Within the Hollow Crown: A Valiant King's Struggle to Save His Country, His Dynasty, and His Love

by Margaret Campbell Barnes

  "I suppose we had better hold a debate," he found himself saying, and thought how amused Robert would be at the mere idea

  of his suggesting such a thing.

  And so, quite informally, this handful of important people taking refuge in the Tower held the strangest debate at which Richard had ever presided. If, in fact, he could be said to preside at all. For—having given up his chair to the Archbishop—he perched for a while on the arm of his mother's, and then wandered restlessly to the window from whence he could see houses burning all along the opposite bank of the river. About the table, in no particular order of degree, crowded his uncle and half-brothers and his cousin Bolingbroke, Warwick and Salisbury, Hales and his satellite Legge, the dignified Lieutenant and a sprinkling of privileged squires like Standish and Bolingbroke's man, John Ferrour. And into this worried assembly walked Walworth, the Mayor of London, and Nicholas Brembre, one of his sheriffs, bringing a breath of the outside world. Apart from their civic rank, one was Master of the Fishmongers' Guild and the other a wealthy grocer; but in the eagerness for news even Gloucester and the pompous Warwick moved willingly to make room for them. Richard himself greeted them quite simply as welcome friends. Brembre's clever, simian face had always fascinated him, and Walworth's experience and poise made him an asset at any meeting.

  In answer to a bombardment of questions they confirmed the bad news about Lambeth and reported that the Marshalsea prison was now ablaze and the prisoners at large.

  "And joining the rebels," surmised Gloucester.

  "Which introduces a definitely criminal element far more difficult to cope with," added Brembre.

  "Then nobody's property is safe!" cried those of them who had town houses.

  But Walworth was able to give them a certain amount of reassurance. Those two totally diverse characters, John Ball the Essex priest and Wat the Tyler, who had made himself the Kentish men's leader, still appeared to have the mob well in hand.

  "You mean to tell us that starving dogs like that saw all Sudbury's priceless stuff and could be leashed back from looting?" scoffed Thomas Holland, in the light of whose experience such a

  miracle seemed impossible.

  "Something of the crusading fervour seems to have entered into it," explained Brembre, with his wry smile. "This gaolbird priest preaches that riches are accursed, and that those who enjoy them in this world will inevitably find themselves garnered with the goats on Doomsday."

  "I am afraid he has also inflamed them with the damnable notion that all churchmen—with the possible exception of a few friars who have thrown in their lot with the people—should be exterminated," warned Walworth, on a more serious note.

  Hales shuddered visibly.

  "The man must be mad!" murmured Joan.

  Sudbury, who had regained his composure, laid a soothing hand on hers. "My dear lady, he has been going about the country railing against our greed and lasciviousness for years. That is why I have more than once had to imprison him."

  Whatever the ethics of the case, Walworth couldn't help thinking that it would have been better for the Archbishop had he burned Wycliffe for a heretic and let this political extremist go. He could almost see the crowd tearing him limb from limb. "If you imprisoned Ball, I would advise your lordship to keep out of their way," he said curtly. He and his sheriffs had enough responsibility with the King in the midst, and he felt that the primate's presence on this side of the river was the last straw.

  Richard watched them all from the window seat, taking in the mounting gravity of the situation. For the first time in his life he felt glad that Uncle Thomas was there. He would know what to do. Undoubtedly, he himself had often behaved like a presumptuous puppy and there was good reason for the value these seasoned warriors set upon themselves. He looked hopefully from his uncle's glum face to a reflection of the same type mirrored in the hard, younger faces of the Hollands. Surely any minute now they would take the situation in hand—rise up and issue orders in the decisive way they were always advocating. Orders which would alter the complexion of things in a few hours. But unfortunately all their experience had been on foreign battlefields against armies who moved and counter-moved according to orthodox rules of strategy. And there had been nothing laid down in the rules about thousands of fellow countrymen armed with pitchforks, growling like bloodthirsty curs against their gates. Moreover, none of them was gifted with much imagination. So they just sat there, dazed by a series of events for which they knew of no precedent or formula.

  "We must do something," the Princess was saying, looking from one to another beseechingly.

  And because nobody else answered her, Richard got to his feet and said the only thing he could think of. "Why not send Sir Robert Knollys to disperse them—" he suggested, remembering how that trusty, brutal old campaigner had come to meet him and how the audacious pirate Dalyngrigge had been conspicuous in his train.

  Those round the table shook their heads. It was true that Sir Robert had scorned to come into the Tower. He was still in his City house. But his forces were inadequate. "Besides, he may be of more use where he is if there should be trouble later on inside the City," Walworth reminded them grimly.

  "You mean they may try to rush the Bridge?" asked Richard, wishing his voice sounded a little steadier.

  "They are right up to it now," said Walworth. "All night they've been burning the brothels along Bankside, and they're threatening to burn down Southwark church if we don't let them across."

