‘Jackass! He’s one of ours!’
Martin recognised Holland’s voice. It came as no surprise to him that the ruthless knight had intercepted his progress to the gates of Heaven, claiming him for the fires of Hell. Had Holland also died in the battle, then?
Holland lowered his left arm, and Martin found himself still gazing up at Beaumont, who scowled at them both before stalking away. Martin realised that the darkness that had fallen over him had been the shadow of Holland’s shield, and felt very foolish.
Holland returned his broadsword to its scabbard and leaned over Martin, seizing him by the arm and hauling him to his feet. ‘Are you injured?’
Martin shook his head numbly, too shaken by his narrow escape to find his tongue.
The two of them gazed across to where the battle was turning in favour of the English. The French ranks had broken, and were fleeing east along the north edge of the marshes, towards the sanctuary of Abbeville. They were pursued by several companies of men-at-arms led by Sir Reginald Cobham. Even as the laggards tried to escape, the men-at-arms would overtake them, cutting them down with a back-handed slash of a broadsword or plunging the tip of a spear between their shoulder blades. Bloody corpses were sprawled on the river-bank or floating face-down amongst the reeds.
Holland chuckled with satisfaction. It was clear that he and his men had done all that could be expected of them that day. ‘Perhaps you archers should wear special livery, such as the Welsh do,’ he suggested to Martin. ‘Warfare is dangerous enough without the added risk of being killed accidentally by your own side. Eh, Kemp?’ He hooked the toe of one boot under the hilt of Martin’s sword and flicked it into the air with a sudden jerk of his leg, catching it by the grip.
‘It would prevent accidents, Sir Thomas,’ agreed Martin.
Holland regarded him curiously. Holding the sword in his right hand, just below the hilt, he offered it back to Martin.
‘Thank you, sir.’ Martin grasped the hilt, wiping the blade clean with a rag before returning it to its scabbard. ‘For saving my life, I mean.’
Holland shrugged, turning away to gaze across to the rest of the army, which was emerging from the marshes as it began to straggle across the ford. ‘I acted only for selfish reasons,’ he said, without turning back. ‘I’ve lost nearly a quarter of my company since we landed at Saint-Vaast, one way or another; your private war against Caynard and his friends has not improved the situation.’ He winced, and massaged his wounded shoulder; the sword-stroke meant for Martin that he had caught on his shield had jarred his arm quite badly. ‘I may need every man I have before this campaign is out.’
‘Then you acted not for selfish reasons, but for his Majesty, sir,’ Martin pointed out stoutly, with the stoicism of blind loyalty.
‘Aye…’ Holland acknowledge vaguely. ‘Yes, I suppose I did.’ He turned back to face Martin. ‘Tell me, Kemp. What will you do when you have served out your twelve months?’
Martin shrugged. He had not really thought about it. ‘I don’t know. Return to my family in Knighton, I suppose.’
‘Return to a life of tilling the soil?’ Holland was contemptuous of the suggestion. ‘Could you really go back to that, after tasting the joys of war?’
‘Joys of war’ was not exactly the phrase Martin himself would have chosen to sum up his career in the king’s service so far, but he had to admit to himself that the prospect of a life of servitude on Beaumont’s manor did not exactly appeal to him. ‘What else could I do?’ he asked.
‘You fought well this day, Kemp. Today, and at Caen. You lack experience, of course, but I doubt that will still be the case in nine months’ time, when you’ve earned your pardon. You could work for me.’
Martin was overwhelmed. ‘Sir Thomas?’
‘I shall be a wealthy man when I receive the ransom for the Comte d’Eu. I’ll be able to employ my own retinue of armed men. Not a large one, perhaps, but I think I can see a place for you in its ranks. I’d pay you thruppence a day during peacetime, plus board and lodging, of course. That would increase to half a shilling when we are indentured to serve the king in his next campaign.’
It was a generous offer. On Stone Gate Manor, Martin earned the equivalent of a shilling a month, and he rarely got to see any of that. He badly wanted to say yes, but he knew he was not in a position to accept the offer. He hung his head disconsolately. ‘I am but a villein, Sir Thomas. I could not leave my lord’s manor without his consent.’
Holland smiled. ‘I’m sure that if I spoke to him… offered him a small recompense…’
Martin shook his head. ‘Sir John hates me. He would never give his consent.’
‘This Sir John… would his coat of arms be argent, a wyvern gules?’
Martin bit his tongue.
Holland chuckled. ‘And you truly desire to go back to slave for this whoreson in a knight’s armour who wages private war against his own bondsmen?’
‘Desire? No.’ Martin shrugged. ‘But what choice have I?’
‘You have plenty of choices,’ Holland told him. ‘You could go and live in a borough town for a year and a day: that confers freedom on any villein, by law.’
‘A town like Leicester, you mean?’
‘Somewhere further from your home would be better, unless you want to be dragged back to the manor in chains and flogged to within an inch of your life. London would be best. I have friends in London. After you have served out your twelve months fighting for the king and earned your pardon, I might be able to get you a temporary post in some rich burgher’s household.’
‘It all seems like a long time in the future,’ Martin said dubiously.
‘Aye, and so it is,’ agreed Holland. ‘But you are young; you have your whole life ahead of you. What do you say, Kemp?’
‘We’ll have to wait and see, sir,’ Martin said pragmatically.
‘Wait and see?’ Holland was astounded that a churl such as Martin could even contemplate rejecting such a generous offer. ‘What is there that remains to be seen?’ he demanded irritably.
