The Crown A Novel

10


Bess, stop trembling.” The candlelight leaped and shook against the dark walls, because of her unsteady grip.

“I’m sorry, Mistress Stafford, I can’t help it.” Bess’s loud voice echoed down the long tunnel.

“Don’t use my true name, please.”

She ducked her head, and I regretted having to scold her. But Bess risked her life for me, and I had to do everything in my power to protect her.

Scratch. Scratch. Scratch.

The sound came from behind me, like long ragged fingernails clawing a wooden stake. This time I didn’t turn around. Bess had warned me that vermin overran the underground tunnel. “We keep setting loose more cats, but it’s the cats that disappear, not the rats.”

Ever since I’d set foot in this dank tunnel, I’d heard them: mostly behind us, but sometimes I’d catch a glimpse of one ahead, a long shiny tail whipping across the narrow passage, on the edge of our quivering circle of candlelight.

“Rats and ravens,” Bess muttered. “My sister’s friends think I put on airs. Humph. It’s rats and ravens everywhere. Not the sort of royal palace they expect.”

I let her go on. Nervous grumbling could help settle her nerves.

Not more than an hour ago, I’d managed to persuade her to help me on my mission. Wearing a makeshift white hood, I posed as Susanna, toting a bundle of clean bedsheets. The male prisoner who faced questioning the next day by the Duke of Norfolk needed new bedding—that was what we would tell anyone who made inquiry. Susanna and I were of similar height and figure, with the same black hair. She was some five years older, but at night, with my eyes cast down, wearing her trademark hood, I hoped to pass for her, scuttling after Bess. She was a maid of the prison, while Bess served Lady Kingston. It was to be expected that Susanna would walk behind.

We’d come across only one yeoman warder so far, checking some papers on the main floor of Beauchamp Tower. I’d held my bundle of sheets as high as I could, so that my face was nearly obscured. It worked as well as I’d prayed. The warder glanced at Bess and me and then returned to his papers. Within minutes Bess had unlocked the door to the underground tunnel and we were down the steps.

At the other end was the White Tower . . . and my father.

I’d thought of him so often, it felt unreal that I would finally come face-to-face with him, speak to him, gain his counsel on what I should do when interrogated tomorrow. Bess said we dared stay only a few minutes. Would there be time, I fretted, would it be possible for me to ask the question pressing on my mind for months. It was, unfortunately, the same question that the Duke of Norfolk tossed at me in such a crude fashion: “Your father almost blew himself up with gunpowder—why would he do that for his dead brother’s bastard?” I simply did not know. My darkest fear was that, without the company of wife or child, my father had gone a little mad at Stafford Castle. If through some miracle he and I were to be freed from the Tower, I’d already vowed to make him the center of my life. There was no question of returning to Dartford. My offenses against the Dominican Order were too serious. But if I could look after my father, at Stafford Castle or anywhere else he deemed best, I would never stop thanking Christ for His mercies. I cherished a picture in my mind, of ladling soup into a bowl for my father as he smiled at me, restored to hale health, his hounds at his feet, a fire roaring.

Bess suddenly stopped short, and I bumped into her. She nearly dropped her ring of keys.

Two enormous rats squatted in front of us, in the center of the tunnel floor. They didn’t scuttle away like all the others. They half turned to face us, the candlelight reflected in their fiery red eyes.

“Lord keep us,” whispered Bess. “They’re like demons, aren’t they? It’s a bad omen, I know.”

I needed to vanquish these rats, or Bess could lose courage. Slowly, I edged around her to get out in front. My heart pounding, I took one step forward, then another.

The rats did not budge.

“Be gone!” I cried, and stomped my right foot hard, just a few inches from their heads.

This, at last, drove them back. Both rats scampered to a hole at the bottom of the tunnel wall and pushed their swollen bodies through it. The second rat paused halfway through, as if stuck, then, turning sideways, squeezed the rest of the way, its thick tail twirling and slapping the side of the hole like a whip before disappearing.

“Thank you,” Bess said. In the candlelight she was pale as ivory, beads of perspiration bubbling on her upper lip.

“Are we almost there?” I asked.

“Yes—look.” She held up her candle to toss the light farther and show me the steps that appeared at the end. As she did so, her hand shook again, and she looked at me, her face an apology. We both knew that it was within the White Tower that we ran the greatest risk of discovery.

