Some weeks later, it was Little John himself, on lookout duty on the edge of Sherwood, who spotted the approaching convoy. Word came back that it was southward bound, and a big one – at least thirty carts and with only a light escort. Rich pickings, easy pickings. “We’ll need everyone,” said Robin.
“We’ll look after the children for you, Marion,” said the abbess. “They’ll be fine with us.”
Alan Wicken would stay behind, to finish a sandal, he said. And Robin’s father stayed too – he rarely left the encampment. Marion said she would stay with him as she so often did, but he wouldn’t hear of it. “You go with Robin,” he said. “I’ll be all right here with the sisters and Alan. Little Martin will look after me.” And she left him fashioning a longbow, lifting it to his nose as he whittled and smelling the yew, his grandson crawling in the leaves at his feet.
Alan Wicken waited until everyone was gone, until the abbess gave him the signal he had been waiting for. It had all been planned, and planned perfectly too. He sauntered over to Robin’s father. “Some of the sisters want to go looking for herbs,” he said. “They’re taking the children. I’d best go with them, keep an eye on them. Shall I take young Martin with us? Let you whittle in peace?”
“Why not? You take good care of him, mind.”
“Oh, I will,” said Alan Wicken. “I most certainly will.” But Robin’s father could not see the smile on his face, as he picked up the child and walked away.
The ambush proved to be a bitter disappointment. For some reason they could not understand, the convoy seemed to change its mind before it ever reached Sherwood. Frustrated and furious, the Outlaws could only watch helpless from the trees as the convoy turned and made its way back towards Nottingham. They returned to the encampment to find Robin’s father stumbling around, distraught, and calling for his grandson. The abbess was gone. The nuns were gone, and so was little Martin Hood. The other children were found some way off, playing by a stream, but Martin was not amongst them. They searched through the forest but he was nowhere to be seen.
If Little John had not stopped him, and Much had not pinned him to the ground, Robin would have gone after him at once. “Can’t you see, Robin?” cried Little John. “That is exactly what they want you to do. It’s a trap. The whole thing is a trap.”
“He’s right,” said Will Scarlett. “They tempted us away, all of us, and we fell for it.”
“It was Alan Wicken who took him,” Robin’s father cried, in his grief and in his shame. “But I let him do it. It was my fault.”
“Not so,” said Marion, wiping the tears from her face. “He is my child. It is my fault. It is a mother’s duty to care for her child, and I left him. No one will go after him, except me. It was I who brought all this upon you, Robin. If you had killed the sheriff when you had him at your mercy, then none of this would have happened. And who more than anyone else welcomed these devilish sisters? I did. The blame is mine, all mine. So it is all mine to put right.” She turned to Will Scarlett. “Will, I need to look as they looked. Can you make me a habit by morning?” Nothing Robin nor anyone else could say would deter her. “They’ll have taken him to Nottingham,” she said. “They are expecting you to come after him, Robin. They will not be expecting me. We have surprise on our side. And haven’t you told me and told me that in war, and this is war, surprise is everything?”
All night long, as Will Scarlett worked on her nun’s habit, Marion talked through her plan with Robin. At dawn, she gathered everyone around her and told them what she had in mind. It was left to Much to pick the precise place, for he knew more than anyone every fold of the land around the mill. Robin listened, but found it difficult to concentrate his mind. All he could think of was little Martin and what the sheriff might do to him, might have done to him already. “It’ll work, Robin,” said Marion, taking him by the shoulder. “It’s the only way. And timing is everything. They must see no one but you. Do not move until you see me wave the silver arrow. May God help us bring him home safe.” Once on the road to Nottingham, Marion and Robin held each other close, neither wanting to let the other go, for both knew just how much depended on these next few hours. Robin tried to make light of it as he said goodbye. “I’ve never hugged a nun before,” he said. “Keep your eyes lowered in Nottingham. They must not see your eyes.”
“If Tuck were here he’d tell us to have faith,” she said, and gathering her nun’s habit about her, she mounted her horse and rode off. “Don’t be late,” she called out. And with a wave of the silver arrow, she was gone.