‘Whether or not I live that long.’
Holland stared at him for a moment and then laughed, clapping him heartily on the back. ‘Aye, right enough,’ he admitted. ‘We may yet both be dead before this week is out.’ A sudden gust of cold wind blew a thick tuft of cloud in front of the sun, and Holland shivered. ‘You’d best get back to your platoon now,’ he told Martin.
‘Aye, sir.’ Martin began to walk along the river-bank towards Holland’s company, which was rallying around Villiers and the banner.
‘I always thought poaching was against the law, Sir Thomas,’ a voice said dryly behind Holland. He whirled around and saw Preston sitting on the trunk of a fallen tree, industriously wiping the blade of his sword clean.
‘He has potential, Wat,’ said Holland. ‘You’ve as much as admitted it yourself. He would be wasted behind a plough.’
‘Like enough,’ agreed Preston, rising to his feet and ramming his sword home into its scabbard. ‘As you say, he lacks experience, but he’s one of the best archers I’ve ever had under my command, and he’s beginning to handle that broadsword as if he was born to it. He’ll make a good soldier. My only concern is that deep down inside he may still have some traces of a conscience.’
‘So may I, Wat,’ Holland said softly. ‘It’s something you have to learn to live with.’
When the rearguard finally made it through the marshes, it reported that it had been attacked on the south bank by the vanguard of Valois’ army, and had lost several wagons from the baggage train. The rearguard had been able to hold off the French until the rest of the baggage train had made it across the ford. By then the tide was coming in again and the French, unable to pursue the English, turned in to Abbeville for the night.
The king’s army halted on the north bank of the river for the rest of that day, while Sir Hugh Despenser led a large detachment of mounted troops on a foraging raid towards the coast, burning a nearby port along with the ships he found in the harbour there. He returned to the main body of the army to report that there was no sign of the English fleet which, it had been hoped, would be waiting off the coast with reinforcements and supplies.
The army was in a bad way. True enough, it had successfully evaded Valois’ army a second time, and had put the last major obstacle between itself and the Anglo-Flemish force behind it. By now it was barely twelve thousand men strong, while Valois was said to have five times that number. The men were exhausted and footsore from having marched so far so quickly, and many of the foot-soldiers found that their shoes were worn out. They had moved so swiftly since they had crossed the Seine that there had been little time for foraging supplies along the way, and now the victuals carried in the baggage train were almost completely exhausted. There was no more bread left, and hunger had reduced many of the men to eating unripened fruit picked off the trees along the way. Martin knew better than to eat such fruit, but the hunger that gnawed at the pit of his stomach sharpened the temptation. He recognised the irony in having wanted to become a soldier so that he would become rich, and never have to go hungry again. Now his purse bulged with gold and silver, but there was no food to be bought or foraged for miles around.
They set out again the following morning, marching north-east through thick woodland for nine miles until they came to a small valley. A stream shallow enough to be forded ran through the valley beyond the tree line, and a village stood on the north bank. They halted before they reached the village, the king sending out orders for his men to rest while they were hidden amongst the trees. At the same time, he sent out scouting parties: some riding south towards Abbeville, searching for signs of Valois’ army to see if it was still in pursuit; others riding to the north-east, hoping for contact with the Anglo-Flemish force. Both sets returned that evening to report in the negative. It was the Feast of Saint Denys, the patron saint of France, and Valois was using the holy day to rest his army at Abbeville while the rearguard caught up. There was no sign of the Anglo-Flemish force led by Sir Hugh Hastings.
That night, Martin dreamed.
He dreamed that his twelve months in the king’s army were over, and that he had been granted a pardon. He dreamed that he had lived in London for a year and a day, and had been granted the status of a freeman. He dreamed that he had returned to Knighton, where he confessed everything to Beatrice, how he had raped a girl in Caen. And she told him that it did not matter, she forgave him, she loved him, and she still wanted to marry him. And suddenly he knew that everything was going to be all right.
And then the trumpets sounded reveille, shattering his dream.
‘How I love to be woken by the dawn chorus first thing in the morning,’ groaned Conyers.
Martin sat up, and slowly realised that he was in a forest somewhere in France. He did not know it, but he was the closest to home he had been since he had landed at Saint-Vaast-la-Hougue, though home was still a long way away. About twenty-one months away, and nine of those yet to be spent fighting for the king. And before those nine months were up he could easily be killed, as easily as he had killed… God alone knew how many men he had killed since he had arrived in France.
He pushed himself to his feet. His stomach ached with hunger, and his feet, clad in shoes with almost worn-out soles, were sore; but on the whole he felt good. In fact, he felt a great deal better than he had done for a few weeks now. The previous day’s rest had been just what he needed, he decided.
He did not imagine for a moment that today would be the longest day of his entire life.
It was still an hour shy of dawn, the pale grey light of the false dawn visible through the trees overhead. The rest of Martin’s companions were beginning to stir.
‘Come on, on your feet, sluggards!’ growled Preston. ‘Mass and communion in half an hour.’
‘Mass?’ Inglewood was bewildered. ‘Is it Sunday already?’
Brewster sat up, rubbing sleep from his eyes. ‘Saturday, I think.’
‘Mass!’ spat Newbolt. ‘To Hell with that! A Luxembourg shilling for your mass!’ ‘Luxembourg shillings’ was the name given to the counterfeit coins that were leaching into the markets of Europe.
‘You’ll all attend mass this morning,’ Preston told them firmly. ‘King’s orders. Do you want to die without absolution?’