I shifted my bundle to my left hip and laid my right hand on her shoulder.

“ ‘Behold, now bless ye the Lord, all ye servants of the Lord. In the night lift up your hands to the holy places, and bless ye the Lord. I have cried to thee, O Lord, hear me; hearken to my voice when I cry to thee. And protect me ever after. Amen.’ ”

“That was beautiful,” Bess whispered.

I smiled sadly. “The words of Saint Dominic, the founder of my order.”

“Mistress, I pray I don’t fail you.”

“You have already done more for me than anyone else since . . .” My voice trailed away as Geoffrey Scovill’s young face flashed in front of me, his eyes brimming with pain over my insult, the last words he’d heard from me. There was no point to this now. I shoved him out of my thoughts.

“Let us go forward, Bess.”

We climbed the steps, and when we reached the top, Bess unlocked the door to the White Tower.

We stepped into an enormous hall. The light from Bess’s candle didn’t even reach the back wall of it. There was not a sound. I knew that Sir William and Lady Kingston kept apartments in the White Tower, as did the king’s disgraced niece, Lady Margaret Douglas, and perhaps others down below, too, besides my father. Yet now, in this eerily silent space, we seemed quite alone.

Bess and I hurried across the stone floor. The air felt much cooler than in the dank tunnel; a faint breeze fingered my bare neck, though I couldn’t make out any windows. I realized from the jutting shape of one stone wall that it was a massive bulwark. With a chill, I felt the strength of the keep’s creator: the greatness but also the fear and greed of William the Conqueror. He’d fashioned this citadel five hundred years ago to house his Norman pride and crush the Saxons. This must have been an enormous banquet or reception hall for early kings. I fought down an absurd fear that the conqueror himself would stalk toward me from the shadows, his chain-mail armor clanking on the smooth floor.

We passed through a series of vaulted rooms. Larger windows shed more moonlight. I could see a faint gold and scarlet light shimmer at the other side of one of the rooms. It wasn’t from the moon or from candlelight; it was something else entirely. I tugged on Bess’s arm. “It’s the chapel,” she said hurriedly, without stopping. So those were stained-glass windows. I longed to go there, to pray for divine assistance, but of course there was no time.

After a few more minutes, I saw another light flickering in the distance, stronger than a candle. It was a torch fixed to a wall. Bess straightened her shoulders in front of me, and I knew this was our destination. My heart beat faster as I followed her.

Below the torch sat an empty chair and a table. I heard a footfall, another, and then a yeoman warder came into sight, a tall one with a long black beard.

“Hello, Tom,” called out Bess.

I raised the bundle higher, so that it covered the lower half of my face, even though doing so made my arms ache.

“Bess, what are you about? I never see you down here.” Tom’s voice was friendly.

“We need to get fresh bedding to the nobleman on the south passage,” she said.

“Tonight?”

“His Grace, the Duke of Norfolk, will be questioning him tomorrow. He doesn’t like it when the lords and ladies reek, you know that.”

Tom didn’t say anything. My heart pounded even faster. I stayed fixed on the empty chair; I didn’t want to meet his eyes.

“By dogfish, is that Susanna?” he burst out, his voice excited.

I could not breathe nor move a muscle.

Bess’s voice sounded strained now. “I didn’t know you were friend to Susanna.”

“I haven’t seen you in more than a year; you keep yourself close at Beauchamp, don’t you, woman?”

Still I said and did nothing. I felt frozen.

“Why won’t you speak to me?” Tom took a heavy step toward me. “Are you still angry over May Day?”

I lowered my bundle. The warmth from the torch’s flame danced on my cheeks.

“No,” I said in a low voice.

I looked into his face, felt his brown eyes boring into mine. I moved my lips into a smile.

Remarkably, he smiled back. Two teeth were missing. “You’re looking bonny, Susanna.”

Bess said, her voice turning shrill, “We have our work to do, Tom.”

“Yes, I’ll take you down to the cell myself,” he said, picking up a set of keys.

“No,” Bess said quickly. “Just give me that key.”

“It’s dark down there,” he said. “I haven’t lit the torches. Why shouldn’t you want my help?”

