The Outlaws of Sherwood (19 page)

“Do you like him?” said Robin.

Little John looked bemused. “I hardly know. It is an odd thing that you ask, for I've been asking myself, and it's not a question I care for; nor is he the first raw young man I have—um—”

“Intimidated into behaving himself,” said Robin. “It is a thing I value you for. I am over-inclined to yell, and I cannot loom as you do.”

“He is not the first raw young man you have given me for a first lesson,” Little John said peaceably. “But he is—different. He is not without talent or brain—or wit,” he added, a little ruefully. “But he has as many moods in an hour as I have in a year, though that may only be the strangeness of his new life. And he is mortally afraid of something; he is halfway up a tree while I'm still turning toward the sound of a broken twig.”

“Poor boy,” said Marian. She looked around. “Where is he?”

Little John shook his head. “Hiding in the shadows somewhere. I suggested to him that he make his report to Robin—I wanted to hear myself what he would say—and he could meet the lady Marian as well, but he gave me such a look as the creature in the snare when it sees the hunter's knife. It is the same look he casts over his shoulder as he climbs a tree to escape the breaking of a twig. He begged that I let him off, and so I did. For all his nerves, I have hopes of him when he has looked around him a little more.”

“And when he has grown accustomed to sleeping on the ground,” said Robin. “He probably hasn't had a good night's sleep since he left his home. He also has to learn to duck. I heard him walk into what passes for the lintel of our cave-door last night.”

“His home?” said Marian. “Where is he from, then? Is there a reason he is afraid of meeting me?”

“He is well-born,” said Robin, “but we know no more; he has not told us that much, but everything about him proclaims it. He fears, I guess, that he knew you in his former life.”

“I see,” said Marian, and her face cleared momentarily; but it clouded again. Robin looked at her inquiringly. “I am trying to recall what news I may have heard of recent runaways,” she said; but if she remembered anything, she did not tell it.

Further details of Sir Richard's disgrace were soon brought back to camp. Rafe, who had a girlfriend who was a tavern-girl, returned from an evening in her company so preoccupied with the tale that Much teased him for being a poor lover: “She'll not tell you things if you forget her in the telling; and then you'll lose both her and her tales. She may be a comely wench enough, but
we
shall miss the tales.”

Rafe said, very much on his dignity, “Lucy understands that I may occasionally think of things that concern her little; she likes me for it.”

“No one, man or woman, ever liked such a preference,” said Much, but Will broke in, grinning: “Not everyone, Much, demands such perfect attention to himself as you do. Why do you not have the fortitude to get yourself a town girlfriend who might tell tales that Rafe's Lucy knows not? Because you cannot spare your own attention long enough.”

“I—” said Much, just as Will said, “Confess!” and Robin said across them both, “Is this an outlaw band or a nursery?”

Alan-a-dale, who lacked, perhaps, humour, nonetheless had an admirable sense of combustible situations from his years as a bard in Norman halls. He struck a gentle chord on his lute, and began to sing. He had dextrously learned to muffle each string as he played it, so that the aftertones died away almost immediately. He became so clever at this that his music had taken on a magical, ethereal quality, till it was easy to believe that his songs were from the faeries, who were standing just out of sight in the shadows. And, as Robin wryly said to Marian, as the faeries' music was said to choose its listeners, presumably no unfriendly ear heard it.

Marriage had been kind to Alan; his moodiness was all but gone, and he smiled more now, even if most of the outlaws' jokes puzzled him. Robin was still hoping to hear of some kindly Saxon baronial hall that wanted a bard, but it was not the sort of thing an outlaw spy-system was over-liable to be informed about—and, meanwhile, Alan seemed to think that he belonged where he was. He sat near the fire now, when he played; he had even learnt to ignore Little John.

What Marjorie thought, she never said—not even, Robin believed, to her husband. She was sitting next to him now; she lifted her head from his shoulder when his hand slipped up the fretwork to find its place. When he sang, she sang harmony in a weary little voice no louder than a sparrow's. The song Alan had chosen was a song of love, and it was hard to tell if it was a melancholy song or not. Robin thought, looking at the two singers, that Marjorie would have said that it was, and Alan would have said that it was not. The song ended, and Alan gave his young wife a kiss; she smiled, and put her head back on his shoulder, but she did not look away from the fire.

