Traitor's Field (31 page)

He was leaning forward now, the pose of magisterial narration forgotten. ‘Discipline’s the thing, you see?’ Shay nodded. Actually, he did see: it couldn’t have been easy to saunter through Doncaster knowing that an alarm would be raised imminently, that a small force could be surrounded and cut off with ease. ‘But my lot, they’re trained and practised. I sent them off around the town, this way and that, so they could deal with anyone who got excited. Planning, you see? That’s the thing.’

Shay found an old warrior’s smile from somewhere. ‘Why, that’s grand, Blackburn. You’d have to have a special troop for that sort of affair.’ Blackburn nodded. ‘And Captain Paulden and the Lieutenant, they came to you, did they?’

‘Yes, sir, they did.’ He nodded busily.

‘And the planning? Who’d worked out all this careful manoeuvre?’

‘Well, we each—’

‘Paulden.’ Morrice, quiet and firm.

Blackburn had the faint sense he was losing control of his story, and nodded again to confirm what his commander said, and repeated ‘Paulden’ authoritatively. ‘Captain Paulden.’

‘And they told you the plan?’

Blackburn hesitated. ‘Yes – but no, not the details. No need for details. I had to provide the men. “Find a dozen or two good men” – that was it. Anyway, it was just a raid, a grand raid.’

The cockerel crow seemed to squawk more loudly into their dusty isolation, and from nearer by a cow moaned. They glanced at each other uneasily.

‘Paulden,’ Shay said deliberately. ‘Do I know the name?’ It was addressed to Morrice.

‘The family have been true for the Crown all through. No great name or fortune, but they’ve given what they— Wait, I should be clearer. There were three brothers.’ Shay’s irritation darkened on his face, and Morrice hurried, words coming rough from the raw throat. ‘One died fighting at Wigan during the Duke of Hamilton’s campaign last year. Two were with us in Pontefract. William’s was the idea to go for Rainsborough; William’s was the plan. He died shortly after the raid – fever. The third brother, Thomas, rode with them. As the lad says, he was usually pretty thick with his brother.’

‘And Teach?’

‘Oh, he was involved right enough. Any conversation needed a bit of sense to it, a bit of experience, you’d find him there; and any deed needed a bit of spirit, he’d be there as well.’

The dull calls of the cattle sounded nearer again.

‘Well then, youngster.’ Shay to Blackburn. ‘What of the death of Rainsborough?’

‘Oh, I don’t know who actually killed him. I doubt anyone does. It was confusion, you see?’

‘Tell me.’

Blackburn was forward again, eager. ‘We’d sent smaller parties of men elsewhere around the town. Captain William stayed out patrolling in the streets.’

‘He didn’t go for Rainsborough himself?’

‘Not at first. He said he needed to be flexible. To command the situation where needed. I remember him saying to his brother, and to Mr Teach, to listen out careful for the signal.’

‘So who actually went for Rainsborough?’

‘Captain Thomas Paulden, Lieutenant Austwick and Mr Teach. And me, too. We rode to the inn, where Rainsborough was, all quiet and innocent-like through the centre of town, and nobody knew what we were after. Then Captain Thomas rode on to the north bridge to prepare our escape there.’

‘So there were only three of you for the deed itself?’

‘Had to be.’ Blackburn temporarily rediscovered some of his superiority. ‘Had to be inconspicuous. And now we’ve to get into the inn, see? The Lieutenant, he knocks and says, all confident, “We have urgent letters for the Colonel, from General Cromwell.” We’d talked about this earlier, and it worked just to plan. The sentry, he was half-asleep, and he doesn’t give much attention to us. Lets us into the yard, and then waits in the gateway. He’s not looking at us any more. He doesn’t know he’s already admitted the biggest threat he’ll ever face!’

‘What then?’

Blackburn’s eyes were alive, intent. ‘Rainsborough’s Lieutenant meets us, and he gets the same story, and swallows it, and he leads Lieutenant Austwick and Mr Teach up to Rainsborough’s room. I stay in the yard – with the horses – someone needs to keep watch, see? Minute or two later—’

‘Who was giving the orders?’

‘Orders? No one, in truth. Mr Teach, perhaps; we’d got used to him as a man for a tight game. Few minutes later they’re down again, Rainsborough and his Lieutenant being pushed ahead. Mr Teach says to me, “Get him in!”, him meaning the sentry, and I immediately grab the sentry in and put him down and the others go into the street, and I put the horses out after them, and everyone’s sort of milling around a moment, and then I see that the sentry is up and looking to interfere and I only had time just to put him down again, nothing fancy, knock him on the nose, always slows them down and makes them think a bit.’ There was part of the young Blackburn that Shay was warming to considerably. ‘But somehow it’s started off in the street now, behind me, and I’m watching the sentry and trying to get out and still wanting to make sure he’s staying down and then it’s shouting and swords and we’re all in God’s hands. In the muddle Rainsborough and his Lieutenant go down.’

