Jackaroo

  It was five days after the highwayman’s death, a hot full summer morning, that horses’ hooves clattered into the Inn yard at midday. Gwyn saw soldiers, their faces red and sweating after the fast ride, as she stood cutting meat for stew in the kitchen. In this weather, with the fires in the kitchen high for cooking, they kept all doors and windows open. The soldiers’ shirts were stained with sweat, and someone was calling for drink, lots of it, and food, and more drink. She dried her hands and went out into the yard.

  Burl was hauling up buckets of water for the seven horses. “It’s the Steward,” he said, his face red with effort and his dark hair matted on his face and neck. “Your father wants you in the barroom.”

  Six soldiers hunched over six servings of pastry at a long table. They were eating in a great hurry, Gwyn thought. They drank thirstily. One of them thumped an empty mug down on the table, banging it like a drum. “More ale—where’s that man?”

  Gwyn hurried to take his mug. Da joined her behind the counter, returning from the guest parlor. “There’s to be a tithe for the crops,” he told her quietly. “We all have to go hear what it is. Steward’s orders. Find your mother and Tad, will you?”

  Gwyn nodded. The tithe would be used, she thought, to refill the storehouses emptied by the Doling Rooms. It would be wise to have them full again, even if the crops promised well for full larders through the winter. She took up the mug and leaned over the soldier’s shoulder to put it near his hand. He was too hungry and thirsty and full of his business to notice who served him.

  “—the fame of being the ones to make such a capture,” he was saying.

  “And is that the kind of fame you’d like? To be the man who brought Jackaroo to hanging?”

  Gwyn froze where she was.

  “It’s not Jackaroo, you clot; it’s some village boy—Steward knows him.”

  “Steward’s eager to hang anyone, just so’s the Earl’s questions are answered.”

  Gwyn turned and fled from the room.

  He would have spent the days asking questions and listening to the answers, she thought. She found Burl in the yard and gave him the order to find Mother and Tad. She looked around her, but the only horses in the Inn were those seven. She could not take one of those.

  “Gwyn, what’s wrong?” Burl asked.

  “Nothing, nothing’s wrong. Oh—they’re going to announce a tithe on the crops—and—” She had no time to make further excuses. She ran into the kitchen and through it. Burl moved more slowly into the barroom, where the soldiers called out for more drink and continued their argument.

  It was all her doing, Gwyn knew. But she would have thought that the Steward could have found a lie to satisfy the Earl. Instead, he had asked questions and heard how the Weaver’s son mocked and boasted. She should have found another way to return his ring, she thought, running up through the woods. The Steward was a Lord, after all, and the Lords did not let you shame them.

  Her breathing was ragged as she stood in Old Megg’s empty hut, and her hands shook as she stripped off her own clothing to change into Jackaroo’s trousers, shirt, tunic, boots, and cape. Cam should have known better. She was tempted to leave him to his fate, but she could not do that.

  It wasn’t even, she realized, that she cared what his fate might be. But since it was her responsibility, she had to do something about it.

  What that something would be, she had as yet no idea. That realization was like a splash of cold water over the panic that burned her. She undid her braids and piled them on top of her head calmly. Her mind at last was working. As she tied the mask over her face, belted the long sword at her side, and picked up the soft hat, she worked at the difficulties.

  Although she heard the bell summoning people, she did not run back to the village. There would be time, time for the people to gather, time for the Steward to make his announcement. Now that her mind worked coolly, she knew what she had to do. If Jackaroo stood up before the people and the soldiers, the Steward could not arrest Cam. But she must have a horse, to ride away on; and they must not have their horses to pursue her.

  Gwyn approached the village from a hill opposite to her usual path. As she descended, she could see people gathered in the central green, while a soldier stood by the well, ringing the bell insistently. Some men hurried down a hillside to the west, and Da led Mother and Tad out of the woods. She watched them hurry along between the houses to join the crowd at the well.

