1The knocking at the gate comes after midnight. His watchman rouses the household, and when he goes downstairs – wearing a savage expression and in all other respects fully dressed – he finds Johane in her nightgown, her hair down, asking ‘What is this about?’ Richard, Rafe, the men of the household steer her aside; standing in the hall at Austin Friars is William Brereton of the privy chamber, with an armed escort. They have come to arrest me, he thinks. He walks up to Brereton. ‘Good Christmas, William? Are you up early, or down late?’ Alice and Jo appear. He thinks of that night when Liz died, when his daughters stood forlorn and bewildered in their night-shifts, waiting for him to come home. Jo begins to cry. Mercy appears and sweeps the girls away. Gregory comes down, dressed to go out. ‘Here if you want me,’ he says diffidently.

2‘The king is at Greenwich,’ Brereton says. ‘He wants you now.’ He has ordinary ways of showing his impatience: slapping his glove against his palm and tapping his foot.

3‘Go back to bed,’ he tells his household. ‘The king wouldn't order me to Greenwich to arrest me; it doesn't happen that way.’ Though he hardly knows how it happens; he turns to Brereton. ‘What does he want me for?’

4Brereton's eyes are roaming around, to see how these people live.

5‘I really can't enlighten you. ’

6He looks at Richard, and sees how badly he wants to give this lordling a smack in the mouth. That would have been me, once, he thinks. But now I am as sweet as a May morning. They go out, Richard, Rafe, himself, his son, into the dark and the raw cold.

7A party of link-men are waiting with lights. A barge is waiting at the nearest landing stairs. It is so far to the Palace of Placentia, the Thames so black, that they could be rowing along the River Styx. The boys sit opposite him, huddled, not talking, looking like one composite relative; though Rafe of course is not his relative. I'm getting like Dr Cranmer, he thinks: the Tamworths of Lincolnshire are among my connections, the Cliftons of Clifton, the Molyneux family, of whom you will have heard, or have you? He looks up at the stars but they seem dim and far away; which, he thinks, they probably are.

8So what should he do? Should he try for some conversation with Brereton? The family's lands are in Staffordshire, Cheshire, on the Welsh borders. Sir Randal has died this year and his son has come into a fat inheritance, a thousand a year at least in Crown grants, another three hundred or so from local monasteries … He is adding up in his head. It is none too soon to inherit; the man must be his own age, or nearly that. His father Walter would have got on with the Breretons, a quarrelsome crew, great disturbers of the peace. He recalls a proceeding against them in Star Chamber, would be fifteen years back … It doesn't seem likely to furnish a topic. Nor does Brereton seem to want one.

9Every journey ends; terminates, at some pier, some mist-shrouded wharf, where torches are waiting. They are to go at once to the king, deep into the palace, to his private rooms. Harry Norris is waiting for them; who else? ‘How is he now?’ Brereton says. Norris rolls his eyes.

10‘Well, Master Cromwell,’ he says, ‘we do meet under the strangest circumstances. Are these your sons?’ He smiles, glancing around their faces. ‘No, clearly not. Unless they have divers mothers.’ He names them: Master Rafe Sadler, Master Richard Cromwell, Master Gregory Cromwell. He sees a flicker of dismay on his son's face, and clarifies: ‘This is my nephew. This, my son.’ ‘You only to go in,’ Norris says. ‘Come now, he is waiting.’ Over his shoulder, he says, ‘The king is afraid he may take cold. Will you look out the russet nightgown, the one with the sables?’ Brereton grunts some reply. Poor work, shaking out the furs, when you could be up in Chester, waking the populace, beating a drum around the city walls.

11It is a spacious chamber with a high carved bed; his eye flickers over it. In the candlelight, the bed hangings are ink-black. The bed is empty.

12Henry sits on a velvet stool. He seems to be alone, but there is a dry scent in the room, a cinnamon warmth, that makes him think that the cardinal must be in the shadows, holding the pithed orange, packed with spices, that he always carried when he was among a press of people. The dead, for sure, would want to ward off the scent of the living; but what he can see, across the room, is not the cardinal's shadowy bulk, but a pale drifting oval that is the face of Thomas Cranmer.

13The king turns his head towards him as he enters. ‘Cromwell, my dead brother came to me in a dream.’

14He does not answer. What is a sensible answer to this? He watches the king. He feels no temptation to laugh. The king says, ‘During the twelve days, between Christmas Day and Epiphany, God permits the dead to walk. This is well known.’

15He says gently, ‘How did he look, your brother?’ ‘He looked as I remember him … but he was pale, very thin. There was a white fire around him, a light. But you know, Arthur would have been in his forty-fifth year now. Is that your age, Master Cromwell?’ ‘About,’ he says.

