The Man On a Donkey

by H. F. M. Prescott

  ‘Tcha!’ cried Darcy. ‘A rabble of poor commons.’

  ‘And I saw Lord Lumley’s banner hang out,’ said Strangways with a stubborn look, ‘and Lord Latimer’s. And the rest that are not gentlemen are yeomen of Yorkshire, harnessed and horsed every man. The poor commons that go on foot lie outside the city. And order is kept as good as in the King’s palace at Westminster.’

  ‘You hear?’ Darcy turned to Constable. ‘The fellow’s as full of treason as an egg of meat. And did you say,’ he asked lightly, as if the matter was nothing but a jest, ‘that I would lead them if they would go the way I will?’

  ‘I said as you bade me,’ Strangways answered, and shut his mouth like a trap.

  ‘And no further?’ Darcy teased him.

  ‘I spoke for myself what was the truth.’

  ‘And was rank treason, I’ll be bound. Well, and what did they answer?’

  ‘One of the Captains said it was more like you would send a spy among them than a true messenger.’

  ‘Which of them was that?’ Darcy rapped out.

  ‘Master Aske – I knew him by his one eye.’

  ‘Well,’ said Darcy, and laughed softly, ‘he may have but one eye, but it seems he can see as far through a wall as another man.’

  After that he questioned Strangways sharply about many things, and at last bade him and Sir Robert go and let him get dressed.

  Strangways, once they were out of the Privy Chamber, would have gone away to find breakfast, but Constable laid hold on his arm.

  ‘What does he mean?’ He tipped his head towards the room they had just left. Strangways shook his head.

  ‘But what will he do?’ cried Sir Robert.

  ‘I’ll tell you one thing he will not do. He’ll not hold Pomfret.’

  Constable cried out at that, ‘God’s Wounds! But he will!’

  ‘If the commons come this way to knock on the gate no man in Pomfret, save the gentlemen only, will fight.’

  ‘God’s Wounds!’ said Sir Robert again between his teeth, thinking it to be only too true.

  Then he said: ‘But will he yield with a good heart? Does he approve their purposes? I—’ he hesitated, ‘I like it ill that we who stand against the commons stand between them and that rascal Cromwell and those that he has set on to spoil the Church.’

  Strangways looked at him searchingly. ‘So that is your conscience in the matter?’ He took his arm from under Sir Robert’s hand, and lifted the latch of the further door. But before he opened he said: ‘What my Lord means now, nor I nor any man can know. He has a deep, working brain, and more wit and wisdom than all of us. But I know this, that since the commons’ cause is the right cause, and the cause of all true men, my Lord will be with them one day. For there’s no man truer nor he.’

  Then he went out, and left Sir Robert not much less puzzled than before.

  *

  A tramping tinker told the news to the yeoman at Oxcue, who told it to a Marrick hind, who brought it to the smithy at Marrick quite early on a fine morning. The smith was busy over a plough, which two improvident fellows had brought in to have the coulter re-set; they said it was leaving a rest-balk between the ridges which would breed thistles next year, and so it might, but any good husbandman would have seen to it long ago, not left it till the very ploughing season itself.

  So those two lounged and leaned at one side of the smithy doors, and the Nuns’ shepherd stood at the other; the bag of his pipes was under his arm, and now and again he would set his lips to the mouthpiece and blow a low and thoughtful note, which was, for the most part, his only contribution to the conversation. His life, spent mostly alone on the fells, set him, as it were, always at a distance: even when the Marrick hind told the news of how the commons had taken York the shepherd did not watch the face of the speaker, but seemed to measure with his eyes the long shadows which the bright morning laid across the fields.

  The owners of the plough were jubilant at the news, their nature being to take pleasure in trouble. The smith, stooping over the coulter, said little, but by his silence managed to convey doubt of the truth of the hind’s story; he did not want to believe it, since, being all for the new ways, he had been very cock-a-hoop about the pulling down of the Abbeys. The hind, however, was positive. ‘Sure it was truth,’ he protested, and the two others rammed it home by every means they could, calling upon Shepherd to agree with them how good news it was. All he would say was, however, ‘Marry, that such things should be! What a coil in the country! What’ll come of it?’

