“Thank you Edward, you are most kind.” Telling passed the basin to the goodwife.
“Not at all. I must return to the army,” he went on, brusque and businesslike. “I shall return when I may.”
He opened the door, a draft of cooler air sending the smoking candle flames sideways.
The goodwife watched him stride down the path, then hurry toward the gate and bend over. She wondered if he had noticed some lost coin forgotten on the flagstones. Then realised he was being copiously sick. All over the gatepost. Cah.
He was buttoned up a tad too tight for his own good, that one, she thought absently, closing the door before he straightened up and looked back, wiping his mouth on the back of his hand.
*************************
Sparrow knew he had to return to the regiment – he’d already been away most of the day and he didn’t need Gillingfeather issuing warrants for his arrest.
They could be anywhere about Market Harborough by now. He had been traipsing after them when he had sidetracked by shouts and jeers from a small courtyard off the main street. A gang of cockney dragoons were holding an impromptu horse sale - disposing of the pick of the loose mounts they had rounded up on the field.
Sparrow could tell by their furtive glances up and down the street that they weren’t donating all the takings back to the New Model’s commissariat. Sparrow dawdled, casting his eye along a rail full of snorting and hoofing chargers. Some of the best horseflesh he’d ever seen. He could ride off on one of these for a few shillings, he thought, picturing himself on the handsome sorrel at the end of the line.
“Aye aye. Here’s another customer boys,” one of them called, tipping his hat back to study the heavily-built sergeant.
“What are you after mate, a good draught horse? I’m thinking sixteen hands or so?”
“What me or the horse?”
A regular comedian. Not many of them about in this damned crew. He winked, daring Sparrow to make a further inquiry. Didn’t do to appear too keen.
Sparrow nodded at the sorrel.
“This one, ’andsome beast. Officer’s charger by the looks of it. But you’re welcome to it for three shillings.”
Sparrow tried to look as unimpressed as possible.
“What d’you take me for, some bumpkin from down country?” he inquired.
The dragoon spokesman modified his grin somewhat.
“Course not sir. I had you weighed up straight off. Francy, that chap knows his horseflesh, I could tell by the look of you, sir.”
Sparrow rubbed his jaw.
“I haven’t got all day to haggle. Two shillings take it or leave it.”
Francy looked mightily put out but didn’t have time to argue about it.
“Two shillings it is,” he agreed, slapping the horse over its hindquarters.
He nodded at one of his mates to unhitch the fine looking beast.
The dragoons had set up the improvised corral just off the Market Cross. Safe enough for now in the teeming street. New recruits were making the most of the assorted booty, doing brisk business while the army commanders made up their minds where they marched next. The courtyard backed on to a small roadside inn, room enough for a dozen and more good cavalry mounts roped up behind the privvy.
The town was crowded with loose troops of horse, odd companies of foot, gun teams and bad tempered baggage waggoners, all trying to push on north with the army. The outskirts made a handy rendezvous where the troops could trade the goods and chattels they had picked up on and around the battlefield.
Make hay while the sun shines, their guidon should have read.
Wounded officers and men had been put up in the mean hovels and cottages which lined the main street. Plenty of stripped corpses, but most had at least been stacked at the side of the road. Plenty of shouting – the odd shot – as the troops increased their stock at the expense of the rapidly diminishing local population.
Safest bet seemed to be to stack your house to the rafters with wounded – leaving no room for looters and thieves. Surgeons sprawled beside doorways, taking a pipe of tobacco and a moment’s rest before they returned to saw some poor sod’s arm off.
Sparrow threw in the extra shilling for the saddle, well padded with crimson velvet over Spanish leather. It would have cost a fortune anywhere else but the London contingent weren’t short of good quality kit that Sunday morning.
They had already made enough to keep them going a year or three back in the capital – so long as they weren’t rounded up by the New Model’s overworked and overstretched press gangs. The army must have lost ten times as many deserters as it had wounded and killed the day before.
No surprises there, Sparrow reflected. The Roundhead soldiers weren’t used to getting the pick of a battlefield. Up to now, they had run from most leaving their gear for the King’s men.
By Christ, Sparrow had lost just about everything he’d ever had, one way or the other. This lot had certainly lost their new doublets – swapped them for less conspicuous civilian coats no doubt.
He watched the cockney tradesmen as they charged about the crowded street, hawking what was left of their wares to all and sundry. Turning the rear base into a summer fair. Sparrow couldn’t blame them.
He would have set up stall himself, if he had a chance of replacing some of his small store of shillings.
“The provost marshal will be through here before long,” he remarked casually, as one of the crew busied himself saddling his new mount. The entrepreneurial horse traders didn’t seem overly concerned. The leader, a flaxen haired lout with piercing cornflower blue eyes and dirt-smeared and stubbled cheeks, rolled the coins Sparrow had handed over from one palm to the other.
“We’ll be on our way once we’ve shifted these. Don’t imagine you’re in the market for those good draught horses? We’ve a few dozen of them and all.”
“The army’ll buy them back. They’re always on the lookout for good heavy horses.”
The musketeer grimaced.
