The Popish Midwife: A tale of high treason, prejudice and betrayal

by Annelisa Christensen

  ‘We must go, Lizzie. We will talk as we ride.’ He sniffed, reminding me of my dreadful condition.

  ‘Have I time to change?’ I asked.

  ‘Nay, we must bear the smell of you until the coast,’ he added.

  We alighted the coach for the second time that evening. The door on my side, where it had been forced open, did not properly close, but I was only glad to be in it and on the way from there. Who knew when – if – it might be safe to return, but in this moment, my attachment to London and England was a frayed tether and I wished to cut it loose. I closed the drape over the window and allowed my youngest two into my arms once we started to move. Soon, my greatest wish was to have Pierre hold me. Now I was safe, I could not stop shaking.

  ‘Come hither, Lizzie,’ Pierre read me as a book. I did as he said. I slid out from behind the children and moved into his arms. He held me tight as we rattled and bounced over rough road and, as a family, we prayed to safely reach the rendezvous.

  32

  10th day of December, 1689 (dawn)

  Seawater intermittently and gently lapped against the side of the rowing boat between the steady clunk… clunk… clunk of oars in the wishbone oarlocks. The right hand man of Mr Cadman, landlord of the Mermaid Inn, rowed us to our rendezvous. The blades sliced the water in near silence, but the thick fog embraced us together with the oarsman’s grunts and groans as he heaved mightily against the sea. His back to me, his face hidden from me, I imagined that huge age-whipped grey beard of his to be blown from his cavernous, large-lipped mouth with each slow growl.

  Each time the man drew back the oars, a rain of cold salt water splashed over me and young Peter. I pressed my lips together and half-closed my eyes against it, but I was happy to smell it. The fresh wide ocean was the smell of freedom and safety, the largest moat a country might have to protect it, a barrier both ways. The more water between us and the land of England, the better I would like it.

  Twisting behind me to look in front of the boat, I could see no more than a few feet from the boat into the darkness, for we used no lantern, and I puzzled by what uncommon gift the oarsman knew our whereabouts and in which direction we moved, if we moved at all, for it seemed we did not. I turned back to face the flat trail of bubbles we left behind us, the only sign to show from whence we came and the progress we were making.

  Isabelle and Margaret, tears long spent, leaned into Pierre’s arms at the back of the boat and faced the oarsman. He held them close; relief and satisfaction leaving no place on his face for fear. He had travelled back to France many times on his travels as a merchant, but this was perhaps the last time; this time Lady Fortune had invited him home to die.

  Young Peter sat still and quiet beside me, made a man this night by his bravery in the face of the danger we had endured. He stared past his father and sisters toward the land we were leaving behind. He may never see it again, but then he had seen enough this night that he may never wish to.

  None of us would ever again in our lives wish to witness the scenes we saw as we left London: men and women that did not fare so well as us were left strung up from signs, others hanging from windows, cut open by their very neighbours; torch-carrying mobs searching the streets for more to torture; children crying in those torch lit streets, newly orphaned, that we could not aid for fear of our being caught further in the terrible events. We must be grateful we did escape such horrid demise, yet we would never forget to mourn those that did not have our fortune.

  I wriggled my toes in ice-cold water that had filled through the fresh-made holes in my boots when we waded out to the waiting boat and I shivered. Digging in my feet as I was dragged through the street was perhaps not the cleverest thing I had done. My wet dress clung as a limpet to my boots and legs and I plucked at it, fidgeting with my so recently torn lace cuffs. I would not sigh my relief until we had left these shores far behind. Boats might yet lie in wait for us just beyond our sight, and we would never know it until they were upon us. ‘Twas certain they would search for us. Our only hope was this God-given fog sent to hide us.

  The oarsman stopped rowing and stowed the oars under the boat’s seat. Suddenly, we were jolted backward then forward as the bow crunched hard against something solid. First I feared we had hit rock, but the oarsman, obviously expecting the collision, stood and took a coil of sopping rope from the puddle at our feet. Once we had righted ourselves, I turned to see what we crashed into and was surprised to find ourselves bumping against the side of a massive ship, silently moored beside us.

  The oarsman yelled something, I did not know in what tongue, then used both arms to swing the rope upwards, to whom I knew not, while his yell still echoed in the small fogless cavern surrounding us. An answering, equally unintelligible shout from above must have told our man the rope had been caught. At least, that’s what I guessed, for it did not fall back down beside us, and the oarsman secured our tiny open boat next to the giant. Then a second rope fell loosely alongside the first.

  ‘Step your feet down firmly, M’Lady,’ said the oarsman, who I was no more familiar with than when we had climbed over the side of his boat on the beach. I expected him to say more, but that was all he said. He gestured towards the slats of wood nailed one above the other onto the side of the boat as a ladder, then reached his hand toward me that I might take it.

  I’m sure I could not be faulted for my obedience, so eager was I to be away from this bobbing twig and onto the sturdy trunk. I dithered not an instant, but came so fast to my feet, my legs being aquiver from the ride, I fell before even I could take his offered hand. The boat rocked precariously.

