Mistress Cromwell

by Carol McGrath

Genres: General Fiction; Action & Adventure; Historical Fiction; Tudor Romance

Synopsis

'A delicious frisson of danger slithers through every page of the book. Enthralling.' Karen Maitland 'A delicate and detailed portrayal, absolutely beautifully done. Captivating.' Suzannah Dunn ' Rich, vivid and immersive, an enthralling story of the turbulent Tudor era.' Nicola Cornick MISTRESS CROMWELL presents the rise of Tudor England's most powerful courtier, Thomas Cromwell, through the eyes of the most important - and little known - woman in his life . . . When beautiful cloth merchant's daughter Elizabeth Williams is widowed at the age of twenty-two, she is determined to make a success of the business she inherited from her father. But there are those who oppose a woman making her own way in the world, and soon Elizabeth realises she may have some powerful enemies - enemies who know the dark truth about her dead husband. Happiness arrives when Elizabeth meets ambitious young lawyer, Thomas Cromwell. Their marriage begins in mutual love and respect - but it isn't always easy being the wife of an independent, headstrong man in Henry VIII's London. The city is both merciless and filled with temptation, and Elizabeth soon realises she must take care in the life she has chosen . . . or risk losing everything. MISTRESS CROMWELL was previously published as THE WOMAN IN THE SHADOWS. Do you love the novels of Carol McGrath? Have you read THE SILKEN ROSE, her brand new novel, starring one of the most fierce and courageous forgotten queens of England? Available now!

Release date: August 4, 2017

Publisher: Accent Press

Print pages: 385

Sample

Midsummer’s Eve



21st June 1526

IT IS A GLORIOUS DAY: the sky a spread of blue with the midsummer sun slowly rising towards its zenith. A sudden breeze blows through the boughs of the apple trees, causing leaves to shiver. On the other side of our garden wall, the monks of Austin Friars are at their morning prayers. A bell that peals the hour from St Peter’s Broad Street gives way to chimes from a hundred London churches until, at last, they cease and for a moment there is only the hum of bees in my lavender beds.

From where I’m sitting in a shady arbour stitching a sleeve for Thomas’ shirt I can see him tending his roses. Enjoy this moment, Lizzy, I think to myself, for in a heartbeat it will be gone. Enjoy watching Thomas taking advantage of a rare holiday, his sleeves rolled back, his shirt loose from his breeches, scattered with dirt like a peasant’s smock, sweat pearling on his brow; my husband, Thomas Cromwell, who works so hard because he is determined to one day stand shoulder to shoulder with the greatest nobles in the land, so he says, and so I believe.

As if he senses me observing him, Thomas glances up from his work and pulls a linen cloth from his belt. ‘We’ll watch the guild marches from the river bank this evening, Elizabeth,’ he calls over, wiping his forehead. ‘It’ll be cooler there,’ He leans on his spade and begins to dig again.

‘Will it?’ I say into the air, for he is not listening now.

I doubt it will be cooler by the river today. We’ll be caught up in a press of people merrymaking. I find myself smiling. How our children love puppet shows that appear on the narrow, cramped streets all the way down to the river. Stages are already erected along the Cheape with tableaux from the Old Testament, and an angel and a devil will wander around the audience; the devil scaring the children, who love to be frightened more than they care for the angel’s blessing.

Listen! Hear my girls now. Catch their excitement, their voices escaping from the opened windows above.

‘What can I wear?’ nine-year-old Annie cries.

‘What can I wear?’ echoes young Grace.

A coffer lid slams and their maid scolds, ‘Hush now, children. You will disturb Gregory.’

Gregory is in the library, working at his letters. No sound escapes from that opened casement, though, without doubt, he would prefer to play outdoors on such a pleasant morning.

I draw my needle slowly in and out of the bleached linen cloth. They say Queen Catherine still embroiders shirts for King Henry, to whom she is devoted, though the pomegranate, her symbol and that of fruitfulness, has not helped her to bear fruit other than a daughter and this has brought about her misfortune and sadness. I am so fortunate to be blessed with my husband and children.

