somehow he thinks that's what Norris is, and he feels an irrational dislike taking root, and he tries to dismiss it, because he prefers his dislikes rational, but after all, these circumstances are extreme, the cardinal in the mud, the humiliating tussle to get him back in the saddle, the talking, talking on the barge, and worse, the talking, talking on his knees, as if Wolsey's unravelling, in a great unweaving of scarlet thread that might lead you back into a scarlet labyrinth, with a dying monster at its heart.
‘Master Cromwell?’ Norris says.
He can hardly say what he's thinking; so he looks down at Norris, his expression softened, and says, ‘Thanks for this much comfort.’
‘Well, take my lord cardinal out of the rain. I'll tell the king how I found him.’
‘Tell him how you knelt in the mud together. He might be amused.’
‘Yes.’ Norris looks sad. ‘You never know what will do it.’
It is at this point that Patch starts screaming. The cardinal, it seems – casting around for a gift – has given him to the king. Patch, he has often said, is worth a thousand pounds. He is to go with Norris, no time like the present; and it takes four more of the cardinal's men to subdue him to the purpose. He fights. He bites. He lashes out with fists and feet. Till he is thrown on to a baggage mule, stripped of its baggage; till he begins to cry, hiccupping, his ribs heaving, his stupid feet dangling, his coat torn and the feather in his hat broken off to a stub.
‘But Patch,’ the cardinal says, ‘my dear fellow. You shall see me often, once the king and I understand each other again. My dear Patch, I will write you a letter, a letter of your own. I shall write it tonight,’ he promises, ‘and put my big seal on it. The king will cherish you; he is the kindest soul in Christendom.’
Patch wails on a single thin note, like someone taken by the Turks and impaled.
There, he says to Cavendish, he's more than one kind of fool. He shouldn't have drawn attention to himself, should he.
Esher: the cardinal dismounts under the shadow of old Bishop Wayneflete's keep, surmounted by octagonal towers. The gateway is set into a defensive wall topped with a walkway; stern enough at first sight, but the whole thing is built of brick, ornamented and prettily inlaid. ‘You couldn't fortify it,’ he says. Cavendish is silent. ‘George, you're supposed to say, “But the need could never arise.”’
The cardinal's not used the place since he built Hampton Court. They've sent messages ahead, but has anything been done? Make my lord comfortable, he says, and goes straight down to the kitchens. At Hampton Court, the kitchens have running water; here, nothing's running but the cooks' noses. Cavendish is right. In fact it is worse than he thinks. The larders are impoverished and such supplies as they have show signs of ill-keeping and plunder. There are weevils in the flour. There are mouse droppings where the pastry should be rolled. It is nearly Martinmas, and they have not even thought of salting their beef. The batterie de cuisine is an insult, and the stockpot is mildewed. There are a number of small boys sitting by the hearth, and, for cash down, they can be induced into scouring and scrubbing; children take readily to novelty, and the idea of cleaning, it seems, is novel to them.
My lord, he says, needs to eat and drink now; and he needs to eat and drink for … how long we don't know. This kitchen must be put in order for the winter ahead. He finds someone who can write, and dictates his orders. His eyes are fixed on the kitchen clerk. On his left hand he counts off the items: you do this, then this, then thirdly this. With his right hand, he breaks eggs into a basin, each one with a hard professional tap, and between his fingers the white drips, sticky and slow, from the yolk. ‘How old is this egg? Change your supplier. I want a nutmeg. Nutmeg? Saffron?’ They look at him as if he's speaking Greek. Patch's thin scream is still hurting his ears. Dusty angels look down on him as he pounds back to the hall.
It is late before they get the cardinal into any sort of bed worthy of the name. Where is his household steward? Where is his comptroller? By this time, he feels it is true that he and Cavendish are old survivors of a campaign. He stays up with Cavendish – not that there are beds, if they wanted them – working out what they need to keep the cardinal in reasonable comfort; they need plate, unless my lord's going to dine off dented pewter, they need bedsheets, table linen, firewood. ‘I will send some people,’ he says, ‘to sort out the kitchens. They will be Italian. It will be violent at first, but then after three weeks it will work.’
Three weeks? He wants to set those children cleaning the copper. ‘Can we get lemons?’ he asks, just as Cavendish says, ‘So who will be Chancellor now?’
I wonder, he thinks, are there rats down there? Cavendish says, ‘Recall His Grace of Canterbury?’
Recall him – fifteen years after the cardinal chivvied him out of that office? ‘No, Warham's too old.’ And too stubborn, too unaccommodating to the king's wishes. ‘And not the Duke of Suffolk’ – because in his view Charles Brandon is no brighter than Christopher the mule, though better at fighting and fashion and generally showing off – ‘not Suffolk, because the Duke of Norfolk won't have him.’
‘And vice versa.’ Cavendish nods. ‘Bishop Tunstall?’
‘No. Thomas More.’
‘But, a layman and a commoner? And when he's so opposed in the matter of the king's marriage suit.’
He nods, yes, yes, it will be More. The king is known for putting out his conscience to high bidders. Perhaps he hopes to be saved from himself.
‘If the king offers it – and I see that, as a gesture, he might – surely Thomas More won't accept?’
‘He will.’
‘Bet?’ says Cavendish.
They agree the terms and shake hands on it. It takes their mind off the urgent problem, which is the rats, and the cold; which is the question of how they can pack a household staff of several hundred, retained at Westminster, into the much smaller space at Esher. The cardinal's staff, if you include his principal houses, and count them up from priests, law clerks, down to floor-sweepers and laundresses, is about six hundred souls. They expect three hundred following them immediately. ‘As things stand, we'll have to break up the household,’ Cavendish says. ‘But we've no ready money for wages.’
‘I'm damned if they're going unpaid,’ he says, and Cavendish says, ‘I think you are anyway. After what you said about the relic.’
He catches George's eye. They start to laugh. At least they've got something worthwhile to drink; the cellars are full, which is lucky, Cavendish says, because we'll need a drink over the next weeks. ‘What do you think Norris meant?’ George says. ‘How can the king be in two minds? How can my lord cardinal be dismissed if he doesn't want to dismiss him? How can the king give way to my lord's enemies? Isn't the king master, over all the enemies?’
‘You would think so.’
‘Or is it her? It must be. He's frightened of her, you know. She's a witch.’
He says, don't be childish. George says, she is so a witch: the Duke of Norfolk says she is, and he's her uncle, he should know.
It's two o'clock, then it's three; sometimes it's freeing, to think you don't have to go to bed because there isn't a bed. He doesn't need to think of going home; there's no home to go to, he's got no family left. He'd rather be here drinking with Cavendish, huddled in a corner of the great chamber at Esher, cold and tired and
