friends, and it is time to set it free!”
The priest had finished nailing the broadsheet to the door, and now picked up the pile of loose copies at his feet, turning to hand them out to the crowd jostling for position. He knew that few of them could read, but on a busy market day like this, the few that could would, within a short space of time, share the contents of the sheet with thousands of people.
“We all know how corrupt the Church is,” the priest continued to shout, “for have we not for generations witnessed the sins of the abbots and bishops? Has not good England laboured under the yoke of the Roman—”
“Or French!” someone in the crowd yelled, and there was general laughter.
“—Church for centuries? Why should we listen to fat bishops and foreign popes who say that unless we pay another penny, and yet another penny again, we shall not achieve salvation? Is salvation something to be purchased, my friends?”
The crowd mumbled, and then roared. “No! No!”
“Salvation is yours through the sacrifice of sweet Jesus Christ,” the priest yelled, his arms waving about emphatically now that he’d handed out all the broadsheets. “It is His gift! There is no need to pay the Church for salvation!”
The roar swelled again—the priest had touched a raw nerve.
“And what of your lords? Do they also not wallow in wealth while you grovel in the dirt? Do they not tax you until you cannot feed your children so that they can have their pretty tournaments and wars?”
There was a movement on the edge of the crowd, and the priest saw it. Soldiers, on horses.
“Who wears the face of Christ in this unhappy world of pain? Not the fat clerics, no! Nor the greedy lords. You wear the face of Christ, my friends, every one of you, through your hard work and poverty!”
The soldiers had pushed their horses very close, and the priest’s face began to gleam with sweat. Not through fear of being apprehended—he had always expected this—but through a desperation to preach to the crowd as much as he could before the soldiers reached him.
“The goods of both Church and lords belong to you, the face of Christ on earth! Not to bishops and dukes who care more for silks than for the thin cheeks of your children!”
People began to shout, some to voice their agreement with what the priest said, others to yell their anger at the now close soldiers.
“My name is John Ball,” the priest screamed, now directing his voice towards the soldiers, a few paces distant. “John Ball! I am not afraid that the corrupt lords and bishops should know it! My name is John Ball and I am the voice of the people, and of Christ, who weeps for the people!”
The was a huge surge of sound, and the soldiers pounced, seizing John Ball by the back of his robe and hauling him kicking and screaming atop one of their horses. One of the soldiers rode his horse close to the church door, and tore down the broadsheet.
“Let him go! Let him go!” the crowd shouted, and the twenty soldiers had to lash about with their swords and push their horses forward to fight their way free.
“It is the Archbishop of Canterbury’s men!” someone in the crowd shouted, and the throng screamed and pushed and pummelled. “Christ damn the Archbishop of Canterbury! Christ damn the Archbishop of Canterbury!”
John Ball, now held firmly across the saddle of one of the men, nevertheless managed to raise his head and yell one last defiant message to the crowd. “When Adam delved, and Eve span—who then was the gentleman?”
And then the soldiers were free, pushing their horses into a hard canter, and there was left only the swelling, murmuring crowd, passing the broadsheets to those who could read out loud.
“What did you know of this?” Lancaster said, throwing the broadsheet down on the table before Bolingbroke.
“My lord,” Bolingbroke said, then hesitated, picking the broadsheet up as gingerly as if it were gunpowder.
Lancaster’s furious eyes swung towards Neville, who stood just behind Bolingbroke’s shoulder. Neither of the two younger men were sitting. They had been summoned into Lancaster’s presence just a few minutes before.
“My lord,” Bolingbroke said again. “I had known that Master Wycliffe and several of his men were travelling through Kent—”
“And you had not informed me? Sweet Jesu, Hal, why not? And why not stop them? Do you think I would be pleased to have men known to be of my household engaged in such seditious activities? Ah! Wycliffe has gone too far this time.”
Neville knew he was going to earn Lancaster’s anger for not informing him personally of Wycliffe’s visit to Halstow Hall, but all he felt for the moment was relief. Lancaster had finally seen the danger in nurturing the demon Wycliffe, and now, perhaps, would go to the lengths necessary to stop him.
“I only found out myself a few days ago,” Bolingbroke said. “I had thought to gather greater intelligence before informing you.”
“My lord,” Neville said. “This is my error, not my Lord of Hereford’s. The day before Salisbury came to Halstow Hall to summon me back to London, I received a visit from Wycliffe, accompanied by Wat Tyler—”
Lancaster sprang out of his chair. “What?”
“—and two Lollard priests, John Ball and Jack Trueman. My lord, I do beg your forgiveness, but they told me they travelled at your pleasure towards Canterbury. I had not thought to comment further on it to you.”
Lancaster muttered an obscenity, moving to stare out a window before turning back to the other two men. “And now Wycliffe and Tyler and the other two are roaming about the south-east, tacking sedition to every wall they can find? No, do not answer that, I do not want to hear the affirmative!
“Well,” he sighed, and rubbed at his beard, thinking, “at least Ball is incarcerated in my Lord of Canterbury’s prison and is, for the moment, the lesser problem … unless he decides to implicate my entire household in treason.”
“My lord,” Bolingbroke said, stepping forward, “he surely will not do that!
“Does anyone know where the other three are?” Neville said.
“Wycliffe, yes,” Lancaster said. “Tyler and Trueman, no. Good Master Wycliffe is in Rochester, where he has been some few days. I have sent men—forty trusted men-at-arms—to fetch him away.”
“You will not bring him back here, my lord!” Neville said.
Lancaster glanced at him. “No, I won’t have him within shouting distance of London, Tom. He goes to my manor of Lutterworth in Leicestershire where he can contemplate the sins of the world in its walled herb garden. As for Tyler—what has gotten into the man?—and Trueman … they have vanished into the labouring population of Kent. Word is out for their apprehension, but I know Wat better than most men, and if he doesn’t want to be found …”
“And Richard?” Bolingbroke asked softly.
Lancaster actually looked relieved. “The three of us in the room are the only ones who know of Wycliffe’s involvement, and that of Wat Tyler. Those two are the only ones publicly associated with my household. The broadsheets, thank God, are unsigned, and do not mention Wycliffe’s name, or the name of any of my house. As far as John Ball is concerned, my Lord of Canterbury has agreed to hold him without public comment for the moment.”
Neville relaxed a little. Simon Sudbury, the Archbishop of Canterbury, was heavily indebted to Lancaster for supporting Sudbury’s election to the archbishopric some years ago.
“So we must hope Tyler and Trueman cause no disturbance that might come to the king’s ear,” Bolingbroke said.
“Aye,” Lancaster said. “That we must.”
John Ball huddled a little deeper into his