Erasmum Hobart

by Erasmum Hobart

  He landed in a heap and took a moment to get his breath back. No bones appeared to be broken – in fact, he had landed on something surprisingly soft. He felt around with his hands and identified the object as a straw bed. Suddenly, he felt something rough slithering alongside his arm and he started in shock, rolling over to avoid what felt like a hairy snake descending on to him. Then Maude landed beside him, holding the coil of rope in her hands, and Erasmus flushed, embarrassed at his nervousness, and felt glad the room was too dark for his face to be visible.

  As Maude swivelled round and put her feet on the floor, Alice stood on a table and replaced the roof panel and the room was flooded with light. Erasmus rose to his feet and looked to where their host was lighting the candles that stood in niches around the room. The old woman gave Erasmus a quizzical gaze, but refrained from comment and continued with her labours. Marian gathered the group together in the middle of the room.

  ‘We aren’t going to be able to come back this way,’ she said. ‘We wouldn’t be able to get the chest through the roof.’

  ‘We’ll have to go through the gate,’ said Alice. ‘Do you want me to deal with the guards?’

  ‘Not just yet. We’re going to have to time it just right – if we dispose of the guards at the end of their shift, it wouldn’t give us enough time to get clear. Now, the shifts are two hours long; Molly says the last changeover was just over an hour ago, so you should hear the chapel bells in about an hour. We have to be back at the gate either ten minutes before or at least ten minutes after that. The chest is in the castle strongroom – that’s under the western gatehouse, so we’ll have to deal with the guards there when we arrive.’

  ‘That’s my job,’ said Alice, with more enthusiasm than Erasmus was really comfortable with.

  ‘Maude, Alice, Erasmus and I will go up to the castle itself,’ Marian continued. ‘Ethel, Meg, you see if you can find us a cart to take the chest out. Try not to be too obvious about it – people get suspicious of carts moving at night.’

  The group left Molly’s house and Ethel and Meg disappeared into the shadows. Erasmus stared into the blackness, but could see no sign of them. Marian and Alice began to hurry towards the castle; Maude grabbed Erasmus’ arm and pulled him along.

  ‘We don’t want to be seen around Molly’s,’ she said. ‘It’ll get her into trouble.’

  ‘How did you get to know her?’ Erasmus hissed. ‘I’d have thought most people would be too terrified to help a bunch of outlaws.’

  ‘She’s Alice’s mum,’ said Maude. ‘She’s more terrified of ’er own daughter than all the Sheriff’s men put together.’

  ‘She’s afraid of her own daughter?’

  ‘Well, she knows ’er better than we do.’

  The gate to the castle bailey seemed surprisingly quiet as the outlaws approached. Erasmus looked at Marian, who was watching the entrance pensively.

  ‘Problem?’ he whispered.

  Marian waved at him to be quiet, then patted Alice on the arm and made a swinging motion towards the left of the gate. Alice nodded and dashed across the street and into the shadow of the buildings on the other side. After a minute or so, Erasmus saw her emerge from the shadows against the wall of the gatehouse and, with her back to the structure, she crept round until she was in the gateway itself. At that point she turned and waved to Marian, who hurried over to join her with Erasmus and Maude in pursuit.

  ‘Where are the guards?’ Marian hissed.

  Alice motioned to the floor of the guardroom, visible through its open door. ‘Someone got to them first,’ she said.

  ‘Are they dead?’ said Maude.

  Alice shook her head. ‘Stunned,’ she said. ‘Do you think I should…’ She made a cutting motion across her throat.

  Erasmus was disgusted. ‘Not when they’re already unconscious,’ he said. ‘That’s just unnecessary.’

  ‘Who rattled your cage?’ Alice hissed.

  ‘Not now,’ said Marian. ‘Something’s going on here and we’ve got to find out what.’

  They made their way through the gatehouse and into the outer bailey, keeping in the shadow of the walls as they went. Once inside the bailey, Erasmus looked up at the castle, which loomed over them with its whitewashed walls seeming to glow in the moonlight.

