World Without End (124 page)

Ralph was shocked. 'Has someone stolen them?'

'No, but some have been given to you already, as heriot when their owners died, and then we couldn't find a tenant to take over Jack Shepherd's land, and many sheep died over the winter. Then there was no one to look to the early lambs this spring, so we lost most of those, and some of the mothers.'

'But this is impossible!' Ralph said angrily. 'How are noblemen to live if their serfs let the livestock perish?'

'We thought perhaps the plague was over, when it died down in January and February, but now it seems to be coming back.'

Ralph repressed a shudder of terror. Like everyone else, he had been thanking God that he had escaped the plague. Surely it could not return?

Nate went on: 'Perkin died this week, and his wife Peg, and his son Rob, and his son-in-law Billy Howard. That's left Annet with all those acres to manage, which she can't possibly do.'

'Well, there must be a heriot due on that property, then.'

'There will be, when I can find a tenant to take it over.'

Parliament was in the process of passing new legislation to stop laborers flitting about the country demanding even higher wages. As soon as the ordinance became law, Ralph would enforce it and get his workers back. Even then, he now realized, he would be desperate to find tenants.

Nate said: 'I expect you've heard of the death of the earl.'

'No!' Ralph was shocked again.

'What's that?' Sir Gerald said. 'Earl William is dead?'

'Of the plague,' Nate explained.

Tilly said: 'Poor Uncle William!'

The baby sensed her mood and wailed.

Ralph spoke over the noise. 'When did this happen?'

'Only three days ago,' Nate replied.

Tilly gave the baby the nipple again, and he shut up.

'So William's elder son is the new earl,' Ralph mused. 'He can't be more than twenty.'

Nate shook his head. 'Rollo also died of the plague.'

'Then the younger son - '

'Dead, too.'

'Both sons!' Ralph's heart leaped. It had always been his dream to become the earl of Shiring. Now the plague had given him the opportunity. And the plague had also improved his chances, for many likely candidates for the title had been wiped out.

He caught his father's eye. The same thought had occurred to Sir Gerald.

Tilly said: 'Rollo and Rick dead - it's so awful.' She began to cry.

Ralph ignored her and tried to think through the possibilities. 'Let's see, what surviving relatives are there?'

Gerald said to Nate: 'I presume the countess died, too?'

'No, sir. Lady Philippa lives. So does her daughter, Odila.'

'Ah!' said Gerald. 'So, whoever the king chooses will have to marry Philippa in order to become earl.'

Ralph was thunderstruck. Since he was a lad he had dreamed of marrying Lady Philippa. Now there was an opportunity to achieve both his ambitions at one stroke.

But he was already married.

Gerald said: 'That's it, then.' He sat back in his chair, his excitement gone as quickly as it had come.

Ralph looked at Tilly, suckling their child and weeping at the same time. Fifteen years old and barely five feet tall, she stood like a castle wall between him and the future he had always yearned for.

He hated her.

Earl William's funeral took place at Kingsbridge Cathedral. There were no monks except Brother Thomas, but Bishop Henri conducted the service and the nuns sang the hymns. Lady Philippa and Lady Odila, both heavily veiled, followed the coffin. Despite their dramatic black-clad presence, Ralph found the occasion lacked the momentous feeling that usually attended the funeral of a magnate, the sense of historical time passing by like the flow of a great river. Death was everywhere, every day, and even noble deaths were now commonplace.

He wondered whether someone in the congregation was infected, and was even now spreading the disease through his breath, or the invisible beams from his eyes. The thought made Ralph shaky. He had faced death many times, and learned to control his fear in battle; but this enemy could not be fought. The plague was an assassin who slid his long knife into people from behind then slipped away before he was spotted. Ralph shuddered and tried not to think about it.

Next to Ralph was the tall figure of Sir Gregory Longfellow, a lawyer who had been involved in suits concerning Kingsbridge in the past. Gregory was now a member of the king's council, an elite group of technical experts who advised the monarch - not on what he should do, for that was the job of Parliament, but on how he could do it.

