Under the Hog: A Novel of Richard III

by Patrick Carleton

  They ate and sang at night round the big wood fires, their faces reddened by them; but the city and its silence and nearness were in their minds, as near as the dark was near, and they were uneasy. They slept and woke again. Then the lords were among them again, flaming in armour, telling them to break camp and march. Ralph’s feet were blistered. Red Tom had told him to tear a little off his shirt and wrap his toes up separately; but he limped still. Here in Warwickshire, in Kingmaker’s county, no one cheered when they passed. An old man by the roadside shouted:

  “White-rose bastards, long live King Harry!”

  A mounted man-at-arms smashed him across the face with the butt of his demi-lance; knocked him heels-upward into the ditch. They dropped into the Vale of Evesham and crossed the Fosse Way before they camped; slouched on through the dull next day, a crowd of men on foot and in saddles, chafed by harness and carrying weapons, and the baggage-carts, four-wheeled and ponderous, requisitioned hay-waggons mostly, creaked and croaked behind them with a guard of mounted archers. Ralph had begun to think, moved to it by new things he had seen and felt and by the largeness of England. The marching and the sight of great men and expectations of battle and the words that had been read by the herald forced his mind open. What he thought was: All this is still England, and there is more of it yet, and it is all the King’s. We are going about, just so many of us, to change the King as though these towns and roads belonged to us. Four armies already are on the march to stop that. How could we ever do it?

  When they had trudged, thirsty and sulking, uphill out of the Vale again and could see Wroxton Abbey far off, they were halted. They stood dumb like sheep, and fresh orders were given. Ralph stroked the rough down on his chin, missing his weekly shave. A fellow near him spat and said softly under his breath:

  “Oh Jesus.”

  The Duke of Gloucester, looking no bigger than a monkey on his big white horse, came down the road toward them from the head of the column, riding at a hand-canter. He reined in hardly twenty feet away, so that Ralph could see his beautiful armour, blued steel with the boar in hammered silver and gold on it, and hear his clear voice which was young and low, very pleasant. He said:

  “Sir William Parr?”

  Sir William kicked his slow roan mare into a trot and came up saluting, making the men jump out of his way.

  “Here, your Grace.”

  The Duke saluted him. He had his vizor down and lifted one gauntlet to it sharply and formally. Eh, but he’s a little one, Ralph thought, not like his brother. It gave him an obscure kind of pleasure to see the little, shiny, erect shape on the tall horse and hear the impersonal voice, coldly friendly, coming from behind the ribs of the vizor, quiet and unpassionate.

  “Sir James Harrington?”

  “Your Grace?”

  Sir James rode up, wiping his mouth with his bare hand. He had been taking a draught from the flask of watered wine that his squire carried.

  “You two and Debenham and Chamberlaine are posted to the vanward under me. March your men up the road and join the others. We deploy on the right of the middle-ward, of course. The King’s Grace will take the middleward, Lord Hastings the rearward. Our outriders have just reported the Duke of Clarence at Banbury with his people. If they make a stand, we shall be pitching battle in about an hour. Ride on and take your places.”

  The men ahead stood from the road to let them march past. It seemed to Ralph that the soldiers like Tom who had fought before had turned cheerful now they had heard there would be a battle. He felt coldish and sickish. Red Tom was whistling. It’s Lent, but I’ve been eating meat, Ralph thought. If I die I shall go to hell. There were men waiting for them at the head of the column. Some of them were the bearded strangers he had seen before. They had swords, and strange things like deep brass cups on the end of poles. Tom jerked his thumb at them.

  “Hand-gunners from Burgundy,” he said. “Germans and Dutch mostly: I reckon a rush to them.” Then he called out queer words Ralph could not understand: “Hey, Heinrich, Duke kommt. Fechten. Schlag tot.”

  A hand-gunner with a yellow beard down to his shoulders, a fat man, grinned. “Recht so: wohl schlagen wir tot.” He pushed the brass part of his strange weapon forward. “Boom!”

  “Silly whorsons,” Tom said, “I’ve seen a many of them.”