“I have it in my mind that we shall make a merry meeting of it for the sheriff and his friend Beautement, when they do come to rob Sir Richard of his home,” said Robin. “Rafe, you have my leave to spend the next day or two in town; I will give you some small coin for supplies we must have, and you may spend your evenings making it up to Lucy so long as you spend your days gossipping in the market-place.”

“I like such a task on both counts,” said Rafe. “'Tis lucky for me that Much has not a town girlfriend, for he could gossip the devil himself to a standstill, and I should spend every day in a tree, straining my eyes after foresters, and never see my Lucy at all.”

“Hmph,” said Much. “It is Will who owes me the apology.”

“In a perfect world doubtless you would receive one,” said Will cheerfully. “But you must make do with this world, in which you will not.”

“Enough,” said Robin. “Alan will wear himself out playing peace between you two.”

Simon appeared at the edge of the firelight and touched Bartlemey on the shoulder, who sighed, stood up, and disappeared into the darkness. Several other such exchanges were taking place nearby. “There will be purses to empty before the week is out,” said Simon; “Sir Miles has been heard saying loudly that the outlaws of Sherwood are a bad knight's excuse for carelessness, and he means to try us as we deserve. He should be here by sunset, the day after tomorrow.”

“Good,” said Robin. “I had feared that his friends would talk sense to him, and he would go the long way around; and we have need of every groat soon. Rafe, your most particular care is to find out what the sum of the mortgages comes to; gossip always exaggerates, so if we take twice over what you can tell us, we shall be safe.”

“I shall cast my ear abroad also,” said Marian.

“Be careful,” said Robin sharply.

“Be careful, Rafe,” said Marian.

CHAPTER TWELVE

Sir Miles did a great deal of bellowing when eight men in Lincoln green fell on him from the treetops, roped him neatly off his horse, caught that horse's bridle as it would have plunged away, knocked his men off their horses likewise, and began to delve into the saddlebags without further ado.

“If you do not be quiet,” said Robin conversationally, as Sir Miles thrashed on the ground and roared that if there were a man among them he would challenge Sir Miles to single combat and that Sir Miles would then water the ground with his blood, “I shall gag you. I begin to think that I should enjoy gagging you.”

“This is not honourable behaviour!” shouted Sir Miles.

Robin grinned. “I hope not. I am, after all, an outlaw and a rogue.”

“I could slay you with one hand tied to my belt!” howled Sir Miles.

“Very likely. Which is why, you see, I took the precaution of tying both your hands to your belt, as well as your feet to each other, before venturing to discuss our business with you.”

“Business!” shrieked Sir Miles. “I'll show you business! I challenge any man of you to single combat! I—”

“Yes, we've heard all that. You are not listening to us,” said Robin. “If any of us wished to face you in single combat, I assure you he would have come forward by now. Cecil, gag this man for me.”

“Gladly,” said Cecil. Sir Miles bucked and gurgled and grew red, but the noise level dropped instantly, as Cecil finished his knots and stood up. He still wore his hat—Robin had observed that he slept in it—but he had tied it around his forehead with a bit of ragged twine, and with the camouflaging dirt smudged on his face and a grin wider than Robin's own, no one looking at him could have guessed that a fortnight before he had been—wherever he had been, sleeping in a real bed, wearing linen shirts, and firing at straw marks. “How do the saddlebags look, youngling?” said Robin.

“Good,” said Cecil. “Heavy.” There was an exceptionally frantic grunt from the now purple-faced man on the ground before them.

“Heavy with the right kind of contents, I trust,” said Robin.

“You need have no fear of that,” said Little John, nodding toward Sir Miles. “If he carried lead he would be calmer.”

“'Tis not lead,” said Cecil. “Gold coin and a few gems.” Robin opened his eyes and whistled. “And sausages, too. I find,” Cecil added sheepishly, “that I miss sausages.”

“There are worse vices,” said Robin.

