The Harp and the Blade (5 page)

With a regretful look at the wine I followed him out and along the cloister till he entered a room which proved to be his study. There was still sufficient daylight to illuminate it, complete with desk, shelves for parchment items, and a pair of chairs. He chose the one by the desk, and at his gesture I took the other.

“How well do you know Count Chilbert?” he wanted to know.

“Not at all and yet too well,” I replied, the wine impelling me toward breeziness. “He wants to kill me, a familiarity I try to discourage from strangers.”

He didn’t laugh, and under the pressure of his waiting eyes I told him exactly what had happened, omitting only the exchange of my old nag for the bay. A priestly garrison might well commandeer such a fine horse for the good of my soul.

He nodded when I had finished. “The count’s a cruel scoundrel, but he’s a powerful figure hereabouts.”

I shrugged. “I was given to understand he had plenty of followers. Otherwise I wouldn’t have given his domain such clearance.”

“I thought possibly,” he hinted, “that you might have heard something about his general activities while you were in the vicinity.”

“I might have, had I been interested. As it was I heard nothing beyond the usual story these days: everything’s falling to pieces, and thieves are plundering the ruins.”

He brooded, seeing a long way. “If some of the thieves are strong enough to protect what they take,” he said at last and more to himself than to me, “it will mean some sort of stability. If the process of chaos could be stopped for just a moment something could jell to form a basis for rebuilding.”

“Your thieves,” I remarked, interested enough to provoke further discussion, “will merely try to take from each other when they’ve got everything else. Then where’s your stability?”

As he answered I could feel the depth and passion of the man. “Chaos gathers speed from its own momentum and never ceases of itself. It must be stopped by force of will.”

He paused, but I knew he would go on. He was in the mood to talk, and I was obviously an attentive listener. “I’m a father of the Church,” he took a new tack, “and I hope not too unworthy a one. Originally, however, I did not take orders because I had an imperative call to holiness. But as a young man my crops were harvested by wandering outlaw bands three times running. Twice, also, my house was looted and burnt, and I had no recourse—no law or power to which I could appeal. It was too commonplace even to excite comment.

“Only the Church, even though much of its strength has been latterly worn away and dissipated, seemed to have the will to hold anything together. My wife was killed in the last raid, so I joined the fatherhood here. There are many in the Church these days for similar reasons.”

I kept silent. He wasn’t asking me for sympathy; he was telling me, and probably for a purpose.

“Because we are a united body and care enough,” he went on, “we’ve been able to keep the wolves away. I’m abbot now, and I try to encourage learning and other proper functions of the monastery, but the bulk of my energies are of necessity used to see that on our lands men can work and live in a normal manner.”

“You’ve got some very capable-looking assistants,” I remarked, thinking principally of Father Clovis.

“I’ve needed them,” he grimly declared. “Now as, as I started out to say, some of the robber chiefs are finally discovering that the pickings are getting poorer each year. As a result they’re seizing what lands they think they can hold for their own. They’re savagely rapacious, of course, but it means a settling of some sort; and to protect the revenue of their realms they will eventually have to establish some kind of order within them.”

“I think I’d rather have no order,” I said drily, “than one of Chilbert’s devising.”

“That’s where you’re wrong,” he told me. “There must be a modicum of law, even if it’s from a bad source, before anything can develop.”

I hit nearer home. “Wouldn’t an up-and-coming count like Chilbert think highly of rich, well-cultivated lands like yours so conveniently near his own?”

“Yes,” the Abbot nodded, “but we’re too strong to be conquered with ease. What he really wants of us is that we should hold our lands from him and pay him for protection—protection from himself as well as from others, naturally. He aspires to hold everything up to Normandy, and he may achieve it. He’s a man of considerable ability.”

The vision of Chilbert’s ruthless face came before me unpleasantly. “I know the general state of the country and all that, but isn’t there anyone who isn’t a murderous brigand to stand against him? Or why don’t you yourself try for the hegemoney?”

He shook his head. “That isn’t my function. I admit I’ve been tempted; but I have given myself to the Church, and, as I said before, I have little enough time to be a priest as it is. If I went in for conquest I’d have none.”

