I wasn’t particularly suspicious of the old man. I imagined myself a good judge of character, although I was occasionally surprised, but if he was a dissimulating bandit, he was a marvellous actor.
We rode east, and a little north, into the hills behind Beirut, and up into the high ground.
Late afternoon, we found tracks – more horses than I could count, and Maurice began to look serious.
Abu Bakr nodded and told John we were very close to his farm. So we turned south at a place where two tracks crossed with an ancient roadside marker, or perhaps a shrine to some pagan god, and Abu Bakr pointed and we saw a very small stone house.
We moved carefully across his fields to the house. I knew he’d come for something, and I assumed it was money.
It was money, but it was also the old man’s wife. The poor woman had spent ten days terrified of Turks, as we learned later, and no one in Beirut would take him out to fetch her in.
But the old man was no fool at all. He got his wife on the mule, and put a sack across the saddle, and John said we should ride.
I was already eyeing ground for a fight. It’s difficult to explain if you haven’t fought in open country, but I could feel them out there; I didn’t think there were many of them. Little spurts of dust, and a glitter of metal.
‘I want to fight on our terms and not theirs,’ I said.
Maurice gave me a cool nod.
John raised an eyebrow.
I reined in behind a stand of trees that was almost the only cover for an English mile. ‘What should we do?’ I asked.
Maurice looked at John.
I’ll mention in passing that when you are an English boy from Cheapside ‘leading’ a fight in Syria, you are a fool if you don’t get advice, and follow it. Eh?
John sniffed. I mean that; he smelled the air.
‘You ride with old man,’ he said to me. Lucky me; I was in command, and I got to be the bait.
He nodded to Maurice. ‘Left, or right?’ he asked with his hands.
Maurice frowned. ‘Left,’ he said, as if asking to have a tooth pulled. He loosened off the tension on his crossbow and re-cocked it, and put a bolt between his fingers.
I went forward with the old man, who was plainly terrified, and his wife, who was cheerful; I think she thought she’d been rescued.
Little did she know …
We emerged from the trees and they were right there – six of them, far more than I’d expected.
I turned the mule around.
An arrow hit the middle of my brigantine. The steel held.
I had a little trouble talking.
I didn’t want to lose Gawain.
I got the old couple back into the trees and turned Gawain again. The Turks – and they were certainly Turks – were circling us; two had gone east, and two west.
That left two in the middle.
I backed in further among the tall cedar trees.
‘Go back!’ I called and gestured, and Abu Bakr and his wife turned and fled.
I backed Gawain again and again. There was crashing to the west, and a high-pitched yip.
Then I took Gawain off the road. I went west, downhill; not very far, but there I found what you always find in deep woods – another old roadbed. Gawain and I slipped along it like a thief in the night, and I rode perhaps a hundred paces to the north, at a trot, and then I turned my mount back towards the road. I could see light through the trees, and a heartbeat later I saw my quarry; the two of them were thirty paces away, having quite intelligently halted their horses at the very edge of the woods.
By the time they saw me, I was at them at the gallop, with the emperor’s sword in my hand. Now, I freely confess that Gawain’s gallop is not much better than an Arab’s canter, for speed, but they were on a road with trees all around them, and they waited far too long to turn. In fact, the nearer of the two raised his bow and loosed.
It was a fine shot. It took me on the snout of my basinet and vanished with a screech of metal and some sparks. He was reaching for a second arrow when I sang my war cry, and he flinched, reached for his sabre, and died, a second or two behind the action. I cut two handed, a rising cut from my bridle hand side; Gawain needed no hand of mine on his reins, not in combat.
His friend used him as cover and turned his horse.
I let go of my sword with my right hand and reached for the javelin I had under my left leg, pinned to the saddle by my weight; I got it free and threw it, a clean miss, and he was gone.
I went and fetched the javelin. I only had two.
