To Serve a Queen

by Josephine Bell

  There were several men and women waiting there who showed relief as the boat drew nearer and astonishment as Francis, his breeches rolled above his knee, his stockings and shoes tied together and hanging about his neck, first stepped over into the mud to pull the boat up and then helped the old man to dry land.

  At once the questions and answers flew while Francis stood shyly apart, cursing his failure to understand their Sussex speech and fully aware they would be equally unable to make out his own accent.

  But the old man soon turned to him. His gratitude for the help he had been given and the excellent catch they had made together completely wiped out his earlier doubt and suspicion. Francis went back to his escort encouraged by the day’s freedom and much warmed by the growing friendliness of the fishing community.

  There was still no news, he found, of any progress at Portsmouth. The expedition was still helpless for want of ships in which to embark the waiting troops. At the same time recruiting for the army in that neighbourhood had to stop, since Portsmouth was in danger of being destroyed by the presence of so many idle men, who were becoming savagely quarrelsome as well as difficult to feed.

  Besides, the King and the Duke had gone down to Plymouth to inspect the main bulk of the army there and several merchantmen and colliers were already anchored in the Sound. Also the London contingent had now left the river and some had been seen off the North Foreland of Kent. But they had not yet arrived.

  Francis was not told all this and did not understand the full seriousness of the local situation. But he grew very tired of waiting. It was pleasant and useful to go out with the fishermen, but he knew this was not a craft he wished to follow indefinitely. He had set his heart upon soldiering and was not satisfied with any other occupation.

  Four weeks went by and the summer reached its height. A period of rain set in. The expected ships arrived and embarkation began. But already the more valuable recruits were melting away daily to seek other ways of fighting the enemy than languishing in a home port. Francis began to wish with all his heart that he had not been caught by the Duke’s men, but had embarked for Holland with his uncle.

  This wish did at last drive him into action. For in early July the leader of his escort had news from London of a more hopeful kind.

  ‘We look to be leaving soon,’ he told Francis one morning. ‘I have orders to deliver you to Dorchester Castle on Portsmouth Harbour where certain officers of the Duke’s force are billeted.’

  ‘At last!’ Francis exclaimed. ‘Does that mean we shall sail before long?’

  The man looked disturbed but made no answer. Francis asked another, older, more experienced member of the troop what this meant.

  ‘It means His Grace, having ordered we take you to Portsmouth, did totally forget to provide us our destination. Until our absence from his service was brought to his attention a month back and again put on one side. Now the complaints from all sides grow louder. Hence our orders are sent at last. But you should have sailed for Plymouth long since, where you would have seen His Grace.’

  After so many weeks’ delay Francis received these details with scepticism, but all the same he went to all his seafaring friends to bid them goodbye and wish them well for the rest of the season’s fishing. So, although the Duke’s men had had little to do with the locals and that not such as endeared them to husbands or sweethearts, or even to landlords whom they had equally cheated and abused, everyone knew they were going and was thankful for it.

  Except the old fisherman, who still favoured young Francis. He knew and warned the boy of the very real danger that lay before him.

  ‘There be bad men lay in the road ye’ll be taking,’ he said. ‘They be everywhere, I’m told, ’tween here and the great harbour. They’ll not stop at the Duke’s livery to rob ye all and kill, maybe.’

  Francis thanked him, but did not take the warning very seriously. He had heard it before. His uncle had been prepared to encounter thieves anywhere on the road from London to Dover. It was an established hazard for all travellers abroad who must naturally have with them money and goods worth seizing. But with his uncle had been an escort sufficient to defend them. And here again there were six men beside the leader. He thought he would be jeered as if he passed on the old man’s message. So he said nothing, but determined to keep his eyes and ears alert for danger.

  It did not help him. The troop set out from Bosham the next morning, following a track recommended by the landlord of the inn, who in all good faith wished to help them on their way and in particular to get them clear of the village before any ill befell them.