  Erasmus couldn’t help but admire the building, seeing it under such circumstances he could understand how such structures could subjugate the masses by their very presence. If he hadn’t seen cities where the tallest buildings appeared to touch the sky, he certainly would have felt oppressed by the tall keep of a castle. As he ran his eyes down the building, he became aware of a dark shadow standing at the foot of it. He tapped Marian gently on the shoulder and pointed towards it. Her gaze followed his and she nodded grimly.

  ‘One of those monks,’ she said. ‘I thought they seemed suspicious.’

  They made their way towards the keep, using the shadows of the outbuildings to mask their approach as much as possible. It seemed to work and the monk continued to stand quietly by the wall, completely unaware of their presence. As they got closer, however, Erasmus realised it was inevitable that, sooner or later, he was going to spot them. What was a monk doing outside the keep, anyway, he wondered. Presumably it was the monks who had stunned the guards, but why? Why hadn’t he noticed them yet?

  He watched the figure shuffle uncomfortably. It appeared to be suffering some discomfort as it stood at its lonely vigil and, as he watched, he caught a glimpse of steel beneath the monk’s habit. Unless monks regularly carried swords, this wasn’t a monk. Suddenly, he became aware of the sound of booted feet behind them and turned to see a squad of soldiers running towards them from the direction of the gatehouse. Seeing no alternative, they ran towards the monk, who drew his sword and waved it pointedly in their direction.

  ‘Glad you could join us,’ he said. ‘How exactly did you get into the town?’ As he spoke, his hood fell away from his face and Erasmus’ face formed a mask of astonishment.

  ‘Deloial!’ he gasped.

  ‘The very same,’ said Deloial then, looking up at the approaching soldiers, ‘These are the outlaws I told you about. Get them.’

  The soldiers closed in, swords drawn. Marian drew her own sword and Alice took out a pair of daggers. Maude stepped back and drew her bow, cocking and firing an arrow in one swift movement. Erasmus looked from the fallen man to Maude’s emotionless face, then back at Deloial’s mocking smile. What should he do? Without really thinking about it, he took out his own dagger and rammed it into Deloial’s right leg, then took off and ran around the bailey. One of the soldiers turned as if to pursue him, but his momentary distraction allowed Alice to slit his throat and throw him to the floor. Erasmus charged past the various wooden outbuildings but, as he approached the forge, he skidded to a halt and stared in shock at the outer wall.

  The space which, when he’d last seen it, had contained his time machine, was empty. He was stranded.

  There’s nothing to quite compare with the shock of losing your only means of getting home. When you miss the last bus from Lamberhurst you can shrug it off with the thought that another day will come and with it another bus. Even if you miss the last plane to evacuate civilians from a pending warzone, there’s still a chance you could make it on foot, but when you lose a one-of-a-kind time machine when you’re eight hundred years from home, it’s unlikely you could wait long enough for the next one. Erasmus stared towards the empty wall, but his eyes were focused on some arbitrary point beyond it. He hoped his machine had simply been moved, that it was around somewhere, because he couldn’t see any way he could spend the remainder of his life in the wrong time without having some impact on history.

  As he stood in the bailey, he began to experience the feeling that someone was behind him. Putting aside his concerns about getting home and focusing his mind on the difficulties of the here and now, he turned slowly on his heel to find himself faced with a familiar figure. Tall, armoured and muscular with a flushing face
and cruel eyes, Gisburne wasn’t an easy man to forget. He waited until Erasmus was facing him, then slowly and purposefully drew his sword. Erasmus looked to his left and his right, the curvature of the castle walls prevented him from seeing whether Marian and the others were still fighting, but the sounds of battle had long since disappeared, so he had to assume they weren’t. He hoped Maude was all right.

  He looked past Gisburne to the forge, but there was no smoke emerging from the chimney and Erasmus knew it was unlikely he would be able to engage Gisburne with anything that wasn’t red hot. He took a step backwards towards the wall where his time machine had stood. Gisburne matched his step, maintaining the distance between them and twirling his sword artistically to exercise his wrist.

