‘What the hell did you think you were playing at?’ said my master, his silver eyes glinting like a pair of barber’s blades. It was later that same night and we were in the Hospitaller’s quarter, where a cowled bone-setter was efficiently splinting Reuben’s broken leg. Outwardly, the Earl of Locksley appeared icily calm, but I knew that he was incandescently angry. ‘You nearly got yourself killed, and, more importantly, you nearly got Reuben killed, and I’m told you even involved your servant William in your childishly stupid scheme.’
‘All you care about is saving Reuben for your grubby money-making plots,’ I flashed back at him. ‘Killing Malbete is important! It is a matter of personal honour for me. Not that you’d understand that, you
… you merchant!’
To my surprise, he merely laughed; a dry hollow chuckle, admittedly, and not a pleasant sound; but it was the sound of human mirth. ‘You were a snot-nosed little thief when I found you, a cut-purse of no family, no money, no lineage, and now you — hah! — you are lecturing me about honour, and calling me a merchant!’ He snorted. ‘You ridiculous, unworldly little puppy; go on — get out of my sight.’ And I found myself walking away from him; and fighting back a great black wave of self-pity. He was right: I was a snot-nose thief, a cut-purse of no family and no lineage — but I did know about honour.
Reuben’s leg was a clean fracture, and though very painful he was well tended in the Hospitallers’ dormitory, where I went to see him and to apologise. ‘Do not concern yourself with it, Alan. We tried to take him; we failed. There will be other opportunities,’ said my Jewish friend — and I felt better about the whole sorry affair. Robin had not spoken to me since our argument, and I knew I was in disgrace, because even Little John was distant with me and found some excuse to cancel our shield practice the next morning. As a result I spent much of the next few days making love to Nur in the little house she shared with Elise in the women’s quarters, and in the light of what was to happen, I was very glad. I can still remember her perfect face — dark eyes you could drown in, her exquisite little nose, the high cheekbones, her luscious berry lips that begged to be kissed… I remember her face so clearly, even now after more than forty years. She was so fragile, so beautiful — it sometimes makes me weep to remember her. I remember her words to me that night, too, when I told her about my spat with Robin: ‘I know that you always try do the right thing, Alan, always. It is one of the reasons why I love you so very much.’
A week or so later, in the searing heat near the middle of August, I was summoned again to see Robin, by William, who found me practicing with sword and shield, alone, in the courtyard of the Hospitallers’ quarter. He was accompanied by Keelie, now a glossy, confident fully-grown lion-yellow dog, who bounded over to greet me and lick my face. King Philip had left Acre at the end of July, taking a some of his knights with him, but others had remained and were prepared to fight on under King Richard’s banner. There was an air of quiet purpose in our army, a sense that we were very soon going to march; and I was determined to prove myself on the field of battle against the Saracens. So despite the crippling heat, and the sweat that drenched me, I practiced my sword and shield patterns every day. There was one fly in the soup: Saladin still had not paid the huge ransom on the three thousand Muslim captives, nor had he returned the True Cross to us — and many said that he had no intention of relinquishing such a wondrous object to his enemies. I secretly thought that the King would have to release the Saracen prisoners before we marched on; we could not possible guard and feed such a multitude on the road to Jerusalem. It would be a blow to his prestige — but what else could he do?
‘The Earl wa-wants you,’ said William, hauling a slobbering Keelie off me and offering a shy smile of greeting. I had hardly seen him since our disastrous attempt on Malbete’s life and even in that short amount of time he seemed to have grown a couple of inches; his face seemed to have changed, too, become less round, the cheekbones more prominent: he must be twelve or thirteen now, I guessed, and it was clear that he was becoming a man. ‘Something bi-big is going on at headquarters,’ he said, ‘everybody is bu-bustling about looking pe-pepleased with themselves: people sharpening weapons, packing ba-ba-bags. I think we might all be on the momove.’
I doubted it; there would have been plenty of rumours if the whole army were to depart Acre. The moon had been waxing in the past few days and, by my amateur calculation, would be full tomorrow night. It was more likely that whatever Robin had arranged with Aziz the sailor would be happening tomorrow.
Robin was curt when I presented myself to him, not a little nervously, that afternoon in the main ground-floor room of his palace by the sea. He was richly dressed in a long silk gown, seated at a table, going through a stack of parchments, checking accounts of some sort. Although I now regretted my outburst of the week before, he looked, in truth, exactly like a merchant. He wasted no time in pleasantries: ‘Are you fit?’ he said. I told him I was. He merely grunted and carried on writing. ‘When you entered my service, two, two and a half years ago,’ he said, slightly formally, ‘you swore that you would be loyal to me until death; do you stand by that oath?’
‘I hope I am not an oath-breaker, — ’I said, a little too haughtily.
He finally looked up from his pages and stared at me, his eyes as cold as naked steel in winter. ‘You might not be an oath-breaker, but you are insolent. What I want to know is: are you obedient?’
It hurt me to be at odds with my master: despite his many faults, he was still a man I respected and liked enormously. In a slightly more conciliatory tone, I said: ‘I serve you, sir, with all my heart, and in doing my duty, I strive always to be as loyal and obedient as I can.’
He finally smiled: ‘Good,’ he said. ‘I need you, Alan, to come with me tomorrow on a… on a training exercise. Speak to no one of this, but tomorrow we will be riding out. Be ready, mounted and armed, here at dawn. Oh, and don’t wear anything with my badge or blazon on it. You might say that we are to be travelling incognito.’ And with another brief smile, he looked back down at his papers; I was dismissed.
When I returned to the palace just before dawn the next day — mounted on Ghost, armed with sword and poniard and carrying my old-fashioned shield, with the snarling wolf device painted over with limewash — I was surprised to see Reuben, his leg a massive bundle of splints and bandages, mounted on a horse. He looked pale and had a slightly bemused look on his face, but he greeted me cordially, and I returned his affectionate words with gratitude. ‘What’s going on, Reuben,’ I asked. ‘In the first place, what are you doing on a horse, in your condition? You should be in bed.’
‘Best to leave the questions till later,’ advised my dark friend in a slightly slurred voice. ‘Let us just say that it is necessary that I accompany you. Do not be concerned for my discomfort — I have taken a strong draft of hashish dissolved in poppy juice — and the pain is hardly noticeable. In fact, I feel… I feel wonderful.’ And he giggled a little.
He might be feeling wonderful. But I was not. I had slept badly and awoke feeling dizzy and sweaty, with a slight but persistent headache. But I pushed all thoughts of my bodily weakness aside as we rode out of the high gates of Acre and turned our horses south. We were forty men in our company, roughly half archers and half men-at-arms, and all of us mounted on well-fed and rested horses. As we rode over a makeshift bridge that spanned the trenches that our army had dug while we were besieging Acre, I noticed that almost everybody in the party had a very familiar face: nearly all of them were former outlaws, who had been with Robin for many years. We were an elite group, I presumed, chosen because each man knew and trusted his fellows and had shared hardship and battle with them. There was also a sense of excitement in our band that I had not felt since we left England. We were going to undertake a training exercise, Robin had said, but it felt as if we were riding through Sherwood Forest on some mad escapade that would put silver in our pouches and a blush of shame on the Sheriff’s face.