But Robin’s troop were oblivious to their fleeing foes; they had already begun to loot the baggage train with a gleeful lack of restraint that reminded me of a pack of wild dogs on a fresh sheep carcass. That dusty stretch of forest-hemmed road rang with the joyful shouts of men-at-arms, the crunch of axes as they knocked the locks from money chests and opened wide holes in the heads of wine barrels. Handfuls of bright coins were thrown through the air – causing a scramble wherever they landed. Blood-red wine was guzzled like water. Precious silks and gold-embroidered cloths flapped in the light breeze, the men wrapping themselves in priceless materials and parading and prancing for the amusement of their friends. Gold and silver vessels were grabbed, examined, briefly admired and then used to scoop more dark wine from the opened barrels. There were snatches of singing and bawdy jests – some men had found stores of food and were cramming choice morsels, preserved fruits, fine cheeses, pickled vegetables into their mouths; some men already seemed to be drunk. From time to time I heard a woman’s scream, and tried to close my ears. It reminded me of the last day of a raucous county fair at the end of summer, with food and wine abundant, the smell of sweat and animal dung and easy money in the air, and brightly coloured, fabulous trade goods that tugged the eye wherever you looked. Every Locksley man seemed madly happy, seeing himself rich and carefree for the rest of his days.
And that included Robin himself.
‘My lord,’ I said, ‘what about the French army?’
‘Hmm? What about it?’ My master was distracted. He suddenly bellowed: ‘I want piles here and here of all the gold and silver items, silks too – any item worth more than … oh, I don’t know, one shilling, is to be collected over there; and any bastard who steals from it will be flayed alive; I swear it. John, get them organized will you. The rest of the damned army will be here before long. We must hurry.’
‘My lord, the French.’
‘What about the damn French?’ Robin rounded on me.
‘We should be pursuing them, my lord. We have our orders: to harry them, to chase them and to stop for nothing. We must leave this wagon train until later, and keep on pressing the French.’
‘Are you mad?’ Robin rarely raised his voice in anger but his bull-bellow at my quiet words nearly lifted me off my feet. ‘Leave all this? Abandon the spoils to Mercadier’s scum? Have you taken leave of your senses?’
‘My lord, we have our orders. It is our sacred duty to the King.’ I did not care to be shouted at, and my own tone to the Earl of Locksley had become cold and formal.
Robin controlled himself: his silver eyes glittered at me dangerously. ‘Do not seek to instruct me in my duty, Sir Alan. I command this battle of men. Not you. And you will remember that. If you wish to go chasing off across country after the fleeing French – I will wish you Godspeed, otherwise you will hold your tongue – and learn to obey my orders. Do you hear me? I have had quite enough of your schoolboy morality, your endless talk of right and wrong. Of my damned duty. From now on you will be silent.’
The sensible thing to have done would have been to have held my tongue. But, of course, young and reckless as I was, I did not do that. My eyes clouded with rage, I said: ‘I, at least, am obedient to my King. I am his loyal man, even if you are not!’ And with that I turned Ghost and began to walk him up the line of the wagons, past the drunken, joyful Locksley men who were happily wallowing in their extraordinary good fortune. I came across Hanno by a huge barrel of ale: he had smashed in the top with his fighting axe and was downing huge draughts of the brown liquid from a golden, jewel-encrusted chalice.
‘Come, Hanno; we have our orders from the King,’ I said pompously. ‘We must pursue the French.’ Hanno stared at me with sheer disbelief. His stubbled jaw fell agape, exposing the yellow-grey wreckage of his teeth, the golden cup held loosely in his hand. Then he tilted his head on one side, and looked down at the ale barrel, and then at the magnificent jewelled vessel in his hands.
‘Come, Hanno, we must be quick,’ I said. A large part of me recognized my unbelievable stupidity – there was a small fortune in silver coins alone scattered about Ghost’s hooves – and yet I could not stop myself. It was utterly foolish for two men to chase after an entire army. What if we caught up with them? What then? But I was set on my course and my pride meant that I could not deviate from it.
I have never felt quite so much love for Hanno as I did in that next moment: he swilled down the last of the ale in the gorgeous cup, tossed it casually over his shoulder, as if it were no more than a gnawed old chicken bone, walked to his horse and mounted smoothly. And with that ugly old Bavarian murderer at my shoulder, I galloped up the line of the wagons and on to the empty road ahead.