  From behind their backs came suddenly the young, cold voice that Ralph knew already: “Outriders on”: and a hundred or more on horseback, well armed, began to trot. They followed; marched past the Abbey and down the Salt Way. There was a difference now in their marching. They did not slouch, but kept step together; kept close. The archers had uncased their bows and most of them carried one arrow ready in their hand. The knights had their vizors down. I’ve not been to confession, Ralph thought, for ever so long. I’ll be put into hell, and our priest never taught us prayers properly. How does it go? Pater noster qui es in … something, I can’t remember, ne nos inducas in tentationem sed libera nos, and some more, amen: and the saints, now: the blessed Virgin and St. Joseph the joiner and St. Anne and St. Antony, St. George, St. Dunstan, St. Cuthbert, St. Thomas the holy martyr: I do hope they’ll remember me. I won’t eat meat in Lent any more.

  In front, people shouted. A horseman came rattling down on them, went forward, galloping so that they barely had time to make place for him. Then they were halted. Voices called. An archer in the company just ahead twanged his string twice and held up his wetted finger to try the wind. There were orders given abruptly and loudly, and they were leaving the road, all the column of them, and stumbling through fields. The knights and captains rode close beside their commands, jostling and herding them.

  “Slope pikes.”

  “Keep rank there, God damn you.”

  “Right of those trees.”

  He was on the inside of the column; could see nothing; but he felt his flesh shrinking together, trying to make itself small, at the expectation of danger coming suddenly down on them; pressed himself close to the man on his right.

  “Halt. Turn about. Form battle.”

  The column faced round and became a line, five deep, of men, pikes thrust out from it, wavering at first and then steadying. He could see better now: could see level fields and the road and their own line with plumps of archers and pikemen or men-at-arms placed alternately; peered over shoulders, pushing his pike, as he had been taught, between the bodies of men in front of him. Music was playing somewhere: chatter of drums and vaunting of fifes and trumpets. Away to his right he could see horsemen, the end of their line. He realised clearly and suddenly what they were: an army straddling a road. The King himself, Edward Long-legs, was there on the road with the middleward, and far on their left was the rearward under Lord Hastings. We are the vanguard, he thought, and our captain is the Duke of Gloucester, whose badge is a boar. We are going to fight. Then he saw the enemy.

  They had not spread out into the fields; were coming in a column like their own down the road, moving slowly, with banners. He looked and looked, thinking: Perhaps somewhere there, in a man’s hand or his quiver, is something to kill me. But the queer thing was that those men coming up the road were the Duke of Clarence’s men, and he was King Edward’s brother. Two brothers on this side, he thought, and one on the other, and us here to fight for the two against the one. Eh, it’s all daft. The column came on; was near enough for him to tell separate movements of legs and arms. Its top was a single sheen like a river, because all the men were helmed; but below, it was broken in colours of clothes and glimmer of harness. Horsemen rode with a banner in its front, and he could not see the end yet. He felt himself almost hiccoughing with afraid expectation. Then, with a jerk, the column halted, light ceasing to ripple on its steel top and beginning to shine steadily. A loud call sounded from trumpets not theirs, and by theirs was answered. A strange twitch and shiver passed along the rank that he was in. Some gripped their pikes more firmly; but others straightened their backs and let the points droop. A dull rough voice behind him said:
/>   “Praise God and St. Bernard.”

  From the head of the column two or three horsemen had moved and were riding alone — bright, small shapes — up the road. All the rest of the compact, long troop stood still. He heard hooves drumming, and the Duke of Gloucester and two knights went past, riding to the road. Ralph saw him go up to the moving horsemen, not lifting any weapon, and they all halted together; were shiny, still points on the road’s white, to which, from the middleward and rearward, more riders came. He wondered was this how a battle always began. For a long time everything was still and he could hear rooks caw-cawing a long way away. Then, in a knot, all those horsemen who had sat in their saddles between the armies moved in one direction; moved toward him slowly; and behind him the music blew up again. From the middle-ward came cheering. He cried out, not bearing to be puzzled any longer:

  “But what are they at?”

  The cheering spread sideways from the vanward; was loudening up the line toward where he stood: an unshaped clamour. The voice that had thanked God and St. Bernard loudly said:

  “Haven’t you eyes? Cheer, you fool. Duke of Clarence has turned his coat. He’s come over to us. We’ll crown Edward King in London again before Easter day now. Go on, you addlewit. Cheer for the Duke of Clarence.”

