Swords From the Sea

by Harold Lamb

  Now, hearing this, Ralph Thorne pushed aside his plate and stood up, waiting until he caught Durforth's eye. The ship's captain started slightly and his jaw set, so that his pointed black beard seemed to jut forward.

  "It is known to me," observed the armiger when silence fell, "that his majesty doth pray for the success of this venture. And any man who puts an impediment in the way of this voyage is a traitor, no less. Who saith otherwise, lies."

  "I will venture where any man dare set foot," cried Cornelius Durforth and beat upon the table with his knotted fist.

  No one, seeing the muscles set in his sun-tanned face, doubted that he was capable of making good his words.

  "Do not spill the wine," put in Ralph Thorne, his hand on his glass. "And do not bring in question again the wishes of the king, which you should know as well as I."

  Durforth frowned at the youth and went on without heeding him.

  "Ill luck dogs us this season. The ships had the wind over the hawse standing down the Thames, and three of our mariners be taken sick. These be portents. Turn back, say I."

  Again he smote the table until the jugs and glasses leaped and clattered.

  "I pray you," said the armiger softly, "do not spill the wine."

  "Still your springald's tongue when elders speak!" cried his father angrily.

  "Will you bide for word from the king?" Durforth demanded of the pilot-major.

  "Sir Hugh will not, nor will I hang back. If it is not God's will we win to Cathay this season, we may yet find new lands and Christian princes to offer us haven."

  The ship's master, fingering the gold chain at his throat, shrugged, and the silence that fell upon them was broken by Ralph Thorne.

  "Do not spill the wine again, sir."

  Anger glowed in Durforth's dark eyes.

  "Your loutish words, sir, hint at the manner of your birth. Was it in a ditch, or perhaps a gutter that you first looked upon the world?"

  The youth from the court raised his glass in his fingers and tossed its contents into the face of the shipmaster who sat across the table from him.

  "Nay, my lord, this should be evidence that I have not learned manners from the Fox."

  Durforth gained his feet, and, wiping the liquid from his cheeks, found no words to reply. His hand groped for his sword hilt and he whipped the blade clear, kicking back the chair upon which he had sat. The armiger drew his rapier and placed it point to pommel, against the quivering weapon of the older man.

  "Art' content, Master? Our swords be of a length."

  "By the eyes of - , would you stand against me, Thorne?"

  "Aye, so, unless," the youth made response gravely, "you are pleased to confess to this company the manner in which you learned my name."

  Fleetingly Durforth glanced from the cosmographer to his son, and Master Thorne answered the unspoken question.

  "Lad," his old voice quavered with anxiety, "what is this?"

  Then, beholding the settled purpose, stern in the youth's face, he flew into a rage at the unforeseen quarrel.

  "Better you had died in the gutter, than thus to affront honorable gentlemen. Nay, you are no son of mine."

  "'Tis the cosmographer's whelp!" cried an Orfordnesse man. "Have him to the dogs!"

  But Durforth swore a great oath and announced that however the villain had been whelped, he would put him into earth before an hour had passed, and summoned Chancellor to act as his second.

  "'Tis clear, my lord," cried the armiger, "that you have profited from the teaching of Master Fox. Nay, I have no second, so must perform the office myself-not for the first time. Beside the inn is a fair meadow, and the evening light is good."

  Now at the second mention of the Fox, Chancellor looked thoughtfully at the youth, as if he would ask a question. But, meeting with no sign of understanding, he turned away, palpably puzzled. The surgeon from the fleet was at the tavern and accompanied them to the clear stretch of grass that Ralph Thorne pointed out.

  The red-bearded merchant was selected to give the word that would set the two men against each other. Ralph stripped himself to his shirt and stood for a moment to let the breeze cool his forehead.

  Chancellor and the surgeon were arguing with Durforth in lowered voices, seeking to have the quarrel patched up before harm was done, pointing out that Thorne was scarce a man grown, but Durforth would have none of them.

  And Thorne, listening to the break and wash of the swell on the beach where he had played many a time not so long since, now had eyes only for the stalwart figure that loomed in its white shirt over against the trees.

