Treason's Daughter (32 page)

‘Mr Chadwick, are you offering me marriage?'

She knows as soon as she says it that she has made a terrible mistake. He flushes near purple, and struggles to speak. His first attempts end in throat-clearing and coughing, until at last he manages to say: ‘Not as such, Henrietta. You must understand my position. Perhaps a more informal, mutually beneficial arrangement?'

She slaps his face. Hard, sharp and irrevocable. His head snaps back, and he makes a curious ‘oh' sound. He stands in silence, looking at her.

‘And you must understand
my
position, Mr Chadwick.'

He takes a moment to compose himself, pulling his chest up like a fighting cock. ‘Forgive me, Henrietta. But I thought that living with whores was bad enough. Now it seems you brawl like one too.'

‘Leave. This instant.'

‘Wait,' he says, and turns round to rummage in the bag he
brought into the room with him. ‘I had another reason for finding you, although you deserve little enough consideration.' He pulls out a wooden box. ‘Here. A present from one who cares about your safety.'

She opens the box. Inside is a pair of beautifully rifled pistols. Intricately worked patterns whorl on the handles, and the barrels are long and gleamingly straight.

‘The best we do with bullets, and the latest in flintlocks,' Cheese says.

‘They're beautiful,' Hen says. Then she looks at the letter tucked in beside the pistols, white against the green damask lining the case. The handwriting strikes her like a punch, winding her.

‘Farewell then,' Cheese says, and bowls out of the room, ignoring her pleas for him to stop. ‘It's all in the letter!' he shouts as he clatters down the stairs.

Hattie comes into the room moments after he leaves; she has been waiting, it seems.

‘Oh honey,' she says as she enters, seeing the tears streaming down Hen's face. ‘What is it? Did Captain Huff upset you?'

‘Hattie. It's this,' she says, waving the letter. She is crying – great heaving tears that catch in her throat and make it hard to speak.

‘It's from Sam.
Sam!
He's alive, Hattie.
Alive!'

CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

November 1645

N
ED PUTS DOWN THE COPY OF SAM'S LETTER HEN ENCLOSED
with hers on the table in front of him. The window ahead looks out onto Wine Street, and the entrance to the guard house. The wooden horse is ready, and the Bristol mob and the soldiers are beginning to gather for the punishment. As good as a show for them. Still, the poltroon, David Curtis, deserves it. Fairfax promised the army two weeks' pay in lieu of plundering Bristol if they took the city. But Curtis, bored on his garrison duty one night, ignored the general and set off on a spree of pillaging.

We can only finish this thing if we curb the plundering and the looting, Ned tells himself. He must go out to administer the punishment. Time enough later to reflect on Sam's letter. Alive! Thank the Lord. Yet not redeemed, though. He was at Bristol. Strange that we did not see each other as Rupert's surrendering troops marched out, thinks Ned. Providence. God saved my bullets from hitting him.

Ned reads the last part again.

And so here we sit, idle and bored at Woodstock Castle, waiting to see if Parliament will grant us safe conduct to the Low Countries. The MPs have offered the Princes Rupert and Maurice safe conduct if they promise not to serve the king again, yet though his loyalty to them is wavering, theirs to him is strong and they cannot accept. Yet we know, even if the king does not, that the war is lost. The peace must now be thrashed out
.

I will follow Rupert where he leads. I am a soldier now, dearest Hen. I have no other calling. He is not half so black as he is painted, my prince. Indeed, his conduct has been beyond reproach. I send you all the love I can spare him. I had a horse, Hen, to love. She died
.

Your loving brother
,

Sam

All the news-sheets are abuzz with the falling-out between the king and his nephew. The king blamed Rupert for surrendering at Bristol.

No fan of Rupert's, Ned was softened by the prince's conduct. Bristol's outer walls were breached, the townsfolk terrified and Rupert's remaining men bracing themselves for death when the prince decided to trust in Fairfax's hard-won reputation for mercy and trustworthiness. Trust that slippery minnow, the king, to think his men's lives and those of the put-upon Bristolians worth throwing away for a cause already lost. They say that the king is in thrall to his adviser, Digby, who loathes the young prince and drops poison in his uncle's ear. What is it with the man Charles, wonders Ned, that perpetually drives him into the arms and counsel of men all the rest of the world consider fools or knaves?

