We followed a trail just north of the Vistula River, heading west. Anna was walking surefootedly on a track I could hardly see. She didn't shy at strange noises or blowing leaves. A fine animal. The plan was to follow the path until the river turned south and pick up another trail heading west again to the Odra River, then south into Moravia. With luck, and pushing it, we hoped to reach the Moravian Gate, a low pass between the Carpathian and Sudeten mountains, on the evening of the fourth day, December 26.
After that it was to be an easy trip in warmer weather into Hungary, where we would buy 144 barrels of wine for delivery to the Bishop of Cracow in the spring. The purchase was for use in the mass and had nothing to do with the bishop's fondness for red Hungarian wines, of course.
The sun was fully up when we passed the Benedictine abbey at Tyniec, high on the white rocks across the river, but we saw not a single person from the time we left Cracow until ten o'clock in the morning.
With the sun up, Boris trotted up and rode beside me for a little conversation. Talking in the dark had been difficult because we couldn't see each other to gesticulate. He wanted to know about Arabic numbers, and I complied.
Boris caught on to the salient points quickly. He was' amused by the idea of zero ("A special character that signifies nothing! Hah!"), but he soon saw its usefulness. I drew the numbers in the air in front of me as though it were a blackboard, and he memorized their shapes without difficulty. He considered the idea of positional notation to be a brilliant creation. The decimal point was still giving him trouble when we heard a rider galloping up from, behind. We pulled off with me to the left side of the trail and Boris to the right to let the fellow through.
The man stopped abruptly between us and turned to my boss. He acted as if I wasn't there.
"You are Boris Novacek?"
"I am."
"You are a thief! You run out on your debts!" he said with a thick German accent.
"Who are you and why do you call me a thief?"
"I call you thief because you do not pay the twentytwo thousand pence that you owe Schweiburger the cloth merchant! And I am the man he sold the debt to!"
"I do not owe you anything, for I do not know you. As for Schweiburger, my debt is not due until Christmas, and today is only December twenty-third!"
The argument got more and more heated, and I became apprehensive. I was unsure of the legalities of the case, but it was obviously my duty to defend Boris if it came to that.
The man must have forgotten about me because while shaking one fist at my employer, he reached behind his back to draw his dagger.
I didn't want to use my sword and kill him, so I grabbed him by the back of the neck and the belt and heaved him out of his saddle. My intention was to throw him over my head and onto the ground. Then I could take my lance and stop any real violence.
But he was much heavier than I had expected. He bumped my lance free while he was airborne, and I tried to catch it with my right foot. But my high saddlebow and cantle had given me a false sense of security; it was quite possible to fall out sideways, which I did. I never claimed to be a horseman.
I was sliding off the right side of the saddle, but my hands were full of creditor so that I couldn't grab the pommel. My tight foot was out of the stirrup, stopping my lance from falling. Trying desperately to find the stirrup, I let the lance go. Then there was nothing left to do but think, Oh shit, why Me? I hit the ground in a tangle of arms, legs, and instruments of violence.
The horses scattered, and we were untangled in an instant. He was on his feet and drawing his sword before I got up. Fortunately, his first blow was to my left, because I parried it before my sword was fully out of the sheath.
I got my sword out in time to parry a vicious chop at my head. "Hey! Stop! I don't have an argument with you!" I shouted as I blocked a blow at my right side.
"Bastard!" he yelled as he tried to bash my skull three more times.
"I'm not your enemy!" I parried a cut at my left leg. "I was only trying to stop you from committing a murder!"
Keeping him from hitting me required no great skill. A parry almost always requires less motion than an attack and so is inherently faster. Also, my opponent had little skill and no ability at subterfuge. He telegraphed every blow long before it landed.
"You ride with thieves, you!" He sent two more whacks at my right leg.
What the guy did have was a heavy sword and an ungodly amount of stamina and persistence.
"Look, I don't want to hurt you!" He was bashing — at my head again. I was once the best man on campus with a saber, but I hadn't worked out in six years. Even then, I had been used to parrying a fencing saber, which weighs less than a tenth of what this guy was swinging.
"You are Polack thief and liar like everybody you know!" He kept on swinging.
"Can't we stop and talk about this? Don't you ever get tired?" My right arm was getting numb.
"Bastard!" he yelled, and started chopping faster. Had it been the twentieth century. I would have known that he was on some kind of dope.
Finally he got one by me, hitting my right shoulder. It broke neither skin nor bone, but it hurt. I knew that the defensive game could not go on forever. I had to disable him.
When next I got an opening, I beat his blade to the left. He overcompensated, and I doubled under his sword. Then, arm out, head and body vertical and in perfect fencing form, I thrust my blade into him.
In fencing, things happen too quickly to be controlled by rational thought. You practice for years so that the reflexes of your arms and legs do the right thing at the right time. That is how you score points.
That is also how I put my sword through the man's neck, severing his trachea and at least two arteries. He was probably dead before he hit the ground, but he continued bleeding. Oh, God, how he bled!
I stared at him, unable to believe what I had done.
"Well fought, Sir Conrad! But was that really necessary?"
"Huh?" I had never killed a man before.
"Why did you throw him out of the saddle?" Boris gathered up the horses and dismounted.
"You didn't see?" I said after a time. "He drew a knife behind his back. He meant to kill you."
"And here is the knife on the ground! My apologies, Sir Conrad. You have saved my life! I am in your debt, sir." He bent over the body and was searching it.
"Just earning my pay, and I am in your debt some three thousand pence." I was a murderer.
"Not anymore, Sir Conrad. Look here." He showed me a pouch he had removed from the body. It must have contained a kilo of gold.
"That amounts to eight thousand pence or I'm no judge. And look here! The man wears armor under his clothes! Had your sword struck elsewhere, it might have been stuck on his rings, and then he would have had your head!" Boris quickly stripped the body while I stood dumbly by. When he was done, the corpse was completely naked. "Haul that a long way off the road, will you? They get unsightly when they rot, and we wouldn't want to offend some good lady."
In his thirteenth-century way, he was telling me that one should not litter. I dragged it off. When I got back, a bundle was heaped on the stranger's horse. Boris was mounted.
"Sir Conrad, I estimate that I could sell this chancefound horse and equipment for four thousand pence. The gold is worth eight, for a total of twelve. We were together at the finding. You did the important work, but you were in my employ at the time. Therefore, I think that an even split would be equitable. Do you agree?"
"Whatever you say." Jesus Christ. I had just killed a man. Killed him and hid the body. Now I was joining in on robbing the dead.
Boris saw my expression. "Well, we can hardly leave this on the road for some thief to find! Now then, your half of twelve is six, but you owe me three, so here is your three thousand pence."