James nodded.
Drew climbed back onto the wagon. It took an extra kick to compensate for the extra weight of stones he carried in his pockets. He watched little Thomas and his father disappear into the dark shadows of the woods. After Eliot and the guards passed by, they would return to Edenford and meet the other refugees on the far side of the north bridge. David Cooper would lead the band of fleeing Puritans north to Tiverton, east to Halberton, then south to the port at Southampton. It would not be an easy journey. The refugees would have to travel fast to join John Winthrop and the Arbella by March 29.
Drew shouted to James, “Keep your head down!”
“I know what I’m supposed to do,” James shouted back. “You just get your wagon movin’ and stay outta my way.”
“Heeeyah!”
Drew urged his horse on. James was right behind him. The two wagons picked up speed down the road toward Exeter.
Like waves on the sea, the dirt highway rose up and down, causing the drivers occasionally to lose sight of each other between swells. On one rise Drew looked behind him in the distance. The pursuit should be in sight by now, but they weren’t. Still, he urged the horses on, waiting to crest another rise.
He looked back.
No one was following them.
Had something gone wrong? Had David Cooper and Thomas been discovered? Or possibly the larger group on the road north of town?
Drew caught a glimpse of James, who had just looked back too. The red giant crouched low with a scowl on his face.
The wagons bounced dangerously from rut to rut, sometimes leaving the road surface entirely, sometimes skidding around curves in the road. It was difficult to drive the horses and stay low at the same time. Drew spread his legs farther apart to balance himself.
He looked back again. Still no one.
Just as he was about to pull back on the reins, a band of pursuers crested a distant hill.
Finally!
James saw them too. His scowl turned into a thin line of determination as the giant urged his horses on.
The pursuing horses were faster. Drew had counted on that. Eliot and the guards would gain on them.
Drew estimated there must have been ten guards in all. The ride was too rough to make an accurate count. He ducked back down and whipped the reins.
The further they got from Edenford, the better. It wouldn’t do for Eliot to discover the wagons’ real load too soon.
The ladies of Edenford had spent a considerable number of evening hours bundling the serges that populated the backs of the wagons. Each bundle had the approximate sitting height of an adult passenger. As they worked, the ladies got into the spirit of the deception, fashioning each of the bundles to represent a person in their group. Some of the bundles had physical characteristics drawn on them; others bore nicknames or pet names. While the bundles were being made one of the ladies sat one completed bundle in a chair, the one representing her husband, and told him things she’d been wanting to say to him for years.
On the night of the escape the bundles were loaded in the wagon and covered with a sheet of canvas. During the beginning of the trip they remained upright, but now the reckless course of the wagons had knocked them all over. It didn’t matter. Had the cargo been real people, by now they too would be piled on top of one another in the back of the bouncing wagons.
“Heeeyah!!!” Drew shouted.
The road leveled out. About a mile more and there would be a bend eastward, heading away from the River Exe. Another mile or so more and the road would turn slightly south, and the gap between the road and the River Exe would continue to increase. Not until it crossed the Culm River would the road correct itself with a sharp turn west; the two would meet again just above the port city of Exeter.
Drew Morgan and James Cooper didn’t plan to make it that far.
Drew checked behind him. Eliot was gaining too quickly. The features of the riders were becoming distinguishable.
They had to get to the eastward bend. It was crucial they reach the bend well ahead of their pursuit. This was important, since getting caught was not part of the plan.
These were not sacrificial lambs driving the wagons; they were two men who had something to live for—something in common, as a matter of fact. Or more precisely, someone in common.
Nell Matthews.
Drew looked back and made eye contact with James. They exchanged nods. It was time.
Drew urged his horse into the left turn. His wagon hit a rut, sending all four wheels into the air and nearly knocking Drew out of the seat. The two right wheels came down as the wagon hit the bend. Drew leaned left and shouted at the horse again. The left two wheels hit with a jarring thud.
Drew glanced over his shoulder. A thicket of trees blocked out James and, farther behind him, Eliot and the guards. Drew pulled on the reins, slowing the wagon.
James came skidding around the turn, the back of his wagon sliding sideways. Just past the bend, he pulled up.
Drew jumped from the wagon while it was still rolling. He hit the horse’s hindquarters.
“Heeeyah! Get going! Heeeyah!”
James did the same.
The horses responded, but with reservation. The reins hung loose.
Pulling rocks from their pockets, the two men pelted the backsides of the horses as they yelled. The horses advanced and would soon be out of range, but they had yet to break into a gallop.
“I can’t throw any farther!” Drew said.
James puckered his lips, which to Drew was an unusual expression for rock throwing. He heaved a stone as hard as he could.
The rock hit Drew’s horse with authority on the rear. It reared and bolted.
It took three more tries, but James managed to connect with his horse, too. The animal bolted and had soon caught up with the first.
Turning toward the open field, Drew and James ran toward the riverbank where there was a slope of reeds provided cover. The field was wide and they had to make it to the river before Eliot and the guards rounded the bend and cleared the trees to keep from being spotted.
