I poured him another goblet of wine and he nodded his thanks before continuing: ‘Our father died shortly after Robin was declared outlaw. Some said it was of a broken heart. The old baron loved Robin best of all his three boys, though he was the youngest. He never much cared for William and me, and had the old bastard lived he would have probably persuaded the King to give Robin a pardon, I think. But the Archbishop of York, the saintly Roger de Pont L’Eveque, insisted that Robin be punished to the full extent of the law for having foully murdered one of his servants. And, as Robin would not come in from the forest to face judgement, he was declared outlaw by the Archbishop. Soon after that, the old baron had a seizure and died, and William, our eldest brother, took over his lands. Then Archbishop Roger died. But, by then, Robin had a list of serious crimes to his name a yard long, and Ralph Murdac was after his blood.
‘Neither Robin nor I are close to William, though he is only two years older than me. He is everything that Robin is not: pious, mean, timid, cautious and respectful of authority. He’s something of a shit-weasel, to be honest.’ I was slightly shocked to hear Hugh talk of his older brother in this way. And he seemed to sense this through the wine.
‘To William’s credit,’ Hugh continued, ‘he has made Robin a standing offer: surrender to him and he will intercede with the law, and try to get leniency. Robin’s not interested, of course; he’d much rather negotiate from a position of strength, which is why he does all this.’ He made a sweeping gesture with his hands at the hundreds of happy, red-glowing faces at the tables to our left and right. ‘Robin would rather have a private army at his back, a couple of hundred loyal men-at-arms, and a dozen barrels of silver to spend when he asks for a royal pardon. And he’s right, too.’ He took a deep swig of wine. ‘He’s always right, you see, always. Not like me. I’m always wrong. Always in the wrong.’ His drunkenness was entering the self-pitying stage.
‘So how did you come to be with Robin in the forest?’ I pushed him.
‘Because of a woman, of course,’ said Hugh. And he laughed, his head hanging loose between his shoulders, chuckling and chortling until his noises began to sound more like sobs. Then cuffing his face with his sleeve, he turned his bleary eyes to me and asked: ‘Have you ever been in love, Alan?’ He didn’t wait for an answer. ‘You
He paused there and stared at me but I said nothing. I wanted him to continue but I felt the belligerence in his tone, the truculence of the self-pitying drunk, and I knew enough to stay silent.
‘I was in love,’ he said, after little a while, ‘with the most beautiful woman in the world. Most beautiful girl in the world. Jeanne was her name and she was the daughter of Richard de Brewister. Oh God, she was beautiful!’ He took another sip of wine and straightened his shoulders, trying to sober himself. ‘I was Lord de Brewister’s chamberlain. I ran his household, kept his accounts — oh, five or six years ago now — and it was there that I fell in love with Jeanne. She loved me, too. And when Jeanne became with child, I wanted to marry her but Sir Richard wouldn’t hear of our union. He had set his sights higher, on an Earl or a Duke, not the second son of a minor baron, a mere clerk. He sent me away, in disgrace; the unfeeling bastard, he sent me back to William. And he sent her to a nunnery, where she was to bear the child, in secret. It was a boy. But I heard. . I was told. . that God took them both during the birth.’
He had broken down and was weeping openly now, the tears running down his long face, and I was embarrassed for him. When he had been my stern teacher at Thangbrand’s, I had never seen him drunk, never seen him so vulnerable. I wanted to get away from him, to flee from his humiliation but, instead, I put my arm clumsily around his shoulders, and he seemed to draw some comfort from it. So I asked what happened next.
‘I was so unhappy after she died, I couldn’t settle. Back at Edwinstowe, I was just a hearth knight, the younger brother of the lord. I would never inherit anything, I’d never be allowed to marry, I would just live out my life in his shadow, existing on his generosity, on the scraps from his table. I was desperate. I thought about taking Holy Orders — I have always tried to love God with all my heart, and to serve Him, but William wouldn’t allow it. He wanted me close at hand, a grateful dependent, living on his largesse, for ever. I think deep down he hates me. But then Robin summoned me. He reached out from the forest to save me.’
Hugh made an effort to compose himself. He sniffed and dabbed at his red eyes with a linen napkin. Then he blew his nose with a loud trumpeting sound. ‘Robin needed me, you see. His band had really grown; from just him and a few friends waylaying travellers in Sherwood to the whole complicated circus you see today: with safe houses, and informers, and his travelling court, delivering his justice to the people. He’s just like a king, in fact, deciding the fate of hundreds, maybe thousands of people, he’s got a decent treasury, he makes loans to distressed knights, to merchants, he practically has his own army. . And he asked
The feasting went on long into the afternoon and early evening, with jugglers and acrobats and fire-eaters entertaining the diners long after they were full to bursting. And, as a full moon began to rise in the night sky, I staggered away from the table, my stomach tight as a drum, and went back to the cave to find my warm straw bed. I left Hugh snoring at the table, his long balding head resting on his arms.
I awoke after only a few hours. The big moon was high in the sky outside the cave but it was not the moonlight that had awakened me. Some of the men were moving about in the cave, quietly, almost stealthily, dressing in warm clothes and moving in ones and twos out of the entrance and into the night. All was quiet except the soft rustling of fur cloaks and woollen surcoats as the men dressed and made their way out into the bright moonlit night. I was curious. Where were they going at this hour? Many outlaws were still curled up and snoring, oblivious, but I decided to follow the men and see what I could see. So I jumped up, pulled on a big hooded cloak with wide sleeves over my shirt and followed them.
There must have been half a hundred men and women walking away from the cave and the crude huts of the visitors and into the wood. It was an eerie sight after that boisterous day, but everyone was silent, almost reverent as they walked away from the hearth fires and into the dark, wild wood. Gripped by a sense of excitement, I pulled the hood of the cloak well forward over my face, and followed the silent crowd. I felt part of some great and solemn secret as I walked along behind two outlaws I knew slightly, through the trees along an old path much overgrown with creepers and brambles, the path indicated by small candles set into the forks of trees at regular intervals. Once we were deep in the wood, I caught up with the two men and they greeted me with nods but no words and somehow I knew instinctively that I should not sully the night with my questions. We walked for the best part of an hour in silence following the path of candlelight ahead and then, all of a sudden, we came out of the woodland to the edge of a piece of wild moorland, and I could not suppress a gasp of surprise. It was the moorland of my feverish nightmare at Brigid’s, with the great grey stone exactly as I had dreamed it, the slanting shape of the ancient rock pointing at the same angle to the sky. But there were the shapes of about fifty dark-robed figures, hooded and solemn, surrounding the ancient stone before which was burning a great fire; and strapped to that great granite rock, naked, gagged, illuminated by the flickering flames and with his eyes huge with terror was the prisoner Piers.
Chapter Twelve
As I stared at Piers, a drum began to beat; a slow heavy regular booming that sounded like the heartbeat of a giant beast. I was glad of my cloak’s deep hood, and I pulled it even further forward, for I did not want to catch the poor wretch’s eye. Or look anyone full in the face. It was shame, I suppose. I knew now why Robin had preserved this enemy soldier, this traitorous former outlaw, and my blood ran cold as I realised the blasphemous cruelty that was to be perpetrated this night. But for some reason I could not move; could not protest. I did nothing but watch with mounting horror as the ungodly ritual unfolded. And when it was over, when I was tormented by the voice of my conscience, I excused myself with the thought that I could have done nothing to save his life in a crowd of fifty blood-lusting pagans; that to try to disrupt that Satanic ceremony could have led to my own death and would have served no purpose. But the truth is darker than that. I did nothing but watch because a part of me,
