Traitor's Field (8 page)

The preacher’s voice soared and rasped, his shoulders rising and falling and his hands conjuring the words out of his chest. From the doorway, many of the actual words were lost, but the tone of the voice was clear, its exhortations and accusations, its bitter denunciations and soft prayers.

There were two men in the doorway, one in the uniform of a Roundhead cavalry officer, the other in heavy practical civilian clothes.

‘You want him?’ murmured the first.

A shake of the head. ‘No need to interrupt. No point in making it worse.’

The man in question could also be seen easily from the doorway. Seated in one of a semicircle of chairs, the most powerful man in England stared with rigid attention at the preacher, jowls slumped and swarthy and large eyes unblinking.

The cavalry officer murmured, ‘Not good?’

Another shake of the head. ‘The south’s alive with Royalists, and while the Army’s fighting up here the Parliament’s getting ready to give it all away again. He’s going to be furious.’

When he visited the Sign of the Boar again the next day, the rider found a message for him from a man passing as Francis Padget. An hour later, he was out of the city and trotting steadily towards a certain crossroads.

He slowed the horse as he came within a hundred yards of the crossroads. It was a well-chosen spot. The land was flat and open all around; nowhere for either party to have set a trap. He kept the horse at a walk, peering ahead to the crossroads, around him, occasionally unobtrusively over his shoulder.

At fifty yards he saw the shape of a man on a horse, under an oak by the junction. His own horse’s ears pricked up, and the rhythm of the walk altered for a moment. He checked that the bag slung by his right leg was open, and let the horse walk on.

Mortimer Shay watched him come: watched the rhythm of the horse, watched the posture of the man, checked all around himself, focused on the road beyond the rider leading back to Leeds. Eventually he eased his horse out away from the tree and into the roadway. As it emerged from under the shadow of the branches, the animal shied at the sunlight, and the hooves stuttered on the ground. Shay found himself blinking in the sudden glare too, forced himself to keep his gaze on the approaching rider despite the orange pain in his eyes.

The two horses edged closer to each other, hoof-beat by hoof-beat on the uneven ground, the men watching each other with the same rhythm: the face, the body, and quickly around; the face again.

Shay said, ‘Have you travelled far, pilgrim?’

‘I have, and I’ve farther still to go.’

‘God and the King’s justice go with you.’

‘God save the King.’

They had stopped still, close enough for the horses to be sniffing at each other’s manes.

Shay scanned the face again, and the poised body. He saw the bag slung loose at the other man’s knee, and stiffened as he saw the pistol butt protruding from the opening.

He forced his eyes up to the man’s face. The envoys of the Committee were implacable. If Shay had been marked for death, no words would save him now.

The other had seen the stiffening of his body, saw the intensity in his eyes. Shay held his body firm; a sudden movement could provoke his death regardless.

The other man moved his hand slowly down towards his knee. Still he held Shay’s eyes. Slowly, he wiped his palm on his thigh, and the trace of a smile came to his lips. 

‘You must be the friend of Francis Padget.’

‘I am Shay.’

A nod from the other. ‘I have heard something of you.’ He held Shay’s eyes for a moment, and then his gaze dropped. Shay held up his left hand clenched, and the man examined the ring that glowed dull on the little finger.

‘You’ve come from Edinburgh?’

‘I have. Whither else did you write?’ The accent sounded strained, as if the man was uncomfortable with the conversation.

‘London, Paris and Amsterdam.’

A nod. ‘We have sent to each. You will receive no reply from any but us.’

Shay waited.

The rider said, ‘My message to you is simple enough, sir, and I hope it suffices.’

The message was simple indeed: the message was a single word; a place.

Shay repeated it once, and the other nodded, and pulled at the reins of his horse. ‘I’ll leave you to your road, sir. Leeds will not see me again.’ He stopped, and gazed respectfully at Shay. ‘I pray that God go with you on your journey.’

MERCURIUS FIDELIS

or

The hone
ſ
t truth written for every Engli
ſ
hman that cares to read it

From
M
ONDAY
, A
UGUST
24. t
o
M
ONDAY
, A
UGUST
31. 1648.

Another day, another crossroads outside Leeds, and another rider clumping towards a rendezvous.

Shay waiting by the junction again. The hooves of the approaching horse stamped slow enough to be counted.

Something seemed. . . the rider was a woman. Shay wondered what story she had for her journey south. Perhaps there was a servant in town, or back along the road.

She rode well: steady, flexible. Instinctively, Shay looked optimistically at the face. Not a fair woman, but a strong one – dark and sure.

The same exchange of greetings, the invocations of a captive King and a disputed God, and again Shay showed the gleam of the ring on his finger. The woman nodded, and Shay knew she was reviewing the protocols in her head. Now she looked up – still there was no relaxation in her face – and spoke.

Again, a messenger had come full two hundred miles to pass a single word: a name.

Some days later, a letter arrived at the Sign of the Boar in Leeds, addressed to Mr Francis Padget. It was put by, as letters were, for travellers and local residents. It was a full week before a large, older man appeared in the inn and, having taken a drink, asked whether there might be any correspondence for Padget. The letter was produced, the drink finished, and the man disappeared back into the town.