A Famine of Horses (29 page)

“What’s going on?” demanded the Earl.

“This man was trying to steal a horse.”

Bothwell’s eyes narrowed. “I said I’d hang anyone that tried to reive one of our horses and I meant it.” He paused impressively. “What d’ye have to say for yourself?”

Carey took a deep breath and relaxed his fists. His face was stinging, one of Hepburn’s rings had cut his cheek, and his headache was settling in properly.

“Only I’d steal a horse that could run if I was going to,” he said, his throat so tight with the effort not to shout he could barely whisper. Bothwell’s eyes narrowed at his tone. “My lord,” he managed to say, adding, “This one couldna go two miles, his footrot’s that bad.”

The Earl lifted one of the horse’s feet, prodded the sore frog hard enough to make the beast dance and snort.

“Ay,” he said at last, “it’s true enough. Take the nag up to the tower and ask Jock of the Peartree if he’ll take a look. With a good scouring he might be well enough for a pack tomorrow night.”

“Ay sir.” said Carey, taking hold of the bridle. The Earl stopped him with a heavy hand on his shoulder.

“Ye’ve too high a stomach on ye for a peddler, Daniel,” said Bothwell shrewdly. “What was ye before, at Berwick?”

For a moment Carey couldn’t think what to say.

“I’ve no objection to outlaws, ye know,” said Bothwell, and smiled, “I am one myself, after all.”

Carey’s mind was working furiously. He managed a sheepish grin. “Ah, it wasnae the fighting, sir,” he said, “it was the women.”

Bothwell laughed explosively. “There y’are, Jock,” he said to Hepburn who was looking offended, “dinnae be sa hard on the man, ye’ve a few fathers after ye and all.”

“Husbands, sir,” said Carey, “it was husbands.” That tickled Bothwell greatly.

He clucked at the horse and led him on to the paddock gate.

“Hey, Daniel,” called Bothwell, “stay away from Alison Graham or Wattie’ll be after ye with the gelding shears.” Carey smiled wanly and lifted his hand to his forehead, leaving the Earl still howling at his own wit.

Carey’s back prickled with Hepburn’s eyes glaring at him. He tried to slouch a bit more while he went over soft ground to save the horse’s feet.

Once at the tower, he tethered the horse at the wall and asked for Jock of the Peartree of one of the boys running past playing wolf-and-sheep.

Jock was inside the main downstairs room with Wattie Graham his brother and Old Wat of Harden who was spread into three men’s space on the bench. They were squinting at a sketch map drawn in charcoal. Carey tried to get a look at it, but didn’t dare come close enough.

“Master Jock,” he said to all of them with his cap in his hand, “The Earl said, would ye look at this horse outside, he’s got the footrot.”

Jock, very fine in a red velvet doublet, stood up and stretched.

“Ay,” he said, “where’s the nag?”

Wattie Graham was rolling up the map and Harden stood, scraped back the bench. “It a’ makes my head swim,” he complained, “I dinna like going so far out of mine own country.”

The two of them went ahead through the door, ambling on towards the gate. Carey went ahead of Jock to lead him to the horse, when he saw a commotion outside by the football field. There was a little group of men gesticulating, the Earl at the centre, some of them pointing towards the tower. Screwing up his eyes, Carey saw a lanky frame topped with black hair, and a hand going up characteristically to twiddle in his ear.

Realisation dawned. It was Young Jock, Ekie—all the reivers he had taken red-handed two days before. They were shouting, waving their arms. His own name floated over to him, poking familiarly out of the shouting. Wattie Graham and Wat of Harden were looking at the fuss, turning to look back at him as the shouting reached their ears.

All the world turned cold and clear for Carey. The thought of the horse still tethered to a ring in the wall flickered through his mind, to be dismissed at once. As he had said himself, there was no point stealing a horse that couldn’t run.

“Laddie, ye’re in my…” Jock began behind him.

Carey half turned, drove his elbow into Jock’s stomach. Jock, who had eaten a much better breakfast than Carey, went “oof” and sat down. Carey backed into the tower, slammed the door, bolted and barred it, then kicked Jock of the Peartree over again as he struggled wheezing to his feet.

