Game of Kings - Dorothy Dunnett [98]
Who can tell by what signs, on a dark, stormy night far from home, a farmer can recognize his own? Lennox’s army was just moving under the lee of the hill when the first shout rent the night. “Hey! Wait a bit! I could swear … God damn it, there’s three of my cattle over there!” It was joined by another. “Here—those are Gilsland sheep!” And an anguished recital began. “Hey! Wait! Stop! Turn them!”
Lennox, riding irritably in front, had his bridle seized by a sweaty hand. “There’s been a mistake, sir. These aren’t Scottish cattle, they’re our own; and sheep and hacks too. We’ll have to turn them.” And the speaker, releasing himself, shot past him and was followed by half the army.
Lennox stood in his stirrups and shouted himself hoarse, but no one replied. He was alone with a handful of men on the southern fringe of an inextricable mess of animals and men, and the latter were exclusively engaged in finding and rounding up their possessions. The Earl of Lennox sank back in the saddle, and at that moment, there was a hissing of wet, grey feathers and the arrows began.
They fell from the heights of the small hill to the east, and from the Scottish end of the road to the north, and as the English, abandoning their livestock, faced about—from the south as well, from over a small group of cattle which, appearing from nowhere, blocked the only way out.
Lennox’s men, pulling out bow and quiver with numbed fingers among the nudging rumps and dripping muzzles, found themselves handicapped players in an unpleasant and one-sided game. They dismounted very quickly indeed, and dodging bent among the heaving flanks, began to make hopeless dashes like mice in a cornfield. The arrows fell faster.
On the slope overlooking the trap, Scott of Buccleuch was enjoying himself hugely. “One for Tam Scott, and one for Bob Scott, and one for Jocky Scott, and one for … Christ, they’ll make off down that Carlisle road if we’re not careful.”
“It’s all right.” One of his own officers reassured him, peering through the dark. “Someone’s driven a small herd across the south end of the road as well, and they’re fighting across it.”
“Dod, are they? Someone’s got brains,” said Sir Wat admiringly. “Well, come on then. Let’s help him.” And he swept over the hill, passing the men fighting at the top—strangers and Maxwells, he supposed. At this point he also saw something else. A shadow. An easy, competent-looking shadow, with wide shoulders and an adroit way with a horse.
Buccleuch waved on the rest of his men and let them pass him, his eyes glued to the solitary horseman. Then the figure opened its mouth to give some advice to a heifer and Sir Wat roared “Will!” in a voice unmistakable over six counties. His son wheeled.
Against an infernal fresco of heaving cattle Scott saw his father’s Red Jimmy beak and two sparks for his eyes; Buccleuch saw a hard elegance of outline and suspected an unaccustomed set to the mouth. He said, and had to clear his throat first, “Boy—will ye come back with me? Now? They won’t miss you in the dark”—speaking fast because men were coming toward them.
He thought the boy jerked, but Will only said in a low voice, “No. It’s too late … I must go,” and gathered his reins. The others were nearly on them.
“Will … meet me then. Just to talk. I won’t keep you, I swear, unless you want it. Send me word, and I’ll come anywhere. Will you do it?”
They were Lamington men coming toward him; Buccleuch watched them in a ferment of fury. Then his son nodded. “Very well. I’ll send word when I can come.” The boy lingered a moment with a look odd, and almost avid; then he wheeled and drove his horse down the road.