The Forest Laird(70)

“Something was different there,” he continued, “something was amiss, and we didn’t know what at first. And then we turned a corner into the marketplace and it was all but empty, save for a half-dozen people who immediately stopped what they were doing—they were huddled together over something we couldn’t see—and turned to look at us. They looked frightened, and guilty, and that’s when Will recognized what was wrong. They were afraid of us, though we couldna tell right then what was frightening them. But they werena talking, and they certainly werena laughing. It was scarce midmorning, and the stalls were all quiet and the only other people there at all were soldiers.

“‘These folk think we’re English,’ Will said to me, watching them. ‘They’re afraid of us. It’s our bows. They’ve taken us for English archers, and no wonder. Look over there—half the men on the other side of the square are archers, dressed just like us.’ He was right, and I hadn’t noticed it until that moment. He held up a hand and stood watching the group of folk in front of us, and when they were all looking at him, waiting for him to do or say something else, he raised his hand a little higher. ‘We’re not Englishmen,’ he says, just loud enough for them to hear. ‘No matter how you think we look, we are Scots like you. We carry English bows, but that means nothing. We are merely passing through on our way south to Jedburgh. What has been happening here?’”

“I thought for a while that no one was going to answer him, but then one of them, he looked like the oldest man among them, looked from one to the other of us. ‘Come forward,’ he says, ‘and see for yourselves what’s happening.’ So we did. There was a young fellow among them, lying on a stall table and covered in blood, and they were trying to stop him bleeding. I was able to help them with that, and once we had the bleeding stopped it didna take us long to find out what had happened.

“The old man—his name was Nichol—told us the English had discovered a new game with quarterstaves and were having a grand time with it. It had started earlier, in another town, but word of it had spread quickly so that everyone now knew what was involved. Gangs of English soldiery would swagger through a town, driving the local men ahead of them the way beaters drive game, until they thought they had gathered enough victims for their sport. Then they would round in their prey and the games would begin. The rules were very simple. Two English soldiers would compete in a bout of staves, watched by an audience of mixed Scots and English. When the bout was over, the quarterstaff being an English weapon, the Scots were invited to try them out. Any Scot who dared was encouraged to knock down a braced English soldier by hitting him across the shoulders. Should he fail, there was no penalty other than the recognition of the fact that the Scots were no match for Englishmen in the use of an English weapon. Should he succeed, on the other hand, he would be rewarded with a silver groat for his accomplishment.”

“That sounds fair enough,” I said.

He raised a hand to silence me. “But the Scots could not win, because the weapons they used were flawed.”

I frowned. “How can a quarterstaff be flawed? It’s essentially a club.”

“True, but even a club can be weakened. When they finally found someone who was willing to try for the groat—and believe me, they made a grand business of provoking people, challenging their manhood, insulting them, and questioning their bravery—the contenders were offered their choice of any of the staffs carried by the soldiery. The weapons were laid out on the ground and their owners stepped away from them. The locals were unsuspicious. They had just watched the English soldiers laying about each other with the same weapons.

“Yet two groups of Englishry were mingled there, one carrying sound, solid weapons that they used to fight each other, and the others carrying weakened staves that were used to gull the locals. So some young fellow, like the one we found bleeding in the marketplace, would eventually take up a staff and smash it across the armoured shoulders of the Englishman who stood there waiting for the blow. But every weapon laid out for the young man’s choice had been cut diagonally, and the damage skilfully disguised. So when the hapless dupe, encouraged by everyone, swung the wretched thing at full strength against the armoured man’s back, the staff shattered, the jagged, broken end rebounding viciously to strike the unarmoured Scot, drawing blood most times and frequently inflicting brutal damage, to the great amusement of the watching English …”

A shadow fell across the table between us, and I looked up to see a pretty young woman gazing down at us, her body tilted sideways against the weight of the great wooden jug she balanced against her hip. “You two are deeply into something,” she said, flashing us both a merry grin. “It must be thirsty work, talking so much. Will I pour you some more ale?”