‘I’d rather not die at all, if I can help it,’ said Brewster, smiling.
‘There’s to be a battle today,’ Preston told them simply. ‘Four large battalions of French troops have been seen headed this way.’
Martin received this news without much excitement. He had often heard rumours of an impending battle; sometimes there had been one, and sometimes there had not. He would believe it when he saw one side or the other charge. In the meantime, all he felt was a mild irritation: he did not feel like fighting today.
‘What’s for breakfast, serjeant?’ asked Conyers.
‘You let the cooks worry about that,’ Preston told him gruffly. ‘You’ll have enough on your trencher as it is.’ He chuckled at his own witticism.
Conyers and some of the others groaned. ‘I can’t fight on an empty stomach!’ protested Newbolt.
‘You can die on an empty stomach,’ Preston replied evenly. ‘I don’t see why you can’t fight on one. If you don’t like it, I suggest you take it up with his Majesty.’
Martin shaved himself with his rondel, honed to razor-sharpness with a leather strop; if he were destined to die today, he thought wryly, there was no reason why he should not be well-groomed. Then he polished the blades of his weapons, prompting the others to do likewise. They were subdued but optimistic. The general appearance of things in the camp gave the impression that the king was in earnest about doing battle with Valois. Whether the French would take up this opportunity was another matter entirely, although given that all the scouts’ reports implied that Valois had at least four times as many troops at his disposal, it seemed unlikely that he would pass it up.
‘Four battalions,’ Tate mused out loud, and turned to the others. ‘How many men are there in a battalion, anyway?’
‘Plenty,’ said Conyers.
‘Enough,’ said Brewster, and shrugged. ‘How long is a river?’
‘How long is a river?’ Newbolt echoed incredulously. ‘What in Hell is that supposed to mean? “How long is a river?”!’
Despite the impression given by their constant bickering, they were in good spirits. If the king were ready to give battle, they reasoned, then that must mean he thought they stood a good chance of winning. Like Martin, many of the younger ones were sick of evading any formal confrontation with the enemy. Ever since they had reached the Seine at Elbeuf, it had seemed as if they were running away. Now at last it looked as if they were going to stand and fight.
After mass, the army began to move out of the forest and across the valley. There was a small wood in a hollow about four and a half furlongs to the north of the village, and the baggage train moved around to the far side of this wood. The waggoners formed a leaguer – a large, square-shaped enclosure that had the wagons themselves as its walls – and all the horses were corralled within it. After taking the Earl of Northampton’s advice, the king had decided that the knights would fight on foot with their men.
There was a low ridge to the north-east of the village, running for about nine furlongs and facing south-east across a shallow valley. It was on the south-east face of the ridge that the marshals drew up the battle lines, about three hundred yards from the bottom of the valley, where the land had been moulded into terraces for easier cultivation.
There was no confusion. The marshals took their time, working carefully and methodically. If they were going to fight a pitched battle, it was important to get the preparations right. Heralds rode back and forth between the battle lines and the camp, ordering each company in turn to pick up its equipment and directing them to their exact spot on the field.
Holland’s company was assigned to the Prince of Wales’ division in the vanguard, positioned just below a windmill on the end of the ridge that overlooked the village. When the time came, they would stand facing across the shallow valley in the direction from which the French were expected to approach; but in the meantime the pioneers and sappers handed out a spade to each of the archers, and told them to dig.
Newbolt spat distastefully on the ground, and then spat on his palms with a reluctant shrug, picking up his spade and attacking the soil. ‘God’s curse! I might’ve known it! I only joined up because I were sick of working the land. So here I stand, about to face the entire might of Valois’ army, and what am I doing? God-damned digging, that’s what!’
‘Shut your trap, Newbolt,’ Preston told him good-naturedly. ‘The only reason you’re here is that you’d’ve wound up kicking your heels at the end of a length of hemp otherwise.’
‘What are we supposed to be digging, serjeant?’ asked Tate, as Preston showed them where to dig.
‘Holes,’ the serjeant told him succinctly. ‘A foot across and a foot down should do it – just enough to make them stumble when they’re approaching our lines.’
Fletchers passed among the archers while they were digging the holes, distributing baskets of arrows so that there would be no danger of them running out. Every archer in Holland’s company received at least one sheaf of bodkin-tipped arrows, with steel, pyramidal heads that were specially designed to pierce armour. It was likely that they would be facing armoured knights charging en masse for the first time.
Those ugly-looking arrowheads brought the full reality of the situation home to Martin far more than any of the other extensive preparations that were being made. This would not be just another skirmish, it would be a head-on collision between two mighty armies. He began to experience that tight feeling of excitement in his chest and his stomach, but by now it was an old, familiar and trusted friend; like his longbow and his broadsword, the tools of his trade. What happened there that day would either put the king on the throne of France, or cast him into a French dungeon to rot.
It was late morning. The sun shone brightly in a sky that was blue except for a few high-up wisps of cloud. The archers were wet with sweat from the back-breaking toil of digging holes in the hot summer sunshine.
Conyers chuckled nervously. ‘I’ll laugh if, after all this preparation, the French decide not to fight.’
‘Make these holes six feet longer and a few feet deeper, and I reckon they’ll make nice graves,’ said Freeman.
‘Aye and like,’ agreed Martin. ‘Let’s hope it’s French corpses that fill them.’
Off to the right they could see the king riding along the front of the lines on a small white palfrey, accompanied by the Earl of Warwick, Sir Thomas Norwich, and Sir John Beauchamp, Warwick’s younger brother, the Royal Standard Bearer. Like Holland, none of them had yet donned their armour. Martin found that he could draw strength from their relaxed confidence. The king halted in front of each company to make a short speech.