He was not a man to be friends with easily, but I liked him. “Isn’t there anybody else?”

“There’s a young fellow called Conan—a Breton, for we border on the march country. Though I’m not quite sure what he wants yet he comes of good stock and is, I think, all right. Nevertheless, he has returned comparatively recently after having been away since boyhood, and I don’t yet know how capable he is or what a following he can eventually get.”

“If you even think he’s all right,” I commented, “that puts him way ahead of Chilbert. Why don’t you throw in with him?”

“I’m not throwing in with anybody yet,” he said flatly. “I’m waiting to see who is strong.”

“You mean to say you’ll let a swipe like Chilbert seize more power when you might be able to check him by joining with a better man?”

He flushed, but his glance remained steady. “I’d like to see a good man rise to the top, but my first job is to look after the abbey.”

“I suppose so.” To my surprise I felt partisan about the matter and a little disappointed in this man, who had made quite an impression on me. Though God knows it wasn’t my habit to pass judgment on moral issues.

He guessed what I was thinking and took me up on it. “There are two ways of looking at such a matter. Perhaps if I were a saint I’d fight blindly for universal good, even if I were convinced that nothing would be gained by my efforts. Being a lesser thing, I prefer to struggle for only the limited good that I believe is within my power to bring to fruition.” He drew into himself a moment before he concluded. “There is a chance that even a saint might think something is better than nothing.”

“Very likely,” I conceded. He was doing his best in difficult times, and I was sorry I had been critical. “Just the same, I’m glad I won’t be here when Chilbert’s kingdom comes.”

“You know from what I have told you,” he said after another pause, “that I’m not anxious for him to succeed. Nor is it inevitable that he shall do so.” He was looking at me earnestly, and I knew by his next remark that he had taken due note of the sword scar on my left cheek. “You’re used to weapons, and you seem to nourish a strong feeling against the count yourself. Conan can use and will, I believe, reward experienced men.”

So that was what he had been driving at! “And if he gets enough of them,” once again I couldn’t repress the slight taunt, “you might feel justified in being his ally.”

“Exactly. Well?”

“No, Father. It isn’t my affair.”

A
FTER
a farewell salute to Father Clovis I headed north again early the next morning, having learned I had still some ways to go before I could make easting. Once I had ridden through the abbey’s fields the forest closed in again, and I saw no more signs of habitation. The sky, mostly clear when I started, was overcast before noon with steadily thickening clouds. Smelling the air, though, I decided that it wouldn’t rain for some hours, possibly not until night. That was considerate of the weather, because there was supposed to be a town of sorts up the line which I should have no difficulty in reaching by mid-afternoon.

I had dismounted to drink at a spring when I first heard them coming. All morning I had met nobody except a lone woodcutter, but these were riding men—several, to judge by the sounds and voices. Having no reason to anticipate trouble with anyone coming from the north, I wasn’t especially concerned. None the less, I climbed on the bay and got off the road west, where there chanced to be less undergrowth. Thus I was still in sight but had comfortable room for maneuvering in case of need.

There were five of them, all well armed. The leader was somewhere in his thirties, a medium-sized man with black hair above a jolly, bearded face. Talking busily, he didn’t see me until he was all but abreast of me. Then at his command they all halted and put their eyes over me. I had nothing to say.

“You’re a stranger in these parts,” the leader announced. “Yes,” I said pleasantly, “and one whose only interest in these parts is to get out of them.”

His face was no longer jovial. “You’re a liar!”

That was rude, but I wasn’t going to do anything about it when he had four men with him. I waited.

“You’re one of Chilbert’s men,” was his next accusation.

I thought the attempt would be futile, but I made one more effort to arbitrate. “I’m not his or anybody’s man.” I touched my harp and deepened my Irish accent as I went on. “I’m just an itinerant bard, and your lousy, local quarrels don’t mean a damned thing to me.”

Paying no heed to my statement, he edged his mount toward me, and I pointedly backed away. “That’s Chilbert’s horse,” he said harshly.

