Chapter III: The Knife in the Twilight

Hugh paused at the foot of the stairs that led through the thickness of the wall to the upper stories of the Keep.

"We have ridden farther than to Crowden Wood this day," he said sombrely.

Edith's fingers picked at the lacings of her jerkin.

"Yes, Hugh, and we are at the parting of the ways."

"You seem not over-burdened with grief at the thought," he exclaimed bitterly.

She raised her eyes to his with new-found shyness.

"I do not grieve, because it is my thought that your path will follow mine," she answered. "If you went adventuring to Outremer, and I stayed home in England, our parting would be longer than 'tis like to be as things have fallen out."

"I am a churl," said Hugh remorsefully. "Forgive me!"

"Nay, this time I shall not forgive," she teased. "Hast beat me with a stick in years past, Hugh. Hast ordered me about as man-at-arms and squire. Always have I forgiven you. But this time I have a mind to hold my anger over your head."

Hugh's stern young face relaxed into a boyish grin.

"And now I know you for the same old lass," he cried. "Ever ready with words and---- But this talk serves naught. Wilt name me always your knight?"

"Always, Hugh."

"One thing more." He lowered his voice. "Trust not this man Mocenigo. He hath an evil manner."

"He is my father's friend, it seems," she replied.

"Friend or not, he----"

"Trust him I must, Hugh," she rebuked. "He bears my father's warrant as well as that of his Emperor. A great man he must be."

"A great man, indeed!" scoffed Hugh. "An Italian swaggerer, some cut-throat expelled his own country!"

"If you do not like him, I am sorry," answered Edith, with dignity. "But I must travel with him, and I intend that he shall be quick to serve me."

Hugh gnashed his teeth.

"I believe you," he snapped.

He turned on his heel and strode down the corridor. He had gone but half-a-dozen steps, when there came a rush of feet behind him and two arms encircled his neck.

"Great silly!" whispered a voice in his ear. "An you are my knight, what matters any one else?"

He felt something brush his cheek, then was pushed violently from behind. When he regained his balance the corridor was empty, but his ears caught an echo of elfin laughter that floated down the corkscrew stairs.

Probably he would have pursued the laughter up the staircase, but at that moment appeared Dame Alicia, a buxom creature who had nursed Edith from babyhood. She was wiping her eyes and occasionally emitted a rasping sob.

"Take heart, good dame," said Hugh, smiling involuntarily at her lugubrious air. "'Tis not every one goes travelling through the world the guest of the Emperor of Constantinople."

"Oh, Messer Hugh, Messer Hugh!" she wailed. "And if we ever come to Constantinople, it will not be so bad--although how am I to talk with the strangers in the land for want of knowing their tongue? But I doubt sorely we will get there, sailing all those leagues in the Great Ocean, where they say if the mariners be not careful they are like to slide off the edge of the world. And if we do not fall over the edge, then there will be the Moors and the black men that eat people and the Saracens and the pirates and the strange animals that come out of the deep to devour whole ships that pass by! Well-away and alas! Sorrow on the day that brought me to this!"

She stumbled up the stairs after Edith, utterly unconsolable.

Hugh felt no disposition to laugh at the woman's fears. He did not think that she exaggerated the perils of the voyage. But he was convinced that a vessel equipped by so mighty a sovereign as the Emperor of Constantinople must be reckoned able to beat off all except the most determined attacks and capable of withstanding the ordinary perils of the sea.

It was growing toward dusk and he did not linger. He gained the courtyard by a side passage, and sent a varlet to summon Ralph with his horse. Whilst he waited he noticed Mocenigo descend the steps from the main entrance to the Keep and a bustle amongst the stranger's swarthy attendants. But his mind gave the matter no second thought, and he thrust his foot in the grey stallion's stirrup and swung into saddle without a word.

They had ridden over the drawbridge and placed some distance betwixt themselves and Blancherive, when Ralph urged his horse alongside his master's.

"Messer Hugh," he said eagerly. "Did you learn aught of these queer people behind us? They do say they come from Constantinople and the lands of Outremer."

"They are from Sir Cedric," returned Hugh briefly.

"Did they have word for Lady Edith?"

"She sets out with them to-morrow."

Hugh strove to speak as if it mattered nothing to him, but the effort pained.

"Ah, Messer Hugh, this is great dolour for us," cried Ralph. "We shall have no more fine rides in Crowden Wood. Who would have thought this morning she would be----"

Hugh cursed impatiently.

"Ralph," he said, "'tis a matter I like not to think over any more. I would be alone for a space. Do you drop back and follow at a distance."

"Ay, Messer Hugh."

Ralph touched his cap and reined in his mount, an ache in his honest heart at the thought that his idol did not want him.

Hugh rode on slowly, the reins loose on the stallion's neck, his head drooped in meditation. He tried not to think of the events of the afternoon. He tried to fasten his mind upon the accounts he must go over that evening with old Robin Fletcher, Ralph's father and the bailiff of the Chesby lands. He tried, when he was convinced that accounts held no interest for him, to recall the verses of some brave chanson and hum them to himself. He tried to think of the new harness he meant to order in London town against his own journey over-seas. He tried a dozen ways of diverting his mind, all equally without success.

