Page 298 of The Pillars of the Earth

William sat down. His body was beginning to ache. These days he felt the aftereffects of a fight in a way he never used to. He had strained muscles, sore hands, and bruises where he had been struck or had fallen. I’m only thirty-seven, he thought; is this when old age begins? He said: “I have to kill Richard. Once he’s gone, the outlaws will degenerate into a helpless rabble.”

“I agree.”

“Killing him will be easy. The problem is finding him. But you can help me with that.”

Waleran rubbed his sharp nose with his thumb. “I don’t see how.”

“Listen. If they’re organized, they mustbesomewhere.”

“I don’t know what you mean. They’re in the forest.”

“You can’t find outlaws in the forest, normally, because they’re scattered all over the place. Most of them don’t spend two nights running in the same spot. They make a fire anywhere, and sleep in trees. But if you want to organize such people, you have to gather them all together in one place. You have to have a permanent hideout.”

“So we have to discover the location of Richard’s hideout.”

“Exactly.”

“How do you propose to do that?”

“That’s where you come in.”

Waleran looked skeptical.

William said: “I bet half the people in Kingsbridge know where it is.”

“But they won’t tell us. Everyone in Kingsbridge hates you and me.”

“Not everyone,” said William. “Not quite.”

Sally thought Christmas was wonderful.

The special Christmas food was mostly sweet: gingerbread dolls; frumenty, made with wheat and eggs and honey; perry, the sweet pear wine that made her giggly; and Christmas umbles, tripes boiled for hours, then baked in a sweet pie. There was less of it this year, because of the famine, but Sally enjoyed it just as much.

She liked decorating the house with holly and hanging up the kissing-bush, although the kissing made her giggle even more than the pear wine. The first man across the threshold brought luck, as long as he was black-haired: Sally’s father had to stay indoors all Christmas morning, for his red hair would bring people bad luck. She loved the Nativity play in the church. She liked to see the monks dressed up as Eastern kings and angels and shepherds, and she laughed fit to bust when all the false idols fell down as the Holy Family arrived in Egypt.

But best of all was the boy bishop. On the third day of Christmas, the monks dressed the youngest novice in bishop’s robes, and everyone had to obey him.

Most of the townspeople waited in the priory close for the boy bishop to come out. Inevitably he would order the older and more dignified citizens to do menial tasks such as fetching firewood and mucking out pigsties. He also put on exaggerated airs and graces and insulted those in authority. Last year he had made the sacrist pluck a chicken: the result was hilarious, for the sacrist had no idea what to do and there were feathers everywhere.

He emerged in great solemnity, a boy of about twelve years with a mischievous grin, dressed in a purple silk robe and carrying a wooden crozier, and riding on the shoulders of two monks, with the rest of the monastery following. Everyone clapped and cheered. The first thing he did was to point to Prior Philip and say: “You, lad! Get over to the stable and groom the donkey!”

Everyone roared with laughter. The old donkey was notoriously bad-tempered and was never brushed. Prior Philip said: “Yes, my lord bishop,” with a good-natured grin, and went off to do his task.

“Forward!” the boy bishop commanded. The procession moved out of the priory close, with the townspeople following. Some people hid away and locked their doors, for fear that they would be picked on to perform some unpleasant task; but then they missed the fun. All Sally’s family had come: her mother and father, her brother, Tommy, Aunt Martha, and even Uncle Richard, who had returned home unexpectedly last night.

The boy bishop led them first to the alehouse, as was traditional. There he demanded free beer for himself and all the novices. The brewer handed it over with good grace.

Sally found herself sitting on a bench next to Brother Remigius, one of the older monks. He was a tall, unfriendly man and she had never spoken to him before, but now he smiled at her and said: “It’s nice that your Uncle Richard came home at Christmas.”

Sally said: “He gave me a wooden pussycat that he carved himself with his knife.”

“That’s nice. Will he stay long, do you think?”

Sally frowned. “I don’t know.”

“I expect he has to go back soon.”

“Yes. He lives in the forest now.”