I Serve (17 page)

At the beginning of the disease, the sufferers were afflicted with great swellings upon the more shameful parts of the body, some like an ordinary apple in size, others like an egg, or others small as a cherry. These swellings were so hard and dry that, even when they were cut with a knife, hardly any liquid flowed out. The deadly lumps, in a short time, spread all over the body. Then the symptoms of the disease changed form. Black or livid spots erupted on the arms and thighs, sometimes big and scattered, sometimes little and close together. They were the sure sign of death to whoever had them. No physician, no medicine was of any use.

The plague was all the worse because it traveled from the sick to the well as easily as fire catches dry wood. Any form of communication with the sick gave the disease to the well and both died in misery; but also, mere contact with the clothes, or anything that the sick had touched or used, seemed to carry contagion with it. Many, eager to preserve their own lives, shunned all contact with the stricken. Brothers abandoned brothers; fathers and mothers abandoned children. But the Almighty rarely rewarded them for this desertion; more often than not, their flight was too late to save themselves.

Your own country France suffered as much or more than mine, so you will believe me when I say that of every two men in England, only one was left alive; the nobles lost less, the commoners lost more, and the clergy suffered worst of all. The graveyards of our ancestors were too small by far, so new fields were chosen where the dead might be buried.

The prince and I were at Berkhamsted when the plague first lifted its head in England. He had large estates there, and though like Chandos he completely relinquished their management to a steward, from time to time he tarried there a week to remind the tenants of their fealty. We had heard but little news of the pestilence, and the prince determined to go to London and enter the lists of a tournament there. The trip down through the countryside was filled with rumors of strange happenings. As we neared the metropolis, we observed many travelers going the opposite way, some driving carts laden down with all their household possessions.

A low mist hung over London as we came up the Thames by barge in the early dawn. The docks and wharfs stretched out cold and empty like the hand of a dead man. As our rowers neared the landing, I moved forward holding the lantern at the front of the boat; the space lit by its feeble flame was small enough for a man to fold his arms around. No one came to tie up our boat. The prince bade me call for the harbormaster. We had often poled up the Thames since our return from France, and I knew the master of the royal dock by name.

“
Will Tyler!” I shouted, but my voice fell to the bottom of the boat against the thick wall of fog. “Will Tyler!” I bellowed, “Do your duty, curse you, and haul the line.”

The soft shuffle of bare feet indicated that someone was present. I tossed the heavy rope into the gloom and was rewarded by a gentle pull from the dock. The boat secured, I leapt onto the wharf and looked about me to chide the harbormaster. “You’ve kept His Highness waiting, Tyler.”

“
I beg pardon, sir,” said a small voice. In the mist, I discerned a tousled head, atop a leather jerkin far too large for its wearer.

“
Where’s Will Tyler?” I barked.

“
Here, sir.”

“
I mean your father.”

“
Dead, sir. Dead one week.”

“
Why, how is this?” I demanded. “And has the city commissioned no new harbormaster for the royal dock? God’s life, this is a sorry state of affairs….”

The boy blinked stupidly and scratched his left armpit. The prince, who had disembarked by now, considered him quietly then halted my harangue with a raised hand. “You have done well, Master Tyler,” he said simply.

“
Thank ‘ee, sir,” said the lad, his lip trembling a little, and his mouth dropped all together when he recognized the crest of the Prince of Wales.

“
Here is a florin for your trouble,” said the prince, and he tossed a bright gold piece to the little urchin. “And mark you, Tyler, if you grow tired of playing harbormaster, then you must come to my estate at Berkhamsted, and I will see about a place for you in my household.”

“
Yes, sir. Thank ‘ee, sir. If my mother be willing, I will, sir.” The lad tucked the florin into his oversized tunic, and with an awkward bow, rushed unsteadily to the harborside cottage, doubtless to share the news with his one remaining parent.

“
You are too generous, Your Highness,” said I.

“
It is my pleasure to be generous while I am able. You are right, of course, that he will be a trouble for my steward, but I do not think it will come to that.” His eye followed the boy who had tripped, risen, and taken to coughing. Then, unaware that he was being watched, the boy began to scratch himself in a most indecent manner. “He will not live the week,” said the prince simply. And it came about that his prediction was most true, for the next time that I was in London, I inquired of the boy and found that the plague had taken him not threedays after our landing.

The prince himself was seemingly immune to the curse. The lintel of his door was marked (with whose blood, I do not know), and though retainers, men-at-arms, and even his own sister perished in the pestilence, the avenging angel passed over him. The king and queen were likewise spared, and indeed, nearly all of the nobler members who had fought in the French campaign.

But for any Christian, whether sick or well, the streets of London were no healthy place to be. London had always seemed cramped and dingy—especially after the splendors of Caen and Calais—and the scourge which beset the city only increased the squalor of the place. If a man did not contract the plague, he must contend with the stench that attended it. All about the city the dead were thrown into open pits by relatives too sick or too frightened to carry them farther. If a man could overcome the stench, he must fend off the insanity that had overcome London’s citizens. While some citizens cloistered themselves in their homes to fast and pray, others ran riot in the streets, drinking, laughing, singing, joking, and doing whatever they willed. All laws, human and divine, were flouted. A man was in as much danger from cutthroats and cutpurses as he was from spots and contagion.

The tournament that we had come to London to participate in was cancelled because of the plague. We tarried a day, and then left the way that we had come. But Berkhamsted was too close to London for comfort, and within a fortnight the prince retired to his estates in Wales.