Later, we shall wend our way down to the ancient waterway that rolls through our city, watching our lives unfold, reminding us how life has its ebbs and flows, its truths and untruths, its sorrows and joys - and, yes, I too have known both great joy and profound sorrow, as I shall relate.

Chapter One



1513 Wood Street

BRANCHES OF ROSEMARY SLID from Tom Williams’ funeral bier, scattering around the mourners’ feet to be trampled into the tiles of the church nave, releasing the scent of remembrance. For a moment, it seemed as if the bier threatened to slope backwards. I let out a gasp of horror. Was it an ill omen? I stood still and my father, mother, sister and the long procession of merchants, their wives, and yeomen following behind me, stopped walking. With one adept movement, the six guildsmen adjusted its weight on their shoulders just in time, and righted it.

My husband had ever been a slight man. I wondered at that, because he had been a King’s Yeoman of the Guard, a protector of the King’s property. Surely this is a heavy man’s job. Tom had been an agile swordsman, though it was sword-play that was to be his undoing. He died from a thrust through the chest on Monday and by Thursday he was wrapped in his shroud.

Tom’s death had been an accident. The Tower yeomen had not used blunt swords for practice that day. It was a hot day and he drank too much ale on an empty stomach, which made him careless, and he’d been caught by a blade in his breast. It had pierced him through.

I smoothed down my dark overdress. With the sun slanting into the church’s opened doorway the black bombazine took on a ghostly, silvery sheen. My breath felt trapped tight inside my chest as, again, I began to follow the bier through the great doorway of St Alban’s Church along the pathway to the graveyard.

It had been raining but now the sun was out and, blinded by the bright June sunlight, I faltered on a loosened, slippery paving stone and almost tripped. Mother reached out and took my hand.

‘Elizabeth, steady.’

Her voice was gentle. My younger sister, Joan, held my other hand.

By the graveside, my tears began to flow. I had never loved Tom Williams and had resented my marriage but I had become used to his quiet manner, his generosity, and to my position as one married into a respectable London family. At three and twenty, I was young to be a widow. Dabbing at my eyes with a soft linen cloth, I cried for his passing along with the other cloth merchants’ wives who wept with me. He had sinned gravely and I despaired for his soul. He had not deserved to die.

Was he now truly at rest? If what the priests tell us is true, he will dwell long in purgatory. I must be strong and not give way to weeping. Wiping away my tears away with a linen handkerchief, I swallowed and distracted myself by scanning the gathering of merchants and merchants’ wives, all familiar faces. A few moments later, my eye lighted on a new face amongst the mourners, a cloaked man standing a little apart under a yew tree. He was high-cheeked, of middle height and looked like a clerk, though wealthy enough to wear the best cloth. I noted the richness of his fur-trimmed hat and the lustre of his velvet cloak as he stepped forward to speak with Father. Puzzled, I watched them as Mother adjusted her funeral hood, complaining how it pinched her ears.

Joan shook raindrops from her cloak and mumbled, ‘Mother, I told you, you could have worn a simpler cap. I told you it was too tight.’

My forward younger sister was a trial to my mother, always knowing better than she.

The stranger nodded and, it seemed to me, discreetly stepped back into the shadow of the yew tree, just as the priest lifted his hand, his surplice hem caught by a breeze into a brief flutter and his raised arms in a flapping gesture making him seem like a strange dark bird, one you would see drawn on the border of a map.

The church bell tolled steadily as Tom was finally lowered into his last resting place. We said our Pater Noster as Father Luke committed my husband, sewn tightly into his linen shroud, onto the hay that lined his grave. As I glanced away, a tame blackbird began to hop about my skirts. Not wanting to tread on it, I moved too quickly, revealing a flash of crimson petticoat below my dark gown.

