I looked at their mother’s empty chair, facing what was left of the painting, the embroidery still lying on the seat.
‘He died so suddenly, our father. Why did he leave us? Why?’ She wept again, the tears of a lost child. ‘Oh, Edward! I drove him to that unclean act. All these years I could have confessed; the old faith allows that if you repent and confess your sins it is enough, you are forgiven. His faith did not allow even that. But I – ’ her voice fell to a whisper – ‘my hardened heart would not allow me to confess. But it was both of us together did that thing, both of us!’
I jumped at the sound of a sharp knock at the door. I heard Vowell and another voice, and then Vincent Dyrick strode into the room, gown billowing theatrically behind him, his lean hawk face furious. He looked at Nicholas and me, at Isabel weeping on the floor, then gaped at the wrecked painting.
‘Shardlake! What have you done? Why is my client in this state?’
I rose slowly to my feet, my knees cracking and my back protesting in pain. Isabel was looking at Dyrick; it was the same puzzled, otherworldly look Edward had worn in the Tower, as though she barely understood who he was.
‘Ask her,’ I answered heavily.
Dyrick was staring again at the painting. Perhaps he saw the prospect of endless fees from this case trickling away like the plaster dust still falling from the ruined wall. ‘Who did this?’
‘Isabel, I fear.’
‘Christ’s wounds!’ Dyrick looked down at his client. Isabel was still hunched over, so ashamed she could not meet our eyes. ‘See her condition – ’ He pointed at me. ‘I cannot be held responsible for anything she has done! It was she who insisted on sending a copy of that complaint to the Privy Council. I tried to dissuade her!’
‘I know. And I may tell you, since Isabel is your client and you must keep it confidential, that Edward and Isabel conspired to murder their stepfather the best part of half a century ago. Edward has killed himself, and Isabel might have done the same had we not come in time.’ I looked again at the painting. ‘This is a tragedy, Dyrick. One made worse by the tangles of litigation, as their mother intended. My efforts with Brother Coleswyn to find a settlement only uncovered a horror,’ I added sadly.
I stepped wearily to the door. Dyrick looked down at Isabel.
‘Wait!’ he said, turning. ‘You cannot leave me alone with her, in this state – ’
‘Vowell will help you bind her wound. Then, if you will take my honest advice, you should send for her priest. Make sure it is him, she is of the old religion and it matters to her. He may be able to help her, I do not know.’ I turned to Nicholas. He was looking at the face of Isabel’s father, still staring out from the wreckage with his benevolent, confident, patrician air. ‘Come, lad,’ I said. We walked past Dyrick, past old Vowell, out into the street.
There, in the August sunshine, I turned to Nicholas. ‘You saved her.’
‘She came to this, even with a good and loving father,’ he said quietly. And I realized with a chill that his parents’ letter had brought thoughts of suicide to Nicholas as well. But he had rejected them, and that was why he had been so passionate with Isabel. ‘What will happen to her?’ he asked.
‘I do not know.’
‘Perhaps it is too late for that poor woman now.’ Nicholas took a deep breath and stared at me, his green eyes hard and serious. ‘But not for me.’
EARLY THE FOLLOWING AFTERNOON I stood at the front of a great concourse outside the church of St Michael le Querne, which gave onto the open space at the west end of Cheapside. More crowds lined the length of Cheapside, along which Admiral d’Annebault would shortly progress. Mayor Bowes, whom I had last seen at Anne Askew’s burning, stood alone on a little platform. I waited in a line with the aldermen and other leading citizens of London, all wearing our gold chains. As at the burnings, a white-robed cleric stood at a makeshift lectern, but on this occasion he was to deliver an oration in French, welcoming the admiral to the city. There was a steady murmur of voices, while water tinkled in the conduit by the church.