‘I do not think the King has done much to assuage the bitterness up here. Oh, he has bought the gentry, secured their allegiance with oaths, but you only need to look at the faces of ordinary people to see what their true feelings are.’

I laughed uneasily. ‘Giles, you sound like those who grudge all rich men and would pull them down.’ I smiled sadly. ‘Sometimes I wonder if they have not the right of it.’

‘No, no.’ Giles shook his leonine head. ‘We must have kingship to have order. But – it is unfortunate that England has the King it does.’

‘Yes. It is.’ I looked out over the fields. They had been carved out of the boggy ground at the foot of the hill and ended abruptly at the marshland, which I saw stretched away for miles. I decided to change the subject, realizing anew how strained old loyalties I had once taken for granted had become.

‘Where was your parents’ farm, Giles?’ I asked.

He pointed with his stick at a clutch of buildings. ‘There. My father drained the land himself. Howlme marsh is quite trackless, you know. There is a hermitage some way off, where a couple of monks used to guide travellers who became lost. Gone now, of course, even their poor hovel taken by the King.’

‘Were you happy as a child?’ I asked him.

He smiled. ‘Oh, yes.’

‘Your father did not expect you to carry on the farm?’

‘No. I enjoyed my schoolwork, you see. They saw my tastes lay with words and arguments rather than billhooks and drainage ditches, and they thought I might raise myself up in the world.’

‘My tastes were bookish too. And I liked drawing – I used to paint for a pastime, though not recently. But I always knew my father would rather have had a strong son to carry on the farm than – well, than me.’

‘He should have accepted you as you were, rejoiced that you had brains.’

‘He tried, I think.’ I hesitated. ‘My mother died when I was ten.’

‘No woman’s softening influence on your father, then.’

‘No, he was harder after that.’ I was silent a moment.

‘I was on my way to my parents’ grave, and then the church. Would you like to see them?’

‘Yes. I must consider a design for a headstone for my father.’

He led me into the churchyard. Most of the gravestones were sandstone, weathered with the years, but he took me to a prominent stone in white marble. The inscription was simple:

Edward Wrenne 1421-1486

and his wife Agnes 1439-1488

At rest

‘They both died when I was a student,’ he said. ‘My mother was devoted to my father. She pined away and died eighteen months after him.’

‘She was much younger.’

‘Ay. My father had another wife before her, more his own age. They had no children. She died when they were in their forties and is buried with her family. Then my father married my mother. I was the child of his old age.’

‘My father’s family lived round Lichfield for generations. I think that was partly why he was sorry I did not carry on the farm. The line going out.’

‘My father came to Howlme from beyond Wakefield when he was a young man. So there was less of a local tie.’

I nodded slowly. ‘Well, it is a fine memorial. Marble, that is good. I shall provide a marble headstone for my father.’

‘Leave me a moment, Matthew,’ Giles said quietly. ‘I will join you in the church in a minute. It is worth a visit.’

I turned and walked back to the church. I stopped. I had heard a branch crack, a loud pop. I stared at the trees that shadowed the graveyard but saw nothing. A deer, I thought, as I walked on to the little church.

The interior was lit dimly by candles. There were pretty little vaulted arches and a new roof whose beams were decorated with Tudor roses. In a large side-chapel a candle winked redly in a lamp set before an image of the Virgin. King Henry would not like that. I sat in a pew, thinking about my father as the light coming through the high stained-glass windows slowly faded. His face came into my mind: grizzled, unmoving, unsmiling. Yes, he had been hard. In truth that was why in adult life I had always been reluctant to go home.

The door opened and Giles came in, his stick tapping on the floor. He went to the side-chapel, crossed himself, then took a candle and lit it from the lamp. He came over, put the candle on the front of the pew and sat down heavily beside me.

‘This is a pretty place, is it not? I was an altar boy once.’ He laughed. ‘We were naughty children. We used to catch the mice that came to nibble the candles, set them between the shafts of tiny carts we made and send them skittering down the aisles.’

I smiled. ‘I was an altar boy too. I was obedient, though. I took it all seriously.’

He looked at me. ‘Till you transferred your allegiance to reform.’

‘Yes. I was hot-headed for reform once, believe it or not. Always questioning everything.’

‘I think perhaps you still do that.’

‘Perhaps. In a different way.’

Wrenne nodded at the side-chapel. ‘That is the Constable chapel.’

‘Sir Robert Constable’s family?’

‘Yes. They have been landowners here for centuries. A chantry priest still says a daily Mass for their souls. The priest of the church when I was a lad was a Constable.’

‘Were they good landlords?’

‘No. They were hard, grasping men, Robert Constable as much as any of them. Yet he died for his beliefs in the end.’

As I told Sergeant Leacon that Broderick would, I thought. ‘I hear his bones still hang over the gates of Hull.’

‘Yes. We shall see them.’ He thought a moment. ‘I sold the farm to the Constables after my father died. It made no sense to keep a farm so many miles from where I lived. No more than it makes sense for you. You should not feel guilty at selling your father’s farm, Matthew.’

‘No, you are right.’

He looked at me and shook his head. ‘You have had much to bear. First your father, now these attacks on you. There have been others, you said?’

I took a deep breath. ‘Three counting the thorn under Genesis’ saddle. Not counting the time when I was struck down and those damned papers stolen. A week ago someone tried to ram a spit through me at the camp.’

His eyes widened. ‘Jesu.’

‘And then a bear was let loose in my path.’

‘Dear God.’

‘I fear the person who is after me may think I learned more than I did from the papers inside that box. I only had time to glance at a few of them.’ I paused. ‘One of them was the Titulus.’

‘Ah.’

‘That was how I knew it was dangerous for you to have a copy.’

‘I understand now. What others did you see?’ he asked curiously. ‘When he questioned me, Maleverer said you had had no time to look.’

‘Nothing of note.’

‘Maleverer must have been angry with you for that.’

‘He and the Privy Council.’

‘How have you borne it all?’ he asked gently. ‘That and what happened at Fulford as well?’

‘One bears things because there is no alternative.’ I looked at him. ‘As you have cause to know, better than anyone.’

‘Ay.’ He nodded his head slowly. ‘Ay. The Lord lays heavy burdens on us. Heavier than a man should have to bear, I think in dark moments.’

I shifted in the narrow pew, my neck was becoming uncomfortable again. ‘I think we should go back now. It will be getting dark.’

‘Allow me a few minutes more,’ he said. ‘I would like to say a prayer.’

‘Of course. I will wait for you by the beacon.’

I LEFT THE CHURCH. Outside the sun was below the horizon now, the churchyard dim. I walked through the gate. I looked out over the camp: torches and bonfires were alight across the fields, all the windows of the manor house were brightly lit. The King and Queen would be there now; Master Craike would have made sure all was ready for their comfort.

Giles was taking a long time at his prayers. I fingered the thick ropes holding the beacon upright, tied tightly to the top of an iron pole that protruded from the centre of the huge bonfire and secured to stakes in the ground at the bottom.