I tugged at my kirtle and gently shook it until the offending underskirt was once again hidden beneath the folds of my black gown. I knew that crimson was a colour forbidden to one of my humble rank, yet I could not resist wearing it. The soft, slippery silk had been left over from a length we had sold to a foreign merchant. Tom had given it to me as a New Year’s gift. Today, I wanted the bright colour to temper the sombre mood that was drowning me, and why should I not? It was my own secret flaunting of the rules that contained our daily lives. Tom Williams had possessed a secret, a secret so dangerous it could never be spoken, and in the keeping of it I feared for his soul and for my own. Tom had broken the rules and now he would receive God’s judgement for his sin.

The priest signalled to me and I unpinned the posy of herbs I wore on my waist, and cast it on top of my husband’s shroud. Others followed my lead until Tom’s linen-wrapped body was concealed under a covering of laurel and rosemary.

Mother squeezed my hand. ‘It’s time to leave. Lizzy, speak, or do you wish your father to speak for you?’

‘No, I shall thank them.’

I raised my head and turned towards the gathering. Through gaps in the mourners, I could see the patiently waiting band of parish poor who had led us through London’s streets, pausing at every wayside cross to kneel and pray. I had not noticed the stench of poverty then, but now, a whiff of their staleness cut through the rain and the scent of damp earth, laurel, ivy and rosemary. I felt sorrow for them all. The world is cruel to the poor.

Joan lifted her black spice-filled pomander to her nose and said in too loud a voice. ‘I am glad I do not live in the City.’ A wimpled city matron standing near to us swivelled her head around and glowered at her.

‘Be silent, Joan,’ Mother said in a low, sharp tone. ‘You may one day.’

I glared at my sixteen-year-old sister and whispered into her ear, ‘Don’t let the merchants’ wives hear that sort of remark. They will think you proud.’

‘I am proud,’ she whispered back.

‘Not today, Joan,’ my mother snapped. ‘Be silent. Your sister has to speak and be heard.’

Ignoring my sister, I turned towards the poor who were waiting by the church door and said, ‘Thank you for coming today. Bread, cheese and ale will be served in the church.’ I paused and added because Tom would need their prayers, ‘Do not forget to say a last Pater Noster for my husband’s soul. Your prayers will guide him into Heaven’s blessed light.’

Their heads bowed with respect and gratitude, they went into the church, and my servants followed them through the door to distribute their funeral dole. How thankful they were for so little, I thought, tears filling my eyes again.

I drew breath and focused my attention on the cloth guildsmen and the yeomen by the graveside, ‘Thank you for your vigil by my husband’s bier this night past, for your candles, for your sorrow at his passing and for your prayers. You must all be hungry too. The funeral feast will be served in my hall.’ They nodded their thanks but continued to pray.

My father smiled at me. I had spoken well. Glad the burial was over, though there was still the funeral feast to get through, I took my sister’s hand in my own and hurried her along the path towards the graveyard gate with Mother just behind. I stopped to open the gate latch and glanced over my shoulder at those who were making ready to follow us. Some still knelt at the graveside, murmuring prayers. Others spoke with Father. They were merchants, good-wives, guildsmen and a knot of Tom’s yeomen friends, red and gold uniforms flashing below their dark cloaks.

I glimpsed the blackbird again, hopping onto the ivy covering an ancient stone grave marker, pausing to study me with sharp, bright eyes. They say a blackbird can carry a dead person’s soul. I shivered, despite the warmth of my garments and the midday sun.

My house stood close by, a tall building with a garden that reached a long way back from the street. Its two overhanging floors held a number of upper chambers and attics. A wide alley along the side led to stables and a spacious gated yard, within which stood a warehouse where we kept the stores of woollen cloth we supplied for various monasteries in the City. Cloth rooms for finer fabrics were situated on the ground floor of the dwelling house.

We entered the great hall by the heavy street door. There, dining trestles were set in a horseshoe for the feast. I glanced through an open side door from the hall into my small parlour. It held a sense of emptiness now that the funeral bier had been removed. The tapers had been extinguished, leaving only black candlesticks, a pair of black gloves and a pile of mourning rings that lay in a basket by the bench.