At noon that day a nun, her head lowered in prayer, rode in through the gates of Nottingham, and up through the little back streets into the market square. No one paid her the slightest attention. Everyone was far too busy buying and selling even to notice her. She dismounted and led her horse over the castle drawbridge and into the courtyard beyond. She handed the reins to one of the sheriff’s men standing by the well. “I must see the sheriff,” she said, “I have a message for him from Robin Hood.”
She was led at once into the great hall of the castle, and there before her stood the sheriff with Sir Guy of Gisbourne beside him. She ran towards them and fell on her knees, her hands together in supplication. “My Lord Sheriff, you have my son.” And she pulled back her wimple to show her face. “You know me, my Lord Sheriff.”
“Robin Hood’s woman,” breathed the sheriff.
“As you say, Robin Hood’s woman; but no longer. I will give you his head, my Lord, in exchange for my son.”
“It’s a trick,” Sir Guy of Gisbourne scoffed, drawing his sword. But the sheriff held him back.
“Maybe,” said the sheriff, walking around Marion as she knelt, her eyes pleading. “And maybe not. The disguise? Why the disguise?”
“I am a cagot, an albino, as you see, my Lord. I am an Outlaw. Could I have got even through the city gates without a disguise?”
“True enough,” said the sheriff.
“And I suppose,” sneered Sir Guy of Gisbourne, “I suppose you will lead us to him, no doubt deep in Sherwood so that we shall be ambushed. What do you imagine we are, imbeciles?”
“No, my Lord,” said Marion, and she drew from under her habit the silver arrow. “You know this arrow, I think. I have only to wave it and he is yours. He waits for me by the burnt-out mill, in open country, my Lord. And he waits alone. But he will not show himself until he sees me with the child. The silver arrow is a signal. I wave it above my head and he knows all is well, that I have rescued the child and brought him out safely. All you have to do is follow me, at a safe distance and unseen, and he is yours to do with what you will. I will have my only son and you will have Robin Hood.”
“A trick, I tell you,” cried Sir Guy of Gisbourne. “A trick.”
“Sometimes, Guy,” said the sheriff scornfully, “sometimes I think you are a very stupid man. You send my sister into Sherwood to bring out the child so that Robin Hood would come after him. She does it. We have the child. So Robin Hood may not have come himself as you thought he would, but his woman has. And the result will be the same – Robin Hood’s head. Do you know how strong is a woman’s love for her child? No, she would do nothing to risk her son’s life. She would do anything to save him, anything. Look at her. Take my word for it, she will lead us to him. Have no doubt of it, for she knows what will happen to the child if she does not.”
“She will lead us into a trap,” Sir Guy roared. “I know she will. I see in those scheming red eyes nothing of motherly love, but only revenge and hate.”
“Bring me the child,” the sheriff called out. “And have three hundred men ready, armed and on foot at the south gate.” He smiled at Sir Guy. “You forget, Guy, that the corn is high in the fields. I shall hide my men in the corn. No one will see them. She will ride ahead with her son, wave the silver arrow and we will wait. If he comes, we shall kill him. If he does not, then we shall know it is a trick and we shall kill her and the child. What have we to lose?”
At this
moment the door opened and the Abbess of Kirkleigh came into the room carrying little Martin in her arms, Alan Wicken alongside her. She listened in silence, her eyes fixed on Marion and dark with suspicion, as the sheriff told her how at last they would capture Robin Hood, how they would be led to him by his own woman. “Brother,” she said, “do not do it. Do not give the child to this woman. I know her. She loves Robin Hood better than life itself.”
“And maybe she loves her son more,” retorted the sheriff. “What do you know of a woman’s love? What do you know of a mother’s love?”
“Listen to the abbess, my Lord,” said Alan Wicken. “She is right. I have seen the love in Marion’s eyes. She would never betray him, not in a million years.”
“Do you think I haven’t thought of all this?” stormed the sheriff, snatching the child away and handing him to Marion. She cuddled him to her and kissed him, the tears running down her cheeks.
