The Death of Robin Hood (12 page)

‘It’s no more than dumb fucking luck,’ said Mastin. ‘We allow ourselves six arrows a day, no more, and I’ve only hit two of the bastards in the past week.’

‘Are we short of shafts, then?’ I asked.

‘Oh, we’re not too badly off,’ said Robin, taking the bow from Mastin. I watched as Robin selected an arrow, nocked it and attempted to haul back the cord. My lord was a strong man – no one could doubt it. But he only managed to pull the cord about halfway back, a foot and a half, perhaps, before loosing. Even that half-draw left him purple in the face and panting. The shaft sped over the wall of the outer bailey and lost itself in the scrubby no man’s land on the other side of the ditch.

Robin smiled ruefully at Mastin and his second, Simeon. ‘You need to build a bit more beef up here, sir,’ said Simeon, slapping his own foot-thick chest.

I saw then how gaunt Robin’s face and body had become after weeks without adequate food. ‘That was a foolish waste of an arrow, for sure,’ he said. ‘And we must husband them for the assault. I think that’s enough for today, Mastin. So, Alan, tell me: how goes it on the walls? Is that south tower ready to come down yet?’

Exactly at that moment, a trebuchet ball crashed into the outer bailey’s south tower below, creating a vast puff of stone dust, and I swear the whole structure shook with the impact like a willow trunk in a gale.

‘Can’t be long,’ I said. ‘But I’m not here about that. Can I speak to you in private, my lord?’

Robin waved
everyone away and we went to the corner of the roof out of earshot.

‘It’s about Miles,’ I said.

‘What about him?’

‘He’s gone.’

‘What do you mean gone? Damn you, Alan – is this how you tell me my son is dead …’ Robin’s face was as pale as milk.

‘Not dead, as far as I know. Gone. Disappeared. He hasn’t been seen since he finished sentry duty at dusk last night.’

Robin looked at me. ‘He’s not among the dead and wounded – you are sure?’

‘I checked – twice. I think, Robin, I think he has gone over the walls.’

I let my words sink in. Robin let out a deep breath.

‘Don’t mention this to anyone,’ he said. ‘If you are asked, say he is with me. If it became known that he deserted … My God, d’Aubigny would hang him for sure. And I dare not think what King John would do if he were caught.’

‘I won’t tell a soul, I swear it.’

A little after dusk, I was inside the outer bailey’s south tower, on the middle floor with a mason and his two assistants. A huge crack ran diagonally up the wall, from the floor below to the floor above. At its widest point I could get my clenched fist inside the fissure easily.

‘Yes, sir, we can fill the crack with mortar – but it won’t get anywhere near dry overnight,’ the mason was saying. He was a dusty little man called Jackson. ‘And when they start again tomorrow, most of it will just slop straight out again. But I suppose it might make it a bit stronger, for a little while. But I would not put my trust in it.’

‘Could we set fires or braziers to speed the drying?’ I said.

‘Might work,’ he said, scratching his unshaven chin. ‘But lime mortar can take weeks, even months, to dry properly – and that’s in the
good warmth of high summer. Still, I don’t see that it could hurt to try …’

At that moment, Sir Thomas’s head poked round the door.

‘Sir Alan,’ he said, ‘I think you had better come and see this.’

I gave the mason his orders and followed Thomas out of the tower and along the south-western stretch of wall to a wooden hut that protected sentries from the worst of the weather. Inside, I found Miles with William d’Einford and Thomas de Melutan sitting on stools against the wall. They were devouring a whole roast chicken and a loaf of bread, tearing at the food with their bare hands.

‘Where the hell have you been?’ I said to the boy.

‘Foraging. In the town,’ he said, and gave me his cheekiest grin. ‘There’s plenty of food in the sack, Sir Alan, that is if you’re feeling at all peckish.’

I opened the sack and saw, all jumbled together, a dozen loaves of bread, another cooked chicken, a whole ham, some small round cheeses and about a score of green apples. My mouth flooded with water; my belly mewed like a begging cat.

‘Right, all this goes to d’Aubigny,’ I said, swallowing thickly. ‘He will distribute it as he sees fit.’ I plucked a half-eaten chicken leg out of Miles’s hand, tossing it into the sack.

‘You will come with me, now,’ I said to him, ‘your father is expecting you.’