  Then – ‘Here’s Priest!’ cried the hind, and as Gib Dawe came by, bent under a load of bracken for winter bedding, the two Marrick men hailed him, telling him the news, which, they guessed rightly, would please him as little as it pleased the smith.

  Gib halted, holding his pikel with one hand, and with the other wiping the sweat from his face.

  ‘So,’ cried one of the two, ‘Master Cromwell and his heretic Bishops shall down,’ and he began to sing a song that was going about in those days—

  ‘Much ill cometh of a small mote

  As a Crumwell set in a man’s throat,

  That shall put many other to pain, God wot!

  But when Crumwell is brought alow—’

  ‘Yea, yea,’ said the other, cocking a snook, neither exactly in the direction of Gib, nor yet far off. ‘Our valiant North Countrymen that have gone forth for the sake of Christ Crucified shall knock on the King his doors—’

  ‘Aye!’ cried Gib, ‘and you’re valiant men too. And yet I would have you wait a while till you have seen the King his doors, namely the great gates of his Tower of London, and the guns therein, very many; aye, and that which may sooner cool you – the gates of London Bridge, where the flies buzz about the meat of traitors thicker than round the butchers’ stalls. And what will a lousy pack of countrymen do against the King’s high nobility with their men-at-arms and the King’s – Tcha!’ he broke off, ‘I’ll answer you no further,’ and he tramped on, leaving them, for the moment, silenced.

  But he himself was ill satisfied with what he had said, having, as it were, conjured up the great and the rich to set down poor men. Yet those poor men, fools and blind, were such as spurned the pure new light of the Gospel; and among them as leaders were proud, overweening men such as Master Robert Aske.

  ‘Christ Crucified!’ He spat out the words. ‘They’ll cry on Christ Crucified when the hangman’s hand is on them!’ Yet it was all awry, to have poor men rise for such a cause, and also to prosper in it. He was angry, but his anger could find no sure aim. He came, panting because of his wrathful hurried pace, to the gate of the parsonage, and pushed through it, his wide burden of dry bracken hissing against the posts of the gate.

  *

  Dame Nan Bulmer brought the news to the Ladies at the Priory, coming hastily into the Prioress’s Chamber, handsome more than ordinary in her untidy, hungry-looking way.

  She interrupted Dame Christabel at Mixtum, would not shut the door, would not sit down, would not eat, yet, as she stood talking, took up from the table and broke and munched the fresh manchet bread, and then reached for the Prioress’s plate of quails, and ate from this small choice morsels casually yet delicately.

  None of these things pleased the Prioress, who had a sore cold, and for whom, alone of the Ladies, there were quails, a present from her sister. Nor did the news please her.

  ‘And so,’ Dame Nan concluded, ‘before them all my kinsman went into the Minster, and before them all laid his gift upon the altar. They say,’ she declared, ‘that there are forty thousand men to follow him, gentlemen and commons. And in the South Country will be many more to rise with our people. So you need not fear,’ said she, ‘that this House shall be brought to an end.’

  She was holding out her fingers vaguely, as if she expected the Prioress to hand her the water to dip them in. Dame Christabel did not move, so she wiped them on the cloth. Dame Christabel looked at the greasy marks and said, ‘I did not fear it. We have my
Lord Privy Seal’s promise for our continuance and the King’s.’

  ‘Mass!’ Dame Nan laughed. ‘You trust to your bribes to bind such a rascal as that fellow Cromwell?’

  ‘Fie! To speak so of the King’s servants!’

  ‘Fie on such a servant of the King!’ and Dame Nan turned away. ‘I must on to tell the Ladies of St. Bernard this good, great news,’ said she, and went, leaving the door open with the fresh morning wind flapping the table-cloth, and scattering light wood ash from the hearth over plates and dishes. Dame Christabel did not, even for courtesy’s sake, follow her across the Great Court to see her away. Instead she shut the door with an angry, quiet care, and, going back to the fire, stood looking at the bright sparks running along a blackened log, and one hand jagging at the beads at her girdle.