“What, a penny a dozen? We’d get a better deal from the King’s men, they’ll be needin’ ‘em as soon as we will.”
“The King’s men would take your horses alright, and never a penny of money,” he chimed. The horseboy completed rigging Sparrow’s new horse and passed him the reins.
“The Newport Pagnell road will be stiff with troops and I know for a fact Black Tom’s put the horse to rounding up strays. I was at the headquarters last night. I heard him give the order. They’ll shoot you, if they catch you.”
“If they catch us? Wodger take us for?”
“You’re the best part of a hundred miles from London. It’s a long way to go with a couple of cartloads of loot.”
“How would you know?”
“This ain’t the first battlefield I’ve walked away from.” He remembered the shambles at Penmethock. The filthy street fight had nothing to do with war – it had been banditry pure and simple – and Sparrow’s wasn’t entirely sure who’d been the outlaws, who’d been the victims.
“I’m just suggesting is all. Bugger off and see how far you get, but those shillings you’ve had off me and all the rest you’ve picked up will be back in some bloody commissariat waggon by nightfall, mark my words.”
The dragoons exchanged looks. Sparrow straightened his hat and tugged at the stirrup. One of the Londoners held the girth while he swung himself up in the saddle and made himself comfortable. He could ride well enough, but it was clear he hadn’t a natural seat.
More like a heap of turnips loaded on a barrow, Francy Snow thought.
“He was made for you,” the leader assured him.
His colleagues ignored the small talk, looking a little more worried now. “Wos’ ‘ee on abaht then Francy?” The leader waved his paw.
“The gennlemun’s warning us to watch our step,” Francy explained, his agile mind leaping ahead, considering possibilities.
“In charge are you? Captain? Major?”
“Sergeant. Just s
ergeant. Hardress Waller’s.”
“Nice bit of cloth, for a sergeant,” Francy observed, nodding at Sparrow’s well-tailored sleeves, lined with small black buttons. “Come down in the world have we? Reformado?”
Sparrow regarded him.
“Maybe.”
“Upset one of the big nobs did yer? Spoke out of turn? Took the Lord’s name in vain?”
“Something like that,” Sparrow repeated defensively. Francy’s face re-arranged itself into a flat mask.
“Well then what’s your bloody interest whether we bugger off back to London or not?”
Sparrow gave the impudent Londoner a long look.
“Well now. Bringing in half a squad of stragglers might help me mend a few fences with my superiors.”
Francy Snow wasn’t impressed.
“Oh ho, we turn ourselves in to make you look good.”
“Let’s just say I need to replace a few of the feathers in my cap as got lost. I’ll see you right once you’re finished here,” Sparrow promised, the germ of an idea beginning to form in his brain.
Maybe he’d spent too much time with Eagleton. The commissioner’s constant scheming was beginning to wear off on him.
Francy considered the offer from every angle.
“Seein’ as you’re a broad minded sort of feller. Not one of these damned sticklers for detail as wants to know the ins and outs of a cat’s arse,” Francy inquired.
Sparrow concentrated, not sure now who was playing who.
“Broad minded enough.”
“Glad to hear it. You seem a decent sort Sergeant, sort a feller could rub along with well enough.”
“You’ll think about it then?”
“Like fuck we’ll think about it. We’re not interested in trampin’ about the country on bloody foot. We’ve had our fill of that.”
Sparrow raised an eyebrow.
“Who said anything about you joining the foot?”
“You mean,” Francy reasoned. “You mean, you’re the one after a transfer?”
“Might be,” Sparrow allowed.
Well he couldn’t hang around Gillingfeather the rest of his life, not without running him through. Francy Snow frowned, trying to piece together Sparrow’s intentions.
“Well then, you might have come to the right place,” Snow said cautiously. “The point is, we’re in need of an understanding captain, seein’ as ours overstepped hisself charging in to Rupert’s stragglers yesterday afternoon. We might be able to put a word in for an understanding, deserving sort of feller, smooth things over for you. Him, I mean.”
“You’ve got the clout have you? To appoint your own officers?” Sparrow crowed. “I’d heard some of the troops are getting a bit above their station these days but I hadn’t realised affairs had gone that far.”
The dragoon turned horse trader ignored his heavy-handed witticisms.
“We can put a word in,” Francy repeated. “If you’re prepared to turn a blind eye now and again, maintain the eminently reasonable attitude you’ve shown so far this morning,” Francy said winningly.
Sparrow snorted.
“I offer to take you lot under my wing, you put in a word for me to join the dragoons?”
“Put it like that, why not? It’s not a bad life in Okey’s,” Francy countered, enjoying the encounter despite the sergeant’s broad West Country accent. “We get to ride rather than hoof it along with you lot. We look out for you, you look out for us. And we get to jump off when it’s convenient to do so.”
As they had the previous afternoon. The army commanders had warned the cavalry against dismounting for plunder – on pain of death. The threat hadn’t extended to the dragoons.
They were only musketeers on horses, handy roustabouts to scout and forage. The precious cavalry had been ordered north, the dragoons had stayed to mop up.
Mop up as much loot as they could conveniently carry.