16‘I am good at telling people's ages. I wonder who Arthur would have looked like, if he had lived. My father, probably. Now, I am like my grandfather. ’

17He thinks the king will say, who are you like? But no: he has established that he has no ancestors.

18‘He died at Ludlow. In winter. The roads impenetrable. They had to take his coffin in an ox-cart. A prince of England, to go in a cart. I cannot think that was well done. ’

19Now Brereton comes in, with the russet velvet, sable-lined. Henry stands up and sheds one layer of velvet, gains another, plusher and denser. The sable lining creeps down over his hands, as if he were a monster-king, growing his own fur. ‘They buried him at Worcester,’ he says. ‘But it troubles me. I never saw him dead.’ Dr Cranmer says, from the shadows, ‘The dead do not come back to complain of their burial. It is the living who are exercised about these matters.’

20The king hugs his robe about him. ‘I never saw his face till now in my dream. And his body, shining white.’

21‘But it is not his body,’ Cranmer says. ‘It is an image formed in Your Majesty's mind. Such images are quasi corpora, like bodies.

22Read Augustine. ’

23The king does not look as if he wants to send out for a book. ‘In my dream he stood and looked at me. He looked sad, so sad. He seemed to say I stood in his place. He seemed to say, you have taken my kingdom, and you have used my wife. He has come back to make me ashamed.’

24Cranmer says, faintly impatient, ‘If Your Majesty's brother died before he could reign, that was God's will. As for your supposed marriage, we all know and believe that it was clean contrary to scripture. We know the man in Rome has no power to dispense from the law of God. That there was a sin, we acknowledge; but with God there is mercy enough.’

25‘Not for me,’ Henry says. ‘When I come to judgment my brother will plead against me. He has come back to make me ashamed and I must bear it.’ The thought enrages him. ‘I, I alone.’ Cranmer is about to speak; he catches his eye, imperceptibly shakes his head. ‘Did your brother Arthur speak to you, in your dream?’ ‘No.’

26‘Did he make any sign? ’

27‘No. ’

28‘Then why believe he means Your Majesty anything but good? It seems to me you have read into his face what was not really there, which is a mistake we make with the dead. Listen to me. ’ He puts his hand upon the royal person, on his sleeve of russet velvet, on his arm, and he grasps it hard enough to make himself felt. ‘You know the lawyers' saying “Le mort saisit le vif”? The dead grip the living. The prince dies but his power passes at the moment of his death, there is no lapse, no interregnum. If your brother visited you, it is not to make you ashamed, but to remind you that you are vested with the power of both the living and the dead. This is a sign to you to examine your kingship.

29And exert it. ’

30Henry looks up at him. He is thinking. He is stroking his sable cuff and his expression is lost. ‘Is this possible?’ Again Cranmer begins to speak. Again he cuts him off. ‘You know what is written on the tomb of Arthur?’

31‘Rex quondam rexque futurus. The former king is the future king. ’ ‘Your father made it sure. A prince coming out of Wales, he made good the word given to his ancestors. Out of his lifetime's exile he came back and claimed his ancient right. But it is not enough to claim a country; it must be held. It must be held and made secure, in every generation. If your brother seems to say that you have taken his place, then he means you to become the king that he would have been. He himself cannot fulfil the prophecy, but he wills it to you. For him, the promise, and for you, the performance of it.’ The king's eyes move to Dr Cranmer, who says, stiffly, ‘I cannot see anything against it. I still counsel against heeding dreams.’ ‘Oh, but,’ he says, ‘the dreams of kings are not like the dreams of other men.’

32‘You may be right. ’

33‘But why now? ’ Henry says, reasonably enough. ‘Why does he come back now? I have been king for twenty years.’ He bites back the temptation to say, because you are forty and he is telling you to grow up. How many times have you enacted the stories of Arthur – how many masques, how many pageants, how many companies of players with paper shields and wooden swords?

34‘Because this is the vital time,’ he says. ‘Because now is the time to become the ruler you should be, and to be sole and supreme head of your kingdom. Ask Lady Anne. She will tell you. She will say the same.’

35‘She does,’ the king admits. ‘She says we should no longer bow to Rome.’

36‘And should your father appear to you in a dream, take it just as you take this one. That he has come to strengthen your hand. No father wishes to see his son less powerful than himself. ’ Henry slowly smiles. From the dream, from the night, from the night of shrouded terrors, from maggots and worms, he seems to uncurl, and stretch himself. He stands up. His face shines. The fire stripes his robe with light, and in its deep folds flicker ochre and fawn, colours of earth, of clay. ‘Very well,’ he says. ‘I see. I understand it all now. I knew who to send for. I always know.’ He turns and speaks into the darkness. ‘Harry Norris? What time is it? Is it four o'clock? Have my chaplain robe for Mass.’