  ‘Lizzie!’

  ‘Mama!’

  I would not have them think the less of me. I could do this. I slapped my hands on the seat our oarsman had so recently quit until I stilled first myself and then the boat. Some warmth lingered where the oarsman had sat and somehow that gave me strength where his hand had not. When I was certain I had the boat stilled once more, I raised myself straight and tall, with my head upraised. I could do this.

  The oarsman struggled to hold the boat still against the ship as it was pulled hither and thither by the swells and my actions.

  Pierre’s expensive shoes were made for solid land and did not grip the slippery wood well. He wobbled perilously close to the edge as he stood yet, ever the gentleman, he stepped to the middle of the boat with more grace than I credit him and, as well, offered his hand to me. I accepted his over the oarsman’s, for though my husband was old and frail, and the oarsman steady, I rather trusted Pierre with my life. Though circumstance dictate I must, I had rather not trust a stranger.

  I stepped over the middle seat to where the boat was pinched with the ship and looked up. Without the ladder, the ship’s side was a smooth, shiny cliff. With the ladder, I still did not know how I could climb it in my long dress, for the fabric would surely catch on my feet. The oarsman grunted with impatience and, modesty to the wind, I hitched up the skirt and apron and tucked the hems beneath the string around my waist holding up the undergarments I was happy now to have had the foresight to wear when it was my wont not to do so.

  With my free hand, I grabbed the rope and tugged it hard to make sure it was firm. It seemed to be.

  ‘I will stand beneath you should you should fall, Lizzie.’ Pierre kissed my hand then released it. ‘Be brave.’

  I took a shoulder high slat, pulled myself onto the side of the ship and climbed. The rungs were wet and slippery, and sometimes there were slimy things I did not want to grasp, but grasp them I did. I ignored the pains spearing every limb, the trophies of our recent dangerous encounter in the city. I had never climbed a ladder in my life, let alone one so high. So I stepped upward with the greatest care and made sure of each hand and foothold before taking the next. My heart ran faster than a deer, and beat louder than its hooves. At one point my foot slipped and I was forced to hold tight whilst I steadied myself.
Dimmed by fog, far below, my husband’s upturned face still conveyed his concern. I could barely see those of my still seated children, not much further, but on the edge of the fog.

  ‘Keep going, dear flittermouse. We follow you.’

  I could do this. I must. I must do this.

  What if I fell? I saw myself falling. My whole body stiffened and I could not bring myself to reach for the next rung. I was like ice clinging to the ladder.

  ‘Reach out and grab the next slat, Lizzie.’ Pierre so well knew me, he knew I had lost the courage I had held onto for so long.

  ‘I only rest, my dear,’ I lied. ‘I ask only for one or two breaths.’

  Easy to say. Not as simple to do. I concentrated on releasing my left hand and raising it to the next piece of wood. My slow and inflexible fingers clasped the cold, slippery surface, soft rotting wood filling my nails, and I looked up rather than down, searching for the top. The fog thinned for a moment and I now saw the rail was closer than I thought. From the bottom I had only seen as far as I was now, but here I was in a position to see both up and down equally well, and judged myself half way. I could either go up or down. If I returned to the bottom, I would still have the ship to climb, and that made no sense. I must go up.

  I cannot recall how I managed to reach the top, but I must have done so, for a waiting hand took my arm and pulled me the last of the way. I stood on solid wood. The relief of that had me bend over, nearly sick, with my hands rested on my knees for support, and I breathed deeply. I wished never to do that again!

  Mortified, I saw my skirt remained tucked into my under clothes. I should be ashamed if royalty should observe such vulgar display and fast loosened it so it fell to the floor before bringing myself upright to peer through the damp air at my rescuer.

  He already busied himself at the rail to secure first the children, then Pierre as they reached the top, aiding them as he had aided me. The boatman did not follow. He was to return to shore and fetch any others that came after us.

  From a thick metal post, the man unwound a rope, presumably the rope the oarsman cast up, and dropped it over the edge, shouting words as unfathomable as his last. Strange that we could hear the rope smack the water when the fog smothered so many other sounds, but then came the noise of water slurping and sucking between the two vessels, the clunking of oars into the oarlocks, then silence.

  I pulled my cloak close around me. We strained to hear the boat move away. There. It was somehow eerie to hear the oars hit the water, receding yet still so close. That was the sound of our path changing, of leaving one life behind and starting another anew.

  If I was sad to leave the old life, it was sorrow for so much good and bad.

  I had won prestige in the highest royal palace, yet been reviled in the lowest inn. I had been a bringer of life, yet also a plotter of death. I had lived with different religions, yet my faith in truth had been constant and I always had God at my side. The years in prison were worse than anything I could have imagined, yet from this place I had received my redemption – a royal pardon for my loyalty to the king, a place on this ship to France and a future in the Royal Court of Saint-Germaine-en-Laye.

  To go with King James in his exile, at his request and with his blessing, was honour and reward enough for a lifetime of loyalty to the kings of this land. Yea, the fate of such terrible betrayal by his own faithless daughter and her coughing, orange husband was a mystery perhaps only God knew the reason of, yet surely he had seen how I had done his work for him, and gifted me and my dear Pierre a chance of happiness to end our days.

