"Clayton Emery - Robin Hood's Treasure" - читать интересную книгу автора (Emery Clayton)

been to a shrine, though it din't do him any good. Plus them two nags.
And their tack."
The merchant, the owner of the barn, cleared his throat. The giant gave
him a gold mark for fetching the blacksmith.
There was a very long space as the blacksmith checked over the booty.
He unsheathed the swords and tested their edge. He rapped them
together to hear them ring. He picked at the handles to learn what kind
of wire wrapped them. He scrutinized everything the same way. Then
he checked the horses. He counted their teeth, stared into their eyes,
pressed his ear against their chests and bellies, poked their frogs,
peered under their tails.
Finally he rocked back on his heels and rubbed his throat. "All of it?"
Little John nodded. "We can't use it."
The smith probed the barn with his eyes. "Forty marks."
"Forty marks?" Will Scarlett bounded off the stall railing and landed in
front of Little John. "Forty marks? Are you mad? God's fish and teeth,
one of those damned helmets alone is worth forty marks! Where in the
hell did you get a figure like that? Forty marks! Christ's sweet tree, it'd
take you three months to make one of those hauberks, and you'd be
glad to charge some idiot fifty marks for it alone! Did you hear the ring
on those swords? One of 'em's got to be Milanese or Damascan, and
you're offering us forty marks for it? The knives would be worth forty
marks even without the sheathes! You Jew! You Saracen pirate! You
tax-collecting, wine-nipping, cheese-paring, gold-shaving --"
Little John interjected, "We'll take it."
Red-faced but silent, the blacksmith twirled the barrels on the lock and
opened the chest. Shielding it with his body, he extracted forty thin
marks and stacked them on the floor. Little John packed them into his
purse. All the while Will Scarlett ranted and raved and waved his arms
in the air. "... call us thieves! Simpletons, maybe! Fools! Children
wandered to the woods! But thieves! You need a town man to teach
you about thievin'...
The blacksmith ordered his apprentices to tie everything onto the
saddles of the horses. Then he led them out, not directly towards the
town gates, but along some oblique route. He didn't say goodbye.
Will Scarlett wasn't through. "... can't believe you let it go at forty
marks, John, and clipped ones at that! Have you lost your mind? We
were robbed, plain and simple, same as we hoist the sheriff! We
could've shopped around! We could've gotten three smiths here, pitted
'em against one another, gotten a fair price! But no! You had to give the
stuff away! We could've gotten two hundred marks --"
Little John grinned. "It's worth a hundred to see you hop like a frog in a
pot."
Scarlett glared. "Forty needs a hundred sixty to make two hundred."
Little John picked up his quarterstaff. "Does it? I never was one for
numbers. Get over twenty sheep and it might's well be a thousand and
one, and half of them wolves. Get you up, you lot, we're for the woods."
Will Stutly creaked upright. He rubbed the small of his back. "What
about them?"
The giant regarded the knights. Through the exchange, as their worldly