Read Online After Flodden by Rosemary Goring - Free Book Online Page A

he not?’ asked the bishop.
    ‘Sent to Sweden,’ said Surrey. ‘He protested, but he was owed nothing more than that. He came within a whisker of being found out. Just to impress a woman, would you believe, a
jezebel who would have much preferred a couple more coins than state secrets whispered on her pillow.’
    He warmed a hazelnut in his palm and rolled it across the table, as if it had been the dice that decided the agent’s fate. ‘He was lucky to survive the crossing. I was sore tempted
to give orders for him to be pitched overboard.
    ‘The new man, on the other hand, is far shrewder. He behaves the part, too: anyone less like a spy would be hard to imagine. He appears utterly open, and a little naive.’
    ‘His name?’
    ‘Even I do not know his real name. His public name, I am sworn not to reveal. For safety’s sake, I refer to him only as the Eye.’
    ‘And has he access to James’s court?’
    ‘Indeed he has. And his contacts are good. I trust him as I have not trusted any informer from that side of the border for many years. Some of what he has told me has later been
corroborated from our own marches.’ Surrey frowned. ‘I believe he is motivated by some strong private passion, but I see no need to know what that is. His commitment seems absolute, and
he’s brave. That’s enough for me.’
    Henry nodded. He rose from the table, and sank onto a settle by the fire. He stretched out his legs and unhooked the crimson mantle at his neck, shrugging it off to lie at his side, a puddle of
velvet gore. The bishop bent to retrieve it, but the king waved him away. ‘You are not a maidservant, Ruthall. Be seated.’ The bishop took his place, and picked at his cuticles like a
sulky child.
    Surrey stood with his back to the fire, the blaze easing his joints. ‘I think this is serious, Your Highness. I think it is possible that all James’s promises to you are
lies.’
    ‘Or that he does not know his own mind.’
    ‘What d’you mean?’ asked Surrey, with a hint of the sharpness his lieutenants were familiar with.
    Henry stared into the fire, the flames reflected in his eyes bestowing a rare impression of warmth. ‘He is a devout man, Thomas, more interested in his soul than in war. Every year he
makes the pilgrimage across the moors to Whithorn. On foot. There’s no shrine in Scotland that he has not honoured with a visit. Or so they say. He prays morning and night, and speaks the
language of the cloister. For a man of the world, he is uncommon pious.’
    He picked up an iron and poked at the logs in the grate. They sparked and hissed, sending a welcome surge of heat into the room. ‘Margaret herself was taken aback at his habits. Early in
her days as wife she wrote me that he wears a chain of iron around his waist, and every year adds one more link to it. This is his notion of paying penance for his role in his father’s death.
His murder, that is. The girdle will get heavier with every anniversary. By the time he is an old man it will weigh a ton and no horse will be able to carry him.’
    The flames sizzled as the king spat on them. ‘Such behaviour turns my stomach. It is the act of a coward. He fears his own conscience more than the eye of God.’
    The bishop nodded. ‘No-one and nothing should have dominion over us but the will of God, and our Lord Jesus,’ he said, in a preacher’s whine.
    Henry continued as if there had been no interruption. He laid the iron in the hearth and looked up at his lieutenant. ‘But,’ he said, ‘his piety is also of a piece with a man
who dreams of going on a crusade.’
    Surrey stared. ‘A crusade?’
    ‘He, and Margaret, and his envoys all speak of it. Jesus and Mary! He has his heart set on Rome at the very least, and Jerusalem if he can.’
    ‘A laudable enterprise,’ said the bishop, ‘if it did not presage trouble for our realm.’
    Surrey swore under his breath.
    His king’s voice found an edge. ‘So that ambition lies rather at odds