Caris was sorry for Alice, his widow, but aside from that she could hardly help rejoicing he was gone. He had bullied the weak and toadied to the strong, and the lies he had told at her trial almost get her hanged. The world was a better place without him. Even his building business would be better off run by his son-in-law, Harold Mason.
The parish guild elected Merthin as alderman in Elfric’s place. Merthin said it was like being made captain of a sinking ship.
As the deaths went on and on, and people buried their relatives, neighbours, friends, customers and employees, the constant horror seemed to brutalize many of them, until no violence or cruelty seemed shocking. People who thought they were about to die lost all restraint and followed their impulses regardless of the consequences.
Together, Merthin and Caris struggled to preserve something like normal life in Kingsbrige. The orphanage was the most successful part of Carir’s programme. The children were grateful for the security of the nunnery, after the ordeal of losing their parents to the plague. Taking care of them , and teaching them to read and sing hymns, brought out a long suppressed maternal instincts in some of the nuns. There was plenty of food with fewer people competing for the winter stores. And Kings bridge Priory was full of the sound of children.
In the town things were more difficult. There continued to be violent quarrels over the propriety of the dead. People just walked into empty houses and picked up whatever took their fancy. Children who had inherited money, or a warehouse full of cloth or corn, were sometimes adopted by unscrupulous neighbours greedy to get their hands on the legacy. The prospect of something for nothing brought out the worst in people.
From the book ‘World without end’ by Ken Follet
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