“Can you send your servant to fetch them?” Thomasin suggested.
“Alas, the king has dismissed my man due to the additional cost he brings, so I am reduced to relying upon the palace servants, all of whom are busy. None are ever to be found.”
Thomasin remembered Catherine speaking of the king trying to send away her friends: surely this was a move to further remove a loyal supporter, ahead of the papal trial.
“No servant at all? That is not right for a bishop.”
Mendoza nodded to Wolsey. “The cardinal kindly sends me one of his men to see to my routines, for which I am most grateful.”
“I will speak to the queen,” said Thomasin, “and see what she can do. A man of your position requires assistance.”
“You are most kind.”
Thomasin did not wish to leave just yet, before she had uncovered the reason for Wolsey’s visit to the bishop. An idea struck her. “Given that you have no assistance, might I do you the service of applying the poultice to your feet? I will be swift and gentle.”
Mendoza opened his watery eyes wide. “You are sure? It is less bad today, so I might be able to tolerate a poultice. Usually I cannot bear for them to be touched.”
Thomasin summoned a passing girl to bring hot water, soap and towels, and knelt on the floor to begin her task. Wolsey shifted in his seat uncomfortably as she knelt before the bishop and removed his boots and the knee-length hose tied to his garters.
“Please don’t mind me, Cardinal,” she said gently to Wolsey. “Pay me no attention and I will soon be done.”
First Thomasin soaped the sore, aching feet and patted them dry. Then she set about applying a little of the unctuous mixture, sightly grainy and strong-smelling. Mendoza winced and twisteda little with the pain, but he nodded to her to continue, knowing that it was doing him good. It was not the task she had intended, nor that which Catherine had instructed, but she could not let the poor man suffer any more, especially given that the king was being so unfeeling.
After a while, Mendoza seemed to relax and addressed Wolsey above her head.
“Your letter, from Erasmus. What does he say?”
If Wolsey had any misgivings about speaking of such important matters before a servant, he overcame them. “It is not the decisive answer that I had hoped for. My friend writes that he has made enquiries in Basel, among learned men at the university, but that they are not in agreement. None of them will advise the king one way or another; they seek precedents in history and in the teachings of learned men.”
“As I suspected,” nodded Mendoza, “none will wish to take sides in this matter. It forces them to choose between the emperor and the king.”
“Many will have no qualms in choosing to support the emperor, especially those under his rule, but with the guidelines for heresy changing almost overnight, none wish to raise their voice and come to the empire’s attention. It is too much to risk, purely for a point of theology raised by the king of a tiny realm on the edge of Europe.”
Thomasin concealed her surprise and reached for more ointment.
“We really are a backwater here,” Wolsey continued. “For all Henry’s ambitions to become Emperor, England is just a toenail on the Hapsburg boot, but he continues to play the game as if he is an equal.”
“Do not let him hear you speak thus,” cautioned Mendoza, “or anyone, for that matter. His pride will not like it, even if it is the truth!”
“Truth or no truth, his path forwards is not a clear one.”
“And so the decision will reside entirely with the legatine court?”
“Entirely with Campeggio, I fear,” admitted Wolsey. “If he does not support the king’s petition, then I am unable to overrule him. It will be a stalemate, and he will have wasted all these months journeying across Europe for nothing.”
“Perhaps,” said Mendoza pertinently, “that is the point.”
Wolsey’s face sharpened. Thomasin switched from one foot to the other, causing the bishop to shift in his seat and rearrange his furs.
“This is my fear,” said Wolsey, leaning in more confidentially. “Is the cardinal here in good faith? What are his secret instructions from Rome?”
“Only he can know that.”
“But as I am the other cardinal in the matter, they should be shared with me, too,” Wolsey insisted. “I must know whether this court is a farce, or if the king has a real, fighting chance. I will prepare my case to the best of my ability, but I cannot perform miracles in the face of implacable opposition.”
“The king has every confidence in you,” said Mendoza, kindly.
“Does he, though?” Wolsey uttered, almost without thought.
