Abigail's Cousin (8 page)

"Take your horses and go." She ordered
them and Dick nursing a bruised arm, gave them a wide berth as he,
with difficulty, tried to unhitch his horse from the wheel. He
shouted
to his mate:
"Help me, 'arry!"

Then they were
gone.

As the sound of galloping hooves
disappeared, Sarah and Abigail rushed into each other's arms until
they heard Tom's voice.
"They're coming back, listen."

All stopped
and listened and indeed they could hear a horse coming nearer. Mrs
Lowther screams and shouts: "Rescue! Rescue!"

Tom says:
"Hush! There's just one horse. It''s from down the hill. It's
someone on their own."

Suddenly Sarah gives a whoop of joy, and
shouts: "It's his lordship. I know it." Then screaming excitedly
forgetting she is Lady Churchill, she dances and shouts: "It's my
John. It
's my John!"
Then more soberly:

"Heaven be
praised. It's his lordship come to our rescue."

But Tom calls
to her from his seat:

“Did you say
rescue, ma'am. We be already rescued," and focussing upon Abigail,
adds: "and she be the one who rescued us."

But Abigail
has collapsed against the wheel, exhausted, to be joined by Sarah,
who said to her: "I shall never forget this cos. Never, never,
never."

The galloping is nearer and they can
clearly hear a labouring horse as he is spurred up the incline,
then Sarah looking down the hill, waves at the approaching horseman
and to everyone's great delight, the horseman stands in his
stirrups and waves back. Even from a distance, all can see that
it
is indeed Sarah's
husband, the Earl of Marlborough, Lord Churchill, catching up with
them.

In the throng
of people surrounding the precincts of St James Palace there is
good humour as people jostle to get near the front and a hubbub of
neighbourliness pervades the gathering even when a single trumpet
blast is heard and the general background chatter sinks to a murmur
drowned by the succeeding fanfare as six royal trumpeters in bright
red, resplendent uniforms blast out their message and when the last
notes die away, the murmur is hushed and absolute silence
reigns.

A single
marching herald is seen to approach a dais upon which is a rostrum
and, from a flagpole flutters a Union flag in the gentle breeze on
this Sunday at four of the hour, on the afternoon of March 8th, in
1702. The herald declaims the age-old proclamation, and two people
in particular exchange glances as they listen to him shout:

"Be it known
unto all that our late sovereign and liege lord, King William, the
third of that name, is deceased - God rest his soul - and that Anne
of the royal house of Stuart has succeeded to the throne of our
several kingdoms of England, Wales, Scotland and Ireland. God save
the Queen! May the Queen live for ever!

For moments
there is stillness then applause as people clap their hands, they
shout, 'God save good Queen Anne' or simply hurrah, and more
hurrahs resound among the multitude. The herald steps down and the
crowd realise the little ceremony is over and start to move talking
all the while to their neighbours, and confident in the resumption
of a general hubbub of talk, Mistress Abigail Hill turns to her
brother:

"By the looks
of you Jack, it would seem the army had only little men to outfit
afore you arrived."

Jack examines
his sleeves and lifts one foot, then the other to confirm what he
already knows but is too ashamed to admit. He even pulls his collar
forward where there is a long gap, for a missing shirt, then says
in self mocking tone:

"Ain't you
sharp, sis! Lucky for me, nobody else has noticed, but in peacetime
the army has little money to spend on new uniforms, excepting if
one gets a promotion." He looks up to his hurrying sister and says
without much hope:

"There's
nought you can do about it, is there!"

Abigail eyes
her brother in turn as they walk and shakes her head:

"Even had I
the material," then added with a bitter grimace, "or the time. No,
brother, sorry!"

People have
thinned out as they walked along St James Street and another
thought struck Jack Hill: "Are you still on speaking terms with
your cousin, sis?"

