Down: Pinhole (16 page)

Solomon Wisdom had been straining to hear the conversation from down the table. “Oh, he can do the deed, up close,” Wisdom called out. “He vanquished a party of soldiers in Dartford handily with only a sword.”

“Is that so?” Henry asked.

“You do what you have to do to survive.”

“A universal truth,” Cromwell said.

“Wisdom tells me you were trained in a special military garrison called Point West,” Henry said.

“West Point, yes.”

“What manner of particulars were you taught there?”

“Well, I’d say we were taught how to use our minds. We learned science and mathematics, psychology, military tactics, weapons systems and a lot of history. Military and political history.”

Norfolk snorted. “Ha! Soldiers are not squint-eyed scholars. They fight. They use their brawn. They do not bury their noses in books.”

Henry ignored the duke and asked, “Did you perchance study me?”

John thought about that hard and came up empty. “To be honest, I can’t recall if we studied any of your campaigns, Your Majesty. We did study the battle of Agincourt.”

“Before my time,” Henry sulked.

John nodded. “And a bit after your time, we studied your daughter Elizabeth’s victory over the Spanish armada.”

Henry seemed to perk up and said, “Perhaps we shall speak more of that. I would have liked to have met Elizabeth when she was full into her reign but fortunately for her, she did not come here.”

The feast continued and Henry fell into whispered conversation with Matilda. John ate the bland offering, searching the table in vain for salt or pepper. Then he felt a knee against his and turned to the raven-haired woman beside him.

“How are you?” he asked.

“I am well, thank you.”

“What’s your name?”

“It is Phoebe.”

“Pretty name. And where are you from, Phoebe?”

“I was a London lass.”

“When?”

“I was born in 1762 and left my life in 1787.”

He was struck by the dullness in her eyes, the listlessness of her countenance. She might have been ravishing once but now she looked worn-out.

“I’m afraid I don’t know the etiquette yet,” he said. “Is it impolite to ask about your circumstances?”

“You mean the reason I am Down?”

“Yeah, that.”

“No, it is not impolite. I was a lady who fell under the spell of a soldier, an officer who returned from fighting in the colonies, your colonies. He was married and I fell into disrepute and ruin when he abandoned me. From that point my life was exceedingly hard and I did some terrible deeds to survive. When I developed the pox and felt my life slipping away I took comfort that my misery was coming to an end. How wrong I was.”

“I’m sorry.”

He felt a hand sliding up his thigh and looked at her quizzically.

“At the king’s pleasure, I am to be yours while you remain at court.”

His head was swimming in ale but he was sober enough to question the savoriness of sleeping with a dead woman. “That’s nice of you. Really nice. Maybe we can talk about that later.”

John watched Norfolk stand, approach the king, and whisper something in his ear. Henry nodded and rose.

“Hear me now,” he bellowed to the assembly. “The Duke of Norfolk wishes to challenge our guest to a test of fighting skills. Master Camp is a renowned soldier in his time and I expect we will be well-entertained by the sport.”

“Do I have anything to say about this?” John asked Phoebe.

“Once the king commands it, it is so,” she said.

He shook his head hard in an attempt to clear it and mumbled, “Shit, I just ate.”

“Make space before my table,” Henry commanded and servants moved in to drag away two of the dining tables.

Before John rose to meet the challenge, Phoebe whispered to him, “I pray you will treat him as harshly as Norfolk is want to treat me.”

John gave her a nod and stood to do a few stretches. “You’ve got a heck of a way to make a guest feel welcome,” he told the king.

Henry laughed. “It is our custom. And besides, Norfolk cannot sleep unless he has had some good sport.”

“Whatever you say,” John said. “This is your house.”

“You will need your capon knife,” Norfolk called to him, drawing another blade from his hip.

“Oh, it’s that kind of sport,” John said. “You fellows get your rocks off with knife fights, do you?”

“Rocks?” Henry said, with a confused look. “Be thankful, John, that Norfolk has not chosen swords, a weapon with which he is most skilled.”

“I’m not going to need a knife,” John said, “if it’s all right with you.”

“You may do what you wish,” Norfolk said, approaching slowly, “but you should not expect any mercy from my hand.”

“Same goes for me, then.”

