The Friar's Tale, стр. 75
Seeing a potential tip vanish, the boy shook his head. "We'll manage." The older one, though, signaled him over to take care of the carriage horses first.
Tuck had not been in this inn in some time. To his relief, it seemed to have changed but little. They had added more cobbles to the inn-yard and replaced worn ones, a sign that they were prosperous. The only smell was of the stables.
Eventually, he surrendered his mule, and went into the common room. John was negotiating rates for all of them, haggling a little.
Tuck knew it would be a bench in the common room for him, and thus ignored the conversation. Instead, he took in the room. It was busy, of course, mostly with locals here for ale and talk. An animated argument was going on at one table, and he could not help but turn towards it.
"Then, the woman slapped him right on the cheek and informed him 'My eyes are up here'. She hit him so hard he fell back on his chair."
"Uppity woman."
"Nah. He deserved it. You know, the man's a total ass. I don't know how his wife tolerates it."
"Because she's a good one."
Tuck sighed. He didn't think a good wife was a woman who tolerated her husband's peccadilloes. No, a good wife would tell her man what she thought of him if he tried anything like that. It was, though, entirely none of his business.
Besides, Will was flagging him down. He'd claimed the largest table in the place, chasing off a boy not much more than an apprentice. Tuck sat down next to him.
"What's going on over there?"
"Argument about whether it's reasonable for a woman to hit a guy who deserves it."
Will laughed. "Did you catch what he deserved it for?"
"Something about where her eyes were."
Will laughed louder. "Then I'd say he deserved it. But you know what some men are like."
"I do." Some men only wanted to know about one kind of woman. The kind who walked three steps behind them with her head bowed. Like the Saracen women. They did that when they left the women's quarters at all. Three steps behind a male escort, only their eyes visible in the mass of cloth that covered them.
Tuck thought that Clorinda would kill as many of them as possible if she was forced into such a situation. The Saracen princes, some of them, had harems of fifty, sixty, a hundred women. Most of whom were probably ignored and forgotten. No man could handle that many wives. And one of the desert nomads had told him that the Prophet actually forbade a man from taking more than four women, and that only if he could afford to keep them properly.
Like powerful people everywhere, the princes ignored the rules. That was life, Tuck thought. The poor would be ground down by rules, the wealthy would ignore them. The good decent folk in the middle...would manage as best they could.
Will broke into his thoughts. "But here comes something to cheer us all up."
That something was a pitcher of ale. Tuck poured himself a tankard, then took a big swig. His eyebrows shot upwards. "Whewf. I remembered the ale here being good, but their brewmaster has excelled herself!"
Will took a sip of his, then grinned at the friar. "Now I know why you wanted to come here."
"Is there a better reason?" Tuck slowed down, savoring every taste of the brew.
"Perhaps not. As long as the lady finds her bed comfortable, or you know who will be sliced up by that tongue of hers."
Tuck shrugged. "For this ale, it would be worth it. But unless things have changed since my memory, I think she'll find it satisfactory. As much as she's found anything on this trip."
"That's the truth of it. I'm pretty sure she would much rather have stayed home." Will sounded distinctly thoughtful. "So would I."
Tuck was pretty sure that he was not acting. Not this time.
31
The White Tower loomed over the river. Tuck stood looking at it, from a good distance, of course. The place held no pleasant connotations. There was something about it that gave a vibe of...maybe it was the ravens.
For some reason, ravens liked to hang out there. Perhaps it had been their place before the humans had come here.
Superstitious people held that the ravens were tied to the luck of the crown. That bad things would happen if they ever left. Tuck saw them just as huge black birds. Birds that would no doubt hang around by the gallows and claim what they could. The fact that they were so dark of feather did not help.
Yet...there was something about their flight that, perhaps, made him understand the edges of how people felt about them. They did have a certain stark beauty to them, the beauty of death itself.
He wondered if he would be fortunate enough to survive much longer. The chances were John would have them all arrested. London jails were not a place one wanted to end up. Worse yet were the dungeons in the White Tower itself, or so rumor had it.
London was not a place Tuck wanted to spend a lot of time in, free or jailed. As he turned to walk back down Tower Hill, he saw an odd juxtaposition of prosperity and poverty. The former rode on the back of the latter. Beggars were common, many of them blind or otherwise mutilated. Many, perhaps, had returned from the Holy Land with such injuries, then been promptly cast aside by those who had so used them. Not all, though, were men. Most...for women in such dire straits always had the option of the bishop's brothels, as did a certain kind of man.
Morality tended to vanish when one was starving. Which was why Tuck walked with his hands on his staff and his eyes alert. These people would slit his purse given a quarter of a chance, and his throat for