Agincourt - Bernard Cornwell [36]
“Prison?”
“She did not want to be a nun. You know what her name is?”
“Melisande.”
“Melisande was a Queen of Jerusalem,” Père Michel said, smiling. “And this Melisande loves you.” Hook said nothing to that. “Take care of her,” Père Michel said sternly on the day they left.
They went in disguise. It was difficult to hide Hook’s stature, but Father Michel gave him a white penitent’s robe and a leper’s clapper, which was a piece of wood to which two others were attached by leather strips, and Melisande, also in a penitent’s robe and with her black hair chopped raggedly short, led him north and west. They were pilgrims, it appeared, seeking a cure for Hook’s disease. They lived off alms tossed by folk who did not want to go near Hook, who announced his contagious presence by rattling the clapper loudly. They still moved circumspectly, skirting the larger villages and making a wide detour to avoid the smear of smoke that marked the city of Amiens. They slept in the woods, or in cattle byres, or in haystacks, and the rain soaked them and the sun warmed them and one day, beside the River Canche, they became lovers. Melisande was silent afterward, but she clung to Hook and he said a prayer of thanks to Saint Crispinian, who ignored him.
The next day they walked north, following a road that led across a wide field between two woods, and off to the west was a small castle half hidden by a stand of trees. They rested in the eastern woods close to a tumbledown forester’s cottage with a moss-thick thatch. Barley grew in the wide field, the ears rippling prettily under the breeze. Larks tumbled above them, their song another ripple, and both Hook and Melisande dozed in the late summer’s warmth.
“What are you doing here?” a harsh voice demanded. A horseman, dressed richly and with a hooded hawk on his wrist, was watching them from the wood’s edge.
Melisande knelt in submission and lowered her head. “I take my brother to Saint-Omer, lord,” she said.
The horseman, who may or may not have been a lord, took note of Hook’s clapper and edged his horse away. “What do you seek there?” he demanded.
“The blessing of Saint Audomar, lord,” Melisande said. Father Michel had told them Saint-Omer was near Calais, and that many folk sought cures from Saint Audomar’s shrine in the town. Father Michel had also said it was much safer to say they were travelling to Saint-Omer than to admit they were headed for the English enclave around Calais.
“God give you a safe journey,” the horseman said grudgingly and tossed a coin into the leaf mold.
“Lord?” Melisande asked.
The rider turned his horse back. “Yes?”
“Where are we, lord? And how far to Saint-Omer?”
“A very long day’s walk,” the man said, gathering his reins, “and why would you care what this place is called? You won’t have heard of it.”
“No, lord,” Melisande said.
The man gazed at her for a heartbeat, then shrugged. “That castle?” he said, nodding to the battlements showing above the western trees, “is called Agincourt. I hope your brother is cured.” He gathered his reins and spurred his horse into the barley.
It was four more days before they reached the marshes about Calais. They moved cautiously, avoiding the French patrols that circled the English-held town. It was night when they reached the Nieulay bridge that led onto the causeway that approached the town. Sentries challenged them. “I’m English!” Hook shouted and then, holding Melisande’s hand, stepped cautiously into the flare of torchlight illuminating the bridge’s gate.
“Where are you from, lad?” a gray-bearded man in a close-fitting helmet asked.
“We’ve come from Soissons,” Hook said.
“You’ve come from…” the man took a step forward to peer at Hook and