A Burnable Book: A Novel Part 20

'She'll listen to reason, if I know Eleanor Rykener. She'll listen to me.'

Millicent scoffed. 'Listen to that man's coin, I'll be bound. That's what he what she's here for.'

'Eleanor's not like you, Mil.' Agnes's tone was suddenly hard. 'Sure, she wants good shills like any maud of London. But that's not what's most important to her.' She looked away. 'Not like you.'

Millicent, stung, stared at her sister's profile. 'Well,' she said, then looked back up Ave Maria Lane. 'Maybe you're right.'

'No maybe about it, Mil. We go in there, get her, get the book, she'll come right along.'

Millicent smoothed her dress, held out a hand. 'Come, then.'

They walked up Ave Maria Lane with locked arms and furtive looks at the work of the scriveners on either side. When they reached the shop door, Millicent turned to face the oaken surface, which was free of tracery and grillwork; nor was there a lock. Blowing out a breath, she pushed it open.

A one-room shop. Clean, well lit, books displayed on single shelves. Two writing desks faced one another in the middle of the shop. The scrivener, seated at one of them with his apprentice and Edgar standing before him, looked up in surprise. On the desk the book lay open.

'What's this?' he demanded.

'We came for that,' said Millicent, pointing. 'Our book, just there.'

'Your book?' Ybott looked from the sisters to Edgar. 'The young man here tells me it's his.'

Edgar raised his chin. 'That it is, sir.'

'Then you two best be on your way,' said Ybott.

'The book is ours,' Millicent insisted. 'It was given to my sister by it was given to her, weeks ago. You hand it over or I'll summon a ward constable.'

'Will you now?'

'Get out, Ag,' Edgar snarled. 'Both of you, now, get out!'

'You know better than that, Eleanor,' said Agnes, conciliation in her voice. 'You know I be your good gossip.'

'That right, Agnes Fonteyn?' said Edgar. 'Leaving me high and dry on Gropec.u.n.t Lane, finding that killed girl, that b.l.o.o.d.y hammer with her brains still on it? That how you treat your "good gossip"?'

Millicent winced at Edgar's use of her sister's full name, and the incautious crowing of their profession. The scriveners, she saw, were taking it all in. Gropec.u.n.t Lane, a b.l.o.o.d.y hammer, a dead girl.

'We are taking the book,' she said quickly. 'This one stole it, and now we're taking it back.' Ybott started to protest. Millicent raised her hand and stepped right up to him, threatening. 'Think about it. Think about a constable, or the ward beadle stepping in here once you summon him. What do you suppose he'll do? Comes in a stationer's shop to find this book of prophecies in your possession, what do you suppose he'll think?'

'Now, look here, by what right-'

'That it belongs to a few maudlyns wandering by, trying to scare up c.o.c.k on Ave Maria Lane?'

Ybott was speechless. Tom Fish shot a fearful glance at Edgar, then at Agnes.

'Would you believe such a thing, sir, if this one here' Millicent pointed at Edgar 'hadn't slunk up from St Paul's to sell it to you himself?'

A feeble shrug.

'What you would believe is what's before you: a London stationer closeted in his shop with a treasonous book, trying to pin the blame on some poor maud he brought within to swyve of a spring afternoon.'

Ybott turned away. Millicent approached the writing desk, lifted the book, and dropped it in her coat's broad inner pocket. She turned on her heel and walked to the door.

'Wait, Mil.'

Millicent turned back to her sister. Agnes approached Edgar, whose face registered a mix of confusion and fear. Agnes reached forward and put a hand on his cheek. Edgar's response was considerably less gentle: a hard slap to Agnes's face that rang through the small shop.

'Where you been, Agnes?' he demanded, his voice hoa.r.s.e with rage. 'Not on Gropec.u.n.t Lane, nor on Cornhull, nor in Southwark, nor lying dead on the Moorfields.' He stomped a foot on the rushes. 'Like that girl I thought was you.'

Agnes shook her head against the tears. 'Oh, Ellie, I don't know what to say to you, dearheart.'