As I dismounted to fetch it, my opponent burst from the tree line. Now he threw a javelin, and I think that at the last moment he couldn’t decide between hitting me and hitting Gawain, because that javelin went just between us, and without thinking, I threw the emperor’s sword.
I hit him; the thrown sword went into his chest just above the gut and he bled out. It was all luck, and he tumbled from his saddle. I thought I had a prisoner, but he was dead.
I fetched his mount, and his mate’s, and I took their bows and swords and their gold.
There is always a little routier in me.
None of us took a prisoner. All our foes were Turcomans – nomads from Anatolia. It was possible that they served Uthman Bey and possible that they’d never heard of him. They were poorer than his men had been; two men hadn’t even had swords, and they were all very young.
And dead.
And John noted that they had no remounts, which either meant that they were very poor indeed, or that their friends were very close with the horse herd.
It took us a surprising amount of time to recover the old couple who were our ostensible reason for venturing so far up the ridge above the coast. But there was no time to linger; there were horsemen to the east, and we moved down the ridge. I had the old gentleman behind me on Gawain, and Gawain, after a fight, was less than enthusiastic about the extra weight.
But we moved across the ridge, slipping from scrub to tree stand, to hiding behind a rickety old barn of stone and mud brick and weathered timber. The fields of this farm had been fallow so long that the ground looked like a plain of wild grass except where you could see a rough shoulder of what had once been a stone wall, or a gate.
Abu Bakr shook his head. ‘Bad place,’ he said. ‘No one live here.’
At least, I think that’s what he said. I was curiously like a passenger, as my ‘men’ were doing all the planning. They moved from cover to cover without a word, and I followed them. As afternoon wore into evening, I figured out what they were doing; John, who quite frankly, looked like a Turcoman, went ahead, moving rapidly, and scouted the next cover. Then Maurice would move, often flanking him, covering him from a distance. Finally, I would be waved to follow, taking the old couple into the safety of the newly scouted cover, where we’d sit waiting for the next move. And the whole time we moved north and west down the ridge, but further north of Beirut.
But before evening turned to night, we cut back along another low ridge. Now we were in a valley, wooded on both sides; Maurice was still keyed up, but John was not, and we made good time, jogging along as if we hadn’t a care in the world.
And we had six extra horses. They weren’t safe for untrained riders, and they all six had tempers – John loved them. Once we were clear of danger, he rode all six in turn.
‘This is Monghul horse,’ he said. The bay was not particularly remarkable except for her piebald colour and her ugly head. But she had a dignity the other five lacked, and John started to show off, riding circles around us.
The sun was a ball on the horizon when we trotted back into camp beneath the walls.
Emile was waiting.
I could see the storm in her face as I approached. And sure enough, as soon as I slipped off Gawain, she first threw her arms around me, in public, and then spat, ‘What
was I to think?’
I had not expected her display of anger.
I had blood on my gauntlets and on one knee, and I was worried that it was etching my harness, and my horse, my faithful Gawain, needed immediate attention. The plain above Beirut was not a desert, but the water was not good or plentiful. And I freely confess that, in that moment, the needs of my harness and my horse came before my lady’s – the more so as I could make nothing of her complaints. I was well; I had never, by my lights, been in serious danger.
‘You love that horse more than you love me,’ Emile spat at me. I was standing in my arming clothes, currying, while Marc-Antonio used ash and rottenstone to take the blood off the steel. John had worked harder than I and wanted to curry the six horses, and Maurice and George and Jesus-Maria had all joined him. Beyond them, Sabraham hovered; he clearly wanted to talk to me, but would not interfere while Emile was by me.
I kept currying. ‘My sweet, Gawain bore me all afternoon in the heat and a sharp fight—’
‘A fight you rode to of your own will!’ Emile said. ‘You are a baron, a lord, my husband! Why not send our men? Pierre Lapot? Or Jean Francois?’