‘Who actually killed them?’

‘Couldn’t say, sir. The others between them. Captain William Paulden, he’d turned up now. Mr Teach, Lieutenant Austwick – but I couldn’t say which. Everyone was armed and angry, and maybe you know what it’s like.’

Shay nodded slightly. He knew what it was like. He was lost in the scene for a moment. It had indeed been a bold and tight game. He watched Blackburn subsiding uneasily, tongue licking at lips still, the energy of the exploit echoed in the describing, and saw decades of young faces like him, uncowed by experience and the sentimental over-attachment of the old to life.

And he couldn’t overcome a sense of unreality about the scene he’d heard described.

April 16. 1649 – Mary, d. of Sir Anthony and the late Isabelle Astbury, m. Sir Henry Lowell, Baronet, of Leicester.

Astbury House: the study: Sir Anthony Astbury seated at his table, straight-backed, eyes switching constantly from the words appearing tiny under his hand in the flyleaf of the family Bible, and the couple in front of him.

Sir Henry Lowell, Baronet, of Leicester returned his father-in-law’s glances with indulgent respect. A decent man, Astbury: a generous dowry, with the prospect of the house eventually, and a handsome daughter, who would be a loved and loving wife and a fine mother. 

Sir Henry Lowell had come through the 1640s well enough. Enough bravery at the start; enough prudence at the end. He had the wounds, heroically won, to impress a daughter; and the contacts, carefully cultivated, to impress a father. In recent years Lowell had kept his focus firmly in Leicestershire, and done solid and generous work with the militia, and the new men in the county knew him for a dependable man.

Lady Mary Lowell was silent, a little sentimental at this last formality of her father’s, a little anxious at what Henry might be thinking, and newly alive and purposeful and happy.

Rachel sat in the corner, forgotten and futile and a little jealous.

Mortimer Shay, Colonel Morrice and Cornet Blackburn, now shadows in the dusk at the edge of a spinney, a grey-green world. The animals of evening were beginning to emerge, with odd calls and rustles among the leaves.

‘This is the Preston road. Travel wisely and in the shadows, but as fast as you may, until you reach the inn. There a wash and a shave, and be gone before dawn. After that you may go more carefree; try to act so. You should have mounts by noon tomorrow. You may try for a boat in Liverpool or Lancaster, depending which road the wind blows you.’ Shay looked into the two gloomed faces. ‘You have the words I gave you safe in memory? The locations?’

A residual awe kept Blackburn silent. Morrice nodded. ‘We do.’ He reached out his hand. ‘We owe you all thanks, sir.’

Shay grunted, and shook hands with both. ‘These days His Majesty can give you little enough of glory or gold for your loyalty. God speed.’

He turned and vanished into the greyness.

The regiment in camp at Banbury, day retreating pale from the sky. As evening became colder and slower, the men huddled closer together, kicking at the ground with practised glances as they thought of sleep, warming themselves with convivial chatter. Life, in this evening, a dry coat and good men around you, seemed gently rather grand. Men sat in clumps, shoulders pressed together, the aloof habits of individuality long forgotten. Cards and knucklebones were produced and peered at with quiet concentration and laughter. Pipes emerged long and frail from inside pockets. Tales were told, chronologies repeated; history can keep you warm.

Hewson’s regiment refused to go to fight in Ireland – and didn’t that show the Generals at last? – one man told me a Major got punched in the face – musket it was, right up his nose – no more fighting until our Leveller demands get met – pay first – of course, pay first – except they can’t pay first, pay ever, because they’re bankrupt in the wars. (And didn’t it feel strangely, wildly good that the real confrontation had begun?) Kicked them all out, though, no pay – so what? – no pay anyway. Whalley’s regiment wouldn’t turn out for their officers – seized their colours, they did – dug in – like a siege, they said – and tell us about Scrope’s regiment. I heard the Colonel was in tears when they wouldn’t obey. Not so smug now, are they?

And here we are. All the regiments of true believing men starting to gather, and then we’ll see what the Generals say. The Army is now about men like us: we’ve reclaimed it from the hands and ideas of the politicians. Fellowship has become our cause, and the Army is fellowship.

The evening heavier. Eventually sleep.

Then the nightmare: the earth shuddering and the heads screaming and the drowsy clusters of men dragging themselves awake and somehow up, and staggering and clutching for shoulders and weapons and clarity and the nightmare is on them. The nightmare is Cromwell, vast leather-and-metal men on rampaging horses, exploding dark out of the night, monstrous grey-brown shadows with banshee swords and a madness of noise. The stupid stumbling self-protecting surrendering men are knocked spinning aside like clods of mud under the hooves. It’s not even a fight: a rampage, a rout, a rounding-up of cattle.