Royal announcements were often made at church services, especially big ceremonies such as this. Today Bishop Henri took the opportunity to explain the new Ordinance of Laborers. Ralph guessed that Sir Gregory had brought the news and stayed to see how it was received.

Ralph listened attentively. He had never been summoned to Parliament, but he had talked about the labor crisis to Earl William, who had sat with the Lords, and to Sir Peter Jeffries, who represented Shiring in the Commons; so he knew what had been discussed.

'Every man must work for the lord of the village where he lives, and may not move to another village or work for another master, unless his lord should release him,' the bishop said.

Ralph rejoiced. He had known this was coming, but he was delighted that at last it was official.

Before the plague there had never been a shortage of laborers. On the contrary, many villages had more than they knew what to do with. When landless men could find no paid work, they sometimes threw themselves on the charity of the lord - which was an embarrassment to him, whether he helped them or not. So, if they wanted to move to another village, the lord was if anything relieved, and certainly had no need of legislation to keep them where they were. Now the laborers had the whip hand - a situation that obviously could not be allowed to continue.

There was a rumble of approval from the congregation at the bishop's announcement. Kingsbridge folk themselves were not much affected, but those in the congregation who had come in from the countryside for the funeral were predominantly employers rather than employees. The new rules had been devised by and for them.

The bishop went on: 'It is now a crime to demand, to offer, or to accept wages higher than those paid for similar work in 1347.'

Ralph nodded approval. Even laborers who stayed in the same village had been demanding more money. This would put a stop to that, he hoped.

Sir Gregory caught his eye. 'I see you nodding,' he said. 'Do you approve?'

'It's what we wanted,' Ralph said. 'I'll begin to enforce it in the next few days. There are a couple of runaways from my territory that I particularly want to bring home.'

'I'll come with you, if I may,' the lawyer said. 'I should like to see how things work out.'

69

The priest at Outhenby had died of the plague, and there had been no services at the church since; so Gwenda was surprised when the bell began to toll on Sunday morning.

Wulfric went to investigate and came back to report that a visiting priest, Father Derek, had arrived; so Gwenda washed the boys' faces quickly and they all went out.

It was a fine spring morning, and the sun bathed the old gray stones of the little church in a clear light. All the villagers turned out, curious to view the newcomer.

Father Derek turned out to be a well-spoken city clergyman, too richly dressed for a village church. Gwenda wondered whether any special significance was attached to his visit. Was there a reason why the church hierarchy had suddenly remembered the existence of this parish? She told herself that it was a bad habit always to imagine the worst, but all the same she felt something was wrong.

She stood in the nave with Wulfric and the boys, watching the priest go through the ritual, and her sense of doom grew stronger. A priest usually looked at the congregation while he was praying or singing, to emphasize that all this was for their benefit, not a private communication between himself and God; but Father Derek's gaze went over their heads.

She soon found out why. At the end of the service, he told them of a new law passed by the king and Parliament. 'Landless laborers must work for the lord in their village of origin, if required,' he said.

Gwenda was outraged. 'How can that be?' she shouted out. 'The lord is not obliged to help the laborer in hard times - I know, my father was a landless laborer, and when there was no work we went hungry. So how can the laborer owe loyalty to a lord who gives him nothing?'

A rumble of agreement broke out, and the priest had to raise his voice. 'This is what the king has decided, and the king is chosen by God to rule over us, so we must all do as he wishes.'

'Can the king change the custom of hundreds of years?' Gwenda persisted.

'These are difficult times. I know that many of you have come to Outhenby in the last few weeks - '

'Invited by the plowman,' the voice of Carl Shaftesbury interrupted. His scarred face was livid with rage.

'Invited by all the villagers,' the priest acknowledged. 'And they were grateful to you for coming. But the king in his wisdom has ruled that this kind of thing must not go on.'

'And poor people must remain poor,' Carl said.

'God has ordained it so. Each man in his place.'