  Erasmus looked over his shoulder at the wall behind him – there was no obvious way he could climb it. He wondered if the guards in the gatehouse were still stunned, or whether they had been replaced. It was a slim chance, but better than running round the bailey with Gisburne until one of them tired. Feinting to the right, Erasmus put Gisburne off his guard, then darted to his left, running clockwise around the bailey at speed. Gisburne, recovering from Erasmus’ trick, charged after him, his breath coming in heavy bursts as he ran. To Erasmus it sounded as if he was being chased by a man with a saw and he almost felt sorry for Gisburne, having to run in so much armour. Dismissing the thought, he charged through the gatehouse and, looking to his right as he ran, he was glad to note that the two guards still lay unconscious on the floor. Unfortunately, Erasmus was distracted enough by the sight that he nearly failed to notice a cart that had been abandoned across the outer door of the gateway. He tried to stop, but his momentum carried him over the cart and on to the road on the other side. He landed on his back, his head banged against one of the wheels, and everything went black.

  Chapter Sixteen

  ‘He’s coming round. Stand back and let him get some air.’

  The room swam in Erasmus’ eyes as his brain attempted to resolve the details into something that didn’t look like it was being observed through a fish tank. His head ached, his back ached and there would be no paracetamol for centuries. He groaned as he opened his eyes. It was fairly dark, which helped with the headache, and Erasmus moved gingerly to take in his surroundings.

  The room resembled the inside of a large barn, a long, stone affair with a wooden roof and straw on the floor. What little light there was came from torches stuck in sockets around the walls and Erasmus could see through the high, arched windows that it was still night in the outside world. He tried to move and nearly fell over. His arms were chained to the wall behind him and he couldn’t move them more than a few inches. His feet had freedom of movement but, if he was going to leave, he’d rather take all of his limbs with him.

  At Erasmus’ first attempt at movement, two men detached themselves from the shadows and approached him. The first Erasmus instantly recognised as Gisburne. Even without his Norman helmet, his face had firmly chiselled lines and his cold blue eyes had a hint of steel about them. The other man was shorter, with a weasel-like countenance and small, piggy eyes. Unlike those of Gisburne, however, these darted around in a way which suggested intelligence and Erasmus realised he was in the presence of some form of authority. He set his own face into what he hoped was an impassive mask and watched as the man studied him with obvious curiosity.

  ‘So this is your mysterious nemesis, is it?’ the weasel-man said to Gisburne. ‘He doesn’t look that dangerous to me.’

  ‘He has some power, my lord,’ said Gisburne. ‘Twice he has managed to escape with his trickery.’

  ‘From what I was told by the guards, you fell over an anvil.’

  ‘I was put off my guard, my lord.’

  ‘Indeed.’ The man turned to address Erasmus. ‘And what powers did you use to put Gisburne off his balance?’

  Erasmus considered his answer carefully. He was aware that he was in a very vulnerable position and that angering either man could be a very bad move at this point. ‘I couldn’t give you the answer to that,’ he said, trying to sound as mysterious as possible.

  ‘Oh, you couldn’t, couldn’t you?’ said the weasel-man. ‘Do you know who I am?’

  Erasmus shook his head.

  ‘I happen to be the High Sheriff of Nottingham and I carry the authority of the King. You’ll answer my questions willingly or you’ll find we have other ways of extracting the information we desire.’

  Erasmus considered this. Evidently the Sheriff was more dangerous than Gisburne, so he smiled in what he hoped was a placating manner. ‘I didn’t use any trickery,’ he said. ‘Gisburne fell over the anvil without my help.’

  ‘Did he indeed? As agile as ever were we, Gisburne?’

  ‘My lord,’ Gisburne tried to protest, but the Sheriff raised a hand to silence him. He continued to examine Erasmus. ‘And what were you doing in the castle?’

  ‘Looking for Robin Hood,’ said Erasmus.

  The Sheriff flushed slightly. ‘You expected to find Robin Hood in Nottingham Castle?’

  This reminded Erasmus that he hadn’t been alone. ‘What happened to Marian and the others?’ he said.

  The Sheriff seemed somewhat taken aback by a chained man making demands. ‘They left,’ he said.

  ‘Safely?’

  ‘Well, we found five of my men dead on the floor and none of the outlaws, so I have to assume so.’

