Looking at the grey arched shape of the window in the blackness, I imagined that I could make out the faint outline on the sill of the thick rope that we had tied there when we first arrived in this room. It was our escape route; the knotted rope hung out of the window and dangled forty foot down to the stone flags of a small courtyard below, where our two horses were tied to an iron ring fixed to the wall. I was nervous; this was not battle, this was a murder we were planning; a cold-blooded execution. Our intended victim? Sir Richard Malbete, of course: a man who richly deserved to die, but Yet… Yet, in all honesty, I would have preferred to face him in open battle, rather than cutting him down like a thief in the dark.
Having said all that, having made my excuses, the plan was mine. And the key to it was my servant William. I had hesitated before involving him in a foul deed like this, unsure of whether he would be willing to help me commit murder and, worse, be willing to risk the wrath of Malbete — not to mention the King’s fury — if we failed. But when I told him that it was the Beast who had shot me with the crossbow in Cyprus, he was more than eager to help me take my revenge — he actually begged to be a part of it.
The plan rested on the King’s new fondness for Malbete, and Malbete’s desire to gain favour with his sovereign, and I had devised it when I came across a pile of the gorgeous tabards worn by the royal pages, which were awaiting a wash in the great steam-filled courtyard, draped with dripping sheets, where the serving maids did the royal laundry. I had been to visit Elise in the serving women’s quarters, because I had one very important question to ask her concerning Robin’s would-be murderer, and having had a satisfactory reply, I just happened to be passing the laundry when the mound of gorgeous red and gold cloth caught my eye. The plan came to me, fully formed, in a flash of inspiration, and after a quick check to see that nobody was watching, I stuffed a tabard inside my tunic — once a thief, always a thief, I muttered to myself — and sauntered away, buzzing with the excitement of a dangerous venture begun.
I had secured Reuben’s enthusiastic participation on the night of the secret dinner with the sailor Aziz, and two days later, William, dressed in a gorgeous red tabard embroidered with the lions of England, ventured into the Beast’s lair.
Sir Richard Malbete had occupied a small, richly furnished two-story house in the southern side of Acre, near the smaller harbour. It was a house of ill-repute, a brothel. He occupied it with a dozen or so of his men-at-arms, many bearing the marks of battle. They had been at the forefront of the attacks on Acre and had suffered many casualties in the terrible fighting before the city surrendered. They were lounging around the house’s central courtyard, drinking wine, fondling the women, a gaggle of sloe-eyed beauties, William told me later, when my servant dressed as a royal messenger walked unannounced into their presence. The men-at-arms sat up, straightened their dress, dismissed the women and Sir Richard Malbete was summoned from inside. William said that, despite the hazardous nature of his mission, he had to master an overwhelming urge to laugh when he gave Malbete the message, which purported to come from the King. The message was simple: that the King desired to meet Malbete in this room where Reuben and I now waited after Vespers that same evening. It was a meeting of a discreet nature, said William solemnly, and would Sir Richard be so good as to come alone. Malbete had agreed, and William had left unmolested, and now Reuben and I waited in the dark.
I heard footsteps outside the door, a man’s confident tread, and then a soft knock at the door and a voice saying. ‘Sire?’ The door opened and light from a pine torch spilled into the dark room. There was a tall figure in a scarlet and sky blue surcoat, looming in the doorway, his face in shadow, and I leapt forward and clamped my arms around his middle, trapping the man’s elbows against his body. He dropped the torch in his surprise and, my face buried in his chest, I twisted him out of the lit doorway and round into the darkness of the room. Reuben slammed the door shut. The man gave a short cry of terror and then Reuben was reaching over my back; his knife flashed once and stabbed into the side of the man’s neck, seeking the big pulsing vein there; the victim’s body jerked violently as the questing blade cut deeply into the soft skin, and a spray of blood drenched the top of my head and told me that Reuben had found his mark. I kicked the man’s legs from under him and released my arms, and he crashed to his knees, bubbling a cry of alarm and clutching his spurting neck. I drew my own poniard, intending to stab the bastard a dozen times, to make sure he was truly dead…
Then the door burst open with a shattering crash, and bright light flooded the room. There were armed men spilling into the chamber all in scarlet and blue and I recognised the mocking, red-scarred face of Malbete at the back of the swarm of intruders. Someone swung a sword at me and I stopped the blow with the hilt of my poniard, twisted the blade free and buried it in his belly. He fell and I pulled the dagger out of his entangling guts and stepped back to give myself space.
‘Go, Alan, go,’ shouted Reuben, ‘the window.’ A second man lunged at him with a spear and he knocked the shaft aside with his long knife and neatly slid the blade deep on and into the man’s armpit, leaving him screaming with pain. Then my friend drew his scimitar, the fine metal coming out of the sheath with a whispering sigh, and he slashed once at another man-at-arms and sliced his face to the bone. I was about to draw my sword, but Reuben shouted again: ‘Go, Alan, go!’ and I hesitated no longer but sheathed my bloody poniard and leapt for the window. I heard a clash of steel behind me, and a shout, and I hurled myself out of the arch, only just catching the rope as I half-fell over the lintel, before climbing down the knots as swiftly as I could. I heard more screams and shouts above me, and again the fast clash of blades, and as I reached the bottom I looked up and saw with relief the thin form of Reuben, ten foot above me on the rope, climbing like a monkey. I saw a head poked out of the window, a dark silhouette, and saw a flash of steel at the ledge. Reuben was nearly with me, he had only ten feet more to climb, when suddenly, sickeningly, he fell; dropping like a hanged man to land with a crack of bone and a hideous scream on the stone-flagged floor of the courtyard. The rope, freshly cut, fell about his body. I had not been idle: I had untethered the horses and with many curses and a good deal of heaving, I managed to get Reuben on to the back of his mount. His left leg was snapped through the shin bone, the bone poking through the skin of his thin leg, and he was moaning, half-delirious in pain, but I got myself on to the back of Ghost and was about to lead Reuben’s mount away from that ill-fated place, when I heard a familiar, much-hated voice calling softly from the window above. And stopped dead, in spite of myself.
‘O singing boy!’ crooned the voice. ‘O singing boy; did you think I did not expect you to try this?’ said Sir Richard Malbete. ‘Do you take me for a fool?’
I said nothing, but my heart was burning with rage at my own stupidity. Of course, he must have expected this. And I had involved my friends in this disaster.
‘Are you there, singing boy?’ Malbete called again, and I had to bite back a foul retort. ‘It seems you have cut up another one of my people, singing boy. I think perhaps I shall now cut up one of yours.’ He laughed a low, dark, bubbling chuckle. I had heard enough, and I dug my heels into Ghost and led Reuben’s slumped and moaning form away from the evil sound of laughter in the dark.