by Andy Croft
One cold day, the children stood listening to a young priest on Tyburn Hill. He was telling anyone who would listen that the world was about to end:
‘And the kings of the earth, the great men, the rich men, the commanders, the mighty men, every slave and every free man, hid themselves in the caves and in the rocks of the mountains, and said to the mountains and rocks, Fall on us and hide us from the face of Him who sits on the throne and from the wrath of the Lamb! For the great day of His wrath has come, and who is able to stand?’
As he listened, Adam looked up at the new line of bodies hanging by their necks on the gallows. One of the bodies spinning gently in the wind had only one hand.
Chapter 11
Unploughed Fields
Will and Adam lay in a muddy ditch, waiting for the pilgrims to pass by on the road above them. They could hear their sing-song priestly chatter as they walked. Above them the sky was grey and cold. At least it wasn’t raining.
They had decided to try to make it back to Brampton. Eve and Rob had tried to persuade them to stay in London but they were determined to go. They had to warn the village about the plague. It was a long way to walk. Near Bradstrete, Adam had pulled the boots off a dead boy about his age. They were a bit loose, but at least they wouldn’t let in water. He tried not to think about where they had come from.
At the start of the journey they had to leave the road to hide as troops of armed men on horseback thundered past. But by the end of the first day, the road was nearly empty. For a long time the only people they saw were a few travellers going north on horseback and some monks on their way to York.
The first night they slept in the woods under a makeshift shelter made of branches and leaves. The next night they slept in a stone barn. It had no roof, but at least it kept the wind out.
They passed the windmill on the top of the hill, its long wooden sails still turning in the wind. The castle was still there, grey on its distant crag. But how different this journey was to the one they had made a few weeks ago! The village church bells were mostly silent now. They walked for miles past unploughed fields. Stray sheep wandered across the high moorlands, as though looking for their shepherds. They passed villages that seemed to be deserted.
On the third day they passed a gibbet at a crossroads. There were four bodies hanging in the cold winter wind. The crows had reduced them to bones but Adam couldn’t help feeling that the dead men were watching him.
‘This plague has brought the outlaws out of their forests,’ said Will. ‘An outlaw needs to fill his belly just like you and me.’
They avoided the towns in case they were arrested as vagrants but they needed to find food so they sometimes went into small villages. At the entrance to one of these, they were met by two men. One held a farmer’s billhook in his hand. The other was carrying a glaive, a sharp knife tied to the end of a long pole.
‘Keep back!’ shouted one of the men. ‘There is no plague here. Go away!’
‘Have mercy on us,’ said Will, ‘We have not eaten for two days.’
‘Go away! We don’t want strangers in our village!’
‘Where are you from?’ asked the other man.
‘We are on our way home from London.’
‘London!’ he cried. ‘The devil’s city! That’s where the plague is crowned king. We don’t want your London plague here. Away with you!’
The two men moved towards them. There was no point staying to argue so Will and Adam turned back. When they reached the main road the two men were still watching them.
On the fourth day they reached Oxham. Their wagon should be waiting for them at Master Watkyn’s house. The streets of the little town were deserted. In the square, a woman was lying by the market-cross. She was dead. A donkey was dragging a cart round and round the square, braying with hunger like a madman. Someone had painted a large red cross on the door of Master Watkyn’s house. Adam and Will knew it was a risk but they needed the wagon. Will’s boots were full of holes.
He knocked on the door. ‘Mistress Watkyn?’
There was no answer.
He knocked again.
‘Go away! Go away, whoever you are!’ shouted a voice. ‘Stay away, for pity’s sake. The Great Death has visited this house. My husband and daughter are both dead. And I shall be next. There is nothing for you here but illness and death.’
On the fifth day they passed a man sitting by the side of the road, resting his feet.
‘Good day to you,’ said the man. He saw Adam staring at the half-eaten loaf of bread on his knees. ‘If you are hungry you are welcome to share my bread,’ he said, offering them the loaf.
He watched Adam hungrily bite on the crust as if it were the bread of heaven.
