Niccolo Rising - Dorothy Dunnett [82]
Astorre did nothing to stop him. He was getting tired of Brother Gilles, who had performed some unspecified favour for one of Astorre’s many sisters and was now collecting his reward. Decency required, however, that the monk should be rescued – unless, of course, the odds were impossible. Astorre scanned the heavy grey sky, and swore quietly. The two college men exchanged clever glances. Claes, arrived up on a ledge, boldly stood in his stirrups and focused his watering eyes on the flags of the oncoming riders. Then his face cleared. “It’s all right. Worcester’s banner. It’s the Englishmen.”
Everyone looked relieved. Tobie settled his reins and prepared to ride back to the monk. Astorre grunted. Only the fallen man, seeing no move to assist him, and himself at the mercy of strangers, raised an arm from the snow in distress. Then he opened his mouth. You could see it, a dot in his white face.
Tobie and Julius saw it. Astorre stiffened. Later, Tobie realised that Claes, high above, had also paused for a moment. By then the blazons must have been perfectly clear, and the plumes, and the horse cloths.
Claes paid no heed to the English. Instead, he trained his eyes on the monk and, with a sweep of his arms, cupped his hands to both ears in the universal gesture of one willing to listen. And so invited, Brother Gilles called to him.
His voice could not be compared to Loppe’s, but he was frightened. For the first time perhaps in his life he hit a true note at the top of his compass. Brother Gilles shrieked, “Help me!” And panicking, repeated it over and over.
Astorre’s head was down like a bull, and his eyes, turned up to Claes, had red veins in them. Astorre said, “Make him stop. Quickly.”
Claes, his hands removed from his ears, glanced down enquiringly. Astorre spoke again, his voice rumbling. “Make him stop. Sign to him to stop shouting. Or he’ll start a God-blasted –”
“He has,” said Julius shakily.
Tobie looked.
The monk had stopped shouting. He was looking upwards. The English party, which had nearly reached him, was looking up also. On either side of the recumbent man, puffs of snow like thistledown wreathed the sides of the steep snowy walls, through which could be seen grey patches and fissures as chains and blocks of snow began sliding towards the track on which the monk lay. A blizzard of snow, rising upwards, told where the first lumps had fallen.
The slope was short, and the momentum enough to knock a few men off their horses and give the rest an unpleasant moment or two, but no more than that. The haze cleared for a moment. Tobie saw that some of the English party, thrown off or dismounted, were pulling a smothered Brother Gilles out of his hollow. The rest had backed out of the line of fall and were waiting until the cascade had settled. It got quiet again. It got so quiet you could hear a sort of low drumming, very like a cavalry charge.
It wasn’t a cavalry charge.
Julius was still laughing when he saw the expression on Astorre’s face, and followed his gaze to the high peaks. There, too, the snow was steaming, and Assuring, and sending gently down to their miniature creek a rumbling sound which had nothing to do with a few hundredweights of snow shocked from a cliff-face, but everything to do with an Alpine avalanche that uprooted forests and overrode valleys and wiped men and horses clean from the mountains. Astorre said, “Ride!” and dug his spurs into a trembling horse which set off, lurching and staggering, along the path they had been taking when stopped. Julius, his horse pushed from behind, struggled, looking at Tobie.
Tobie said, “Go on. I’ll follow.”
Julius hesitated, and obeyed. Tobie dug in his spurs and forced his horse to the side of the track, against the oncoming, buffeting stream of his own frightened company. Above him, Claes was leaving his ledge. As his horse came stumbling down, Tobie confronted him. He had the words on his lips: “You and I are going back.” He had no need to say them. Claes had wrenched his horse round already and was