No Man's Son

by Doris Sutcliffe Adams

  The sentinels slithered down from the crests in spurts of shining sand. The three remounted and started south. Landry had contrived during the day to speak with one of the Turcoples, the country-born light horsemen who scouted for the army, and knew roughly where to find the vast Saracen encampment, which would in any case be hard to miss. More important, he had learned that the Saracens were as little as the Franks in the habit of regularly patrolling their outskirts, confirming him in his frequently uttered opinion that armies all the world over differed not at all in their standards of incompetence.

  “Scout round when someone cannot sleep or wants to exercise his horses, and for the rest leave it to Heaven,” he pronounced. “And I reckon the Infidel councils are just such a wrangle of snarling jealousies as King Richard’s, but at least Saladin is spared a rival of higher estate and lesser gifts peevishly undoing all his labours, so the advantage is his. And now silence, all of you.”

  Their ghostly column threaded through the maze of wind-heaped hills, the horses sinking fetlock-deep, the men ploughing over ankles in the loose dry sand. The moon shone in their faces, undimmed by any trace of cloud in the desert sky. For what seemed hours they pressed silently southward, with only the faint jingle of bridles and creak of leather to emphasise the stillness. Far away in the night jackals wailed, an eerie quavering that lifted the hairs on one’s nape.

  Landry halted the horses and made a sign to one of the four young men, who scrambled on all fours up the treacherous face of a dune, sliding back at every step, until he could thrust his head over the summit and cling there by his elbows. He remained for a moment and then slid back in an avalanche of sand, and plunged to his master’s stirrup to report in an undertone.

  “Lights, my lord, south-east. A great multitude.”

  They went on more cautiously than before. The four brothers ranged ahead, climbing every now and then to win a clear view of their objective. Presently Pablo signalled them to halt and look for themselves. Landry, Piers and Rodriga floundered to the top of a dune, where they lay flat on their bellies with their elbows hooked over the summit and their toes dug in below, sand trickling along their flanks in a rustling whisper. Rodriga’s heart thudded against her ribs.

  Lights by the thousand, tents as thick as trees in a forest, dark patches of sound and movement that must be horse-lines, filled her eyes and ears and flattened her to the sand. The wind, blowing to her across the plain, bore the mingled stinks of men and horses, goats and camels to her nostrils. Then the first impression of impregnable might passed, and she began to pick out details. The great main encampment lay beyond her to the south-east, a confusion of dimming fires and dark tents, with the occasional lighted one shining like a lamp among its neighbours, but outposts had been crowded out from it into the hollows of the dunes. An odd, homely simile came to her mind; it was as if someone had emptied a pailful of water on the ground, making one great central pool with armlets running out in all directions, and around its verge isolated splashes. She began to look for one of the latter, that should not be beyond the capacity of her father’s little troop.

  Landry saw it before she did, touched her arm and pointed. She saw a group of one large and three small tents, snugly set in a valley between the sandhills, within sight of the main camp but apart from it. Horses were picketed in a double line, between a dozen and a score, which, allowing for the Saracens’ lavish use of fresh mounts in battle, suggested reasonable odds. They were not seeking glory, but loot, without loss. They would incidentally strike a blow for the Holy Sepulchre and slay as many Infidels as they could, but that was not their first concern.

  They walked the horses closer, circling round until they could climb another dune and look down on the camp. The large tent was still lighted. Its occupants were in no haste to sleep; someone was playing a wailing outlandish tune on an instrument that sounded like a flute, and a voice joined it in a weird chant. A couple of dark figures moved among the horses, and another crouched over the flameless glow of a dry dung fire. A shadow moved on the lighted wall. A jackal among the dunes howled so that goose-flesh rose on Rodriga’s skin, and further off another answered.