I pulled the door closed, and stepped forward into the middle of the hall, ready to greet my guests. My father stood with me as, fussing, Mother and Joan checked the tables.

I could not help saying, ‘All is as it should be, Mother. You needn’t worry. Look, the only white on display is that of linen table cloths.’

‘Yes my dear, but your funeral guests will judge us,’ she said. ‘Well, yes, I can see that your napkins are freshly laundered.’

I nodded. ‘Meg has overseen all.’

The hangings that usually made the hall look welcoming were shrouded with thick black cloth. Mother swept over to the wall behind the high table and straightened a fall of black cloth so that not even a bright stitch on the hanging could show beneath it. Joan stood back with her arms folded and approved.

Hired servants were still in the process of setting out borrowed pewter mugs for the funeral ale, plates of fowl, bread and savoury pies. Meg, my maid, led three kitchen servers along the trestles with dishes of meat and platters laden with fresh salad. For once Meg was clad tidily, in a dark kirtle with only one black, springing curl escaping her cap.

As she passed close to me, Meg whispered, ‘Mistress Elizabeth, it will soon be over.’

‘Thank you, Meg, for your concern,’ I said, longing for the day to end.

As they flowed into the hall, mourners approached me with respectful words, and I noted that the stranger from the churchyard was amongst them. I had a strange feeling now that something about him felt familiar; his square jaw or the determined set of his shoulders. I was sure I had met him before. Perhaps it was just that he had purchased cloth from us in the past. He bowed to me and when Father introduced him as Master Cromwell, the gentleman said in a smooth, hushed voice, ‘Mistress Williams, I am sorry for your loss.’

‘Thank you, sir.’

He hesitated for a moment, as if he would say more, but closed his mouth again, bowed and then crossed the hall to speak to a group of local cloth merchants. Father took my arm and guided me to the high table. Everyone found places and Father Luke blessed the food and drink.

I had no appetite for the feast, though others clearly did as the pies and meats vanished from their platters with speed.

Crumbling a pasty on my plate, I found myself answering a visiting merchant’s questions about Tom’s death. He expressed his sorrow, excused himself and turned to his neighbour. I heard him discuss his wool sales. Soon enough, I thought, I must think of my own business. Not today, not for a little time yet. Gerard Smith, my journeyman, was more than competent at managing things. I glanced along the trestles to where Smith, a small man around thirty and two, with sand-coloured hair and bright, kindly blue eyes, was seated with the apprentices. I hoped I could rely on him, because if I could not then Father would take over our cloth business himself.

For several hours, I spoke little and ate sparingly. Father went about the hall speaking with merchants. I wondered how I would manage but knew I must and would. A chair scraped beside me, jolting me out of my thoughts. I felt a light touch on my elbow and glanced up. The feast was ending. My merchant had left his place. Gone to the privy, no doubt. Instead, Father stood by my chair, with Master Cromwell by his side.

‘Lizzy, Master Cromwell is my new cloth middle-man. He would like you to show him your bombazine cloth. He has admired your mourning gown.’

I started. This was nothing new. Father always employed different cloth middlemen to sell his fabrics to Flanders, thinking each one better than the last but today, at my husband’s funeral, it was not seemly. Master Cromwell was watching me through eyes of an unusual shade, not quite blue or grey.

He bowed and said, ‘Forgive me for staring, Mistress Williams, but you see I knew you as a child. Your father used our fulling mill in Putney.’ He smiled at Father.

That was why he was familiar. I stared back, and in a moment or two I had recollected a tough, wicked little boy, some years older than I, who taught me to fish in the river with a string and a hook with a wriggling worm at the end of it.

‘I do recollect you, Master Cromwell. We played together as children,’ I said, feeling my mouth widen into a smile. ‘Father sent your father our cloth to be washed, beaten, prepared and softened for sale. I remember climbing trees and stealing apples. You led me astray.’