Carey had his dagger in his hand, but decided against using it and put it back. Instead he kicked Jock deliberately in the groin and when he hunched over with his eyes bugging, Carey turned him on his stomach, put a knee in his back, undid Jock’s own belt and strapped his arms together behind him before Jock’s eyes had uncrossed.

Grabbing a bottle of ale off a table as he went, Carey propelled Jock in front of him by the neck of his jerkin. Behind him there was a thundering on the door.

“Carey!” roared Bothwell’s voice, “Carey, God damn you, open up!”

Carey dropped Jock on the floor and put a bench on top of him, then shoved one of the tables up against the door. Somebody let off a gun outside, and splinters flew from a shot hole, followed by shrieking.

“Halfwits,” muttered Carey, looking about for weapons. There were no firearms but there was a longbow with a couple of quivers of arrows hanging on the wall by the door, so he grabbed them gratefully, picked up the struggling Jock and clamped his arm round the man’s neck.

Bothwell was shouting orders, Scott of Harden was shouting orders, Wattie Graham was shouting at them not to burn his bloody tower. There was a double thud of shoulders against the iron bound door which had been designed to withstand battering rams.

Jock was going blue, so Carey let him breathe for a moment.

“Now Jock,” he said, “I’m sorry to do this to you, but you’re my hostage.”

Jock struggled feebly at the indignity, so Carey cut off his air again and half-dragged him up the spiral stair to the next floor. An iron barred gate was pegged open there, so Carey unpegged it one handed and it clanged shut, having been recently oiled. He didn’t have the key to the lock but he managed to jam it with a chest standing in the corner.

Jock was thrashing about under his arm again, so Carey squeezed until the man’s eyes crossed. He could hear a lot more shouting outside. It seemed Wattie Graham was still objecting to his door being bashed in.

“I don’t want to kill you,” he said reasonably, panting a little as he hauled Jock up the next flight of stairs and past the next iron gate.

Something moved in the corner of his eye: he ducked his head and held his hostage up as a shield and the swinging bolt of wood landed on Jock’s skull not Carey’s. Carey dropped him and the longbow, dived sideways, glimpsed Alison Graham in a whirl of skirts with a club in one hand and a dagger in the other, her eyes wild.

He charged into her with his shoulder, knocked her against the wall so the breath came out of her, still got a glancing blow about the head with the club and pricked in his arm by the dagger, tried a knee in her groin to no effect and then punched her stomach and bruised his knuckles on her whalebone stays. Christ, where weren’t women naturally armoured? No help for it. He punched her on the mouth, and she finally went down, bleeding badly. Please God, he hadn’t killed her. No, she was breathing. One of her teeth looked crooked, which was fine since he’d taken the skin off his knuckles on them. He found the bunch of keys on her belt, ripped them off, picked her up under the armpits—Jesus, the weight of her—and hauled her into the linen room where she had been at some wifely pursuit. He locked the door on her, turned back to Jock and found him still googly-eyed from Mrs Graham’s blow.

Gasping for breath he shut the gate, tried six of the massive bunch of keys and at last found the one that locked it. He turned and looked for the final flight of stairs up to the roof. There was no staircase, spiral or otherwise, just a ladder at the end of a passage. He could think of only one possible way he could get Jock and himself up there. He choked Jock off again to make sure, trapped his head with a bench from one of the rooms, climbed the ladder and heaved the trapdoor up. Blinking at the sunlight on the roof, he put down the longbow which was miraculously unbroken, the bottle and the two quivers, only half of whose arrows had fallen out. Then he went down the ladder again, heard a deep ominous boom from all the way downstairs. Clearly Bothwell had prevailed on Wattie Graham to let his tower be broken into. Carey picked up Jock by the front of his red velvet doublet. At least he was still stunned.

A treacherous voice inside said perhaps he didn’t need Jock of the Peartree on top of his other troubles, and another voice said it was too late now and he might as well be hanged for a sheep.

“Right,” he said more to himself for encouragement, than to Jock who couldn’t hear yet, “you’re coming with me.”