She stopped in
her track and faced her brother. He, on the other hand, looked down
upon her tight bodice with its stiff stomacher which had the effect
of forcing the breasts into the fashionable décolletage and he felt
flattered as people passed them on either side, men even venturing
a second glance. However her tone of voice forced his eyes onto her
stern countenance. Her words were like cold water on his
self-esteem:

"If that means
what I think it to mean, forget it brother. I am not advancing
your..." She hesitated and he filled in the missing word,
'promotion'. She walked on seemingly disgusted but Jack persisted
saying in a complaining tone:

My pocket
money is stopped so I could not save up for a new uniform if I
wanted to." But his sister did not falter though now approaching
the Pickadilly Road where the noise of carriages was very loud she
was forced to shout to be heard:

"Cousin Sarah
stopped your pocket money when she heard you spent it on drink.
Besides you still have your pay or does that go on drink!"

Jack could
have told her that he had not been paid for months. This was
customary in the army of that time where officers, even lowly
lieutenants were expected to provide for themselves, or rather,
their families, but Jack has no family. Yet he knows telling his
sister will get him nowhere. Civilians just do not understand army
ways. Instead, as his sister beckons him to turn around and walk
back the way they had come as she is due back on duty at the
palace, he tries a different tack:

"Masham has
just been promoted captain."

Once again she
stopped and faced him. Now they were alone. This time she was
conciliatory:

"You want me
to talk to Cousin Sarah about your promotion."

"There's a war coming, sis. You wouldn't
want your brother to be
more at risk than your lover."

She bridled at
this description of Masham who was visiting the palace at the time
though he had made no declaration. She privately thought he was
more interested in her beautiful younger sister, Alice. Yet it was
good to see him. As she continued to mull over his remarks, Jack
resumed his wheedling:

"There is not
much time, sis, because if there is war, we shall end up over
there, across the North Sea, then there will be no chance. If, your
cousin could mention it to the captain-general! After all, after
that highwayman incident, he promised to do anything for you."

She now spoke
sharply and to the point: "After that incident, he bought you a
commission as a lieutenant. Masham's father bought his son the rank
of ensign, yet here he is now, a captain. In five years he has
jumped above you, and he deserved to. Brother, you had a shiftless
reputation on the farm. Nothing has changed."

Jack laughed
out loud: "Good old sis! Not in love! Pull the other one." I get
your drift but be fair, sister. Masham has been in the army five
years against your Jack's three so he did have a head start."

His sister
nodded conceding his point but shook her head too which meant, 'if
it were the other way round, it would make little difference'. They
had arrived back at the gardens which fronted the palace, the
flowers and shrubbery looking decidedly the worse after being
trampled on by the hundreds of people anxious to improve their
vantage point for the hearing of the royal proclamation just an
hour earlier. Abigail said:

"I've still a few minutes afore I need to
go back. Let's sit awhile." Jack took off his peaked cap, nervously
and then seeing his sister waiting hurriedly swept the leaves from
the wooden seat which encircled an oak tree and thankfully she sat
down. He replaced his cap and as he did so noticed a movement fifty
yards away. An officer was pacing up and down and because he and
his sister were partially camouflaged by the tree, he wondered if
his s
ister had seen him,
for it was Captain Samuel Masham himself.

Without a
doubt he was one smart soldier. His redcoat was close fitting to
the waist ending with the customary flare each slashed with a smart
side-pocket which on the right side displayed a discrete kerchief.
Purple breeches showed each time he made a stride; they ended just
below the knee tied with red ribbon garters. Without pointing him
out, Jack stuck out his own feet observing to his sister:

"Look at those
cotton stockings. Even from here a man can tell he's wearing silk,
and if I had my razor with me, I might shave in the mirror of his
shoes. And look at that hat! I would not dare to wipe the seat with
it." Jack's remark about the shoes was pure hyperbole as Masham was
too far away, but he did notice his sister preen in anticipation of
meeting him upon their return though she was in no hurry. He would
wait. He always had. She said to her brother:

"Cousin Sarah
has invited me to the theatre. Mayhaps I will broach the subject
then." Abigail would notify cousin Sarah of Masham's elevation in
the full knowledge of Sarah's dislike of Masham, but she said
nothing to her brother about this thought. She went on to say:

"They say that
her majesty will confer new honours upon Lady Churchill and then
she may be in a generous mood. Cheer up brother! Things are never
as bad as they seem."