  That was it, and now they were going to London, a great conquering army, conquering without a blow. When they left Banbury he stepped out in pride on his sore feet, with his head full of music. He had seen wonderful things; would have something to talk about all his life; and he was going to see London and help crown a King there.

  They were fifteen thousand now, and people cheered here and there as they went by. Seven thousand had come up out of the South-west shires behind the Duke of Clarence’s banner, which was a black bull, and were queer fellows to Ralph, speaking an English he could barely comprehend: said Ich for I and turned their esses into zeds. They said the Duke had never meant to fight his brother; had brought white-rose favours in his baggage ready to distribute to them when the right time was. Some of them did not seem pleased to change. People in their parts, they said, held with the house of Lancaster. They had news, too, that the old Queen, Holy Harry’s wife, and her son were coming from France with a good army; were expected on the West coast any day now. They would join their troops to those of Kingmaker and there would be bloodletting.

  “And when it comes,” Tom told Ralph, “if our King’s wise he’ll keep his kind brother and these West-country sheep-stealers under his eye. The half of ’em are red-rose men at stomach; and as for the Duke of Clarence, a man who’s turned his coat once’ll turn it twenty times; and that’s what.”

  He said this whilst they were lounging, a hundred or so of them, before a church in Daventry. Their King was in the church at his prayers, and his fifteen thousand took a little rest about the town, drinking and playing shove-groat on the steps of the market cross. They were for Northampton, the word was, and then St. Albans; and from St. Albans for London.

  “You’ve seen London, Tom,” he said. His mind was always on the city now. No one had ever been there from his village.

  “Aye, three or four times. That’s a city, I’ll tell you. There’re strong whores in Cock’s Lane and the best eel-pies ever I’ve eaten: and I’ll tell you a thing. If you’ve any manner of goods that you want to chaffer and no words said — something you’ve found, say — take it to the Lombards. They’ll buy it off you and no questions. What the devil’s to do?”

  A man had come out of the church, a squire with a staring face, and was shouting:

  “A miracle, a miracle, loved be God, a wonderful sign!”

  Then Sir William came out, pushing the squire aside, and cried in his high voice, furiously: “On your knees, you bastards: get on your knees and a pox on it. Fifty million devils, d’you think the goddam’ saints work a miracle every day of your lousy lives. Kneel down and be damned. Here, one of you run for a priest and let’s have some Christian prayers in the devil’s name.”

  They slumped by ones and threes down on the cobbles, wondering, uncovering their heads. A fat priest was hustled onto the church steps and blessed them. Sir William nudged him and whispered. He nodded; began to talk gabblingly and uncertainly.

  “My sons, I announce to you great joy. Populus, as it stands in the Book, qui ambulabat in tenebris vidit lucem magnam. It has pleased almighty God to approve by a most marvellous working the justice of the Lord Edward’s quarrel. Whilst the King in excellent piety, as he is a most pious and godly prince, was kneeling in discharge of a vow — Oh my sons, it is good to pay vows — before the image of the blessed St. Anne, that great saint, the mother of the mother of God, a kindly lady whose ears are always open to prayer, that great saint, I say …”

  He paused, having lost, it seemed, his discourse; began again:

  “The holy image was covered, as is the custom of the Church during this season of Lent, with a screen of boards. Behold a miracle. As the Lord Edward knelt before it, the boards opened of themselves, visibly parting by the work of no man’s hand. They closed again. Is it not good to pay vows? They opened yet again, and widely, so that the image of the blessed saint, the dear mother of our Lady, was plainly seen by all. There is a miracle, my sons. There is a sign that the cause in which you bear arms is pleasing to God, and for the amendment of your naughty lives. Amen, dico vobis. Do not harden your wicked hearts. Here is a marvellous opportunity of grace. The holy image is here, here in this church of God. See that you all, by some pious work, show the kind saint that this token of her love has not been wasted on you. Bring forth fruits meet for repentance. Abstain from riotousness and ill-guidance whilst you are in this town where the power of God has been so gloriously manifested. See that your prayers, your vows, your alms show God and the dear kindly saint your gratitude. Amen.”

