yes, he thinks, and Jane a queen like other queens. Henry has been showing her off to the ambassadors, allowing her to converse. He is surprised – everyone is surprised – by her calm and poise. But afterwards she seems to withdraw into herself. During her first week on show, her eyes had sought out her brothers, or his, for a signal what to do. The women around her are still set fluttering by any disturbance. Francis Bryan says, what do you expect, Thomas? It is only weeks since you were questioning them one by one and tying their poor little stories in knots. They need time to recover from the fright.

The day is upon us. Helen has a list in hand. Harry Percy’s furnishings have been under covers to protect them from plaster dust and the smell of fresh paint. In the chief bedchamber, the earl’s arms have been unpicked from bed hangings of blue and cloth of gold. The counterpane of gold damask and blue velvet came with the house; beneath it, layers of new blankets of dense white wool. He woke, this morning, thinking of Tyndale, lying in the running damp. If the executioner does not kill him, another winter will. In Antwerp they slide the printed sheets of the gospels between the folds of bales of cloth, where they hide, white against white. Warm, nestled, God whispers within each bundle; His word sails the sea, is unloaded in eastern ports, travels to London in a cart. He makes a note to himself: Tyndale, talk to Henry, try again.

For the Lady Mary’s use, he has advised choosing the warmest room in the house. A great bed of down is ready, hangings of tawny velvet, cushions of russet velvet and figured green satin. ‘It could be a bridal bed,’ Helen says. He can see the pleasure it gives her – a poor girl, brought up hard – to handle the fine stuff and have a brigade of cushions at her command. She says, ‘I have moved the great purple chair to the gallery for the king. I must find a lower one for the queen. There is a little gold brocade chair for the Lady Mary. They say she is spare of habit and small.’ She hesitates. ‘Shall I see her?’

Helen is the wife of a man in the king’s privy chamber, close to his person; why should she not make her curtsey? But there are customs, and she will not break them. ‘When you show them in to their supper, I shall stand with the servants. You must not bring me forward, I should not like that.’

They are in the gallery as they speak; Helen looks up at the arras, at the white thread limbs of running figures, a maid with streaming hair. ‘I have no idea who these folk are.’