by Tim Vicary
“Mother, there are Rachel and Sarah still here. I have cooked and cleaned and cared for Oliver all morning, as I did all day yesterday and all the days before that since ... and in truth there is no need for me to be here this afternoon. There is only Oliver, and I shall be back later ...”
“You have time enough to spend with Ruth Spragg! Is that where you are going?”
It was true that Ann had spent several afternoons with Ruth in the last few months. It was hardly a relaxation - the poor woman was driven half distracted trying to cope with four small children and the thought of her husband, cramped and chained below decks on the stormy seas. There were frequent tears and trouble in that house too. But at least none of it pointed at Ann.
“Ruth has troubles - you know that, mother. It is good for her to talk.”
“Do you not think I have troubles and need to talk? But my own daughter does not want to listen!”
“Mother, I do listen to you. But it is always the same thing - that I should marry Tom, which I cannot do. I do not want to hear it any more!”
“Ann, your father and I brought you up in the bosom of the congregation as a daughter who should honour and respect her parents, and bring honour and respect to them. One who should be married by now, not one who ... “
“Mother, I do love and honour you, just as I will always love and honour my father, until the day I die. He had no harsh words for me, whatever I had done! But now I just need to be alone for a while, to think and ... to pray, perhaps.”
“It is not what your father would have wanted.”
“My father!” Ann felt the blood drain from her face, and for a moment her knees shook. She caught hold of the doorpost to steady her. She saw little Oliver’s big eyes watching her. It was not just the effect of her mother’s words - her body was betraying her. “Oh mother, you cannot ... how can anyone say what ... “
“Would your father have wanted you to be pointed at in the village as a disgrace to us all? Someone who begged for his life with the name of a libertine on her lips? Someone who could have a house and husband of her own instead of ...”
“Mother, I cannot listen to you. I ...”
“Ann, if you will not listen to me, think of what your brother Simon would say. He is the head of the family now. He at least is a godly boy, and ... “
Ann shook her head furiously, and put her cloak on. It had been Simon who had found that she had been taking food to Nicolas Thompson in his hiding place in the woods, Simon who had suggested that it would be better if Israel Fuller did it. Israel had agreed, saying, so she had heard, that such matters were better undertaken by men of God than ‘self-confessed whores’.
“Mother, Simon is not here, and he is only a boy like Tom, who has seen and knows nothing beyond what he hears from cowards and turncoats like Israel Fuller! Would you have me marry into that clan of prating hypocrites? Cowards who betrayed father and our cause? It is they who should be pointed at, not me!”
Mary Carter stared at her eldest daughter hopelessly, without understanding. For a moment it seemed that there was a ghost standing there in front of her, her husband come home to tell her he had chosen to die, for reasons which made no sense, no sense at all.
“Ann, what is this cause to me? Was it not that which killed your father, and broke our family? At least Tom and Israel Fuller are alive! They did not die in their stubbornness! Tom can give you a new life, a new start ...”
“Mother, I cannot listen to you. I am going out!”
Ann turned, went out of the door, and up the street. She felt weak, still shaking with the argument, and had to lean for a moment against a wall on the corner. It was not the first time she had felt like this; such scenes were draining her, like a wound that would not stop bleeding. And she needed all her strength, all her energy now.
As she paused, she heard a small voice behind her.
“Ann! Ann! Come back! Let me come!” The tiny figure of her two-year-old brother was plodding determinedly up the street after her, tears running down his face.
“No! Oliver, go home!” She could not bear any more of this, not now. Fiercely, she turned and went on up the steet, ignoring the small cries behind her.
But they did not go away. Several women turned and looked at her, and at the edge of the village she had to turn and stop, out of sheer pity and embarrassment. She sat down on the parapet of the bridge, and waited for him to plod up to her. He was calling out as he came.
“Ann! I come. I want to come too. Don’t like mother! Want to walk with you, see father.”
She picked up the grubby, tear-streaked little boy and wiped his face with the edge of her apron.
“Oliver, I’m not going to see father. No-one can see father now. Father’s dead - he’s with Jesus and the saints.”
“He’s not! Bad men killed him, not saints. I want him come back, like Jesus did! I want to go with you, see father!”
