Stewart had not eaten since yesterday morning.

He had three pennies left.

The loaf on the baker's stall cost one.

He stood across the street watching a woman arrange the bread beneath a piece of cloth.

The smell reached him.

Fresh bread.

For a moment he thought of Alice.

He turned away.

York was behind him now.

He had left through Micklegate Bar three days earlier and followed the road west with no particular place in mind.

Leeds was somewhere ahead.

He had never been there.

It seemed as good a place as any.

The rain had started during the night and had not stopped. His boots were covered in mud and the bottom of his coat was wet through.

A cart passed.

The driver pulled his horse to one side to avoid a deep rut filled with brown water.

"You want a ride?"

Stewart looked up.

"Where are you going?"

"Tadcaster."

Stewart knew the name.

"I've no money."

"Didn't ask for any."

Stewart climbed onto the back.

The cart carried sacks of grain. He found a place between them and rested his head against one.

The driver looked over his shoulder.

"York?"

"Aye."

"Got family there?"

Stewart looked towards the road behind them.

"No."

The driver nodded.

He did not ask again.

They travelled for most of the morning.

The rain eased.

Fields stretched away on either side of the road, broken by hedges and small patches of woodland. Men worked in one of them despite the weather. A boy stood near a gate holding a stick while several pigs rooted through the mud.

Stewart watched them pass.

By midday the cart stopped.

"This is as far as I go."

Stewart climbed down.

"Thank you."

The driver nodded towards a building farther along the road.

"You might find work there. Farmer lost a man last week."

"What happened to him?"

"Left."

"Why?"

The driver smiled.

"You'll find out."

He flicked the reins.

The cart moved away.

Stewart walked towards the farmhouse.

A dog began barking before he reached the gate.

A broad man appeared from behind a barn.

"What do you want?"

"Work."

"What can you do?"

"Most things."

The farmer looked him over.

"That's what every man says."

"I can mend a fence. Dig a ditch. Handle a horse."

"Where are you from?"

"York."

"Master Fletcher. At the mill in York."

"Why'd you leave?"

Stewart looked at him.

"My wife and daughter died."

The farmer's face changed a little.

"Pestilence?"

"Aye."

The farmer took a step back.

"Pestilence?"

Stewart nodded.

"Then you'll not be sleeping in my barn."

"I asked for work."

"And I'm telling you there isn't any."

"You said you'd lost a man."

The farmer stared at him.

"That was before you told me where you'd come from."

"I'm not sick."

"How would I know?"

Stewart had no answer.

The farmer pointed towards the road.

"Go."

Stewart remained where he was.

The dog came closer.

It showed its teeth.

Stewart left.

By late afternoon he was hungry enough to spend one of the pennies.

He bought a small loaf from a woman beside the road and ate half of it before he had walked fifty yards.

He wrapped the rest in cloth and put it in his sack.

His fingers touched Margaret's doll.

He stopped.

For a moment he stood in the road with his hand inside the sack.

Then he closed it and walked on.

That night he slept beneath a hedge.

The ground was wet.

He pulled Alice's shawl from the sack and laid it across his chest.

He did not sleep much.

Something moved in the field during the night.

A fox perhaps.

Once he heard horses on the road and saw the glow of a lantern passing through the darkness.

He kept still until they were gone.

The next morning his back hurt and his boots were still wet.

He ate what remained of the bread.

Two pennies.

He walked.

Near midday he came upon three cottages beside the road.

Smoke rose from their chimneys.

A woman was hanging linen across a line.

"Excuse me."

She turned.

"I'm looking for work."

She stared at his clothes.

"What sort?"

"Anything. I've worked a mill most of my life."

"Where?"

"York."

The woman stopped what she was doing.

Stewart saw the change in her face.

"I've been away from the sickness three days. There's nothing wrong with me."

"My husband isn't here."

"I mean no harm."

"Keep moving."

"I'm hungry."

She picked up the basket at her feet.

"I said keep moving."

A man's voice came from behind the cottage.

"Everything all right?"

The woman disappeared inside.

Stewart walked on.

He had spent most of his life working.

He had never begged.

Now people looked at him as though there were little difference.

Towards evening he reached another village.

A wooden cross stood near the centre. Beside it were the stocks.

A man sat with both ankles trapped between the boards.

Someone had thrown rotten vegetables at him.

Two boys stood nearby laughing.

Stewart stopped.

"What did he do?"

One of the boys looked at him.

"Begging."

The man in the stocks lifted his head.

"Don't believe the little bastard."

The boy laughed.

"Called the constable a pig as well."

"Aye. That I did."

Stewart almost smiled.

Then he noticed the constable coming across the road.

The man looked directly at him.

"You there."

Stewart kept walking.

"I said you."

He stopped.

The constable approached.

"What's your name?"

"Stewart Hirst."

"Where are you from?"

"York."

"Where are you going?"

"Leeds."

"What business have you there?"

"Looking for work."

"What trade?"

"Mill worker."

"Whose mill?"

"Master Fletcher's. York."

"You're a long way from his mill."

"My wife died."

The constable waited.

"My daughter too."

"Pestilence?"

"Aye."

The constable took a small step back.

It was the second time Stewart had seen a man do it that day.

"When did you leave York?"

"Three days ago."

"Where have you slept?"

"Where I could."

"Whose service are you in now?"

"No one's."

"Got a testimonial from your master?"

Stewart shook his head.

"I didn't think I'd need one."

"You thought wrong."

The constable looked at the sack over his shoulder.

"What's in there?"

"My things."

"Show me."

Stewart lowered the sack.

He took out one shirt.

Then the other.

His stockings.

Alice's shawl.

The constable pointed.

"What's that?"

"My wife's."

Stewart reached into the sack and took out Margaret's doll.

The constable looked at it.

Stewart put it back before he could ask.

The constable looked towards the road.

"You don't want to be here after dark."

"Why?"

"Because you're without employment and you've nothing to prove where you've come from."

"I've told you where I've come from."

"That's not proof."

"I worked for Master Fletcher."

"Then you should've got something from him before you left."

Stewart tied the sack.

"And if I go back?"

The constable looked at him.

"You've come from a house with pestilence. I wouldn't go back anywhere."

Stewart picked up the sack.

"What am I supposed to do?"

"Find work."

"That's what I'm trying to do."

The constable said nothing.

Stewart understood.

He put the sack over his shoulder.

The constable nodded towards the road.

"Keep moving."

Then he walked away.

The man in the stocks watched him go.

"Friendly fellow."

Stewart looked at him.

The man grinned through broken teeth.

"Could've been worse."

"How?"

"You could be sitting here with me."

Stewart walked on.

He left the village before dark.

That night there was no hedge.

No barn.

Only the road.

He found an oak tree and sat beneath it.

His stomach hurt.

One penny remained in his pocket.

He rolled it between his fingers.

All his life he had worked.

Tomorrow he would ask again.

After that, he did not know.

He closed his hand around the penny.

Then he thought of the empty house.

Alice's shawl.

Margaret's bed.

There was nothing to go back to.

Stewart lay beneath the tree and pulled his coat around himself.

Tomorrow he would find work.

He had to.

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                                                                 - XXV-