‘That was long ago. I am not that boy now, Mistress Williams.’ His bulky frame seemed to shift uncomfortably.

‘Nor I that girl.’ I looked hard again at his face. The unruly child was utterly transformed into a smooth, sophisticated cloth merchant. ‘I can see you no longer raid orchards for apples.’

I thought quickly. I would need a middleman. Aloud, I said, ‘But my cloth, you want to view my fabrics now, sir? Today? Today of all days? Why?’

‘Master Cromwell returns to Antwerp within a week, Lizzy. He can help you with cloth sales.’ Father added quickly. ‘In fact, Master Cromwell can help us both. He is working for the Merchant Adventurers, buying cloth for sale in Antwerp.’

I recognised that I needed this money as a matter of some urgency as, of late, we had not been doing as well as in previous years. I rose to my feet and said, ‘Master Cromwell, it would be a pleasure, but to see my cloth you must come tomorrow.’

‘Then, I shall come tomorrow, if I may.’ He bowed low. ‘Thank you for receiving me, Mistress Williams. I apologise for disturbing you on such a sorrowful day. Tomorrow morning at an hour before midday? Would this be suitable?’

‘I shall be here to receive you.’

‘God bless you, Mistress Williams,’ he said quietly, then bowed again and took his leave.

When he had moved away, I glanced over to where my mother sat at the end of the table with Joan, thinking that if she had overheard she would object to any business broached by me at her son-in-law’s funeral, but she was in conversation with Father Luke and I could see that he was listening closely to her. I smiled to myself. My mother was the beautiful, perfect hostess who could make everyone feel important. If only I was more like her; for I had no female friends, only Meg, the servant girl who grew up in our household, and very few male acquaintances.

‘Elizabeth,’ my father said, ‘Your guests are leaving now. You must bid them God speed.’

I stood, neatly folded my hands and said aloud so all could hear me, ‘May God guide you all safely home tonight. Thank you all for your care of me today.’

It was over. The interminable day was finished and tomorrow afternoon my family would return to Fulham and I would be on my own. My new life would begin. I determined that Thomas Cromwell would purchase as much of my cloth for sale as could be spared.

On the following day, the appointed hour arrived and after pleasantries were exchanged, I escorted Master Cromwell and Father to the storerooms. ‘Master Cromwell,’ I said, trying to make conversation as we walked along the passage. ‘Where have you been these past years?’

‘Abroad - Italy - learning the ways of business, banking, a little of the law and a bit of soldiering too, Mistress Williams.’ His full mouth eased into a pleasant smile.

My father drew to a stop before the storeroom door. He held out his hand. ‘The key, Lizzy?’

‘Oh, a moment.’ I returned along the dim corridor and entered the chilly parlour. Once inside, I felt a disturbance in the air, as if my husband’s unhappy soul were watching me, hovering by the tall candlesticks that had guarded his bier. I hurriedly drew the storeroom key from the cupboard and ran from the darkened room as if its shadows were about to pursue me.

I opened the door and led us into a spacious chamber filled with shelves filled with fabrics and where summer light filled the room. Linen shone and gleamed; wools appeared soft and comforting; the new mixes of silk and linen seemed to glow with colour and texture. Father immediately took charge and led Master Cromwell forward. Fingering my cloth and moving his clearly experienced eye over the first ells of cloth that Father pulled out from the shelves along the wall, Thomas Cromwell chose the green bombazine to sell abroad as well as several lengths of fine worsted.

‘I shall send for these tomorrow if it is not an intrusion on your time of sadness and prayer.’

‘Thank you. I shall be here,’ I said.

‘And, I shall do my best to sell the fabrics, Mistress Williams. I set sail by Midsummer’s Eve and should return in a month.’ He touched my arm. At his familiar gesture, I drew back, but in my confusion my skirt caught on a wooden nail jutting from the shelf. As I tugged it loose, Master Cromwell glanced down. Fumbling nervously, I untangled my gown, praying that Father had not noticed the flash of crimson.