  "Burning the brothels—whatever for?" exclaimed Gloucester. In any warfare he'd ever had anything to do with they were the one part of a city one might reasonably expect to be spared.

  "Haven't you noticed that almost every stew is kept by a Fleming?" laughed the younger Holland.

  Simon Sudbury surveyed the handsome young know-all with a nice blend of toleration and dislike. "Not frequenting them myself, I'm in no position to judge," he said, in his quiet, humorous way. "But I have long deplored the Londoner's prejudice against the Flemish woolstaple."

  "If Sir John's observation be correct your lordship must admit that our citizens have some provocation," grinned Brembre. "After all, two of our most flourishing industries in the hands

  of foreigners—"

  "I'm not sure that's the only reason for the burnings," said Walworth, with a meaning glance at Prior Hales, who fidgeted uncomfortably and hoped that only local sheriffs and such would know that the Bankside property was his. After all, when he had let it to the Flemings at a soaring rental he had been careful not to inquire too closely into their affairs. "And the poor—er—inmates?" he asked hastily, with a virtuous clearing of his throat.

  "This fanatic Ball had them dragged out into the road and put to death," Walworth told him. And Sudbury, who was neither cruel nor a hypocrite, was heard to murmur something about finding someone to cast the first stone.

  Richard had scarcely been listening. The fate of a few tumbledown stews concerned him not at all. But the fate of London did. "Has the drawbridge at the other end of the Bridge been raised?" he asked sharply.

  "Yes, sir. And the tower on the bastion this side of it fortified." The Mayor turned and answered him at once, as if jolted into surprised recognition that his orders mattered. "Walter Sybyle, of the Mercers' Company, is alderman for that ward, and I have offered him reinforcements. Though the fool will probably refuse them out of jealousy for his Guild!"

  "As long as it is only jealousy, and not treachery!" muttered Brembre shrewdly. "I don't altogether trust that man."

  "Then let us send a company of pikemen and be done with it," advised Thomas Holland sensibly. But it appeared that they would give such offence to London pride as to jeopardize the citizens' much taxed loyalty.

  Finding it useless to wait upon other people's advice, Richard's mind was beginning to work clearly on its own account. In fact, this thing was becoming rather fascinating, like a game of chess in which one enjoys outwitting a wily opponent. "Don't forget that raising the movable p
art of the bridge will let shipping through into the Pool," he pointed out. "These insurgents won't dare try to get across in the comparatively few rowboats moored on the other side. But you'll have to see that all big ships tie up below the bridge on this side, or Tyler may try to board them as they pass through and use them for transport."

  "Too true!" admitted Brembre. "We must send word to Chaucer to stop them before high tide."

  "And Aldgate ought to be fortified against these fresh forces from Essex," blustered Gloucester. And he and the Hollands began telling the civic dignitaries how to do it.

  The word Aldgate started a train of thought in Richard's mind. If Gloucester had been in the Tower for several hours before his own arrival, it was a pity he hadn't begun telling people how to do things a bit earlier! "If Robert de Vere and Thomas Mowbray were able to leave by that gate this morning," he asked, cutting across their confusing spate of directions without apology, "why were no messengers sent through before I got here to rouse the unaffected shires? Surely there are plenty of my knights sitting comfortably in Midland manors who would have come to our assistance?" He looked straight at Gloucester as he spoke and was aware of his mother ranging herself joyfully on his side—probably more because it was the first time she had ever heard him openly call one of his uncles to account than from any sense of gravity of the omission.

  Thomas Plantagenet stopped giving orders but said nothing. It would so obviously have been the sensible thing to do that most of the older men looked sheepish. But Henry Bolingbroke took up the idea. "There may still be time," he said, in his unflustered methodical way. "If Walworth can send these knights the exact disposition of the rebels, a relieving party could approach under cover of darkness and attack them in the rear. And that would be our moment to ride out in two separate parties and outflank them."

  "After all, London is as good as besieged, isn't it?" said Richard, backing him up.

  It was the idea of Youth—chancy and exciting—and it appealed to several present. But others objected on the ground that it would take up too much time.

  Joan, who had been thinking how this new touch of brisk masterfulness became Richard, withdrew her adoring gaze from him and turned her mind to the business in hand. If the men couldn't settle something, she must. She dealt with it much as she might have dealt with a plague of mice or some troublesome servants clamouring for higher wages. "If you're sending out messengers at all, why not send them to Blackheath and Highgate and ask these people exactly what they want?" she suggested. "Then perhaps we can appease them and they will go home."

  Men cunning in council turned to look at her in shocked surprise. Put like that the whole business sounded absurdly simple. Her suggestion went straight to the heart of the thing, of course; but then, women's minds worked so differently, always putting common sense before pride. And if one heeded them, why, there'd be no wars or anything…Nothing to sit in Council for, or feel important about. But at least one man besides Richard beamed upon her. The Mayor was grateful to her for making it easier to say what he had really come to say. "I have already taken it upon myself to do so, madam," he confessed.