Harry Plowman said: 'And has God ordained how we are to till our fields with no help? If all the newcomers leave, we will never finish the work.'

'Perhaps not all the newcomers will have to leave,' said Derek. 'The new law says only that they must go home if required.'

That quieted them. The immigrants were trying to figure out whether their lords would be able to track them down; the locals were wondering how many laborers would be left here. But Gwenda knew what her own future held. Sooner or later Ralph would come back for her and her family.

By then, she decided, they would be gone.

The priest retired and the congregation began to drift to the door. 'We've got to leave here,' Gwenda said to Wulfric in a low voice. 'Before Ralph comes back for us.'

'Where will we go?'

'I don't know - but perhaps that's better. If we don't know where we're going, no one else will.'

'But how will we live?'

'We'll find another village where they need laborers.'

'Are there many others, I wonder?'

He was always slower-thinking than she. 'There must be lots,' she said patiently. 'The king didn't pass this ordinance just for Outhenby.'

'Of course.'

'We should leave today,' she said decisively. 'It's Sunday, so we're not losing any work.' She glanced at the church windows, estimating the time of day. 'It's not yet noon - we could cover a good distance before nightfall. Who knows, we could be working in a new place tomorrow morning.'

'I agree,' Wulfric said. 'There's no telling how fast Ralph might move.'

'Say nothing to anyone. We'll go home, pick up whatever we want to take with us, and just slip away.'

'All right.'

They reached the door and stepped outside into the sunshine, and Gwenda saw that it was already too late.

Six men on horseback were waiting outside the church: Ralph, his sidekick Alan, a tall man in London clothes, and three dirty, scarred, evil-looking ruffians of the kind that could be hired for a few pennies in any low tavern.

Ralph caught Gwenda's eye and smiled triumphantly.

Gwenda looked around desperately. A few days ago the men of the village had stood shoulder to shoulder against Ralph and Alan - but this was different. They were up against six men, not two. The villagers were unarmed, coming out of church, whereas previously they had been returning from the fields with tools in their hands. And, most important, on that first occasion they had believed they had right on their side, whereas today they were not so sure.

Several men met her eye and looked quickly away. That confirmed her suspicion. The villagers would not fight today.

Gwenda was so disappointed that she felt weak. Fearing that she might fall down, she leaned on the stonework of the church porch for support. Her heart had turned into something heavy and cold and damp, like a clod from a winter grave. A grim hopelessness possessed her completely.

For a few days they had been free. But it had just been a dream. And now the dream was over.

Ralph rode slowly through Wigleigh, leading Wulfric by a rope around his neck.

They arrived late in the afternoon. For speed, Ralph had let the two small boys ride, sharing the horses of the hired men. Gwenda was walking behind. Ralph had not bothered to tie her in any way. She could be relied upon to follow her children.

Because it was Sunday, most of the Wigleigh folk were outside their houses, enjoying the sun, as Ralph had anticipated. They all stared in horrified silence at the dismal procession. Ralph hoped the sight of Wulfric's humiliation might deter others from going in search of higher wages.

They reached the small manor house that had been Ralph's home before he moved to Tench Hall. He released Wulfric and sent him and his family off to their old home. He paid off the hired men, then took Alan and Sir Gregory into the manor house.

It was kept clean and ready for his visits. He ordered Vira to bring wine then prepare supper. It was too late now to go on to Tench: they could not get there before nightfall.

Gregory sat down and stretched out his long legs. He seemed like a man who could make himself comfortable anywhere. His straight dark hair was now tweeded with gray, but his long nose with its flared nostrils still gave him a supercilious look. 'How do you feel that went?' he said.

Ralph had been thinking about the new ordinance all the way home, and he had his answer ready. 'It's not going to work,' he said.

Gregory raised his eyebrows. 'Oh?'

Alan said: 'I agree with Sir Ralph.'

'Reasons?'

Ralph said: 'First of all, it's difficult to find out where the runaways have gone.'

Alan put in: 'It was only by luck that we traced Wulfric. Someone had overheard him and Gwenda planning where to go.'