He shook his head in disgust. ‘Turks, no.’ He said. ‘Turks and Turcoman not all good archer. Some fall off horse. Horses. Yes? But Kipchak and Mon-ghul ride, shoot, always win.’ He shrugged. ‘Not always. Yes? But many.’
Juan pursed his lips. ‘Yes, John,’ he said.
John was not the only Christian Turk, not by a long chalk. As I later found, the Greek Emperor had a whole regiment of them, and so did some of the lords of Achaea and Romania. But his archery was superb and the tales of his prowess circulated rapidly. Some of our crusaders came to see him shoot and to wager on him. I confess I made a fair packet on him one afternoon, wagering with a dozen former brigands as the marks were moved farther and farther away.
A new shipload – a great round ship – of crusaders had come from Venice. It had aboard a number of Gascons and some other French and German knights. I hadn’t met them yet, but they all came to watch the archery and complain of the heat.
One of crusader knights was d’Herblay. With him as a full retinue of men I knew – some well, like young Chretien d’Albret, who remembered me as a routier only slightly less barbaric than Camus, and many Gascons, Bretons, and Savoyards men-at-arms who clearly viewed me as their lord did, as an enemy. Gascons are the touchiest people on the face of the world. They hate each other, and everyone else, in equal parts, and when one of them achieves a measure of fame, they expect to be treated like Charlemagne and Lancelot all rolled into one. The Bretons were hard men who said little and scowled much. The Savoyards were veteran men-at-arms.
And they were with the Comte d’Herblay. Young d’Albret wore his colours, so that I had some warning that the man was present.
I wanted d’Herblay dead – humiliated and dead. But there was more to it than that. Even while John the Turk took their money with his archery, I was watching them. They swore, they blasphemed, and perhaps more important, their clothing was slovenly and their jupons were all spattered with the rust of their maille, which they probably didn’t trouble to clean over much. The Order drilled its knights and volunteers every day; these crusaders never seemed to practice at all. They ate, they drank, they gambled, and they fornicated. Their state pressed through my hatred of d’Herblay.
These were bad men.
Very like the man I’d once been.
D’Herblay paid over his debt on his wager with a poor grace. ‘And when did you become a little priest, Gold?’ he asked. ‘Have you discovered little boys? Are you pimping for the Pope?’ He nodded and smiled his ironic smile. ‘Of course you are not dead. Of course. When a gentleman wants something done right—’
‘He needs to have the courage to do it himself,’ I said.
I was curious to find that his taunts had very little impact. In a camp in Provençe in fifty-seven or fifty-eight, those words would have sent me into a rage. Here, I looked at Juan, who was hard by, and he rolled his eyes. You must imagine us, in our sober brown gowns, neat and clean as new-made pins, and these rust-stained brigands. D’Herblay was himself well dressed, in incongruous and sweat-matted fur and wool. But his men looked like the scrapings of a particularly rancid barrel.
‘You used to have the name of being a fighter, Gold,’ d’Herblay said.
‘I would be delighted,’ I said carefully, ‘to fight you at any time.’
He flashed his fake smile.
‘Daggers, right now?’ I offered.
Juan put his hand on my arm. ‘The order would cast you out. And perhaps excommunicate you.’
‘I don’t give a fuck,’ I said. Ten minute with them, and I was becoming one of them again.
D’Herblay stepped back among his men-at-arms. ‘And be knifed in the back by your thugs?’ he said.