I asked him why we could not merely bribe some servant. And he shook his head sadly. ‘We need a fighting man. I need to know how many men will be with each tax-gathering party, and their strength, their weapons and morale. It needs an experienced soldier. And, don’t forget, you will have Hanno with you for company. He will run all the messages to me, and for safety’s sake you and I will have no contact after this ridiculous inquisition until your time with Prince John is over.’
‘But, Robin,’ I protested weakly, ‘the world will think me a man of no loyalty, a cur who turned traitor on his lord…’
‘It is necessary, I’m afraid, Alan. Everyone must think that. If they do not believe that you have genuinely betrayed me at this inquisition, Prince John will never take you into his service. You and I will know the truth — that you serve me still. And be honest with me: you did not like my playing the bloodthirsty part of Cernunnos; as I remember it, you were quite angry with me at the time. All I am asking you to do is to tell the truth to the inquisition when they ask it of you. You can do that, can’t you?’
‘But what about you, Robin? What about your life?’ I said. ‘If the Templars find you guilty at the inquisition tomorrow your life will not be worth a rotten turnip.’
‘I have made arrangements. Do not concern yourself about that. Now, will you do me — and our good King Richard — this great service?’
I sighed: ‘Yes, sir.’ I could summon little enthusiasm for his plan: betrayal, ignominy, the very real chance of a felon’s death on the gallows. Still I said yes. I could never refuse Robin, no matter how unpleasant or difficult or dishonourable the task he proposed to me.
‘You know that I will not forget this? That I will be for ever in your debt?’ He gripped me by both shoulders.
‘Yes, sir.’
‘Good man!’ he said, and he slapped me on the back and left me to my preparations for an immediate departure to Germany after the Templar trial.
And so for six long months I had been acting my part as Prince John’s man and feeding information to Robin through the good offices of Hanno — where was he? I wondered. I had dispatched my wily German friend the day before yesterday to pass on the news of the great silver wagon train to my master and I had not seen him since. Had Prince John’s men taken him? Was his corpse at this moment twisting in the wind on the town gibbet?
I had not intended to accompany the wagon train of silver. All those months ago Robin and I had agreed that, to try to avoid doubt falling on me, he would not rob tax-gathering parties of which I was a member. I had only joined the force of knights guarding it at the last moment, on the specific orders of Ralph Murdac: clearly their suspicions of me had finally come to a head. I felt my throbbing nose and ran my tongue over the chipped tooth. There had been no need, it occurred to me then, for that brutal knock from Little John. I could have stayed with Robin and saved my own life. Right now I could be riding Ghost through the cool clean spaces of Sherwood, free and clear, beside Robin and Little John and all my friends — rather than lying here, with the Devil beating his drums inside my head, waiting to be ripped apart by that grotesque monster Milo.
I realized that I was pitying myself and stopped abruptly. I was not dead, not yet. I got up from my barley sacks and began to make an examination of the storeroom. It was small, perhaps four paces by five and seven foot high. The door was a solid one made of thick elm boards, bolted securely from the outside. I pressed my ear to the door and heard — nothing. I wasted a few moments banging on the door and shouting for a gaoler but got no response: it must be the early part of the night, I reckoned, about eight of the clock. Either the guards were asleep or eating, or no one had bothered to post them. There was nowhere I could go, deep as I was in the bowels of the great tower, no chance of escape, so perhaps there was no need to detail guards to watch a locked door all night.
The walls of my cell were cool, dry smooth sandstone, with no breaks or cracks or fissures that I could discern, and there were no tools or weapons in the room of any kind. By touch I found an empty bucket, and a jug of cool water. I drank deeply and relieved myself in the bucket. And that was it, apart from some sacks of barley and a couple filled with oats. I did not know the underground ways of the great tower well, having only been down here on two or three occasions — Hanno knew it far better than I, as there were innumerable cellars and kitchens and pantries down here under the big square keep and built into the thick walls surrounding the upper bailey, and he often spent time down here in the warren of corridors and disused rooms, engaging in illicit trysts with some of the castle’s serving girls. But I had a rough plan of the castle in my head and I reckoned that I was not far away from the closely guarded underground treasury where Prince John was keeping the silver from his summer’s tax gathering.
I prayed a little more, this time for strength in my coming ordeal, and then settled back to think about Milo. I pondered the question of how a smaller, lighter man could defeat a much larger, heavier one, but my thoughts on the little I knew about wrestling kept being interrupted by disturbing images of Goody.
In my mind’s eye I could see her sweet face, her soft golden hair and her thistle-blue eyes sparkling with happiness — or sudden, incandescent rage. I realized that more than anything in the world I wanted to see her again, one more time before I died. I would like to hold her tightly in my arms and tell her that everything was going to be all right. I wanted to apologize for deceiving her as to my true role among Prince John’s men. And, so badly, I wanted to touch her soft cheek, and kiss her on the lips…
I had to use a deal of force on myself to stop these thoughts sliding into greater sinfulness. She was as a sister to me; she looked to me for the protection of an older brother. Who was I to start thinking about kissing her? Besides, she despised me: ‘You hateful man,’ she had said. ‘I never want to speak to you again.’ These harsh words were burnt into my heart. Yet, if she only knew…
Stop, Alan, Just stop. Milo: Milo is the problem at hand; you must concentrate on defeating the ogre if you want to live…
And at some point in this strange half-dreaming, half-anxious state, I fell truly asleep.
I awoke just after dawn and drank some more water. And then I sat and waited, munching a handful of loose oats, sitting on the barley sacks, and I waited and waited. After what must have been several hours I started hammering on the elm door, and demanding proper food and more water. I heard footsteps and a harsh voice in English told me to hold my noise. And then the footsteps went away and I sat for hours in the darkness thinking about my fate and singing long, jolly cansos loudly to myself to keep my spirits up. I must have dozed again, for the next time I was awoken it was by the door of the cell crashing open and the dim light of the corridor outside spilling violently into the room. Four men-at-arms burst in and grabbed me by the arms and hustled me out into the passageway. I had no time to resist, and before I knew it I was being marched up the stone steps to the ground floor of the great tower, out of its iron gate, past the eastern side of the great hall and across the middle bailey with the afternoon sun slanting down. I was escorted roughly out of the barbican and north towards the new brewhouse, with the four men-at-arms close around me until we approached the wood-and-earth palisade at the east of the outer bailey that marked the limits of the castle.
The whole outer bailey was buzzing with men-at-arms and servants and clergy; almost every one of Prince John’s dependants, it seemed, wanted to watch the afternoon’s ‘amusement’. And there in the centre of the roped-off area of the list, sixty foot by sixty foot, stood Milo.