  They were not stupid men, but they were servants trained to obey orders. This was their undoing, for they ought to have guessed that they and their unimportant young novice in the art of war had been totally forgotten until a few days ago. They had not clearly understood the changed circumstances that had turned an enthusiastic troop of volunteers, some from as far off as London, into a rabble of disillusioned ruffians. They took the usual precautions of travellers, but they rode along the track in loose formation, joking, laughing, as if for a day’s outing, instead of formed into a close, alert body. Francis took note of it, remembering his Uncle Arthur’s troop and its swift reaction to possible danger.

  In this way he saved his own life when the attack came, as it did in mid-afternoon. Men rose up from all sides, silent ragged men with knives, cut-down pitchforks and scythes and bludgeons of hard wood. No firearms, for there had been no issue of powder or shot to the men, only to officers. Also those who had got hold of muskets or pistols had been obliged to sell them for food. All the deserters were starving by this time, unless they had got well away inland. Even the few who had remained loyal were on siege rations.

  The Duke’s men had no chance at all. The leader was struck off his horse and killed at once. The others tried to flee but were soon caught and despatched. Only one man and Francis wheeled their horses to charge the attackers who were all on foot. The man got away. Francis would have succeeded too, but his horse stumbled over the body of a fallen man and though he kept his seat, in the brief pause an attacker leaped to pull him from the saddle; he was thrown to the ground and secured.

  He expected death in the next second but no blow fell. Instead he was rolled over and found himself staring up at a fierce bearded face while rough hands searched his pockets, with little grunts and squeals of satisfaction as they found his pistol, his money and his papers. His sword had been snatched from his hand as he was dragged off his horse. He had only found time to draw and thrust at one attacker during the short action.

  A brief order drove the clustering vagabonds back. Behind them Francis saw a tall figure in dirty uniform with a naked sabre in his hand. There was fresh blood on the blade. As the ruffians shrank away the man took a step nearer.

  ‘Stand up!’ he ordered, staring fiercely at the prisoner.

  Francis stared back, fully defiant.

  ‘With pleasure, an’ you loose my bonds,’ he said angrily.

  The tall man laughed.

  ‘It is but a boy!’ he cried. ‘But a child of some spirit, I think.’

  He slipped his blade under the rope that had been flung round Francis, binding his legs and arms. It fell away and he scrambled to his feet, looking down with disgust at the dark stain of blood the murderer’s sabre had left on his clothes.

  ‘Who are you, boy?’

  ‘They took my papers. Read there who I am. I serve the King. It is the Duke’s men you have slain.’

  ‘Is that so?’

  The tall man called for the papers, slowly wiping his blade with a bunch of grass as he waited for them to be brought to him.

  Francis fought down the fear that struggled for mastery now against his defiant anger. The contest was not over when the leader of the ambush unfolded his commission and appeared to read it.

  ‘Can the fellow read or does he make pretence to do so?’ Francis wondered, but said nothing, standing with his legs a little apart to suppo
rt his weak knees, his hands clasped behind his back to hide their trembling.

  ‘So, my friends,’ the tall man said, looking round at his band, who had gathered close again, ‘we have a prize, it seems. For ransom, I judge. More profitable than press money, for they write here they would have the young whelp an officer.’

  Growls and derisive laughter greeted this speech. Francis was not encouraged by it. For who would take it upon himself to ransom such as he? The great duke had already forgotten him. The King would have no recollection of that brief audience. His family had thankfully disposed of him. They would not suffer from his disappearance but would greatly resent being asked for more help on his behalf, who should never have been born.

  Who should never have been born, he repeated to himself many times during the rest of that day, while he lay, bound again, in the gang’s hiding place, between the track and the reedy margin of the shore of Emsworth Creek.

  Towards nightfall a light shower drew more grumbling from the rogues who surrounded him, but it roused them to untie his ankles and heave him to his feet so that he could walk with them to the nearest shelter. No traffic had come by their hiding place since they went to ground so it was unlikely they would be challenged now.

