Falstaff

by Robert Nye

  The alchemists turn base metal into gold, and in so doing they find the universal solvent, and the elixir of life.

  O Muses, Sacred Nine, and Memory most of all, mother of all of them, and they our mothers – I was Doll Tearsheet’s alchemist that night, and by gamahuche turned her base metal into gold. And found myself solved in her universal solvent. And drank the elixir of life from the quivering goblet of her cunt.

  What did it taste like?

  Eternity, madam.

  Or chestnuts.

  Chapter Eighty-Eight

  About divers minor charges, costs & wages owing to Sir John Fastolf

  (3rd Note by Stephen Scrope)

  St Matthew’s Day

  Where are his sons then?

  Of all the lies in this book of lies, I think that none will give more offence to sober men than his lies about what he has done with women.

  Owing for divers charges and costs borne for the time that he occupied the office of the Constabulary of Bordeaux, the sum of … … … … … … …

  £227. 15s. 3½d.

  These are monstrous filth.

  These are the ravings of a devil.

  There is even the chapter which he has entitled ‘about the ***** of Sir John Fastolf’. I have not read it. I will not read it. No right-minded person would be seen looking for an instant in that direction.

  Owing for wages in his service done to the King, and to the Duke of Clarence, being the King’s Lieutenant in the Duchy of Guienne, the sum of … … … …

  £200. 10s. 0d.

  But I have read his lies about my mother.

  Which insult me, Scrope.

  In that case, for reasons best known to himself (but shame would not be among them), he chose to attribute the disgusting narrative to his ‘Mrs Quickly’.

  Owing for costs and charges that he bare when he was Lieutenant of the town of Harfleur, in Normandy, as shown by a debenture … … … … … … …

  £133. 6s. 8d.

  I say that as certainly as there never was a ‘Mrs Quickly’ or an ‘Ancient Pistol’, so he never did those things to my mother in the snow, or anywhere else. He neglected my mother, and me, wasting our money on drink in London.

  That he wasted money on whores too, I can believe. Only a whore would tolerate such a beast. Whether or not he did with his whores the filthy deeds which he has said he has done, I neither know nor care.

  Owing for the keeping and vitalling of the Bastille of St Anthony in Paris, as shown by the creditors of Sir John Tyrell, late Treasurer of the King’s house, in a bill remaining in the Westminster Exchequer, the sum of …

  £43. 0s. 0d.

  He gives the game away in that ‘Day Eighty-Four’, where he rejects Basset’s narrative of his petty adventures in France …

  In the first place, he rejects Basset so that he can lie and lie and lie in giving his own versions. (As if so great a battle as Agincourt hung upon an attack on the baggage!)

  In the second place, in that chapter you will notice him teasing and taunting those pathetic toadies, Hanson and Nanton, with more of the disgraceful fantasies about his niece Miranda which have disfigured and dirtied his book from its beginning.

  Owing for the safeguard of the town of Pont Meulent, the sum of … … … … … … … … …

  £39. 10s. 4d.

  I, Scrope state for a fact that it is all lies and nonsense.

  I, Scrope, state for a fact that this crude animal, my stepfather, is impotent, and has been so for many years.

  Indeed, there may well never have been a time when he was capable of fathering a child. Consider for one moment his immoral praise of sherris sack in that ‘Day Eighty-Two’, where he has put it on record (in Worcester’s hand) that if he had a thousand sons he would teach them to addict themselves to drink.

  A man betrays himself in what he says.

  This great Lucifer betrays himself here.

  All his tales of doing the deed of darkness with so many women are untrue.

  ‘If I had a thousand sons …’ he said.

  He has no son.

  He has fathered no child.

  Yet if he was only a thousandth part as potent as he has made himself out to be in these obscene boastings, then surely he would have been father to many children?

  I, Scrope, write facts.

  Over all this, owing for wages of him and his retinues being in the King’s service in France and Normandy, as well as for sundry expenses borne in the safeguard of the fortress of Alençon and other fortresses abroad, the sum of … … … … … … … … …

  £13. 13s. 3d.