“Nollie, my love, I’m not going to see father, truly. I’m going to be alone, that’s all. But I’ll tell you a secret, if you’re very, very good. If you go to my room, very quietly, and look in the drawer by the bed, you’ll find a little wooden cross that father gave me when I was young. If you get on your knees, close your eyes to pray and hold it very, very tight, sometimes you can see father talking to you, in his old, kind voice, like he used to have when he came home from his travels. Only you have to go alone, Oliver, and pray very hard. Do you think you can do that?”
“I don’t know. Will you come with me?” He had stopped crying, and looked up at her trustingly.
“No, Nollie. You have to go alone.” She hated herself, but she had to get away. And he would come to no harm from it, surely.
“Will he talk to me?”
“Perhaps. That’s what I do, when I want to talk to father. But don’t tell mother.”
“All right.” He got down from her knee and walked back into the village. At the corner of the street he turned and waved happily. She thought how marvellous it was that two-year-olds could change so suddenly from utter grief to contentment, or hope. If only I could do that, she thought. But then, that is what I have come away for, partly. Even if nothing comes of the meeting, I have this time alone now, free for myself. I must use it to be happy, to be calm again.
She walked away, alone through the lanes, towards Colyton Hill. This meeting was the other reason for going out, the one her mother did not know about. She had seen Robert only once since her father’s death, on the road to Shute, and had told him shortly what had happened. He had not known about it, because he had been taking a party of prisoners east to Weymouth at the time. She had been too shocked to speak at length, or know what she felt towards him, and had not thought she would see him again. But two days ago, in the market-place, the wife of a groom of the Pole’s had pressed a note into her hand in the market-place, and the memory of his love had returned to her like a false spring in midwinter, lighting up the bleakness of the life that oppressed her. So today she was coming to the hilltop as the message had said, though she hardly thought he would want her now.
She walked steadily away from the village, a stubborn, windblown figure in the muddy lanes, and came out at last onto Colyton Hill, where she had met Robert in those warm days of early summer.
It was October now, and a north-west wind was blowing the leaves from the trees. Some of them sailed over Ann’s head as she waited, fluttering down on the field in front of her as she gazed south-east across the estuary to the sea, and she thought how like the brown beech leaves were to the little sails she could see beating their way steadily westwards towards Beer. She thought how she loved the view from here, even without its memories; the wide sweep of the valley below her to the estuary, and the little village and church of Axmouth nestling below the long ridge of hills beyond. She watched the cloud shadows chase each other, turning the hills from summer green to gloomy olive, and the seas from their deep blues and greens to a stormy winter grey, flecked with fleeting splashes of whit
e spray where the waves were cuffed by the wind.
It was too cold now to sit for long on the ground, as they had done earlier that summer. For a moment she paced up and down on the grass, and then, when no-one came, sat hunched on the roots of a beech tree, leaning her back against the smooth trunk and listening to the sough of the wind in the branches overhead. She wondered if Robert would come, and if he did, what he would say.
The wind strengthened, and a shower rattled down on the remaining leaves out of a darkened sky. She shivered, and wrapped her brown cloak closer round her, glad that she had thought to bring it. Perhaps he would not come at all. But she would not go until it began to get dark; they could not think any worse of her at home than they did already.
A red squirrel scurried down the trunk of a tree a few feet away, and began to scrabble amongst the roots, stopping every few seconds to look around, its body and tail frozen in perfect mid-motion. It saw her and stared for a long minute, then decided she was harmless and continued its digging. The wind eased as the squall passed; after a while Ann saw it strike at the fishing boats out at sea, and pitied the sailors as the brown sails dipped and bobbed almost out of sight between the waves.
The squirrel cocked its ears and suddenly leapt up the tree, spiralling around the trunk as it climbed, and Ann heard the slap of hooves on the path in the wood. Then Robert rode onto the hillside.
At first he did not see her, and she saw the frown on his long freckled face as he looked around him, gently patting the great bay hunter. He wore his blue uniform coat, with the short military wig, wide sword-strap and thigh-length riding boots; yet there were no pistols or armour, nothing else about him like a soldier. He sighed, and had just spurred his mount on to look elsewhere when he saw her. The great horse snorted and arched its proud neck as he reined it in.
“Ann! So you have come! I didn’t see you!” He smiled, and she realised how much like a treestump she must seem, hunched among the roots in her brown cloak. Yet she felt her hands trembling under it; she was afraid to get up and face him.
He swung out of the saddle and left the horse free to graze, its reins over its head. He strode towards her, his hands held out, the smile mingling with the frown on his face, as always.
