The Heretic’s Wife (57 page)

“Then why wouldn’t he give his name?”

“I don’t know why. I’m sure he has his reasons. But I’m here to stand for his identity. He is no vagrant. His father is a landowner in Kent. He attended both Cambridge and Oxford and is a man of great reputation and learning, and you have him locked up in the stocks like a common criminal!”

Prudence cautioned him not to add that under the law even a common vagabond should not be left to die of thirst and starvation. Best not to get the magistrate’s back up.

But the magistrate must have read his mind. He scratched his head and answered defensively, “We were within the law. How do you know he’s who he says he is? That’s why we didn’t feed him. If a man gets hungry enough, he’ll be less stubborn.”

Cox tried to control his temper. “I recognized him, that’s how I know who he is. Charlotte Bascomb said he asked to see me. I was skeptical, but
when he started to talk I remembered his voice. He called me by name—we were at Cambridge together—and when I washed the filth from his face, filth put there by his abusers because you wrongfully put him in the stocks, I knew him immediately.”

The magistrate appeared to consider before answering, and then motioned for the constable. “We’ll let him go, then, on your surety, but if you talk of this, you be sure and say that he refused to give his name, and he had no papers. We acted within the law.”

“Yes, yes, I understand. It’ll not be held against you. Now send the constable straightaway before the poor man expires from hunger.”

After a good meal and a bath, John was able, with Leonard Cox’s help, to get to the abbey where the prior greeted him warmly, expressing outrage when he heard of his treatment in Reading. The prior had spent a bit of time in the stocks during his year in prison, he said, and knew what that did to a man. He reiterated his support for the movement, but admitted that after the king had released him with a warning to be more orthodox in his teachings, he tried to be more careful.

Yes, he still ran the underground movement, still held the Bible readings, but they were more cautious now about whom they trusted. He happily produced a purse with enough heft to support John as he made the rounds to the merchants and shadow “congregations” as they called themselves. But he gave a warning too.

“Don’t be fooled,” he said, “by the fact that More has resigned. It is said he’s more determined than ever to burn out all vestiges of reform.”

“How can a man of learning be so intolerant?” John asked.

“I know. It’s hard to believe this is the same man who authored
Utopia,
who once championed humanist causes and new learning. He even agreed with Erasmus that reform was needed.”

They were in the chapel abbey, where the prior was taking his tour of duty, the same as the other monks. It was his day to rub the carved wood of the roodscreen with linseed oil and polish the gold and silver of the altar vessels: the elaborate jeweled chalice, the paten, the ciborium.

“Do you not ever wonder,” John asked, pointing to the stained glass of the Gothic windows, the gleaming gold of the altar, reflected in the multicolored lights from the sun’s rays, “what Jesus would say about all this?”

The prior smiled. “I know what you are thinking, that we should sell the Church’s treasure and give the money to the poor, but I would remind you, dear friend, that our Lord said, ‘The poor you will have with you always,’ when Judas Iscariot objected to an extravagant and expensive form of worship.”

“I do not need to be reminded of what the Scripture says, but that was in the context of Jesus’ anointment for his crucifixion. We celebrate a living Christ in spirit and truth by emulating His ways, not the ways of the woman who anointed him for burial with expensive perfume—or those of the temple priests.”

The prior nodded in what might be construed as agreement. “Consider this too. As long as these altar vessels remain, I can go on with our mission. They give me cover. And they have other, more utilitarian uses. That purse I gave you? It will not be the first time a golden candlestick has been turned into printed Scripture. We have replaced this one with gilded copper. It sheds as good a light upon the host as the gold one and should the archbishop come—” He shrugged. “But they will all be gone soon enough. King Henry will not be able to resist such a treasure. Ironic, isn’t it? What was used to celebrate the Prince of Peace will go to fund war with France.”

John held up the fake candlestick, hefted it in his hand. “Well, here’s one that won’t. I thank you. William Tyndale thanks you too.”

The prior reached inside his cassock and pulled out a piece of paper, unfurled it on the altar.

“Here is a map with a
c
where you’ll find congregations that will lend you support and be glad to hear you preach. Burn it when you have memorized it. Here is a document showing you as a messenger for the priory should you find yourself at odds with the vagrancy law again. You are welcome to rest here as long as needful.” He handed John the documents. “I understand you have taken a wife.”

“I have. With the assistance of a priest from this very abbey.”

“Has that proven to be a happy choice?”

“A very happy choice. We are expecting a child. A Christmas blessing.”

The prior smiled wanly. “Then, my friend, you need be especially careful. You do not want your child to be an orphan before it is born. More and Stokesley make quick work of burning these days.”

Within two days John felt strong enough to begin his rounds. He left the abbey on foot, not wanting the expense of a horse. The first “congregation”
was less than five miles back toward London. The last was near Southend in Essex. He could get a ship there for home and Kate. He would be back in Antwerp before All Saints’ Day, God willing.

Thomas More looked up from the map he was squinting at, the map of rebel “congregations” that Bishop Stokesley had just delivered to him in his study at Chelsea.

“I knew they were spreading, but I did not know there were so many,” Thomas said in disgust.

