Outlaw by Michael Morpurgo Read Free Book Online Page A

is most needed. So I came to look for Robin Hood, to help him help the poor, and to lend him my prayers and my sword, if he wants them.”
    “Oh, he wants them, good friar,” said Robin, and even as he spoke the Outlaws came running out of the trees all around. It was all Robin could doto prevent them throwing themselves at the friar. “Leave him be,” he cried. “He is an enemy of our enemy, so he’s our friend. Besides which, he’d cut you all into little pieces with that sword of his – believe me. He may not look much, but I tell you, he wields a sword better than any man alive. And look what he has brought us.” Robin held up the sack and shook it at them. “Gold and silver. Treasure to feed the hungry mouths, lots of them. This friar, unlike most, is a true friar and worthy of his calling, a Christian man. Welcome to our band, friar.” And when they embraced, the friar squeezed him so hard that Robin felt his ribs might crack. “Do you have a name, friar?” he said.
    “Brother Ignatius. But that’s a terrible mouthful, so my friends call me Tuck, Friar Tuck.”
    So Friar Tuck came to live amongst them in Sherwood. He set up a candlelit chapel in the cavebeyond the clearing and made it plain that he expected everyone to be there each Sunday when he rang the bell for Mass. He was not a fellow to be argued with, and they soon knew it. Very few dared or wanted to stay away. He ate enough for three good men, but to the Outlaws he was worth every mouthful. Sundays he kept for the healing of the soul. “We’re arming ourselves for Christ,” he would say. But every other day he spent schooling the Outlaws in the art of swordsmanship, so that the forest rang now to the clash of steel on steel, and Friar’s Tuck’s infectious laughter. Loud buffoon, fierce warrior, wise priest, Tuck was a man of many parts, and it was he as much as anyone who bound the band of the Outlaws together and made a fighting force of them. Each one was now highly skilled with sword and bow, but although a few outsiders had trickled in to join them in Sherwood,there were still not enough of them to attack the sheriff and Sir Guy of Gisbourne in their strongholds.
    Tuck did not mince his words, he never did. “We can’t just wait here, Robin, until folk decide to join us. We have to go out and recruit them – that’s what the Lord Jesus did, by God’s good grace. And we need more weapons, better weapons, swords, spears, shields. Either we go out and steal them – and we can’t do that without waking the sheriff up – or we make them. We need a smith. And there’s another thing. You’re all of you a deal too small and skinny, if you don’t mind my saying so. I could blow most of you over with one snotty sneeze. We have to be able to fight them with our bare hands if necessary. You’ve got to be strong. You’ve got to learn how to wrestle.” And he patted his great stomach as he went on. “Don’t look at me. I can’t teach you, not with this belly of mine.And Robin can’t either. He’s all whippet and no hound. We need to find someone who can teach us how to wrestle, how we can snap Sir Guy of Gisbourne’s miserable neck with a tweak of the wrist, or squeeze the life out of the Sheriff of Nottingham. A little faith, Robin, and by God’s good grace, we’ll find the men we need.” In the event they were to find the wrestler first.
    Much was a miller’s son. All his life he had worked with his father, carrying sacks of wheat from the granary to the mill, and then sacks of flour from the mill to the cart outside. They worked every waking hour God gave them and they sold their flour to anyone who would buy it. The Sheriff of Nottingham bought all the flour he needed from Much’s father, but he always grumbled that his prices were too high. Much’s father, unlike many other millers, was no cheat. He always gave fairmeasures for a fair price, and so he refused to lower his price even when the sheriff threatened to burn