I had been wondering what had sicked him on me. “It was,” I acknowledged.

“He might lend it to a friend scouting for him,” the fellow jerked his head and his followers deployed on either side of him, “but he’d never give that horse to anybody.”

I swung the animal in question around. “We traded. Moreover,” I pointed out, seeing that he had made up his mind to credit nothing I said, “I made an excellent bargain. I doubt if you can catch me.”

But he was for trying. They all surged toward me at his word, and the bay swept away from them through the forest. We made fine speed, for the great trees were wide apart and the brush trifling. Dodging occasional low branches was the only real excitement in the business as they never had a chance of catching us. Nevertheless, they were hard to convince and didn’t give up until, without especially pushing himself, the bay ran completely out of their sight at the end of a couple of miles.

Soon afterwards I breathed him, listening to make sure they weren’t catching up. At the end of some minutes there was still no sign of them. “Nice work!” I told the horse appreciatively.

It was only then that I realized my new predicament. With a sunless sky and in a country where landmarks meant nothing to me the only possible way of retrieving the road was the laborious one of retracing my own tracks. And did I really want the road under the circumstances? Suppose that man who was so opposed to presumptive friends of Chilbert also reasoned that I would have to retrail myself and arranged to cut me off north and south. The more I considered, the more answerless my problem seemed as far as immediate action was concerned.

The best of all the undesirable courses that offered called for waiting over in the woods in the hope that the next day would bring a sun to guide me. But my mount and I would need water, and I had passed neither stream nor spring on the way in. Resignedly I started to wander in search of one or the other. If the road was still directly back of me, which it probably wasn’t, north would be off to my right. I had to set some course, so, facing that way, I rode.

I fared slowly, for when going nowhere a man feels foolish to hurry. I was feeling sulky now. It was bad enough to be forced from my original route for being Chilbert’s enemy. To be hounded from my alternate itinerary for being his friend was an irony too annoying to amuse me. And just how I was going to win free was more than I could guess.

My gloom was not so deep, however, that I didn’t pause often to make sure that I wasn’t coming near the road again. I didn’t though, and so had one negative direction. Wherever I was heading, it wasn’t east.

In about_an hour I found a spring but didn’t abide by my original and sensible plan of staying beside it. It was then only early afternoon, and I was far too restless to face waiting out the day in philosophic inaction. After letting the horse forage, I therefore went on. There was always the long chance of running across somebody or something which might be of help.

It wasn’t for several hours that I encountered the first real break in the trees, but when I did it was a big one. A long while ago it had been a huge farm, and though stretches of it were badly overgrown with brush other sections had patches of tall grass scattered through the weeds. The horse could do well there.

I rode toward a likely looking portion, but stopped as I heard dogs bay in the woods downhill to my right. They were heading my way, the next few yelps told me, and I felt much cheered. The hunters would almost unquestionably be glad to share with me after the kill, and I could learn from them all I so much wanted to know about the lay of the land.

Following the course of the chase by the baying, I nodded contentedly to myself. The quarry should break into the clear shortly.

Sooner than I expected the quarry did. It was a manhunt. Emotionless with surprise, I watched him wade through the brush and up the hill on a line that would pass me closely. He wasn’t really running any more, though he was still trying. Twice he fell.

He had a bare sword he was using as a staff, leaning on it heavily as he plodded forward, head down. He was quite near when he first saw me and halted, swaying. He was too tired to have much of a face, but I knew what he was thinking. If I was an enemy the game was up.

Except that he was big, brown-haired and fairly young I couldn’t tell anything about him. Maybe he was the kind of man who should be chased by dogs, but I gave him the benefit of the doubt. “No enemy,” I called.

He still didn’t move. Needing both mouth and nose for breath, he couldn’t talk, but he pointed at my horse with his empty hand.

I cursed to myself. A fine animal like the bay could bear double for a while, but unless there was some refuge fairly near the pursuers would catch us, which included me. And if they killed him, as they presumably meant to do, it would be strange if they boggled at killing any ally they found with him.