This change of venue pleased me well, for Wales was no more than a day’s ride from my parents’ home in Herefordshire. I had not visited Chandos’s estate since my days as his squire, and I longed to display to full advantage the spurs I had won in France. Only then could my parents take proper pride in their son who had become companion-at-arms to a prince. His highness established himself comfortably on his lands and then gave me a week’s leave. I armed myself for the short journey, carefully polishing the insignia upon my shield. I had left a boy; I would return a man, entering the nineteenth year of my life and the third year of my knighthood.

*****

It was the same wooden house that I had left behind, though the thatch was as threadbare as a pauper’s jerkin and in sore need of repair. A thin wisp of smoke came from the chimney and I rejoiced to see that the place was inhabited. As I turned down the lane toward the cottage, a wizened old woman stepped out of the trees and came face to face with my mount. The horse started violently; I calmed him and berated the old hag for coming so suddenly into the way.

“
Better sudden than saddened,” she cackled.

“
What do you mean?” I asked.

She answered in a lilting tone of gaiety, “I must be quicker than the pest, if I’ll stay quicker than the rest.”

I saw then that her brains were addled and would have pushed past her in the road. But she called out after me, “Have a care, stranger! The devil’s spouse is in that house.”

“
Devil’s spouse?” I asked, befuddled. “What’s she?”

“
A horrid hag you call the plague.”

I reined in my horse and crossed myself fervently. “Are you sure?” I asked, for I had heard of few cases of the Black Death in the rolling pastures of Herefordshire.

“
As sure as any, sir,” the rhyming witch replied, but when I plied her further with questions, she mumbled incoherently and darted back into the woods.

I frowned in consternation, unsure how to proceed. If the house had plague, it was folly to enter it. But who knew whether to trust the words of such a crazy beldame? I looked again at the house and saw the smoke curling up from the chimney like the tail of a cat. The plague may have entered the cottage, but someone there still had life enough to add wood to the kitchen fire. I could not leave without venturing further.

I called out when I came to the clearing in front of the house. A man answered me through the door, with a voice that grated like the chains in a well. “For Christ’s sake, begone!”

“
I seek William and Miriam Potenhale!” I said. “Are they here?”

There was a moment’s pause. “No,” answered the voice.

“
Are they alive?” I asked.

“
What is it to you?” demanded the voice.

“
They are my kin.”

I heard a rustling inside and it seemed like the voice was nearer to the door now. “What is your name?” the man asked.

Sir John Potenhale,” I answered.

“
Ah,” said the voice plaintively, and the cottage door swung open to reveal a gaunt, hollow-eyed man. His right leg ended just below the thigh, and he leaned helplessly on the frame of the door.

“
Father!” I exclaimed gladly, though I recognized him more by his crippled leg than by his altered face.

“
Not a step nearer,” he croaked as he saw that I had begun to dismount. “The plague has been in this house—I’ll not have it take you as well as your mother.”

“
Is she dead then?” I asked, and when he nodded I felt a heavy weight like a millstone begin to bear down on my chest.

“
How did you avoid it?” I asked.

“
I did not. The pestilence grew on me before it touched her body. Yet she would not leave the house and stayed to nurse my sickbed. I had given up all hope except for death to come quickly. I do not know how many days I lay there, insensible with the fever. But when I awoke, the swellings had subsided, and your mother—God rest her soul!—had died in the bed beside me.”

“
God rest her soul,” I said mournfully.

“
Aye, God rest her!” said my father, “For she’s had little enough of rest in this world. She toiled night and day to see to the food and comfort of a worthless cripple, and I with this useless stub of a leg have outlived her at the last. I should have died in her stead.”

“
You could not choose to take her place,” said I.

“
I should have taken her place years ago,” said my father. “I should have taken her place of humility, of service, and of love. But instead I chose to pursue a life of pride and glory—I took up the arms of an earthly lord instead of the cross of a heavenly king. And for my sins—and for the sins of others—she has paid the price. Aye, for this plague is a punishment on our land, a woe on our war-mongering king, a scourge on his stiff-necked nobles, and a curse on the complacent clergy. It is the bane of sinners everywhere both in impious England and the lands round about.”

“
Peace,” I said. “You are raving.”

“
Peace, you say! Peace, you say! But there is no peace. This pestilence is the hand of God and it will not be lifted till the English people humble themselves in the dust before Him.”

“
The plague has addled your wits,” said I. “I will not hear you.”

“
Miserable sinner,” said my father, and his eyes rolled wildly in his gaunt and frenzied face. “Once I took nothing but pride in your advancement. I gloried in your prowess and your preferment at the hands of Sir Chandos. But this too was sin and for this your mother was stricken. I see the same pride in you, and for this you will perish with the rest of them. If only I had taken you at birth and sent you far from me. If only I had given you to some holy hermit or cloistered you away from the world. Then, maybe then, you would have sought the fear of the Lord instead of the honor of men, and your soul at least would have been saved.” He laughed hoarsely, and out came the same devilish cackle of the old woman that had met me on the path.

“
Is everyone in this place mad?” I cried out in terror. I had overcome my fears at the battles of Caen and Crecy, doing my duty with sword and buckler despite the gnawing worries in my throat. This new fear was overmastering. I put spurs to my horse and took to the road as if a pack of snarling wolves were at my heels.

My poor horse worked hard that day, for I barely gave him time to breathe on the path back to Wales. My father’s hollow laughter was ringing in my ears, and the terror of it nearly blotted out the sorrow I felt for my mother’s death. There was no one to reason me out of the indescribable horror that had overwhelmed me; no one save myself. “So,” I said pensively, “I have no mother, and my father is a madman. Is that the hardest thing that could befall a man? I still have my honor, I still have my place, and there are worse things that a man could do than serve a prince.” With these words, I calmed myself, and by the time I reached the prince’s stables my nerves had steadied a little.