  If fortune should decide it so, I would still practice as a midwife. Most women in France were Catholic and would gladly receive my services. ‘Twas ever my calling and what I wished to do until I died. I could but regret my College for Midwives would never be built in England in my life, unless the king would return there.

  As we stood there at the dripping iron rail of that ship with others of the Royal Court and watched more persons brought on board in the manner Pierre and I had been, my remembered life wended a path from my ransacked comfortable beginnings in Buckinghamshire; to near destitution after my husband left me with five children to feed; to meeting and loving Pierre, and his support throughout every year I lived in and out of prison; and to my final release and esteem given to me by His Royal Highness and his beautiful wife.

  Perhaps sensing the trail of my thoughts, Pierre wrapped his arms around my waist from behind and stood with me in silence, looking out to sea.

  ‘What of my children?’ I had no way of knowing my older children’s fate, and prayed our warnings of late had sent them out of the city and to the safety from persecution ere now. I clasped Pierre’s arms to me as a cloak to ward off pain that I may never meet with them again.

  ‘As with mine, we will find them, or they will find us.’ Pierre leaned over my shoulder to place his cheek next to mine. It was cold, soft, old, but it reassured me.

  We stood a while more. It was near dawn, and thin light turned the fog grey.

  Hairy men were all places on deck, doing things sailors knew to do. Then, finally, a line of strong seamen turned the large cogged wheel that hauled the heavy chain and rusting barnacle-covered anchor on board. With that, they pulled ropes and released ropes and raised large flapping sails as tight-woven as my memories. The gentlest breeze touched my face as we begun to move. I shivered, and Pierre held me tighter.

  ‘I own, my hospital was a fanciful dream, Pierre. I suppose such places can never be.’

  ‘You do your dream injustice, my Lizzie. Be assured, such fine ideas merely foreshadow another time, a time that has not yet come, when one great king or another will follow your plan, and he will build it and honour you for it.’

  I smiled at Pierre’s faith in me. His faith in the woman I was held me fast to truth and goodness when I might have failed in courage, rivalling only the backbone given to me by my calling as a midwife, which, though it had always sustained me before, would not on its own have been enough in these last years.

  Still, I was The Popish Midwife, and honoured to be so entitled.

  Not for the first time, I thought of my family’s motto: Semper Eadem – Ever the Same. Being true to myself, and to truth itself, might have changed our destiny and won us the prize of a better and safer life in the Royal Court, but it had done nothing for those we left behind. We left everything the same.

  I could do nothing now for those poor souls in England, but I would always remember their tragedies and tell any that would listen of them.

  THE END

  With Thanks

  Despite being written in solitude, a book is never written entirely in isolation.

  The worst of crimes are enacted by the writer against his or her family, so I now take this belated opportunity to apologise to my children’s skeletal remains, poised by their empty plates at the table, still waiting for dinner to be served. Kids, yes, it was me that caused you all to get your asses kicked on ‘games night’, when my thirty open windows of research crashed the internet. Oh, and thanks for doing all the housework for weeks at the time while I chatted on Twit…I mean, immersed myself in the seventeenth century. Joe, Carmen, Connor and Rhianna – you rock!

  My sisters and their families deserve thanks for their unswerving support. To Helen Cleary, for her belief in me as well as years of pushing me to do something with my writing, and to Karen Gray, for her encouraging feedback - it wasn’t as hard to read as I expected it to be!

  Special thanks to my beta readers for such detailed and helpful thoughts: Tim Savage, for being my writing rock and friend across the Atlantic for many years. And to Paul Scales, who persisted in reading a genre so alien to him, I thought he’d side-stepped into another universe to escape! Hands together, also, for Will Kent, for his invaluable advice on some details about Catholicism.

  Another special thanks goes to Carmen Christen
sen for her awesome cover design – it’s exactly as I imagined it!

  Thanks, also, to Charlotte Mouncey for formatting my debut novel.

  James Essinger earns a gold star distinction for his reading and editing of it (thrice!), and for his ongoing support and friendship throughout.

  And, last, I crossed time to meet The Popish Midwife, a remarkable and inspirational woman, who upheld the truth regardless of the risk to her life. Thank you, Elizabeth Cellier, for allowing me to tell your story.

  About the Author

  Annelisa Christensen was born in Sussex, took a psychology degree at the University of Stirling in Scotland, then returned to the south to partner in a fashion design company with her childhood friend, Julia. They had fun selling to shops and in street markets all over London, but dissolved the business when children came along, both believing in putting their families first.

  Delighted to be offered the job of laboratory technician in the local secondary school, in which she had herself been Head Girl twenty years earlier, she simultaneously wrote a magical realism series (as yet unpublished). She wrote The Popish Midwife after falling in love with Elizabeth Cellier in some 300-year-old disbound pages of a trial she bought off the internet. The more she discovered about this woman, the more she wanted to share this amazing woman’s story. The Popish Midwife is the result of years of research and writing.

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