‘Because …’ I paused. It was not that I was going to make an angry retort. It was that I had not simple answer. ‘Abu Bakr needed the service of a knight—’
‘Abu Bakr is an infidel!’ Emile said. ‘What care you or I for him or his wife or their brood? They are not our people! We owe them no loyalty, no service. They are not even servants of Christ! You could have died!’
‘Abu Bakr has sold us food the last two days,’ I said.
‘You scared me,’ she suddenly said, and there were tears in her eyes. ‘You frightened me. Sabraham was worried that you were late, and I …’ She took a breath. ‘I will apologise. This is why men think women are weak.’
I put a grimy hand on her face. ‘I am sorry to have scared you,’ I said. ‘I admit I rode out without … a thought. I … fight.’ I snatched a breath, because I had been working up to a fight, almost like a physical confrontation, and her capitulation left me shaken.
‘Your hand stinks of blood,’ she said, moving it away from her face. She looked away, and back. ‘William. I have dreamed of you. Your face kept me sane in dark times. Don’t go and get killed before I enjoy you a little.‘ She smiled. ’And wash your hands. And the rest of you.’
She leaned over and kissed me. ‘And your Fiore is a godsend,’ she added. ‘I love the way he thinks. He should be a poet.’
‘Really?’ I asked.
She slipped away. I had trouble thinking of Fiore as a poet.
I went back to currying Gawain.
Sabraham came next. The area under the wall where we worked the horses had become my office, and now Nerio and Miles were in the anteroom. Out beyond them, Fiore was teaching Marc-Antonio in the twilight while Sister Marie watched.
Sabraham crossed his arms and raised an eyebrow.
I looked at him, and went back to currying.
‘I’ve heard Maurice’s report,’ he said. ‘He thinks the hills are full of Turks.’
‘John calls them Turcomans,’ I said.
Sabraham nodded. ‘So does Maurice. Did you think they belong to Uthman Bey?’
‘No,’ I said. ‘No. But … It’s bad out there. I don’t think this is Uthman Bey and us. I think that the Turcomans to the north know that the Mamluks are gone, and they are moving in. I think we’ve chosen a very interesting time to ride up the coast.’
Sabraham nodded. ‘I would like to try for Ladiquiya,’ he said. ‘I think we can make it in three days. He cocked an eye. There’s a rumour here that the King of Cyprus is raiding the coast behind us, and another rumour that a Geneoese ship took a merchant bound for Alexandria. We could be very unpopular here. Or be in the midst of a five-sided war.’
‘Have you done this before?’ I asked.
‘Once, with just George. Never with a party this large – and I had a furman from the emir permitting me to ride abroad armed. And not while the Genoese and the King of Cyprus were making war.’ He shrugged, as if a knight-donat of the Order of Saint John could regularly be expected to get an official military pass from the Mamluk military governor of Syria.
On the other hand, I was a relative newcomer to Outremer, and I could already see that by hurting the Mamluks we’d unleashed various lions and tigers and not necessarily improved the situation for anyone. And I could see that further military action by King Peter would only hurt us.
And I thought of the ruined fields. ‘This whole area …’
He nodded. ‘Devastated. In another fifty years, these cities won’t be able to feed themselves,’ he said. ‘Still, if we move fast …’
I shrugged. ‘I agree. Let’s get an early start.’
‘Goes without saying,’ he smiled. ‘This will be remembered as a great empris, William. And it will count as your caravan.’
Caravans were trips to the Holy Land, and knights and knights-donat often had their service measured by the number of caravans; I understood better why that was now.
Sabraham moved off, meaning to tell all our non-combatants to be ready to move, and Nerio and Miles approached me.
‘We’re moving tomorrow?’ Nero said.
I nodded.
‘Only, one of the Syrian merchants says that the Genoese ships won’t stop here, but at Ladiquiya,’ Nerio said. ‘And if they come to make war, they will not stop at all.’
‘He’d like to join us with forty camels,’ Miles said.
