by M. C. Frank
“No one said that, Robbie, as far as I know,” he answered carefully, “and that isn’t what I meant, so will you calm down?”
Father Tuck cleared his throat loudly from the other side, and the men sent murderous looks his way.
“I was only saying,” Little John continued, beginning to get annoyed by this conversation, “that maybe there was no reason, maybe it was too much…”
“Let me be the judge of that,” Robin said severely and Little John turned abruptly his back on him, offended.
“Come on, John, I don’t want to quarrel with you,” Robin said again more calmly. “It’s just that you both come here, you and the holy man, pounding at me with your accusations, well, what do you want me to say, that I’m sorry I did it? I’m not, I think it was long overdue him, and what’s more I’d do it again.”
They stayed like this, chewing their food vigorously in silence, until father Tuck spoke in his serene, almost smiling voice.
“I’m not here to accuse you, boy,” he said, “merely to ask.”
“Well then ask away, and be done with it,” Robin replied curtly.
“You plan to marry her, of course,” Tuck went on unperturbed by his abrupt manner.
Little John almost choked and Robin’s cup fell to the ground. Both men looked at the friar as if he had said that Robin planned to take the throne of England.
“My question is this,” Tuck said, pretending not to notice, “when?”
“What did you say?” Robin asked, and his voice sounded incredulous.
“It sounded as if he said… ‘marry’?” John answered in a frightened whisper, pronouncing the word with care, as if it were a dangerous explosive.
“Have you drunk too much ale, old man?” Robin said. “You’re talking nonsense.”
“Oh no, I am perfectly sober.” Tuck replied promptly. “You are the one whose cup is on the ground. Maybe you should sleep it off…”
He was interrupted by Robin’s taking him by the shoulders and shaking him until his teeth rattled.
“Explain yourself, Tuck,” he said. “Now.”
Friar Tuck waited patiently until Robin left him alone and then made a point of arranging his cap and sitting once again straight.
“How young you are, Robin,” he said finally and his eyes were kind and serious. “I forget sometimes, that though you are our leader, you are still incredibly young.”
Robin hung his head. An infinite sadness came over him and John seemed to sense it, for he gripped his chief’s shoulder in silent support.
“Don’t you see what is happening?” Father Tuck went on. “You are in love with this girl, this clever, beautiful girl whom you were besotted with even when she was a boy.”
Robin lifted his face and saw that the friar’s eyes were gleaming. Father Tuck observed his expression for a moment, and then nodded. Even if he hadn’t fully believed it when he said it, he knew now that he was right.
“All of us can see it, and I am sure she can too,” he said. “And she seems to worship the ground you walk on.”
The friar paused for effect, but Robin said nothing for once. He only buried his head in his folded hands. Father Tuck’s heart ached for this fatherless boy who had made a name for himself in the world but yet didn’t know his own heart.
“Did you really think that you could steal kisses, that you could hold her hand and talk to her all starry-eyed and it wouldn’t affect her?” he said. “And what will you do with her, once you are no longer satisfied by merely watching her, what will you do when you find out she loves you too? Will you keep her, unmarried? I don’t think your heart will bear it, she being a lady and all.”
Robin shuddered involuntarily at these words.
“But even if she wasn’t,” Tuck said, “you still wouldn’t have her as your mistress, for you are a gentleman at heart no matter that you don’t have the lands to prove it.”
“I had not thought of it this way,” Robin said after a while, his voice sounding broken and hoarse. “What am I doing? She deserves better than this.”
Father Tuck shrugged.
“But if this is what she wants?” he said. “Ask her, and you’ll see.”
“Ask her what?”
“To marry you, of course!”
“No!” Robin shouted, appalled at the idea. “I would never marry her, I’d never do that to her.” His voice dropped to a whisper. “I love her too well.”
“Then, maybe you should tell her to leave,” Little John said slowly, for he was considering the words carefully before he said them.
“That’s the thing, I can’t,” Robin said, tormented.
“Listen to me, boys,” Tuck said firmly. He loved calling them boys even though Little John was a good ten years older than Robin.
“Listen to me. You,” he indicated Robin with his finger, “are making a mistake by not asking her to marry you. I think she would say yes. As for telling her to leave, don’t do that. It’s obvious she is enjoying herself here with us and, after all, there are some of us who have chosen to live here in the forest, even though we were not outlaws at the first place,” he added, thinking of himself. “She however, she was an outlaw long before she appeared half-dead outside our camp, so where would she be better protected than here?”
“Yes, that’s it,” Robin said almost leaping from the ground in his sudden excitement. “She has to stay here for protection! She has to.” He placed a kiss on the priest’s balding head. “I’ll always love you for what you said right now, father Tuck.”
Tuck laughed in amusement and motioned for him to sit down.
“Calm yourself, you crazy boy,” he said, “I am not yet finished with you. If you heed my advice, you’ll ask her to marry you. It will make you happy, I think,” he added tenderly.
“It would, immensely,” Robin answered, “but what of her? I can’t tie her to a man like myself, don’t you see? What do I have to offer her? This is no life for her. What woman would be content to live as we do?”