‘These are hungry times,’ the man said, shaking his head. ‘Lawless and dangerous, too. A few weeks ago the Scottish king sent an army to invade England in the North.’
‘Are these really the last days?’ asked Will. ‘Is it really the end of the world?’
The man smiled. ‘Not the end of the world, my lad. Just the end of the world as it has been for too long.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Why do folk like you and me never eat meat?’ asked the man, chewing the bread.
‘Because meat is for lords and kings and bishops,’ said Adam. ‘And merchants,’ he added, remembering the smells from Master Watkyn’s kitchen.
‘Why are wages so low?’ asked the man. ‘Why do you work for a man you have never seen?’
‘Father says that God gave the land for the rich to enjoy and the poor to work,’ said Adam.
The priest spat. ‘Do you think God intended the world to be enjoyed only by the rich? When Adam dug and Eve span, who was then the gentleman? Where was then the pride of man?’
Adam didn’t answer. He was thinking of Eve, back in London. He hoped that the sickness had not touched her.
‘Are you a priest then?’ asked Will.
‘I have no parish and I do not need to pray inside a building. My church is the land where people work. My flock are the poor, wherever they live.’
‘You don’t sound like a real priest,’ said Adam.
‘Some call me a hedge-priest. Your “real priests” do not welcome me inside their temples. For one thing I cannot read or write Latin. I believe that the Bible should be written in English, so that common folk like us can read it.’
‘I can read,’ said Adam.
‘What is the point of being able to read if the word of God is always in Latin? A church should be the house of God, not a temple of gold. The Holy Church should spend its money helping the poor, not buying expensive icons or selling prayers for the wealthy dead. A servant of God should not worship money and luxury. There are too many fat bishops in England and too many thin labourers. After this plague, England is going to be much changed. The farmer shall be free to work on his own land. Kings and bishops shall be brought low. And we shall build a new Jerusalem!’
Chapter 12
Raven’s Wood
By the middle of the next day, they knew they were nearing the end of their journey. To the east lay the hills above Brampton. They quickened their pace at the thought of home. Beyond Netherford, they followed the wooded slopes of the riverbank.
Brampton lay quiet and still in the cold afternoon sunshine. They could see the old church with its line of yew trees. They started to run. Then they stopped. There were armed men standing in the road.
Will pulled Adam behind the hedge. ‘It is Sir Philip de Mandeville’s men from the hall over at Carbury,’ he said. ‘They must be there to stop people going into the village.’
‘But why?’
‘To stop the plague getting in. This is good news, Adam! It means that the plague hasn’t reached Brampton yet!’
It also meant that they would have to go through Raven’s Wood to get to the village. They walked back to the stream and crossed the fields to the edge of the wood. There they hid in the dark undergrowth waiting for nightfall
.
As soon as it was dark, they made their way into the trees. The sky was full of clouds, so there was no moonlight to light the way. The trees were whispering in the wind. A badger snuffled past them, digging in the roots of a tree. An owl screeched in the trees above their heads. For a moment, Adam remembered Will’s tales about goblins living in the wood.
In places the wood was thick with nettles and dead bracken and brambles. A briar cut Will across the face. Adam tripped over a tangled tree-root. Several times they had to turn back and start again. Eventually, they reached the edge of the wood. Brampton was sleeping quietly at the bottom of the hill. Just then, the moon came out from behind the clouds.
As it did so, something crackled in the bushes ahead of them. There was a man standing at the edge of the wood. It was one of Mandeville’s men. He was holding an evil-looking maul, a big war hammer, in his left hand. There was no time to hide. The man had already seen them.
Will and Adam ran as fast as they could back into the wood, scrambling through the brambles, ducking to avoid low-hanging branches. Adam could hear the man crashing through the undergrowth behind them. Faster. Closer. Faster. Closer.
‘Got you!’ cried the man, grabbing Will by the neck. ‘Got you! Poaching in his lordship’s woods are you?’
