The Chronicles of Robin Hood (18 page)

Robin slipped down through the scrub on to the open verge, and stood looking northward, where the dusty highway wound like a white ribbon through the forest towards Worksop. The sun was down behind the forest trees, and the road was in shadow; but here and there, wherever there was a gap between the branches, the sunset light streamed through and lay in bars of gold across the dust of the highway.

Robin glanced up, judging the angle of the sun. It would be some while yet, in all likelihood, before the sheriff and his men reached the ambush that awaited them, and he was wondering if there would be enough daylight left for shooting—should shooting be necessary. Sword-play would need less light. There was an hour of shooting-light left, he judged, and that should suffice. Turning, he scrambled up the bank again.

Among the hazel-scrub the outlaws and Diccon were waiting. ‘Twenty paces farther down the road, lads,’ Robin said. ‘The scrub gives closer cover there, and ’tis a better place than this, by the look of it.’

Silently they followed him to the place of vantage which his quick eye had picked out from the roadway. The road curved slightly here, and the hidden men would be facing a little north, and so have a better command of the highway down which the sheriff and his men would presently come; also, as Robin had said, the scrub grew right down to the edge of the road in a tangled buttress of nut-trees and wild guelder rose which shielded them from the eye of anyone who came down the road, while leaving their own view clear. It was a place very well fitting to their purpose.

The wood-rangers settled themselves comfortably,
sitting with their bows ready strung beside them in case of need, although, if all went according to plan, Robin alone would use the bow, while the rest did what must be done with the broadsword; and every man had his naked blade across his knees. Robin squatted down among them, and slipping the bowstave from his shoulders, bent it across his knee and slid the silken bowstring into place.

For a while they waited. Diccon shifted impatiently from knee to knee, but nobody else moved as the long minutes passed; they had lived long enough in the Greenwood to learn patience from the wild creatures.

Presently a faint sound broke the evening stillness. Much-the-Miller’s-Son was the first to hear it. He listened for a moment with his head on one side, then nodded and got silently to his feet. Soon everyone could hear it—the clip-clop of a horse’s hooves and the confused sound of many feet. A band of men was coming down the Worksop road.

The tramping drew nearer, and parting the branches of the wayfaring-tree at his left hand, Robin saw a score of men-at-arms rounding the corner of the road and coming on towards him, with the sheriff on a grey horse at their head. In the front rank of the men-at-arms, with his hands bound behind him, walked Sir Richard-at-Lea between two men with drawn broadswords.

At the sight, Robin’s face became set and grim. Very gently he let the branches of the wayfaring-tree sway back into place, and taking up an arrow, nocked it to his bowstring. Glancing down the long line of the ambush, he saw every man poised to spring, sword in hand, alert and eager-eyed. Their bows lay ready at their feet, each with an arrow sticking barb down in the turf beside it, ready
to hand in case of need. There was no need for him to give last-minute orders: every man knew what he was to do when the moment for action came.

The tramping was almost upon them now, but still they waited, Robin with the drawn bowstring tingling between his thumb and forefinger. Flickering nearer and nearer through the leaves, he watched the sheriff’s grey horse and black gown, until the rider was almost level with him on the road below; then he loosed. The twang of the released bowstring sounded very loud and menacing, and the clothyard shaft snored down from the forest verge, to strike the ground with a sharp thud and stand quivering in the dust of the highway, under the very nose of the sheriff’s horse.

Instantly a great uproar broke out on the quiet road. The startled horse was rearing and plunging, wild-eyed and snorting with terror, the swearing sheriff clinging to his mane and saddle-bow. The men-at-arms had halted, and were searching the forest shadows with startled eyes; and the captive had wrenched himself round in the grip of the two men who held him, and with desperate hope in his eyes was staring in the direction from which the arrow had come.

Then down from the tangled hazel scrub sprang Robin of Barnesdale, with his forest-rangers at his back.

‘Master Sheriff,’ said he, ‘you have two prisoners whom I count as friends. Give them up to me now, and no harm shall come to you.’

‘Wolfshead! Cut-throat! Out of my way!’ mouthed the furious sheriff, and dragging his heavy sword from its scabbard, he shouted to his men to close around the prisoners; then, wheeling his still terrified horse, he made
as though to ride down the tall outlaw chief who barred his way.