The archers began to plant their arrows in clusters in the ground at their feet. ‘Remember, no one is to loose until the order is given,’ said Holland, raising his voice so that the whole company could hear. ‘And once battle is joined, on no account is any man to break ranks unless specifically ordered to do so. If anyone does, they’ll not only be putting his own life in peril, but also the lives of their companions. If any one of you disobeys either of these commands and lives to tell the tale… I’ll see to it that he never gets around to finishing it.’
The king rode up with Warwick and Norwich to where Holland stood before his men. He was unarmed but for a white marshal’s baton with a gilt head, elegantly dressed in robes of emerald green velvet, his handsome countenance smiling and cheerful. He saluted Holland with his baton. ‘Good morning, Sir Thomas. Are you and your men ready for battle?’
Holland bowed low. ‘Ready and willing, sire.’
‘Excellent.’ The king turned to address the archers. ‘Well, stout fellows, this is it. We’ve come a long way since we landed in Normandy nearly seven weeks ago, and in that time you have all fought nobly and bravely for the furtherance of my cause.’ He did not need to shout, his strident tones carrying clearly through the ranks. ‘I would take issue with any man who claimed that there was one amongst you who had failed in his duty to me. If there were any justice in the world, I could fain send you all home now and ask no more of you, to let others in their turn fulfil the duty that they yet owe to me.’
There was a slight frisson throughout the ranks at the suggestion that they might wish themselves elsewhere that day, but the king raised a hand to calm them, smiling. ‘But you all know as well as I that if there is to be any justice in this world then we must make it ourselves,’ he continued gravely. Then his features cracked into a grin. ‘And if all of you had the opportunity to leave this place at this moment and return to England and safety, I doubt not that each and every one of you would reject it, and in preference stand with me against the usurper Valois.
‘Doubt not that our cause is just, and that God the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost is on our side. And though the enemy may be greater in number, each one of you, armed with the power of God, shall have the strength of ten, and behind you shall stand all the legions of Heaven.
‘I speak to you now not as your king, but as your countryman and your companion-in-arms, when I ask you to stand up for my honour and to defend my rights; and that when the time comes for you to do your duty, not one of you shall be found lacking in strength or courage.’
‘Three cheers for his Majesty!’ said Villiers, and as the archers joined the young squire in his cheers, not one of them suspected that his outburst of boyish loyalty was the result of a strong hint from Holland.
The king waved in acknowledgement, exchanging greetings with one or two men whose faces he was able to put names to. ‘Is that old Daw Oakley?’ he called.
‘Aye, your Majesty,’ responded Oakley, grinning with pleasure at being recognised.
‘We’ve come a long way since we fought together on Halidon Hill, have we not?’
‘Aye, sire.’
The king spotted Martin in the ranks, recognising him by his coverchief. ‘It is Martin Kemp, is it not?’
Martin flushed, overwhelmed at being picked out by the king in front of so many people. ‘Aye, your Majesty,’ he managed to stammer, bowing clumsily.
‘I’m much obliged to you for the loan of your coverchief at Saint-Vaast-la-Hougue. Let us hope that this day it is Valois who gets a bloody nose!’
The men all laughed raucously. The story of the king’s accident on landing at Saint-Vaast had spread throughout the army.
The king took the reins of his horse in his left hand and rode on to address the next company. Holland made his way through the press of men as if to speak to one of his serjeants. As he passed Martin, he paused momentarily to murmur in his ear. ‘It seems you made quite an impression on his Majesty,’ he said humorously. ‘Don’t let it go to your head.’
‘Nay, sir.’
There was still no sign of the enemy by the time the king had completed his inspection of the battle lines at noon. The men were dismissed one unit at a time to make their way to where the cooks were preparing food by the leaguer. While they were awaiting their turn, Holland’s men sat down in their positions and began talking amongst themselves. Some played at jacks or dice, while others boasted of the feats they planned to perform that day. Conyers, as enterprising as ever, managed to combine both these activities by arranging a game of jacks and using the French noblemen they hoped to capture as stakes. ‘I’ll wager the Count of Blois to the Duke of Alencon that you can’t pick up all seven on the next throw,’ he told Brewster, the platoon’s jacks champion.
Brewster grinned. He was on a winning streak. ‘Your Count of Blois, and I’ll raise you the Count of Hainault.’
‘There’ll be no taking prisoners this day,’ Preston cut in firmly. Taking prisoners usually meant leaving the ranks, and that had already been strictly forbidden. ‘You’ll leave taking prisoners to your betters and concentrate on your own task: killing Frenchmen’.
Preston’s words cast a cloud over his men, reminding them that this was no game they were looking forward to, but a bloody battle. Martin wondered if the tough old veteran could be nervous. If a hardened campaigner like Preston had cause to be worried, he mused to himself, what hope was there for the rest of them?
Norwich rode up towards mid-afternoon and told Holland that it was time for his men to go and get something to eat. The archers cheered without waiting for the order to be relayed to them through their serjeants, and pushed themselves to their feet, marking their places with their bows, caps and helmets.
‘But if you hear the call to arms, you get back here smartish, I don’t care what you’re doing!’ Preston called after them.
A pale-faced Inglewood made no attempt to move. ‘Not coming?’ asked Tate, replacing his bow in its cover to protect it in his absence.
Inglewood shook his head. ‘Not hungry.’