  In spite of themselves the others looked relieved. "Quite right, Walworth—quite right!" approved Warwick. A tradesman could do that sort of thing, of course, and it would save men of noble blood from demeaning themselves. "And what did they say?"

  Walworth got up and looked with respectful diffidence towards the raised window embrasure where Richard was standing. "They refused to treat with us at all, but only with the King. They want to tell him their grievances. They seem to think that he—"

  Whatever more he said was momentarily drowned in indignant shouts of "Monstrous!" and "Impossible!" Only when his listeners had spent their indignation were his concluding words audible. "They want him to go to Blackheath."

  The words came to Richard as a shock. They wanted him to go—not all these warlike adults arguing around his table. The thought of going back to Blackheath—to a Blackheath no longer ominously orderly but swarming with wild beasts who burned down palaces and killed prostitutes like helpless sheep in the streets—was a far more terrifying challenge than any he was ever likely to encounter in the lists. Across the heads of the rest he met William Walworth's steady gaze, and it was as if the man had thrown down a gage. A gage for which the prize was London. Only instead of cantering across some flag-decked lists he would have to ride out from these strong encircling walls into a hostile world where violence and class hatred ruled. Into a strange, inverted world where, like Gloucester and the rest, he didn't know the first thing about the rules. He felt miserably inadequate, but something in him—some heritage stronger than himself—made him nod assent to the inquiry in Walworth's honest eyes.

  "Is it necessary for anyone to go?" asked his elder half-brother, anxious for his safety. "After all, bread doesn't grow on Highgate or Blackheath. Tyler and Straw can order their men about but they can't feed them. Not all those thousands."

  "Keep them out of London for another twenty-four hours and their empty bellies will tell them to go home," agreed the Lord Lieutenant.

  Walworth and his sheriff exchanged uneasy glances. "If we can," they muttered in unison.

  But Gloucester had evidently been turning over some new project in his mind. "I don't see why the King shouldn't go out to them," he said unexpectedly. It was his first contribution to the discussion for some time.

  "My dear Duke, consider the boy's age!" protested the Archbishop. And Salisbury backed him up with the very objection which Gloucester had been swift enough to mention when the rebels had waylaid the King's mother. "Doesn't it occur to any of you that they may keep his Grace as a hostage?"

  "And then they might demand anything!" spluttered the Prior, well aware that his own head would be one of the first things they would want.

  In response to his mother's imploring gaze Richard had returned to the table and was standing by her chair, but evidently he was not giving in to her arguments. "If he goes, I shall go with him!" she declared. "When my father was Duke of Kent he made most of his serfs free. For the love they bear him and the Black Prince and myself they will do us no harm."

  "Then we will all ride with you, madam!" cried Standish and several others, stirred by her courage and trusting rather bleakly in her optimism.

  They were almost all on their feet now, arguing more fiercely than ever. Richard was grateful to Bolingbroke for ending it. "Listen, milords!" he called out, rapping the table with the quillons of his sword to make himself heard. "There's no need to ride anywhere. Why can't Richard go by barge? Down the river to Rotherhithe or somewhere. He can summon the leaders to the bank and hear what they have to say from midstream. Then there will be no danger of hostages or trickery."

  Old soldiers like Warwick and Salisbury were half ashamed of themselves for not thinking of so simple a solution. This son of Gaunt's was a likely looking lad, mature for his age and quick to seize an advantage. And—much as they hated to admit it—new situations called for adaptable young minds.

  "An excellent idea, Harry!" approved Richard, and sent for his bargemaster before the others could think up some argument against it. "We'll go this afternoon."

  John Holland, not to be outdone, sprang up with such clumsy haste that he upset his stool with a bang. "Why not now—this morning?" he demanded pugnaciously.

  Richard and Henry were bending over a map of the Thames valley which Standish had had the forethought to bring along and which he had just unrolled across the table before them. For once these two grandsons of Edward the Third were in absorbed accord, fair head and dark almost touching. "Because this morning, my dear John," explained Richard without even looking up, "my watermen would have to pull back up-river against the tide. Whereas this afternoon the tide will be on the turn and we can come back quickly—if we should need to."

  Chapter Eight

  Richard had told Ralph Standish to wake him early on Corpus Christi day so that he might attend Mass. But he ha
d slept badly and lay still in his bed for a while, thinking over all the disturbing events of the previous day. After dinner they had gone down the river in the state barge as Henry had suggested. The meadows at Rotherhithe, usually so lush and green, had been black with insurgents, and the royal party had stayed off shore for a little while talking with their leaders. A very little while it seemed, looking back upon those confused and nervous moments. And then they had taken advantage of the turning tide, just as he himself had shocked John Holland by suggesting, to row back a great deal quicker than they had come. Because they were afraid. They—the supposed cream of English nobility—afraid of that ill-fed, ill-armed rabble on the bank.

  Richard Plantagenet groaned with shame at the thought of it, turning closer into the blessed privacy of his tapestry bed hangings.