“My lady delights in buying things and has the wherewithal to indulge herself,” Cat said proudly.

“You look very fine yourself. I envy you that crimson velvet. Queen Catherine gifted her attendants with livery to match that of the officers of the king’s privy chamber, but black is not my favorite shade.”

“You have no cause for complaint. You are just where you wanted to be—at court. Have you done anything to help our mother and sisters?”

“There are good reasons why I have not yet approached the king. His moods are uncertain. I do not wish to incur his wrath. We must be patient.”

Cat did not look convinced.

“Are you happy in the service of Anna of Cleves?” Nan asked.

“I am,” Cat said. “She is a good mistress. But do not try to change the subject. What are you waiting for? If I were here, in your position, I would have found a way to ask the king for a pardon long before this.”

Nan sighed. In the face of Cat’s criticism, she had to admit that she had not tried very hard to find the right moment. She’d let fear rule her. But what if there never was a perfect time to ask a boon of the king?

“Soon, Cat,” she promised. “I will talk to His Grace soon.”

The next day, after dinner, the king presented Queen Catherine with more gifts—two lapdogs and a ring. She thanked him prettily and then, with a look that asked permission first, gave them to Anna of Cleves. Since Nan knew that Catherine Howard was not overly fond of spaniels and that the ring was not nearly as magnificent as the other jewels the king had given her, she supposed that His Grace had approved the gesture beforehand.

The king’s honorary sister and Nan’s real one stayed at Hampton Court for one more night and left the next afternoon. Cat’s disapproval weighed heavily on Nan. Two days later, seeing that the king was in an especially jovial frame of mind, Nan gathered her courage and approached him during one of his visits to the queen’s presence chamber. “A word with you, Your Grace?”

“Why, Nan! What a vision you are.”

“You are too kind, Your Grace.” She slanted a glance at the queen, but Catherine was winning at cards and paid them no mind. “I crave a moment’s conversation, if it please you, Your Majesty.”

Nan hated to grovel, but it was necessary. When King Henry led her a little aside, into a window alcove, and gestured for his attendants to keep their distance, she essayed a few flattering remarks before she broached the subject of her sisters’ confinement in Calais. She was not yet ready to risk asking favors for her mother.

“To whom do you refer, my dear?” The king did not seem to know what she was talking about. Had he truly forgotten that he’d imprisoned most of her family?

“To my oldest sister, Philippa Bassett, and to the youngest, Mary Bassett. They have been the … guests of two citizens of Calais for some time now. If Your Grace would permit them to return to England, they might live at Tehidy in Cornwall, one of the properties my brother John Bassett inherited from our late father.” She took care not to mention Lord Lisle’s name, or to remind the king that Mary was the one who had illegally betrothed herself to a minor French nobleman.

Peering through her lashes, Nan could not read the king’s expression. Was that a frown of displeasure? Or merely the result of intense concentration? Her stomach twisted into knots as she waited for him to speak. She did not dare say more for fear of irritating him.

“Hmmm,” King Henry said at last. “I suppose there is no harm in it, so long as they both rusticate in the country upon their return.”

“You are most generous, Your Grace.” She deepened her obeisance, nearly touching her head to the floor.

He lifted her up, beaming at her, and signaled for Anthony Denny to approach. “Denny, remind me on the morrow to order the release of Mistress Philippa Bassett and Mistress Mary Bassett. They are to be conveyed from Calais to Cornwall at my expense.”

“As you wish, Your Grace,” Denny said, bowing low.

Well pleased with his own generosity, King Henry returned to his queen’s side. She’d noticed his absence and did not look happy to see him in such close proximity to Nan.

When Denny started to follow the king, Nan caught his arm. “Will His Grace keep his word?”

Denny winked at her. “If I have everything ready for his signature and seal, he will not even read what he’s signing. He’s that anxious to dispense with routine business and return to enjoying the company of his bride.”


The Deputy of Calais, my Lord Lisle, hath not been led to judgment; and it is said that he shall be kept prisoner in the Tower for his life, where he is somewhat more at large than formerly he was. And in truth, Sire, certain noblemen of this Court have said to me that on several occasions they have heard the King their master say that the said Lord Deputy hath erred more through simplicity and ignorance than by malice.

—Charles de Marillac, French ambassador to England, to the king of France, 18 July 1541

15

Ned Corbett started his search for Sir Gregory Botolph in Louvain, then moved on through the Low Countries until at last he located his quarry in a nondescript tavern in an obscure Flemish town.

“So, Botolph,” Ned said to him, “we meet again.”

With extreme caution, Botolph reached up, took the point of Ned’s knife between his fingertips, and eased it away from his own neck. Ned sheathed the weapon and slid onto the bench opposite Botolph’s stool. All around them he heard the fragments of conversation and the bursts of laughter typical of a dark, noisy tavern. This one was much like the places Ned had frequented in London and Calais, but here the language being spoken was not English.

“My man, Browne, is right behind you, Botolph, should you decide to flee.”

“Where would I go, Ned? Indeed, I am glad to see a friendly face in this godforsaken place.”

“I’ve no desire to be your friend and every inclination to spill your blood for what you did to me and to Philpott and to the others.”

“What I did?” With exaggerated calm, he took a swallow of beer, watching Ned over the rim of the tankard. “I did not coerce anyone. I used no force or violence. Clement Philpott brought disaster down upon his own head by betraying all he believed in.” He sipped again and grinned, unrepentant. “Indeed, if all had gone according to plan, my friend, you’d have been the one to cry foul treason to Lord Lisle.”

