Agincourt - Cornwell Bernard - Страница 50

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The French were retreating fast now, but they had done what they had set out to do, which was to damage the siege-works. Three of the cannon, including the King’s Daughter, would never fire again, and all along the trenches parapets had been thrown down and men killed. And now, from the broken ramparts, the defenders jeered at the English as the returning raiding party negotiated the deep ditch in front of the broken barbican. Arrows still followed the French and some men were struck and slid into the ditch’s bottom, but the sally had been a success. The English works burned and the garrison’s insults stung.

“Bastards,” Sir John was saying repeatedly. “They caught us sleeping, the bastards!”

“The Savage isn’t touched,” Hook reported stoically, “but they broke the Redeemer.”

“We’ll break them, the goddam bastards!” Sir John said.

“And none of us was hurt,” Hook added.

“We’ll hurt them, by Christ,” Sir John vowed. His face was twisted by anger. The siege was already bogged down, but now the enemy had delivered another hard blow to the English hopes. Sir John shuddered as an enemy man-at-arms, taken prisoner, was ushered down the trench. For a heartbeat it looked as though Sir John would unleash his fury on the hapless man, but then he saw Melisande and released his frustration on her instead. “What in the name of suffering Christ is she doing here?” he demanded of Hook. “Jesus Christ on the cross, are you turd-witted? Can’t be without your woman for a goddamned minute?”

“It was not Nick!” Melisande called defiantly. She was holding the crossbow, though she had not shot with it. “It was not Nick,” she said again, “and he did tell me to go away.”

Sir John’s courtesy toward women overcame his anger. He grunted what might have been an apology, and then Melisande was explaining herself, talking in fast French, gesturing toward the camp, and as she spoke Sir John’s face showed a renewed anger. He turned on Hook. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

“Tell you what, Sir John?”

“That a bastard priest has threatened her?”

“I fight my own battles,” Hook said sullenly.

“No!” Sir John thrust a gauntleted hand to strike Hook’s shoulder. “You fight my battles, Hook,” he punched Hook’s shoulder again, “that’s what I pay you for. But if you fight mine, then I fight yours, you understand? We are a company!” Sir John shouted the last four words so loudly that men fifty yards down the trench turned to watch him. “We are a company! No one threatens any one of us without threatening all of us! Your girl should be able to walk naked through the whole army and not a man will dare touch her because she belongs to us! She belongs to our company! By Christ I’ll kill the holy bastard for this! I’ll rip the spine out of his goddam throat and feed his shriveled prick to the dogs! No one threatens us, no one!”

Sir John, with his real enemies safely back behind their smoke-rimmed ramparts, was looking for a fight. And Hook had just given him one.

Hook watched as Melisande spooned honey into Father Christopher’s mouth. The priest was sitting, his back supported by a barrel that had come from England filled with smoked herrings. He was skeletally thin, his face was pale and tired and he was plainly as weak as a fledgling, but he was alive.

“Cobbett’s dead,” Hook said, “and Robert Fletcher.”

“Poor Robert,” Father Christopher said, “how’s his brother?”

“Still alive,” Hook said, “but he’s sick.”

“Who else?”

“Pearson’s dead, Hull is, Borrow and John Taylor.”

“God have mercy on them all,” the priest said and made the sign of the cross. “The men-at-arms?”

“John Gaffney, Peter Dance, Sir Thomas Peters,” Hook said, “all dead.”

“God has turned His face from us,” Father Christopher said bleakly. “Does your saint still speak to you?”

“Not now,” Hook admitted.

Father Christopher sighed. He closed his eyes momentarily. “We have sinned,” he said grimly.

“We were told God was on our side,” Hook said stubbornly.

“We believed that,” the priest said, “we surely believed that, and we came here with that assurance in our hearts, but the French will believe the same thing. And now God is revealing Himself. We should not have come here.”

“You should not,” Melisande said firmly.

“Harfleur will fall,” Hook insisted.

“It probably will,” Father Christopher allowed, then paused as Melisande wiped a trickle of honey from his chin. “If the French don’t march to its relief? Yes, it will fall eventually, but what then? How much of the army is left?”

“Enough,” Hook said.

Father Christopher offered a tired smile. “Enough to do what? To march on Rouen and make another siege? To capture Paris? We’ll scarce be able to defend ourselves if the French do come here! So what will we do? We’ll go into Harfleur and remake its walls, and then sail home. We’ve failed, Hook. We’ve failed.”

Hook sat in silence. One of the remaining English cannons fired, the sound flat and lingering in the warm air. Somewhere in the camp a man sang. “We can’t just go home,” he said after a while.

“We can,” Father Christopher said, “and we most certainly will. All this money for nothing! For Harfleur, maybe. And what will it cost to rebuild those walls?” He shrugged.

“Maybe we should abandon the siege,” Hook suggested morosely.

The priest shook his head. “Henry will never do that. He has to win! That way he proves God’s favor, and besides, abandoning the siege makes him look weak.” He was silent for a while, then frowned. “His father took the throne by force, and Henry fears others might do the same if he shows weakness.”

“Eat, don’t talk,” Melisande said briskly.

“I’ve eaten enough, my dear,” Father Christopher said.

“You should eat more.”

“I will. This evening. Merci.”

“God’s sparing you, father,” Hook said.

“Perhaps He doesn’t want me in heaven?” Father Christopher suggested with a wan smile, “or perhaps He is giving me time to become a better priest.”

“You are a good priest,” Hook said warmly.

“I shall tell Saint Peter that when he asks if I deserve to be in heaven. Ask Nick Hook, I shall say. And Saint Peter will ask me, who is Nick Hook? Oh, I shall say, he’s a thief, a rogue, and probably a murderer, but ask him anyway.”

Hook grinned. “I’m honest now, father.”

“Thou art not far from the kingdom of heaven, young Hook, but let us hope it’s many a long day before we meet there. And at least we’ll be spared Sir Martin’s company.”

Melisande sneered. “He is a coward. Un poltron!”

“Most men are cowards when they meet Sir John,” Father Christopher said mildly.

“He had nothing to say!” Melisande said.

Sir John had gone to the shelters where Lord Slayton’s men were camped. He had taken Hook and Melisande with him, and he had bellowed that any man who wished to kill Hook could do so right there and then. “Come and take his woman,” Sir John had shouted. “Who wants her?”

Lord Slayton’s archers, his men-at-arms, and his camp followers had been cleaning armor, preparing food, or just resting, but all had turned to watch the show. They watched in silence.

“Come and take her!” Sir John shouted. “She’s yours! You can take turns like dogs rutting a bitch! Come on! She’s a pretty thing! You want to hump her? She’s yours!” He waited, but not one of Lord Slayton’s men moved. Then Sir John had pointed at Hook. “You can all have her! But first you have to kill my ventenar!”

Still no one moved. No one even met Sir John’s eyes.

“Which man is being paid to kill you?” Sir John had asked Hook.

“That one,” Hook said, pointing at Tom Perrill.

“Then come here,” Sir John had invited Perrill, “come and kill him. I’ll give you his woman if you do.” Perrill had not moved. He was half hiding behind William Snoball who, as Lord Slayton’s steward, had some small authority, but Snoball dared not confront Sir John Cornewaille. “There is just one thing,” Sir John had added, “which is that you have to kill both Hook and me before you get the woman. So come on! Fight me first!” He had drawn his sword and waited.

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