  Gwyn crept down behind the Blacksmith’s house, where the horses were tethered. She untied them, wrapping the long reins tightly around their saddles so that they would not catch their feet as they ran. One horse she brought to the back door to the Blacksmith’s shop, looping the reins through the latch. He whinnied gently, his head turned back toward the others. Gwyn left the door open and slipped into the shop. The fire burned at the forge; the bellows and hammer lay where they had been dropped. She crept to the front door and took off her hat.

  Standing unseen behind the doorway, she heard the Steward’s voice explaining to the people that the tithe was the Earl’s way of husbanding supplies against the need of the Doling Room during the winter, explaining that this was yet another way the Earl looked out for the welfare of the people. Hearing the man’s smooth and convincing words, Gwyn wondered why he was frightened of the Earl. Surely the Earl knew his Steward’s value.

  It was not fear of the Earl, she suddenly knew as surely as if she had been there to hear their conversation about the ring. It was not fear that drove the Steward. It was his own desire for revenge. The rumors of the Earl’s anger were only rumors and perhaps started by the Steward himself. Maybe, she thought hopefully, this story of an arrest was also only soldiers’ rumors. Gwyn stood in the protection of the forge doorway, looking out around at the scene before her.

  The Steward stopped talking, and the air waited quiet around him. Gwyn watched, where his hair lay pale and flat over his scalp. His voice carried easily across the village cupped between the hills, for all who stood facing him to hear. Gwyn watched the people’s faces as they listened attentively to the Steward.

  “There is a man,” he said, speaking out again, “who has been preying upon the Lords, as other men have been preying upon the people.” He let his meaning sink in. “There is a man who has taken from the Bailiff taxes the people have paid out of their own hardships. He has urged discontent upon the people, leading them to wish to act against their Lords.”

  Few men gathered there were innocent of complaints against the Lords and guilty eyes fell before the Steward’s glance.

  “He has dared to come even into the Doling Room—taking food from the hungry,” the Steward’s voice announced. Gwyn moved back into the shadows and put on the hat, settling it firm on her head. That it was lies did not matter, if the people believed the Steward. She stepped into the shadow of the doorway.

  “I have come today to take that man, who has made the people doubt the Lords and the Lords doubt their people.” He pointed with a finger and gave the order, “Take him!”

  Gwyn watched through the doorway. She would wait for her moment in silence and then she would step out, to announce herself. You have the wrong man, she would say, low and bold. As soon as they had all seen her, she would turn and run.

  Da stood with one arm around Mother and the other around Tad. Rose had worry and fear on her face, where she stood next to Wes. Everybody’s eyes followed the soldiers, who marched in formation to pluck Cam out. The people near him stepped back.

  Cam tried to pull free from their hands, shaking his head, his eyes wide with terror. He looked around, searching out the faces of the people. “But I didn’t,” he said, “I never did. I never would.” The Weaver cried aloud and held one of the soldiers by the arm. The people were stiff with fear and surprise. “You all know me,” Cam wailed.

  The soldiers dragged him before the Steward and pushed him roughly onto his knees. The Steward smiled down at Cam. Gwyn watched, motionless.

  “You’ve got
the wrong man. My Lord, I never did those things; you’ve got to believe me. Ask anyone.” He grabbed at the Steward’s hand, clutching it in his own. “Somebody tell him!” He turned to look at the people. Nobody spoke.

  “You will recall that ring,” the Steward said. He was enjoying this.

  “But I didn’t do it,” Cam wailed, dropping the hand and covering his eyes with his own hands to hide his tears. “It’s not right to hang me; I never did. It’s not fair.” He cowered on the grass at the Steward’s feet.

  “What a man is this, people,” the Steward called over Cam’s bent head. “Is this your Jackaroo, then?” His questions were greeted by a shamed silence.

  The soldiers stood near to Cam, three on each side.

  Gwyn stepped out from the doorway. Nobody saw her. She took air into her lungs.