After following Botolph’s trail for six months, Ned was not inclined to rush the other man’s explanation. He signaled to the tavern keeper for a beer of his own and one for Browne and motioned for his servant to take a seat on the other side of Botolph.

“I want the true story,” he said when he’d downed enough of the dark, frothy brew to take the edge off his thirst. “All of it. Your mad scheme cost good men their lives and forced others into exile.”

Botolph shrugged. “I am not the villain here, but the man responsible is beyond your reach.”

“Who?”

“Thomas Cromwell.”

“Cromwell’s dead.”

“Precisely.”

Ned’s initial reaction was disbelief. He already knew Botolph was a practiced liar. But something about the fellow’s demeanor made him think that, unlikely as it seemed, he might be telling the truth. “Start at the beginning.”

“I stole some plate when I was a canon. In hindsight, a grave miscalculation, but I needed money. Lord Cromwell found out about it and summoned me to his house in London. We met in secret in the dead of night and he made me a proposition I was unable to refuse. My freedom and my reputation for helping him bring about Lord Lisle’s fall from grace.”

“He wanted to fill Lisle’s position in Calais with his own man.” That much had been obvious for years.

“Not only remove the lord deputy, but make it seem as if he had betrayed the king, betrayed England. Cromwell wanted him imprisoned, at least for a time.” Botolph grinned. “Cromwell intended to tell the king the whole story, admitting he’d entrapped Lisle to prove how unfit the fellow was for his post. Then he’d have interceded for Lisle with the king, persuading His Grace that Lisle was merely incompetent for allowing treason to prosper, not a traitor. Lisle would have been freed and restored to his title and honors, but he’d never again have been given any responsibility. And I’d have been pardoned.”

“And Philpott? He’s dead, Botolph. Hanged, drawn, and quartered. As I would be had I not been helped to escape.”

Botolph shrugged. “I warrant Philpott would still have been executed one day, for heresy if not for treason.”

Ned’s fingers itched to throttle Botolph. His former friend showed neither guilt nor remorse. “You could have come forward. Saved him. Saved us all.”

“From what? Your own stupidity? Those who were arrested did conspire to commit treason, no matter if it was a real plot or not. Besides, once Cromwell was arrested, who would have believed me? His execution ruined everything.” He drank deeply.

“You knew your friends would suffer for believing in the scheme. Left to his own devices, Philpott would never have plotted treason.”

“It was all Cromwell’s plan,” Botolph repeated.

“Even your meeting with Cardinal Pole and the pope?”

Botolph laughed. “I never went to Rome, Ned. Why should I?”

“For the gold?” Ned drained his tankard and signaled for another. Was this possible? Was everything Botolph had told them an invention?

“That, too, was supplied by Lord Cromwell. I did as I was told and I received my reward. Two hundred gold crowns. Enough to help me elude pursuit. There was to have been more but, as matters turned out, that will not be forthcoming.”

“Two hundred crowns is the rough equivalent of fifty pounds.” John Browne spoke for the first time, his voice a harsh monotone. “A man can live comfortably on a tenth of that per annum. Monks pensioned off when their monasteries closed are managing on far less.”

Botolph drank again and stared at the dregs. “I was never a monk. I never wanted to be a priest, either, but I was the fourth son. What else was there for me? And then I fell into Cromwell’s clutches.”

“You could go back,” Ned suggested, unmoved by Botolph’s whining. “Perhaps the king will reward you for your honesty. Lord Lisle surely will, since it will mean his freedom.”

Botolph started to laugh. “What kind of fool do you take me for? I may not be able to live in luxury, but I still have my head.”

For a moment, a red haze distorted Ned’s vision. His hands curled around the ceramic tankard and squeezed as the urge to kill Botolph grew stronger, all but overcoming his common sense. He wanted to shift his grip to the other man’s throat and snap his lying neck.

The tankard cracked with a sharp, splintering sound. Ned stared at his beer-soaked fingers, at the growing puddle on the table. Slowly, he shoved himself away from the table.

When he had control of himself again, the mess had been cleared away, and he had a fresh tankard of beer—pewter this time—he looked Botolph in the eye. “If you will not voluntarily go back to England to face the king’s justice, then Browne and I will take you there, bound and gagged, if necessary.”

“You’d forfeit your own freedom for revenge? I do not think so. You cannot return home any more than I can.”

“Gregory Sweet-lips” still possessed the silver tongue that had led so many men astray. Within a quarter of an hour, he’d convinced Ned that, with Cromwell dead, there was no one left who would believe the true story.

“Then give me one good reason not to kill you here and now,” Ned said.

“Only one? I can give you a hundred. And I can make it worth your while to go away. Cromwell paid me two hundred crowns. Half of that is yours to forget you ever found me.”

“While you stay here, living under a new name, enjoying your new life?” He would disappear again, to lead other men into trouble, or perhaps to rob another church of its plate. Ned considered the situation while he finished his beer. The decision to take all a man’s money, along with his life, was not one that could be made lightly.

IN EARLY FEBRUARY, the king went to London, leaving his bride behind at Hampton Court. It was the first time they had been separated for any length of time since their marriage, but King Henry had been growing ever more unpredictable. Nan did not think he’d tired of his young bride, but perhaps he needed a respite from her company.

Queen Catherine scarcely seemed to miss him. She occupied herself as she always did, with dice and cards and dancing and a steady stream of entertainers to provide distraction.