Was Sam with Rupert in his mad stalk across the country to find the king and tell his version of the tale? Ned wonders. Probably, if he is with him now. A semi-rapprochement, they say, between king and nephew. The elder has proved himself half-faced though, again and again. Ned thinks of the documents seized at Naseby, which proved the king was negotiating to bring armies of papists from abroad. Wanted to ship them in from left and right, to squeeze poor Protestant England between the papist savages of the Irish bogs and the onion-eyed French.

Ned stands and straightens his jacket, donning his hat and pulling himself straighter. He thanks his God that he has only to fight the last pathetic half-battles of this war, and not negotiate a peace with the man Charles, who lies like a cheap whore and wriggles like a maggot.

He steps outside into the icy air. The drums call for the punishment, and the miscreant is led forward. He looks young and vacant, his mouth slack, his limbs long and awkward. The sawhorse is ready, mounted on a makeshift pedestal. It looks like a hobbyhorse for children, except for the sharpened spines that run wickedly across its wooden back. Curtis is led forward and pulled onto the horse. His mates must have smuggled him some liquor, Ned surmises, for his head hangs groggily and there is little sign of the fear that should be consuming him. Once mounted, though, the pain reaches his fuddled brain.

Ned reads the articles of war which cover theft in the solemn, sonorous voice he saves for Sundays, his voice rising as the whimpering from the man begins to swell. At a nod from Ned, Sergeant Brakes comes forward with two corporals and ties heavy muskets to each of Curtis' ankles. He pulls and tugs at
the manacles tying his hands behind his back. Writhing makes the horse more painful; but staying still and bearing the pain is impossible. He wriggles between the agony of inaction and the torture of movement. The poor sap-pate, thinks Ned. The men behind him begin to mutter. He's had enough, they reckon. His testicles chafed to ribbons, he'll be shitting blood for a week.

Ned ignores their murmurings, though the man's screaming is whirling though him.
Thou shalt not steal. Thou shalt not steal. Thou shalt not steal
. Oh Lord, keep me strong. Lord, help me keep to your path. Then, suddenly, a new thought, strong and unexpected.

I want a child. A child.

Hattie swirls a ring on a string over Anne's distended belly.

‘A girl,' she pronounces. ‘Poor moppet.'

Anne pulls her clothes back on, shivering in the November chill. She pulls a blanket up over her belly, tucking its edges in and underneath her, smoothing it down on top.

‘Cold, today,' she says.

‘Yes, child. But we must save all the coal we can. To keep the moppet toasty when she appears. Keep us all warm at the gossiping.'

From the corner by the window, Lucy says: ‘How soon?'

‘Just a few weeks,' Hattie says, and Anne grimaces. Lucy bends her head back to her sewing.

Hen comes in and dives under the blanket next to Anne, putting her freezing hands onto her cousin's belly.

‘Ow. I can feel that through my clothes, you harpy.'

‘Well, if you will lie here under a blanket while I work… Hey, I can feel it move.'

The baby kicks and twists under Hen's hands. A life inside a life; miracle upon miracle.

Anne grimaces. ‘I can feel it too.'

‘Not it. Her,' says Hattie. ‘Look at the way she's carrying.'

‘You just want it to be a girl, Hat,' says Hen.

‘Of course I do, not being a beef-witted simpleton. Who'd not want a lovely girl to raise?'

Hen begins to feel warmth returning, her fingers melting back into life. ‘Hat, did you see Mother Wilkes today?'

‘No. I must take her something. She's starving herself to death, poor gudgeon. All three sons lost to the war now the youngest has stopped a pike. She's given up, I think. I did see Goody Simmonds.'

‘The midwife?' asks Anne.

‘Yes.' Hattie pauses, twirling a strand of hair round her finger. Hen has learned to recognize the gesture: it denotes awkwardness and dislocation. The girls look at her expectantly.

At last, she says: ‘We spoke in hypotheticals. She told me that the minister is laying pressure on her about attending to by-blows. That her licence is in his hands, and she needs his good will. That she would find herself forced to question an unwed mother most ferociously during the lying-in.'

‘And thanks to Lucy,' says Anne venomously, ‘I may find myself in such a position. My word and good name doubted.'

‘With cause,
Mrs Wells
,' counters Lucy.