“Thank you, my Lord, thank you.” And Marion put up her wimple again. “You are right, both of you,” she said. “Yes, I love my Robin and I hate what I am about to do, but my child comes before anything, before anyone.” And with the boy in her arms she walked out of the great hall of the castle, set him on the saddle of her horse and mounted up behind him.
Robin and Much and Little John lay in the dry ditch by the burnt-out mill. “I should never have let her do it,” Robin was saying, and not for the first time. “It’s madness. Does she think a nun’s habit will protect her? What if the sheriff doesn’t go along with it? What if he takes her prisoner too? What if he kills them both?”
“What if? What if?” said Little John, chewing on some barleycorn. “Did you think ‘what if’ when you went in there to rescue your father? Well, did you?”
“If she’s not here soon,” said Robin, “then I’m going in after her.”
“You won’t need to,” whispered Much, who was peering over the top of the ditch. “Have a look.” And there over the crest of the hill Marion came riding, little Martin clinging to the pommel of the saddle and bouncing up and down.
Robin squinted into the sun. “Are you sure it’s her?”
“It’s her right enough,” said Little John, his hand grasping Robin’s arm. “But wait for her signal like she said.”
As they watched, they saw Marion rein the horse to a standstill. Then she was waving the arrow in the air, the silver glinting in the sun. “Up you go then, Robin,” said Little John. Robin leapt out of the ditch and ran down the road past the burnt-out mill. As planned, he slowed to a walk as he climbed the hill. The corn was high in the fields all around him. She let him come on as long as she dared, then all of a sudden put her heels to the horses side and came galloping down towards him, one arm around little Martin. From behind her, from the corn on both sides of the road rose an army of the sheriff’s men. Robin lifted his horn to his lips and blew. His own army of Outlaws, some five hundred strong now, rose as one from the standing corn and at once loosed off five hundred arrows, none at random, each one aimed at a man’s heart. Scores of the sheriff’s men fell back into the corn, some ran at once, and the rest stood their ground as the Outlaws came at them, their bloodcurdling war yell on the air, their great swords scything both corn and men before them. Marion and the child rode through the oncoming Outlaws, on to Sherwood and safety. But Robin, Much and Little John stood shoulder to shoulder with the Outlaws and fought. This was no short, sharp ambush, no little skirmish. This was a vicious close-quarter killing battle. They hacked and they slashed until the man in front of them dropped, and when he did, there always seemed to be another to take his place. They were all of them wet with blood and sweat, and tears too. All those lessons Tuck and Much and Robin had taught them stood them in good stead, for after two hours’ fighting the sheriff’s men at last turned and ran. From the top of the hill the sheriff and Sir Guy of Gisbourne watched all this in horror and disbelief. Neither dared even to draw his sword, for both knew that they would surely be sought out by the Outlaws and die in the corn that afternoon if ever they joined the battle. As their men streamed past them towards Nottingham, battered and bleeding in defeat, they saw the triumphant Outlaws simply melt away into the corn again, a phantom army disappearing.
Over two hundred men lay dead in the corn that night when Robin and his Outlaws came back to collect their dead. They knew already who was missing, what to look for. Thirty-five of the Outlaws had died in the fierce heat of the battle that afternoon, thirty-five good friends, thirty-five good fighters they could ill afford to lose. They carried them back home to Sherwood and buried them in the clearing with the others. Little Martin was safely home and the battle had been won; but grief is a more powerful thing than exultation. They lay down that night on the forest floor, numb in their sadness, but thankful they were still alive to see the stars above them.
In Nottingham Castle the sheriff brooded by his fire and swore that he would hang, draw and quarter anyone who was ever heard to speak the name of Robin Hood. Side by side in bed that night, Sir Guy of Gisbourne and the Abbess of Kirkleigh swore they would not rest until the day Robin Hood lay dead and cold in his grave.
When Friar Tuck returned from his pilgrimage a few days later, he was not alone. The wan young man he brought with him seemed sunk in a deep sadness. He stared about in bewilderment as the Outlaws crowded round him. “Who are you? Who is he, Tuck?” they asked. Friar Tuck waved them away with his sword.