  “Look!” Cam cried. Still on his knees, he pointed with his arm off to the path leading from the woods.

  Gwyn’s head swung around.

  There at the edge of the trees stood Jackaroo, his feet wide apart, his face hidden by a black mask that fell down over his chin, a bright red feather in his wide hat. He held a thick staff in gloved hands, and he stood there in dappled sunlight, as straight and strong as the staff he held.

  “I think you are looking for me?” he asked. “I don’t think you want to take the wrong man.” His voice rang out, as rich and warm as the hills swelling under sunlight.

  Gwyn stepped back into the shelter of the Blacksmith’s shop, although there was little danger that anyone would notice her. Everyone in the square stood motionless, except Cam. He scrambled to his feet and slid back into the crowd, wiping his face with his sleeve, already grinning.

  Gwyn didn’t know what to do. She would have to disappear, and quickly.

  “If you will take any man, Steward, it must be me,” Jackaroo called down. His voice rolled over the quiet scene, calm as the land itself.

  Burl’s voice.

  What was Burl up to? Gwyn thought angrily. What did he think he was doing, dressing up as Jackaroo and standing there, so close, just asking for trouble.

  “Take him, you fools!” The Steward finally found his voice. “I don’t care if you take him alive, as long as you take him.”

  Gwyn didn’t wait to watch what the soldiers would do. She wheeled around and ran to the back door. She mounted the horse, who stepped back nervously at her haste. “Hwyya!” she cried, riding among the four horses who still lingered. They trotted away from her, heading up over the hillside. Their own stables were in Earl Northgate’s City and that was where she hoped they would go.

  Two soldiers appeared around the Blacksmith’s house as she turned her horse’s head to ride away. They did not pay any attention to her in their pelting race to capture their own mounts.

  Two gone meant four would be after Burl, Gwyn thought. She entered the woods, her mount slowed to a walk, her ears listening. She heard voices calling, and the sound of men breaking through underbrush. She followed the sounds, bent low over the horse’s neck. The last thing she needed at that time was to be dismounted by a low branch.

  A voice called out in recognition, and others answered it. Gwyn urged the horse on.

  The soldiers had caught up with him in a shallow dell near the far edge of the woods, not far from the Inn. He had turned to face them there, his staff held in both hands. Three of the soldiers were closing a broad circle around him, while the fourth lay cursing and clutching his ankle where he had fallen. The soldiers had their short swords out and spoke to one another. “He’s only got the staff. Move in now, easy. He’ll surrender soon enough. We’ll even take him alive.”

  Gwyn walked her horse onto the path behind them and unsheathed her sword. At the sound of ringing metal, their faces turned to her. She spoke over their heads to Burl: “My Lord, you had better find your own horse and be off. I can hold them here.”

  His masked eyes met hers, but he didn’t move. It was the soldiers who moved, joining closer together, conferring. They were in the middle, between the two Jackaroos, at the hollow at the base of the dell. “Go now,” Gwyn ordered Burl.

  “As you wish, my Lord,” he answered her.

  He turned up the hillside, into the trees, and Gwyn gave her attention to the soldiers, who did not quite dare to move to follow him. They were muttering to one another, two blades held toward her, one toward Burl’s retreating figure. There was no one to give them orders, and they were not used to that. All she had to do, Gwyn told herself, was keep them occupied long enough for Burl to make the safety of the Inn. Once there, he could hide in any of a dozen places where they would never find him.

  The soldiers seemed to realize this, belatedly. One of them broke away from his fellows to follow Burl. Gwyn rode right at the three, then, forcing her reluctant horse. She hoped that their instinctive fear of being trampled would override their skill with the swords. She rode right at one soldier, who threw himself into the bushes to avoid her.

  Once beyond the trees, she turned again, trying to hold the horse in control. The soldiers muttered together, their eyes fixed on her. The fourth soldier called out: “If you lose this one, there’ll be the devil to pay.”