  ‘If any pass us we be travellers,’ the tall leader said in a menacing voice to Francis, at the same time cutting the thong that bound his wrists. ‘You will walk beside me and if you call out or make any move to run, ’fore God it will be your last.’

  He showed Francis the knife at his belt, which he now drew from its sheath and held in his hand. And so the march began, first to the track and then across it towards a half-fallen-down hut beside a deserted wattle sheepfold.

  As they began to move, the gnats and mosquitoes that had been humming about them in the reeds rose in a great cloud. Francis whipped off his hat, which had been returned to him reluctantly by the fellow who had snatched it previously. He swept it about his head, turning in a circle to do so, partly in earnest to defend himself and partly in a fresh burst of defiance.

  To his immense surprise he saw two figures in a small boat not far away upon the creek rise to their feet, pull off their knitted woollen caps and wave back.

  His friends! And they had recognised his hat! They were signalling! His whereabouts were now known. He swept round once more, waving high and beating down at the diminishing swarm of tiny enemies.

  Would he could as easily repel those larger foes who straggled on ahead of him and his gaoler. His feeble signals had been far too vague to give any hint of his peril to those good friends on the water. They had recognised him, or so he thought, perhaps with silly hope. But surely they would conclude he was with the Duke’s men, making slow progress towards Portsmouth in their usual lethargic manner.

  As he was led onwards to reach the hut he stumbled deliberately, turned right about to recover himself, and saw, to his surprise and inward delight, that the fishermen had pulled in their lines, made sail and were hurrying with all possible speed for home.

  Before he moved on again he pulled a tag of leather from the inside of his wide-topped boot and left it in the path. The tall man was scanning the track they had left, watchful, ready for instant action. His knife glinted in the last red beams of the dying sun.

  It rained again just before the group settled down to rest. To sleep, Francis wondered, hoping that might be true. At any rate the worst-dressed, raggedest members of the party shrank away from the gap that had been the door of the hut and Francis moved himself by slow inches nearer to it, the sound of the movement swallowed up by the rough talk, frequent noisy quarrels and later heavy breathing of the gang.

  Francis had noticed, without much surprise, that the tall leader did not mix closely with his men, took the poor ration of bread and cheese when it was brought to him, but ate little of it, passing the bulk to Francis, who was by now very hungry, not having eaten since they left Bosham that morning. Later the man went out alone and did not return.

  At first this did not surprise Francis, for he had realised the fellow both despised and suspected his rabble band. But when night fell and later a gibbous moon mounted the sky from the distant horizon by Wittering he began to fear the leader was gone, leaving him to the murderous whims of the brutes who lay snoring beside and beyond him.

  Presently a dark shape appeared low on the ground at the hut’s opening. It was not the absent leader, too wide, too heavily bearded, too slow. A gnarled hand reached forward to him. It was a hand he knew well, for he had seen it all through those summer days, holding oar and tiller, line and rope and halyard.

  Without a moment’s delay Francis began to roll silently over, carefully drawing in his legs at the opening, rolling again to clear it, until he found himself seized by two pairs of hands and lifted back down the slope to the track, where he was set on his feet, the replaced bonds cut away, then hurried among the reeds again to the water’s edge and the boat drawn up there.

  All the time, that seemed an age to Francis but occupied no more than ten minutes, neither he nor his rescuers uttered a single word. There was no need and they were not talkative men. Francis understood. In fact much of the attraction of those fishing trips he had taken lay in the quiet passing of the day, undisturbed by human chatter, hearing only the sea and the wind and the cries of birds whose business was with the water.

  When the boat was well out from the land Francis said, ‘There was a man who seemed to lead them. He left the hut long since. Did you not meet him?’

  ‘Oh aye, we met him,’ the old fisherman said.

  After a time Francis said, ‘The Duke’s men. Did any of them return to Bosham?’