The sky darkened in the west and the shadows lengthened. The trees that lined the narrow track cast a weaving shuttle of shade, as the wind brushed their tops. But Hugh was heedless of all about him. The stallion knew the homeward path and was safe to follow it. Hugh was enwrapped in gloomy consideration of his own affairs. He never saw the slinking figure that crept among the trees, gained the roadside copse and stole slowly nearer as the light waned.

Hugh's first warning was the sudden swerving of the stallion. Out of the tail of his eye he had a momentary vision of a compact object that hurled itself across the road at him, of a knife that flashed in air. Then came the impact. Hugh half-turned in his saddle, and struck out with the hunting-spear he held in his right hand. The blow served to deflect the knife, but his assailant caught him about the waist with one arm and dragged him, tussling, to the dust of the path. The spear flew from Hugh's hand. The stallion snorted and reared, hesitated and galloped back along the way they had come.

Hugh found strength for one despairing cry.

"Ralph!" he shouted. "Ralph! To----"

The threatening knife cut short his words. The man he had to contend with was squat and immensely agile, and very slippery to hold. Time and again in that brief struggle in the dust Hugh thought he had pinned him down, only to find the dark, villainous face, with deep-set, wicked eyes, leering at him from above, the knife barely held off by such a grip as Hugh had secured on the assassin's wrist. It was a battle fought in silence. Hugh was too busy to speak after his first frantic cry. The assailant grunted a few exclamations in some language Hugh did not understand, but he, too, had no wind to spare.

Over and over they rolled, the knife circling and stabbing, slicing and cutting. Hugh's doublet was cut to ribbons, a long scratch on his shoulder bled freely. But always he managed to ward off the point in time to avert a deadly blow. He was tiring fast, however, and a look of ferocious satisfaction was dawning in the squat man's eyes, when the thunder of hoofs resounded in the narrow way.

"Messer Hugh, Messer Hugh!" came Ralph's voice.

The squat man raised his head, sniffed with his nostrils like a wild animal, launched one more desperate blow, and without warning leaped clear and darted along the road. Hugh scrambled to his feet as Ralph galloped up, leading the stallion.

Hugh caught the bridle of his mount.

"Shoot me a shaft at yon knave," he commanded grimly. "See, he runs in the shadows of the wood."

Ralph leaped from his horse, nicked the string of his long-bow and drew a shaft from the quiver at his belt. But the squat man, after a look over his shoulder, swerved abruptly into the woods.

"He is gone from us," said Hugh regretfully.

"Nay, Messer Hugh. I think I know how he must head. Ride after me, an it please you."

Hugh led Ralph's horse between the trees, and followed the archer's footsteps. They travelled swiftly in a direction at right angles to the road, and presently emerged upon an open meadow, surprisingly clear in the twilight. Against the farther wall of woodland showed a running figure.

"I thought so," said Ralph with satisfaction.

He stepped into the clearing, raised his bow and drew the string to his ear.

"Allow a scant foot for windage," he muttered to himself. "Ay, that will be it. So!"

As he loosed, the assassin looked behind in time to see the clothyard shaft winging toward him. And so swift was the arrow's flight that before the man could move, whilst his head was still turned, the arrow pierced his back and stood forth a foot beyond his chest. He shrieked once and fell.

"Bravely shot, Ralph," applauded Hugh.

"It might have been worse," admitted Ralph. "'Tis the first time I have shot a man."

"'Twas more than a good shot," returned Hugh, "In this light, too! An the King's Verderers saw you, Ralph, I should not keep you long."

"'Twill take more than the King to pry me away from you, Messer Hugh," replied Ralph simply. "Did that dog stab you?"

"'Tis of no consequence. Come, let us look at him. By his dress he was none of the Greenwood Men."

"Greenwood Men!" exclaimed Ralph. "Yon was no Greenwood Man. He ran like a lumbering bull in the very way I thought he would. We would not have caught one of the Merry Men in that fashion, Messer Hugh."

"He is some landless fellow, mayhap," said Hugh as they rode across the meadow.

When they reached the body, Ralph drew out the arrow and turned it over so that the face was revealed in the dwindling light.

"That is no Englishman--or Frenchman, either," declared Hugh.

A vague feeling of uneasiness stirred him.

"Have a look at his pockets," he directed.

Ralph made a methodical search of the man's clothing. Except the knife, some leather string and one silver penny there was nothing to show for his trouble.

But in examining the jerkin of rain-soaked, tarnished leather, the front of it tore apart.

"St. Mark aid us!" murmured Ralph. "Do but see the markings on his chest, Messer Hugh!"

Hugh dismounted from the stallion and bent close over the body. Daubed on the man's hairy chest in lurid colours were pictures of weird animals and a crucifix.

