Agincourt - Cornwell Bernard (читать книги онлайн без сокращений .txt) 📗

“I chose to be with you,” Melisande said stubbornly.

“We’re going to die,” Hook said.

“No,” she protested, but without much conviction.

“You talked to Father Christopher,” Hook said remorselessly, “and he talked to the heralds. He reckons there are thirty thousand Frenchmen. We’ve got six thousand men.”

Melisande huddled closer to Hook, trying to find shelter under the cloak they shared. They had their backs to an oak tree, but it offered small protection against the rain. “Melisande was married to a king of Jerusalem,” she said. Hook said nothing, letting her say whatever it was she needed to say. “And the king died,” she went on, “and all the men said she must go to a convent and say prayers, but she didn’t! She made herself queen, and she was a great queen!”

“You’re my queen,” Hook said.

Melisande ignored the clumsy compliment. “And when I was in the convent? I had one friend. She was older, much older, Sister Beatrice, and she told me to go away. She told me I had to find my own life, and I didn’t think I could, but then you came. Now I shall do what Queen Melisande did. I shall do what I want.” She shivered. “I will stay with you.”

“I’m an archer,” Hook said bleakly, “just an archer.”

“No, you are a ventenar! Tomorrow, who knows, maybe a centenar? And one day you will have land. We will have land.”

“Tomorrow is Saint Crispinian’s Day,” Hook said, unable to imagine owning land.

“And he has not forgotten you! Tomorrow he will be with you,” Melisande said.

Hook hoped that was true. “Do one thing for me,” he said, “wear your father’s jupon.”

She hesitated, then he felt her nod. “I will,” she promised.

“Hook!” Thomas Evelgold’s voice barked from the darkness. “Time to take your boys forward!” Tom Evelgold paused, waiting for a response, and Melisande clutched Hook. “Hook!” Evelgold shouted again.

“I’m coming!”

“I’ll see you again,” Melisande said, “before…” her voice trailed away.

“You’ll see me again,” Hook said, and he kissed her fiercely before relinquishing the cloak to her. “I’m coming!” he shouted to Tom Evelgold again.

None of his archers had been sleeping because none could sleep in the drenching rain beneath the thunder. They grumbled as they followed Hook up the gentle slope to the great stretch of black plowland where, for a long while, they blundered around searching for the picquet they were to relieve. Hook finally discovered Walter Magot and his men a hundred paces ahead of where the sharpened stakes were still positioned. “Tell me you left me a big fire and a pot of broth,” Magot greeted him.

“Thick broth, Walter, barley, beef and parsnips. Couple of turnips in it as well.”

“You’ll hear the French,” Magot said. “They’re walking their horses. If they get too close you sing out and they go away.”

Hook peered northward. The fires in the French camp were bright despite the rain, their flames reflected in rain-driven flickers from the water standing in the furrows and the same distant firelight outlined men leading horses in the field. “They want the horses warm for the morning,” Hook said.

“Bastards want to charge us, don’t they?” Magot said. “Come morning, all those big men on big goddam horses.”

“So pray it stops raining,” Hook said.

“Christ, pray it does,” Magot said fervently. In rain like this the bowstrings would get wet and feeble, stealing power from the arrows. “Stay warm, Nick,” Magot said, then led his men away to the dubious comforts of the encampment.

Hook crouched under the lash of wind and rain. Lightning staggered across the sky to stab down in the valley beyond the vast French camp and in its sudden light he had a vision of tents and banners. So many tents, so many banners, so many men come to the killing place. A horse whinnied. Scores of horses were being walked in the plowland and Hook, when they came close, could hear their big hooves sucking in the wet soil. A couple of men came too close and both times he called out and the French servants veered away. The rain slackened from time to time, lifting its veil of noise so Hook could clearly hear the sound of laughter and singing from the enemy camp. The English camp was silent. Hook doubted many men on either side would be sleeping. It was not just the weather that would keep them awake, but the knowledge that in the morning they must fight. Armorers would be sharpening weapons and Hook felt a shiver in his heart as he thought of what the dawn must bring. “Be with us,” he prayed to Saint Crispinian, then he remembered the advice of the priest in Soissons Cathedral, that heaven paid closer attention to those prayers that asked for blessings on others, and so he prayed for Melisande and for Father Christopher, that they would live through the next day’s turmoil.

Lightning staggered across the clouds, stark and white, and the thunder cracked overhead and the rain settled into a new and venomous intensity, falling so thick that the lights of the French camp faded. “Who goes there?” Tom Scarlet suddenly shouted.

“Friend!” a man called back.

Another flicker of lightning revealed a man-at-arms approaching from the English encampment. He was wearing a mail coat and plate leggings and the sudden lightning lasted long enough for Hook to see the man had no surcoat and, instead of a helmet, wore a wide-brimmed leather hat. “Who are you?” Hook demanded.

“Swan,” the man said, “John Swan. Whose men are you?”

“Sir John Cornewaille’s,” Hook answered.

“If every man in the army was like Sir John,” Swan said, “then the French would be wise to run away!” He almost had to shout to make himself heard above the rain’s malevolence. None of the archers responded. “Are your bows strung?” Swan asked.

“In this weather, sir? No!” Hook answered.

“What if it rains like this in the morning?”

Hook shrugged. “We’ll shorten strings, sir, and shoot away, but the cords will stretch.”

“And eventually they’ll break,” Will of the Dale added.

“They unravel,” Tom Scarlet said in explanation.

“So what will happen in the morning?” Swan asked. He had crouched near the archers who were clearly uncomfortable in the presence of this stranger.

“You tell us, sir,” Hook said.

“I want to know what you think,” Swan said forcibly. There was an embarrassed silence because none of the archers wanted to share his fears. A gust of laughter and cheering sounded from the French camp. “In the morning,” Swan said, “many of the French will be drunk. We’ll be sober.”

“Aye, only because we’ve got no ale,” Tom Scarlet said.

“So what do you think will happen?” Swan insisted.

There was another silence. “Drunken goddam bastards will attack us,” Hook finally said.

“And then?”

“Then we kill the goddam drunken bastards,” Tom Scarlet said.

“And so win the battle?” Swan asked.

Again no one answered. Hook wondered why Swan had sought them out to have this forced conversation. Eventually, as none of his men spoke, Hook did. “That’s up to God, sir,” he said awkwardly.

“God is on our side,” Swan said very forcefully.

“We do hope that, sir,” Tom Scarlet said dubiously.

“Amen,” Will of the Dale put in.

“God is on our side,” Swan said even more forcefully, “because our king’s cause is just. If the gates of hell were opened in tomorrow’s dawn and Satan’s legions come to attack us, we shall still win. God is with us.”

And Hook remembered that far-off sunlit day in Southampton Water when the two swans had beaten past the waiting fleet and he remembered, too, that the swan was one of the badges of Henry, King of England.

“You believe that?” Swan asked, “that our king’s cause is just?”

None of the other archers answered, but Hook recognized the voice now. “I don’t know if the king’s cause is just,” he said harshly.

There was a silence for a few heartbeats and Hook sensed the man who called himself Swan stiffen with indignation. “Why should it not be?” Swan asked, his voice dangerously cold.