  "Begin, gentlemen," quoth the red-beard.

  Durforth stepped toward his antagonist, his point advanced, the dagger in his left hand gripped at his hip. The armiger took time to salute him, smiling, and this seemed to anger the shipmaster, who lunged and sprang in, his dagger flashing.

  Engaging and parrying the sword, Thorne stepped aside from the dagger thrust, half turning as he did so. For a moment the two blades slithered together as the swordsmen felt each other out. Durforth was in no mood for this and leaped in, grunting, for his antagonist had turned his sword aside and avoided the dagger thrust again.

  This time the armiger stepped clear, lowering his point. "Guard yourself better, Durforth, or I will spoil you."

  He had not used his poniard yet, but as Durforth thrust powerfully, he locked sword hilts, and stabbed at the man's heart. Durforth was quick to see the dagger flash, and his own poniard went at Thorne's throat.

  There was no parrying and no avoiding the double cuts. But Durforth swayed to the right as he struck, so that the armiger's dagger missed his heart, ripping through his side instead. And Durforth's poniard, instead of entering the youth's throat, grated against the collarbone and caught in the shoulder muscles.

  They drew their daggers clear, and Thorne, feeling his left arm grow numb, let his own fall to the grass.

  "A cool head, I vow," muttered the surgeon, calling Chancellor's attention to this. "He may not strike a good blow with his left, and so presses the tall fellow with his sword. Ha! "

  Durforth, feeling the blood drain from his wound, had advanced to the attack again, his dark eyes venomous. But Thorne's rapier coiled over his blade and forced him to give ground. Back and back he went, to the side of the field where they had entered. All his skill was bent to the task of guarding his life, for he was given no further chance to use the poniard.

  "A moment ago," quoth the surgeon critically, "the lad would have exchanged his throat for a blow, but now-a rare sword, he. Give you odds, sir, black beard."

  It fell out otherwise. Figures appeared in the dusk, running from the tavern, voices cried out and the ringing of steel ceased. Two gentlemen who came upon the scene had struck up the weapons of the antagonists, and between them stood a form there was no mistaking.

  "In the king's name, have done!"

  Master Cabot's thin voice was rife with anxiety. He breathed hard, having come in haste when he heard at the inn of the duel that was to be fought. With him were others in a green livery, and one especially, who, attired in all the splendor of costly sables and seal skin with a massy chain of gold around his throat, kept in the center of the newcomers as by right and stared about him thoughtfully, pinching his lip between thumb and forefinger.

  Durforth dashed the sweat from his eyes and flung down his weapons, calling upon the surgeon to bind his hurt, but Thorne confronted Cabot sword in hand, quivering with anger.

  "Sir, by what right do you come between us?"

  The old navigator leaned on his stick composedly.

  "Tush, lad, is the voyage to Cathay not a greater thing than thy wildfire temper? I cannot have Master Durforth spoiled for the venture. Nay he knoweth, above all others, the proper course to round Norway. Amend thy quarreling and cry quits."

  "Never!" broke in Thorne.

  Cabot fingered his long beard, frowning.

  "Thy father came to me at the manor house, and did ask that t
he duel be stopped, for like the loyal Englishman he is, he hath the success of the venture at heart."

  "Nay, your Durforth hath earned his death."

  "How? "

  Thorne opened his lips to reply, but beholding the new arrival who stood apart among the men in livery, he kept silence while the company in the meadow scanned him curiously.

  "I may not say, at this moment."

  Hearing this, Durforth, who had been bending over the bandage on his side, smiled and sheathed the sword that the surgeon handed him.

  "You are discreet-a trifle late, my young hotspur."

  "Here is a riddle," murmured Sebastian Cabot. "A youth who proclaims a just quarrel and a man grown who admits of none. Stay! Knowest thou this springald, Master Durforth?"

  "Not I. His face is strange to me."

  "Perhaps, gentlemen," observed a level voice, "I can rede ye this riddle."

  "Aye, we may well profit by thy wisdom, Renard," assented Cabot. "And so shall I be twice thy debtor, since thou hast been at the pains to come from London hither with a coach for my conveyance from the coast."