  A horse whinnied not far away, and the Catalans caught at the nostrils of their three mounts to prevent them from answering. They held their breath, hearts thumping and hands on weapons, as a small party of unseen horsemen jingled through the sandhills. The slight sounds of their passing faded, and they saw the moving dark blot emerge onto the plain further south and go towards the main encampment. Landry drew an audible sigh of relief and muttered instructions. Rodriga, the three bridles over her arm, knelt with her head just topping the crest and watched the men go. A low command, and they plunged soundlessly down the dark-shadowed face of the dune, the sand sliding and falling with them.

  The four brothers separated out and ran for the horses, slashing picket-lines and seizing halters. Their two guardians were cut down immediately. Ramiro leaped at the cook, who fell kicking across his fire, flopped over and never moved again, and then at the dark tents, slashing ropes so that they collapsed in a welter of poles and cloth. Landry and Piers shouldered into the largest tent. Wild shadows leaped and swooped on the glowing walls, the flailing blows enormous and savage. She heard a screech that choked into a gurgle, the tent lurched as something dark thumped against a wall and slid down it, and then the blows were done. The shadows stooped and grabbed. Rodriga drew free breath and glanced at the horse-lines. Four riders were up and astride, clutching halters to subdue plunging, terrified horses, and Ramiro was running to join them.

  Her courser Caliph suddenly snorted softly and jerked at the bridle. His head was up, his ears pricked forward, his nostrils quivering as he scented something that was behind her and no part of the struggle below. Rodriga came to her feet, dropped the bridles and slithered down, lifting her javelin for a cast. If more than one foe lurked behind her she would scream the alarm, but she doubted that there could be, or she would have been rushed already. For a single enemy she disdained to interrupt the men; he would come no nearer than was needful to make sure her aim, and die before his spitted body struck the sand.

  “Stay your hand, my lady. I yield,” said a low voice that had become familiar, and a thin dark figure twisted snake-like over a crest and slid feet-first to the bottom about ten paces from her. He started to rise, but she swung her javelin back in menace, and he sat still, his hands outspread and plainly empty of weapons, his eyes glinting in his bearded face.

  “Not a move or a sound, or you die!” she hissed, her heart hammering fearfully as she thought of the others scuffling below. She dared not turn her eyes away to see how they fared; she had seen the speed with which this venomous serpent could hurl himself into attack. Her strained ears caught only the neighing and squealing of frightened horses struggling to break away; no alarm had then been given.

  “If I intended to betray you I should have done it already,” Marco calmly pointed out.

  That was obvious, and Rodriga scowled acknowledgment. “What Devil brought you here?” she whispered violently.

  “No diabolic aid was necessary, my lady. I followed you.”

  “You knew—”

  “My lady, you exaggerate the pains the Devil will take to assist his servants. I departed no further than behind your tent until I had overheard your father’s plans.”

  She gave a little gasp of outrage. Then her inconvenient sense of humour seized upon this impudence, and all at once she was neither angry nor afraid, but struggling to hide untimely laughter. The imperturbable scoundrel still sat in the full moonlight with his thin face upturned to hers, apparently untroubled by the threat of her javelin, though he made no move that might be reckoned a provocation. She was fully prepared to kill him, she would not blunder at this range, and he knew it. Marco would never under-rate an enemy.

  A penetrating whistle tore through the night, Landry’s signal to her and to his men. Marco no longer mattered; it was too late to betray them now. She leaped
to the horses, caught up the bridles and sprang like a boy to Caliph’s back. When she looked again the renegade, as she had half-expected, had vanished. Yells sounded faintly from the valley. A mob of horses and riders were plunging up to where she waited, a dozen horses at least, bolting in panic. The riders straddled their mounts bareback, and led the loose horses by rope halters; they clutched oddly shaped bundles under their arms and to their breasts, and over all the noise, now augmented by the clangour of gongs and cymbals and the blare of trumpets, she could hear Landry laughing.

  She drew beside him with her own charges, and he reached to thrust an awkwardly cornered and weighty mass of link-mail into her arms. She deduced it was a small casket bundled into a chain-hauberk, and hastily made it fast to her saddle-horn as they galloped into the heart of the dunes. There was uproar behind, but yet no sound of pursuit; it would take the Saracens a little time to discover what had happened at the isolated camp and organise a chase to avenge it. They pounded north, avoiding the direct route to Acre where several hundred horsemen would soon be hunting them.