Little John moved dispassionately out of the way as Sir Miles rolled toward him. “It is well you gagged the fellow,” he said. “His noise could have brought foresters fifty miles. They are not such bad woodsmen that I want to build a church tower and hang a bell in it to toll over our doings.”

The other men were roped together and blindfolded, and made to walk with gentle, or mostly gentle, prods from staves to tell them which way to go. Sir Miles would not walk. When they hauled him to his feet, he attempted to kick the man who untied his ankles. Robin thrust his staff between his legs, and without his hands to save himself, he fell heavily. “That is a curious trick for an honourable man,” said Robin, watching the knight roll back to the tree he had lain against and struggle that way again to his feet. He tried to kick Robin this time, and Robin did not try to be gentle when he bashed his staff between Sir Miles' ribs and pelvis. This time when he fell, he lay still for a few moments.

“Tie his legs again,” said Robin, “and untie his mouth; but hold that bandage ready, for my ears are sensitive.

“We are taking you and your men to a place where we can pick you over at our leisure; but we have no wish to be kicked while we are about it. You will be blindfolded anyway, and more liable to kick an unoffending tree than any of us.”

Sir Miles was a little curled up where he lay; he looked as if his side probably hurt him. “I will not co-operate with my captors,” he said hoarsely, “who took me and my men all unfairly.”

“You will do what it suits us you shall, and it suits us to prevent you from arriving in Nottingham yet. Your choice is merely of how uncomfortable you wish to make it for yourself.”

“I will not co-operate,” said Sir Miles, beginning to get his voice back. “And my family will not ransom me.”

“He thinks we are Saracens,” said Little John. “Trust a Norman not to know the difference between a Saxon and a Saracen.” Cecil giggled.

“Your family will be put out by no such demands,” said Robin. “We have no dungeons for the keeping of prisoners, even if we wanted the trouble of them.”

“As a knight and a man, I will not co-operate with my captors!” bellowed Sir Miles, fully recovered, though he winced as he drew breath. “I challenge any—”

“Gag him,” said Robin, and Cecil leaped to obey. Simon, who was in charge of the other captured men, looked inquiringly at Sir Miles and then at Robin. “Er—what
do
we do with him?”

“If he thinks it more manly to be thrown like a sack of meal over a horse's back and hauled, then we can oblige him, I guess,” said Robin. “He had his choice. I will add, sir,” he said to the man on the ground, “that we would have led you by smooth ways, and you would not have fallen, unless, of course, you were trying to kick the trees. Blindfold him, and bring his horse.”

Sir Miles was not a happy sack of meal; he flailed so much that he made his high-bred war-charger uneasy (“Silly beast to be riding through Sherwood anyway,” said Cecil. “Perhaps he was expecting a tournament,” said Little John), and they had to shift him to a more tranquil mount. “We should tie his hands and feet to the stirrups,” said Simon crossly, after they had made the transfer. “That would quiet him.”

“No,” said Robin. “If the horse fell or bolted I would not have even an enemy so vulnerable.”

There required three men to hold him at last; one to lead the horse, one to hold him at the neck, and one at the ankles. It was not a pleasant journey. “Less comfortable for him than you,” said Robin over the horse's back, as he took his turn at ankle-holding, to Simon, who had Sir Miles' collar. Sir Miles contrived to overbalance himself once, and only Robin's strong hold on his feet prevented him from falling over the other way to the ground. “If you do that again I shall let you fall,” said Robin, “and break your neck, if fate wills. My patience wears thin.”

“At last,” murmured Simon.

Sir Miles was tamer after that, but from Robin's words or from exhaustion, only he himself could have said, and no one wished to try inquiring. The other men went submissively enough and, as Robin had promised, none fell, nor had trouble keeping his feet, for the outlaws gave warning when necessary to a blind man.

Sir Miles got no supper that night, for the three or four times his gag was briefly removed he immediately began shouting; and as Robin was as cautious about noise in the smaller camps at Growling Falls and Millward as he was at Greentree, Sir Miles was not given more than half a word's roar before he was shut up again. Perhaps from his example all his men were very well-mannered, and while they looked uneasily at the green-clad folk who faded in and out of the shadows, they were willing enough to eat the food given them.