Hilary Mantel Collection. Hilary Mantel

sitting, young, tranquil, her head bowed over a book. She looks up. ‘Ich bitte Sie, ich brauch' eine Kerze.’

      ‘Christophe, a candle for her.’

      The book before her he recognises; it is a tract of Luther's. ‘May I?’ he says, and picks it up.

      He finds himself reading. His mind leaps along the lines. Is she some fugitive Cranmer is sheltering? Does he know the cost if she is taken? He has time to read half a page, before the archbishop trickles in, like a late apology. ‘This woman is …?’

      Cranmer says, ‘Margarete. My wife.’

      ‘Dear God.’ He slams Luther down on the table. ‘What have you done? Where did you find her? Germany, evidently. This is why you were slow to return. I see it now. Why?’

      Cranmer says meekly, ‘I could not help it.’

      ‘Do you know what the king will do to you when he finds you out? The master executioner of Paris has devised a machine, with a counterweighted beam – shall I draw it for you? – which when a heretic is burned dips him into the fire and lifts him out again, so that the people can see the stages of his agony. Now Henry will be wanting one. Or he will get some device to tease your head off your shoulders, over a period of forty days.’

      The young woman looks up. ‘Mein Onkel –’

      ‘Who is that?’

      She names a theologian, Andreas Osiander: a Nuremberger, a Lutheran. Her uncle and his friends, she says, and the learned men of her town, they believe –

      ‘It may be the belief in your country, madam, that a pastor should have a wife, but not here. Did Dr Cranmer not warn you of this?’

      ‘Please,’ Cranmer begs, ‘tell me what she is saying. Does she blame me? Is she wishing herself at home?’

      ‘No. No, she says you are kind. What took hold of you, man?’

      ‘I told you I had a secret.’

      So you did. Down the side of the page. ‘But to keep her here, under the king's nose?’

      ‘I have kept her in the country. But I could not refuse her wish to see the celebrations.’

      ‘She has been out on the streets?’

      ‘Why not? No one knows her.’

      True. The protection of the stranger in the city; one young woman in a cheerful cap and gown, one pair of eyes among the thousands of eyes: you can hide a tree in a forest. Cranmer approaches him. He holds out his hands, so lately smeared with the sacred oil; fine hands, long fingers, the pale rectangles of his palms crossed and recrossed by news of sea voyages and alliances. ‘I asked you here as my friend. For I count you my chief friend, Cromwell, in this world.’

      So there is nothing to do, in friendship, but to take these bony digits in his own. ‘Very well. We will find a way. We will keep your lady secret. I only wonder that you did not leave her with her own family, till we can turn the king our way.’

      Margarete is watching them, blue eyes flitting from face to face. She stands up. She pushes the table away from her; he watches her do it, and his heart lurches. Because he has seen a woman do this before, his own wife, and he has seen how she puts her palms down on the surface, to haul herself up. Margarete is tall, and the bulge of her belly juts above the table top.

      ‘Jesus,’ he says.

      ‘I hope for a daughter,’ the archbishop says.

      ‘About when?’ he asks Margarete.

      Instead of answering, she takes his hand. She places it on her belly, pressing it down with her own. At one with the celebrations, the child is dancing: spanoletta, Estampie Royal. This is a perhaps a foot; this is a fist. ‘You need a friend,’ he says. ‘A woman with you.’

      Cranmer follows him as he pounds out of the room. ‘About John Frith …’ he says.

      ‘What?’

      ‘Since he was brought to Croydon, I have seen him three times in private conversation. A worthy young man, a most gentle creature. I have spent hours, I regret not a second of it, but I cannot turn him from his path.’

      ‘He should have run into the woods. That was his path.’

      ‘We do not all …’ Cranmer drops his gaze. ‘Forgive me, but we do not all see as many paths as you.’

      ‘So you must hand him to Stokesley now, because he was taken in Stokesley's diocese.’

      ‘I never thought, when the king gave me this dignity, when he insisted I occupy this seat, that among my first actions would be to come against a young man like John Frith, and to try to argue him out of his faith.’

      Welcome to this world below. ‘I cannot much longer delay,’ Cranmer says.

      ‘Nor can your wife.’

      The streets around Austin Friars are almost deserted. Bonfires are starting up across the city, and the stars are obscured by smoke. His guards are on the gate: sober, he is pleased to note. He stops for a word; there is an art to being in a hurry but not showing it. Then he walks in and says, ‘I want Mistress Barre.’

      Most of his household have gone to see the bonfires, and they will be out till midnight, dancing. They have permission to do this; who should celebrate the new queen, if they do not? John Page comes out: something want doing, sir? William Brabazon, pen in hand, one of Wolsey's old crew: the king's business never stops. Thomas Avery, fresh from his accounts: there's always money flowing in, money flowing out. When Wolsey fell, his household deserted him, but Thomas Cromwell's servants stayed to see him through.

      A door bangs overhead. Rafe comes down, boots clattering, hair sticking up. He looks flushed and confused. ‘Sir?’

      ‘I don't want you. Is Helen here, do you know?’

      ‘Why?’

      At that moment Helen appears. She is fastening up her hair under a clean cap. ‘I need you to pack a bag and come with me.’

      ‘For how long, sir?’

      ‘I cannot say.’

      ‘To go out of London?’

      He thinks, I'll make some arrangement, the wives and daughters of men in the city, discreet women, they will find her servants, and a midwife, some competent woman who will put Cranmer's child into his hands. ‘Perhaps for a short time.’

      ‘The children –’

      ‘We will take care of your children.’

      She nods. Speeds away. You wish you had men in your service as swift as she. Rafe calls after her. ‘Helen …’ He looks irate. ‘Where is she going, sir? You can't just drag her off into the night.’

      ‘Oh, I can,’ he says mildly.

      ‘I need to know.’

      ‘Believe me, you don't.’ He relents. ‘Or if you do, this is not the time – Rafe, I'm tired. I'm not going to argue.’

      He could perhaps leave it to Christophe, and some of the more unquestioning members of his household, to take Helen from the warmth of Austin Friars to the chill of the abbey precincts; or he could leave it till the morning. But his mind is alive to the loneliness of Cranmer's wife, the strangeness of the city en fête, the deserted aspect of Cannon Row, where even in the shadow of the abbey robbers are bound to lurk. Even in the time of King Richard the district was home to gangs of thieves, who issued out by night at their pleasure, and when the dawn came swarmed back to claim the privilege of sanctuary, and no doubt to share the spoils with the clergy. I shall clean out that lot, he thinks. My men will be after them like ferrets down a hole.

      Midnight: stone exhales a mossy breath, flagstones are slippery with the city's exhalations. Helen puts her hand into his. A servant admits them, eyes downcast; he slips him a coin to raise his eyes