Robin watched him coming with a grim smile, his own blade gleaming in his hand. The next instant the grey horse was almost a-top of him; the two swords rang sharply together, hissing and grinding; then Robin sprang in under the other man’s guard, his blade flashed forward and up, and the Sheriff of Nottingham flung up his arms, and crashing to the ground, lay still.

Robin stood for a moment looking down at the fallen man. He would not have slain the sheriff for any wrong done to himself, but a wrong done to a friend was another matter. Then he walked over to the trembling horse, and after looping its bridle over a branch, turned to the fight which was now raging between the outlaws and men-at-arms.

Sir Richard, his hands still bound behind him, had staggered clear of the fight, and the next moment another bound figure burst from a knot of men-at-arms and came reeling across the road, wrenching and straining at the cords about his wrists. It was the young squire.

Robin went straight past them, his sword ready in his hand, and hurled himself into the fray. But the fighting was nearly over; the heart was gone out of the sheriff’s men now that their master had fallen, and already some of them were dropping out of the fight and slinking off into the forest. Soon the rest of them flung down their weapons in token of surrender, and in a short while all was over. The outlaws drew off, and stood breathing quickly, their swords still in their hands, staring at the men-at-arms, who stared sullenly back at them.

Several of the sheriff’s men were wounded: one writhed
in the dust with a gaping wound in his thigh; another sat up, staunching the gash in his shoulder as best he could; a third had his head laid open from temple to chin and lay unconscious in a crumpled heap. More of the men had lesser wounds, and indeed there were few who had come through the struggle quite unscathed; yet no one save the sheriff had been slain, for the resistance had been half-hearted, and the outlaws had fought to disable, not to kill.

Robin left his men on guard over their beaten foe and strode across to Sir Richard, who, with his squire beside him, was still straining at his bonds. The outlaw drew the long Irish hunting knife from his belt and cut the cords that bound their wrists.

‘Thanks, Master Outlaw,’ said Simon D’Aubernoun, as his bonds fell away, and he began to chafe the red scars on his wrists.

Sir Richard set his hands on Robin’s shoulders and looked him levelly in the eyes. ‘Robin, my friend,’ said he, ‘what can I say to you in thanks for this day’s work?’

‘Say nothing,’ Robin answered him. ‘But come back with me now to Dunwold Scar. Your lady waits for you there, and it will have been an anxious waiting time for her.’

‘She came to you, then?’ said Sir Richard, turning to walk beside the outlaw captain as he went back towards his own men.

‘Aye, she came,’ replied Robin.

Alan stepped out from among his comrades, and came to wring his father’s hand in gladness. Robin left them together, and turned to the dispirited men-at-arms.

‘Raise your hands. Keep them raised. Let no man make
any move,’ said he, sternly. Then, to his own men: ‘Scarlet, Gilbert, Goldsbrough, Much, Will—fetch your bows.’ He waited as the five men sped back to where they had left their longbows, and returned with shafts ready nocked to their bowstrings. ‘Keep them covered, and shoot any man who moves,’ Robin said quickly. ‘All the rest of you—take their weapons from them. Leave them not so much as a bodkin, lads.’

He stood looking on with a grim smile as the wood-rangers went among the crestfallen men-at-arms, picking up broadswords and bucklers from the trampled dust, slipping daggers from their owners’ belts. Soon there was a pile of weapons on the grassy verge, and the sheriff’s men, whole and wounded alike, were quite unarmed.

‘Now,’ said Robin, ‘those of you who are unscathed, take up your damaged comrades, and get you gone back to Nottingham. Carry the sheriff back with you if it pleases you, or leave him to be found by the next traveller—it matters not to me.’

Hurriedly and in silence the men-at-arms gathered up such of their wounded comrades who could not walk. Hurriedly, two of them picked up the sheriff’s body, and without a backward glance, with no desire save to be gone as quickly as possible, like the beaten curs they were, they set off down the road.

Behind them the outlaws stood, arrows still nocked to bowstrings, watching their retreat until the last of them had passed from sight round the bend of the road some half-mile away.

Then Diccon came thrusting through the bowmen, to put his hands between Sir Richard’s once more, almost blubbering with relief; and the young squire turned to
Robin, with his slow smile, saying: ‘My thanks are due to you, Master Robin—for I also had no wish to hang before the gates of Nottingham Town!’