"They will not come off," said Ralph after an unsuccessful attempt with a moistened thumb. "It will be witchcraft, mayhap."

"Nay, I think not, Ralph," answered Hugh. "It is some seaman's trick--but this man is far from the sea for one of his trade. 'Tis a matter will bear investigation. Do you say nothing of it to any one. I will hold council with Prior Thomas, and we will search the roads to find if the fellow has been hereabouts."

Ralph frowned down at the dead man.

"I like it not," he growled. "What enemy have you, Messer Hugh, would wish to have a knife stuck in you?"

"None that I know of," returned Hugh, but the feeling of uneasiness which had irked him before made his answer seem a mockery to him.

That squat figure, the bestial, sullen face, the tarnished, cast-off tinsel of its garments--with or without cause, they brought to his mind the gaudy array of strangers he had last seen ducking and scraping before Mocenigo in Blancherive courtyard.

He cast the idea from him as preposterous.

"Come," he said abruptly. "We have to talk with Prior Thomas, and the hour grows late."

Throughout their ride to the Priory gates, Ralph kept his horse at his master's cropper and his longbow was bent and ready at his back. But they met no one, until the porter at the gate hailed them and asked their business, for monasteries, like castles and walled towns, were chary of admitting callers from the night.

Prior Thomas listened to Hugh's account and questioned Ralph.

"There was naught upon him, you say, save these markings, that he might be known by?" he ended.

"Naught," replied Hugh.

"Are there strangers in these parts---- But yes. You yourself told me of meeting them this morning on the road for Blancherive."

Hugh assented and, of course, was obliged to narrate the message brought by Mocenigo.

"Ah, that is sad hearing," exclaimed the Prior, with tears in his eyes. "The little maid is to leave us so soon! I must ride thither with you, Hugh, after Matins. And what sort were these strangers?"

"Foreign, like their lord," answered Hugh. "I have had the same thought as mayhap troubles you, Father Prior."

"We must not leap to conclusions in such a grave matter," cautioned Prior Thomas. "In such an assemblage of men, roysterers and mariners, I take it, there are always some unheedful of God. It may be such an one marked you ride from the Castle and planned to line an empty wallet from your person."

"That is true," agreed Hugh.

"In any case," continued the Prior, "we must think of Edith. No harm has come of this and if there be no reason for it, 'twere well nothing was said to cast a shadow over her journey."

"There is shadow enough," said Hugh gloomily.

Prior Thomas put a hand on his shoulder.

"Hugh," he said, "thou hast been almost mine own son to me. I could not have pleaded with Our Lady for a dearer one. When I was Master of the Novices your father deeded to the Priory the lands of Greenmere and Hautepuisse, and in return asked that we care for your upbringing and guard your interest against wicked barons. Prior Hubert gave you to my especial charge that day, and in it have you been ever since. I know well, dear lad, this is a night of sorrow for you. But I would have you remember that you have vowed yourself to a high quest, and until that quest is achieved you have no right to give your thoughts to any other object."

Hugh raised his eyes very humbly to the Prior.

"Father Thomas, you have taught me a lesson I required," he admitted. "I thank you. I will try to win my first victory over myself."

He choked and blinked his eyes hard.

"It is very long to wait," he added.

"It is very long," answered Father Thomas gently, "but the good knight schools himself to place his faith in Our Lady and studies how he may achieve merit in Her blessed sight. Doubt not, Hugh, an you strive lustily and with perfect faith, in the end you shall win to content."

"Must I tarry here the whole of another year?" pleaded Hugh.

"You must," said Prior Thomas firmly. "We dare not ignore the bond our brethren made with Sir James on the sacred bones of St. Cuthbert of Crowden."

"A year," groaned Hugh.

Yet the next morning he contrived to present a smiling face to veil his discontent, as he bade farewell to Edith on the London Road.

"A year hence you will be following me," she laughed to him, for she seemed as carefree as he.

"Ay, you may look for me," he answered steadily.

"In Outremer?"

Hugh turned to find the sardonic features of Mocenigo at his elbow.

"In Outremer, Messer Mocenigo," he repeated.

Mocenigo eyed him as Hugh had seen knights watch each other in the lists.

"Mayhap I, too, shall have the pleasure of meeting you there," said the Italian smoothly--"if you come."

"I shall come."

Mocenigo smiled and kneed his horse forward. There was that in his smile which was an answer--and might have been a threat.

The cavalcade began to move.

"God keep you, Hugh," said Edith hastily. "If I hear of Sir James, you shall know."

"Our Lady guard you," returned Hugh.

He kissed her hand and pulled the grey stallion back. She rode past him, a brave figure, slender and straight, fearless eyes fixed on the dusty road ahead--that road which led on to the sea and beyond to the fabled lands of Outremer, lands of magic and sorcery, of great deeds and wickedness, of romance and mystery, where the battered Empire of the Eastern Rome and the fringe of crusading states fought to keep back the onrushing Moslem waves that threatened to engulf all Christianity.