“Leave him be. Leave him be,” he cried. It was then that he noticed that many of the Outlaws were bandaged, that others lay stretched out under the trees. “Oh God, what has happened here?” he said, suddenly alarmed. Marion was bending over one of the wounded. “Robin! Is Robin hurt?” cried Tuck. And much to his relief, he saw Robin parting the crowd to get to him. The two friends hugged each other.
“It’s so good to have you back, Tuck,” said Robin, and Tuck held him at arm’s length, looking him up and down. “Not a scratch on me,” Robin laughed. “Good as new.”
“But there has been a fight, hasn’t there? What happened?”
And Robin told him the whole story from the beginning, blow by blow. Friar Tuck listened in silence, his brow furrowing all the while in fury. “The Abbess of Kirkleigh, it could be no one else,” he said. “I told you about her, the sheriff’s sister, and Guy of Gisbourne’s lover. Had I been here I would have known her. I would know her anywhere, fiendish witch that she is. Let me just come within a sword’s length of her, by God’s good grace.” He shook his head. “I should have been here, I should have been here.”
Only Marion seemed to be able to comfort him. “It’s over, Tuck,” she said. “What’s done is done. Martin is safe, and the sheriff and his men stay inside the walls of Nottingham, too frightened even to come out. Better still, you are back home, safe and well. We have missed you, Tuck. We did not think we would, but we did.”
As the laughter died away, the young man whispered something into Tuck’s ear. Tuck nodded and looked around anxiously. “Little John,” said Tuck. “Where’s Little John?” He grasped Robin by the arm. “He’s not one of the thirty-five, tell me he’s not.”
“Don’t worry. He’s fine,” said Robin. “He’s gone back to the battlefield again to collect the best of their swords. He won’t be long.” And the young man smiled for the first time. “You know Little John, do you?” Robin asked him.
“Oh, he knows him.” Tuck spoke for him, and put his arm around him. “He knows him well. I tell you, this man is heaven sent, by God’s good grace, heaven sent. Did we not pray every day for freedom and justice? Well, we will have them both, and soon, for God has heard us. This man is the answer to all our prayers. With his help we shall have our good King Richard back home where he belongs. We know the vile usurper, Prince John, scours the land for gold, claiming he needs it to pay the king’s ransom. But we know too that the last thing in the world he wants is his brother back on the throne. Why else does Richard still languish in his Austrian dungeon after all this time? And wa
s it not because of this that we collected the ransom ourselves and hid it away in our cave chapel, ready for the right moment? Now, by God’s good grace, the right moment has come. We will pay the ransom and fetch back our king.”
“But how? No one knows where the king is,” said Robin.
Friar Tuck smiled. “This man does. Tell them, Blondel, my friend, how you found good King Richard, tell them how you did it.” The young man hesitated, looking to Friar Tuck for reassurance. “Don’t worry yourself. They’re an ugly bunch, but not as savage as they look. Speak up. Tell them what you told me in Canterbury.”
And so Blondel began. “I am Blondel. I am the king’s minstrel. I was with him in the Holy Land. At the end of each day he always loved to hear me sing, and one song in particular he loved. It soothed him, he said, soothed away his worries and his pains. Sometimes we would sing it together. We called it ‘The Candelight Song’, a flickering tune, like no other I have ever heard. He was taken hostage on his way home from the wars; and like everyone else, all I knew was that he was being held by the Duke of Austria, but I did not know where. He has dozens of castles. It could have been in any of them. So for these last months, I have wandered through Austria, playing the mad minstrel. I would walk round and round each castle, singing ‘The Candlelight Song’, hoping he would hear me and know me and sing back the song. Castle after castle I tried, and there was no answering refrain. I began to despair. The day I found him was a wild and windy day. I remember that because I had to sing out loud against the wind. I thought it was an echo I was hearing at first, but it was not. It was another voice, but the same song. I had found my master.” His voice caught in his throat at this moment, and his eyes filled with tears. “I could not see him, only his hands on the bars of the dungeon window across the moat, but it was him. It was his voice.” He could speak no more.