‘Why, it is not a pleasant fate, to hang, as I have heard tell,’ said Robin, and he laughed. ‘But come, let us not stand here on the road, for dusk is not far off, and we must make haste or supper will be spoiled before we get home!’

So bows were unstrung, the bridle of the sheriff’s horse was freed from the branch over which it had been looped; captured weapons were collected; and the whole band scrambled up through the hazel-scrub of the verge and disappeared into the forest. Robin led the way, with Sir Richard beside him; Alan A’Dale and Simon the Squire followed with the rest of the band, and Will-the-Bowman brought up the rear, leading the grey horse and whispering soft endearments into its twitching ear.

The light had been thickening on the open road before they left it, and dusk came upon them before they had gone more than a mile or so. The blue dusk deepened to darkness, and between the tree-tops, whenever they were far enough apart to let the sky through, the stars pricked out, faintly veiled by thundery cloud-rack.

It was full darkness when at last they came close to Dunwold Scar and saw the red flicker of firelight through the trees. Robin gave a low whistle, and was answered by a whistle so like his own that it might have been an echo; and pressing through the dense scrub that edged the glade, they came out on to the open turf. The cooking fire blazed cheerfully, the gilded smoke rolling upwards towards the stars; and beside it, his face turned towards the shadows which still hid Robin and his band, sat Little John, still holding the wheaten cake he had just
taken from the hot ashes. The Lady Elizabeth stood over the stewpot; she had been stirring the savoury-smelling stew, and still held the spoon; and her head was up and her eyes wide as she stared eagerly towards the sounds of the advancing outlaw band.

As they came out on to the glade, Robin called to her blithely: ‘Here is your husband, Madam; we have him safe and sound.’

She flung down the spoon with a little joyous cry, at the same moment as Little John, finding the wheaten cake burning his fingers, dropped it hastily on to the grass. She kilted up her skirts and came running, to fling herself into Sir Richard’s arms; then, a few moments later, drew herself away, to catch Robin’s hand and raise it to her lips.

‘Oh! Master Robin!’ cried she. ‘How may I ever thank you? But indeed and indeed I will speak your name in my prayers as long as I live.’

Robin shook his head. ‘Nay, Madam,’ said he, gently, ‘there is no need to thank me. Pray for me if you will, and I shall be the better for your prayers. But now—supper smells sweet, and we are six-and-twenty very hungry men!’

She turned away at once towards the pot, exclaiming between tears and laughter: ‘It has been ready this hour and more, and Little John and I have been hard put to it to keep the stew from spoiling; so come, all of you, and eat it up before it is burned to a cinder and the good pot ruined.’

So, laughing and merry, the party settled themselves round the fire. Robin folded up his long legs and sat himself down beside Little John, who looked round with a broad, slow smile, and a ‘How now, Master?’

‘Twas a goodly fight, John,’ replied Robin. ‘But I sorely missed you beside me. You must get that leg of yours well before we have another!’

Will-the-Bowman returned a little later from stabling the sheriff’s horse, and sat down also. The rich stew was ladled out into well-worn cherry-wood bowls, and everyone set to work, for they were very hungry, one and all.

When the meal was over, and greasy fingers wiped on the grass, and the outlaws had settled down to enjoy the pleasant evening hour, Robin turned to Sir Richard, who, with his lady beside him, was sitting nearby, and said: ‘Now, friend Richard, as to your future?’

The knight shrugged his shoulders. ‘That is in
your
hands,’ said he.

‘The barons will be hot against you for the crime of aiding a notorious band of wolfsheads,’ said Robin, with a wry smile. ‘And soon there will be a new sheriff of Nottingham, out for your blood as well as mine. You must come to the Greenwood, Richard—there is no help for it.’

‘And for myself nothing would please me better,’ replied Sir Richard.

‘And for your lady wife?’

The Lady Elizabeth slipped her hand into Sir Richard’s brown palm. ‘I go where my husband goes—gladly,’ said she, in a voice that was very soft.

‘That is well said, My Lady,’ said Robin, and turned to the little tow-haired archer: ‘Diccon lad, what of you? Will you go and find a new master or follow your old one?’