  ‘Ill,’ she said, half aloud, ‘will come of it. Ill will come of it.’ She did not know how; she did not fear any ill in particular, but because Master Aske and these others had blundered in where they were not needed, she would be ready to blame them if ill should come. And then she remembered Dame Nan’s last words – she would away to tell the Ladies of St. Bernard the news. The Prioress heard the beads, the string of which a sharper unconscious jerk of her hand had snapped, begin to patter on the hearth, and into the rushes. It had been indeed these last words that pricked her most nearly. Should the rebels succeed in their purpose not only Marrick, but all Abbeys should stand. For long now, hardly recognized but dearly cherished, there had lain at the bottom of her mind the thought of Marrick continuing secure, thrifty, prosperous in barn and byre; while in the House of St. Bernard’s Nuns, down the river, the wind would blow through the unshuttered, empty rooms, where no more were there any Ladies in the white gowns of the Cistercians.

  ‘But,’ she said to herself, as she stooped to search for the beads, which were of pretty carved boxwood, ‘rebellion doth not prosper, because God hateth it.’

  She had to endure much that day from the Ladies, to whom Dame Nan had managed to scatter the news on her way across the Great Court, as though it were corn, and they a company of clucking hens.

  And clucking hens the Prioress found them, assembled as they were, a noisy excited company in the warmest corner of the Cloister. Dame Margery Conyers, her face crimson and eyes streaming, had her hands clasped, and was crying: ‘Deo gratias! Deo gratias! Our House is saved! Our House is saved!’ (As if Christabel Cowper, Prioress, had not already saved it.) And there was Dame Anne Ladyman, shaking her head, and casting her eyes this way and that in the very manner of a brainless hen, and declaiming upon ‘that sweet noble gentleman Master Aske. Jesu! he hath all our hearts at his feet.’

  The Prioress came near them and the tumult a little hushed, but then Dame Margery cried out demanding that they should send money to the commons to help the cause. ‘And if not money,’ said she, with surprising common sense, ‘then we have cattle that can be driven thither for their meat, and none of us will grudge to go a little hungry this winter for those men that are our defenders.’

  The Prioress only looked at her, but she spoke to Dame Anne Ladyman.

  ‘How old are you? How old?’ They all knew as well as Dame Anne herself, which was not precisely, but dismally near enough. ‘And you talk of your heart, and of sweet noble gentlemen! Oh!’ she cried, ‘if you had committed fornication I could better forgive it than such very foolishness. Yet that you never did, but only and always cackle of it, cackle, cackle!’

  *

  There was however one who, in the Prioress’s opinion, spoke with propriety of this unlawful scurry of the commons. In Chapter that morning Dame Margery’s suggestion was debated by the Ladies, but, by the force of the Prioress’s resistance, defeated. In the charged silence that followed, Dame Eleanor Maxwell slowly rose. They all turned to her, staring. Not one could remember when it was that she had last spoken in Chapter, but they thought they could be sure enough of what she would say concerning this great news of her kinsman, which someone had shouted into her ear.

  And then she began, in her faint, light, toneless voice, to tell them that though she could not herself well recall the evil times when men fought for the two Roses, yet she had very often heard her father speak of them. ‘And evil times they were, though you think not of them, nor does that rash boy. Nor can he nor any other serve God by moving war against his Prince when the realm is in peace.’ And she sat down again, her face trembling, and her hand shaking on her stick.

  *

  One of the Manor ploughmen told the news to Malle. He was an old Aske servant, and so he took great pride in what Master Robin had done, since Aske was Aske to him, whether of the older or younger branch.

  Malle had come out with her spindle to drive Gib’s cow to pasture on the grass along the verges of the road. The sun was still not yet high, and the shadows were long. In a neighbour’s croft a man was digging; as he drew the spade out the earth-scoured iron flashed white; the new-turned earth of the plough furrows glittered too, sticky wet, and the polished quarters of the two horses shone dark, yet bright.

  ‘Hi! mad Malle!’ cried the ploughman. ‘Have ye heard this good news?’

  Malle stopped, letting the spindle run down and hang still at her knee. But when he told her she did not seem to make much of it, only mumbling, ‘What will they be at?’ Then she moved on, after the slowly moving cow. The ploughman shrugged, slapped the rope rein against the horses’ flanks to start them again, and tramped away with a good heart, looking forward to the drinking and talking there would be at the alehouse, when dusk brought all home from the fields.

