Lamentation (The Shardlake Series Book 6) by C. J. Sansom Read Free Book Online Page A

bird tells me that after church she will be walking out again with young Master Brown, that works in one of the Lincoln’s Inn households.’
    I looked at Josephine. ‘Which one?’
    ‘That of Master Henning,’ Josephine said, reddening. ‘He lives in chambers.’
    ‘Good, good. I know Master Henning, he is a fine lawyer.’ I turned back to Agnes. ‘I must go and wash before my guest comes.’ Though goodhearted, Agnes could be a little tactless, and I did not want Josephine embarrassed further. But I was pleased; it was more than time Josephine had a young man.
    As I left the kitchen, Martin returned. He bowed. ‘The table is set, sir.’
    ‘Good. Thank you.’ Just for a second I caught Josephine glance at him with a look of dislike. I had noticed it once or twice before, and been puzzled by it, for Martin had always seemed a good master to the lower servants.

     
    G UY ARRIVED shortly after seven. My old friend was a physician, a Benedictine monk before the Dissolution of the Monasteries. He was of Moorish stock; past sixty now, his dark features lined and his curly hair white. As he entered I noticed he was developing the stoop that tall men sometimes do in their later years. He looked tired. A few months ago I had suggested that perhaps it was time for him to think of retiring, but he had replied that he was still quite fit, and besides, he would not know what to do with himself.
    In the dining room we washed our hands at the ewer, put our napkins over our shoulders, and sat down. Guy looked admiringly over the table. ‘Your silver has a merry gleam in the candlelight,’ he said. ‘Everything in your house looks well these days.’
    Martin knocked at the door and came in, setting out the dishes of salad, with herbs and slices of fresh salmon from the Thames. When he had gone I said to Guy, ‘You are right, he and Agnes were a find. His old employer gave him a good reference. But, you know, I am never at ease with him. He has such an impenetrable reserve.’
    Guy smiled sadly. ‘I remember when I was at the monastery at Malton, we had a steward such as that. But he was a fine fellow. Just brought up to believe he must never be presumptuous with his superiors.’
    ‘How are things at St Bartholomew’s?’ I asked. The old hospital, one of the few for the poor in London, had been closed when the King dissolved the monasteries, but a few volunteers had reopened it, to provide at least some service. Guy was one of the volunteers there. I recalled guiltily that when my friend Roger Elliard had died three years ago I promised his widow to continue his work to open a new hospital. But then the war came, everyone suffering from the taxes and fall in the value of money, which had continued ever since, and no one was willing to donate.
    He spread his hands. ‘One does what one can, though Jesu knows it is little enough. There is talk of the city authorities taking it over, with a grant of money from the King, but nothing ever seems to happen.’
    ‘I see more driven into poverty in the city every day.’
    ‘Poverty and illness both.’
    We were silent a moment. Then, to raise our mood, I said, ‘I have some good news. Tamasin is pregnant again. The baby is due in January.’
    He smiled broadly, a flash of good white teeth. ‘Thanks be to God. Tell her I shall be delighted to attend her during her pregnancy again.’
    ‘We are both invited to a celebration on George’s first birthday. The twenty-seventh.’
    ‘I shall be glad to go.’ He looked at me. ‘A week on Tuesday. And this coming Monday will be – ’ he hesitated – ‘the anniversary of . . .’
    ‘The day the Mary Rose went down. When all those men died, and I so nearly with them.’ I lowered my head, shook it sadly. ‘It seems a peace treaty has been signed. At last.’
    ‘Yes. They say the King will get to keep Boulogne, or what is left of it, for ten years.’
    ‘Not much to show for all the lives lost, or the ruination of the coinage