The Death Ship of Dartmouth: (Knights Templar 21) (41 page)

A face appeared, frowning with disbelief that turned to horror. It was whipped away and a high, screaming noise came to Hawley’s ears. He went up at a run, his sword a clattering encumbrance at his hip, until he was at the top and could throw a leg over. A bell rang once, twice, and then there was a shrill cry, and silence. Hawley sprang down on to the hard wooden deck and drew his sword.

Coroner Richard was already running over the slippery planks towards the cabin under the stern deck. As he passed the mast, a man jumped at him, and Hawley saw the Coroner whip his sword about. There was a wet, sucking noise, and the man’s arm was parted from his body. It fell to the ground, twitching like a worm cut in half, and the huge man lumbered on his way as though nothing had happened. Hawley ran to join him, finishing off the wounded sailor on the way. At sea there were no prisoners: it was kill or be killed.

The door was barred, and Sir Richard pounded on it to no avail. When Hawley reached his side, he too battered the timbers, and then whistled. His carpenter, a man with oak for arms, ran to his side, then took a hatchet from his belt
and swung it at the panel beside the door. Three blows and a great crack opened as he turned the hatchet and levered the panel away. Another swing, and the panel fell inside. He hacked at the morticed plank beneath, then kicked the bottom panel, and there was an opening.

‘Come out now, master,’ Hawley called through the hole. ‘If you come out, you’ll live.’

‘You will pay for this
piracy
, man!’ shouted Sir Andrew. ‘You’ll be flayed alive for the damage done to Lord Despenser’s ship, and I’ll be delighted to witness your dying agonies!’

‘You’ll see nothing at all if you don’t come out now!’ the Coroner roared at his side. ‘I have the authority and duty to arrest you, and if you don’t come out at once, I will have your body dragged out.’

Even as he bellowed, Hawley heard the shouting from the other end of the ship. The sailors who’d been woken by the bell were appearing, and a ferocious fight had broken out. Steel rang on steel, and men’s voices, hoarse with rage or fear or both, bellowed defiance or hatred. Hawley turned to see that his men were winning. The crew were already so depleted, with half of them still wandering about the town, that the outcome was inevitable.

‘Your men cannot win. Come out and you may live,’ the Coroner declared.

‘So you say. How do I know you will hold to your word?’

‘Y
OU DARE ACCUSE ME OF BAD FAITH
? It was
you
who murdered a man from this town, Sir Andrew! You won’t leave here alive while there’s a man in Dartmouth to stop you, and you only have a small crew. If you come out now,
you can save some of your men and perhaps save yourself from disaster too. But if you make me go in there to get you, I’ll make damn sure you die.’

Hawley stepped back as a burly figure ran at him. He had already stabbed the man in the breast when he realised the body was headless, and he withdrew his sword distastefully, kicking the corpse towards the ship’s side, where it toppled into the water.

‘You have no crew, Sir Knight. You are going nowhere.’

The bar at the door slid back, and the door opened to show Sir Andrew, clad in tunic and gipon, sword at his side, that sneering expression on his face still.

‘What now? Will you bind me?’

The Coroner stepped forward and clenched his fist, holding it underneath Sir Andrew’s nose. ‘You contemptible little shite. If you tempt me, yes, I may have you put in chains. Or I may pass you over to the mob here in Dartmouth for them to deal with you. So
don’t
tempt me, Sir Andrew.’

Alice, Danny’s widow, was sitting on her stool at the table, trying to sew by the light of a flickering candle. She could barely see to thread her needle, but with the children having no father, and with her losing her husband, there was no money. She must pull herself together and set to, to mend all their clothing, and perhaps take in other people’s mending too.

There would be work when the ships came in. The fishermen always needed help in gutting and salting down the hauls, while sailors would always be glad of extra hands to repair torn sails or nets. Yes, there would be work – and the older children must look after the younger. In God’s name, it would be hard, though. The church would offer alms, and the food would be useful, but she would have to spread herself to survive.

Her eyes suddenly misted. God, how she missed her gentle Danny. Wiping her eyes with the back of her hand, she then closed them in defeat. She could do no more tonight. Glancing at the children asleep on the floor, she forced the tears away. There was no time for sorrow. She must plan the next day’s work so that she might collect some money.