I dragged a protesting Miles across the outer bailey, into the keep and up to the roof of the south tower.

‘Ah, there you are,’ said Robin icily, when presented with his errant son, who was half-smirking, half-cowering as if expecting a blow.

I left them together and lugged the sack of food back down the stairs, heading for d’Aubigny’s private apartments. I heard the terms ‘irresponsible … ill-disciplined … disobedient … and God-damned reckless’ floating down the spiral stair behind me, and then
the words ‘foraging … depriving the enemy of stores … legitimate tactic of war … and I was so hungry’ wafting on their heels.

It occurred to me then, as I hefted that life-giving sack down the stairway, that Miles’s exploit – sneaking both in and out of the castle and returning with an abundance of enemy food – was exactly the sort of madcap thing his father would have done at his age. Did Robin recognise it? Probably not. But I could not think too badly of Miles for his actions. He had been reckless but there was no denying the boldness, imagination and skill with which he had achieved his ends.

Truly, the acorn does not fall far from the tree.

I was tempted by that sack, I will admit. I was as hungry as anyone and I had a week’s worth of food in my hands. Divided between the garrison it would mean less than a mouthful each. By God, I was sorely tempted. It crossed my mind that nobody would ever know if I finished off Miles’s chicken leg before I handed the rest of the sack over to d’Aubigny. Perhaps it was even my due as captain of the walls? Perhaps I deserved it for all my efforts. But I resisted temptation. With difficulty. And, ultimately, I was glad I did.

I gave the heavy sack to the constable of the castle and he greeted the gift with wonder. ‘I won’t ask where you got this, Sir Alan, for I suspect that I would not like the answer at all. My order stands that there must be no sorties, no sallies, no excursions outside the walls by any man. But thank you,’ said d’Aubigny. ‘It will make a welcome change from horse-meat slop for the wounded.’

I did not trust myself to speak, I merely nodded, mourning the half-eaten chicken leg, and turned to go.

At that moment, I felt a stony thump under my boot soles, heard a sound like the tearing of a mountain and a great rumbling crash. I spun away from d’Aubigny and peered out of the window of his chamber. But all I could see was a huge cloud of yellow-grey dust where
the outer bailey’s south tower had once been. I rushed for the doorway.

‘Sir Alan,’ my commander said, as I reached the door. I turned in time to see a small round object coming at me at some speed. I grabbed it out of the air a few inches from my face. It was an apple, large, crisp, green and bursting with sweet-tart juice. I took a bite. I swear that right then it tasted more delicious than anything I had ever eaten.

‘To keep your strength up,’ said d’Aubigny. ‘You’re going to need it today.’

Back on the walls of the outer bailey, I ran along the parapet into the slowly clearing dust cloud shouting: ‘To arms, to arms!’ but I saw that it was hardly necessary. Sir George Farnham had the men rallied and they were converging on the breach where the tower had stood.

And not a moment too soon. Even before the fog of masonry grit cleared, I could see the enemy advancing on the breach from several directions – for the trebuchets had smashed a hole twenty paces wide in the wall of the outer bailey, and in the place of the south tower was now a saddle of rubble a mere ten foot above the surface of the outer bailey. The tumbling of the wall had created a rough natural stair of rubble astride the fortification. An active man could easily scramble from one side to the other, from the dry moat to the interior of the castle in about the time it takes for a man to say a
Pater Noster
. If he was allowed to pass without a fight, that is.

On the eastern side of the saddle, looking west along the wall, I could just make out Thomas Blood and a band of twenty or so men-at-arms, covered from head to toe in a fine powder and scrambling into the breach.

Sir Thomas and I both stepped gingerly on to the inward rubble slope at the same time, the loose stones shifting dangerously under our feet. We met in the middle, at the highest point of the breach, and looked
south over the dry moat, now half-filled with broken rock, and beyond it, past an open space of mud and scrub, through a gate in the town wall and down a broad street – along which marched a company of spearmen two hundred strong in yellow-and-black surcoats. They were a mere hundred and fifty paces away and coming on at a trot. To my right, beyond the trebuchets, I could see a crowd of horsemen with nodding plumes and tall lances, mustering with many an excited cry. And crossbowmen, dozens of those evil bastards, creeping towards us from the town gate in ones and twos, carrying their huge shields.

‘Everybody down,’ I shouted. ‘I want every man on his belly below the ridge.’