Adam watched in horror as Will struggled to get free. The man’s grip was too strong. Adam felt sick with fear for his brother. The penalty for poaching was hanging or blinding. The man rolled the maul in his hand. He seemed to be deciding whether to take Will back to the manor at Carbury or whether to finish him off there and then.
Suddenly, something leapt through the air with a great growl and landed on Mandeville’s man. A wolf! The man was swinging and slashing at the wolf with his maul, but the wolf had him by the throat.
Will and Adam ran away, out of the wood and into the long field. They could hear the cries and snarls of man and wolf behind them. Then, it went quiet. They lay there in the dark, watching the stars slide out from behind the clouds. Tomorrow they would be home.
Chapter 13
Home at Last
As soon as it was light, Will and Adam crept across the long field to Brampton. The early morning mist hid them as they ran along the hedgerow under the dripping willows. A silent line of hooded crows on the wall by the mill watched them cross the bridge.
The first thing they noticed was the silence. An un-milked cow stood on the green, bellowing in distress. The only other sound was the barking of dogs. Then, they felt the stillness. One of the dogs ran towards them, barking and whining.
‘Bo!’ cried Adam, bending down to greet him. The old dog was a lot thinner than usual. His bony ribs were showing through his coat. Bo licked Adam’s face in happy recognition. ‘Come on, lad, let’s go home.’
Bo led the way through the village. The gate to the mill was open. The smith’s forge was cold. Mistress Fletcher’s dog was whining and scratching at her door. The thatch on Widow Hodge’s house was still unfinished. Outside the dyer’s house, the goat was tethered to the fence. It was straining on its rope to get to the grass beyond its reach. There was no sign of Agnes. Even Old Hugh and his wife had stopped arguing. The shutters on most of the houses were closed. Several of the doors were painted with red crosses. The Great Death had reached Brampton before them.
The door to their house was open. Inside, the fire was out and both rooms were empty. There was no sign of their mother or father. A large rat was sitting on the table, staring at them. Then someone came in.
‘Adam! Will! What are you doing here?’
‘Sam!’ cried Will. ‘Where is everyone? What’s happened? Why are Mandeville’s men stopping people coming into the village?’
Sam frowned. ‘They aren’t stopping people coming in, Will. They are there to stop anyone leaving!’
‘But why? Where are Mother and Father? Please don’t tell me…’
‘I’m so sorry, Will, Adam. They’re… they’re dead. They died. The great pestilence took them. Brampton is now home only to rats.’
Adam felt as if someone had stuck a knife in his back. ‘No, no, no! It can’t be true. It can’t be. It can’t be.’
‘Diccon was the first one to die, just a week after you left. Then Widow Green and her Margery. At first we buried them properly but there were so many deaths. I hope God will forgive us, but we couldn’t give them all a proper burial. The priest asked me and Ned to dig a pit at the far end of the churchyard. That’s where you will find your parents. And so many others… We threw in the priest two weeks ago. There’s hardly anyone left.’
‘But how did the sickness get here?’
‘No-one knows how it found us here. Some said the well had been poisoned. Perhaps it was the wind that brought it. Or else demons. This plague has wings. And it will feed on anyone. Brampton is a village of the dead. There is nothing for you here now. You should have stayed in London.’
‘London!’ said Will. ‘You would not talk like that if you had seen what our eyes have seen in London.’ He tried to describe the burning pits at night and the bodies in the streets. ‘London is now a living hell,’ said Adam. ‘And England is become a graveyard. They say it is the end of the world, Sam. We’re all going to die…’ He sat down on the edge of the straw pallet and closed his eyes.
‘You will die if you don’t eat something,’ said Sam. ‘You two look like you haven’t seen food in a while. Until the world does end, those of us who are alive still need to eat.’
‘Sam, old friend,’ said Adam, ‘my belly is tired of thinking about food but my feet are tired of walking. I need to rest, Sam. My head hurts. I just need to sleep.’
