London - Edward Rutherfurd [297]
“Luther began as a reformer and ended a heretic. That’s what happens when people set themselves up against the wisdom and authority of the ages,” Rowland replied.
Susan could not help feeling that in the reformers, and especially those who went over to Protestantism, there was a certain arrogance. “They want everybody to be perfect,” she complained. “But God rewards us all for doing our best. The reformers want to force everyone to be like them and they think no one can be saved otherwise.”
But Thomas was still not to be swayed. “Reform will come in one way or another, sister,” he would reply. “It must.”
“At least one thing is sure,” Rowland would say with a smile. “There will be no Protestants in England if King Henry has his way. He hates them.”
Of that, Susan thought, there could be no possible doubt.
But if Thomas Meredith was glad to bring happiness to those around him, he was preoccupied by a rather different meeting. It had taken place two days before the royal christening. A very private meeting. With his master, Cromwell.
The royal secretary never ceased to fascinate Meredith. An expert courtier, closest adviser to the king, you would scarcely have guessed he was the son of a humble brewer. He had not risen, like Bull, through scholarship but by his ruthless grasp of affairs. And yet there was always something else about him – some secret reticence, perhaps a secret set of convictions. Only a very few men, Meredith guessed, even got a glimpse of these.
They had been alone in an upstairs chamber when the royal secretary had murmured to him that he had news from Rome. “The Pope,” he had informed the young man, “is about to excommunicate the king.” Thomas had expressed concern, but Cromwell had merely shrugged. “He has to really, to save face, after all Henry’s done.” Then he gave a wry smile. “Yet His Holiness still does not say who, in his opinion, is Henry’s true wife.”
It was clear, however, that the secretary had some purpose in telling him this. Cromwell’s eyes, though set very wide apart, were small and Meredith felt them upon him now like a pair of dividers. “Tell me,” he said quietly, “what you think of this news.”
How carefully he had answered. “I regret it when any man, even a pope, cannot agree with my master the king.”
“Good.” Cromwell looked thoughtful. “You were at Cambridge?” Thomas nodded. “Friends with Cranmer?” Nothing escaped the secretary. Thomas agreed that he was. Cromwell seemed satisfied; but he had not finished. “And tell me, my young friend,” he continued softly, “this news of excommunication: is it good or bad?”
Meredith looked him straight in the eye. “Perhaps it is good news,” he answered quietly.
Cromwell grunted, but both men knew that this had been an invitation. The secretary had given him his confidence, had referred to the secret which, though neither of them had ever spoken the thought aloud, they had long since guessed they shared. The secret which Meredith could not tell his family and Cromwell could not tell the king. The next few months, Thomas Meredith thought, would be interesting.
1534
Only once, during the first year at Chelsea, was Susan’s peace of mind threatened; and that problem, she thought proudly, she had handled rather well.
It had been an April day which had started poorly, with a messenger coming from the Charterhouse bearing a letter that had just arrived from Peter in Rome, and which announced that, having been ill there, he would not be returning to London for some months. It was sad news. But even this had been driven from her mind by the sight, in the middle of the afternoon, of her husband riding dejectedly towards her, ashen pale and accompanied by Thomas, who was looking unusually solemn. She ran out to meet them.
“What’s the matter? Are you in trouble?” she asked Rowland. “No,” Thomas replied. “But he may be tomorrow.” And he led the way inside.
In her