Free The Betrayal of Father Tuck: An Outlaw Chronicles short story by Angus Donald Page A

boisterous lad who ran happily about Marie-Anne’s castle of Kirkton filling the air with his shrill joyous shouts. How she wanted to see his lovely little face, to hold his strong, squirming body in her arms. She had been parted from Hugh for only four days but she longed to see him again almost as much as she longed to be parted from her brother-in-law.
    Marie-Anne pushed these ill-disciplined thoughts away and raised her eyes to the opposite wall of the wooden hall and the two flags that had been hung there in honour of the feast. Her own device, an elegant white hawk on a cheerful blue field, and Lord Edwinstowe’s stumpy white oak tree on a field of green. The tree’s leaves were outsized, huge stylisations of foliage, and six massive acorns were overlaid on them, making the whole image as clumsy and crude as the man himself.
    ‘… and Alan mentions a jolly canso that he wrote especially for King Richard and which, he says, was much applauded by the court. It really is most amusing. It is the story of a young knight who falls in love with his lord’s wife and who decides to disguise himself as a serving maid to gain access to his lady’s chamber—’
    ‘It sounds deeply immoral,’ interrupted Lord Edwinstowe. ‘I don’t understand this faddish new enthusiasm for adultery. I don’t understand why these trouvères are forever banging on about illicit liaisons. It is wanton mischief-making. Family loyalty, the duty to one’s flesh and blood, that is the most important thing in life; and that is founded on fidelity between man and woman. If Sarah were ever to indulge in that kind of silly flirtation, I’d cast her off like a pair of dirty hose. In my opinion, a married woman who encourages a lover is no better than a common whore.’
    A strained silence descended, broken only by Tuck crunching hard into a crisp apple. He had tried, God knew, to steer the conversation into harmless waters. But the man was a boor, plain and simple. The apple, however, was delicious. Sarah, Lady Edwinstowe, a moon-faced, plump woman with watery blue eyes, smiled wanly at her husband but said nothing about being compared to a pair of soiled leggings. She farted quietly, not quite silently, and fed a sweetmeat to the half-asleep and very overweight toy dog nestled in her bountiful lap.
    Marie-Anne noticed that a pair of servants were standing beside her, one holding a bowl, with a clean towel over his arm, the other offering to pour water over her hands so that she might clean them. The meal was clearly over.
    Thank God we are going home tomorrow
, she thought, as she rinsed her hands in the stream of warm rose-scented water. They had done their duty by Robin’s appalling relatives, and with luck they would not have to bear the company of the odious Lord of Edwinstowe for many a month to come, perhaps for years.
    ***
    A warm September sun smiled down on the party of travellers the next morning as they made their way through thick forest, heading north-west on the old cart track towards Sheffield. The Countess of Locksley and Father Tuck led the procession. Behind them came eight tough-looking men-at-arms clad in dark green cloaks over mail and two laden pack-ponies. At the tail of Tuck’s horse stepped two huge reddish-grey wolfhounds, savage-looking animals as big as bull calves, with low-slung square heads and powerful jaws.
    ‘He’s not a bad man,’ said Tuck, ‘just a little old-fashioned.’
    ‘He’s an arse,’ said Marie-Anne. ‘He’s a full-blown, dyed-in-the-wool, no-hope-of-Salvation arse. Thank God we’re quit of him, his bovine wife and his drafty castle. I cannot wait to be at Kirkton, to breathe the clean air of the Locksley Valley!’
    Tuck smiled. ‘You are too hard on him. He means well, and he is Robin’s only surviving male relative – for the sake of the family, we must try to be civil to him, since you have no other living kin.’
    ‘You be civil to him, if you must, I can hardly bear to look at