Midday. There were flowers on the heights above the Bekaa Valley, and the trees were very green to the east. It was a beautiful day. It was the last day of April, and spring was everywhere, and despite my worries, I rode by my lady and wished her the joy of Beltane as our Syrian merchant followed us with his forty camels and his six men-at-arms, all looking like Mamluks in turbans and splinted maille.
Sister Marie turned her head away and made a sour-milk face. Lady Eugenia clapped her hands together and asked me what Beltane might be.
‘It is a holiday, my lady. A festival.’ I smiled.
‘A saint’s day?’ she asked with her elven face.
I had to laugh.
Sister Marie shook her head. ‘Pah! A pagan festival of fornication, drunkenness, and other sins.’
Emile smiled at them both. ‘Ah, Sister, be kind to we poor women who are not brides of Christ. It is a festival where women are allowed to dance and sing – where you sit all night by a fire and welcome in the spring for the first of May. I have known a priest to compare it to Easter.’
‘To the peril of his immortal soul – the waxing of the sun is not an event comparable to the birth of the Son!’ Sister Marie said hotly. ‘Sir William, I am surprised that you would tolerate this paganism. I thought better of you.’
Now she sparked my anger. I was growing tired of being lectured – by Emile, by Sabraham, by Sister Marie.
‘I’ve known priests and nuns who felt differently about Beltane, in England,’ I said.
‘Oh, England,’ Sister Marie said, her blood up. ‘A land of heretics.’
Emile put a hand on Sister Marie. ‘I think my husband means only to allow his soldiers an evening of fun after many hard days,’ she said, and I loved her for it. Especially the word ‘husband’.
Sister Marie sniffed audibly. ‘I am no prude,’ she said. ‘I am not intolerant. But Beltaine is a Devil’s feast. Not for Christian men and women.’
I rode away and found Sabraham, by passing down the column. ‘Does the Order allow the celebration of Beltane?’ I asked.
He laughed. ‘Allow?’ he asked. ‘Well, brother. Let’s say that in the English langue tonight, the Irish and the Scots and most of the English will be unusually merry, and there may be bowls of milk in the yard, but nary, nary a maypole to be found. And no green maidens.’
That lightened my mood. Sometime before Vespers, while Syr Giannis tried to find us a campsite by the coast, as far from the lowering ridge and the Turcomans as we could get, I rode up beside Sister Marie.
‘Sister,’ I said. ‘I will be allowing a Beltane fire tonight. As there’s not much wine, the festival won’t be very riotous.’ I raised a hand to forestall her argument. ‘I’d have a mutiny if I refused them this, and I have asked Sabraham – this is within the Order’s military rule.’
She sniffed.
You know, when you are young, and see a knight, or an officer of the king, you imagine that this man is instantly obeyed; indeed, you see it happen. And you think, By the Saints, that’s power. That’s who I want to be.
And then when you are ‘in command’ it turns out that you are in a web of relationships, and they are not unlike marriage. The Bible bids the man to command the woman. Certes, I’ll wager those admonitions were written by men who’d never loved a woman.
My point is that Sister Marie’s sniff was the best I was going to manage. And as we rode into our camp, I had the further pleasure of being addressed by our Syrian merchant, who respectfully requested to understand the religious dispute we were having, in fair Italian.
I almost snapped a short answer.
‘In my party there is travelling a very learned man,’ he said. ‘He speaks Persian,’ the Syrian added, as if this was the very highest guarantee of learning. His name is Hafiz-i Abun – he has travelled far, and he can perhaps resolve your dilemma. He has read all the Christian books.’
‘I would be pleased to meet him, my friend,’ I said. ‘For the moment, I have to see to the camp.’
I thought no more about it; Ewan and Ned Cooper had built a bonfire.
Ned stood by the pile of wood, leaning on his axe, with which he made fires, built shelters, and killed his enemies.
‘Proper job,’ he said. It was his cant phrase. I think Ned had taken too many blows in his days; he tended to snap ‘proper job’ in answer to almost any situation.
I dismounted, because their work deserved a little attention and praise.
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