There was nothing I could think of to say, nor Bess. Silently, we followed him down a series of passageways. His red-and-gold uniform was stained and even slightly ripped, I saw when he paused to light the first torch. He was more unkempt than other warders I’d seen. I wondered if the men assigned to nights at the Tower were of lesser stuff.

Tom hummed a song as he walked to my father’s cell, turning around every so often to smile at me, as if I’d recognize the tune. I would always nod back. I was braced for him to squint a little harder, to realize I wasn’t the woman he thought. But he did not.

After what seemed like an eternity, Tom stopped and lit a torch fixed to the wall with his own. He pounded on the wooden door next to it. “Prisoner, attend!” he thundered. “You have company.”

Tom opened the door with his key. It yawned open into a black space. Bess nudged in behind me with her short candle. I could make out a bed in the corner with a long inert body on top.

“You’re right, it does reek in here,” Tom said. “You need help?”

“This is woman’s work,” Bess said firmly. “Leave us with him. It will take but ten minutes.”

Tom grunted. “Right. I shouldn’t leave my post for that long.” He backed away and closed the door. I heard the key turn.

Bess placed her candle on the floor next to the door and grabbed my sheets. “I’ll do the work while you talk,” she said.

I sprinted across the room. “Father, wake up, it’s me. Joanna. Please, wake up.”

He lay facedown under a blanket, and I shook his shoulder. It felt sharp and bony; he’d lost weight.

He didn’t awaken, and fear surged through me. Had my father died in his cell? I reached up and felt for his thick hair; I could hardly see him in the faint candlelight. His head stirred at last under my fingers; he turned and opened his eyes.

The man was not my father.

“No!” I howled. “This can’t be.”

Bess flew to my side. “What’s wrong?”

“He’s not my father.”

“But he has to be,” she insisted. “Unless . . .”

“What?”

“We didn’t say ‘Stafford.’ There must be a second nobleman on this passageway, and he assumed this was the man we meant would be questioned by Norfolk. Oh, no.”

I pounded my thigh with my fist. “We have to get Tom to take us to my father.”

“No, no, mistress.” Bess shook her head. “We can’t. It will seem too strange. I fear he’s half suspected something’s amiss already.”

A croaking sound interrupted us. With a start, we realized it was the man on the bed, listening while we talked.

“I know you,” he said hoarsely. “Joanna. Stafford. What are you doing here?”

I looked down. There was nothing familiar about him: a pair of huge dark eyes in a gaunt face. His cheekbones stuck out of his face; his lips were cracked and white. “It’s Charles.” His voice was broken, gasping. “Charles Howard.”

Bess gasped. “The man who tried to marry Lady Margaret Douglas!”

I couldn’t believe it. The rash, swaggering young Howard who’d mocked me years ago at Stafford Castle bore no resemblance to this skeleton.

“Charles, was it you? You wooed the king’s niece?” I asked.

He closed his eyes and nodded.

“Does your brother know you are this ill? Has the Duke of Norfolk been informed?”

He shuddered, and I feared he was convulsing. But he was laughing. The way his mouth twisted, I finally recognized him as Charles.

“Stop,” I patted his quaking shoulder. “You’ll make yourself worse.”

“I am dying of lung rot, Joanna. It’s what my brother wants. It’s what everyone wants. Best way to solve it.”

“Solve what?”

“My treason.” He struggled to gain his breath. “Our treason. But how she loved me. The poems she wrote . . .” His voice dissolved into sputtering coughs.

Bess stirred next to me. “And she loves you, too, sir. I know. I’ve waited on her.” I wondered at that. Bess had told me stories only of a peevish girl, raging against her royal uncle’s punishment. But I silently thanked her for her kindness.

Indeed, Charles seemed to draw strength from what Bess said. “Does she love me still?” His words came faster now. “I’ve thought she wanted me dead, too. Then she could marry someone else with the king’s permission.” He blinked, looked us over with more alertness. “But why are you here?”

Bess said, “You tell him, mistress, while I change the bedding. We’ll have to lift him out first.”

The two of us lifted his poor body out of the bed, an easy task as he had wasted away almost to nothing. We settled him in the room’s chair, and I told him of Margaret’s burning, our arrests, the Duke of Norfolk’s questioning, and the news Bess had heard that led us mistakenly to his cell.

