The Courier's Tale Read Online Free

coming that very night to take four young goshawks from a nest high in the middle of the wood.
    Our party split into two. Some went in among the trees, Tom Rutter and I hid on the outskirts of the wood. We stayed there and watched the moon come up. A little while later, four or five figures came past and went on into the trees. Rutter whistled softly into his fist. After a while an owl answered deep in the wood.
    Then we came up behind the bishop’s men, and we all fought in the dark with sticks and swords until they ran away. One of the bishop’s men was Rutter’s brother. He was the source of our information. All the same, both brothers fought manfully and gave each other some good blows with their staves.
    The following morning I had a long talk with my brother George. When I told him that I recently had seen the King, he went very red.
    ‘Did he mention me?’ he asked, scanning my face earnestly.
    ‘It was not that kind of conversation,’ I said. ‘I can’t be sure what was discussed – the fall of Tunis, the state of the Venetian navy . . . There was no occasion to turn to personal matters.’
    It had been four years since George was sent away from court. Every hour he dreamt of returning, but no word of forgiveness had come. While we talked, he seemed to look at me in a new light, his eyes darting up and down and taking in the worn jerkin and breeches and seven-day beard.
    ‘Well, I hope you did not disgrace your family, that’s all I can say,’ he said. ‘Heaven alone knows if you did not commit some solecism that will never be forgotten. For me, of course, it is different – I was brought up with the idea of the court. From the cradle, I thought of nothing but the services our father did there, and his before that, and his before that. I know at once, for instance, without even thinking, to whom one should bow, to whom bend the knee, to whom smile and whom to ignore, which ladies one might dance with and which to kiss. It was all mother’s milk to me, I could do it blindfold, whereas, of course, for you, with different prospects . . .’
    The reason George had been banished was this: one day, he approached the King and his secretary Cromwell, and announced that he desired to state his opinion about the plan to divorce the old queen and marry Anne Boleyn.
    They both gazed at him in astonishment. Though at the time it was the sole subject on everyone’s mind, in front of the King everyone was infinitely discreet and in fact behaved exactly like mice on the floor of a lion’s cave.
    ‘Well, what is it that you have to say?’ said Cromwell.
    ‘Your Highness must not marry this girl,’ said George.
    The King stared at him.
    ‘And why not?’ he said.
    ‘Because,’ said my brother, ‘Your Highness’s conscience will never lie easy. You have already meddled with the sister, and also the mother—’
    ‘Never with the mother,’ said the King in a low voice.
    ‘Nor never with the sister either, so put that from your mind!’ cried Cromwell, and he turned to glare over his shoulder as he hurried after the King, who was walking rapidly away.
    The next day George was summoned to see Cromwell and told to leave court at once, take himself off to the country and hold his tongue and mind his own business. For years he waited for forgiveness. During this time he diverted himself with building the gatehouse, impoverishing the estate and teaching the servants some of the manners of court.
    As we spoke that morning, for instance, there in the dining room, Tom Rutter dressed in livery was standing behind my brother, glaring at the back of his head. During my childhood Tom was the chief captain of the stable lads, hapless victor in the village brawls and lord of the chaff-house where, to my wonder, he used to stretch out his hand like lightning and catch a mouse and squeeze it to death in his bare hand. Now he was being taught to lean forward and fill my brother’s wine cup from time to time without being