Tombland

Nicholas said, still in a pleasant tone, ‘As is common knowledge, nearly all the trees on the escarpment have been cut down, to provide wood and give a clear view of Norwich. There is only one large one left. I have sheltered under it myself.’

‘Yes,’ Hodge agreed.

‘The distance between the tree and the path to Norwich is at least a hundred feet. I will be happy to measure it out before Captain Kett. At that distance you could not possibly hear anything I said to Toby Lockswood.’

‘You were shouting!’

Nicholas laughed. ‘To hear me from that distance, amid the commotion that was going on, I should have had to have used a trumpet!’

Some in the crowd laughed; they liked humour.

Hodge made no reply. Nicholas waited a minute, then asked for the witness to be dismissed. Hodge gratefully disappeared into the crowd. Toby glared at us.

Wallace, the second witness, was very different, a large, solid middle-aged man. He took a confident stance, arms folded, and in answer to a question from Toby said he had been standing near them and heard the words Nicholas was reported as saying. Nicholas then asked, ‘What exactly did you hear?’

‘What you said, gemmun, at the crest of the hill as Wharton was being led down. I was not ten feet away. You said, clear as day, that Robert Wharton should be freed, Captain Kett imprisoned, and that we are a commonwealth of rogues!’

There were boos from the crowd. Nicholas turned to Kett, and asked quietly, ‘May I ask, Captain Kett, that Goodman Wallace remain where he is while I call my witnesses, Edward Bishop and Thomas Smith, of Tunstead?’

Kett nodded, and Nicholas waved to two men. As they stepped forward, Wallace looked uneasy. Nicholas said, ‘I am told you come from the same parish as Goodman Wallace.’

‘I do.’

‘You remember the eighteenth of July?’

‘Yes,’ Goodman Bishop replied. ‘We was working over towards Thorpe Wood, building a new pen for some of the pigs. I remember the day because that evening there was much talk about what had happened to Wharton in the afternoon.’

Smith nodded agreement, then turned and pointed a finger at Wallace. ‘He was with us all day, the job took that long. Not least since Biller Wallace is the laziest man in our parish, and did not half the work we did. We was jowered out by the end of the day, but not him.’

There was laughter from the crowd. The fact that two others had been present with Wallace at the pig-pen a mile away clearly showed him to be a liar. Wallace clenched his fists and shifted angrily. ‘Those fools have the day wrong, it was the day before that we worked with the pigs.’

Nicholas said, an edge to his voice now, ‘If it was the day before, why would Goodmen Bishop and Smith remember the talk about Robert Wharton that day?’

‘I don’t know,’ Wallace answered belligerently. ‘Ted Bishop’s always had no more sense than a May gosling, and Tom Smith’s not much better!’

Bishop snapped at him, ‘At least I tell God’s truth under oath, as a good Christian should, and do a fair job of work without making a tutter of it!’

At this there was more laughter; the mood of the crowd had clearly swung in Nicholas’s favour. The fact that he had spoken to the commoner witnesses civilly probably also helped. Toby Lockswood looked round, furious. I guessed he was a man who would hate being laughed at above all else.

Nicholas turned and bowed to Kett. ‘That is all my evidence, Captain. I submit myself to the judgement of the camp.’

Then Toby Lockswood lost his temper. He pointed a finger at Nicholas and shouted, ‘Overton spoke against the Commonwealth and the rebellion many times in the early days. He is only allowed in the camp because of his connection to Serjeant Shardlake. I say that being a gentleman is itself enough to send him back to prison!’ There were a few cheers and claps, but most remained silent.

Nicholas’s face first paled, then turned as red as his hair. He stepped forward and spoke to the crowd, raising an arm. ‘Yes! I was born a gentleman, but I was disinherited. I have no lands, no tenants, I am but a junior lawyer. It is true I came to Norfolk believing gentlemen were born to rule and be obeyed, but now – having seen how this camp has been organized, and witnessed a royal army, which I was brought up to believe would be skilled and honourable, run like so many sheep, I no longer know what I think. But I swore to Master Shardlake I would cause no trouble in the camp, and nor have I. Imprison me for having the birth and education of a gentleman, if you like. I cannot help that.’ He paused for breath, then, in his turn, pointed a long finger at Toby Lockswood. ‘One thing I am not is a liar, nor a man who garners his hatreds as a squirrel hoards nuts! Is that to be Toby Lockswood’s Commonwealth, where men abuse their power to hurt others? Is that not what you are all trying to change?’

For a moment the crowd was silent. Then Toby shouted back, ‘We will have an end of all such men as you!’