  Chapter VI

  Master Cabot Speaks

  The man addressed as Renard answered the navigator's courtesy with a bow. He had the assurance of one who makes himself at home in all company, yet the manner of one born in a high station. Carrying his head a little aslant, what with his beaked nose and his fur necklet he did somewhat resemble the fox that his name signified.

  "This youth, my masters," he went on, "is known to me and others as a follower of a certain person of the court. It is in my mind that his patron desired the death of your ship captain, and so dispatched this Thorne upon his mission of mortality. 'Tis said others have fallen by his blade in the duello."

  His words were tinged with a foreign accent, and he seemed to find in them food for a jest. At any rate he smiled, his thin face saturnine in the dusk.

  "Who sent you?" demanded Chancellor the outspoken.

  "The king," responded Thorne as bluntly, "by my lord of Stratford."

  "Ah," observed Master Renard, "a moment ago you did not deny that Durforth had not the honor of your acquaintance."

  The armiger looked at him silently, bending the slender steel between his fingers, paying no attention to the gash in his shoulder.

  "And as you do not deny it now," the newcomer pointed out, "'tis passing strange that you should name Durforth a traitor. Nay, is a man a traitor because he spills wine in a hedge tavern? Or-and you are a soldado, a bearer of arms-do you hold him doomed because he resents a slight?"

  Still Thorne was silent, alert as if he faced a new antagonist whose speech was no less deadly than the tall man's steel.

  "Lacking other evidence," Renard concluded, "it must appear that you picked a quarrel with Master Durforth, who is embarking upon the king's business. Did anyone lay such command upon you?"

  Thorne perceived at once the shrewdness in this questioning. Renard must have heard from Durforth of the death of D'Alaber. Nothing was more certain than that the Spaniard desired vengeance for the death of his follower. And Renard had several gentlemen in attendance, with a score of men-at-arms within call.

  To make known that Edward was dying and the Papists all but in power might give excuse for a general drawing of weapons in which Chancellor and Sir Hugh, who had no men at their backs, would be slain.

  "'Tis a hanging matter you have embarked upon," resumed Renard lightly, "but-"

  "No 'buts' my lord!" The armiger laughed. "Either I am a murderer, dealing death for so much silver in hand, or I am a gentleman affronted in his cups. If the second, my quarrel is my own affair and you are cursedly inquisitive; if the first, why summon up the bailiffs to hale me into jail, there to await the king's justice."

  "The lad stands upon his rights," assented Chancellor gruffly. "Durforth miscalled him in the tavern. Let him go."

  Cabot had been questioning the surgeon, and now turned, palpably relieved.

  "Aye, no harm has been done to either. The hurts are slight. Come, my masters, a glass of wine. The ships sail before dawn with the tide."

  "I pray you," put in Renard, "come up with me to the manor house, where we shall fare better."

  He spoke briefly to two of his men, and Thorne, who watched them in the deepening dusk, saw them move off toward the tavern and the waiting coach. With a stifled exclamation he strode forward, coming between Chancellor and the old navigator. "Master Cabot, do you know with whom you drink?"

  "Surely," smiled the navigator, "with the Lord Renard, preceptor of the Princess Mary Tudor."

  "And a Spaniard who is no mean cosmographer-who hath no love for us of England."

  Sebastian Cabot was old, and loved quiet better than angry words; moreover he was governor of the Mystery and Company of MerchantsAdventurers of London, newly formed. He had labored greatly to outfit and man the three ships, and the last thing he desired was a quarrel with the powerful envoys from Spain at the court.

  He rested his hand on the arm that Chancellor held out, and made answer not so much to Thorne as to the others who listened in astonishment to the charge of the young armiger.

  "Nay, we would have lacked many things in this venture, had not my Lord Renard given us aid, in weighty advice. He hath been diligent in our council for which we are beholden to him."

  By now they had come to the street where Renard's lackeys with lighted torches awaited them, with the merchants of Orfordnesse and those who had come from the ships. These bowed respectfully to the old navigator, who, leaning upon the arm of the pilot, looked around in benign satisfaction.