He slid Jock up to a sitting position, got hold of his shoulders and hefted Jock onto his back with his legs hanging down in front. There was about thirteen stone of solid muscle and bone to the man and it took two heaves for Carey to stagger to his feet. The ladder looked as if it stretched halfway to the moon.

He climbed one tread at a time, gasping through his teeth, with the sweat making a marsh of his shirt. Halfway up, Jock came to and started to struggle and swear: they swayed dangerously and the ladder creaked.

“STAY STILL!” roared Carey. “Or I’ll dump you on your head.”

Jock threshed once more, then saw how far they were from the floor and stayed still. Carey went the rest of the way up the ladder, heaved Jock onto the roof.

He kicked Jock in the stomach again to slow him down, turned, pulled up the ladder with his abused arm muscles shrieking at him, heaved the trapdoor into its hole and bolted it, then sat with his back against the parapet and waited until he had stopped crowing for breath and the spots had gone from his vision.

Jock glared at him, sprawled like a trussed chicken on the roof flags, bleeding from his nose and a nasty lump on his head.

“That’s better,” said Carey and coughed. He didn’t think he’d ruptured anything, which was a miracle. His heartbeat seemed to be slowing at last. “Now we can talk, Jock”

Friday, 23rd June, late morning

It so happened that Will the Tod Armstrong was out in the horse paddock of his tower with a young horse that he was breaking on the lungeing rein. His youngest grandson was watching admiringly from the gate. Dodd came at a fast jogtrot to the fence, ducked under it and walked up close to his father-in-law, who took one look at his battered sweaty face and became serious.

“Is Janet all right?” he asked at once. “Where’s the raid?”

Never mind Janet, Dodd thought, what about me, I’m half dead of thirst.

“She’s fine…” he said in between deep breaths, “she’s in Carlisle. It’s not a raid, exactly, it’s the new Deputy Warden and Richard Lowther.”

“Sit down, rest yourself. What happened to your horse? Did ye come on foot from Carlisle, ay well, ye’re young. Little Will, run down to the house and bring back some beer for your uncle. No, you may not ride the horse, use your legs.”

Both Dodd’s calves chose that moment to start cramping. He swore and tried rubbing them.

“Walk about a bit,” advised Will the Tod, “I mind I ran twenty miles to fetch Kinmont’s father once when I was a lad, and if ye stop too suddenly, ye cramp.”

Twenty miles, was it? thought Dodd bitterly, ay it would be. Nine and a half miles over rough country and mostly uphill in much less than two hours, and Will the Tod will have done twice that in half the time in his youth.

“Well, what’s the news?”

Dodd told him. Will the Tod found the whole thing hilariously funny. His broad red face under its grey-streaked bush of red hair shone with the joke, he slapped his knee, he slapped Dodd’s back, he slapped the fence.

“Ye ran from Carlisle to save the
Deputy Warden
?” hooted Will the Tod. “Jesus save me. Why didn’t ye run to fetch
his
dad? There’s a man that has a quick way with a tower.”

“He never burnt yours,” Dodd pointed out. There were still bitter memories on the border of Lord Hunsdon’s reprisals after the Rising of the Northern Earls.

“Only because I paid him.”

“He could have taken the money and still burnt you out.”

“Ay well, that’s true. So his boy’s in trouble, eh?”

Dodd explained, as patiently as he could, that he was.

“What do ye expect me to do about it?”

Dodd suggested, still patiently, that if he could really put sixty men in the saddle at an hour’s notice as he’d boasted the last time they met, then he might give the Deputy Warden cause to be grateful to him. Not to mention pleasing his daughter Janet, who was in such a taking about the blasted man, it might have worried a husband less trusting than himself.

“Oh ay, call out my men for the Deputy Warden.” Will the Tod found that funny too. Dodd, who had blisters on both his feet and his shoulders, not to mention the damage he’d taken struggling through the secret passage, failed to see the joke. He waited for the bellowing stupid laugh to stop and the said, “Well, sir, if ye’ve come over to loving Richard Lowther in your old age, I’ll be on my way to the Dodds at Gilsland.”