‘Don’t,’ he said.
But I was tired of Frenchmen and their rules and gossip, so I took my lance — a sharp lance, the type we use in war — and rode at Le Maingre.
My knee wasn’t bad. I got myself straight on my horse, and I got the lance down and into my lance rest without shaming myself. I steadied the lance and aimed it at the crest of his helmet as I’d been taught, leaned a little forward and touched Goldie with my spurs.
All in all, it was probably the best run with a lance I’d ever had. I got it all together, and my lance point was on target-
He smashed me to the ground. I bounced. If I hadn’t had a steel breastplate, I’d have been dead. As it was, my once-beautiful breastplate took a tremendous dent — he hit just a few fingers width from the crossbow bolt — and broke some ribs.
I was knocked unconscious. Which is just as well, because le Maingre informed Richard Musard that if I’d been conscious, he’d have killed me.
He took Goldie — that was his right by the law of arms as he’d bested me in single combat — and rode away.
Young men recover quickly. I did — I was up the next day and riding a plug, while Richard, looking like a lord, rode his magnificent bay. Every man on the road assumed I was his squire.
My pride took longer to heal. I had put some thought into leaving the life of arms, but now I wanted revenge.
The difficult part was that I wasn’t sure just who I wanted to take my revenge against.
It was clear to me that chivalry was a closed company. That the men who lived inside it — at least the French — would use any means, no matter how dishonorable, to exclude outsiders.
And to be fair, it was equally clear to me that we English used the language of chivalry as a cloak of convenience under which to conduct ruthless war for profit.
Nothing makes a young man angrier than the discovery that he is not valued, not respected, and that his best efforts are wasted. Wait, I lie. The thing that most angers a young man is the confusion of discovering that the philosophy he allows to govern his actions is a nested set of lies.
I glowered at every man on the road — I wanted a fight every day, to prove to myself that I wasn’t a loser. Not a fool. Christ, the ease with which le Maingre had put me in the dirt. I really didn’t understand, then, how great was the divide between the competent man-at-arms and the trained man-at-arms.
I hid from my various moral dilemmas — adulterer, murderer, false knight — if that was possible, and instead concerned myself with my worldly repute. All I could think about as we entered Gascony and rode south along the good roads through the unburned farms was that I’d been made to look a fool. That I had failed. I had no worth, no preux. And that somewhere in the north, Emile would be told by her smirking husband that I’d been taught manners by a French lord, who’d dropped me in a field like the goldsmith’s apprentice I was.
So much for giving up a life of arms.
Richard more than stood by me. Richard probably saved me from hell.
Every night, we sat at campfires, me with broken ribs and more badly damaged than my scarred and rusting armour. Richard lived in a simpler world. His gentle Jesus was closer, his Virgin Mary was always there for him. He didn’t doubt knighthood; he merely found many men wanting.
Pardon — he didn’t say any of those things, right out.
But when we were close to Bordeuax, he handed me a cup of wine. ‘Remember, what you said? When I said I was a slave? And you said you had been a London apprentice?’
‘What does that have to do with it?’ I asked. I was entirely surly.
‘You said that some day, we’d be knights.’ Musard stared out at the stars for a little while. ‘Did you think it would be easy?’ He leaned forward. ‘They don’t want us, William. They want to keep it all for themselves. The power, the riches, the pretty girls. Even the honour. Honour is like money, William. There’s not really enough of it for everyone. If you’d saved — I don’t know, if you’d saved Sir John Chandos on the bridge — he’s rich enough in honour to let you have some. But this French lord? He isn’t going to let you have any.’
I nodded. ‘That’s what I’m saying!’ I spat.
Richard sat back and crossed his legs. ‘If you were a black man who’d come to all this from Spain, you’d have thicker skin, brother. Do you believe in God?’
‘Of course! What do you take me for, some heretic?’ I snapped.
‘No. But listen.’ He spoke slowly, as if speaking to a child. Which, that night, I was. ‘Do you believe in priests? In the Mass?’ he asked.
I nodded. ‘Of course. Where’s this going?’
‘Yet some priests are foul bastards, lecherous and vile. The Pope is a Frenchman who may be our enemy. That Talleyrand, a cardinal of the church, is hardly living in poverty. People say he’s the richest man in the world.’ Musard shrugged. ‘Bad priests don’t touch the truth of our saviour. Bad knights don’t touch the truth of chivalry.’
I was angry, and I wanted to stay angry, but his words went home.
We rode into Bordeaux just before the gate was closed the next day, and I had begun to feel a little better. England would save me. I allowed myself to think about my sister. To think that my outstanding ransom from Poitiers might be paid. That and the pay from a year in the saddle for the Prince.
I began to see another life.
We rode in, an hour before sunset, just after the feast of the birth of St John the Baptist. The guards at the gate stopped us, despite our arms.
One of the gate guards was a northern retinue archer. He knew Sam, and he beckoned to him and they exchanged words. Sam came back to us and shook his head.
‘I know you gentlemen won’t do as I ask, but I aim to ask anyway. I’d like the four of us to ride away, now. Just turn your horses and ride.’ Sam shrugged. ‘The Three Foxes is no longer ours.’
I grew hot. I wanted a fight. ‘I’ll kill all of them!’ I said.
Sam put a hand on my bridle. ‘No. Things have changed, here. That’s what Harry was telling me. The Prince is back, and there’s good law here. And the Prince’s men-at-arms do not run brothels.’ He looked at the two of us. ‘The Prince knows.’
‘Fucking Chaucer,’ said Richard. His lips were tight.
Sam shrugged.
‘But we have the safe guards!’ I said.
Sam raised an eyebrow. ‘If Sir John Cheverston ever really wanted them, he still does. He’s in the field. I propose we go and take him the sauvegardes — and send them via Perkin. See if we can collect our pay without being arrested.’
Richard whistled. ‘Arrested!’
The word was like a bolt of levin going to my heart.
Sam nodded. ‘I’m guessing that they intend to declare you outlaws and degrade you from the rank of squires.’
Richard sat silently on his horse.
I thought about the French. ‘To hell with them,’ I said.
Richard met my eye. He was crying. ‘God damn them all to hell,’ he said. It was the first time I’d ever heard him speak openly against the Prince, whom he loved.
Two days later we fell in with the Captal and headed to his own estates in the south. Richard poured his heart out to the Gascon lord while I just sat on my horse and hated everyone.
By the time Richard was done telling our tale, we were sitting on stools around a fire — the Captal had a pavilion and had invited us to dine with him, which was lucky, as we were penniless as well as friendless.
He rubbed his chin and watched the fire. ‘You two wastrels ran the Three Foxes?’ he asked. He grinned. ‘You sound very Gascon to me. Have I said this before? Listen, the Prince will not forgive such a thing. No shadow must touch his honour — he sees himself as the greatest knight in the world, the very pinnacle of chivalry.’ De Grailly made a face. ‘In truth, I think perhaps he is, and it is a very difficult rank to hold. Men gossip. You must not only be a great knight, but you must keep men from hating you for it.’ De Grailly watched the fire. ‘May I loan you two a little silver? I would not recommend that you visit Sir John Cheverston. He won’t want to arrest you, but he will. He is the Prince’s man, and whatever he thinks privately, he will degrade you.’