The Chronicles of Robin Hood (2 page)

Robin’s eyes moved quickly over the peaceful scene, and his heart was sore, for he loved Goddethorne; but there was scant time for vain regrets. From his post on the forest verge he could look right down into the distant garth, and there he saw figures that moved idly about, and one that lounged before the door of the corn-barn.

‘Are they bolted in?’ he demanded, without looking round.

‘No,’ replied Much. ‘They are bound hand and foot, and the abbot’s men have set a guard over them—or that was how it was when I came that way a few hours ago, and played the gaping half-wit for those devils’ benefit!’ And he laughed quietly as he remembered how he had tricked the swaggering men-at-arms into thinking him a harmless poke-my-nose.

‘Good!’ said Robin. ‘That will make our task the lighter.’ And so saying he moved off with quick, soundless steps, along the woodshore towards a thicket of hazel and young trees which stretched down to the very boundary of the hay-field. And Much went after him, wondering as he had often done before at the uncanny silence and swiftness with which the tall man passed among the tangled wilderness of goat-willow, elder, and traveller’s-joy without so much as the rustle of a leaf or the snap of a broken twig to mark his passing.

Only a few yards from where the thicket finally came to an end there rose an ancient thorn tree forming the end of a long hawthorn wind-break. Robin paused a moment among the hazel bushes, looking quickly from side to side; then he stepped out on to the open turf.
Much sped after him like a small, faithful shadow, and a moment later the two were crouching in the dry ditch in the lee of the wind-break. They went down it, bent double, with the thick-leaved hawthorn hedge between them and the steading, to the place where a narrow gap in the wind-break gave access to the bean-patch beyond. Once among the tall, tendrilled bean-plants they were safe from observation, with cover right up to the wall of the linhay and the barn beside it.

There was a window high in the linhay wall. It was only a lancet window, made for defence, like the arrow-slits in the outer walls of the cow-byres and the farmhouse itself; but this particular window had been enlarged a little for some purpose long since forgotten, and although it was narrow, it was long. Robin had wriggled through it often in his boyhood days, and he was fairly sure that he could do so now. He pointed it out to Much in the fading light, and stooped down.

‘Climb on to my shoulders,’ he whispered, ‘and I’ll raise you up so that you can get in.’

Much looked doubtfully up at the narrow window, but did as Robin bade him; and as soon as he was high enough he grasped the stone sill and drew himself up, and contrived to wriggle through into the hay-loft which formed the upper story of the linhay.

Robin handed up both bows, and then himself leaped for the sill. His hands gripped on the rough stones and his raw-hide shoes were soundless against the wall as he scrabbled for a well-remembered foothold and drew himself up. He had broadened more than he knew since last he came that way, and for one moment it seemed that he would not be able to force his way through; but he did
it at last, sideways, with his head screwed down on his shoulder and one leg left behind, and pitched down head-foremost on to a pile of fodder inside. And as he picked himself up, he knew that no matter what happened he would not be able to retreat by the way he had come.

Much was kneeling against the wall, and Robin gestured to him to remain where he was; then, holding a loose truss of hay before his head, he began to worm his way forward towards the open end of the loft. Inch by inch he wriggled forward, until he could look down over the edge of the rough floor and see the whole farm garth below him. The dusk was rising between the old walls, and the saffron flicker of mingled fire- and candle-light showed warm and welcoming through the windows of the house-place.

Sounds of coarse revelry splurged forth from those windows, for Sir Guy of Gisborne and the abbot’s men were making themselves at home on Robin’s beef and home-brewed perry, and he frowned as he listened to the uproar. The fading light was just strong enough to show him the whipping-post which had been set up close to the gate, with the ropes still lying beside it, and the figure of a man-at-arms who lounged before the barn door—and Trusty. Trusty lay in the light of the house-place window, with his head twisted at an unnatural angle over a dark stain where his blood had soaked into the beaten earth.