Tuck observed him for a while, taking in his tortured eyes and his furrowed brow.
“She, I think,” he answered quietly.
But Robin shook his head and flopped back on the ground.
“You do as your heart tells you, boy,” father Tuck said, “and not as your foolish brain. And you,” he pointed at Little John, “you learn to accept her presence here and teach your friends to do the same.”
“But, father…” John started saying, a confused expression on his face.
“You know what I’m talking about,” Tuck persisted. “You reconcile yourself to the girl and learn to love her as best you can.” He leaned back against the tree and closed his eyes as if settling for a nap, but the two men heard clearly his next words. “For she is here to stay.”
…
The next day Rosa was taken aback at Robin’s behavior to her, but she didn’t show it. He seemed cold and distant and didn’t even look her way. She was surprised by how much she missed his concern for her and his comments, sometimes appreciative, sometimes tender and most often ridiculously funny, as he happened to pass her by while she was tending to her chores.
The days passed, green leaves turned brown with winter, and the forest paths became muddy with freezing rainwater -and he continued to ignore her.
Rosa, not knowing how it pained him to stay away from her, concluded that she had somehow displeased, or even worse, disappointed him. She would have fallen into a deep depression if she had allowed herself the luxury, but she reprimanded herself sharply and decided to try her best notwithstanding Robin’s behavior. She wouldn’t be of much help around the camp if the was moping about all day. Besides, she told herself, it wasn’t as if she didn’t know this would happen sooner or later. Robin had been very good and attentive to her while she needed him, but now that she was well and strong again, he had more important things to do than be a lonely girl’s companion.
So she went about her business as before and tried to coax Little John
and Matt to teach her combat.
John was impressed by her grace with the stick and Matt’s job was easy as she knew how to handle a sword already. The days passed uneventfully for her, waiting for the men to come back from their excursions and not asking to be taken along, for she had lost the heart for it now that she knew Robin didn’t want her. She concentrated at keeping the men clean and their bellies full and they appreciated her for that far more than if she were to fight with them every day.
Slowly she began to learn now to fashion arrows, and Little John, with whom she had become great friends as soon as she lost Robin, it seemed, spent hours patiently showing her how to make a sturdy bow. She watched closely and tried to imitate his actions, making one of her own. What she was too ashamed to admit, though, was that she didn’t know how to use it. She kept her secret in the midst of a forest full of excellent archers and prayed that she wouldn’t need to yield a bow herself.
Robin Hood insisted that every man in his camp, no matter his age or constitution, would at least know how to aim a bow and hit true if the need arose. She alone was exempt from these lessons, seemingly being content to watch, even though in her heart she longed to leap up and join in.
As midwinter approached the whole camp was aflutter with the promise of the feast the men held twice a year among themselves, with archery contests, games, wrestling, prizes and food. A lot of food.
Robin had started these feasts as a way to help them forget the sorry excuse for a life they were leading as outlaws, as well as the wives, mothers and daughters most of the men had left behind, but the feasts had had so much success so far, that the men insisted they had them twice a year, one in the summer and one in winter. They filled their days for weeks with anticipation and joy as well as with a flurry of activity, for every small hut, every snow-covered branch had to be decorated gaily if the feast was to be a grand affair, not to be put to shame by the Sheriff’s blatant show of wealth.
This year, however, Robin’s heart was much too heavy to let him participate in the general excitement. He knew he would have to play his part in the contest no matter how he felt, but his spirit weighed on him heavily, his sleepless nights beginning to take their toll on his stamina, his eyes troubled and dark.
…
Meanwhile, things were falling back to normal at the castle. The Sheriff was still recovering from his humiliation at the hands of the outlaws and from the realization that his daughter had actually escaped with her life.
He wasn’t forming any plan just yet, however; he was licking his wounds and biding his time. And when the opportunity came, his wrath would be catastrophic for the Merry Men’s band, he was sure of it.
The days were dragging along and he didn’t have anyone to confide in. He had written to Sir Hugh repeatedly, receiving no answer, and soon after Rosa’s imprisonment news began to reach him of that worthy’s presence in the isles. Rumor had it that he was nursing a broken heart, and refused to see anyone. The Sheriff thought about it and turned it in his mind a million times, wondering if he should himself inform him of the supposed loss of his daughter or to wait for the disturbing news to reach him in its own good time.
He considered and hesitated, and then finally one day he had hesitated too long.
Late one evening the gates of the castle opened to admit a weary traveler’s horse, which was foaming at the mouth for its soaked rider, Sir Hugh himself, had ridden it to his door at breakneck speed, heedless of the danger.
A few minutes later he stormed into the Sheriff’s rooms roaring in anger and pain, his long black cloak still dripping rain on the floor around his black boots and demanded explanations. Explanations and revenge.
The Sheriff looked upon Sir Hugh’s bloodshot eyes and trembling white lips with secret amusement. He didn’t get up to welcome his honorable guest, as he once would have done. Instead, he leaned back into his favorite tall chair for comfort and prepared himself for a rather unexpectedly pleasant evening.