Tate shrugged, and made his way after the others, who were crowding around the field kitchen. ‘I hope there’s some God-damned food left for us,’ shouted Newbolt. ‘God’s doom, I’m starving!’
Martin skewered a pork chop with his rondel. He did not feel as if he were on a battlefield; the spirits of the men around him were so high that it was more like being at a fair. He washed down the meat with a cup of watered-down wine and strolled into the wood with Conyers.
‘You’ve been in a battle before, haven’t you?’ said Martin. ‘A real battle, I mean.’
Conyers nodded. ‘I were at Morlaix four years back. We were commanded by the Earl of Northampton that time. We lined up on a hillside facing the French, just like we’re doing today, and we thrashed them hollow. Me and Hodge.’ He suddenly fell silent, remembering that he would never again stand side by side with Rudcock facing the enemy.
Martin felt the same way about Rudcock’s absence from their ranks, but did not want to dwell on the matter. Rudcock was dead, and no amount of mourning could ever bring him back. ‘What were it like?’ he pressed Conyers. ‘At Morlaix, I mean.’
Conyers chewed his last mouthful of pork ruminatively and swallowed. ‘It were like the skirmish at Saint-Vaast, only bigger,’ he decided, licking grease from his fingers. ‘More men – on both sides, I mean.’ He turned his head to glance speculatively at Martin. ‘Scared?’
‘Aren’t you?’
‘Aye – scared witless. Don’t worry, we’ll be all right.’ They crouched on opposite sides of a tree to answer the call of nature. ‘If we don’t do it now, we’ll most likely do it in the heat of battle, and we don’t want that,’ chuckled Conyers.
It was late afternoon when they got back to their positions. There was still no sign of the enemy. ‘Pisspants reckoned he saw four or five knights at the edge of yonder forest while you were off stuffing your faces, but I’m damned if I could see owt,’ said Preston, gesturing vaguely across the valley, to the south-east. ‘Mark you, my eyes aren’t as strong as they used to be.’
‘Five knights do not an army make,’ Freeman said in disgust, and hawked loudly before spitting on the ground. ‘I’ll wager ten to one they don’t show.’
‘I’m inclined to take you up on that, Freeman,’ said Holland, suddenly stepping up behind him. ‘Four or five knights could have been a reconnaissance party. Perhaps the rest of Valois’ army is not so far behind.’
A dark shadow fell across them, rapidly spreading across the whole valley as dark and gravid clouds suddenly filled the sky. ‘Looks like rain,’ Villiers said dubiously. Even as he spoke, the first few drops began to patter down. Newbolt swore and unstrung his bow hurriedly. The others did likewise, coiling up their bowstrings and tucking them under their hoods, caps and helmets to keep them dry.
‘Can we go and shelter under those trees, serjeant?’ asked Conyers, grinning, as the rain rapidly increased in intensity.
‘What, and risk missing all the fun?’ Preston replied dryly.
The downpour was heavy, and before long they were all soaked to the skin. ‘I can’t see the French coming out in this,’ Hick Lowesby said miserably.
‘Not if they’ve got any sense,’ agreed Newbolt. ‘They’re probably still in Abbeville, sitting warm and snug in front of their fires, and laughing at us stuck out here in the rain.’
‘It won’t last,’ Preston assured them. ‘It’s just a summer shower.’
As usual he was right. The downpour abated after half an hour, and then died away as suddenly as it had started. The rain-cloud had passed on, and the sun came out once more, low in the sky to the west as it sank towards the horizon, warming their backs. A rainbow appeared across the valley.
‘I hope that’s a good omen.’ said Villiers.
‘If we beat the French today, it’ll be thanks to English yew, not any omens,’ Holland replied cynically.
‘If the French show up at all,’ grumbled Newbolt.
‘What hour do you suppose it is?’ wondered Tate.
‘It must be nearly vespers,’ Inglewood told him.
‘The French won’t come now, will they?’ Tate sounded hopeful. ‘It’ll be dark soon.’
A couple of black birds winged their way across the battlefield, cawing. They landed in the field near the bottom of the valley, searching the wet grass for earthworms brought to the surface by the downpour. They seemed oblivious to the thousands of armed men massed only a few hundred yards away. Martin wondered if they were some kind of omen… or was it black cats he was thinking of? No, it was magpies. One for sorrow, two for joy, went the old saying. But these were not magpies.
Tate’s mind seemed to be working along similar lines. ‘What kind of birds are those?’ he asked suddenly just for something to say.
‘Crows, I think,’ said Lowesby.
‘No, rooks.’ Inglewood was adamant.
‘What difference does it make?’ demanded Newbolt. He always got irritable when he was nervous. ‘Who cares?’
‘How can you tell?’ Drayton asked Inglewood.
‘My father taught me an old saying,’ explained Inglewood. ‘If you see a rook standing in a flock of crows, then it’s a crow. But if you see a crow standing on its own, then it’s a rook.’ He frowned. ‘Or is it the other way around?’ He bit his lip, as if the whole outcome of the battle might depend on his getting it right.
There was a pregnant silence while the whole platoon ingested this titbit of country wisdom. It was Newbolt who broke the silence.
‘Ballocks,’ he said.
‘What?’ Inglewood was caught off guard by the vehemence of Newbolt’s response.
‘Ballocks,’ Newbolt repeated succinctly. ‘Rooks is just as gregarious as crows.’
Conyers laughed out loud. ‘Come again?’
‘Gregarious,’ repeated Newbolt, self-conscious at his sudden display of erudition. ‘It means friendly, like. You know, sociable.’