  That night, when the door and shutters were barred, Malle was cutting bread for Wat’s supper and hers; bread and lard was their supper; Gib had had his, and gone up to bed with the rushlight to read there, so they groped by the last light of the fire and must speak only in whispers. But it was pleasant here and friendly; Wat had his bare feet in the ashes that had a touch soft as silk, and warm. Before Gib went he had told them, sharply and angrily, the news from York. Wat was rubbing his belly over it now, as if he had eaten something very good. He was always pleased at things which displeased his father. But Malle mumbled to herself over the loaf.

  ‘So there is news,’ said she suddenly, in as loud a whisper as she dared. ‘A marvel is the news. God is here comen to us. That is the news!’ She flapped her left hand in the air as though Gib’s news was a fly which she drove away.

  ‘How can He put on,’ she said, ‘such a homespun coat, and not burn all up with the touch of Him? If He shouldered down the sun, and quenched light with His coming, it would be no marvel.’

  Wat scrambled up, and catching a handful of her gown, shook it impatiently, being hungry. Malle shoved into his hands two thick slabs of bread with lard between, and he went back to the hearth. But she lingered at the table. ‘Instead,’ she murmured, ‘He came stilly as rain, and even now cometh into the darkness of our bellies – God in a bit of bread, to bring morning to our souls. There is news.’

  Gib called angrily from the room above. Wat looked up with a glare, but shrank away from the fire and into the safer shadows. Malle cried that they two would not be long. She laid her finger on her lips, and laughed silently at Wat, to wipe away his scared look.

  October 18

  All the Captains except Robert Aske stood in a wide, deep window in the house of Master Collins, the Treasurer, in York. The window was open, and the late afternoon sunshine and mild air came pleasantly in. The Captains had put on what they had with them of best clothes to sup with Master Collins; some had bought a new cloak or doublet or a finer sword since they came to York, so that they made a cheerful show. They talked cheerfully too, for Master Collins was known to keep a good table, and the smells that they had met on coming in had promised well.

  They heard someone come pounding up the stairs, and then Aske burst into the room. He had a quill pen stuck behind his ear, inky fingers, and a smudge of ink on his cheek.

  ‘Master Collins,’ he said, ‘I pra
y thee have me excused, but here’s no time to sup to-day.’ He turned to the others. ‘The Vicar of Brayton has come to me. He says that Strangways, my Lord Darcy’s steward – you know him, Cawood, Rudston—’ He looked to them and they nodded – ‘The parson says Strangways has shown him a way to enter into the Castle. What Castle? Marry, Pomfret. But whether that word of Strangways be truth or trick the parson says this is sure – that the servants and even my Lord’s men will not stand up against us. Which of you will come with me? How soon can we muster to ride?’

  ‘Wait a moment.’ Mr. Saltmarsh pushed his way forward. ‘Where is this Vicar of Brayton? Let’s have him in to question him?’

  ‘He’s gone. I sent him back forthwith. He’ll have ways to—’

  Sir Thomas Metham’s sharp voice came from the midst of the group.

  ‘God’s Death! You sent him? And now you’d send us?’ and he laughed in a silence.

  ‘Aye, Mr. Aske,’ Saltmarsh said, with more courtesy, but no less mal-ice in his voice. ‘It seems to me also that the messenger should have come to all the Captains, and if he came to one, that one should have brought him to the rest.’

  ‘Mass!’ Aske began, and had been about to say the truth, that indeed he had never thought of it, and now was sorry. But Sir Thomas snickered again, and – ‘Mass!’ said Aske instead, ‘what does it matter? There’s the news. Now—’

  ‘Yet,’ Mr. Saltmarsh objected in his smooth voice, ‘yet tarry.’

  ‘I’ll not tarry. Pomfret we must have. I tell you—’

  ‘You tell us too much, Master Aske.’ Mr. Saltmarsh looked round about for approval. ‘Are you head Captain over us?’

  ‘Aye,’ cried Sir Thomas, ‘are you?’

  ‘I tell you—’ Aske said again, his voice easily overmastering their voices, and thereafter for a few minutes the servants below, and passers-by outside, could hear the clamour and sometimes the words of a very pretty quarrel.

  At last – ‘We cannot,’ Aske cried, ‘wait on further news from Lincolnshire. We hear news enough.’