Smaller and faster, Drew quickly outdistanced the huskier James. As Drew sprinted across the grassy field, he looked up the road. A cloud of dust over the trees indicated approaching horses.
He reached the edge of the bank and vaulted over a patch of knee-high reeds. He hit the ground, rolled, scrambled onto all fours scurried back up the ridge. In the distance, the horses pulling the serges continued to run. In front of him, James puffed heavily as his legs and arms churned toward the riverbank. His massive feet pounded the soft earth.
On the road Eliot and the guards rounded the bend.
“Hurry!” Drew shouted at James.
The only response from the red giant was a violent puffing sound and the thud, thud, thud of his boots.
He was slowing.
Drew looked behind James.
Eliot was pointing at the wagons and yelling something.
James plodded toward the riverbank, his chest heaving. He was still several feet away when Eliot turned his head to shout something to the guards behind him.
James cannon-balled over the embankment and rolled halfway down the slope before skidding to a stop, face-up. His enormous chest gasped barrels full of air.
Drew checked the road.
Had Eliot spotted James?
Drew held his breath.
None of the pursuers slowed.
No one turned into the field.
Drew and James had done it!
“Get up!” Drew said. “This is no time to take a nap!”
He was half-jesting.
To his surprise, James took one more gulp of air, jumped up, and was making his way upstream.
The two men made their way back to the forest where earlier they had hidden their travel bags. James’ bag was lightest; most of his things were with his family. Drew’s bundle had his clothes, his Bible, and a treasured memento he discovered the day after his first conversion. Folded among
his clothes was the lace cross he had taken from Nell’s journal.
Drew extended his hand to James.
This was where they would part ways. James would go back to the forest, then head west where he would meet up with the fleeing Puritan band outside the village of Honiton.
Drew had yet to decide where he was going. He had completed his mission. Nell and Jenny were safe. He had no reason to doubt the cobbler’s words on that account. The people of Edenford were on their way to the New World where they would be free from Bishop Laud and a money hungry king. Everything Christopher Matthews had asked of him had been accomplished. Drew’s task now was simple—stay out of Laud’s reach.
Almost reluctantly James shook his hand.
“Where you goin’?” he asked.
Drew shrugged. “I don’t know.”
James stood there, as though he wanted to say something. An awkward silence grew between them.
Then, with a slap on Drew’s shoulder, he said, “God be with you.”
He turned and walked away.
“And with you,” Drew called after him. “Give my love to Thomas and your father.”
Without turning back, James acknowledged him with uplifted hand.
For several moments, Drew watched him go. Then, he crossed the river and headed west.
Drew spent Saturday alone.
He wandered the roads of Devonshire, north of Exeter, avoiding Dartmoor, a large granite plateau with rocky peaks and shallow marshy valleys, thin soil, and coarse grasses. He preferred the promise of the central land. It was a fertile area with an exceedingly fair amount of corn, grass, and wood. In other words, it was more like Edenford.
While he walked, he prayed; when he rested, he read the Bible. That was all he had now—God and the Bible. He tried to tell himself that was enough. Maybe he was to be like the apostle Paul, roaming from town to town, teaching and preaching, but never putting down roots. Having friends, but no family. No wife. At times he thought he could be satisfied with that kind of life, but often he wanted more. He wanted the kind of life Christopher Matthews had in Edenford—family, close friends, a fellowship of believers … the kind of life the curate enjoyed until Drew Morgan came to town.
Drew followed the Creedy River into a little village called Crediton. It was Sunday morning and he went to church. Because it was a Puritan congregation, the communion table was not railed off, and the capable young minister preached his own message without wearing the mandatory surplice. During the sermon Drew’s mind wandered. He was struck by the similarities between Crediton and Edenford. They were both small villages situated beside a river. The people were of Puritan persuasion. As the preacher spoke to them in familiar terms, it almost seemed a family gathering in the minister’s sitting room. The difference between the towns was in their industry; while Edenford was a wool community, Crediton residents were farmers.
Following the service, Drew met the minister who introduced him to Richard Tottel, a farmer and father of three daughters and a son. Tottel invited Drew home to share their Sunday meal.
The Tottels were a meaner sort of family, compared to the residents of Edenford; they were poor barley farmers. Richard was serious minded and made of tough fiber, a man who was earnest in his walk, wise, sober, and grave. But then he had reason to be. Under the gray skies and cold drizzles of Crediton, he and his fathers had cleaned their ditches, repaired boundary walls, inserted new stones into their houses and barns, and plowed their fields with only moderate success. By denial and hard work over the generations, the family had added field to field and won a position among its neighbors.
Tottel’s three daughters, the oldest two old enough to marry, hovered over Drew like flies on honey. They were comely enough with good black eyes, sharp minded, and very neat. Every few minutes their father would shoo them away, but they would inevitably return.
Mrs. Tottel was Richard’s third wife. He had seen the first two die in childbirth, along with child after child who yielded up their souls in convulsions or fever. However, it was evident to Drew these people did not pity themselves, did not bemoan their rank or position in life. They simply went on doing things as well as they knew how. Their daily life had given them a hardness that would not soon be broken.
