The Tournament Read Online Free PDF

the length of the board until she stood nose to nose with her rival king and, protected by her trusty bishop far behind her, Mr Giles would quietly say, ‘Checkmate.’
    At one tavern, Mr Giles did exactly this move and it enraged his opponent, a local salt miner who fancied himself at the game and was reputedly unbeaten in that town. Upon being mated, the miner kicked back his chair, rose and shoved Mr Giles harshly backwards.
    Mr Ascham, standing nearby, moved with surprising speed and caught Mr Giles before he hit the ground.
    The miner loomed above them, a stout fellow with a face enfilthed by his day’s labour underground.
    ‘You cheated!’ he growled.
    ‘I apologise for beating you, sir, but I did not cheat,’ Mr Giles said in a conciliatory way.
    ‘We will play again!’ the goliath boomed.
    Mr Ascham stepped forward. ‘I think we are done for the evening. Perhaps we can buy you a drink as thanks for a game well played.’
    ‘Or maybe I will break you both in two, rut your little girl here, and then buy myself a drink!’ the miner said. A few of his friends chuckled ominously.
    ‘That will not happen,’ Mr Ascham said, his voice even.
    The big miner stiffened. The entire bar went quiet. I gazed around at the crowd who were now taking a keen interest in the confrontation.
    The miner locked eyes with my teacher. ‘I know you travel with guardsmen, foreigner, but your guards are outside now. I will have beaten you to a pulp before they get through that door.’
    Then, with a suddenness that shocked me, the miner lunged at my teacher, swinging a massive fist at his face.
    Mr Ascham moved with a speed I had not thought him capable of.
    He ducked the behemoth’s lusty blow and then bobbed up and loosed a brief but powerful punch to the big man’s throat, striking him squarely in the Adam’s apple.
    The enormous miner stopped dead in his tracks. His eyes bulged red and he gasped for breath as if he were choking. His hands clutched at his throat as he dropped to his knees.
    My teacher, calmer than calm, his eyes steady and unblinking, stood over him. The miner was at his mercy.
    ‘My friend played a fair game, sir, and he meant no offence. Nor do I. I do not desire to hurt you any more.’ Mr Ascham’s eyes scanned the hall for any who might wish to avenge their choking friend. ‘But I will defend my travelling party if you make me.’
    He pushed Mr and Mrs Ponsonby and me toward the door. Mr Giles followed, walking backwards. Elsie appeared then from somewhere—a side door, I believe; she must have heard the ruckus—and joined us at the exit.
    Mr Ascham threw a couple of silver coins to the floor in front of the kneeling man. ‘We bid you all good night and shall forthwith take our leave.’
    We left that mining town immediately and made camp in some woods far to the east much later that evening. But as we rode away from that town I saw my teacher’s hands on his reins.
    They were shaking.
    The following day, as I rode in the cart alongside Mr Ascham on his horse, I said, ‘Mr Ascham, I was unaware you were so, well, capable in a fight. Have you always been so?’
    My teacher shook his head. ‘I’m no great fighter, Bess. In fact, had that fight gone on any longer, that miner would probably have knocked me senseless. But I did enough to get us all out of there safely, which was all I wanted to do.’ He smiled sadly. ‘Bess, despite all of humanity’s many advances in medicine, the sciences, architecture and the arts, we live in a brutish world, one in which force is still the ultimate arbiter.’
    ‘But what about England? Is it not a nation of laws?’ I argued, just as my teacher had taught me. ‘The rule of law is what makes ours a civilised nation.’
    Mr Ascham snuffed a laugh. ‘We are not so civilised.’
    ‘But I can walk down any street in Hertfordshire without fear of any bodily harm.’
    ‘This is true. But do you know why that is the case?’
    ‘Because of the rule of law.’ I