Millicent opened the door a crack. The tradesman who had been watching from across the street was gone. She stepped forward and grasped Edgar's wrist. 'Come along. You be a part of this now as much as I am myself, and Agnes here.'

He tried to pull away. Millicent tightened her grip. 'Don't be a child.'

Millicent felt Edgar's acquiescence in the loosening of his muscles. She tugged, and he finally allowed himself to be led from the shop. By the next bell they were halfway across the bridge.

They pa.s.sed the following days at the p.r.i.c.king Bishop, stowed in a third-storey room overlooking Rose Alley. It was sour in there, the linens strewn across the pallet crusted with the spent pa.s.sions of the men who dried their parts on them every day. The book rested in an alcove beneath a low shelf, just within the door. Thomas Pinchbeak, Millicent felt certain, was determined to purchase it, despite the delay caused by Eleanor Rykener's theft, and she was equally determined to sell it for the greatest sum she could extract.

On the fourth night, in the stillest hours, they awoke to hoa.r.s.e shouts on the street below. Cracking a shutter, Millicent looked out to see five men on horseback, dark hoods and cloaks obscuring any features. They were cl.u.s.tered up by Smith's Rents, their animals circling in the darkness. One of them dismounted and approached the p.r.i.c.king Bishop, his short sword glistening at his side.

The shouts had come not from him, though, but from his unexpected antagonist.

'Y'aren't Southwark men, that be sure.'

Millicent leaned out. Down below stood St Cath, yawping in the lantern-light, a withered arm in the air, her shift billowing obscenely in the night breezes. The old woman pointed up the alley in the direction of the palace. 'By what right do you trounce in the bishop's liberties? By whose warrant?'

St Cath's crazed bravery soon brought company. Three maudlyns joined her on the street to confront the armed man. They were joined in turn by a dozen girls from the other houses, all shouting at the company to leave the stews the way they had come. Soon nearly twenty maudlyns of Southwark had encircled the men, cackling a righteous din to fill the stews. More lanterns were brought out, the lane filling with a shimmering glow.

Millicent moved for a better view, and her elbow pushed the shutter slightly to her right. The movement drew the man's attention. He looked up. His face was covered, all but his eyes and forehead wrapped in a black scarf tucked between his doublet and cape. For a long moment, in the glare of the lamps, she stood frozen by his stare. His eyes, deep and cruel, smouldered as he memorized her face. Then he looked away.

Now more distant cries, the echo of metal on metal, the clatter of hooves, and everyone's attention was drawn up Rose Alley. Joined by Agnes and Eleanor at the window, Millicent heard before she saw the opposing company bearing down hard past the Vine. The man on foot turned and sprinted back to his horse, joining his fellows in a mad dash in the opposite direction.

For these were the Bishop of Winchester's liberties, the unannounced intrusion by the strange company a violation of ecclesiastical jurisdiction. The bishop did not take such incursions lightly, nor did his men, a company of which had been dispatched from the palace's main guardhouse into the stews. It was an unfair fight, for though the strangers had the advantage of surprise, Winchester's men were greater in number. Within minutes the violators had been chased through Bishopspark and into Winchester's Wild, where they would scatter themselves to the winds.

Once the street had calmed there were sounds of shutters slamming along the way. Bess Waller appeared at the door, her cheeks ruddy in the candlelight. 'You need to leave, all you, at first bell. They were here for that book, plain as the sun.' She did a circuit of the room, shoving their few things into a basket and sack.

'But where are we to go, mere?' Agnes asked her as she pulled on her shoes. 'We have no place, nor coin.' Eleanor huddled at her side, watching the exchange.

'Not her concern, Ag.' Millicent was pulling on her own shoes, the once-elegant skins by now full of holes, not all of them patched. 'Our good mother doesn't bother herself with inconveniences like the welfare of her daughters.'

Bess came to stand by the bed. Stooping, she pressed something into Millicent's hand. Cold, metallic. Millicent looked down, hoping for coins. She saw a key.

