Quarterstaff: The Legend of
"Little" John Naylor
Have you ever wondered what happened to Little John and the rest of the Merry Men after Robin Hood got to live happily ever after? I did too, then I came across this story and the person who told me the story swore it was true. Despite him being of suspicious character, I believe him...
HOW THE STORY CAME ABOUT
There was a time that I was working for a courier company and on my many journeys to Johannesburg Int. Airport, I used to pass a huge billboard for a casino (can’t remember which one) and it read: “Who’s this Jack they keep hitting at [our casino]. Well, I started wondering, playing with the name “Jack”. Soon it became “Jacques” and then I remembered a scene in Robin Hood: Men in tights where they are on the shooting range and one of the men uses a Cruise Missile arrow. That was the basis of the story. The three bad guys were worked in when I got to that spot in the screenplay. Up until then they never existed. The story’s name changed several times, from Robin Hood and the Purple Prince to Little John and the Purple Prince until I finally settled on the present title.
THE SETTING
The story takes place in and a round Hull, mainly at the castle of Lord Dunwidden, in Medieval England at the time that Robin Hood was active in Sherwood Forest. A few very wealthy noblemen ruled the country and the biggest portion of the populace lived from hand to mouth, having to resort to all kinds of activities to make ends meet. Not much has changed since then, it seems.
THE GOOD
Little John is quite happy to live the life of freedom and uncomplication that he now has since Richard III’s return from bondage. Things go awry when he has visions of a beautiful woman and he sets out on a destiny changing journey to get to the bottom of his problem.
Catherine, the woman in John’s visions, is the spirited daughter of Lord Dunwidden. She has her own beliefs and often speaks without thinking. Her contrariness brings her face to face with her beliefs and the realities of a situation that is forced on her and she has some difficult choices to make: love for a man or love for her family and duty to her country. (Richard had spurned the sister of Phillip of France, leading to a cold war situation between two England and France.)
Lord Dunwidden is a feudal lord with vast tracts of land and a man of vast influence in the court of Richard III. He is well liked by his people because he treats them better than most. Dunwidden is a widower and father of Catherine and Michael, his son who is away on the crusades and missing presumed dead. He has only one wish: to see his grandchildren. Dunwidden had promised his dying wife that he would live to see his grandchildren and he is now growing old and tired of Life. Now that Michael is dead, that duty falls on Catherine to fulfill. This has now become the main quest for him. His desire drives the events that shape the story. How far will he go to ensure his only child’s happiness is a question that he faces himself.
THE BAD
Jacques Le Purple, a French nobleman, is a man on a mission: to save his family from economic embarrassment and to save his own neck from the riff-raff that he owes a lot of money to from his gambling and debauchery. The answer to his problems lies in marrying Catherine. He is pompous and full of himself with little regard for anybody but himself. He presents a false side to Lord Dunwidden and wins the old man over, but his true colors are revealed when Dunwidden travels to London to see the king.
Lataquin, Pierre and Henri are three gangsters that arrive in England to collect money owed by Jacques to them. They are the driving force behind him. They are also the men who end up helping Jacques in his mission and are also, unwittingly, on the wrong end of Jacque’s conniving schemes.
THE STORY
Plagued by visions of a beautiful woman and having no idea who she is, Little John decides that the best way to get to the bottom of the matter is to find her and figure out why she’s in his head, so to speak.
His travels lead him to Hull where he almost immediately runs into Catherine, the woman in his visions. Sparks fly between them and she ends up at the receiving end of his amorous attentions. Catherine is both annoyed and intrigued by John as he is with her.
At the same time, three hooligans try to rob John on the instigation of local Ben Macgaddis, but he manages to beat them off. John goes after Macgaddis only to find that he has fled the county. He decides to stay on his farm to await his return. This is also a handy excuse for John to get closer to Catherine.
