“I owe it all to my newly appointed Archbishop of Canterbury,” he heard the new King saying.

“What I did, my lord, was what any of your loyal subjects would have done had God favored them with the good fortune to see the truth.”

He saw himself riding into Canterbury, the Archbishop who had saved the throne for the rightful king and rid the country of the impostor.

But these were only dreams—pleasant to indulge in for a while, but insubstantial. There must be some action some time.

He visited his friend frequently and often he was on the point of telling him of his discovery, but he refrained from doing so. He was afraid of bringing his theories into the light of day because he greatly feared they would immediately evaporate.

Instead he talked of events of the days of great Edward and the accession of Richard.

“The Tudor has a very flimsy claim to the throne,” he insisted.

His friend always looked furtively over his shoulder when he talked like that. He was a timid man. “It is of little concern to us,” he said. “What difference does it make to the life of a humble priest what king is on the throne?”

“I like to see justice done,” said Richard piously.

“We all do as long as it doesn’t do us any harm. We know it could have worked so differently. As you say, Richard might not have died at Bosworth. He might have lived to have sons. Or there might have been others to come to the throne. There’s young Edward of Warwick and his sister Margaret. They are children, I know. But there is John de la Pole, the Earl of Lincoln. They say that Richard made him the heir to the throne . . . in case he didn’t get children of his own . . . on account of the Earl of Warwick’s being but a boy.”

“The King has young Warwick under lock and key in the Tower, which shows he’s afraid of him. What has this young boy done . . . a boy of ten years or so, to deserve imprisonment? Why he’s as innocent as . . . as . . .”

A vision of the young Lambert Simnel came into his mind. He must be about the same age as the imprisoned Earl of Warwick.

“I wonder,” he went on, “why some of them don’t rise up and, er . . . do something about it.”

“Oh, Henry Tudor is safe on the throne, particularly now he’s married Elizabeth of York . . . uniting the houses . . . and as they’ve got a son . . . young Arthur . . . well, he’s safe enough now.”

“But I reckon some people feel angry about it. I reckon there’s the Earl of Lincoln for one. . . .”

He was excited. He wanted to get away to think. He had to be practical. What hope had a poor unknown priest of bringing about a rebellion? Why hadn’t he seen before that he needed help? He was reluctant to share the glory but on the other hand shared glory was better than no glory at all.

Suppose he went to the Earl of Lincoln. Would the mighty Earl receive a humble priest? But perhaps he would want to see a priest who believed he had made a great discovery.

And then it seemed to him that he had a sign from Heaven.

It was his friend who imparted the news to him. He had been wondering how he could find the Earl of Lincoln when his fellow priest said: “Have you heard the latest news? They say that the young Earl of Warwick has escaped from the Tower.”

Richard’s heart began to hammer against his side. Escaped from the Tower! When? It could have been some time ago because such news took a long time to get around.

The young Earl of Warwick was aged about ten. He must look rather like the boy in the baker’s shop.

Now he must act. This had decided him.

It was not easy to get an audience with the great Earl of Lincoln but when Richard Simon eventually succeeded in doing so what he had to say received the Earl’s full attention.