‘There’s no such word!’ scoffed Conyers. ‘You just made it up!’
‘There is too! Anyways, how would you know? You can’t even spell your own name.’
‘And you can, I suppose?’
‘All I’m saying is that rooks always hangs around with other rooks,’ said Newbolt. ‘That’s why they always builds rookeries together.’
‘Don’t talk daft,’ cut in Freeman. ‘You talk about flocks of crows, don’t you? Whoever heard of a flock of rooks?’
‘Anyway, whatever those two birds are, they aren’t standing in a flock, and they aren’t standing on their own, neither,’ pointed out Oakley.
A shout went up some distance behind them, and they all broke off their debate on ornithology to glance over their shoulders. A look-out had been stationed on the roof of the windmill, and he was waving frantically towards the king’s tent, which had been erected to the rear of the lines, about halfway between the crest of the ridge and the wood behind it. The tent was out of sight to the men in the prince’s division, but presently a handful of figures appeared silhouetted on the ridge behind them, gazing over their heads towards the south-east. Holland and his men gazed too. Armour could be seen glinting about a mile and a half away, where troops were emerging from behind the trees that blocked the view of the road to Abbeville. A herald blew the call to arms, a call that was taken up by trumpeters throughout the battle lines. The clamour put the two birds to flight.
Valois had finally arrived with his army.
Martin felt the familiar tightness return to his stomach and chest. He had been so engrossed in his companions’ discussion that he had quite forgotten why they were all there. Men who had wandered away from their positions now hurriedly scrambled back into place.
Norwich was standing by Holland. ‘The hour is late,’ he observed. ‘It will be dark anon, and they must be weary from their march. If they have any sense, they will not attack until the morrow.’ There were traces of both hope and fear in his voice.
Holland stared at him deprecatingly. He for one had never credited Valois and his vassals with any sense when it came to fighting battles. He made his way unhurriedly to the rear of the line to don his armour with Villiers’ help, returning about a quarter of an hour later. He looked invulnerable in his suit of plate armour, chain-mail and reinforced leather, but Martin knew he was no better protected than the knight he himself had slain near Quettehou. Armoured knights were hard to kill, of that there could be no doubt; but it was reassuring to know that they were not invincible. Martin checked his bodkin-tipped arrows. They had parchment fletchings, unlike the feathered fletchings of his ordinary arrows, so it was easy to tell them apart, even by touch.
Then he remembered that he had not yet restrung his bow since the rainstorm. He took the coiled string from under his helmet and fastened it on to the bowstave. But his neglect had made him panicky, and his trembling fingers made a mess of the task. He forced himself to get a grip. The enemy were still over a mile away, and in marching order; it would take them time to form into battle array. He unstrung his bow and started from scratch, forcing himself to take his time.
The archers could see the vanguard of Valois’ army more clearly now. There were knights and men-at-arms on horseback, and the usual Genoese crossbowmen with their red and white pennants. There were thousands of the enemy all told, more men than Martin had ever seen at one time before, stretching back along the Abbeville road until they disappeared behind the trees. He could make out the by-now familiar banners of Valois and Saint-Denys.
Holland, Norwich and Villiers were also studying the enemy’s banners and pennants. ‘There’s the famous Oriflamme,’ observed Norwich.
‘The pennant that signals no quarter is to be given?’ Villiers asked nervously.
‘The same,’ agreed Holland.
‘Valois must be with them, then,’ said Norwich. ‘The Oriflamme is only raised when the French king rides with his army. I can see the banner of Valois’ brother, the Duke of Alengon, and the Duke of Lorraine, and our old friend Robert Bertrand…’ As he continued, he might have been noting the arrival of contestants at a tournament. ‘The Counts of Auxerre, Namur, Blois, Aumale, d’Harcourt… does Sir Godefroi know that his brother rides in the enemy ranks, I wonder?’
‘He must be expecting it,’ Holland said grimly.
‘And look there,’ said Norwich, pointing. ‘Do you see yonder banner? Gules, a lion rampant queue fourchée and passed in saltire argent – the arms of John of Luxembourg, King of Bohemia.’
Holland nodded. ‘I’d heard he was allied with Valois. They say it was his men who fell on our vanguard at the ford the day before yesterday.’
‘Is it true his Majesty is blind?’ asked Villiers.
‘So they say,’ replied Norwich. ‘And there is the banner of King Jaime of Mallorca… four kings on a single battlefield, eh?’
‘Three kings and a usurper,’ corrected Holland.
‘Quite so,’ Norwich agreed hurriedly. ‘A fine array of nobility, nonetheless. Have you ever been the guest of honour at a feast where a stuffed peacock was served, and it almost looked too fine to eat?’
‘Today I am feeling extremely hungry, I’m afraid,’ said Holland, flexing the articulated fingers of his right gauntlet around the hilt of his scabbarded broadsword.
They could hear the advance of the enemy by now, a cacophony of trumpets, cornets, kettle-drums and war-cries. The vanguard of Valois’ army seemed to be in some confusion, but eventually the Genoese crossbowmen began to advance into the valley.
‘It seems they wish to take us up on our offer of battle after all,’ sneered Holland. ‘I was beginning to think they might not have the stomach for a fight.’ He raised his voice to address his archers. ‘All right, men, this is it. Stand by!’
‘Remember, no one is to loose until I give the order!’ Preston reminded his platoon.