  ‘One only, about noon, with a slashed arm and a tale of murder. We summoned help to bring in the dead and discovered the horses. The baggage had gone, with the harness.’

  ‘Then a message –’

  ‘Can wait,’ the old man said, and the others nodded.

  The little boat drove on, sometimes sailing, sometimes rowed, through the passage between the north of Hayling Island and the mainland and across Langston Creek to the mouth of Portsmouth Harbour. Then over the wide waters to Dorchester and the old castle by the shore.

  ‘How can I thank you?’ Francis said as he stepped out on the shingle.

  ‘By keeping thy mouth shut, lad. Tell how you was attacked and taken. Tell that you escaped from drunken guards and fled. Tell how a friendly boat came partly to your aid. But not a word of us, not a word of Bosham. Not a word of where ye all stayed these weeks past.’

  ‘But there was a messenger to the Duke. There were orders to come here to Dorchester.’

  ‘That man died in the ambush.’

  ‘The wounded one? He who gave you that news?’

  ‘He died at sundown. Say what you will, my son, and God preserve you. But no mention of Bosham or we be in danger from all sides, King’s men and Devil’s men alike. No word of Bosham.’

  ‘I swear it,’ Francis said, taking the old man by both hands. ‘I swear there shall be no name spoken but of Chichester. My wits have been much shaken by my experience,’ he said solemnly, and then laughed in relief.

  Releasing the old man, he said quietly, ‘And God bless and preserve you all, my dear friends, on your return and thereafter.’

  They cast off at once, sliding away into the darkness. The moon was down, but already there was a pink glow in the east behind the hills. Francis walked up from the water to find the guard at the castle gate.

  Chapter Seven

  Francis made but a poor impression upon the guards at the castle, arriving as he did alone, bedraggled, without weapons or papers to prove his identity. But they were experienced soldiers who had served abroad and so were accustomed to deal with stragglers, defectors, refugees and all manner of distressed persons. Moreover the young man’s bearing was not that of a peasant or a rogue. His speech, though unfamiliar, was clear and fluent. He insisted upon his rank of gentleman in the direct service of the Duke of Buckingham. He described
the ambush, glossed over his escape from his captors and demanded to be taken to the captain of the castle.

  His obvious youth told in his favour. Besides, rumours, that spread as always very rapidly where news travelled only by word of mouth, had already brought the tale of a fatally wounded man in the Duke’s livery, riding into Bosham, one arm hacked to the bone. He had died within a few hours, but his story matched this boy’s; there must be truth in it.

  So Francis was allowed in, given much-needed food and drink, allowed to clean himself and his torn clothes before being taken to the chief officer of the garrison, who questioned him severely and in great detail, but afterwards accepted him as a useful recruit.

  In less than a week room was found for Francis on a vessel proceeding to Plymouth, which he reached with the continuing favourable easterly wind on the third day out from Portsmouth.

  Still the venture hung fire, though the required merchant fleet was fast assembling now and some order was being brought about by the appointment of Lord Wimbledon as head of the expedition. Francis, given into the care for training of a certain Lieutenant John Felton, heard bitter criticism of the whole ordering of the plan.

  ‘’Twas thought of in the early spring at such time as the prevailing winds blow for a spell from the east. Why was the muster of ships not made promptly at Plymouth?’

  ‘The difficulty of finding troops at once to fill those ships?’ suggested Francis. He was tired of hearing the same complaint about the good wind. He described how he had ridden with his uncle who had told him of Count Mansfeld’s difficulty in finding men for his mercenary army.

  ‘I do not doubt it,’ Felton answered. ‘The Count’s reputation is not high. His aims and hopes fly far in advance of his means. There be men enough here in the west. His Grace ordered the assembling too late because his popularity is high just now for his warlike attitude and this is well known in all the eastern counties about London. Also he likes to visit Portsmouth as the Lord High Admiral. The crowds turn out for him. He thought to fill his eastern ships quickly, but failed in this.’