At the knock on the door, her heart pounded in fear. No one came visiting this late: whoever it was must have some evil purpose.

Taking hold of her knife from the table, she rose and went to the door, peering through the gap at the side to see who was there. As she did so, a shiver tore through her frame with the speed of a plummeting hawk.

She dropped to her knees and gasped with horror. One of the children snuffled in her sleep, and Alice went to her on all fours, even as the door rattled. If she could, the terrified woman would have recited the
Paternoster
, but she wasn’t educated enough to have learned such recitations. She simply called on God to save her, to protect her children, and meanwhile the door thudded as a fist struck it.

‘Go away!’ she cried. The children were all stirring now, and the youngest began to sob.

A whisper reached her, like the soughing of wind through the branches.

‘Adam! You’re dead,’ she sobbed, averting her face. ‘Go back to the hell you came from!’

Baldwin and Simon had a fair-sized force when they left to seek the sailors. It did not take long to guess where they might be. Screams and shouting were coming from over towards South Town, and the two of them waved to the others to join them as they hurried on.

The town of Clifton had grown to join South Town, but where the two had originally met there were some rough areas of land. Beyond these were the beginnings of the old town that had once been separate. Simon knew it moderately
well, although he tended to keep to the Clifton end of town, for that was where the bulk of his work was. He was aware that there were brothels down here, and several taverns that catered for other tastes, with cock-fighting pits, dog-baiting, and gaming rooms where a man might sit and lose his month’s income in one game of chance.

The crew from Sir Andrew’s ship were involved in an altercation with the owner of a small alehouse, with the slatternly drab who tried to ply her trade there standing before the door screeching at the sailors who were trying to gain admittance.

‘Keep off, I say! Ow! You think you can barge in here and do what you want? I say you can …

Simon chose this moment to exercise his authority. ‘Good evening, Malkin! I think you have no more to fear. As for you lot, you were to be held in the gaol, I think?’

‘Piss on you! We’re trying to find the Frenchie,’ the leader of the sailors shouted.

From his complexion and speech, it was clear that Jan and the others had drunk a quantity of liquid bellicosity since leaving his house, and Simon smiled with relief that this was one opponent he need not fear. ‘Him? Oh, he’s here with us,’ he said glibly.

‘We’ll take him, then,’ the man declared loudly, stepping forward.

‘First we’ll escort you back to the gaol. Not only have you attempted to take a ship in the haven here, but you have also helped in the murder of a man who was guarding you on behalf of the King. You are all arrested. Drop your weapons!’

The ringleader stood in front of him, befuddled and bleary. He eyed Simon with a frown, then looked down at his sword, swaying slightly before spitting at Simon’s feet and rushing forward at Pierre with a yell. Three others lifted their weapons and followed him, and Simon was buffeted from the path of the first two, before coming to blows with the third, who gripped a long knife in one hand, an axe in the other.

He swung his axe at Simon’s head, and the two-headed weapon clashed from the Baliff’s sword, missing his shoulder by less than an inch. The long knife slipped towards his belly, and he had to reverse his blade’s movement to knock it aside, but as soon as he had recovered, the axe was moving again, first up at his neck, then round in a flashing arc and swooping down towards his knee. He leaped back, feeling foolish after his initial confidence about Jan.

The trouble was, sailors always started fighting when they were drunk: they were worse even than the miners on the moors for grabbing for a knife or dagger. The slightest insult to a man’s wife, sister, mother, ancestry or even his methods of choosing his plots for digging, were all fine incentives for a fellow to reach for the nearest piece of steel and try to spit his opponent, even if the opponent had yesterday been his best friend.

The axe returned with a punch towards his face, and he had to duck. Quickly, he slipped his sword across to his right, opening the man’s breast and slashing at his fist. A finger fell away, and the knife was dropped, and then Simon held his sword’s point at the man’s throat, and hissed, ‘Yield, fool!’

