The White Company / Белый отряд. Книга для чтения на английском языке

) Тьфу ты!]” growled the soldier, striking his flagon on the board until the dishes danced again. “What, in the name of the devil, hath come over the folk? Why sit ye all moping by the fireside, like crows round a dead horse, when there is man’s work to be done within a few short leagues of ye? Out upon you all, as a set of laggards and hang-backs! By my hilt! I believe that the men of England are all in France already, and that what is left behind are in sooth the women dressed up in their paltocks and hosen.

”

“Archer,” quoth Hordle John, “you have lied more than once and more than twice; for which, and also because I see much in you to mislike, I am sorely tempted to lay you upon your back.”

“By my hilt! then, I have found a man at last!” shouted the bowman. “And, ’fore God, you are a better man than I take you for if you can lay me on my back, mon garçon. I have won the ram more times than there are toes to my feet and for seven long years I have found no man in the Company who could make my jerkin dusty.

”

“We have had enough bobance and boasting,” said Hordle John, rising and throwing off his doublet. “I will show you that there are better men left in England than ever went thieving to France.”

“Pasques Dieu![66 - Pasques Dieu! – (фр. воскл.) Боже ты мой!]” cried the archer, loosening his jerkin, and eyeing his foeman over with the keen glance of one who is a judge of manhood. “I have only once before seen such a body of a man.

By your leave[67 - By your leave – (разг.) С вашего позволения], my red-headed friend, I should be right sorry to exchange buffets with you; and I will allow that there is no man in the Company who would pull against you on a rope; so let that be a salve to your pride. On the other hand, I should judge that you have led a life of ease for some months back, and that my muscle is harder than your own. I am ready to wager upon myself against you, if you are not afeard. ”

“Afeard, thou lurden!” growled big John. “I never saw the face yet of the man that I was afeard of. Come out, and we shall see who is the better man.”

“But the wager?”

“I have nought to wager. Come out for the love and the lust of the thing.”

“Nought to wager!” cried the soldier. “Why, you have that which I covet above all things. It is that big body of thine that I am after.