red with blood? Strike dead the first-born son in every family?‖
―I should hope not the latter, my lord, if only for your sake.‖
Hotspur grunted.
―I counsel you, my lord, to prepare your way now. Speak closely and secretly with those
who will support you. Exeter was rash, stupid. He deserved to fail. But if you—‖
―Do not tell me how to wage a war, Thorseby.‖
Thorseby closed his mouth, raising his eyebrows slightly as if a schoolmaster rebuking
his wayward pupil.
Hotspur picked up a letter that he‘d been reading before Thorseby had come in. It was
from his father, Northumberland, now back in his northern stronghold, and it contained many
interesting statements and yet more interesting suggestions and promises. Hotspur‘s father had
grown somewhat tired of Bolingbroke, it seemed, especially since Bolingbroke had proved himself so willing to doubt Northumberland after Exeter‘s attempted rebellion. A word here, a
frown there, and so easily did allegiance shift. Hotspur pretended to peruse the letter for a few
minutes, then he folded it carefully, and put it down again.
―If any man wishes to challenge Bolingbroke,‖ he said, ―he will need more than swords
behind him.‖
Thorseby smiled, small and cold. ―I am a powerful man in my own right,‖ he said. ―The
Dominican family will stand behind you. Already my friars have been whispering, preparing the
way for God‘s will as expressed through you.‖
Thorseby”s Dominican „family”? More like a murderous flock of black crows, thought
Hotspur, and shivered slightly at the thought of the great winged beasts swooping down on him
through the cold, grey mists.
―If God sends me a sign,‖ Hotspur said, ―then I will move. Until then, I merely watch.‖
―And plan.‖
Hotspur hesitated, but only slightly. ―And plan. Begone, Thorseby, for I think to warm
this chamber with your absence.‖
PART TWO
The Dog of Pestilence
Lady Mary stood all skin and bone,
Sure such a lady was never known:
This lady went to church one day,
She went to church for all to pray.
And when she came to the church stile,
She sat to rest a little while.
When she came to the church-yard,
There the bells so loud she heard.
When she came to the church door,
She stopt to rest a little more;
When she came the church within,
The parson pray‘d ‗gainst pride and sin.
On looking up, on looking down,
She saw a dead man on the ground;
And from his nose unto his chin,
The worms crawl‘d out, the worms crawl‘d in.
Then she unto the parson said,
Shall I be so when I am dead?
Oh yes! oh yes! the parson said,
You will be so when you are dead.
Traditional English nursery rhyme
I
Tuesday 21st May 1381
—i—
The nave of St Paul‘s in London was crowded with people but, strangely, nevertheless
completely hushed. Many had queued patiently in the courtyard since many hours before dawn,
hoping to be among the first admitted inside.
To see.
Two days ago King Richard‘s corpse had arrived in London from Pontefract Castle in
West Yorkshire. One hundred men-at-arms had accompanied the coffin on its black-draped bier,
protecting it from the curious, subdued, close-pressed crowds. Behind the men-at-arms came
nineteen hessian-wrapped and ash-painted professional mourners, one for each year of Richard‘s
life. They had accompanied the corpse to St Paul‘s where six of the men-at-arms had carried it
inside, the cathedral‘s doors closing promptly behind them.
The dean and his monks had spent two days preparing both display and corpse. That
amount of time had set tongues a-wagging all the faster. Why did they need so long? Was it
proving hard to stitch up the dagger holes? Or to smooth his poison-ravaged face with
flesh-coloured wax?
But now St Paul‘s and Richard‘s remains were thrown open to the inspection of the
curious, and the Londoners had flocked to the occasion in their thousands.
Richard lay in an open, solid oaken coffin, its joints well sealed with wax and other
substances, set on its bier before the altar. Candles and incense surrounded the bier save for a
space directly before the coffin where a single person could step close for a quick viewing.
To one side stood an ever-changing guard of several priests and friars, there to ensure that
the individual‘s viewing was only quick, and that he or she did not attempt to snatch a lock of the dead king‘s hair, or a scraping from under his fingernails to sell at a local relic market.