Catherine has her own problems as well with the numerous suitors that come and go at Dunwidden Castle and she has to fight off their unwanted attentions. She makes it clear that she intends marrying for love, even if that means marrying at an older age and against her father’s wishes. She believes that the man worthy of her has to be decent and well brought up, not after her money like most of her suitors are. He would be the lord of a vast estate and as such had responsibilities towards the people.
Things don’t work out for John and Catherine and they end up having a fight about the Class System. This doesn’t squash their feelings for each other though, and they run into each other again before Catherine comes to his farm to apologize for her actions.
Jacques enters the picture as Catherine is in the process of dumping another suitor. He is on a mission to marry Catherine and cunningly endears himself to Dunwidden. Catherine doesn’t take to him despite her father’s hopes.
Things take a turn for the worse when three gangsters arrive and have an unfortunate (for them) meeting with John. They swear revenge against him after he beats them in a fight. They find Jacques and demand their money from him. Through clever maneuvering, they end up doing hard labour in the fields of Dunwidden, something which infuriates them. Jacques discovers the reason why Catherine will never marry him and he turns to his enemies for help to get John out of the picture permanently.
Jacques wins Dunwidden over and asks to marry Catherine, much to Dunwidden’s delight. The relationship between John and Catherine grows, but there appears to be no way that they can overcome the matter of her nobility and his lack of it. Dunwidden has made it perfectly clear that Catherine will not marry below her standing and decides that Catherine’s time to choose is up. He promises her to Jacques.
Things speed up when Dunwidden travels to London to see the King and leaves Jacques in charge. The gangsters steal some of the Dunwidden jewelry and frame John, who is arrested for the theft by Jacques. John is thrown into prison, awaiting execution, much to Catherine’s despair. There appears to be no way out for John after Jacques confronts the two lovers in the dungeon. Efforts by Catherine to bargain for John’s life with Jacques come to nothing, so she sends an urgent plea for help to Robin.
John has friends amongst the locals and manages to escape from the dungeon with the help of his guard. In the process, John discovers who the real jewel thieves are and also clobbers Henri unconscious with a club. Jacques launches a desperate manhunt for him and in the pursuing flight, John is wounded. Tommy Keegan, a local that John has befriended, comes to his aide and nurses him back to health in the forest.
Robin and his men arrive and hear about John’s troubles and also settle the score with the four men who attempted to rob John in the beginning. They find John but fail to convince him to leave Hull. The wedding day draws closer and an archery contest is organized by Dunwidden as part of the festivities. He forces Jacques to supply the main prize- a pot of money (all the money he and his friends have on them). Jacques sets the standard for winning the prize extremely high and it is only Robin’s men who come close. Robin is about to leave for Sherwood when Jacques arrives on the farm and threatens him. This convinces Robin to stay and help John. The two of them go to the fair and both John and Robin hit the target, Robin winning the prize. Jacques figures out the truth and is insanely upset and orders Henri to go to the farm to look for John and murder him. John is waiting for him and they end up fighting again. Henri finally admits the truth to John and Robin.
The day of the wedding arrives, and brings with it a visit from the king. Robin kidnaps the friar due to perform the ceremony and replaces him with Tuck. Tuck runs into a devastated Catherine at the castle and promises that things will turn out alright.
A very tense Jacques tries to hurry Tuck along at the ceremony. The king suspects that there is something afoot when he recognizes Tuck. Unknown to everybody present, Michael slips into a pew at the back of the church. John exposes the treachery and chaos ensues as the remaining gangsters, with Jacques holding a knife to Catherine’s throat, attempt to escape. Robin and Michael duel with Pierre and Lataquin while John chases after Jacques. A fight to the death ensues in Catherine’s bedroom and Jacques is finally killed. Robin and Michael capture the other two in the process.
THE END
Not really,
What happens to Michael, Robin and the three bad guys, Lataquin, Henri and Pierre is a story for another day. I do know that they go on another adventure when Richard orders the bad guys delivered to Phillip of France to deal with.
