Crows (Part 2)

Wolf Crawl Week 20: Monday 13 May – Sunday 19 May

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Welcome to week 20 of Wolf Crawl

This week, we are reading the second part of the chapter, “Crows, London and Kimbolton, Autumn 1535.” Cromwell visits Katherine at Kimbolton, and Anne is pregnant again.

You will find everything you need for this read-along on the main Cromwell trilogy page of my website, including:

• The reading schedule

• Weekly updates, like this one

• Plot summaries for each character

• Online resources about Mantel’s writing and Thomas Cromwell

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Last week’s post:

Crows (Part 1)

This week’s story

Cromwell remembers the day he turned up at the Frescobaldi house in Florence. He boasted like an Italian and called himself Hercules. He started by sweeping the floor and worked his way up.

Back in 1535, he is writing in his head The Book Called Henry. He asks his little Welsh boy whether he prays in his own tongue. When his agent, John Ap Rice, comes in with a box of relics, he says, ‘John, you must sit down and write. Your compatriots must have prayers.’

Stephen Gardiner has been down in Putney. He says, ‘I know things about your life you don’t know yourself.’ He says Cromwell doesn’t just look like a murderer. He is one. And his father, Walter, bought off the bereaved family.

Anne summons him. Once he gets past a superfluous Mark Smeaton, he faces a discontented queen. She suspects Katherine of conspiring with Chapuys to urge the emperor to invade. She sends Cromwell to Kimbolton to root out any treason.

Cromwell takes Christophe. On the road, they stop at an inn where he, Cromwell, sleeps with the landlord’s wife. At Kimbolton, he enters the church and asks a priest to pray for Thomas Wolsey.

Katherine asks about Anne and requests visits from Chapuys and her daughter Mary. She remembers her first son, who lived fifty-two days. He tells her to make Mary reconcile with the king. But while Anne is queen, Katherine will have no mercy.

Anne is pregnant again, says a reliably informed Lady Rochford. So now is Jane Seymour’s chance to become the king’s mistress and her brothers prepare her for the task. Meanwhile, Anne shrinks in her clothes, holding within herself her future, the future of England, and the future of Master Secretary Thomas Cromwell.