Chapter 9: When the Shoe Fits

It was a while before Hugh explains his absence from the Chateau’s courtyard to me.

“I had a feeling that if I was to profit from this venture, while you heroes negotiate our escort to the King’s palace, or hunting lodge, if that was our destination, I thought I would play some horseshoes with the stable lads and make the trip worthwhile. No building up the pot, just a quick game to breed my few English silver pennies with the silver deniers of Normandy and France.

“Me and Old Smithy take these Norman and French deniers as penny payments at the smithy, they are slightly bigger and of a finer silver than English coins, or at least they was until last year. We can only get rid of them deniers in Barton town, where they have more Normans and foreign merchants upon the high road. Rumour has it that King Henry was so pissed off about the debasement of the English coinage last spring that he summoned the worst of the moneyers to his court and cut off a hand and a testicle of each one! The new coins out of all the mints are much better, near perfect, and they bin takin old coins fer new. King Henry is the man to get things done aright, and I were pleased that I’ll be meeting him again in a few hours.

“The winnings in Canterbury town cathedral stables only settled my bar bill, Rob. Your father Sir Will and Lady Alwen generously offered to pay my accommodation and stabling costs if I’d accompany them, but I have other expenses in these two weeks that I have taken off work. Old Smithy wants me to buy his forge so he can retire, by paying him so much a week out of my wages to buy the equipment and tools over the next few years. And I need to rent my own place after they move away as I use a bed chamber in their house and Mrs Smith makes my break-fast and eventime dinner.

“I noticed the stables as we climbed the hill to the chateau from the port and whispered to Father Andrew that I was slipping away to try my luck. He grinned and held my bridle while I slipped off unnoticed. ‘Half hour only,’ he warned quietly, and I nodded back. He may be a priest, but he’s more a man of the world than most clerics passing through what needs new horseshoes.

“I had to walk around the castle walls to get to the stables, wasting ten of the thirty minutes Father Andrew warned me I had the token time of. There was a still warm forge by the stable, no one about, but the new shoes the smith was amaking there took my interest. They was made from a finer metal than the pig iron we gets from Brummigan Iron Mill, it was brighter, lighter and the shoes made thinner but stronger. I selected three new identical shoes and weighed them up individually in my hand. They were nicely balanced throwing shoes.

“You know, Rob, how you breathe as you aim an arrow at a target and, as your grip draws the string taut and you pull the arrow feathers close to your nose, anyone watching ye can see you making those slight adjustments to the pitch and angle as you calculate the distance and assess the airs around you which influence the flight after the release. Then you empty your lungs and, with your every muscle tuned into producing the right twang of delivery, the spinning of the dart driven by the feathers which help drill through the air, all leading into the heart of the target. You barely think about it consciously, it is all in the gut and memories of the muscles and sinew involved. It is like I am with the spinning of the horseshoe to the target, getting distance and spin right so the shoe is open at the heels when it reaches the spike, then turns enough so it wraps around the spike. When the toes strikes the spike, all the force behind it is distributed around the shoe so it doesn’t bounce out and away and spoil the throw.

“When I left the forge and entered the stable I found only one lone stable boy mucking out one of the stalls, not good for competing against, you need three or four fellows showing off to each other to get a good pot going quickly. I hailed him with a simple good morning.

“‘Tu parle anglais?’ he said back to me.

“‘Oui,’ I replied, and then he bloody well charged me with his pitchfork aimed right at my chest. I thought little of it but threw one of the horseshoes I carried at his throat. It stopped him in his tracks, his head snapping back. I swear, in that empty stable, I heard his neck break with a sickening sound that almost made me heave and bring up my break-fast.

“Then I heard someone running back to the forge behind me. I quickly dragged the poor dead lad back behind some bales and hid myself, just peering over to see what I could see and be ready to start arunning if the alarm was to be raised.

“It was the smith hisself, returning with a pail of water to put out the flames in his forge. He was gone in an instant and then I heard a large number of horses in the courtyard start to walk away towards the exit. I thought that you had all done your business, Robin, and was leaving me behind. I covered the body with a horse blanket and covered that further with loose straw and then ran out into the courtyard in front of the stables.

“I saw the last of the horsemen duck down and pass under the partly lowered portcullis and ride off. Damnation! I thought that I had missed you! Then I noticed our horses, the fresh ones we rode up from the docks, left by the side wall, still saddled up and eating oats and drinking from pails of water what was left out for them. As I walked towards them, I heard a shout behind me, I turned and there was a black-clad Knight, in a plumed helm, mounted ahorse with shield and lance at the ready.

“He said something in Norman or French that I didn’t understand, so I shrugged and said something like ‘I don’t speak Norman lingo, Sir,’ you know, to be as polite to the Knight as becoming a humble smith, and he levelled the bloody lance and spurred his horse on to charge me, just like the unfriendly stable boy did.

“Now, Rob, honestly what could I do? I was trapped by our horses behind me and had no time to get behind them, so I worked out the distances, the height he stood off the ground on his mount, his motion up and down as he rode, the spin cycle of the horseshoe and, when I judged aright, spun away the horseshoe and readied myself to throw the last one within a breath and a half, which was all the time I had left.