  “Amen,” said Ralph, and men said Amen all round him. He could not get into the church to see the holy image because of the crowd of knights and nobles there; but he found a little Christ at a street-corner and said his prayers to him: “Sweet Christ, our priest never taught us prayers properly, but you know what I mean. Sweet Christ, thank you for the holy miracle, and I will live cleanly. Don’t damn me at doomsday because of Lent. I won’t sin so again, and I’ll be shriven at Easter, and I’ve got a farthing I’ll give the next begging friar we meet. Don’t let me be killed in a battle, for the sake of our Lady and blessed St. Anne, and God bless King Edward and the Duke of Gloucester. Amen.”

  On the Thursday before Easter they were in London.

  Ralph could not rightly believe that he was there. He realised now, had not known before, why in the first place he had taken livery and gone along with Sir William. He had gone along to see London. They had a two days’ wait at St. Albans whilst King Edward, people said, was writing letters to Queen Elizabeth in sanctuary and to the Bishop of London and the Archbishop of Canterbury. Then they went in, and there were people shouting and waving hands, and cloths hung out of the windows and aldermen riding in scarlet and rich citizens in violet, and they marched through more streets than Ralph ever saw and were heroes; had come into London and brought King Edward the Rose with them again. No one had stopped them, and Ralph did not understand how poor fellows like him could matter so much to grand Londoners; why women smiled and blew kisses and men called: “God bless you.” It seemed he and Red Tom and Sir William and the hand-gunners from Burgundy and all the rest of them had done something marvellous. The miracle of St. Anne might be part of that; but then, after a little, he understood that it was because everyone in London loved beautiful King Edward. They wanted him back again, and had a welcome for poor, simple folk from the North and the Midlands who had guarded him across England.

  London was amazement to him: the many streets and the many churches; the tangle without end of houses whose lower storeys were brick or stone; the shops where all things in the world were to buy or sell; cookhouses where you could have any dish that you asked for, like a Lord’s kitchen but ope
n for common folk; Londoners talking their odd, clear talk; Lombards and Germans and Genoese; armourers’ shops making harness for knights; a vast bridge with real houses upon it; hot baths open to all; many hundreds of houses each having its own sign, so that a rank of them hung out at different levels, like a row of pikes, over the street: the bear, the crown, the mitre, the fess, the rose, the crescent, the bull, the foot. People looked cheerfully at him everywhere. God bless King Edward and À York were passwords. The grand people, in violet and mulberry, who walked down Cheapside as though it were theirs had white roses stuck in their bonnets. The first day a pretty girl, very well dressed, ran out of a shop as he passed, with a mazer of wine.

  “Mother says, if you’re one of King Edward’s men, drink and God love you.”

  He had only drunk wine four or five times in his life; smiled and fumbled with the wooden bowl, frightened to look at the girl; gulped pink claret and lifted his hand to his sallet.

  “God bless you and long live King Edward; à York.”

  He heard wonderful gossip. The Londoners talked all the time. There was no sitting still in a tavern or on a market-bench, wondering who a stranger might be. Anybody was somebody to a Londoner. They all talked to him. An apprentice as nicely dressed as a squire and able, as he said, to speak French told him how, two days before they came in, the Archbishop of York, Kingmaker’s brother, had raised six hundred men and ridden about the City with King Harry, calling on everyone to stand by the true blood of Lancaster.

  “But you never saw such a miserable sight,” the apprentice said, “Holy Harry sitting his horse like a sack and mumbling. He’s no make of a King, and everyone knew you were all of you lying at St. Albans. We’ve no use for King Harry. They had the guards out guarding the City, but Recorder Urswick — he’s clever — he told ’em all to go home to dinner when he heard you were coming, and so King Edward was let in. I’ll tell you what. I’d like to fight for the white rose myself. I’m tired of trade. You’re a lucky one. I’ll tell you. Why shouldn’t you sup with me, if my master’ll let me off, to-morrow night; and bring some of your company? I’ll give you a London supper. My master’s a white-rose man, belly and bones. He might give me a groat towards it.”