Her brother
did cheer up on hearing that and said to his sister:

"The barrack
room gossip says that while Marlborough runs the war, his friends
will run the country and his wife will run the queen. So keep in
with cousin Sarah, sis. She may do you a lot of good, too."

Abigail sought
to trump her brother's barrack talk with Palace rumours: "The
gossip in the palace is that our lady bountiful will soon be chief
lady of the bedchamber, Groom of the Stole, Mistress of the
Wardrobe and Keeper of the Privy Purse, and her majesty might even
make her Warden of Windsor Forest."

"Phew!" said
Jack, "So a little promotion for cousin Jack will be a mere
bagatelle." The indicating the waiting officer, he added: "Tell you
what, sis. Your Masham over there is sporting another emblem now
his right side is turned towards us."

Abigail
focuses on him and Jack thinks any minute Masham will spot them but
his eyes are for the road. She answered: "Do you mean that bushy
thing round his neck. What do you call it?"

"A gorget,"
responds her brother. See mine's black with gilt studs."

"Mister Masham
has them is gleaming silver. They almost dazzle when he turns into
the sun. Mind you, Jack, yours would shine too if you took care to
polish them. Still it must have cost a pretty penny."

"Pretty
penny," objected Jack, "pretty guinea or I'm a Dutchman. And that
hat of his! I'm looking forward when he cleans the sidewalk making
his bow." But his words were lost on his sister as she had stepped
forward and waved to Masham who promptly came towards her.

Jack said:
"I'm off to the Crown and Anchor, sis," and would have had not
Abigail ostentatiously removed her purse through a slit just below
her bodice. She removed a coin, telling him:

"Here's
something brother. Until next time!" Disappointingly for her,
Masham stopped in his tracks not wishing to meet Jack, who hugs her
in gratitude and farewell, his mind racing ahead as to how many
drinks, a shilling will buy. Then he is gone and she resumes her
progress towards the smiling Masham and Jack is denied seeing him
sweep his hat to the ground in greeting her.

As the last waves of Ottoman expansion
broke upon the walls of Vienna, towards the close of the sixteenth
century, it was said that the Viennese, venturing from the city
after the departure of the Turks and wandering among their
abandoned tents and effects sought to discover the source of the
aroma which arose every day the Turks were there encamped
outside the walls of the city.
The aroma was more successful in besieging the battlements than the
Turkish soldiers as it stimulated appetite among the inhabitants,
not good where hunger stalked the streets of the city.

Someone picked
up a box upon which was written the word 'qahveh' from whence came
that appetizing aroma, that whiff of the exotic east. The searchers
found more clues including beans, milling implements and
instructions in Arabic, and before very long the Viennese were also
enjoying the selfsame beverage which was such a feature of the
Turkish besiegers' daily life and as the memories of the siege
faded, the Viennese welcomed their new found beverage as a blessing
forgetting their hardships. In the ensuing years visitors to Vienna
also liked to share the new 'qahveh' habit until eventually it
found its way to London, whose inhabitants not gifted in the
vernacular of other nations, began to open places of their own to
serve a man the new beverage of 'coffee’.

Almost a
century after the failed siege of Vienna, coffee houses were
abundant in London boasting such names among their devotees as
Jonathon's, Garaways, Manns or, perhaps reflecting its origins,
Smyrna. Often a notice about the origins of coffee would be
prominently displayed under the title of 'The Vertue of the COFFEE
Drink'. Following its title would be a description of its origins,
for example: 'The grain or berry called Coffee, groweth upon little
Trees, only in the Deserts of Arabia.'

While watching for his coffee being
prepared, a first-time traveller might well interest himself in
this description as leaflets also were laid upon each table. 'It is
a simple and innocent thing, co
mposed into a drink by being dried into an Oven, and ground
to Powder, and boiled up with Spring water...'