Robin remained very still for a long time, looking at the body of his faithful friend, and it seemed to him that the death of his dog stood for all the injustice and oppression that was rife in the land. And his rage began to sing within him as an arrow sings in flight; he wanted to leap
down into the garth and shout to the devils in his house to come out and fight; he wanted to kill every one of them as they had killed his dog. But he knew that he could not do that now; he was there to get his villeins away from the fate in store for them, and the abbot’s men would have to wait for another day. But as he began to worm his way back towards the rear of the linhay he swore in his heart that that day should come, and that henceforth his hand was against them and their kind, and the fat churchmen who were their masters, and the cruel lords who were as bad as the churchmen—because of the thing that they had done to Trusty and were doing to England.

A few moments later he was beside Much in the shadows, whispering his plan into the little man’s ear. For a short time they lay in silence, until the blue dusk at the open end of the linhay was deep enough to make it unlikely for any movement in the garth outside to catch the eye of the carousers in the house-place. Then Robin reached out and touched his companion, and they began to creep forward.

The man outside the barn door was growing restive and wanted his supper. He kept on turning to look at the lighted windows, muttering angrily under his breath; and it was in one of these moments, when his back was turned, that Robin leaped down from his hiding-place. The man heard the soft thud of landing feet behind him, but before he could turn or cry out Robin was upon him. There was no struggle as Robin slipped the knife blade cleanly under his ribs, and the man-at-arms collapsed with a grunt.

Next moment Much had dropped both bows into the driest part of the midden, where they would make no clatter on landing, and leaped down to join him.

‘The barn door—quick! You have your knife!’ Robin hissed, and as the little man sped to raise the heavy latch, he picked up his bow from its resting-place, and, fitting an arrow to the string, turned to face the farm-house. If anyone should come out, the candle-lit window would silhouette them for a moment and give him a mark to shoot at.

Behind him in the darkness of the barn he heard a faint whisper and a groan, and then soft footsteps over the threshing floor; and it seemed to him that Much and the other villeins were making enough noise to rouse the half-mile-distant village itself. But there came no hush in the thick babble of voices beyond the lighted windows, and no figure appeared in the doorway. And now the four villeins were beside him, like shadows in the dusk, and Much was already running for the gate.

There was a tiny grating sound as the heavy bar was lifted and the bolts drawn back; but Robin did not turn his head. He was moving backwards towards the now open gate, with his eyes on the flickering golden window-squares that had so recently meant home to him, and his arrow still nocked to his bowstring. Then the tall gate-timbers were on either side of them, and the next moment they were all outside, and Much, aided by one of the other villeins, was silently closing the gate and jamming it with the bar, which he had thoughtfully brought out with him for the purpose.

A few moments later Robin spoke to his five followers crouching in the ditch beyond the wind-break. ‘Listen, lads. You all have bows hidden under your pallets. Oh yes, I know you have. Go and get them. Get any other tools or weapons you have in your huts—food—anything
that might be of use to us. Be quick, and come back to me here.’ He detained one of the men as he rose in obedience. ‘Diccon, what of your wife?’

Diccon, the only married villein, said dully: ‘She has gone to her brother up t’village, Master. I did send her away yesterday when first we got news of you being outlawed.’

‘Good!’ Robin said. ‘Now go after your fellows—swiftly, lad.’ As the four figures sped away into the twilight he turned to Much, who crouched beside him in the ditch. ‘Much, my friend, an hour ago you said you would come to the Greenwood with me; but think, lad—there is still time; if you go back to your hut now, no one will think to connect you with this night’s work. For myself and my four farm-lads there is no way back, but for you the road is still open, if you take it in time.’

‘I will take no road back,’ said Much gruffly. ‘I will go with you to the Greenwood, Master Robin, if you’ll have me for your man.’

‘I will have you for my man, Much—very gladly,’ Robin said, and put out his hand to grip the other’s shoulder.

Silence fell between them. Robin was watching the low humps of the villeins’ huts in the gathering darkness, listening for any sound of discovery from the farmstead behind him. Once he and his little band had gained the shelter of the forest they would be safe, for no man-at-arms in all broad England could find Robert of Locksley in Barnesdale Forest—if he had no wish to be found. But between the villeins’ huts and the Greenwood there was a good space of open land, and he could not be content until it was crossed and the trees of the forest all about
them. So he heaved a sigh of relief as a figure detached itself from the nearest hut and came running towards him through the dimmit. Another followed it, another, and another, and the desperate small band was complete again.