A herald came riding past at a gallop, reining in his palfrey long enough to murmur briefly in Holland’s ear. Holland nodded curtly, and the herald rode on to where Sir Reginald Cobham stood with his men. Holland spoke to Preston, and the serjeant smiled broadly at his master’s words before passing them on to his men.
‘The first volley is to land sixty yards short! Pass it on!’
‘Sixty yards short?’ echoed Inglewood. ‘You mean, we’re to miss on purpose?’
Preston nodded. ‘That’s right, lad!’
‘But what for?’ protested Inglewood.
‘Never you mind! You just do as I tell you! Any man shoots over two hundred, I’ll have his guts for garters!’
‘Pisspants is right!’ Martin muttered to Brewster. ‘What’s the point of shooting short? It’s just a waste of arrows!’
‘Oh, I think the serjeant knows what he’s about,’ replied Brewster, with a lazy smile.
‘You just do as you’re told,’ agreed Oakley. ‘You’ll see why soon enough.’
Martin shrugged. He suddenly realised that in spite of all he had been through since landing in France, this was still only the second time he had stood and faced an enemy attack head-on. He remembered how he had panicked and made a mess of things that first time on the beach. This time, his earlier anxiety seemed to have vanished entirely. Now he felt calm and fatalistic. If he was to die, then so be it: it was no worse than he deserved, and death could be no worse than the terror of the mêlée on the bridge at Caen. He selected his first arrow – an ordinary one: the Genoese were poorly armoured compared to the French knights and men-at-arms – and nocked it with practised, workman-like motions. He did not take aim yet: the Genoese were still too far away.
They were advancing in skirmishing order, their crossbows presented. They crossed the bottom of the valley, three hundred yards away. A great shout suddenly went up from their ranks, doubtless some kind of war-cry intended to intimidate their opponents. Martin and his companions were unperturbed. He idly wondered if it meant anything in Genoese; to him it sounded like a meaningless, animalistic bellow, but that could happen to any word or phrase roared by hundreds of men simultaneously.
Another shout rose from the Genoese as they continued their inexorable advance up the slope towards the English battle lines. The sun was already setting behind the ridge, shining in the eyes of the crossbowmen. Martin recalled what Preston had said on the first day of training about not attacking with the sun in your eyes. It was somehow reassuring, as if the French did not know the first thing about war. Norwich had been right when he said that it would be wiser for the French to postpone their attack until morning, when the sun would be shining in the eyes of the English. Martin smiled to himself, thinking that it was just as well that Valois had not been trained by Wat Preston.
A third shout rose from the Genoese ranks, and at that moment they loosed their first volley.
All the bolts fell short.
Stupid whoresons, thought Martin.
‘Steady, lads. Don’t loose yet,’ cautioned Preston, lest the Genoese volley provoke any of his men into retaliating. He need not have bothered: his men were well-drilled, and knew what was expected of them. ‘Remember, sixty yards short!’
The Genoese paused to reload their crossbows. They did not have their large shields strapped to their backs, but they instinctively turned their backs on the English nevertheless. They could not march and reload at the same time anyway. Reloading a crossbow seemed like an awkward and time-consuming process to Martin, and he decided that he was much happier using his longbow. The Genoese resumed their advance. They were only two hundred and fifty yards away now, and Martin knew that at that range he could pick off any one of them; but he also knew better than to disobey orders.
The Genoese were still advancing, loosing the occasional shot towards the English ranks, but they were shooting up-hill, and practically into the sun.
Preston was watching Holland. ‘Steady, lads,’ he told his men.
Holland drew his broadsword from its scabbard, holding it aloft so it caught the sun’s last rays, glinting in the twilight.
‘Step up and nock,’ ordered Preston. The archers each took one pace forward, nocking their arrows to their bows. ‘Mark – sixty yards short, remember! Draw!’
Martin raised his bow, pushing away the bowstave with his left arm, aiming sixty yards short of the advancing Genoese. He reckoned he could easily hit one of them, but if Preston wanted him to shoot short…
Holland brought down his sword with a sharp, chopping motion.
‘Loose!’
Martin let fly. Suddenly the sky seemed to grow darker as a cloud of arrows filled the air, soughing with eerie menace as they whirred towards their targets. He had never seen anything like it. The arrows – literally thousands of them – seemed to arc downwards as one, like a swarm of bees or a flight of birds flying in formation.
They all fell short of the Genoese, just as had been ordered. To Martin it seemed like a waste of good arrows.
But now the Genoese were running forward, stopping just short of where the English arrows were embedded in the ground. Now Martin could see the reason for shooting short: the Genoese had assumed that was the maximum range of the English archers, and that they would be safe provided they went no further.
‘Nock,’ ordered Preston. ‘Mark to kill this time.’
Martin selected his mark, a crossbowman who was pausing to reload his weapon. The Genoese were targets, just like any other.
‘Draw!’ ordered Preston, waiting for Holland to give the signal once more. ‘And… loose!’
Once again the sky was darkened with arrows. They curved down, this time raining amongst the ranks of the Genoese.
The effect was devastating. The crossbowmen were falling dead or wounded on all sides. Martin saw the man he had aimed at go down, and smiled with satisfaction. He was so pleased with the result, so astounded by the impact of the English volley, that for a few moments he forgot to nock another arrow to his bow. Then he remembered where he was and why he was there, and he realised that for every Genoese who had been killed or seriously injured, another ten were still standing.
That’s no problem, thought Martin; we’ll just have to shoot ten more volleys.