  The loose sand dragged at the hooves and sobered the newly taken horses so that their first panic subsided. Gradually their riders were able to achieve control, to steady the headlong rush to a trot and then to a walk. They halted after a mile or more to let Landry and Piers change to their own horses and the familiar stability of a saddle. The clamour of cymbals and trumpets came thin and faint through the night.

  “The horses will pay for the venture,” Landry pronounced cheerfully, “if we get them to Acre.”

  “It is inadvisable,” said a deep quiet voice at their backs, “to return as one came on these occasions.”

  Piers swore and reached for his sword, but Marco had thoughtfully placed himself beyond Rodriga, out of the men’s immediate reach. He was now astride a trim and graceful Arab mare, and his cool effrontery in joining them won her appreciation even as she poised her javelin.

  “What devil spewed you among us?” demanded Landry, hastily dropping the halter he held and reaching for his sword. He peered almost incredulously at the dark shape beyond his daughter.

  “The Devil leaves some matters to our own enterprise,” Marco answered. “And that was sound advice. I will venture my own neck on it.”

  “What treachery do you brew now?” Piers cried violently, swinging his courser about on his haunches and making for him round behind the other two, who also wheeled to face the renegade. The squire’s sword glittered like a bar of solid moonlight in his hand.

  Marco folded his hands demurely on the mare’s neck. She sidled nervously, her bit jingling. “Treachery? After the aid I have just offered? Truly Christians have no gratitude!” he mocked.

  “Gratitude?” he spat. “Why are you here, whoreson recreant?”

  “It seemed that the venture might provide entertainment,” Marco said blandly.

  Piers snarled and heaved up his sword, but Landry, who was too seasoned a soldier to be distracted from essentials, swung an arm across his chest to halt him and signalled to the Catalans to start the horses. He followed, Piers sulkily obeyed an imperative gesture, and Rodriga herded Marco up behind them without needing a word of instruction. Landry spoke over his shoulder, his voice grimly jocular.

  “The first treacherous move, you hound, and you will learn what entertainment there is in cold steel!”

  “If I had intended treachery I had no need to come within its reach. I had only to lift my voice, back yonder.”

  “So you had,” admitted Landry, who was handicapped by a strong sense of justice. “I trust the entertainment is worth the trouble—or have you the incomparable impertinence to claim a share of the loot?”

  “I leave that to your conscience,” Marco answered, and Rodriga regrettably giggled in appreciation. She lowered her javelin, but held it balanced across her pommel for an instant lunge. Probably the fellow had told the truth; he might well have made the crack-brained venture through sheer delight in mischief. He set no value on his life, and he possessed an odd, unaccountable sense of humour.

  Piers, still clutching his sword in a faintly foolish fashion, swore again. “Why are we parleying with this renegade, instead of cutting his throat before he betrays us?” he demanded.

  “How admirably you exemplify Christian justice!” Marco murmured.

  “Put that sword up until I bid you draw it!” Landry commanded him. He obeyed. Landry pushed into the lead, and the Catalans fell back with the loose horses. They plunged steadily through the sand, leaving the noises of pursuit behind. Marco rode serenely beside Rodriga, apparently oblivious of her ready javelin, and of Piers’s seething resentment and the Catalans menacing him from the rear. The captured horses now seemed reconciled to the strangers and to the scent of spilled blood that must linger about them; they could not be unaccustomed to the latter if they had been ridden in battle.

  The soft sand muffled any sound of hooves, and they were taken by surprise when one of the mares threw up her head and whinnied loudly in greeting. She was answered from ahead. They halted, listening intently, and heard the jingle and rattle of a considerable company approaching rapidly. Landry gestured with his left hand and started his horse into a walk, westward towards Acre. One of the advancing horses whinnied. A distant voice challenged them in Arabic.