Then Robin rose silently to his feet and went back by the way that he had come earlier that evening, along the wind-break and up through the hazel thicket to the sheltering darkness of the forest; and at his heels stole five shadows, less silent than he, for they were less skilled in the ways of the wilderness that was now to be their home.

Behind them rose a sudden yell, and a thunder of blows against the timbers of the jammed gate. But the great trees were already between them and the open country, and the mazy fastnesses of the Greenwood closed about them.

Later that evening, in a clearing several miles from Goddethorne, in the very heart of Barnesdale Forest, the six men faced each other round a fire they had built of hastily-gathered branches. They had eaten a very scanty supper, for of the small amount of food that the villeins had been able to bring from their huts something must be set aside for the next day, and they were still hungry. They had left behind them the life and the fields that they and their forefathers had known for generations; the four farm villeins were dazed by the rush of the day’s events, and in pain from the brutal flogging they had received that morning; and they sat staring dumbly into the fire which lit their weary faces with a fitful golden radiance.

Much was taking stock of their possessions: six bows and two-and-twenty arrows (five of them clumsily made),
three spare bow-strings, a reaping-hook, a leather bucket, a rusty sword, a wooden platter, two coils of hempen rope, an old brown cloak, his own and Robin’s hunting-knives, some pieces of bread, and a little coarse flour. Little enough, but it would suffice until they could come by more.

Robin sat with his hands locked round his updrawn knees, looking from one to another of his little band with a very kindly eye.

‘Lads,’ said he at last, ‘Diccon, Barnaby, Gurth, Watkin—thank you for trying to defend Goddethorne for me.’

Barnaby shook his head slowly. ‘Us did what us could, Master Robin—us and Trusty. But ’twas little enough us could do with sticks and stones ’gainst they devils. And they killed old Trusty.’ Barnaby was the cowman, and he had worked Trusty since the dog was a half-grown pup, and loved him almost as well as did Robin himself.

‘Aye, they killed old Trusty,’ Robin said, half under his breath; then he rose, and stood looking down at the five faces in the firelight. ‘It is the Greenwood for us now, lads. There is no place for us in the world of men any longer, and to-morrow you also will be outlaws and wolfsheads, with every man’s hand against you.’

There was a fierce muttering from the men around the fire, and Watkin, who was older than the rest, spoke for them. ‘Us don’t care for that, Master, if you will lead us.’

‘Lead you?’ cried Robin. ‘Then listen to me, lads, for if I am to lead you I will not have you become like the robbers who make honest men’s lives a terror. Firstly, you shall harm no woman, nor any man in woman’s company, for the sake of Mary the Mother of Our Lord.
Secondly, you shall not rob or molest any poor man or honest yeoman who works for his bread as you and I have worked; nor any poor knight errant; nor any child. But against the rich merchants and the barons and pot-bellied churchmen who trample the weak beneath their feet and scoop the poor possessions of humble folk into their greedy pouches, you may do what you will. Thus, and thus only, will I be your leader. Men of the Greenwood, do you accept my terms?’ His voice had grown louder as he spoke, and his last words rang through the midnight forest like a challenge to oppression and injustice.

The men answered him gladly, fiercely: ‘We accept your terms, and we will have you for our leader, Robin of Barnesdale.’ They scrambled to their feet and came to him one by one; and there, kneeling beside the fire, each man set his hands between Robin’s in token of fealty and swore to be true to him and to each other, to the death if need be.

Afterwards they lay down around the fire and, being worn out with the day’s events, for the most part were soon asleep. But for a long time Robin lay wakeful on his back, staring up at the stars which sparkled here and there through the branches, and listening to the stealthy night-sounds of the forest, thinking about Goddethorne—and Trusty—and wondering very much what the future held for himself and his little band, and making plans for their betterment, until at last he too fell asleep.