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He went away, laughing horribly. Gloucester drummed upon the table, his brows contracted. But the lean Duke said nothing; big York seemed to drowse; and Henry of Derby smiled as he sounded a gong for that scribe who would draw up the necessary letters. The Earl’s time was not yet come, but it was nearing.

In the antechamber the priest encountered two men-at-arms dragging a dead body from the castle. The Duke of Kent, Maudelain was informed, had taken a fancy to a peasant girl, and in remonstrance her misguided father had actually tugged at his Grace’s sleeve.

Maudelain went first into the park of Windsor, where he walked for a long while alone. It was a fine day in the middle spring; and now he seemed to understand for the first time how fair his England was. For entire England was his splendid fief, held in vassalage to God and to no man alive, his heart now sang; allwhither his empire spread, opulent in grain and metal and every revenue of the earth, and in stalwart men (his chattels), and in strong orderly cities, where the windows would be adorned with scarlet hangings, and women (with golden hair and red lax lips) would presently admire as King Edward rode slowly by at the head of a resplendent retinue. And always the King would bow, graciously and without haste, to his shouting people…. He laughed to find himself already at rehearsal of the gesture.

It was strange, though, that in this glorious fief of his so many persons should, as yet, live day by day as cattle live, suspicious of all other moving things (with reason), and roused from their incurious and filthy apathy only when some glittering baron, like a resistless eagle, swept uncomfortably near on some by-errand of the more bright and windy upper-world. East and north they had gone yearly, for so many centuries, these dumb peasants, like herded sheep, so that in the outcome their carcasses might manure the soil of France yonder or of more barren Scotland. Give these serfs a king, now, who (being absolute), might dare to deal in perfect equity with rich and poor, who with his advent would bring Peace into England as his bride, as Trygaeus did very anciently in Athens–“And then,” the priest paraphrased, “may England recover all the blessings she has lost, and everywhere the glitter of active steel will cease.” For everywhere men would crack a rustic jest or two, unhurriedly. The vivid fields would blacken under their sluggish ploughs, and they would find that with practice it was almost as easy to chuckle as it was to cringe.

Meanwhile on every side the nobles tyrannized in their degree, well clothed and nourished, but at bottom equally comfortless in condition. As illuminate by lightning Maudelain saw the many factions of his barons squabbling for gross pleasures, like wolves over a corpse, and blindly dealing death to one another to secure at least one more delicious gulp before that inevitable mangling by the teeth of some burlier colleague. The complete misery of England showed before him like a winter landscape. The thing was questionless. He must tread henceforward without fear among frenzied beasts, and to their ultimate welfare. On a sudden Maudelain knew himself to be strong and admirable throughout, and hesitancy ebbed.

True, Richard, poor fool, must die. Squarely the priest faced that stark and hideous circumstance; to spare Richard was beyond his power, and the boy was his brother; yes, this oncoming king would be in effect a fratricide, and after death irrevocably damned. To burn, and eternally to burn, and, worst of all, to know that the torment was eternal! ay, it would be hard; but, at the cost of one ignoble life and one inconsiderable soul, to win so many men to manhood bedazzled his every faculty, in anticipation of the exploit.