37‘Perhaps I could say Mass for you,’ Dr Cranmer suggests, but Henry says, ‘No, you are tired. I've kept you from your beds, gentlemen.’ It is as easy as that, as peremptory. They find themselves turned out.

38They pass the guards. They walk in silence, back to their people, the man Brereton shadowing them. At last, Dr Cranmer says, ‘Neat work.’ He turns. Now he wants to laugh but he dare not laugh.

39‘A deft touch, “and should your father appear to you …” I take it you don't like to be roused too often in the small hours. ’ ‘My household was alarmed.’

40The doctor looks sorry then, as if he might have been frivolous. ‘Of course,’ he murmurs. ‘Because I am not a married man, I do not think of these things.’

41‘I am not a married man, either. ’

42‘No. I forgot. ’

43‘You object to what I said? ’

44‘It was perfect in every way. As if you had thought of it in advance. ’ ‘How could I?’

45‘Indeed. You are a man of vigorous invention. Still … for the gospel, you know …’

46‘For the gospel, I count it a good night's work. ’ ‘But I wonder,’ Cranmer says, almost to himself. ‘I wonder what you think the gospel is. Do you think it is a book of blank sheets on which Thomas Cromwell imprints his desires?’ He stops. He puts a hand on his arm and says, ‘Dr Cranmer, look at me. Believe me. I am sincere. I cannot help it if God has given me a sinner's aspect. He must mean something by it.’ ‘I dare say.’ Cranmer smiles. ‘He has arranged your face on purpose to disconcert our enemies. And that hand of yours, to take a grip on circumstance – when you took the king's arm in your grasp, I winced myself. And Henry, he felt it.’ He nods. ‘You are a person of great force of will.’

47Clerics can do this: speak about your character. Give verdicts: this one seems favourable, though the doctor, like a fortuneteller, has told him no more than he already knew. ‘Come,’ Cranmer says, ‘your boys will be fretting to see you safe.’

48Rafe, Gregory, Richard, cluster round him: what's happened? ‘The king had a dream.’

49‘A dream? ’ Rafe is shocked. ‘He got us out of bed for a dream?’ ‘Believe me,’ Brereton says, ‘he gets one out of bed for less than that.’

50‘Dr Cranmer and I agree that a king's dreams are not as other men's dreams. ’

51Gregory asks, ‘Was it a bad dream?’

52‘Initially. He thought it was. It isn't now. ’ They look at him, not understanding, but Gregory understands.

53‘When I was small I dreamed of demons. I thought they were under my bed, but you said, it can't be so, you don't get demons our side of the river, the guards won't let them over London Bridge. ’ ‘So are you terrified,’ Richard says, ‘if you cross the river to Southwark?’

54Gregory says, ‘Southwark? What is Southwark?’ ‘Do you know,’ Rafe says, in a schoolmaster's tone, ‘there are times when I see a spark of something in Gregory. Not a blaze, to be sure.

55Just a spark. ’

56‘That you should mock! With a beard like that. ’ ‘Is that a beard?’ Richard says. ‘Those scant red bristles? I thought there was some negligence by the barber.’ They are hugging each other, wild with relief. Gregory says, ‘We thought the king had committed him to some dungeon.’ Cranmer nods, tolerant, amused. ‘Your children love you.’ Richard says, ‘We cannot do without the man in charge.’ It will be many hours till dawn. It is like the lightless morning on which the cardinal died. There is a smell of snow in the air.

57‘I suspect he will want us again,’ Cranmer says. ‘When he has thought about what you have said to him and, shall we say, followed where his thoughts lead him?’

58‘Still, I shall go back to the city and show my face. ’ Change my clothes, he thinks, and wait for the next thing. To Brereton he says, ‘You know where to find me. William.’

59A nod, and he walks away. ‘Dr Cranmer, tell the Lady we did a good night's work for her.’ He throws his arm around his son's shoulder, whispers, ‘Gregory, those Merlin stories you read – we are going to write some more.’

60Gregory says, ‘Oh, I didn't finish them. The sun came out.’ Later that day he walks back into a panelled chamber at Greenwich. It is the last day of 1530. He eases off his gloves, kidskin scented with amber. The fingers of his right hand touch the turquoise ring, settling it in place.

61‘The council is waiting,’ the king says. He is laughing, as if at some personal triumph. ‘Go and join them. They will give you your oath.’ Dr Cranmer is with the king; very pale, very silent. The doctor nods, to acknowledge him; and then, surprisingly, a smile floods his face, lighting up the whole afternoon.

