‘Oh, normally I’d instantly decide to be stupid,’ said Robin. ‘But first I want to know who you’re after.’
‘Your brother, Edmund Carey. He stole property which is mine and he…’
‘Edmund Carey? That’s not him. That’s Edward Morgan. Didn’t you check the book?’
‘I know your mother’s maiden name as well as you do, Carey, if that’s what she was and…’
‘You know, if you insult my mother I’ll simply have to kill you, which I could do, right now, if I wanted to. And then it would all be very inconvenient, I’d hang for it if I lived, which might upset my father, but you would be dead and facing God Almighty and all the poor souls you’ve destroyed with torture and ill-treatment. And then you would go to hell for the rest of eternity. So don’t you think you ought to try to be polite, hm?’
‘The sick man that you are standing in front of is Edmund Carey and I want him,’ said Heneage impatiently. ‘I’m going to take him, so get out of my way. I won’t tell you twice.’
‘You’re going to take him, are you? Who? You personally? I don’t think so. You haven’t the stomach and you haven’t the strength for it. So who’s going to do it?’ Again Julie could hear the smile in his voice as he moved his head to look lazily round at the men-at-arms crowding the stinking cellar and making it even more airless. ‘Are you?’ he asked the nearest one. ‘Or you? Or you, over there? Or the two of you? I think that’s all you could get in on me at once, given the way this cellar’s built. Such inconvenient pillars, aren’t they? Whyever did they build it like that? So you see, it isn’t really very easy for your men, Heneage. They’ve got clubs and knives and I’ve got a sword and I’m sure they’ll knock me down eventually, but in the process I should be able to kill at least one, maybe even two of them. Maybe I’ll maim a few more of them, you never know. This is a broadsword: it’s not perfect for close-quarters work but it’s quite sharp and it has two edges as well as a point and I’m in excellent practice with it.’
He looked round again, balancing on his toes and looking quite relaxed. ‘So who’s it to be? Which of your men love you, Heneage, which ones would follow you into battle?’
You could feel the tension in the air and also the way uncertainty spread among the men around Heneage. They were looking at each other, assessing Robin’s stance, deciding whether he was telling the truth, wondering why he was talking so much. Julie knew. He was acting, playing for time. Edmund’s bony fingers were gripping hers tight enough to hurt.
‘Maybe we could just fight it out, Heneage, eh?’ Robin was moving now, waving his sword in elaborate arcs and making it flash hypnotically in the sunlight filtering down through the window, shifting his feet like a tennis player. ‘You and me, sword to sword, or knife to knife. That would be fun, very chivalric, very old-fashioned. Or use guns. I can see you’re not a fighting man, more of a desk man really, aren’t you? Standing back while other men do your dirty work, get themselves killed in your service? But you could probably fire a gun, couldn’t you, something light like a dag, only weighs a couple of pounds, you could do that. Maybe you could even aim it straight? I’m not as good a shot as I should be, you’d have a chance.’
Heneage’s mouth tightened. ‘Don’t be ridiculous. In the name of the Queen I order…’
‘Don’t drag my cousin into this,’ said Carey pointedly and Julie had to hide a smile because of the expression on some of the men at arms’ faces.
‘Webster, Oat, arrest that man.’
Two of the men at arms moved forward uncertainly. Heneage seemed to expand with rage like a pigeon’s neck. ‘And you, Potter, get him out of there.’
The men-at-arms were advancing in a circle on Carey who had stopped his little dance and taken up a fighting crouch, the open en garde with sword and poignard recommended for more than one opponent. He was grinning at them, showing his teeth like a fox at bay.
‘I’ll give twenty-five shillings to the man who subdues him,’ said Heneage. Carey laughed.
‘Christ, Heneage, you’re cheap. The Borderers are offering ten pounds sterling for my head.’
That was when everything got confused. Julie noticed that the men-at-arms at the back of Bolton’s Ward were distracted, they were looking over their shoulders. Heneage was listening to one who was whispering in his ear, there was the sound of boots on the stairs, shouts. Meanwhile the men at the front hadn’t realised anything was happening, they were focused on Carey and nerving themselves. Suddenly they made their rush, two of them from either side with their clubs high. One swung down, one swung sideways, Carey blocked the higher one with his blade, leaped sideways to avoid the worst of the sideswipe, used his poignard to stab for the man’s face when his sword got stuck in the cudgel’s wood and the man fell backwards away from Carey’s stab while the other two tried to hit him as he tried to shake the cudgel off his sword. Julie flung herself forwards trying to catch the boots of one of them as Carey took a blow on the shoulder and faltered; she caught them and got a kick in the face though she brought the man down.
There was another man-at-arms in the fight; Carey had dropped his sword, dodged a club, kicked someone in the kneecap and then somebody had caught his arm, he was hit again, shrewdly with the thrusting end of a cudgel in the belly and he doubled over. One man at arms lifted his club high to bring it down on Carey’s head and finish the fight. It bounced off the sturdy haft of a halberd thrust out by a broad elderly man in black velvet and brocade. There was a sweep of tawny satin and flame-red velvet gown as the elderly man whirled, punched the man-at-arms and knocked him down.
Carey was upright again but obviously couldn’t see properly, hadn’t realised he could stop fighting now, he was lungeing towards the newcomer with his poignard. Julie put her hand to her mouth, but the old gentleman stood his ground with the halberd held in defence across his body and roared, ‘ROBIN.’
It was almost comical to see Carey stop almost in mid-air, skidding on the slimy floor, fighting for balance. One of the new men at arms in a blazing livery of black and yellow put out a hand and stopped him from falling over.
‘F…Father,’ he wheezed as his sight cleared, looking round him at his father’s men, some of whom were grinning. ‘Where the…hell have you been?’ He sheathed his poignard carefully at the back of his belt, and leaned against the wall, tenderly cradled his midriff, easing his shoulder and wincing, shaking his head to clear it.
Lord Hunsdon looked at his son for a moment, obviously assessing him for serious damage, and then he turned to Heneage who had suddenly seemed to shrink in size and had drawn back. The place was so full of men now, it was hard to move, every one of Heneage’s men countered with one of Hunsdon’s.
Hunsdon stared coldly at Heneage for several seconds. ‘Mr Vice Chamberlain, I’ll deal with you later,’ he said. ‘Where’s Ned?’
Carey gestured wordlessly, still working on catching his breath. Julie picked herself up from where she had been nursing her painfully bruised cheek, curtseyed as low as she safely could to Lord Hunsdon.
‘He’s here, my lord,’ she said. ‘Be careful, don’t go near him if you’ve never had gaol-fever. He’s been terribly ill with…’
Quite gently Hunsdon put her aside, went over to his son and embraced him. Only Julie heard what he said which was, ‘There now, poor boy, you bloody idiot, there now.’
The next moment Hunsdon had turned round and was giving a dizzying series of orders which cleared Bolton’s Ward as if by magic, Heneage standing blank-faced in a corner under guard, his men at arms told they’d get in no trouble if they went and stood quietly in a corner of the gaol courtyard, some of Hunsdon’s men sent running to find and hire a litter, no bloody new-fangled carriages mind, they could ignore the useless contraption standing in Fleet Lane.
Hunsdon went over and clasped his youngest son to him as well. Carey was recovering quickly now, bright eyed and rather pleased with himself until something occurred to him and his face clouded.