After five more volleys, the Genoese were already beginning to waver. The English and Welsh archers were positioned in wedge-shaped formations on the wings of the prince’s division, so that the Genoese found themselves caught in the crossfire as they advanced to attack the men-at-arms in the centre.
There was a sound like a crack of thunder, but instead of lightning, smoke and flame seemed to fly down towards the Genoese. Astonished, Martin followed the trail of smoke back to where the ribauds he had seen at Portsmouth were positioned beyond the gap between the prince’s division and the Earl of Northampton’s division on the left flank. Even as he watched, he saw the engineers operating another ribaud. They ran clear of the weapon, and seconds later it belched flame with another crack of thunder. Martin did not know what power lay behind such engines, but he was glad it seemed to be on his side.
Such weapons were known to the French, who had used them long before the English had taken them up, but it was a new experience for the Genoese to come under fire from these engines. At that range, the wide spread of bolts and pellets was largely ineffectual, killing only a handful of the crossbowmen. But the Genoese were terrified by the thunderous noise, the flame-spewing tubes and the trails of smoke. It was as if the English had harnessed the power of thunder and lightning. Did the French not say that the English were demons? Did this not prove that they had the power of Satan on their side? Scared witless by this new and unexpected development, they broke ranks and fled in confusion.
A great cheer went up from the English ranks. ‘That’ll teach Valois not to hire mercenaries!’ shouted someone.
‘I hope he demands his money back!’ Conyers shouted in reply.
Some of the English archers started to gesticulate at the retreating backs of the Genoese, demonstrating the fact that unlike the archers supposedly captured and mutilated by the French, they still had the first two fingers of their right hands.
Tate was grinning nervously, his face shining. ‘Have we won?’ he asked.
‘Er… not yet, lad,’ Preston told him dubiously.
They gradually became aware of a rumble like distant thunder, and looked to their front to see several companies of armoured archers and men-at-arms riding into the valley. Even in the failing light they made a brave show in their shining armour, their banners and pennants fluttering. They rode at a trot, lances carried upright.
Then they broke into a canter, callously riding down the fleeing Genoese who got in their way, some of them even aiming sword-strokes at the crossbowmen.
The horsemen were charging in a disorderly mob, and the Genoese who got in their way only served to break up the ranks even further. The hooves of their massive coursers sent tremors through the ground as they charged forward, and it seemed as if nothing could break their impetus.
‘Nock!’ ordered Preston.
Martin selected a bodkin-tipped arrow and nocked it.
Now the Frenchmen were charging up the slope towards them. It was the kind of slope that looked gentle enough until one tried to run up it. Already the pace of the horses was beginning to slacken, the uneven terraces breaking their rhythm.
‘Mark!’
Now Martin felt fear: not the tightness in the pit of his stomach, but a sharper, paralysing fear that turned his limbs to water. It was not the speed of the charging horsemen that frightened him so much as the seemingly implacable power of the charge. Part of him told him he was a fool to stand there, waiting to die, either spitted on one of those long lances or trampled underfoot by the massive horses. Wondering if he was alone in his fears, he glanced briefly left and right. Conyers and Brewster stood on either side of him, their faces pale and taut with fear, but their expressions resolute. Their resolution gave him heart, and he fought back the temptation to turn and flee for his life.
‘Draw!’
The serjeant’s words snapped Martin out of his paralysing fear. He marked his target, pushing out the bowstave and taking aim.
‘Loose!’
Martin loosed his arrow. Horses reared as the volley struck home. Armoured knights fell from their saddles to crash to the ground. Other horses tripped and stumbled over the bodies that had fallen before them, some of them losing their riders. The noise of shouting men, neighing horses and crashing armour was terrific.
But the majority of the knights and men-at-arms rode on. They couched their lances, urging their mounts into a canter. They were less than a hundred and fifty yards away now.
‘Loose!’ ordered Preston. ‘At your own rate.’
Martin had already nocked another arrow to his bow and now he loosed it, reaching for a third arrow and loosing that before his second had yet struck its target. On either side of him his fellow archers did likewise, so that the air was continuously filled with arrows. The horsemen were charging towards the front rank of men-at-arms in the prince’s division, so now they found themselves shot at from both sides by the archers in the wings, caught in the same lethal crossfire that had broken the advance of the Genoese. The slaughter was terrible to behold.
Perhaps half the horsemen in this initial charge managed to reach the men-at-arms to the right of where Martin stood, but they could not persuade their horses to charge through the fence of levelled spears that greeted them. They struggled to goad their mounts forward, jabbing at the men-at-arms with their lances or hacking at the spearheads with their swords. A few English men-at-arms were slain, but even more Frenchmen died on those spear-points, and the front rank held firm. The English and Welsh archers continued to pour their arrows into the flanks of the French formation. The ground immediately before the English men-at-arms, between the two wings of archers, had become a killing ground.
Another formation of French knights and men-at-arms was charging across the valley floor towards Northampton’s division, further along the ridge. They received a similar reception.
Now the attack on the prince’s division began to break, the horsemen wheeling their chargers about and riding back down the slope. The archers continued to shoot after them until they were out of range. The slope was littered with the corpses of men and horses.
Another cheer went up from the English ranks.
Martin felt elated. They had done it! The flower of French chivalry had been routed by a handful of English yeomen armed only with their crooked sticks. He had been told that archers and dismounted men-at-arms could defeat armoured knights on horseback, but he had never really believed it until now.
His elation was short-lived. On the far side of the valley, the survivors of the initial charge were rallying, joined by fresh troops brought up from the rear; and there were plenty more where they had come from.
The battle had only just begun.