Cromwell’s wife, to whom Chapuys refers as the daughter of a shearman, was Elizabeth Wykys, descended from one of an ancient family of esquires, who was gentleman-usher to Henry VII[28]. A reference in Cromwell’s will of July 12, 1529, to one ‘Mercye Pryo_ur_’ as his mother-in-law[29] has led some writers to suppose that he married Elizabeth, daughter of Sir John Pryor, and widow of Thomas Williams, a Welsh gentleman; but a letter to Cromwell from one Harry Wykys of Thorpe, near Chertsey, dated November 2, 1523[30], disproves this theory, and corroborates the other. The most probable explanation of the entry in the will is that Mercy Pryor married twice, and that she was the mother of Elizabeth Wykys by her first husband[31]. Cromwell’s wife was probably a woman of some property. He was exactly the sort of man who would seek a wife with an eye to the financial advantages of the match, and the theory that Elizabeth Wykys was rich fits in well with the evidence that her mother was married a second time. Moreover Cromwell’s property increased so fast during his years of service under Wolsey, that even his notorious accessibility to bribes could not account for it, had it not been augmented from some outside source. Chapuys goes on to say that for some time after his marriage Cromwell kept servants in his house, carrying on the business of his father-in-law; a statement corroborated by his correspondence, which shows that he plied his trade as a cloth and wool merchant at least as late as 1524. There can be little doubt, however, that he continued his business as a solicitor at the same time, for it would be impossible to explain his sudden advance in legal prominence in the years 1520 to 1525, if he had not had long practice in the law beforehand. The strange combination of employments in which Cromwell was engaged fitted in well with the peculiar versatility of the man, and brought him into close contact with diverse sorts of men, in diverse conditions of life. A more detailed account of his career during the seven or eight years which followed his probable return to England it is impossible to give, for between 1512 and 1520 there occurs another extraordinary gap in the life of Thomas Cromwell, during which we do not possess a single trustworthy contemporary record concerning him. In 1520 there is certainly evidence that he was known to Wolsey, but precisely how or when his connexion with the Cardinal began, it is impossible to tell.