The White Company Chapter 5 - How a Strange Company Gathered at the "Pied Merlin"

**Arthur Conan Doyle** (0:25)
CHAPTER V. A strange company gathered at the Pied Merlin.
The night had already fallen, and the moon was shining between the rifts of ragged, drifting clouds before Alleyne Edricson, foot-sore and weary from the unwanted exercise, found himself in front of the forest inn which stood upon the outskirts of Lindhurst.
The building was long and low, standing back a little from the road, with two flambeaux blazing on either side of the door as a welcome to the traveler.
From one window, there thrust forth a long pole with a bunch of greenery tied to the end of it, a sign that liquor was to be sold within.
As Alleyne walked up to it, he perceived that it was rudely fashioned out of beams of wood, with twinkling lights all over where the glow from within shone through the chinks. The roof was poor and thatched, but in strange contrast to it, there ran all along under the eaves a line of wooden shields, most gorgeously painted with chevron bend and saltire, and every heraldic device. By the door a horse stood tethered, the ruddy glow beating strongly upon his brown head and patient eyes, while his body stood back in the shadow. Alleyne stood still in the roadway for a few minutes, reflecting upon what he should do. It was, he knew, only a few miles further to Minstead, where his brother dwelt. On the other hand, he had never seen his brother since childhood, and the reports which had come to his ears concerning him were seldom to his advantage. By all accounts he was a hard and a bitter man.
It might be an evil start to come to his door so late and claim the shelter of his roof.
Better to sleep here at this inn, and then travel on to Minstead in the morning. If his brother would take him in, well and good. He would bide with him for a time and do what he might to serve him. If, on the other hand, he should have hardened his heart against him, he could only go on his way and do the best he might by his skill as a craftsman and a scrivener.
At the end of a year he would be free to return to the Cloisters, for such had been his father's bequest. A monkish upbringing, one year in the world after the age of twenty, and then a free selection, one way or the other. It was a strange course which had been marked out for him.
Such as it was, however, he had no choice but to follow it. And if he were to begin by making a friend of his brother, he had best wait until the morning before he knocked at his dwelling.
The rude plank door was ajar, but as Alan approached it, there came from within such a gust of rough laughter and clatter of tongues that he stood irresolute upon the threshold. Summoning courage, however, and reflecting that it was a public dwelling in which he had as much right as any other man, he pushed it open and stepped into the common room.
Though it was an autumn evening and somewhat warm, a huge fire of heaped billets of wood crackled and sparked in a broad open grate. Some of the smoke escaping up a rude chimney, but the greater part rolling out into the room so that the air was thick with it, and a man coming from without could scarce catch his breath. On this fire a great cauldron bubbled and simmered, giving forth a rich and promising smell. Seating round it were a dozen or so folk of all ages and conditions, who set up such a shout as Alan entered, that he stood peering at them through the smoke, uncertain what this riotous greeting might portend. A rouse, a rouse! cried one rough-looking fellow in a tattered jerkin. One more round of mead or ale, and the score to the last comer. Tis the law of the Pied Merlin, shouted another. Ho, there, Dame Eliza! Here is fresh custom come to the house, and not a drain for the company. I will take your orders, gentles. I will assuredly take your orders, the landlady answered, bustling in with her hands full of leaven-drinking cups. What is it that you drink, then? Beer for the lads of the forest, mead for the gleam-man, strong waters for the tinker, and wine for the rest. It is an old custom of the house, young sir. It has been the use at the Pied Merlin this many a year back that the company should drink to the health of the last comer. Is it your pleasure to humor it? Why, good dame, said Alleyne. I would not offend the customs of your house, but it is only sooth when I say that my purse is a thin one. As far as two pence will go, however, I shall be right glad to do my part. Plainly said and bravely spoken, my suckling friar, roared a deep voice, and a heavy hand fell upon Alleyne's shoulder. Looking up, he saw beside him his former cloister companion, the renegade monk, Hordel John. By the thorn of Glastonbury, ill days are coming upon Bewley, said he. Here they have got rid in one day of the only two men within their walls, for I have had mine eyes upon the youngster, and I know that for all thy baby face there is the making of a man in thee. Then there is the abbot, too. I am no friend of his, nor he of mine, but he has warm blood in his veins. He's the only man left among them. The others? What are they? They are holy men, Allen answered gravely. Holy men? Holy cabbages! Holy bean-pods! What do they do but live and suck in sustenance and grow fat? If that be holiness, I could show you hogs in this forest who are fit to head the calendar.