As I spoke a trebuchet ball smashed into the front slope of the breach, showering all of us with stinging chips of rock. I felt a trickle of warm blood from a nick on my chin, but ignored it. A splash of wet mortar covered my right knee – the mason had been right, despite our braziers and all-night fires, it was a long way from being set. ‘Get down everyone, behind this line, on the reverse slope.’

More men were joining us, running in from across the courtyard or along the parapet behind the unbroken outer bailey walls and crouching, kneeling or lying flat below what remained of the wall. I took up a position in the centre of the line, burrowing my way into the jagged stones between Sir Thomas and Miles – who was grinning like a happy monkey – with a good sixty men, most of them knights, iron-mailed, steel-helmed, with long swords drawn, all packed in around and below me like the silver catch on a fishmonger’s tray.

I heard the first whizz of crossbow bolts and the harsh crack as they caromed off the stones. ‘Heads down, gentlemen,’ I said. ‘Heads down till I give the word; heads down till they reach the top of the breach; then up with me and start killing the bastards as quick as you can. We will show them who we are, this day; we will show
them our mettle and make our names immortal. Today, men, we fight for England – we fight for liberty, for the charter and for an end to tyranny. Today … we fight!’

I have never had the gift for rousing speeches on the eve of combat – Robin managed it with ease and flair – but I did my best and my words were greeted by a suitably warlike growl from the knights around me and that warmed my soul.

Sir George Farnham, off to my left, shouted: ‘For England, for liberty!’

We might be lying flat on our bellies like dogs, we might be only a few men, but I knew that most of my little command were supremely trained in war, men of proven strength, skill and courage, and I knew too that those who had not fought before had been preparing for this moment since they were seven years old. They were English knights. The best in the land. And this was the bloody work they were trained to do. I was not without fear, no sane man is before battle. But I knew we could hold the breach until the sky fell and we would send all these savage Flemish dogs to hell.

I twisted my neck around and squinted up, behind me, looking to the south tower of the keep, the intact elder sister of the one that had been destroyed. I waved and I saw with a wash of joy a thin, fair figure, high above, holding a bow horizontally in the air above his head, pumping it up and down in response to my waving arm.

For we were not facing this onslaught alone.

The
arrow volley struck the first ranks of the Flemish spearmen like a shower of lethal hail. I was peering over the lip of the breach and I saw almost the entire first line of mercenaries, more than a score of men, knocked apart like skittles in a tavern alley when the wooden ball strikes true. Men dropped outright or staggered backwards, spurting blood, the blow landing just as they were beginning to make their climb up the rubble slope towards us. The roaring of their war cries was muted and replaced by the desperate screams of stricken men. And while the second rank were still trying to get past the dead and dying, stepping over the prone bodies and on to the loose scree of rock and broken stone, the second volley from Robin’s men high above up in the south tower of the keep swept into their ranks with devastating force.

Robin’s two dozen bowmen loosed volley after volley and the slaughter they did was truly dreadful, but not every arrow found its mark and not every man was felled by the merciless barrage. A few hardy souls, a couple of dozen brave men, were struggling up the slope to meet us, some stuck with several shafts, others miraculously unwounded. They shouted threats and curses and called upon
the saints to aid them, and they charged upwards, spears levelled.

‘Up, men, and to your work!’ I shouted, leaping to my feet. Behind me a wall of English iron and steel rose up to meet the men of Flanders, the long swords flashing like terrible lightning in the grey November air.

One fellow, fair-haired under a cheap steel cap, rushed at me, his feet slipping and sliding on the loose rock. He drove his spear hard at my chest but I turned to the left, deflected the point with my shield and hacked down with my sword into the base of his neck, cutting easily through his quilted gambeson. He fell away but another was behind him and as his spear lunged for my face I had to duck hastily. I felt the spear-tip score a furrow in my helm and my sword flicked out purely by instinct to puncture his unguarded groin. He screamed like a pig at slaughter as I felt the sword-tip grating against bone, and a great pulsing jet of gore shot from his upper thigh straight into my face. Momentarily blinded, I just had the mother wit to raise my shield before a heavy axe blow crashed against my protected forearm. Miles, at my left, barged past and I heard him shout, ‘Die, you big Dutch bugger!’ and deal a pair of savage blows to a vast shape in front of me, knocking the man down and away.