'Ditch Street by the Split Shill, just within Aldgate,' said Bess, her night breath foul on Millicent's cheek. 'Small place there I've leased four years now. It's empty, has been a good while. They won't look for you there, that's sure.'

This, for Bess Waller, counted as generosity: the loan of an unused hole across the river. Millicent looked at her mother, wondering what moral world those unwavering eyes saw when they peered into a gla.s.s. Though I suppose I'm not one to judge, she thought. She closed her eyes, then her hand over the key.

THIRTY-TWO.

Logic Lane, Oxford Sir John Clanvowe, standing at a trestle table, poured wine from a silvered flagon. 'We will have an additional guest this evening.'

I masked my displeasure with a small sip. A seventh unproductive day among Angervyle's book chests had put me in a sour mood. 'Delightful. The wine, I mean, though I'm sure your guest will be as well. Who is he?'

'I shall let it be a surprise.' Clanvowe spread the frayed ends of his coat across his uncushioned chair. 'Let me hear about your week in Oxford. Have you enjoyed yourself?'

'Not particularly,' I said, opting for honesty. Over the first several days I had felt like a starved man at a king's feast. So many new books to plumb with the raw excitement of a child, losing myself for hours at a time in these authors formerly known only by name and reputation. Yet the search had soon grown monotonous, as each new book failed to reveal anything about the elusive Lollius. After all that time among Bury's books I had started to experience the dark building behind the Durham grange as a hermit's cell.

In airing all of this for Clanvowe, though, I stayed vague, telling him I was in Oxford to track down some texts related to my next major work. We sat in his parlour, spa.r.s.ely furnished with several chairs, a writing desk, and a short shelf of dusty books against one of the whitewashed walls beneath exposed timbers. Paid well for his service as a knight of the chamber, Clanvowe had been a stalwart in Gaunt's campaigns in Aquitaine, Castile, and France, and he was known to be quite rich. Despite his wealth, though, he lived like an Oxford student if a well-armed one.

His finger traced the lip of our gla.s.s. 'There must be more to it than that, John, to pry you out of Southwark. There are plenty of books in London. What is it you hope to find among Bury's ma.n.u.scripts? What brought you here, to Oxford?'

'I would ask you the same question.' I took the wine. 'I'd have thought you would spend every hour out of court at Radnorshire, honing your Welsh.'

His face loosened into a smile. 'And it's well honed indeed by this point, what with all the diplomacy I'm performing up and down the border for the king. The marcher lords are a restive bunch. Master connivers. As to my own purpose in Oxford? Byddwch yn dysgu cyn bo hir, my friend. And I asked first.'

'Impressive,' I said. Clanvowe's yellow whiskers were tensed, gathered in a thick bunch. 'You won't translate for me?'

'You'll learn soon enough,' he said.

'Learn what?'

'That's the answer to your question.'

'Which question?'

'Both of them, I suppose. Now,' he said, leaning forward to refresh the gla.s.s, 'to the purpose of your visit.'

I looked away, thoroughly muddled, already exhausted with all the effort. I took a long drink of wine and watched the flickering shadows play on the knight's eyes. Sir John had come to Oxford fresh from the political turmoil of London, where all the talk was of war, spies, and factions. He was also a knight of the king's chamber, and though he was a friend, there was no question where his loyalties would go should he learn of a threat to Richard. This was precisely why I wanted to speak with him: however Clanvowe might react to the existence of the prophecy, he would do so with the king's best interests in mind. Yet by divulging the existence of the De Mortibus, I would be bringing its dark prophecies into King Richard's affinity for the first time, an irrevocable and potentially perilous step.

Making a decision, I turned back to my host. 'Do you know Horace?'

Clanvowe's brow dropped. 'Slightly. Peasants, slaves, philosophizing merchants. Not to my taste.'

'The odes are great achievements, though.'

'Is that so?'

'But very hard to find. Angervyle's must be one of a handful of copies in England.'

'Do you have a favourite?'

'The ninth ode of the fourth book.'

'What is its subject?'