“That’s probably only half. Tyndale’s books have done a lot of damage to the Church over these seven years. Would that Cuthbert had taken a firmer hand with him and not let him get away. My predecessor was too disposed toward combating enemies with words.”

Thomas shifted the paperweight on his desk to anchor a corner of the map. Upon the completion of Thomas’s first anti-Tyndale polemic, Bishop Tunstall had given him the paperweight, a fly suspended in a giant blob of amber. “Don’t discount the value of words, Excellency,” Thomas said resentfully. He felt a need to remind the bishop of just how much his own words before Parliament had cost him.

The blade of the bishop’s jawbone reminded Thomas of a dagger’s edge, and he possessed a will just as honed. In spite of his recent silence before Parliament, Stokesley was a formidable ally, stronger than Thomas had had in Bishop Tunstall. But he missed the fellowship of that former alliance.

“Cuthbert meant well,” Thomas said. “He just lacked the temperament to follow through. He thought the enemy could be contained with words and argument.” He pointed to the mountain of manuscripts anchoring another corner of the map. “But you are right, Excellency, if words alone could do it, Tyndale’s vile pen would already have been stopped. I have answered every heretical argument, and yet the books and English Bibles with their profane glosses still seep into England, bringing the stench of an Antwerp shithole with them.”

Stokesley pounded the map with his fist. “We must stop them now! Or there will not be enough oaks in England to make the stakes to burn them all. And it’s going to be harder since we have lost the cooperation of Parliament.”

Thomas couldn’t resist one last jab. “God knows I tried. I lost the chancellorship because of it.”
While you remained silent.
The unspoken words hung between them.

Stokesley answered quickly, “No man could have done more. You were very eloquent. But you can be sure the heretics know of this development. Their arrogance is stronger than ever. One of them has slipped back in—a bold and arrogant move.”

Thomas’s ears perked at this. “Is it a name we know? Who is it?”

The bishop smiled, obviously pleased to be imparting this new knowledge his spies had gleaned. “It is said that he is one of William Tyndale’s closest friends, though I did not recognize his name. He was arrested for vagrancy in Reading”—he pointed to the map spread out on the desk where Reading Abbey was marked with a larger
X
than the rest—“but unfortunately let go by the local magistrate when the schoolmaster identified him as a former Cambridge scholar.”

Thomas’s pulse quickened. “Was his name John Frith?”

“I think so. You know of him?”

And so should you, my illiterate friend,
More thought. Here was another difference between Stokesley and his predecessor. Tunstall was a scholar and a supporter of the new learning in classical studies. That was one reason Tyndale had approached him about a translation for the English Bible in the first place. This new Bishop of London rightly presented himself as a man of action and not of words. “He is one of the young scholars turned heretic who survived the Oxford fish cellar,” Thomas said.

“Ah. I thought I’d heard the name before.”

“As well you should. He writes quite prolifically against the doctrine of Purgatory.” Thomas was gratified to see the stain of embarrassment on Stokesley’s face. He stood up and began to pace the room, his mind whirling. “We must catch him this time. Not only will we stop the profane lies spewing from his pen like venom from the fangs of a viper, but he will lead us straight to Tyndale. We could burn the two of them, back to back. Such a fire would scent the streets of paradise with the burning fat of a bountiful sacrifice.”

Stokesley picked up the paperweight and considered it. The fly’s wings were outstretched as though it had only meant to alight temporarily upon the sap, to suck its sweetness before being caught for all eternity. He put it down. “What we need is a trap,” he said.

“Our traps are already set, Your Excellency.” More tapped at the
X
’s on the map. “Here and here and here. All we have to do is bait them. Sooner or later, John Frith will spring one of them.”

“And when he does, what then? Under Parliament’s new law, he falls under the jurisdiction of the king.”

“You need not remind me,” Thomas snapped. “It’s true,
you
can’t arrest him. But even though I’ve resigned as chancellor, I still have some legal power until a new one is appointed. I can arrest him in the name of the king.”

“But how can we catch him, if we don’t know what he looks like? Have you ever seen him?”

“We know what he looks like.” Thomas fumbled among the papers piled on his desk and pulled out a single sheet. It was an artist’s sketch of a handsome young man, with dark wavy hair, a straight nose, and strong winged eyebrows above wide-set eyes that gleamed with intelligence, just as George Constantine had described him to Hans Holbein.

“We will circulate this sketch among all the spies, infiltrating their vile
congregations
in Oxfordshire and Berkshire, and instruct them to draw out each suspect on his opinions concerning Purgatory and the Eucharist. By the time Frith is picked up, we’ll have enough evidence that even the king will not hinder his arrest.”

Thomas was rolling up the map to return to Stokesley when he was interrupted by a knock. He handed the map to Stokesley and went to answer the door.

“Sir Thomas, there is a Franciscan brother, a man named Richard Risby, to see you.”

“Send him away. Tell him I will not meet with him, and he is not to come here again,” Thomas said in a low voice.

The bishop looked up from the framed miniature portraits he’d been admiring during the interruption.

“That is your friend Erasmus, is it not?”

“It is. Do you know him?”

“I know of his work,” the bishop said, obviously proud to display this one bit of learning. “Who is in the other portrait?”

“Another close friend from Flanders, name of Peter Gillis. He gave me the portraits as a memento of my last visit to Antwerp.”