The Bastard's Tale by Margaret Frazer Read Free Book Online Page A

with his voice down and the slightest nod at Dorset’s men, “They were saying something about a Henow Heath.”
     
    ‘Our good marquis of Suffolk has gathered in a few thousand men from his manors around here to Henow Heath just north of Bury on the claim that Gloucester is coming with an army against the king.“ Joliffe clamped his free hand on Arteys’ arm in a friendly-looking grip hard enough to stop what Arteys had been going to protest while he went on, ”By tomorrow, hopefully, someone will have pointed out to Suffolk how much a fool he’s going to look when Gloucester rides into Bury with his eighty or so men. Then, before you know it, there’ll be a few thousand very displeased fellows making their ways back home from Henow Heath.“
     
    Face and voice controlled, Arteys asked, “Why does Suffolk have them there at all? He has to know Gloucester isn’t coming with any army.”
     
    ‘He knows, but he’s maybe thinking that if he yells loud enough that the duke of Gloucester is dangerous, no one will listen when Gloucester declares Suffolk’s sins aloud.“
     
    ‘Suffolk’s sins?“
     
    ‘Or however one sees his stupidities.“
     
    ‘Gloucester isn’t coming against Suffolk. All he wants is pardon for Lady Eleanor.“
     
    ‘And let’s pray he gets it. But in the meanwhile you might want to find somewhere else to be today besides out and about in Bury St. Edmunds.“
     
    Chapter 5
     
    Years ago Frevisse had chance to watch players at their rehearsing and had enjoyed it. Skilled craftsmen at work were almost always a pleasure to watch and at their best players were very skilled craftsmen, able to weave words and pretense into something that could bring their audience to laughter, anger, even grief. Since Master Wilde’s company had been chosen to perform for the king, she had presumed they were not merely good but among the best and from watching them the past few days judged she was right; nor was she surprised that Joliffe was among the best of them.
     
    But she had not been simply a looker-on for even the first day. When her presence was explained to Master Wilde, he had warned her to keep secret anything she saw here and after that ignored her, but Mistress Wilde had come to where she sat and asked if she could sew. Frevisse had admitted to simple stitches and so this cold afternoon, with the thin sunlight through the hall’s high windows giving light but no warmth, she was again on the bench along the hall’s wall alternately breathing on her fingers and hemming a green gown, three yards around the hem and taking forever. The measure of Mistress Wilde’s need was that, even after seeing Frevisse sew, she had let her go on with it, because the play was in two days’ time and there were a great many hems and trimmings yet to be stitched if all the players—heavenly Wisdom and Lady Soul, the devil Lucifer, three Mights of Virtue, three Devils, and a pair of small demons who were John and Giles—were to be clothed by the night after tomorrow. The cost of it all was no trouble, even to Wisdom’s grand robe of cloth-of-gold, since Abbot Babington was paying, and the hiring of sufficient seamstresses should have been no problem, except Master Wilde was determined to have as little as possible known about the play ahead of time.
     
    ‘I won’t have talk,“ he had said to Frevisse. ”I want there to be surprise and wonder when we do it for the court. I won’t have everything driveled away to the world and its cousin beforetime. So your promise, please you, my lady.“
     
    Frevisse had promised, more out of understanding for his passion than from belief in its necessity. Abbey and town were taken up with the business and bother that always encircled the king wherever he was. Lords, lawyers, officers, and clerks deep in trying to carry on the government and pursuing their own ends while they did were mixed in with the knights, gentry, and common men of Parliament all with ends of