  He speaks sometimes of a bastard son, in Ireland, who became a monk. No one has ever seen this ‘Dom William Fastolf’. He does not exist.

  He told in earlier chapters of a stepsister, called ‘Ophelia’. I never heard the name before in heaven or earth. Just as there never was an ‘Ophelia’, so you can be sure that he never did with an ‘Ophelia’ any of the secret things he said that he did.

  As for his niece Miranda – she is my cousin, and a sweet and kindly girl. I play chess with her. She helps me when he sets me to absurd and demeaning tasks, such as piling logs for him as if I were his slave. I, Scrope, write facts. I swear that this same Miranda is as chaste and ignorant of his filthy dreams as the day is long. He chooses to imagine for himself all manner of wanton occupation with the dear Miranda. And out of fear and their own lewd longings, titillated by his, those henchmen write it down. I tell you none of it takes place outside his head.

  Why does he tell such lies?

  Why is the Devil damned?

  He writes a kind of requiem for a life he never lived.

  He tells you lies about himself.

  I, Scrope, tell you the truth about him and about his book.

  This is a work of fiction.

  Sum total owing of … … … … … … …

  £657. 15s. 6½d.

  Chapter Eighty-Nine

  How Sir John Fastolf went to the wars again, & about the siege of Rouen

  Michaelmas Day

  I was suffering once more from consumption of the purse. There seemed no remedy but a return to the wars. Besides which, peace palled and appalled me. My spirit languished in its stews. My lance grew rusty in the hat-rack. I turned my thoughts again to France.

  This was Hal’s second great voyage of conquest.

  First, the Earl of Huntingdon was given the job of clearing the English Channel of the enemy’s ships. This he did. He met nine of them, all hired by the French King from the Republic of Genoa. The first three he sank, the second three he put to flight, and the third three he captured – together with their admiral and a large sum of money.

  We sailed from Southampton on 23rd July – which meant that I had time to keep the Feast of my dear St Mary Magdalene the day before embarkation.

  Fair stood the wind for France.

  Our army consisted of –

  1000 pioneers and miners;

  25,528 combatants;

  1500 ships of all sizes.

  Of the 25,528 combatants, there were 17,000 men-at-arms. 17,007, if you count me. It was a sunny, showery morning, with blackbirds on the cross-trees of the masts, and I was in quest of my knighthood, though I did not know it.

  The beaches were deserted where we landed. Banks of pebbles stretching as far as the eye could see, and not a Frog in view. The disaster of Agincourt had so broken the courage of the French, we soon discovered, that they had very little intention of meeting an English army again in the field if they could help it. Their plan of campaign was to garrison their fortified towns as strongly as possible, so that we would exhaust ourselves gradually in the effort of taking them. That plan failed. Henry was better furnished for siege warfare than he had been before (all those pioneers and miners). It did not rain, and we did not fall foul of the quickshits. And I was in an invincible sort of mood. I could have knocked towers over with my belly.

  Touques, a royal castle, fell first
to us. Then Damvilliers, Harcourt, and Evreux. We took Caen after a short siege, in which Hal demonstrated how much he had learnt from the experience at Harfleur. Our miners got right up to their walls, which were battered by cannon at the same time. We did this by mining first on one side, while the cannon attacked the other, and then reversing the modus of attack. We ended up by entering the town on both sides, simultaneously, and with a loss from first to last of less than five hundred men. Henry treated the inhabitants of Caen with clemency, so long as they acknowledged his right to the French Crown. Other neighbouring towns at once offered to capitulate.