  It had been decided that in this contingency Ramiro should answer, but Marco forestalled him. He shouted that there had been a Christian raid and asked whether any riders had passed. His first word almost won him the point of Rodriga’s javelin between short ribs and hipbone, but she checked herself just as it entered flesh, realising barely in time what he was about. Another voice replied across the intervening dunes that nothing had been heard but the distant alarm. Marco shouted his thanks, informed the troop that they had overshot their quarry and must try to cut off the Unbelievers before they could reach Acre, and finished with a string of elaborate curses that sounded uncommonly convincing. They were ploughing westwards as fast as the horses could take them, and the answering good wishes came faint and thin after them.

  Landry released his hold on the squire’s sword-arm, which he had been grappling grimly since Marco opened his lips. He uttered a grunt of relief.

  “My lady, you may now take your javelin out of my ribs,” Marco said calmly.

  “Merciful God!” exclaimed Rodriga, shaken by what she had come near doing. “When you opened your mouth it was all but through them! Why did you not warn us?”

  “No time.”

  “But if I had not understood Arabic I should have thought you betrayed us!”

  “I knew you understood it, my lady, and took the chance.” He sounded amused, though he was feeling at his side that she had pricked.

  “But—but we speak Arabic! Ramiro would have answered—”

  “Arabic of Spain, my lady,” he corrected her, and chuckled softly.

  Suddenly comprehension came to Rodriga, and with it a peculiar suspicion which solidified to certainty. Marco had foreseen that very need, and it was his true reason for joining their venture. In view of the killer’s known character that seemed incredible, but no other solution fitted the facts. She had put no faith in his expressions of gratitude, but she had misjudged him; he had proved his sincerity by this service.

  Similar comprehension had come to Landry, for he slapped his thigh with his open hand and uttered a somewhat chagrined oath. “Lord Above! Never thought you might prove worth leaving alive!” Marco nodded acknowledgment of that gracious concession. Piers, who had been fondling his hilt and cursing under his breath, raised his voice to protest that nothing justified that omission, but Landry would have none of it.

  “Praiseworthy it would doubtless be to cleanse Acre of him,” he stated in his forthright fashion, regardless of Marco’s feelings, “but this night he has earned reprieve. A truce until we are inside the trenches, and then it is no concern of mine who slays whom.” Rodriga looked from one to the other of the antagonists, her mind troubled. Piers was her
friend, but justice acknowledged that the renegade had shown greater forbearance tonight, and she could not regard his extermination as a laudable sanitary measure. When the motive was personal hatred the deed could wear no other name but murder, and if Piers attempted it he would stain his honour as well as imperil his life. She let him draw a few yards ahead with her father, and then said very softly in Arabic, “He means to kill you at the first chance.”

  “He will not,” Marco assured her. After a moment he added, “Have no fear, my lady. I shall not harm him.”

  He read her all too accurately, and her skin burned to a blush so that she was glad of the night. She muttered disjointedly, “I did not mean—I would not wish—” and then checked; excuses made matters worse.

  “My lady, I thank you for the warning, but I do not imagine it was prompted by concern for me,” he answered dryly. She could not deny it. Throughout the Christian camp his killing would be applauded as a long-overdue act of scavenging. Yet he had this night, unasked, done them all considerable service. He had received very little in the way of thanks, either.

  “I would not see you harmed,” she said stiffly. That was true.

  He turned his neat black head against the moonlight, that made it but a shape cut from black shadow. “I believe you, my lady,” he said quietly. “Your foolish cub is safe from me.”

  CHAPTER V

  The light of the sinking moon silvered the dunes, casting dense black shadows over their landward slopes. Along the shore the surf glimmered white, and the path of the moon was silver on the dark face of the bay. The walls and towers of Acre stood stark black against the radiance, with the vague black mass of the camp sprawling about it. Here and there lights glowed like sparks. A wind breathed from the dunes behind them, giving an illusion of coolness. Rodriga was sweating slightly with nervousness, and shivered a little as it touched her.