The Friar's Tale, стр. 63
Good luck on that, he thought. Kings were notoriously lazy creatures who tended to enjoy the perks of the crown more than fulfill its duties.
John, Tuck mused, was less so than most. Richard, of course, simply had his priorities wrong.
"Richard should abdicate!" That was the sudden cry, and it startled Tuck, for it seemed for a moment to have come out of his own thoughts, out of his own mind.
Richard should abdicate. He could not even disagree. He could not... Well. That was the way of things. The king could not be forced out.
"Richard should be dealt with!" That was an uglier mood, flowing through the crowd. It did not get too far, but the word that was unspoken was an ugly one.
Assassination. It would not be hard. Some melee in the Holy Land, who would even know that the blade that took the king's life was not a Saracen's curved scimitar.
But to hear it being openly espoused was disturbing. Tuck could not even blame the guard who loosed an arrow into the crowd.
People charged him. Tuck was forced, in the process of avoiding being trampled, to knock a couple of them aside with his staff, scowling as he stalked towards the woman. "Was this what you were trying to start?"
She jumped down off the table before she became a target. "What do we have that makes it worth not starting trouble?"
He did not have a good answer for her other than, "Our lives."
"Not for much longer, the way things are going."
"For what its worth, I agree. Richard should either come home or abdicate in favor of John. But he will come home on his shield."
"And some, I think, would encourage that. I don't. Let him crusade... But not with our money and not with my sons."
"Crusaders are supposed to be volunteers." Tuck suspected victims of levy had been taken, but...
"They did volunteer. But they are wide-eyed boys, who will volunteer for anything and never count the cost."
She was right. Tuck flinched a little. Reginald might have volunteered. Reginald might still...it was one sure way to obtain the pardon that would allow him to return to settled life. A king would not dare refuse pardon to a pilgrim, of any kind.
"You know similar."
"I think all boys are like that. Some never become men. Some girls never become women, for that matter."
It was not limited to the male gender, by any stretch. The refusal to grow up, the refusal to set aside the attitudes of childhood was a human thing, Tuck thought.
"Sometimes, it's good to be like a child."
"Sometimes," Tuck agreed. "But we should get out of here." The riot had roared away from them. "Before the guards spot you."
She picked up her skirts, nodded once, and ran. Tuck suspected she was a widow. No husband to keep her in order. No husband to help her think things through, either, although women were sometimes better at that than men.
Tuck just walked away.
"Halt, Brother."
Tuck stopped, turning to face the guardsman. He said nothing.
"Who was that woman?"
"A rabble rouser. I don't know. I've never seen her before." His answers were completely truthful. He did not know who she was, and he would certainly not help them find her to execute her. That would be the inevitable result of her being discovered by them. They would hang her for sedition without even thinking about it.
Without, certainly, considering there might be some truth in her words. One did not speak so about one's ordained king...in public anyway.
Tuck had heard far worse things said about Richard over a cup of ale in a quiet back room. You could get away with a lot if they thought you drunk.
The guard shook his head. "You swear that you do not know her?"
"I swear." He could do so in a clear conscience. He wished he knew her, but he did not. He wished she was...no, not a man. Younger and fitter. No.
They did not need somebody that stupid.
"Avoid her. She's going to be fitted for a noose and I'd hate to see her drag others with her."
"I fear it is too late for that."
Tuck glanced over...the riot was starting to head back this way. "If you'll excuse me."
The guard made no attempt to prevent Tuck's escape from the scene.
25
The river that flowed through Nottingham was large enough for boats to come up it, although the rapids south of the city were a problem. The ambitious spoke of building some kind of canal to bypass them.
Perhaps one day that would be done. One day a long time in the future. It did seem that people made their slight improvements. Better millstones.
Of course, one took one's flour to the mill and paid the mill tax. Tuck wondered how many old-fashioned querns had been sneaked out of storage. And, idly, whether they could get their hands on one. A quern was inefficient, but it did not make bad bread, in the end.
The mill tax. The levy. All the ways in which the lords took what the peasants had made and built to pay for the protection they were supposed to provide.
There would be more riots. And before too long a lord would die at the hands of his people. What would John do about it? Tuck stared across the river and wondered.
A grey heron rose up from the bank, spreading its great wings. There was a heronry not far away from there, the birds were a common sight. Some people liked to chase them off, for they ate a lot of fish. Of course, one had to be careful. Their beaks were long enough to possibly kill a man.
Tuck shuddered a bit at that thought. What a way to go...killed by a bird. Almost funny, in a dark way. The heron, of course, was nowhere near him.
Something darted through the water itself. Probably an otter. They ate a lot of fish too, and men liked to