Thomas Cromwell had seen my forbidden underskirt, for he glanced down, mischievously raised an eyebrow and smiled at me. ‘You have inherited a good trade, Mistress Williams. Who will help you now that your husband has -’ He broke off. I knew he was wondering, as had others, if my husband had been murdered or if his death was accidental. ‘Now that he has passed,’ he said with tact. ‘How will you manage now?’

‘I ran this business for a time after my father-in-law died of the bloody flux. When my husband had served the King, as a yeoman, I had to supervise the overseer, the apprentices and the cloth sales, all of it. I had to manage then and I shall manage now.’

‘With my help, Lizzy,’ Father said firmly, as he looked at me with piercing eyes from under bushy eyebrows.

‘Of course, Father, indeed.’ I thought of the day he had promised me away in marriage. He would have his eye on my business now. His face relaxed into a genial smile.

Thomas Cromwell’s eyes darkened in the candlelight. I saw again that they were not exactly grey but rimmed with hazel, their centres brooding, and they changed colour as do agates.

‘May I see if there is anything else?’

‘Do,’ I said.

Father shifted his bulk over to the shelves and pulled out my plainer cloth. Master Cromwell continued to study bolts of cloth as if he was measuring how much each was worth. He stopped by a roll of painted cloth Father had ignored, pulled it from its shelf and laid it out over a table until it revealed a carpet of golden stars scattered over a midnight-blue linen background.

His breath whistled through his teeth. ‘Beautiful. Painted cloth can fetch a good price. And this painted cloth, well…I could sell it for you.’

‘Oh,’ said Father, raising his great eyebrows again; he favoured plain cloth. ‘You see profit in that?’

‘I do.’ Master Cromwell slid a long finger over the cloth. ‘I certainly do.’

I moved to his side. ‘That cloth is promised to Austin Friars.’

‘What do the friars want with stars? Ah, of course, the Advent plays.’ Master Cromwell was silent for a moment. ‘Can you find more of this?’

Despite my desire to have nothing to do with painted cloth that my husband had purchased heaven only knew where, I said, ‘Perhaps.’

‘Well, then, Mistress Williams, fine painted cloth will sell in the courts of Europe. It is being used to ornament clothing these days. I shall make enquiries.’ As he turned to me again, I felt the soft swish of his expensive cloak caress my hand as if a cat was purring against it. Father said that we would take an advance for me on my cloth today and the rest of the profit after it was sold. I liked this arrangement well. Most of all, I liked the fact that the merchant had addressed me, not Father, and had spoken to me as an equal.

Thomas Cromwell departed after the midday Angelus rang. When he kissed my hand, my fingers felt warm. My heart beat a little faster. He was a stranger, yet no stranger. The wild boy was now a handsome man, wealthy it seemed and not for the likes of me, a recent widow. I shrugged the thought away. For now on, I would sell cloth and continue to live quietly in life’s shadows.

The following morning, Thomas Cromwell sent a wagon to collect the cloth. It was Midsummer’s Eve, and I had hoped he would come himself, but he did not. Instead, his servant came and dealt with Smith. I faced a lonely midsummer. There would be no revels for me this year, for I would pass my Midsummer’s Eve praying for the safe passage of my dead husband’s soul, the husband who had been no husband to me.

The disastrous marriage to Tom Williams had been imposed on me four years earlier because Father claimed he always acted in my interests, and because, in turn, I had recognised that I had obligations and duties to my parent. I made the best of it I could, though I often wished I had never agreed to it.

Chapter Two



1509 Putney

I WAS A COWARD.

For I could not set myself against my father’s wishes. A daughter could not. He called me into the little chamber off the hall on a chill February morning where a small fire was lit. After he had waved me to a stool close to the flame, I sat and waited for him to speak, wondering what merited this summons so early in the day. I had hoped that Father would suggest that I could help him in our cloth trade, because ever since he had spoken of trade with Flanders weeks earlier, I had prayed that he would include me in his new plans. I could read, write, count and keep ledgers up to date. I could negotiate and, importantly, I had an eye for colour. He often remarked on this.