  This is the list of the towns, castles, cities, and abbeys that fell to us on that second tour of France: (I follow Basset) –

  Falaise, Argenton, Bayeux, Alençon, Fresne-le-Vicont, St Savers de Vive, St Jakes de Beuron, St Jakes de Burvam, St Low, Valence, Averence, Lisieux, Everose, Counsheux, Vire, Karentine, Cherbourg, Vernoile, Morteyn, Esey, Powntlarche, Dounfrount, Pountedomer, Turve, Costaunce, Galion, Caudebec, Mustirvilers, Dieppe, Vernoile sur Seine, Mawnt, Towk, Morvile, Cursy, Gundy, Vermus, Garcy, Eu, Vileine, Egyll, Curton, Fagernon, Chamberexs, Ryveers, Bewmanill, Bewmalyn, Semper, Trace, Groby, Tylly, St Denise, Bonvile, Perers, Asse la Rebole, Tanny, Antony, Balon, Mountfort, Tovey, Lowdon, Noaus, St Romains in Plaine, Daungell, Peschere, Bolore, Keshank, Turre, St Germaine, Bomstapyll, Croile, Bakuile, Bellacomber, Likone, and Ankorvile.

  Most of these surrendered without a fight.

  At Falaise, we simply sat between the French and their relief, waiting for shortage of puddings to do what swords do quicker. It took three weeks only.

  Amid the welter of mere names, the Benedictine abbey of Bec-Hellouin remains in my recollection vividly. The French had kicked the monks out and commandeered the place to use as a fortified strongpoint to arrest our progress. After we had smoked them out, and hanged a cowardly captain for the blasphemy of posing as an abbot to save his skin, we spent a little of the winter resting there. Why not? Our force was under the command of Thomas, Duke of Clarence, which meant that the Benedictine wine did not have to stay unbroached. That was a warm and welcome winter, in a vine-bright country, with drink in plenty, and roaring fires where we could toast our bums, bake nuts, and sit and dream of home. It was there that I began to make my plans for investing all my profits of war in good fair English land. I laid plans also for the creation of Caister as it is now – my dream, my castle, and my home. When stores ran low, we had only to send out a few men to fill up the cellars again from what they could find in the neighbour castles.

  Spring came. Harry came. He took command. We left Bayeux and marched up the southern bank of the Seine. Our destination was Rouen.

  Rouen. I dare to say that there has been no greater siege in the history of the world since Troy and Jerusalem were taken.

  This is the story of it.

  Hal’s first object was to possess himself of the strong position of Pont de l’Arche, a bridge about eight miles above the city, and commonly known as the Key of the River. This bridge was held by the French, and our scouts reported that it was so constructed and so thickly manned that to force its overthrow would inevitably involve us in a great loss of our own men. The King accordingly marched us some three miles lower down the river, to a place where it was divided by an island.

  The Frogs, curious, followed us.

  Why were they curious?

  I’ll tell you why, my little Pigbum.

  Because dancing along in the rear of our party, mounted on a vast horse, a lovely Suffolk, I came, with a small group of followers, including my Ancient Pistol, all kitted out and caparisoned for the fox hunt.

  The hunting of foxes was unknown in France at that time. We had started the sport in England, and it was in its infancy. But I was already a devotee of the art – despite the impedimenta presented by my belly – and liked few things better than to flush foxes from the coverts round the Hundred River, and pursue them across this pancake county.

  Now the countryside round and about Rouen had put me terribly in mind for Caister, and with a night’s riding and a bellyful of burnt brandy inside me, I was brimming over with nostalgia as we made our way down beside the Seine away from that Pont de l’Arche.

  I resolved, therefore, on a little spot of innocent fox-hunting.

  Or not so innocent …

  For I had, of course, required the King’s permission to indulge my whim. And he, the sly fox himself, had seen in this bizarre request an opportunity for an ingenious stratagem. Hal was now an old hand at war, and he knew that in the battlefield so much depends upon what men expect to see, and then what they do see. If the two things fail to match, then a soldier may behave unpredictably. Those Frogs guarding the Key of the River Seine expected to see the King of England ride past, carefully beyond the reach of their crossbows. They expected to see the huge force of pioneers and men-at-arms in his wake. They expected the drummers and the banners and the priests and the baggage. In short, all the usual retinue and panoply of an army on the march.

  But they certainly did NOT expect to see the rear guard in command of an inebriate fat gentleman on a great grey shire horse. A gentleman dressed in scarlet and blowing on a silver horn. And surrounded by a small party of other chaps similarly accoutred.