While the Tottel girls stared at him, Drew had his first taste of a West Country tart, an apple pie with a custard on the top. And, since having company was a special occasion, the tart was topped with clotted cream—scalded cream and milk with a little sugar in it. The meal was delicious, and Drew found himself entertaining thoughts of staying in Crediton for a few days. He couldn’t see himself as a farmer, but maybe God had something in store for him here. At least that’s what he was thinking during supper. After supper was a different story.
Following the meal the entire family gathered around the fire to talk and smoke. Drew came to learn it was a universal preoccupation in this part of the country. Tottel, his wife and daughters, even the younger children, lit pipes of tobacco and puffed contentedly throughout the afternoon. The Tottels were offended when Drew did not join them. He left shortly after that and made his way down the road.
That night as he slept out in the open, he looked heavenward at the starry multitude, thinking and praying. Maybe he shouldn’t have been so intolerant of the Tottels’ use of tobacco. He was being unfair to them. He was hoping to find another Edenford, another Matthews family, another Jenny, another Nell. But Crediton wasn’t Edenford and the Tottels weren’t the Matthewses.
He had been rereading Paul’s journeys in the Acts of the Apostles and had come to the part where Paul and Barnabas were sent from Antioch on their first missionary journey. His blood was stirred afresh by the sailing references as they traveled first to Cyprus, then to Perga and Pamphylia. Before falling asleep, Drew decided to make his way to the coast.
Avoiding Plymouth and Exeter, he made his way eastward and reached the English Channel at Lyme Bay. He was in Charmouth for Easter Sunday. Finding no Puritan congregation, he attended a service at the Church of England but left before it concluded. For some reason, everything the bishop of Charmouth did reminded Drew that at that moment Bishop Laud was doing the same thing at St. Michael’s in London.
The following day was March 29, when the first of John Winthrop’s fleet would set sail for the New World. If all had gone well, David Cooper’s family and the other Edenford refugees would be on board.
Would Nell and Jenny be with them? Drew wished he knew. All the cobbler would tell him was that they were safe. But safe where? Would Cooper use that term to describe the hardships they would face on the rocky shore of the New World? Probably not. More likely, they were safe at the estate of a wealthy Puritan who took them in upon hearing of the heroic death of their father.
That afternoon Drew went to the seaside and scanned the waters. He didn’t really expect to see them on their first day of sail, but he went anyway. Except for a bevy of small Flemish boats, there were no other ships to be seen.
On Tuesday and Wednesday he looked for them again and decided he had probably missed them in the night. The ships would sail with the wind, regardless of the time of day. Drew tried not to act disappointed as he continued his journey along the coast.
At Christchurch he took a small skiff to the Isle of Wight for no other reason than to get onto the water. Paul and Barnabas had their Cyprus; the Isle of Wight was Drew’s English equivalent. He lodged at Yarmouth.
In his Bible reading he had concluded Paul and Barnabas’s first missionary journey and was into their second one. His chest ached when he read of the disagreement between the two that caused them to go separate ways. They were friends, brothers in Christ. Why would they let a disagreement sever that relationship? The pain in Drew’s chest grew heavier.
He fought back his rising emotions.
I’m just suffering from loneliness, he reasoned.
To get his mind off the painful departing of friends, Drew read chapter 16, about Paul at Troas. The apostle had a vi
sion of a man standing on the other side of the sea, calling to him to cross over and help.
On Monday Drew woke thinking about the excursion to the New World. They had set sail a week ago. By now they would be a little more than a fourth of the way to their new home. He dressed and walked to the wharf.
Frightened shouts split the air as the street he was walking emerged onto the wharf between two large buildings.
An out-of-control carriage was heading straight toward him, its driver slumped over to one side and its solitary passenger—a man of great age—helplessly bouncing around in the carriage seat. A half-dozen men trailed the carriage, shouting at the horse to stop.
The horse was scared, its eyes wide with fright.
Drew waved his arms wildly, hoping to scare the horse.
The horse didn’t slow. It kept coming.
Anxiously, Drew glanced about for an escape. Wooden walls rose up on both sides of him, there was no place to jump. He couldn’t outrun the horse, which left him but a single course of action.
He removed his coat, waved it over his head, and charged the horse.
The horse reared. Once. Then again.
Drew managed to grab the bridle. He held on, making soothing sounds. The horse shivered and pranced anxiously, but submitted to Drew’s strong hand.
By now several of the pursuing men had caught up with the coach.
One man took charge, shouting at the others to care for the slumped driver. But it was too late, the driver was dead from causes not readily evident.
The man in charge approached Drew to thank him. He introduced himself as Captain Burleigh, captain of Yarmouth Castle. He was a grave but comely gentleman, weathered by countless seasons at sea, much older than Drew had originally thought, which made his spryness and strength of character all that more remarkable.
Drew introduced himself.
“Morgan?” the old man said. “Any relation to Admiral Amos Morgan?”
“My grandfather.”
“Of course, you are!” the captain cried, seizing Drew by the shoulders and looked him over. “Fine resemblance. And how is the old buzzard?”
The Puritans (American Family Portrait #1) Page 36