I waited a moment. 'A poet named Lollius.'

Clanvowe flinched. I have you, I thought, pleased with myself. 'You know it, then?'

'I don't,' he said, recovering quickly. 'Though perhaps there's more you want to say about it.'

I was saved from accepting the challenge by the arrival of Clanvowe's other guest, signalled by a soft knock at the outer door, then a quiet exchange with Sir John's sole servant. We stood as the third man entered the parlour.

A priest, capped and robed in russet, a simple belt at his waist. No other adornment, though the uncompromising blue of his eyes forced attention, as if roundels of lapis lazuli had been painted around his pupils. A beard, bushy and long, caped his neck. I recognized the man, had seen him on at least one occasion but couldn't place him. Clanvowe made his hostly bow and spread his hands. 'Master John Gower, Esquire, let me present the curate of Lutterworth, Father John Purvey.'

I maintained enough presence of mind to reach forward and clasp hands. Purvey was a young man, his grip on my arm strong with the righteous confidence of the fanatic. Secretary to John Wycliffe himself until the master's death the prior December, Purvey was known as a preacher and scholar of radical leanings, and if what I'd heard was true, he had had the main hand in Wycliffe's recent translation of the Bible, a notorious work that was even now being circulated among the conventicles.

The conversation remained superficial until a weak sop was served, at which point Purvey turned to me with a mischievous smile.

'We have much in common, Master Gower.'

'In what way, Father?' The broth, light and unsalted, tasted vaguely of almonds.

'We are both writers, for one.'

'Though our respective subjects speak to our differences.'

'And our commonalities. Your Mirour de l'Omme has struck a chord among the men of our persuasion.'

Our persuasion? I swallowed. 'How is that?'

'Well, for one, you're not shy about criticizing the church, even its most powerful sects.' Then, to my horror, Purvey quoted my own French: '"The friars preach poverty to all, but they're always stretching forth their hands for coin. They love their worldly comforts, but never do they seek employment. Instead they wander about in the habit of vagrants."' He sipped, smacked his lips. 'Truer words have never been written about the friars. Not even by Master Wycliffe himself, bless his soul.'

Clanvowe laughed gruffly. Purvey t.i.ttered, and I met their amus.e.m.e.nt with an uncomfortable smile. 'You came prepared this evening, Father. I'm impressed.'

The conversation moved on, the remainder of the meal consisting of overdone rabbit in a mealy pie, with old mustard on the side. I picked at my portion, imagining that every bite had to be taken carefully, as if my very teeth might grind with heresy, though Clanvowe and Purvey were now chatting amiably about the priest's new living. 'Now that I'm at Lutterworth, it's difficult to get back to Oxford as often as I would like. But that may be for the good.' He looked down at his rabbit. 'It's time I remain in one place for a while, tend to the souls in my care.'

'A fine suggestion,' I said. 'After all, priests are as numerous as stars in the sky. But unlike stars, only two of a thousand know how to shine.'

Purvey gave me a nasty look. 'You question my sincerity, Master Gower.'

'Only your memory, Father Purvey.'

He wiped his lips. 'Take Wykeham, your Bishop of Winchester. The man has twelve livings to his name, all going to fund his castle and his liberties in Southwark, his fishing ponds and his wh.o.r.es. Yet how often do you think he visits those parishes? Once a year, if it suits his schedule?'

'He's a busy man,' I pointed out.

'If the priest of the parish can't live a virtuous life, how is he supposed to teach his parishioners to avoid sin? If gold rusts, what about iron? It's like a shepherd smeared with s.h.i.t herding a flock of sheep, trying to keep them clean.' He pounded the table. 'This is the problem with the higher clergy, Gower. They've become barons, building obscene castles for themselves, taking on concubines and mistresses and G.o.d knows what else. This is why I support their disendowment so strongly. Why should our spiritual leaders also be our wealthiest possessioners?'

I looked at the nearest candle, amazed the man would say such a thing in my presence. 'That position has been condemned by the pope, Father. As you well know.'