Norfolk was a powerful man who seemed to have his wits about him despite the ale he had consumed. He positioned himself sidelong to John and grasped his dagger underhanded, the better to strike an uppercut to the gut. John could tell from the anger in his eyes that this was to be no mock battle. Someone was going to get hurt.

John assumed a fighting stance on the balls of his feet, his left leg forward, his fingers slightly curled. All the diners were standing now, jockeying for position. The two men circled each other, John focused on Norfolk’s eyes. He could usually get a fraction-of-a-second advantage watching an opponent broadcast his intentions by the angle of his gaze.

He wasn’t going to make the first move. Krav Maga worked best when it began with defense. The waiting game seemed to play havoc with Norfolk who eventually grew impatient and made an upward lunge with his knife hand. John saw it coming and stepped to his right, grabbing Norfolk’s wrist with two hands. He used the duke’s momentum to violently twist his arm and send him reeling backwards onto the floor. John held onto his wrist until it was so deformed by the force of the maneuver that he was able to take away the knife as easily as snapping a leaf from a tree.

The entire move and countermove took no more than a second and the crowd seemed to be in confusion until Norfolk pushed himself onto his feet, rubbing at his wrist.

“My goodness, did you see that?” Cromwell called to the king.

“I did indeed,” Henry said. “Most extraordinary.”

John smiled and offered the knife back to Norfolk, handle first, saying, “I think you lost this.”

Norfolk took it, his face smoldering. John was walking away from him when Norfolk let out an enraged yell and attacked again, this time with an overhand thrust.

John wheeled and deflected his knife arm away with a sharp, lateral chop and simultaneously, landed a knee to the groin and a blow to the throat with the heel of his other hand.

Norfolk dropped the knife and went to his knees, gasping for air. As the crowd murmured in shocked reaction, John picked up the dagger, tested its weight and threw it point first across the room into a beam, where it stuck cleanly.

“Well done!” Henry roared.

But Norfolk was not done. He rose unsteadily and this time drew his sword.

“Really?” John asked, but Norfolk’s only response was a two-fisted grip of the handle and a charge with the weapon held high over his head.

John had never tried the move on an attacker with a sword but he knew instinctively it would work. When Norfolk was two feet away and closing, John pivoted on his left leg and threw his right leg high into the air, going airborne. Before Norfolk could react, he had his right leg swung behind the duke’s right ear, pinning his raised arm to his neck, and his left leg scissored around Norfolk’s waist. He let gravity do the rest. John fell backwards, taking Norfolk with him and when he hit the floor he kept rolling in a backwards somersault, flipping Norfolk onto his back. He finished the move by grabbing the duke’s elbow and violently rolling him over again, leaving the sword safely behind on the floor.

John picked himself up and kicked the sword away, accepting the accolades from the crowd. Norfolk was too dazed to stand on his own and some of his men had to come forward to help him up.

Henry, Matilda, and the others at the king’s table seemed dazzled by the display and for the first time he saw Phoebe openly smile. He repaid the gesture with a small salute.

“Excellent display. Come, John,” Henry shouted, “you will join me in my privy chamber for a night of conversation. We have much to discuss.”

As John was catching his breath, a man approached, offering a fresh tankard of ale.

“Marvelous,” the man said with a thick Italian accent, “absolutely marvelous. Complimenti.”

“The guy didn’t know you don’t fuck with a Green Beret,” John said, panting.

“I am sorry, signore, I do not understand your meaning.”

John took the ale and thirstily drank it down.

“Don’t worry about it. You’re not from here, are you?”

“I am Giovanni Guacci, the ambassador from Italia to King Henry’s court.” He lowered his voice. “I must deliver a warning to you, sir. Do not under any accounts trust the king. He knows only treachery. He will suck you dry and when he is finished with you, he will throw you into a rotting room. Only I can offer you the assistance you desire.”

“And what do you think I desire?”

“To find the lady Emily, of course.”

After the Duke of Guise departed for his hunt Emily was able to shed her layers of fancy clothes. For the rest of the day she was confined to her chilly tower room with JoJo. Marie appeared at meal times with a platter of sinewy meat and stale bread that JoJo ate heartily. Emily could only stomach the bread. By the evening she had learned everything about JoJo’s drab life in Africa and somewhat more colorful life in France, and to avoid going stir-crazy, she had begun to explain MAAC and the cosmos to a mostly disinterested companion.