Father coughed, folded his hands behind his back, looked at me earnestly and said, ‘Lizzy, you are eighteen. It is time you were wed.’

This was not what I wanted to hear. I nearly fell off my stool, so great was my disappointment. I looked up at him, trying to hide my displeasure, blinked and nervously pinched the wool of my russet gown between finger and thumb. ‘Is it, indeed, Father?’

‘Yes, I have found you a husband.’

A chill gripped me. ‘Who?’

‘Tom Williams. A good family, cloth merchants, like us, only richer.’ Father looked hopeful and said with meaning, ‘He is an only son. Your mother has lost two children, boys.’ He crossed himself. ‘And there is only Harry who is busy with his estate in Surrey. I want to see you wed into cloth.’

‘Well, I do know who Tom Williams is,’ I burst out in a passion. ‘I have seen the family at guild processions and I don’t care for him and I am too young to wed.’ My arms stubbornly folded themselves. They could not help it.

Father leaned down and kissed my forehead, loosed my arms and took my hands in his. ‘We can afford a dowry and you are not too young, my child. Be reasonable, Lizzy. Tom Williams’ father is an important member of the Drapers’ Company. We spoke of you only yesterday. Look, he brought me that gift…as a token, a promise.’ Father glanced up and pointed at a new painted cloth that hung on the wall above us. It showed Abraham’s sacrifice which I now thought ominous. I looked away, refusing to praise it. He chose his next words carefully. ‘One day Tom Williams will inherit the family fortune. They are wealthy drapers. Richard Williams will invest in my worsteds and fine wools. He is offering you, and our family, opportunity, don’t you see? Will you agree, Lizzy?’

‘No, I do not see, nor shall I agree,’ I said.

I would not take this man Father was thrusting at me. I thought of children disturbing my happy existence. I thought of an end to my beloved studies.

Father reached for a chair and moved it around to face my stool. Sinking onto the cushioned seat, he leaned forward, his face so close to mine. His breath smelled of sweet peppermint. ‘You will have a good home,’ he said. ‘Of course, since Master Williams is a King’s yeoman you will have a most coveted position too. Our cloth business will be secure. They are well-connected.’

This was all about markets, not me, and I was the sacrifice.

‘Not as well-connected as we,’ I said quickly, thinking of my mother’s good connections with minor nobility. ‘Mother needs me here. I help her with the household accounts, with embroidery, sewing and weaving. I had hoped to help you, too, Father, in the business.’

‘Mercy will manage. You will not be lost to her. There are maids, plenty of those, to help and I have apprentices. The business is not for women.’

I snorted and frowned. The maids did not play the lute for my mother to sing in the evening dusk. As for business - better to be a cloth merchant than a cloth merchant’s chattel. I fumed inside, anger eating me up.

Folding my hands in my lap, I tried to be still, but my soft blue woollen kirtle whispered as I restlessly moved my feet and strived hard to keep my voice even. ‘I have learning, Father.’ I shook my head. ‘The Williamses will have no time for that.’

I thought of Tom Williams’ ill, fragile mother with her yellowing pallor; the father who was bent and aged. Tom Williams, I truthfully did not know at all, but there was a quiet about him as silent as the falling snow. I imagined that as a King’s yeoman, he moved with slow, thumping, marching feet, whereas I was small and quick.

My father looked weary and defeated. ‘Won’t you take him, Lizzy, take him for my sake, and, indeed, for your own? It is an excellent match. You will come to like him, love him perhaps.’

I would not take Tom Williams for my own sake. I began to form the words but I hesitated. What choice did I have? That was the truth of it and the lie. We daughters were given to believe we could refuse, but choice did not really exist for women like me. Love him! No. Like him, possibly.

As I hesitated, tears gathere