“Are you cold? You look like a doormouse, or a hedgepig, sitting there!”
She reached out timidly to one of the hands he offered, and let him pull her to her feet. She ventured a smile.
“I’m not that prickly, am I?”
“No. Just a trifle windblown, about the hair.” He put up a hand to smooth some of her tangled locks, and she almost wept at the touch, so carefree and loving, like the time he had combed her hair in the inn. No-one touched her hair like that now.
“So. That’s better. You got my message, then?”
“So it seems.”
“I was afraid you would not come. You seemed ... so hurt, when we met before, and I was little help. I thought perhaps you might blame me.”
“Why should I blame you? You did what you could. It was my father’s choice.”
“A strange choice.”
“Yes.” He frowned, wanting to know more but not pressing her, and she said nothing. There were still places she could not go, reminders of the execution, around the town: she did not want to speak of it.
“Why did you want to see me, Robert?” Her face was quite open as she waited for his answer, the green eyes defenceless, a trifle anxious, in the frame of auburn hair.
“Why? That’s a strange question! You should know why.”
“But things have changed ... “
“I have not changed.”
“It’s been a month since I saw you.”
“Oh ho! So she is jealous, now!” He laughed - a hollow laugh that was meant to lift the conversation onto the plane of sophistication and gallant flirtation. But it fell flat. “You are not married, are you?”
It was her turn to smile at the sudden transition. “No, Rob, I’m not married.” It was a sad smile, but a smile for all that.
“I thank the Lord for that! But in truth, Ann, I’ve been in London with the regiment. I couldn’t see you sooner. I have to go back in two days.”
“And you want me to go with you?”
“Well, yes.” Despite what she had to tell him, she was enjoying herself; she had always enjoyed surprising him, upsetting his poise. With him a pose was not serious, as it was with her own people.
“As your mistress, then, I take it?”
He shook his head, bewildered with hope and surprise.
“Well, yes, Ann, of course. You know I couldn’t marry you, however I feel. That would be, well ... “
“Impossible, because of your father, and your wealth.” Her smile was broader now. It could not last.
“Yes. But I told you, Ann, it wouldn’t be dishonourable, as folk might think it here. I would care for you, and get you a house, and a maid ... “
“Then I’ll come.”
“And you could have singing lessons, and ... you’ll come?”
If it had not been so serious she would have laughed aloud, at the thought of entrusting herself to a man with such a foolish- looking face. The mouth under the long, solemn nose hung quite open, the hazel eyes were wide and innocent as a child’s. But she had to clasp her hands to stop them shaking.
“I’ll come, Rob, if it’s as you said before, exactly. And if you still love me when ... “
“You’ll come! Annie, my love, you’ll never regret it, I promise! It will be as I said!”
She let him embrace her, but dared not respond. He wanted to kiss her but she put her fingers on his lips.
“Rob, let me finish. Please!”
“What is it? You have finished!”
“I am ... with child now.”
“With child?” The exultant smile faded; the frown returned.
Her throat felt dry, and her hands were shaking again. But it must be said.
“And ... it may not be your child, Robert. I hope and pray it is, and it may well be, but it may be Tom’s. You remember ... “
“You lay with him to give him courage.”
“Yes. Though he got none from it.”
Robert’s frown deepened, and Ann looked down, letting her hair fall forward over her face. She had said what she had to say. She could not bear to see him refuse.
“I’ll come with you, Rob, as I said. But will you take me as I am?”
A long gust sighed through the beechwoods behind her, and a crow croaked loudly as it was blown away downwind. His hand moved her hair away from her face.
“Yes, my love. I will.”
About the Author
Tim Vicary is the author of over 25 books, including legal thrillers, historical novels and graded readers for foreign learners of English. He lives in the English countryside near the historic city of York, in the north east of England. You can find out more about Tim on his blog, where he writes about books, writing, living with animals, and anything else that sparks his interest. You can also follow him on Twitter, get in touch via Facebook, or send him an email on [email protected]
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You might like to read another of Tim Vicary’s historical novels. To see them online, just click on one of the links below.
Nobody’s Slave
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Tim Vicary has also written a series of Legal Thrillers, about a tough barrister called Sarah Newby. The first three books in the series are:
A Game of Proof
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A Fatal Verdict
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Bold Counsel
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