There was a loud clash as the axe fell to the cobbles, and Simon breathed a moment’s sigh of relief before looking about him. Baldwin had three men kneeling on the ground under his sword’s blade while he gazed around with genial interest as though measuring the competition. Beyond him, Simon saw Pierre with one of the sailors, and as he watched, the Frenchman snapped his sword back-handed and stepped away. There was a gout of blood and his opponent fell, his head rolling over the cobbles. Hamund was behind him with a dagger smeared with blood, looking dazed at the sudden eruption of violence, while other members of the posse stood about with their weapons dangling.

Simon heard a cry, and turned in time to see a man with a steel war-hammer in his fist running towards him.

A war-hammer was a fearsome weapon. On one side was the inch-square hammer head, while on the reverse was a vicious spike that projected four inches from the haft. A spear-tip at the top that could stab or slash shone wickedly in the occasional silvery moonbeams, and the whole was set atop a three-feet-long haft of wood strengthened with tangs of steel.

The man held it like a spear and he ran at Simon as if determined to gut him. Simon could only smash at the weapon with his sword and whirl from his path, but the fellow was quick on his feet and immediately tried to club Simon with the butt, which was weighted with a large ball of iron. It found its target, and Simon cried out as his elbow felt as though it was smashed to pieces. His hand was suddenly nerveless, and his sword dropped clattering to the ground.

‘Baldwin!’ he screamed.

Missing finger or no, the axeman was already grinning ferociously, and had gathered up his weapons again. He blocked the path of the others as the man with the hammer prodded it forward at Simon, forcing him away from his companions.

Holding his dead right arm with his left, desperate, Simon could only watch as the spear-tip waved before him, close to his face, at his throat, at his belly or groin. It moved, regular as a pebble on a string, and Simon was utterly engrossed at the sight as he moved back. Then something hit at the back of his knees, and he toppled into a carved moorstone horse-trough. The jarring sensation made him cry out with pain, but before he could attempt to regain his feet, the hammer was at his head, and it caught him a glancing blow over his eye. Simon felt sick with pain, and then he saw the hammer rise again, and begin to fall. He made a quick prayer …

And it stopped. There was a blade beneath it, blocking it – Pierre’s blade – and Simon couldn’t breathe as he watched the duel in fascination. The heavy blade swung around sharply, and the hammer was flicked away, only to stab out at Pierre, nearly nicking his thigh. Pierre leaped back, and the hammer was aimed at Simon again, but then Pierre returned and stopped it with a ringing crash that shook the hammer away, and now the hammer-fighter turned his full attention on to Pierre, leaving Simon to roll out of the trough, carefully protecting his arms as he landed on the ground again. He stayed there on all fours, panting, exhausted, as he watched his saviour.

Pierre handled his blade like a man who had been possessed by a fighting demon. He thrust, parried, blocked a great crashing blow that would have knocked Simon to his knees, and then began to move more swiftly, pressing his enemy with speed and determination, forcing him back farther and farther. The axeman was keeping the others away, but seeing his friend being pushed back, he lost concentration for a moment, and Simon saw Baldwin and Hamund attack together, Baldwin’s sword cleaving through his arm near the shoulder, and while the man screamed in rage and hatred, Hamund’s knife thrust in through his back, the point appearing in his breast. He shook Hamund away, and tried to reach the hilt of the knife with his remaining hand, but panic made him mad even as the blood pumped from his shoulder and he weakened. Soon he fell to his knees, and he flailed at his back ineffectually for a little longer, before keeling over and screaming once as the stump of his arm crashed into the cobbles. Then he was silent at last, and Hamund and Baldwin rushed to Pierre.

The hammer man knew that he was lost, but he wouldn’t give up. He snarled at the men, even as they surrounded him. It was only a matter of time now, and he gazed at them all, eyes running from one to another. Pierre and Baldwin exchanged a look, and both sprang forward at the same moment. The hammer man shifted his weight and flung his point out, trying to spit one of them, but too late. Pierre’s blade slapped into and through his thigh, while Baldwin’s stabbed upwards, piercing his throat and running on until Baldwin’s fist was below his chin, the knight’s other hand gripping the wrist of the hand that held the hammer.

The man went over backwards like a sack of flour, and thrashed desperately as he drowned in his own blood, the fluid jetting from his nostrils and erupting from his mouth. Baldwin withdrew as the man gradually eased, and wiped his blade on his tunic.