The Black Rose Page #2

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I'd like you to tell me freely

why this feeling is so bitter.

You may speak up, lad.

As you see, I came

this way while hunting...

so let us say that for the moment

I am not your king...

so we talk as

between two men.

There'll be no penalty

for the truth.

You're a Norman,

that's reason enough.

But it's not.

It's over 200 years

since the conquest.

Surely Saxons and Normans

should have found a way...

to live together

in that time.

Your father did not feel as you do.

He was a Saxon.

He knew that if this

bitterness was not healed...

it would be

the worse for England.

This is a problem that must be

dealt with one way or another.

Tell me, when you refuse me

your loyalty because I am a Norman...

have you not considered that

I have no choice in the same matter...

that I must be king

for Norman and Saxon alike...

whether I like it or not?

Do you Saxons not owe something

besides hatred to the same cause?

What do I owe the Normans?

We lived at Gurnie when the Normans

were no better than wolves of the sea...

and it was a better Gurnie then

before they came to rob us.

She's a Norman...

and she robbed me

of my name.

She robbed my father of the chance

he had to have a Saxon son.

It was her doing

that I never knew my father.

He willed me into the service of a Norman,

but he can't make me serve them.

I have heard nothing in this

that touches my problem.

This seems to me to be a matter

between a son and his father.

I would not like the lad to be hanged

merely because he has been hurt.

It is our wish

that he be let go free.

Do you suppose this house could give

a traveler rest? Let's say if he was born here?

- Master Walter!

- It's good to see you, old Will.

You've grown, and well too.

Come in. Come in.

You're home again.

I hoped you'd come by suppertime.

I laid a place for you.

You knew I'd left Oxford then.

Aye. We have a guest who came

from Oxford. About you, I think.

- Who's that?

- Bacon. Friar Roger Bacon.

Oh. Friar Bacon. He was

a teacher of mine. I'd like to see him.

I'll tell him, Master Walter.

Will-

Uh, what did he say when

he found I'd left school?

- My grandfather, I mean.

- You know him, Master Walter.

He never says anything.

He just looks.

- Well, how is he?

- You saw that pile of iron in the moat?

Yes, I did.

I meant to ask.

We have gone into trade.

A belted knight

of Gurnie in trade...

dealing in armorers'

iron and swine.

And just like he does everything else,

not a word to anyone.

One morning, the horses were gone

and the swine came.

And then the iron.

And when they wanted to know

where he wanted it put...

he told me to have them

put it in front of the gate.

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