“Play the game.”
She had to scream at Denise because of the uproar.
“Play the game. Swear, curse, be one of them.”
Denise fell to, and helped Marpasse. The big woman had whipped out her knife, and slit the sacking of the bale she had dragged down over the tail board. The bale contained nothing more than rolls of white cloth.
Marpasse spat on it, and swore, for other men and women were crowding up.
“White bibs for the fools, curse them! May Simon’s corpse be a bloodier colour.”
She seized Denise by the wrist, and dragged her off as though to hunt for richer spoil. But in the thick of the scramble she ran against the chest of a white horse that came out from behind one of the waggons. Marpasse saved herself by holding to Denise.
The rider on the white horse broke into a shout of laughter.
“Great, fat sheep, where are you running?”
And Marpasse stood open-mouthed, for it was Isoult, Isoult in a man’s hauberk, and red surcoat, her black hair bundled up under a steel cap.