A week after that they had a letter from that Ridley of Willimoteswick to say that he had not bought their cannon and should not. For he had heard from his cousin Ridley, that was the monk Francis of Belford, how the Young Lovell was alive that they had sworn to him to be dead. Moreover, that lord had done no sorcery at all, but all that was false witnessing. Therefore Ridley of Willimoteswick counselled them very earnestly to give up that Castle to its rightful lord or he would never be their friend again. Moreover, he said that the monk Francis advised him that the hundred and fifty pounds they had given him for the purchase of cannon was no money of theirs but belonged of right to the Young Lovell. How that might be he did not know, but he was determined to buy them no cannon and to hold that money in his own hands until the rightful ownership should be determined.
Then those of the Castle cried out on the evil that there was in their world and time, and that there was neither faith nor truth in man. The heat blazed down upon them; the Castle stank, and now terror began to come into their souls so that the women wakening in the night or walking round the corners of the stony corridors would scream out suddenly. For on all hands they heard how the Young Lovell's men resorted to him and how Richard Bek had sent him basketsful of gold from the White Tower, lowering them to boats that came on his behalf in the dawn. And knowing him as well as they did, they knew that he was a very fierce and cruel man to evil-doers and destroyers of order in his lands.
Then there came those letters from the Bishop and spread dismay amongst them, for the Lady Isopel had a great dread of priests and raised perpetual outcry in the Castle, asking that it should be given up to the Bishop. So they answered those letters as best they could. Then came other letters from the Earl of Northumberland in which he reded them very strongly to give up that Castle and sue for mercy. For, said the Earl, he must now withdraw from them all his countenance and he had written a broad letter to the King in his Council praying him to reverse the judgment that that Earl had given, on false witness brought before him, against the Young Lovell.