The Tragedy of Arthur_ A Novel - Arthur Phillips [144]
[ACT II, SCENE V]
[Location: The road to Lincoln]
Enter Denton, Sumner, and Bell
DENTON
High words ride on high wind,1 I say. When they
would have your guts to stuff their pudding-bags,2
they start at singing of Troy for us to love our labors
more.
BELL
I grant York was but first I ever knew of war. Never
had I chance until now, I was not able, but what I saw
in York’s turned3 roads calls shame on talk like that.
SUMNER
A new warrior, la! And all the glories fall in for him.
And thou’rt equal to the king! Had his first taste at
York. Didst thou and he stand with shoulders
touching?
BELL
Why bend thy brows?4 Do I go boasting? Nay. I
walked in tremble-knee’d, sure. But did I skirr?5
When the dragon6 belched fire and the ordnance7
thundered, I stood firm. Knocked two Germans
down, I did. Lifted one his beaver back when I put
him on the turf. Put my blade through. I did, thus,
just pushed it through. Like when I would kill
coneys8 with my brother, like that, some, tough, yet
not so tough, in truth. It goes in soft. I never cared to
look the coney in his eye neither, when time came.
Nor cared to look at this big yellow9 one. Said
something in Saxonish, I suppose it was.
DENTON
Like as not only giving thee “rest you merry.”10
BELL
Think you so?
SUMNER
Or “fair fall you, valiant soldier.”
BELL
He may, he may have.
SUMNER
What block art thou? Needest thou be set to school in
Saxon talk to know he begged thee mercy or swore
out upon thy soul or cried for his new orphan or his
own Saxon mother in Saxonland, which is far from
York, I tell thee, too far to be wandering in hope of
friendly greetings. Hast thou hope he did forgive
thee? Honors thee thy valor? What tales to sing
thyself to bed withal!
BELL
No stories, but what I have seen I’ll sing: men do with
valor face death and all the doom beyond when for
their king they fight.
DENTON
Bend, boy, bend thy head, thy battle-mate’s on hoof.
Gloucester for Arthur passes
SUMNER
His visor down, all silence.
DENTON
A ghost, like. I first knew battle for his father. Thou
mightst have eaten butter had I stepped in cream.11
SUMNER
But this one fights the same as his sire, no fear at all in him.
DENTON
Is he not flesh? Is he of other stuff and feels not a
blade peel off skin? His eyes are agates? They do not
jelly if an arrow pinch ’em? His bones so hard as will
not splinter out the skin as I saw Nick Safe’s arm do?
BELL
What serves this talk? To fright a man before a battle’s
fought is no victory, nor like to win us one. Every
fool can say the price to flesh, but marching in
withal, as our king there does march, that’s a lesson,
not to gabble subtle meant to void an army’s guts
afore the fight. What more corruption could a
canker12 spread in corn or rose than that? Thou
mightst be a Saxon tongue to make us weak in heart.
DENTON
A fig13 for all thy corn and flowers, boy.
BELL
Thy breath stinks enough. A flower might cover o’er thy toothless mouth and worse.
SUMNER
That stink he borrowed of certain French
companions, all now burning night and day, and off
to powder tubs.14
DENTON
I’ll learn you both some Saxon words, you knaves.
BELL
I need no more words of thee, coward, nor can my nose take none.
Trumpets
SUMNER
Quiet now, the both. That’s Lincoln there and the trumpets sound.
BELL
After York, it will be nothing. I had some chance to be
at York at all. They’ll stand me a spigot at the Pard’s
Head,15 if I tell my tale.
DENTON
Again a fool, before and after a fool, a fool from claw
to beak. You sit mum, not you who tells it, you, the
man by you tells it and you sit mute as marble and
first you say it was not this, it was nothing, then you
say you want no talk, and then, when the noise for a
tale is up, then, then you say, “So. I’ll tell you how it
was at York, but it’s no tale I can tell swift, and—” and
you wait a time, you cough, and say, “Throat’s dry.”
Then old Francis opens wide the taps for a man who was at York.
Trumpets
BELL
That’s the trumpet of our company. To the walls and