“A man my brother pays heed to besides the king?” Charles wondered. “He thinks everyone’s a fool.”

I shook my head. “I was hoping my father would know.”

Bess asked, “Could it be Archbishop Cranmer? Or Cromwell? They’ve both been here to question prisoners.”

Charles thought about it. “Aye, those are the two most important men in the land. But my brother hates the Archbishop of Canterbury and the Lord Privy Seal with all his soul. He pays no heed to them, nor ever would.”

“He hates them?” I asked, surprised.

“His Grace, my loving brother, despises men of common birth raised up by the king. And they are both enemies of the old faith. So he is not aligned with them.”

“But the duke doesn’t care for the old faith—he led the armies against the rebellion.” I said, confused. “He had every rebel hanged.”

“My brother would never say no to the king’s commission, but he prefers the old ways.” Charles shrugged. “He’s like Gardiner.”

“The Bishop of Winchester?” Bess asked.

“Aye, that’s the one. Wily Winchester. If there’s any man my brother pays heed to, it’s him. But he’s in France. King got angry with him and made him permanent ambassador. Couldn’t be Gardiner coming to see you.” He started coughing again, a horrible ripping noise. When he took his hand away from his mouth, I saw fresh blood on it.

There was a pounding on the door. “Are you ready?” Tom called from the passageway.

“Give us a minute,” Bess shouted. To Charles Howard, she said, “Sir, we need to get you back into bed.”

He nodded. “Good luck to you,” he whispered as we laid him back on his fresh sheets.

I kissed his frail, hot cheek. “Good-bye.”

Bess was by the door, waiting. I grabbed her sleeve. “Let me try to persuade Tom to take me to my father,” I pleaded. “We can say he needs his bedding changed as well. We’ve come all this way.”

She shook her head. “Mistress, it won’t work. I feel it. We will be revealed when—”

The door swung open, and Tom stuck his head in. “All finished?”

“Yes,” Bess said. “We have only to take the old sheets to be burned.”

“Leave them in the passageway,” he said. “I’ll see it’s done.”

We shuffled out; he closed the door behind us, locked it, and then stood there. He didn’t lead us away. I opened my mouth to make my plea, but closed it. There was something odd in Tom’s eyes when he looked down at me. And I didn’t have my bundle to hide behind anymore.

“I checked with the officer of the watch,” he said slowly. “He knew of no orders to clean Lord Howard’s cell or anyone else’s this late at night. It can always be done in the morning. I didn’t think that made much sense.”

My throat tightened.

“We had the orders,” Bess said. “You’ll see.”

Tom sneered at her. “Perhaps you took him a love letter from Lady Douglas?”

“Of course not,” Bess said indignantly. “Check the cell yourself.”

“I don’t think I will,” Tom said, his eyes lingering on me.

I heard a faint rushing in my ears.

He jerked his head forward. “Let’s go.”

We followed him down the passageway. I glanced at the wooden doors along the way. Was my father behind one of them? I’d lost all in my gamble to find him. And not only that. I’d brought Bess down with me. Frantically, I tried to think of some way to save her, to excuse her involvement, but nothing seemed plausible.

We reached Tom’s station. I expected him to call for a fellow warder and march us to our fate.

He did not.

Tom grabbed my arm and pulled me close. His rough beard scratched my forehead. “Come with me, Susanna.” I tried to pull away but couldn’t.

Bess demanded: “What are you doing, Tom?”

“You two lasses are up to no good, but I won’t say a word. All that’s required is a bit of time alone with Susanna, and then I’ll take you both to maids’ quarters for the night, and no one’s the wiser.”

“No,” I said.

“Come, Susanna, it’s not like we haven’t done it before. Course I was sore drunk that night. But I remember your sweet mouth. And I’m dead sober now, sweetheart.”

“I won’t let you take her away from me,” Bess howled.

“You can watch if you like, Bess, I don’t mind,” Tom said.

It happened in a flash. Bess stomped on the inside of Tom’s right foot. He let go of me, yelping and hunched over in pain, and then Bess made her two fists into a club and hit him on the back of the neck. His stomach hit the floor, hard.

“Run!” Bess grabbed me, and we sprinted into the darkness of the White Tower.