…
The Sheriff observed the dance of the flames across Sir Hugh’s thin and sullen face. He felt a low chuckle begin to rise from his belly, but suppressed it before it bubbled out. People could be so stupid, he thought. So easily manipulated. So blind.
He had given enough time to the young man seated opposite from him to vent his anger and his accusations. He had listened to him rant on and on about his -the Sheriff’s- murderous deeds, and his merciless, hard heart that had killed his own daughter.
Indeed he was beginning to get bored. Time to change the flow of this one-sided conversation. He leaned forward in his chair, bringing his face closer to Sir Hugh’s and noticing the stubble on his chin and the paleness of his cheeks with distaste.
“Listen to me, boy,” he began as tenderly as he could. “Don’t let your judgment be clouded by malicious slander, don’t let them poison your thoughts. You know me, don’t you?”
“I thought I did,” came the bitter answer.
Nottingham sighed dramatically.
“It is as I feared,” he said feigning resign. “My letters reached you too late. Or maybe not at all. I thought they might be intercepted, but I imagined I trusted my own couriers…”
“What letters? What are you talking about? Who is ‘they’?”
“Ahhh…” said the Sheriff and fell to staring into the fire mysteriously.
“Tell me, man, don’t beat about the bush so!”
Sir Hugh was beginning to get impatient. The Sheriff smiled inwardly. This was a nice change from the man’s previous accusing words, he thought.
“I was hoping to break it to you more gently,” he said reluctantly. “Her suffering, her… death…” he wiped an imaginary tear from his cheek. “Their role in it. Oh my poor girl, how she must have suffered. And though she was a traitor to me -you see, I know that at last- but still, to die in the hands of those she thought her friends… A death so cruel I can’t even begin to imagine…” he stopped and buried his head in his palms.
Sir Hugh watched him in speechless horror and seemed unable even to breathe.
“How much greater is my hatred for them now I couldn’t possibly begin to tell you, my friend,” the Sheriff continued and his voice trembled with genuine emotion now, “although I had hoped that you would be more on my side than you seem to be.”
“Them? Who are they? What did they do to her?” Sir Hugh shouted, having finally found his voice. He got up, storming about the room, barely able to contain his desperation.
“Why, didn’t you know?” the Sheriff raised his eyebrows incredulously. “They murdered her in the forest, of course. Robin Hood and his men.” He chucked darkly. “To spite me, of all things.”
Silence, ominous and tense followed his cruel statement.
“They… what? I thought, that is I heard it was you who…” Sir Hugh stammered in confusion.
The Sheriff looked at him through lowered eyelashes that concealed his triumph. Time you felt a little foolish yourself, my friend, he thought to himself. He shrugged, as if further speech was impossible.
“I thought they were against murder,” Sir Hugh said after a bit.
“They obviously changed their policy for my benefit,” the Sheriff answered easily. “Or else they… they used her for as long as they liked and then decided to discard her like an old dog.”
Sir Hugh’s eyes watered in spite of himself as he recalled the way Rosa had spoken of the outlaw, Robin Hood, how her entire face had lit up with pride and loyalty, how she had defied his opinion and ignored his warnings. He passed his palm across his face. No, he had no difficulty believing that the Sheriff was telling the truth, and he was intent on finding out even more of it. As much as he could.
The Sheriff folded his hands across his rotund stomach as Sir Hugh sat back down, looking even more heart-broken and sullen than before. But at last, he was ready to talk reason.
…
A couple of days before this significant meeting, Robin Hood woke up in the morning with no idea o
f how close everything, including his very existence, was to being knocked off balance and tumble into the abyss. He did have a huge appetite however and, after his daily ablutions, he decided to walk towards the eating area of the camp and see what was being cooked. As he got closer he noticed that no pleasant smell met his sensitive nostrils and became suddenly suspicious.
Sure enough, the camp was empty.
A few loud snores from the sleeping men managed to penetrate the distance and reach his ears, but that, aside from the chirping of the morning birds, was the only sound around. He shook his head.
Rosa had been at her post almost every day since her recovery, quickly becoming a fixture beside the large cooking pot, the good father Tuck usually sprawled in a plump heap on the grass next to her. The men had gotten so much used to her waking up a good half hour before them, that they no longer noticed it.
He did, however. He noticed the gathering light playing with her hair, he noticed her slender fingers moving nimbly across the pots and pans, he noticed her ready smile and her kind eyes. He also noticed the sharp pang he felt in his heart every time he saw her there, fresh and beautiful like the crisp sunshine, so close to him and yet so completely untouchable, as far away from him as if she was still living in the castle.
How he longed to sit beside her, to talk to her or to simply watch her, drinking in the sight of her. All he could do however, it seemed, was grunt in her direction by way of greeting and go and sit himself in the farthest side of the clearing, stealing glances at her in spite of himself the whole time he pretended to eat.
None of this was possible today however, and he tried not to worry, thinking to himself that she was entitled to a bit more sleep and that her failing to show up didn’t necessarily mean she was unwell.
“No use sitting around and looking at the remains of yesterday’s fire, my boy,” father Tuck’s voice said behind him. “Ain’t going to cook yourself breakfast that way.”