  So, as I say, hey diddle diddle, they turned curious, and about half of them followed.

  Perhaps they thought I was a carnival.

  Perhaps they thought the King would bypass Rouen, and they had orders merely to see us out of sight.

  Perhaps they feared some necromancy.

  I don’t know.

  What they got was a full-blown fox-hunt! For it was my luck, just this side of the island dividing the river, to flush a splendid creature from the brushwood. He came up out of the grass like a red flame suddenly lit in clear morning air.

  ‘Tally ho!’ I cried.

  And we were off …

  My little fox-hunting party, that is, and the foolish Frogs. For, momentarily, the idiots followed us! They had dashed across seven fields and some of them fallen off their horses and into the ditch, before serious shrill trumpets from behind them warned them that their frivolity had not gone unobserved by the general garrison remaining on the Pont de l’Arche, and that the commander there was hopping mad at this diversion.

  But by the time the runaway French had mustered, and gathered their wits, and rejected the novelty of this red-coated English game of pursuing foxes to the death – our King had swung round with the main body of the English army, occupied the island with a small force of gunners, and thrown up such a sudden cannonade that all the enemy troops left to guard the passage were put to flight.

  Those French novices of the fox-hunt withdrew in dismay and some disarray to face the fury of their commander.

  I caught my first French fox. And I caught the French.

  I had a fine brush despatched to the King, via Pistol.

  I drank burnt brandy sitting on top of a haystack.

  Henry, now holding both banks of the Seine, constructed a bridge of boats to join his two camps, and went on pounding at the Pont de l’Arche from these powerful positions, bombarding it night and day for three days, until it capitulated.

  ‘Qu’est ce que ceci Tally-ho?’ was all the garrison’s commander had to say.

  And I took pleasure in instructing him in the mystery of how we English had declined (or elevated) it from the old Norman hunting cry of Taillis au! (‘To the coppice!’), which my ancestors had heard their overlords employ after the Conquest, when William’s men went after English stags. So the wheel had come full circle. And the French had been led a dance by our new English version of their own old game.

  Rouen was now isolated from the rest of France.

  We held command of the river. We had invested all the country round about. Every way the French looked out from the walls of Rouen they must have seen the sun shining on the armour and the banners of the English army.

  The story was only beginning, however
. Rouen was very strong. Its walls were high and well supplied with artillery. I suppose the whole must have been five miles in circumference, having some sixty towers each armed with guns and catapults, and reinforced by a deep ditch running round it. The garrison within was uncommonly large. There was a local militia numbering at least fifteen thousand men, and a force of not less than seven thousand regular troops and artillery. A spiked jewel. An iron maiden.

  Hal made no assault upon the town. He simply made it impossible for the French to get out. He even had a heavy iron chain strung across the river, in case a ship should try to run the gauntlet of our guns. The French were well and truly trapped, and they knew it. Besides which, in addition to their large garrison, Rouen was packed with a multitude of countryfolk who had flocked in from the neighbourhood to avail themselves of the shelter of its walls.

  I remember the Duke of Clarence pointing at the haystacks in the fields and saying: ‘My brother is getting as skilled as Caesar in these little matters. He’s got this city under siege before it had the chance to secure a harvest for the winter. They’ve had it!’

  I think we all knew that, English and French. For our part, you see, we could afford to send off marauding parties to obtain provisions from the towns round about, whenever we needed them. But Rouen had to wait for help from the King of France. And the King of France could not help himself, let alone his city of Rouen.

  We heard as winter set in that all bread was used up in the city. They had nothing but water and vinegar to drink. The only meat they had left was horseflesh. The citizens of Rouen were driven to the eating of their cats and their dogs, as well as rats and mice. A quarter of a horse, fat or lean, sold for one hundred shillings. The head of a horse was worth half a pound. Dogs went for ten shillings, cats for two nobles, while a rat cost forty pence and a mouse 6d. Not that there were many mice left. The people were compelled to eat roots and bark and moss, and any grass they could find growing within their walls. And then they began to die in that rich city, and they died so fast every day that they were left unburied.