Chapter 14
Too Young to Die
Adam woke up with a start, shaking and sweating with fright. Then he remembered where he was. And what had happened. He lay on his straw pallet staring at the familiar beams above him. He was shivering with cold. But at the same time he was burning with a fever. He was drenched in cold sweat. His bones ached and his hands and feet were tingling. He could taste blood in his mouth. He felt underneath his right armpit. There was a lump. This couldn’t be happening. Not now. Not to him!
He tried to sit up. Then he realised he wasn’t alone. There was a hooded figure standing at the end of the bed.
‘Will?’
‘Will? Sam? Is that you? Stop fooling about!’
The figure said nothing, but lifted the hood. It wasn’t Will. Or Sam. Adam recognised the cold, yellow eyes beneath the hood.
He knew exactly what was going to happen next. Death raised a long bony finger and pointed at Adam.
‘Not me!’ shouted Adam. ‘Please! Choose someone else. Someone older. I’m too young to die!’ But the figure just shook its head:
‘All who labour, all who toil
Must one day lie beneath the soil.’
Adam felt the cold hands of Death on his throat. He tried to stop himself being pulled out of the bed. But it was no good. He was weak and Death was strong. He was being dragged towards the pit.
Outside Adam could hear shouting. Or were the voices inside his throbbing head? There was a smell of wet straw burning. Smoke was creeping under the door of the cottage. The smoke was choking him. Cows were panicking in the barn, maddened with the heat and smoke. Their wailing sounded like a chorus of devils in Hell.
Death grabbed Adam by the throat and dragged him coughing and screaming across the room towards the flames, repeating over and over and over:
‘Tonight you draw your final breath
And join the dance, the Dance of Death,
The Dance of Death, the Dance of Death…’
Chapter 15
All Those Who Live Beneath the Sky
Adam jumped out of bed, trembling and sweating. He felt under his arm-pits. Nothing. Bo was lying at the end of the bed, twitching in his sleep as usual. Someone had lit a fire which was smoking in the hearth.
He stretched out on his straw pallet, staring at the familiar beams above him. He tho
ught about everything that had happened. He thought about his parents lying in the churchyard. He thought about the neighbours he would never see again. And he thought about Eve and Rob and the other people he had met in London.
So many people were dead. And yet he was alive. It made no sense. Why had he been spared? Better people than him had been taken by the plague. He wasn’t rich or powerful. He wasn’t clever or brave. But God must have saved him for a reason. But what reason could there be among so much grief and misery?
His thoughts were interrupted by the door opening. It was Will.
‘Adam!’ he cried, throwing his arms around his brother. ‘You’re alive!’
‘I won’t be alive much longer if you don’t let go of me,’ spluttered Adam, ‘I can’t breathe!’
‘Sorry,’ said Will as he sat back on the edge of the bed. ‘Welcome back to the land of the living.’
‘Why? Where have I been?’
‘You have been asleep for almost four days,’ said Will. ‘You had a terrible fever. Of course we feared the worst. Me and Bo took it in turns to sit by your bed.’ Hearing his name, Bo woke up and barked.
‘It looks like the great sickness is passing, Adam. Sam says there have been no deaths in Brampton for a week now. Folk at Netherford and Hambleton say the same. Lord Mandeville wants us to start planting turnips in the Long Field before the spring. If you are feeling well enough you can help us. There’s lots of work to do and not many of us to do it.’
‘You can stay and plant turnips for Mandeville if you want,’ said Adam, ‘but I’m leaving as soon as I can.’
‘What do you mean?’ said Will. ‘Where are you going?’
‘London.’
‘What?’
‘That’s right,’ said Adam. ‘I’m going back. If England has recovered from its sickness, then it must be safe again in London.’
‘But you can’t!’ said Will. ‘Lord Mandeville won’t allow it.’
Adam sat up in bed. ‘I’ve been thinking, Will. We can’t go back to the old ways. Perhaps the Great Death was God’s judgement. Perhaps it wasn’t. But the Dance of Death is now over. And no-one can dance with Death and stay the same. England must be changed by all that has happened these last few months. We can’t go back to how things used to be. If Lord Mandeville wants to eat turnips, he can plant them himself.’