The Black Book (Part 2)

Wolf Crawl Week 23: Monday 3 June – Sunday 9 June

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Welcome to week 23 of Wolf Crawl

This week, we are reading the second part of ‘The Black Book, London, January – April 1536.’ This runs from page 223 to 255 of the Fourth Estate paperback edition, ending with the line: ‘One day he will give in and invite it to stand by the hearth.’

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:

The Black Book (Part 1)

This week’s story

As proposed, Cranmer invites the Duke of Norfolk to dinner. It is Cromwell’s peace offering with jellies. But Thomas Howard’s peculiar son, the Earl of Surrey, comes too. He doesn’t like base men like Cranmer and Cromwell, and he lets them know it.

At home, Cromwell listens to Gregory’s stories and then shuts himself in his room with a piece of paper. He lists the combatants in this war: the Boleyns and their foes. In his mind’s eye, he sits the Boleyns’ enemies down to talk.

In the real world, he talks to the Seymours. He must manage their expectations but make sure they don’t sell Jane cheap. ‘You must not give in to the king,’ Edward tells his sister.

Chapuys interrogates Cromwell about Jane Seymour at Austin Friars: currently a building site. The ambassador wants to know who she is and whether Cromwell will turn on the queen. ‘Anne is desperate and dangerous,’ he says. ‘Strike first, before she strikes you.’

When Anne appears at court, she is much changed. She is ‘light, starved,’ and doleful. Cromwell believes it is a ruse. ‘She is on the offensive,’ he thinks.

In Parliament, the nation’s business goes forward. The Commons rejects his poor law despite the king’s support. And a Court of Augmentations is set up to manage the dissolution of the monasteries. Meanwhile, Cromwell’s income is augmented by bribes and fees. ‘It’s the way business has always been done.’

He gets Anne’s cousin Francis Bryan drunk. One-eyed Francis has fallen out with George Boleyn and seems ready to dish the dirt on Anne. But for now, the only name he gives Cromwell is the one he doesn’t want to hear: Thomas Wyatt.

Promotions. Edward Seymour to the Privy Chamber. Rafe Sadler to the king’s side. Helen his wife is bereft, but Cromwell is delighted. He need not prep Rafe for the job: ‘All his life has been training for this.’

He, Cromwell, manages Henry’s courtship of Jane. He helps write Henry’s love letters, making sure they are not too subtle. And he tells Jane what to talk about with the king: Horses. Dogs. Cannon. ‘He feels irredeemably sad,’ and at the same time, has the impulse to ask Jane’s sister Bess to marry him. In a half-world of stories and myth, she alone seems to ‘understand his life.’