  ‘Five!’ Erasmus was impressed despite his misgivings about violence.

  ‘Yes,’ said the Sheriff. ‘Five soldiers. Oh well, c’est la vie.’

  ‘Such is life? Five people die and you just write it off as another day.’

  The Sheriff looked at him, one eyebrow raised curiously. ‘Vous parlez français? Quand avez-vous appris cela?’ he said.

  ‘I learnt it as a child, but I’d prefer to stick to English,’ said Erasmus.

  ‘Well, well – an educated man.’ The Sheriff appeared to be re-evaluating Erasmus, which could be a good thing but, equally, might be fatal.

  ‘Get him off the wall,’ the Sheriff said to Gisburne. The brute opened his mouth to protest, but the Sheriff’s frown dissuaded him from actually saying anything. Reluctantly, Gisburne approached Erasmus, twisted his arm to gain access to the chains behind him, then slid out the bolt that held them in place. Erasmus rubbed his sore wrists gratefully as his captor beckoned him to join him at a low table in the corner of the room.

  ‘You interest me strangely,’ said the Sheriff. ‘Why would an educated man be seeking a rogue like Robin Hood?’

  ‘To learn about him.’

  The Sheriff raised a quizzical eyebrow. ‘Do go on.’

  ‘We have stories about Robin Hood where I come from,’ said Erasmus. ‘Legends, if you will. They tell of a man who robbed from the rich to give to the poor. I wanted to see how true they were.’

  ‘News takes a time to travel to your part of the world I see.’

  ‘Why do you say that?’

  ‘Robin Hood stopped giving money to the poor a couple of years ago.’

  ‘He still robs from the rich?’

  ‘Oh yes, but what he does with that money…’ The Sheriff left the point hanging.

  Erasmus’ curiosity was piqued. This was the first time someone had actually come out and said it. Something had changed and the Robin Hood of legend had given way to someone who was altogether more real and much less noble.

  The Sheriff appeared to be musing on something, there was a strange glint in his eyes and Erasmus watched him closely. The man was undoubtedly clever, but there was a cruel streak there too. Perhaps that’s what it took to be a man of power under Prince John.

  Gisburne, standing uncomfortably at the side of the room, cleared his throat. The Sheriff snapped out of his trance and stared at the man with a look of annoyance.

  ‘What is it?’ he snapped. Gisburne gestured in Erasmus’ direction and the Sheriff nodded slowly. ‘Oh, very well,’ he groaned and turned back to Erasmus.

&nbs
p; ‘About two years ago, Gisburne encountered a man answering your description in Sherwood Forest. Was that you?’

  ‘I don’t know, when was two years ago?’ The words were out of Erasmus’ mouth before his brain had had a chance to vet them. Not for the first time, he had stumbled on the linguistic difficulties of time travel. The Sheriff gave Erasmus a peculiar look, like the kind you’d usually reserve for the insane, whilst Gisburne just looked confused.

  ‘Sorry,’ said Erasmus. ‘What I meant to say was, I don’t have any real grasp of time – could you refresh my memory a little?’

  The Sheriff nodded, but there was still something in his eyes that Erasmus couldn’t quite put his finger on. ‘Would you care to tell the story?’ he said to Gisburne.

  Gisburne, sidelined and mystified by the conversation so far, took a moment to realise that the question was directed at him. When the fact registered, he puffed out his already prominent chest as if he were about to begin the solo from some mediaeval opera.

  ‘About two years ago,’ began Gisburne, and Erasmus was almost disappointed that he spoke rather than sang, ‘I was riding through Sherwood Forest. I’d received a tip from one of our foresters that Robin Hood had a camp near the Newark road and, acting on that information, we were attempting to encircle the camp and flush out the outlaws. I suppose it’s possible that the anticipation of catching that villain distracted me somewhat, but—’

  ‘Stick to the facts, Gisburne – we don’t want your life story,’ said the Sheriff.

  ‘My horse was disturbed by a loud noise,’ Gisburne continued, ‘and I was thrown from the saddle. Imagine that, a rider of my stature—’

  The Sheriff waved his hand to prompt Gisburne to get on with it.