  “It’s the devil playing against us now, I don’t wonder,” panted the man Gwyn had driven into the bushes. “There’s no sword made to kill a man already dead.”

  “Do you not see that it’s two different men, you superstitious fool?”

  “I see what he wants me to see,” the soldier muttered. “There’s never a soldier sent out has taken him. And many sent out that never returned, these hundred years.”

  “I see one man in two places,” another said.

  “Circle him round,” the fourth advised.

  “Aye, if he’s living we can take him,” one of the three said boldly. This rallied them.

  The three soldiers split apart, one staying in front of Gwyn, the other two circling to her sides. Their faces were grim. Gwyn watched their movements, her sword out and ready. She didn’t know what she should do. She didn’t even know how to use a sword in battle. She understood then exactly how ill-prepared she was for the role she was playing.

  Her horse backed nervously beneath her. For a second, she thought she would lose her balance, then she clamped her legs tighter. The horse must do as she willed. And, if they had her, they would pay for the capture, she promised herself. But they wouldn’t take her if she could help it. She had the horse, and they had none. She had the long sword and their own fear.

  Gwyn slashed with her sword at the man on her left. He backed off and she turned quickly to the man on her right. It was his arm she hit—for a brief time the sword felt thick and heavy in her hand, before she pulled it free. She did not hear his cry, but looked to the front, where the third soldier reached out to grab at the horse’s bridle.

  Without thinking, Gwyn dug her heels into the horse’s sides. The horse leaped forward. She saw the soldier’s face close as she went past him, and she felt his lunge at the leg she thrust out to kick him off. Her horse shied to the side. Swaying, Gwyn grabbed for his mane with both hands. She dropped her sword.

  There was nothing else for it now, so she bent low over the animal’s neck and urged him on, into the woods, away from the path. Burl had his head start and that was all she could do. She must make her own escape now. Jackaroo could not be captured. Riding low over his neck, she slapped at the horse with her hand, forcing his pace.

  She kept to the woods until she was beyond the village, then she headed across open land, down hill and up. She had no idea where the soldiers were. She was coming up on the vineyard before she realized that she stayed in the saddle only by her hands wrapped into the horse’s mane, that her body bounced helplessly. Only one leg gripped at his sides, and that was no good. She looked curiously down at her left leg.

  Blood streamed out from the split leather. It ran down over the shoe, thick and red. Gwyn’s head swam at the sight and at the recognition that it was pain she felt, spreading ou
tward from a numbness at her leg. The horse threw her off.

  Gwyn landed with a blow that knocked the breath from her body and knocked her hat off. She had no time to think. She was just below the vineyard, so she grabbed at the hat and forced her legs under her. She stumbled between the rows of vines and fell down onto her knees, again concealed.

  The sun poured down on her back and her ears rang. She could hear nothing but a curious whimpering breeze and her own heartbeat. Beside her, the twisting vines rose, each one covered with broad leaves and heavy with purple grapes. Gwyn’s mouth was dry and painful, and she wished the grapes were ripe. She would have liked to put a grape into her mouth and feel it burst there with sweet liquid.

  The whimpering came from her own mouth, and she clamped her teeth shut over it, to silence it. There was no sound of pursuit, but she thought there would be pursuit. She knew now how the hares felt, when the dogs were after them. Like the hares, she was too frightened to move. But she would like, she thought, to have just one grape and to burst it with her teeth.

  And she would have liked, she thought dizzily, to know what Burl was doing dressed up as Jackaroo, although she began to believe she had imagined all that. She was no longer quite sure how she had come to be crawling here in Da’s vineyard, with one leg uselessly dragging behind her, and the soil soft and clinging underneath her. She remembered that she must not be found as she was, although she didn’t know what was wrong with the way she was.

  Gwyn dragged herself across the dirt of the vineyard between the tall rows of vines. Insects buzzed all around her. She did not know why it was so important to keep her hold on the hat she clutched, which slowed her down terribly and was, anyway, too bent and dirty ever to be worn again.