‘Aye, well,' Hattie bustles onwards. ‘Goody Barker, being an old friend of mine, and me a gossip with her at many a birth in
the parish, says that if a young lady were to want to avoid such an interrogation during her labouring, there are places to go. She named a house in Stepney where questions are not asked.'

‘And what would happen to me, were I to be officially unmasked?'

‘At best, a whipping. The father found and made to pay.'

Anne snorts. ‘He's dead, most like. Well, Lucy, thank you. Should we tell Ned, I wonder, about the brew you drink each morning? Does he know you purge his seed?'

‘I do no such thing.' Lucy stands and walks to the window, fanning herself with one hand, trailing her embroidery behind her in the other.

Hen watches her. She's unfathomable. If Ned were here, she would cry at the accusations levelled at her. She is hard as a nut, yet pretends to be soft. Soppy, that's the word Hen's father would have used. Whereas Anne, God love her, is all brittle shell when people are watching.

‘You could deliver the baby, Hattie,' says Hen. ‘Anne should be here, with people who love her.'

‘If it's a simple birth, yes. Along with some of the more experienced gossips. The goodwife Claire Barker, for one. And Mary Overton. Have you met her, Anne? Lives the other side of the back, in the house with the green door. She's had a few of her own and, more to the point, she's not the least afraid of the minister's wife. Her and her husband are friends of freeborn John Lilburn. She's gaining a name in the agitating line – freedom of conscience and liberty of worship. You know.'

‘Well then,' says Anne. ‘As long as she don't preach at me while I'm down, this Mary Overton sounds perfect. So there it
is – Hattie shall midwife me.'

Hattie pushes her hair back from her face and paces nervously. ‘You understand the risk, Anne, love? I can deliver a sow. But a girl? If aught goes wrong, we may need to call in the midwife, nonetheless. And your lying-in with the new moppet may not be a comfortable one.'

Outside the window they hear shouting. Hattie crosses the room to look.

‘Old Joe,' she says, and sure enough Hen can hear the thump of his wooden leg on the cobbles.

His voice drifts up through the ice-flecked air. ‘Oh and ye will be damned. Oh and ye will be damned.

‘And I saw three unclean spirits like frogs come out of the mouth of the dragon, out of the mouth of the beast, and out of the mouth of the false prophet
. And they were called Charles and Rupert and Laud.

‘Oh and you will be damned. You will be damned.
And I heard a great voice out of the temple saying to the seven angels, Go your ways, and pour out the vials of the wrath of God upon the earth.'

Anne rolls back her eyes.

‘Be kind,' says Hen. ‘His wits have been addled since the battle at Newark.'

‘London, you are Nineveh. Nineveh. Nineveh.
Woe to the bloody city! It is all full of lies and robbery. Because of the multitude of the whoredoms of the well-favoured harlot, the mistress of witchcrafts, that selleth nations through her whoredoms, and families through her witchcrafts. Behold, I am against thee, saith the Lord of hosts; and I will discover thy skirts upon thy face, and I will shew the nations thy nakedness, and the kingdoms thy shame. And I will cast abominable filth upon thee, and make thee vile, and will set thee as a gazing-stock.'

Anne lumbers to her feet and crosses to the window, wrenching it open to let in the icy wind and the veteran's lament.

‘I will cast abominable filth on thee, Joe, if you don't shut up. I've a full pot here, you clay-brained codpiece.'

‘I see you, whore. I see you, wag-tailed punk. Who put that by-blow in your belly, whore?
And he saith unto me, the ten horns which thou sawest upon the beast, these shall hate the whore, and shall make her desolate and naked, and shall eat her flesh and shall burn her with fire
.'

Hen is smiling at the exchange, until she sees Anne's face in the pause before she turns back into the room. She puts on a smile then, but Hen saw the fear, saw the uncertainty in the half-second she thought herself unobserved.

Hattie, ever alive to a room's undercurrents, says to Hen: ‘Any word of your brothers?'

‘Of Ned, yes. He is still busy at Bristol. Of Sam, no. What of your brother, Anne?'

‘He still will not reply to my letters. Sends them back unopened from that sty he guards in the back of the west somewhere. Your husband, Hattie?'

‘Not a word. But then he's a butcher, not a scholar. The end is coming though, soon enough, and then we'll see if he turns up,' says Hattie.

They nod and look at each other. Why aren't we happier that the war is ending? wonders Hen. Why this bottomless trepidation?