‘Ay.’ The fat man gasped. ‘You’re a nuisance, you are, matey,’ he told Locke. They carried him upstairs; I heard him groan at the jolting of the chair. Sir Jacob inclined his head.

‘Often by the end they’re in such pain they can’t think of anything beyond that. Well, he’ll be out of it tomorrow, his head will be off.’

‘There is to be no trial?’

Sir Jacob gave me a long sideways look, as though I had committed an impertinence. ‘I think you need some time to reflect on where you are,’ he said. ‘Yes, that would be best. We shall talk again later.’ He sat down at the desk and began writing notes on a paper, ignoring me again while he waited for the gaolers to return.

I stood there, my legs shaking, thinking frantically. Had the Queen had dalliance with Dereham as well as Culpeper? It seemed incredible, yet it was the only explanation for Cranmer’s signature on the warrant. And they knew nothing about Culpeper. I could deny knowledge of Dereham truthfully. But would they believe me, would they try other means? And I knew that if they tortured me I would tell them anything to get them to stop, tell them about Culpeper or what I suspected of the King’s ancestry, anything. I could bear less than Locke had, I knew that, less than Broderick would have. My head reeled with sudden terror and I hid my face in my hands and groaned.

With a puffing and blowing, the turnkeys came back down the stairs. I pulled my trembling hands from my face. Sir Jacob was looking at me with what seemed like quiet satisfaction. ‘All right,’ he said. ‘I think the penny has dropped. Put him in with Radwinter.’

Chapter Forty-two

THE FAT TURNKEY took me up a flight of stairs to a narrow torchlit corridor lined with sturdy wooden doors. He opened one and thrust me in with a twist of his arm so forceful I nearly fell.

The cell was a long chamber with a low roof. The bricks had been whitewashed but were disfigured with patches of mould. Through a small, high barred window at the other end of the room I could see a patch of dark sky and hear the hiss of rain hitting the river. We must be right by the water. The only furniture was a pair of rickety truckle beds opposite each other by the door. On one of them Radwinter sat, head in his hands. They were chained together, as were his feet. He did not look up as the turnkey led me over to the other bed.

‘Sit down,’ the fat man said. I collapsed rather than sat on a thin, filthy mattress, stinking of damp. There was no blanket. ‘Stretch out your arms,’ he ordered. ‘Come on, I haven’t got all day.’ His tone was still quiet but when I looked up his hard little eyes told me he meant business. I reached out my arms. So quickly and dextrously that I hardly had time to realize what he was doing, he took a chain with a manacle on each end from under the bed and slipped the manacles round my wrists. There was a double click and I was pinioned. He bent down, pulled out another length of chain and secured my feet. He stood back and inspected his handiwork with a nod.

‘There. That’ll do.’

‘Is this necessary?’ I asked, my voice rising with fear.

‘Is this nec-essary?’ he repeated with a grin, imitating my educated tones. ‘It’s the rules, matey. This is the least of it, you’ll see.’ He glanced at Radwinter, who still sat with head bent, then left the cell. The key rattled in the lock.

I sat there, rigid with terror. The chains were long; I could move my arms and no doubt walk, but they were heavy and one of the gyves was tight, not enough to stop the blood but sufficient to scrape my wrist painfully when I moved it.

I looked up to see Radwinter staring at me. He was filthy, eyes wild and bloodshot in his dirty face. How different from the neat, confident figure who had greeted me at York Castle.

‘What have you done?’ he asked in a cracked, hoarse voice.

‘Not what I am accused of.’

‘You lie!’ he shouted suddenly.

I did not reply. I thought, what if he leaps at me?

He went on, talking fast in bitter, intense tones. ‘You were always a weakling, and weaklings are dangerous, can be prevailed upon by the sinful, like Broderick. Wrongdoers must be punished, that is right, my father said when he beat me that it was God’s law and he was right, it is. It is!’ he shouted, as though I had contradicted him. ‘But I did not kill Broderick! I made mistakes but mistakes are not disloyalty, they should be punished but not with this!’ His voice rose and he looked at me with frantic, glaring eyes.

‘Perhaps they will only question you,’ I said soothingly, ‘then let you go when they realize you were not responsible for Broderick’s death. I do not believe you killed him.’

What I said did not seem to register. ‘Mistakes must be punished.’ He frowned. ‘But not so severely. It is deliberate wrongdoing that must be dealt with harshly. My father taught me. To forget my bedtime, only three strokes of the switch. To stay out playing deliberately, twelve. The scars remind me, that is why he put them there, to remind me.’

I did not reply. I did not need to, for his eyes were unfocused, looking inward; he was talking to himself rather than to me.

‘Sometimes he would make me kneel and look at the switch for half an hour before he used it. It was part of the punishment. He told me that doesn’t work with animals.’ He looked up at me then. ‘Do you remember,’ he said with a smile, ‘I told you that?’

‘Yes.’ I thought, Maleverer was right, his wits have gone, this has been too much for him. They have locked me in here with a madman.

‘He told me about that when we went to the bull-baiting, when he held my hand so tight the blood stopped flowing. Waiting, it frightens a boy and I knew it would frighten a man too.’ He smiled suddenly, a leer the like of which I hope to see on no man’s face again. I moved down the bed in an involuntary effort to get further away from him. He seemed to come to himself and glared at me, the old icy stare.

‘You will feel the switch, I mean the instruments, you will and I will not because I am innocent, I am righteous in God’s eyes! The King who is God’s representative on earth, he will not allow it!’ He began to shout, suddenly full of mad fury. I cowered away. ‘You weak bentbacked creature! The King gave you what you deserved at Fulford Cross!’ He laughed, suddenly full of wicked glee like an evil imp in a morality play. He was in a world of his own, or perhaps he always had been. He stopped abruptly. ‘Maleverer accuses me,’ he said. ‘Accuses me falsely. When I am out of here, he will feel the switch. I shall lay it on him.’ He shook his head. ‘No, I mean the irons, the fire. Why does my head fizz and burn? Why can I hold nothing in it straight any more?’ He gave me a look of desperate appeal.

‘You should see a priest, Radwinter,’ I said.

‘They would send me a papist, a damned papist that should be burned…’ His voice lowered and his muttering became incomprehensible, a mad babbling to himself. I stood up and crossed to the window. The chains clanked and rattled and made movement difficult. I thought again how this was the fear of everyone in London, to stand in a cell in the Tower, limbs chained, accused of treason, awaiting questioning by Jesu knew what terrible methods. And I was cold, chilled to the bone. I closed my eyes and put my hands over my face, listening to Radwinter’s demented whisperings and the hiss of the rain on the river outside. It sounded closer now, the tide must be rising. I had never been so afraid in my life.

I went back and lay on my bed, shivering with cold. Hours passed. Radwinter had lain down too and gone quiet. We both jumped up when a key turned in the lock but it was only the young turnkey bringing food, a thin pottage that smelt bad, little lumps of gristle floating on the scummy surface. He laid the bowls on the floor.