Читать книгу Hers To Command - Margaret Moore, Paul Hammerness - Страница 7

London, Michaelmas, 1243

SIR ROALD DE SAYRES’S nostrils flared with disgust as he stepped over the refuse in the alley in Cloth Fair between the slaughtering yards of Smithfields and the bulk of St. Bartholemew’s Church. Aware of the sword he wore on his left, he firmly clasped the hilt of the dagger stuck in his belt on his right and scanned the alley for the man he was to meet.

“Sir Roald!” a coarse Yorkshire-accented voice called out in a harsh whisper. The bulky shape of a big, brawny man stepped into the alley from a shadowed doorway. He wore breeches, tunic and cloak, patched and none too clean.

Roald peered at the figure in the dim light, trying to get a good look at his face. “Martin?”

“Aye, sir,” the man replied with a nod of his shaggy head.

Roald relaxed a little, but he didn’t take his hand from his dagger. “You told no one you were planning to meet me here?”

“No, sir,” the former garrison commander of his uncle’s castle answered.

“And you told no one in Ecclesford you were going to London?”

“Not daft, am I?” Martin replied with a hoarse laugh.

Not daft, but not clever, either, Roald thought as he regarded the traitorous fool. “It’s as you promised? The garrison—?”

“Will be like lambs to the slaughter. Taught ’em next to nowt, and their weapons are older’n my mother. Paid for the worst, told Lord Gaston—who wouldn’t know a decent sword from a pike—they was the best.”

And pocketed the difference in price, no doubt.

“Them that are left won’t know how to mount a proper defense, neither,” Martin bragged, the big brute clearly not caring a ha’penny about the fate of his former comrades-in-arms. “They’ll be running ’round like chickens if you march on ’em.”

“And his daughters? Prostrate with grief, I assume?”

Chuckling like the fool he was, Martin nodded. “They was weepin’ and wailin’ when I left. They think that father of theirs was a saint or summat.” Martin grinned again, the corner of his wide, ugly mouth lifting. “Told ’em I wouldn’t take orders from no women—and I wouldn’t, neither, especially that Lady Mathilde.”

Roald didn’t care what excuse the man gave for leaving his cousins’employ as long as it didn’t involve him. “You told no one you were meeting me tonight?”

“No, my lord.”

Pleased his alliance with this traitorous oaf was still a secret, Roald reached into his finely woven woolen tunic and produced a leather pouch. He had no immediate financial needs, thanks to the moneylenders who were only too happy to help him when they learned he was the heir of Lord Gaston of Ecclesford and soon to be in possession of one of the most prosperous estates in Kent.

As always, it wasn’t just the thought of his new wealth and power that warmed him. How he’d make that shrew Mathilde grovel before he sent her off to a convent for the rest of her life. As for Giselle…his loins tightened at the memory of her ethereal beauty. He’d marry her off to the highest bidder, but not right away. Oh, no, not right away.

Martin cleared his throat, clearly anxious for his reward.

Roald held out the pouch, mentally assessing the man’s strengths and weaknesses. A trained fighter Martin might be, but all men had their vulnerabilities. Big men were slow, and stupid men were the most easily defeated of all.

Grabbing the leather bag, the soldier eagerly emptied it into his calloused palm, the coins gleaming in the moonlight. With a slow deliberation that set Roald’s teeth on edge, the lummox began to count them as he returned them, one by one, to the pouch.

“Do you think I’d try to cheat you, Martin?”

Martin glanced up, frowning. His gaze faltered, and he swept the coins, half of which were below their proper weight and value, back into the pouch. “No, my lord.”

Roald fingered the jeweled hilt of the dagger in his belt. “What will you do now that you’re quite rich?”

Martin grinned. “Enjoy some sport, then get meself a wife. Maybe buy an inn.”

“I could always use a trained fighter,” Roald proposed.

Martin shook his head. “Beggin’your pardon, my lord, but I’m done with that. Not gettin’any younger, nor any faster. Time to take what I’ve earned and settle down.”

“Like a horse put out to pasture, eh?”

Martin frowned as if the comparison displeased him, but he nodded nonetheless. “Aye, you could say that.”

“Well, it’s a pity, but of course, if that’s what you’d prefer,” Roald said amiably. “I give you good night, then, Martin. And if there’s ever anything I can do for you, you mustn’t hesitate to come to me and ask.”

With a bow and another grin, the soldier tugged his forelock and started to pass the French nobleman, heading for the end of the alley.

He never made it. With the speed of an adder, Roald grabbed him by the neck from behind and shoved his pretty silver dagger up under the man’s ribs.

His eyes wide and wild, gasping for breath, Martin flailed like a landed fish as he tried to free himself. Unfortunately for him, while Roald was not as big or muscular, he was strong. And determined. Still holding the bigger man around the neck with his arm, he pulled out the dagger and shoved it in again.

Weak, the blood pouring from his side, Martin sank to the fetid ground, falling with a thud when Roald finally released his hold.

Out of breath and with a look of disgust, Roald pulled his dagger free and wiped it on the man’s no doubt flea-infested tunic. “Should have worn mail, you stupid ox,” he muttered as he grabbed the pouch. Twenty marks—or even a portion of that—was still worth holding on to. His greedy little whore of a mistress had been demanding a present from the new lord of Ecclesford. He would give her a ring or some such bauble, and he trusted she’d be suitably grateful. After all, there was no need to go rushing off to his estate. Mathilde and Giselle would be too upset by their father’s death to do anything but mourn for days yet.

As for Martin, when his body was found, people would assume he was just another fool who came to London and got himself murdered.

They’d be right.