Agincourt - Bernard Cornwell [57]
On the second dawn Hook was standing as far forward as the ship’s cramped bows permitted and he was watching the sea, hoping to find a man-swallowing fish, when Sir John silently joined him. Hook hastily knuckled his forehead and Sir John nodded companionably. Melisande was sleeping on deck, sheltered by stacks of barrels and wrapped in Hook’s cloak, and Sir John smiled toward her. “A good girl, Hook,” he said.
“Yes, Sir John.”
“And doubtless we’ll bring a score of other good French girls home! New wives. See those clouds?” Sir John was staring straight ahead to where a cloud bank lay across the horizon. “That’s Normandy, Hook.”
Hook gazed, but could see nothing beneath the clouds except the foremost ships of the fleet. “Sir John?” he asked tentatively and received an encouraging look. “What do you know about,” he paused, “the Seigneur d’Enfer,” he struggled with the French words.
“Lanferelle? Melisande’s father?” Sir John asked.
“She told you about him?” Hook asked, surprised.
“Oh, she did,” Sir John said, smiling, “indeed she did. Why do you want to know?”
“I’m curious,” Hook said.
“Worried because she’s a lord’s daughter?” Sir John asked shrewdly.
“Yes,” Hook admitted.
Sir John smiled, then pointed over the Heron’s bows. “See those small sails?” Far ahead of the English fleet was another spread of ships, far fewer and all much smaller, nothing but a scatter of tiny brown sails. “French fishermen,” Sir John said grimly, “taking news of us to their home ports. Let’s pray the bastards won’t guess where we’re coming ashore, because that’s their chance to kill us, Hook! As we go ashore. They know we’re coming! And all they need do is have two hundred men-at-arms waiting on the beach and we’ll never manage a landing.”
Hook watched the tiny sails that did not appear to be moving against the sea’s immensity. The western sky was still dark, the east was glowing. He wondered how the sailors of the English fleet knew where they were going. He wondered whether Saint Crispinian would ever speak to him again.
“There,” Sir John said softly. It seemed he had decided to ignore Hook’s question about the Sire of Lanferelle and was instead pointing straight ahead.
And there it was. The coast of Normandy. It was nothing but a shadowed speck for now, a scrap of dark solidity where the clouds and the sea met.
“I talked to Lord Slayton,” Sir John said. Hook stayed silent. “He can’t travel to France, of course, not crippled as he is, but he was in London to wish the king well. He says you’re a good man in a fight.”
Hook said nothing. The only fights that Lord Slayton would have known about were tavern brawls. They could be murderous, but it was not the same as battle.
“Lord Slayton was a good fighter too,” Sir John said, “before he got wounded in the back. He was a bit slow on the down-stroke parry, I remember. It’s always dangerous to raise a sword above your shoulder, Hook.”
“Yes, Sir John,” Hook said dutifully.
“And he did declare you outlawed,” Sir John went on, “but that doesn’t matter now. You’re going to France, Hook, and you’re no outlaw there. Whatever crimes you’re accused of in England don’t count in France, and even that doesn’t matter because you’re my man now.”
“Yes, Sir John,” Hook said again.
“You’re my man,” Sir John said firmly, “and Lord Slayton agreed that you are. But you’ve still got a quarrel. That priest wants you dead, and Lord Slayton said there were others who’d happily fillet you.”
Hook thought of the Perrill brothers. “There are,” he admitted.
“And Lord Slayton told me other things about you,” Sir John went on. “He said you’re a murderer, a thief, and a liar.”
Hook felt the old flare of anger, but it died instantly like the spume of the waves. “I was those things,” he said defensively.
“And that you’re competent,” Sir John said, “and what you are, Hook, is what le Seigneur d’Enfer is. Ghillebert, Lord of Lanferelle, is competent. He’s a rogue, and he’s also charming, clever and sly.