‘Bob? Any ideas?’
Bob remained perfectly still.
Liam came over and prodded his shoulder. ‘Bob? Hello?’
Cabot’s eyes narrowed. ‘What is the matter with him? He seems entranced.’
Liam could see muscles in Bob’s face twitch, and the slightest flicker of his eyelids. ‘What is it? Are you getting something?’
‘Just a moment,’ replied Bob. ‘Processing.’
‘What is the matter?’ asked Cabot again, rising from the round oak table, still a shambles of piled parchments and scrolls, matters long overdue for the sheriff’s attention.
‘I think … I think we’re getting a signal.’
‘Signal?’
Liam ignored the old monk’s question. He pulled up a stool in front of Bob and sat down. ‘Bob? Tell me what you’ve got.’
‘Decompressing wide-range tachyon signal data packet,’ he replied. ‘Just a moment.’
A new signal from Maddy, that’s what this had to be. He wondered what had happened. Something not good, presumably.
Finally Bob stirred. His gaze returned from the grey sky over Nottingham and settled on Liam. ‘I have a message from Maddy and an attached data package, Liam.’
‘So what’s the message?’
‘Time wave has arrived. Significant contamination event, originating 1194. Mission requirement has changed. Prevent an event known as “Great Peasant Revolt”. See data package attached for further information on event origins. Pandora now a secondary consideration. Please acknowledge.’
‘What’s the data package?’ asked Liam.
Bob blinked several times before he spoke again. ‘The Great Peasant Revolt of 1194 began during the reign of King Richard. His prolonged absence on the Third Crusade left his country bankrupt. With the king abroad, the authority of the crown quickly eroded under the proxy rule of the king’s younger brother, John …’ His monotone voice echoed across the hall for the better part of an hour as he read aloud the compiled dossier.
Cabot was the first to speak when he’d finished. His normally gruff voice shaken and small. ‘And this … these are events that are yet to happen? Just as I was saying to ye — rebellion? Civil war?’
Liam nodded. ‘That’s history that has now happened.’
‘Has happened?’
‘Will happen,’ corrected Liam.
‘But need not happen if — if …?’
‘If I … if we take some sort of action, yes.’ He offered Cabot a smile and an apology. ‘It seems you’re right, Mr Cabot — there are more pressing matters to attend to.’
‘This means ye will …?’
‘It looks like Bob and me need to stay on here.’ He got up and wandered over to the window and leaned against the stone frame. ‘Those riots going on last night … that appears to be the very beginning of this peasant revolt. It all starts here in Nottingham.’
‘Affirmative,’ said Bob. ‘Corrective measures will need to be applied here immediately.’
‘Ye have John’s full authority,’ said Cabot. ‘Ye will use that?’
Liam shrugged. ‘I’d be mad not to.’
‘So … Liam, ye will become the new Sheriff of Nottingham?’
Liam saw that Bob looked unhappy about that. ‘I know, I know … if I make myself sheriff, I’m contaminating history, but it looks like — ’
‘Negative,’ Bob interrupted. ‘Contamination level may be acceptable.’
Liam laughed. ‘Oh come on! There was never a Sheriff of Nottingham called Liam O’Connor!’
‘Historical records of this time do not specify a particular name for the Sheriff of Nottingham.’
‘You mean … no one knows who it was?’
‘Correct. This means your name is unlikely to be recorded in history. This is an acceptable contamination risk.’
Cabot joined them by the window. ‘Do I presume from yer exchange that ye can become the sheriff, then?’
Liam nodded. ‘Uh … yes. Yes, I suppose I can.’
‘Good!’ Cabot slapped him on the back. ‘’Tis much that needs doing.’
‘And quickly.’ Liam sucked in a deep breath. ‘This morning, then, I suppose we should make a start. Get an idea of what supplies there are in the castle. What money there is left in the coffers. And perhaps find out what the people of Nottingham have to say … what they need the most. And this hooded fella — whatever, whoever he is — the poor seem to think he’s some kind of a folk hero. As soon as we can, we need to deal with him.’
Cabot’s old face wrinkled with a smile. ‘Good decisions already, young man.’
‘And we should also get a message back to base,’ Liam said to Bob. ‘Let them know we’re working on it, and that Becks is down in Oxford, so they know where to beam a signal if they want to contact her.’
‘Affirmative,’ replied Bob. ‘I will prepare an encoded message to be carved on the gravestone.’
‘Gravestone?’
Liam offered Cabot a guilty shrug. ‘I suppose we should’ve asked first. We’re, uh … we’re using one of your graves up at Kirklees as a … as a sort of message board. Hope you don’t mind? It involves sort of carving a few lines and — ’
Cabot frowned. ‘Ye are interfering with a man’s gravestone?’
Liam nodded.
‘Whose?’ he growled angrily.
‘Haskette.’
Cabot pursed his lips for a moment. ‘Oh, BrotherRobert? Not to worry, the man was a fool anyway.’
CHAPTER 43
June 1194, Normandy, France
He stared across the cool blue of the English Channel. It glistened in the morning sun, calm as a millpond, quiet as a monk, as it lapped gently up the Normandy shingle and withdrew with a whisper.
King Richard finished urinating and tucked himself away. His gaze drifted along the coast towards the small cluster of ships beached and battened up, and the tents and marquees erected between them topped with pennants that twitched and swayed in the light breeze.
A party of English nobles had arrived to meet him in Normandy. All of them pledging their support for him, their men-at-arms, their money. His royal tent last night had been full of them, like errant schoolchildren, all trying to outdo each other in their demonstrations of unflinching loyalty to the crown.
Richard smiled.
Just like naughty children … blaming each other for the unrest in the north of England. The rumours, if they were to be believed, mentioned a rebellion of peasants. And these fools who had come to meet him in Normandy should have been maintaining the order of England while he was away instead of bickering among themselves, jostling for favours and power.
And, of course, his brother John … The useless idiot appeared to have done little to help the situation. He was weak, that was his problem, that had always been his problem, a weakling, a coward.
Richard tasted bile in his throat and spat.
The whole ugly, cold, wet country of England disgusted him. His spineless brother, the squabbling two-faced nobles, the repulsive peasants … even the ugly language they spoke, Anglish. Its tones grated on his ears.
My kingdom. For what it is.
It was worth nothing more than the taxes he could throttle out of the miserable place. Taxes to raise a new army and reclaim his French lands lost during the last five years.
France. All of France … that was his birthright, his true home. That was what God wished for him. And more.
He’d known that since he was a young man. Known his destiny was to rule all of Christendom — not just that ugly wet island of Britain. And with such a magnificent force behind him, he would sweep once more into the Holy Lands and east into the Arabian deserts, wiping out Saladin’s army.