Cheaper to equip and all. Dragoon cobs only cost a few shillings as against the three or four pounds the quartermasters paid for good cavalry chargers. Unless he could get them from rogues like these…
Sparrow shook his head.
“You’re having me over. Captain you say? Just like that? You on one of these soldiers‘ committees then?”
Francy Snow shook his head.
“Get your application in quick, they’ll be looking to make good the losses while they can, otherwise there’d be no bugger left to give the orders,” Francy argued. “They still need someone givin’ orders, committee or no.“ That made some sense at least.
Sparrow leaned back in the saddle. Let them think about it.
“I thought you said you were off to London anyway?” Francy pursed his lips.
“Ah, we could. Maybe we’d get through, too,” he allowed. “Maybe it’d turn out like you said, we run into a patrol, they help themselves to all our merchandise and the ringleader, yours truly, gets strung up from the nearest tree.”
Sparrow thought about it. Transfer to Okey’s. Captain if this sharper had it right. Might be worth an inquiry if it meant getting away from that bastard Gillingfeather. He’d floor him before too much longer, having to watch his madcap capering day in day out.
Captain Sparrow of Okey’s dragoons. He was quite tickled by the idea. Keep him mobile and all, which might come in handy. Damned army, setting him up and knocking him back down again.
“Where will you be?”
“Here or hereabouts. We’ll have to report back some time soon, seein’ as you’ve persuaded us as to the error of our ways, come back to the colours,” Francy leered, taking hold of Sparrow’s bridle and yanking the sorrel’s head sideways.
“Like I said, we scratch your back, you watch ours.” Francy raised his colourless eyebrows. “And we get to keep all our, proceeds,” he asked. Sparrow nodded. “No questions asked?”
“No questions asked.”
“Well all right then.”
“Right enough. I’ll need to collect my baggage. Straighten it my end.”
“Course you do sergeant.” He released the bridle and gave Sparrow’s new horse an encouraging slap on the rump.
“Aye,” Sparrow replied, tipping his hat.
They watched him click his heels and turn the sorrel out into the crowded road.
*************************
Royalist prisoners were being escorted down the main street. Horse mainly, caught up in the frantic pursuit over the moors, in the nasty little coombs which bordered the battlefield.
Read the newsbooks and you would have imagined the battle had been over in an hour. But unexpected obstacles had created bottlenecks where improvised rearguards had carried the fight into the dusk and beyond.
At Marston Moor the previous summer the battle hadn’t even started till supper time.
What was left of the Royalist army had managed to get away in the gathering darkness. But the victorious Roundhead horse had made better sport that long afternoon at Naseby, at Clipston, at Farndon and Marston Thrussel.
The Royalists had turned and fought at half a dozen choke points during the retreat, and the exhausted survivors were still being brought in, formed up and then marched off to Rockingham Castle where the garrison, hard pressed by enemy forces for so long, were preparing a gloating welcome for their new charges.
*************************
Early Sunday morning and the bulk of the New Model troops were resting where they could. Sparrow could hear them singing in the fields beyond, psalms washing over the countryside like waves on the strand, quietly soothing as if they could heal the wounds inflicted upon the commonwealth of Northamptonshire.
Cottages, outhouses, pig pens had been pressed in to service as shelter for troops of both sides. Many were squatting beside walls or sprawling in gardens, long since picked clean of the meanest provender.
The long-suffering inhabitants could only watch and wait. At least this lot attempted to pay for some of the stuff they’d taken. The Royalists had already stripped the pla
ce clean – and never a penny of money for that either.
The grinning thieves had assured them they had done their duty to his majesty.
Duty alright. Now they were being marched back to their former feeding grounds and the locals weren’t shy in telling them what they thought of their depredations.
Sparrow had asked directions from any number of soldiers, and been given any number of likely locations for his regiment. He had decided to return to the town cross when he saw the battalion of black coated preachermen striding through the street like God’s own warriors. Bibles under one arm, sword or pistol in the other.
He recognised Peters, the chief chaplain, livid features and unruly black hair. Dark eyes scanning the soldiery as if he was taking the Sunday parade. He was the soldiers’ favourite, a strutting, finger wagging Welsh Cicero. A campfire prophet whose homespun sermons could last for hours at a time, mesmerising whole regiments despite the harshest of Welsh accents.
Gillingfeather worshipped the man, hanging on every word, pushing to the front and echoing his outraged rhetoric with fevered amens.
And a few paces behind was Telling, large as life in his rather dishevelled black suit. Where on God’s earth had he been, looking so bloody pleased with himself.
Unlikely anybody would pay his bumptious sermons any mind.
He hadn’t noticed Sparrow, turning his new horse into the side of the road and slipping down from the saddle.
“Mr Telling sir,” William called, startling the well-padded preacher.
“Sergeant Sparrow,” he replied, curtly correct, checking his pace as Sparrow tied his new horse off to the rail beside a trough. The sorrel leaned in to drink from the murky green depths.
The chaplain allowed his party to stride on, then removed his hat and smoothed his lank brown hair. He hadn’t shaved, and looked as much an outlaw from the forest as a man of God.
“Is Miss Morrison in town? I am instructed to inquire after her care.”
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