  "Gentlemen, it is seemly that we should bid farewell to these navigants in such a pleasant hour."

  The vague unrest that had clouded his lined features at Thorne's accusation disappeared; his eyes brightened and his voice rang out with something of the assurance of other days when he had stood on his own poop.

  "Let no factions arise in your company, my masters; if you differ in opinion, submit the question to the council of officers of the captaingeneral, Sir Hugh. Remember, when you reach the new lands, to take precautions against attack.

  "The natives you will see, perchance, have no knowledge of Christians or their ships. If you take one of the savages on your ships, entreat him in friendly wise, give him food and apparel, and set him safely ashore.

  "When you go ashore, leave mariners to guard the pinnace and venture not to any city of the pagans save in numbers sufficient for your protection and with swords and firelocks in hand. If a storm arises, agree upon a meeting place where your ships may join together if you are parted."

  Then, turning to the people of Orfordnesse, he lifted his hand.

  "And you, sirs, who keep to your own coast, bethink ye that these navigants go of their own will into the perils of the sea, and the uncertainties of pagan lands. We hazard a little money upon Fortune, they risk their lives. For those who, by God's will, are not to return to this coast, whose sepulcher shall be the sea or pagan earth, let us offer our prayers."

  He bent his head, and the folk of Orfordnesse, amazed at his gentle words, followed his example in silence, harkening to the spluttering of the torches, the mild rustle of the wind in the foliage, and the sighing and muttering of the distant breakers. Perhaps it was the first time they had ever prayed for men who were yet living.

  Thorne waited until the last of the gentry had gone off in the coaches of the manor house, attended by linkmen. Then he allowed the innkeeper, who had a liking for gossip, to wash out the cut in his shoulder and wrap wet cloths around it. Which being done, he called for his horse.

  "Alack, Master Ralph, thou'lt not ride, wi' thy shoulder hacked and bloodied."

  Master Ralph, pacing the yard betwixt pump and threshold, offering no response, the fellow tried another tack.

  "The gentry be mortal angered at ye, angered as ever was! Thou'lt not be for London town, where the worshipful lords would set thy body on a gibbet. Or it may be a wrack, or e'en fire and
the stake."

  Abruptly-so quickly that the worthy keeper of the White Hart quivered in the ample region of his stomach-the armiger stopped his walk, close beside him.

  "Where is the nag?"

  The other muttered something about the horse being foundered and his men all beside themselves, what with the king's gentlemen and the Spanish lord.

  Thorne took up the lanthorn which Fulke had fetched with him.

  "Nay, I'll wait upon myself." And, glancing back a moment later, he was amused to see his stout host legging it around the tavern.

  Reflecting that he had gained, overnight, a reputation for violence, he sought the stables and halted to peer within the carriage house at the line of stalls in the rear. The horses were stamping and restless but he could not see any stable knaves.

  Thoughtfully he set the lanthorn down between his feet. The delay in bringing his horse out, the uneasiness of the beasts in the stalls, the alarm of the tavern keeper, all this bred in Thorne an undefinable suspicion.

  He was at some pains to make certain by listening and watching the shadows in the stable that no retainers of the Spaniard were awaiting him here.

  He was alone in the stable, but not at ease in his mind. Instinct urged him to turn and run through the door, or at least to look around. Instead, the armiger unbuckled the clasp that held his cloak at the throat. Still grasping the loosened ends he stepped forward, over the lanthorn, and let the long riding cloak fall. So it covered the light, and the stable was in darkness that same second.

  Thorne stepped to one side, his soft leather boots making no sound on the trodden earth, and laughed aloud. From one of the windows behind the carriages a pistol had blazed and roared, filling the place with smoke and setting the horses frantic.

  "A popper is no weapon for the dark, my masters," he cried. "Come in, with your cutters. The door is open."

  As he spoke he shifted position again, drawing his rapier and considering how to get himself out of this trap with a whole skin. With his injured arm extended to the full in front of him, and his sword drawn back ready for a thrust, he moved toward the entrance, through utter blackness. At once his groping fingers touched something that moved and started at his touch.