Dick Whittington stood in line with everyone else, and was as curious as everyone else.
Whittington was no fool, and had understood very well that Bolingbroke could not have allowed
the former king to survive as a lodestone for every disaffected person in the kingdom.
Nevertheless, he thought, it was a shame that Bolingbroke couldn‘t have arranged for Richard to fall off a horse in front of a score of impartial witnesses, or arrange his drowning in a swollen
river as Richard and his party were attempting to cross. The rumours sweeping London ever
since news of Richard‘s death had ranged from the bizarre to the almost certainly correct:
Lancaster‘s ghost had so terrified Richard one dark night he had fallen down dead (or
Lancaster‘s ghost had set fire to Richard, or flayed him, or torn off his genitals and eaten them,
leaving Richard to bleed to death); a band of Scottish soldiers had infiltrated Pontefract Castle in
an attempt to kidnap Richard and make him their king, but had mistaken Richard for a guard,
killed him, and then kidnapped the guard and installed him on the Scottish throne; Richard had
choked to death on a frog which had taken up residence in the damp castle; Richard had pined to
death over his lover, Robert de Vere; Bolingbroke had sent a band of assassins to Pontefract to
murder Richard by means most foul.
Worse were the rumours that Richard was not dead at all, and that news of his death was
only an official attempt to disguise the truth—that Richard had escaped Pontefract and was even
now riding on London with an avenging army of tens of thousands behind him.
God had anointed Richard, therefore would God allow Richard to be so destroyed? And
if Richard were truly murdered, would God allow his murder to go unpunished?
The truth, Whittington thought, as he slowly shuffled forward a few places in the queue,
was that the Londoners, as many other among the English, were starting to feel a trifle guilty
about their role in Richard‘s downfall. They had abandoned Richard with an indecent haste,
supporting ―fair Prince Hal‘s‖ counterclaim to the throne. While Richard had been festering in
Pontefract, awaiting his murder, they‘d been crowding about Westminster Abbey, shouting
Bolingbroke‘s name as if it were a charm against evil.
Now they were here in their droves, impelled not only by curiosity but by guilt.
Starting to get impatient, and finding that his joints ached greatly in the chill damp of the
cathedral‘s nave, Whittington craned his head, trying to see how much longer he might have to
wait. The queue appeared to stretch for some thirty or forty persons before him, but the priests
standing about the coffin were making sure that people were moving briskly, and not loitering
too long over Richard‘s open casket.
No one showed any signs of wanting to loiter, however. Perhaps, Whittington surmised,
the stench was putting off even the most guilty or ardent of viewers.
Loiter they might not, but Whittington noticed that every man and woman who turned
aside from the coffin had pale faces as they crossed themselves, halting briefly for the blessings
of the priest. And they were quiet as they walked away, not pausing to whisper or gossip.
Some drew their wraps tighter about themselves, and looked nervously over their
shoulders with darting eyes.
All left the cathedral as quickly as they could.
Whittington‘s curiosity grew, and he fidgeted impatiently.
The queue ahead of him was moving very quickly now. Perhaps only some four or five
stood between Whittington and his turn at a viewing, and Whittington‘s head craned all the
more. He could see a little into the open coffin over the shoulders before him—there was a heavy
drape of a richly embroidered material over most of Richard‘s body. Whittington could see a
pale blur of a face, and it appeared that Richard‘s skeletal arms and hands were crossed over his
chest, clutching a gold crucifix.
He shivered suddenly, feeling as if a winter frost had dug deep into his bones.
The people ahead of him visibly shivered, too, and hurried the faster, bending only
briefly over the coffin.
Then, finally, it was Dick Whittington‘s turn, and he stepped forward. A priest murmured
in his ear, ―Hurry! Hurry!‖, and the stench of hot incense and cold decaying flesh assaulted his
nostrils, making his stomach roil.
He stepped up to the coffin, and peered in.