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thirsty, but under considerable tension working on Brian. He did not object as
Herrac filled the cup again. Also, his mind was really not on the wine. He was
busy trying to tie in this sudden visitor fromScotland with laidlyWorms ,
Hollow Men, and the second-front possibility Herrac had mentioned and
Carolinus had seemed to dismiss so airily.
Mages could be wrong.
Chapter Ten
"I'll say aye to that," saidLachlan , filling his own glass moodily and then
drinking from it. "Seeing as it'sEngland that's to be invaded, and he's the
only Englishman among us."
"Except for m'Lord de Bois de Malencontri," said Herrac. "He's English,
also."
It almost came to the tip of Jim's tongue to assert that he was not English
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but American or would have been under ordinary circumstances. But the problem
of explaining what he would mean by that stopped him in time.
"Still," put in Dafydd, "there is something different about the fact that a
Scotsman, a Welshman and a Northumbrian, even with one Englishman, should sit
in council upon such a matter as this."
"Let us have done with oddities!" said Herrac sternly. "For that
matter,Northumbria is become Northumberland; and nowadays we, also, are
considered English. Moreover the matter concerns not merely Northumberland
andEngland , butScotland and Wales as well. If we are to be overrun by
Frenchmen, we will soon discover we have exchanged King Log for King Stork.
Have you not stopped to think that every Frenchman with the right to wear a
sword will be looking for land of his own to make into an estate at the
expense of whoever the former owner might be? That will includeWales it most
certainly will includeEngland and it may well threatenScotland as well, once
they are in power below the Border."
"Aye to that, too," grumbledLachlan ."The gold that the French send is pretty
enough; but no King spends gold for nothing but friendship; or an agreement so
honored in the breach as the Auld Alliance, between his country andScotland ."
He looked directly into Jim's eyes.
"In a word.Sir James which I will so call you, for the words come more kindly
to my lips than those of 'm'Lord' we are talking about an invasion of England
from Scotland, backed with French gold, but made with Scottish lives and
Scottish blood, that needs must be spilt before England can hope to be
conquered not that any hope of that there is."
"You're concerned about Scottish lives, then?" asked Jim. "How does it come a
Scotsman like yourself would be here now, warning what may well be the enemy,
of a planned attack by your own people?"
"Because Herrac has the right of it.We can all become prey to the French,"
saidLachlan . "Also I'm no friend of the MacDougall, who is the main force in
incitingScotland into this bloodbath withEngland . Not that I would mind a
conquest ofEngland that will work. But this one cannot and will not."
"And why won't it work?" asked Jim, suddenly keenly interested.
"Because the damned French won't show up when they're supposed to!" half
shoutedLachlan , thumping the table with his fist. "They never have before,
and they won't now! It's the men of theclans,France wants to pull its
chestnuts out of the fire for it. Let Scotsmen conquerEngland ; and thenFrance
will sail up, smiling; and let off its ships enough fresh armed men to slay
and rout those very Scotsmen that have gained the land for them. How else can
they gain by this?"
"You have yet to tell us, look you," said Dafydd, "what makes you so sure
that they will do just this thing you say."
"Because the French have been always such!" saidLachlan . "They seek to buy
Scotsmen to conquerEngland for them. It has always been their way; and it
cannot be other than their way now. How would matters stand if Scots and
French were faced with dividingEngland between them, somewhere down in the
midlands? If ye wouldna have had a war between them for other reasons before
that, ye'd have war between them then! Can ye think that anything else would
happen?"
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It was curious, thought Jim, howLachlan 's accent seemed to come and go. At
moments he talked like the rest of them. At other moments he was hardly
understandable.
"Knowing the English and French I, for one, think not," said Herrac. "M'Lord
James and Master bowman and Sir Brian if he were here I would say to you now
that I am of the mind of Lachlan on this. Our Border has taught us that there
will never be peace of any real sort between Scots and Englishmen. No more is
there any Scot, or Englishman of the Border, who will willingly give up what
he owns to a Frenchman. There is no doubt that whatLachlan brings us is the
truth. What we are here to discuss is not whether it will or will not be, but
how it will be; and how we may possibly blunt the spearpoint of its first
movement southward."
"Do we know where the spearpoint is going to come from?" asked Jim. "And also
what it'll consist of? If it's a full size army "
"Would it were," said Herrac, with a sigh. "I fear me it is something much
worse."
"Why? What's that?" asked Jim, surprised to see this powerful Border warrior,
obviously one who had had a good deal of experience in the battles of his
area, sound so defeated before any kind of conflict had begun.
"Why?" echoed Herrac."Because it's not to be an army. It's to be our old
enemy, whom you've met already.These who wounded Sir Brian, who lies
upstairs."
"Who?Do you mean ?" said Jim, wanting to hear the name actually pronounced.
"The Hollow Men," said Herrac.
Bingo!
Right on thebutton, thought Jim and the Dark Powers pulling strings on all of
them.
"So!" he said aloud. "But I still don't see any great problem with it. At a
guess how many Hollow Men are there not more than a couple of thousand, say?"
"Probably not," said Herrac. "No one knows, of course.None living."
"Well, there you are," said Jim, feeling the effect of the wine making him a
little more talkative than he would generally have been. "Any invasion force
fromScotland that intended to make a serious attempt atEngland would need at
least thirty thousand men, wouldn't it?Thirty thousand men on up.Maybe
forty fifty thousand. Maybe even more "
"How many men does it matter there are in the army of Scotsmen?"Lachlan
interrupted roughly. "Whatever their number,England has that many fighting men
and more. What matters is the advance force.The Hollow Men. What's to be done
about even two thousand, if they canna be finally killed?"
"Well, they can be killed " Jim was beginning.
"But temporarily only!" saidLachlan . "If they can come back to life in
forty-eight hours, in forty-eight hours they can be back, killing mortal men
who won't rise again! How do you think they've kept their land in theCheviot
Hills this long, and none been able to take it from them?"
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"But " began Jim argumentatively; and then suddenly realized he had nothing
to argue with. WhatLachlan had pointed out was at the very least an
unmistakable problem. Still, he did not see how the fact of the Hollow Men,
heading things up, guaranteed a bloody penetration deep into thelandofEngland
; without promising the highly unlikely, which would be an overwhelming
Scottish victory. The Hollow Men were too few to guarantee a Scottish victory.
"De'iltake ye, man!" saidLachlan . "Think! They canna lose the Hollow Men
cannot lose, I mean. As long as they leave one of their own back up in the
Cheviot Hills or better still, for safety, a small number of their own, then
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