The King’s Evil. Andrew Taylor

Most of them had visible swellings, great goitres that bulged from their necks or distorted their features. They suffered from scrofula, the disease which blighted so many lives, and which was popularly known as the King’s Evil, because the King’s healing hands had the power to cure it. There were at least two hundred sufferers in the hall below.

      ‘I had a visitor on Wednesday.’ Lady Quincy’s voice was even softer than before. The hairs lifted on the back of my neck. ‘My stepson, Edward Alderley.’

      One of the royal surgeons led them up, one by one, to kneel before the King. Some were lame, hobbling on crutches or carried by their friends. There were men, women and children. There were richly dressed gentlemen, tradesmen’s wives, peasants and artisans and beggars. All were equal in the sight of God.

      There was a reading going on below, something interminable from the Prayer Book; I couldn’t distinguish the words.

      ‘Edward was in good spirits,’ she went on. ‘Full of himself, almost as he used to be when his father was alive. Prosperous as well, or so he would have me believe.’ There was silence, apart from sounds of the shifting crowd below and the distant gabble of the reading. Then: ‘Do you still know where to find his cousin Catherine? Just nod or shake your head.’

      I nodded. The last time I had seen Edward Alderley, he had struck me as an arrogant boor, and I knew his cousin would not welcome his reappearance in her life.

      ‘Good. Will you take a message to her from me?’

      ‘Yes,’ I said.

      ‘He told me that he knows where she is hiding. He said it was a great secret, and I would know everything soon.’ Lady Quincy paused. ‘When he has his revenge for what she did to him. He said that he and his friends would see Catherine Lovett dead and he would dance on her grave.’

      ‘His friends? What friends?’

      She shrugged and was silent.

      I was surprised that anyone might want to make a friend of Edward Alderley. He was a bully and a braggart, with a dead traitor for a father. After his father’s disgrace last year, Lady Quincy had lost no time in reverting to the name and title she had used when married to her first husband.

      In the hall below, the King was stroking the neck of the kneeling patient with his long fingers, while someone in the crowd was weeping and the clergyman was praying in an inaudible monotone. The King’s face was grave, and his heavy features gave him an air of melancholy. He was staring over the head of the kneeling woman. It seemed that he was looking up at me.

      ‘Do you think Alderley was telling the truth?’ I said.

      Lady Quincy stirred beside me, and her arm brushed mine, just for an instant. ‘He came to …’ There was a pause, as if she needed a moment to decide what to say. ‘He came in the hope of impressing me, perhaps. Or … Or to make me afraid of him.’

      ‘Afraid?’ I looked towards her again, but her face was still invisible. ‘You? Why should you be afraid of him?’

      ‘Warn Catherine for me,’ she said, ignoring the question. ‘Promise me you will, and as soon as you can. I don’t want her death on my conscience.’

      ‘I promise.’

      ‘I believe Edward would kill her himself if he could.’ She paused, and then abruptly changed the subject. ‘I shall listen to the sermon at St Olave’s on Sunday morning. Do you know it? In Hart Street, on the corner of Seething Lane.’

      I nodded. It was not far from the Tower, one of the few churches in the walled city that had survived the Great Fire.

      ‘Will you meet me there? Not in the church but afterwards – wait outside in a hackney. I wish to be discreet.’

      ‘Very well.’ I felt a stab of excitement. ‘May I ask why?’

      But she had already turned away. She slipped through the crowd towards the door, followed by her small attendant, who I now saw was a lad with dark hair, presumably her footboy though he wasn’t wearing her livery. He was wrapped in a high-collared cloak that was too big for him.

      Disappointment washed over me as Lady Quincy passed through the doorway to the stairs. The footboy followed his mistress. In the doorway he glanced back, and I saw that the lad was an African.

      After Lady Quincy and her attendant had gone, I waited for a few minutes to avoid the risk of our meeting by accident. I left the balcony and went down to the Pebbled Court behind the Banqueting House. The sky was grey and the cobbles were slick with rain.

      The public areas of the palace were packed, as they always were when the King was healing. The sufferers did not come alone: their family and friends came too, partly to support them and partly to see the miracle of the royal touch. It was unusual to have a big public healing ceremony in September, but the demand had been so great that the King had ordered it. Charles II was a shrewd man who knew the importance of reminding his subjects of the divine right of kings. What better way of demonstrating that God had anointed him to rule over them than by the miracle of the royal touch?

      I crossed to the opposite corner of the court, passed through a doorway and went up to the Privy Gallery. Mr Chiffinch was waiting in the room where the Board of Red Cloth held its quarterly meetings; I was clerk to the board, and he was one of the commissioners. He was alone, because the other commissioners had already gone to dinner. He was sitting by the window with a bottle of wine at his elbow. He was a well-fleshed man whose red face gave a misleading impression of good nature.

      In his quiet way, Chiffinch wielded more power than most men, for he was Keeper of the King’s Private Closet and the Page of the Backstairs, which meant that he controlled private access to the King. It was he who had told me to wait on the balcony in the Banqueting Hall until Lady Quincy approached me; he had said it was by the King’s order, and that the King relied on my discretion. He had also said that I was to do whatever her ladyship commanded.

      ‘Well,’ he said. ‘What did she want?’

      ‘I’m not permitted to say, sir.’

      He shrugged, irritated but clearly unsurprised by my answer. He disliked being in a state of ignorance; the King did not tell him everything. ‘You didn’t attract attention, I hope?’

      ‘I believe not, sir.’

      ‘I’ll tell you this, Marwood: if you put a foot wrong in this business, whatever it is, we shall make sure you regret it. The King does not care for those who fail him. And he’s not in a forgiving mood at present, as my Lord Clarendon is learning to his cost.’

      I bowed. A few weeks earlier, the King had removed Lord Clarendon, his oldest adviser, from the office of Lord Chancellor in one of the greatest political upheavals since the Restoration of the monarchy seven years before. But removing Clarendon from office had not made him politically insignificant. His daughter was married to Charles II’s own brother, the Duke of York. Since the King had no legitimate children, and Queen Catherine was unlikely to give him any, the Duke was his brother’s heir presumptive. Moreover, the next heirs in the line of succession were Clarendon’s grandchildren, the five-year-old Princess Mary and her infant sister, Anne. If the King were to die, then Clarendon might well become even more politically powerful than he had been before.

      ‘These are dangerous times,’ Chiffinch went on. ‘Great men rise and fall, and the little people are dragged up and down behind them. If my Lord Clarendon can fall, then anyone can. But of course a man can rise, as well as fall.’ He paused to refill his glass, and then went on in a softer voice: ‘The more I know, the better I can serve the King. It would be better for him, and for you, if you confided in me.’

      ‘Forgive me, sir. I cannot.’ I suspected that he was looking for a way to destroy the King’s trust in me.

      ‘It’s curious, though,’ Chiffinch went on, staring at the contents of his glass. ‘I wonder why my lady wanted to meet you in the Banqueting House of all places, at one of the healing ceremonies. She so rarely comes to Whitehall these