62An air of improvisation hangs over the next hour. The king does not want to wait and it is a matter of which councillors can be found at short notice. The dukes are in their own countries, holding their Christmas courts. Old Warham is with us, Archbishop of Canterbury. It is fifteen years since Wolsey kicked him out of his post as Lord Chancellor; or, as the cardinal always put it, relieved him of worldly office, so allowing him the opportunity, in his last years, to embrace a life of prayer. ‘Well, Cromwell,’ he says. ‘You a councillor! What the world comes to!’ His face is seamed, his eyes are dead-fish eyes. His hands shake a little as he proffers the holy book.

63Thomas Boleyn is with us, Earl of Wiltshire, Lord Privy Seal. The Lord Chancellor is here; he thinks in irritation, why can More never get a proper shave? Can't he make time, shorten his whipping schedule? As More moves into the light, he sees that he is more dishevelled than usual, his face gaunt, plum-coloured stains under his eyes. ‘What's happened to you?’

64‘You didn't hear. My father died. ’

65‘That good old man,’ he says. ‘We will miss his wise counsel in the law.’

66And his tedious stories. I don't think.

67‘He died in my arms. ’ More begins to cry; or rather, he seems to diminish, and his whole body to leak tears. He says, he was the light of my life, my father. We are not those great men, we are a shadow of what they were. Ask your people at Austin Friars to pray for him. ‘It's strange, Thomas, but since he went, I feel my age. As if I were just a boy, till a few days ago. But God has snapped his fingers, and I see my best years are behind me.’

68‘You know, after Elizabeth died, my wife …’ And then, he wants to say, my daughters, my sister, my household decimated, my people never out of black, and now my cardinal lost … But he will not admit, for even a moment, that sorrow has sapped his will. You cannot get another father, but he would hardly want to; as for wives, they are two- a-penny with Thomas More. ‘You do not believe it now, but feeling will come back. For the world and all you must do in it.’ ‘You have had your losses, I know. Well, well.’ The Lord Chancellor sniffs, he sighs, shakes his head. ‘Let us do this necessary thing.’

69It is More who begins to reads him the oath. He swears to give faithful counsel, in his speech to be plain, impartial, in his manner secret, in his allegiance true. He is getting on to wise counsel and discreet, when the door flies opens and Gardiner swoops in, like a crow that's spied a dead sheep. ‘I don't think you can do this without Master Secretary,’ he says, and Warham says mildly, by the Blessed Rood, must we start swearing him all over again?

70Thomas Boleyn is stroking his beard. His eye has fallen on the cardinal's ring, and his expression has moved from the shocked to the merely sardonic. ‘If we do not know the procedure,’ he says, ‘I feel sure Thomas Cromwell has a note of it. Give him a year or two, and we may all find ourselves superfluous.’

71‘I am sure I shall not live to see it,’ Warham says. ‘Lord Chancellor, shall we get on? Oh, you poor man! Weeping again. I am very sorry for you. But death comes to us all.’

72Dear God, he thinks, if that's the best you get from the Archbishop of Canterbury, I could do the job.

73He swears to uphold the king's authorities. His preeminences, his jurisdictions. He swears to uphold his heirs and lawful successors, and he thinks of the bastard child Richmond, and Mary the talking shrimp, and the Duke of Norfolk showing off his thumbnail to the company.

74‘Well, that's done,’ says the archbishop. ‘And amen to it, for what choice have we? Shall we have a glass of wine warmed? This cold gets into the bones.’

75Thomas More says, ‘Now you are a member of the council, I hope you will tell the king what he ought to do, not merely what he can do.

76If the lion knew his own strength, it would be hard to rule him. ’ Outside it is sleeting. Dark flakes fall into the waters of the Thames.

77England stretches away from him, low red sun on fields of snow.

78He thinks back to the day York Place was wrecked. He and George Cavendish stood by as the chests were opened and the cardinal's vestments taken out. The copes were sewn in gold and silver thread, with patterns of golden stars, with birds, fishes, harts, lions, angels, flowers and Catherine wheels. When they were repacked and nailed into their travelling chests, the king's men delved into the boxes that held the albs and cottas, each folded, by an expert touch, into fine pleats. Passed hand to hand, weightless as resting angels, they glowed softly in the light; loose one, a man said, let us see the quality of it.

79Fingers tugged at the linen bands; here, let me, George Cavendish said.

80Freed, the cloth drifted against the air, dazzling white, fine as a moth's wing. When the lids of the vestments chests were raised there was the smell of cedar and spices, sombre, distant, desert-dry. But the floating angels had been packed away in lavender; London rain washed against the glass, and the scent of summer flooded the dim afternoon.