“Can’t we go out for a walk?” Emily asked after a prolonged silence.

“They don’t like us wandering about.”

“Why?”

“I dunno. Maybe it’s too much distraction for the working men seeing feminine flesh. Maybe they’re worried we’ll escape. They have their reasons.”

“Don’t you get bored?”

JoJo filled her goblet with more wine. “I get drunk and try to think about fun things I used to do. Sometimes I go downstairs and chat with the girls. The days that Guise wants me, at least I get a better meal. If they ever cut me off from wine, then I’d be screwed.”

Emily threw her hands into the air and said, “What an existence!”

“It’s better than most have, dearie, and it’s as good as it’s ever going to get for the likes of me.”

“Well I can’t sit around drinking and waiting to get raped by a ghoul like Guise. I’ve got to get away from here and back to England. Will you help me?”

“You’re a riot, you know that? Have some wine and stop the mad talk.”

From the ramparts of Castle Guise two sentries saw torches in the distance. They strained their eyes in the darkness.

“Whoever it is, they are coming fast,” one said to the other.

“Should I sound the alarm?”

“Not yet. Wait. If someone wanted to attack, do you think they’d announce themselves with torches?”

The riders came ever closer until the sentries were able to make out two galloping torchbearers flanking a standard-bearer flying the flag of the Duke of Guise.

“The duke returns from his hunt.”

“In the dead of night?” the second sentry asked.

“Maybe there’s been an accident. We'd better open the gates.”

“Are you sure?”

“Do you want to be the dismembered fool who refused the duke entry to his own castle?”

Before slipping into bed, Emily had succumbed to the senses-dulling lure of wine. JoJo was already lightly snoring when she started on her second cup. There was no sound from the lower floor so she supposed the other women were asleep too.

She was startled by a shout, throaty and full of alarm.

Then a chorus of loud, male voices joined in and a horn blared.

“JoJo, wake up!” Emily said. She had to shake her to get a response.

“What the fuck?” JoJo answered groggily.

“There’s something going on. Listen!”

JoJo rubbed her eyes and shot Emily a frightened look. “This isn’t right. This is bad. Get dressed.”

The women on the lower level heard the growing commotion and they too were hastily dressing and lighting candles. The shouting outside escalated to screams. Then from the baileys came gunfire.

“What should we do?” Emily asked JoJo.

“Barricade the door. Help me move the bed.”

As they were dragging it across the floor, Emily said, “What do you think is happening?”

“It’s an attack.”

“Has it happened before?”

“Only once since I’ve been here but they didn’t get inside the walls. This sounds worse.”

“Who was it? The last time.”

“Clovis.”

The sounds of fighting intensified and soon, pressed into a corner, they heard footsteps on the stairs followed by pounding at the door.

“Open up. It’s me, Marie!”

JoJo asked if she was alone and when she assured them she was, they moved the bed aside and let her enter. In a rush of words the old woman told them that the duke had been attacked while hunting and had his standard taken. Men were inside the walls, stabbing and shooting the castle defenders. She grabbed Emily by the shoulders and said, “I heard one of them asking where you were!”

“They knew my name?”

“They said, ‘the girl who’s alive.’”

“Where can I hide?”

JoJo asked Marie, “Can we get to the dungeon?”

Marie thought not but JoJo insisted they try.

The three of them made it down one flight of steps where the other women were in a state of panic, huddled and crying. Emily wanted to take them to safety but JoJo told her she was crazy and pulled her down the stairs to the bailey where chaos reigned. By the light of orange torches, men were visible yelling in rage and fear. Steel blades clanged and arrows sliced the air, thudding into flesh and smashing into stone.

The bearded soldier from the carriage ride spotted the women and ran across the bailey, hacking his way through invaders until one of them, short and squat, with a low center of gravity, did not fall so easily. This fellow wielded a two-headed axe that he swung at the duke’s man with a terrible ferocity, backing him up several paces. Every time the soldier tried to advance, the axe parried his broadsword blow for blow. One mistimed sweep of the sword left the bearded man off-balance and the squat man capitalized with a downward blow that cleaved his face and turned his beard red. Then, in the blaze of a nearby torch, Emily saw the victor’s face, one eye covered with a leather patch.