by Ann Swinfen
She realised suddenly that, framed against the light of the candle, she could be seen from outside. Turning her head, she blew it out and at that very moment a voice called softly.
‘Anne? Is that you?’
Her heart lurched painfully. Not John’s voice. But a voice she knew, a light, young voice. John’s youngest brother. She leaned far out of the casement, trying to discern whether there was a more solid darkness in the shadows at the foot of the wall.
‘Richard? Richard? Where are you?’
‘God be thanked! For mercy’s sake, sister, let me in. I never knew Swinfen locked and barred before.’
‘We never had reason to bar the doors before. Come to the parlour window. Some of the servants are asleep in the kitchen, and the front door always makes such a noise.’
She saw a smaller shadow detach itself from the larger one and slip round the corner of the house. At once she fumbled for her strike-box to relight the candle, then pulled her robe over her shift and ran barefoot down the stairs to the parlour. Setting the candle down on the table, she used both hands to lift the heavy bars off the shutters and swing them inwards. Richard was already outside the window. She fumbled open one of the casements. Putting his hands on the sill, he vaulted clumsily over and collapsed on the floor at her feet. As she struggled to rebolt the shutters, she could feel his hot breath on her bare toes.
‘Richard!’ She knelt down beside him. ‘You’re hurt!’
His head was clumsily bandaged with a dirty cloth, and the seeping stain of blood was wet. He seemed in no hurry to get up off the floor, but heaved himself to a sitting position, with his arms about his legs and his chin on his knees, still breathing heavily.
‘What’s happened? Has there been another battle with the king’s men? Where’s the rest of your regiment?’
‘My regiment?’ He gave a harsh laugh. ‘Would that be the regiment pledged to fight for freedom and an end to tyranny? Or would it be the regiment that is Cromwell’s lick-spittle?’
He looked about wildly, as though he expected to see the regiment behind the door.
‘Stay there,’ Anne called over her shoulder, unnecessarily, running swiftly and silently to fetch water and rags and salves from her stillroom. To reach it, she had to pass through the kitchen, but the servants sleeping there on pallets did not stir, despite the thunderous heat of the night.
The cut to Richard’s head was not as bad as she had feared: a sword slash above his eye, it had bled a good deal, but was not deep. She washed and dressed it, crouched on the floor beside him, while he chewed on bread and cold bacon. At last she managed to persuade him to sit on a chair at the table. His breathing had steadied and he looked less wild.
‘Now, Richard,’ she said, clasping her hands in her lap to steady them, ‘can you tell me what’s happened?’
‘It’s a sorry tale, and too long to tell now,’ he said, ‘for I fear I may be followed.’
‘But who is following you?’
‘That part of the regiment that supports King Cromwell,’ he said bitterly. ‘Things have come to a pretty pass when comrades in arms, who have fought side-by-side against a common enemy, fall out with each other in victory.’
He explained that when word had reached his regiment, busy keeping down the Royalists in the north, that several regiments had occupied London and were going to see that all the soldiers received their arrears of pay, there had been great rejoicing.
‘For things have gone very hard with us, Anne. There have been times we’ve near starved, when there was no more food to be had by raiding the farms. And look at my boots!’
He held up his foot, clad in tattered remnants of leather bound together with twine.
‘Some have no boots at all, nor had none all last winter, and lost their toes with frostbite, for it’s hard country up there.’
Then further news had come.
‘The peace voted on by Parliament was cast aside, we heard. Now, so long as we get our pay, there’s many of us want peace, and a return to our homes. I know that peace is what John was working for. I don’t always agree with my elder brother, who thinks he can treat me as a child, but I know he’s honourable and just. If he approved the settlement, I was happy.’
He looked around.
‘Is there no ale?’
Anne got up and fetched it from the court cupboard.
‘Not only was the vote of Parliament cast aside by force,’ he said, ‘but we heard the members were driven out and imprisoned. Then we heard of the death of the king. I wept no tears, but I don’t think it was honourably done.’
He drank deeply from the tankard and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand.
‘All this while, we hear, Ireton is making wonderful promises to John Lilburne, and so does Cromwell, too, when he gets to London. Then Lilburne is cast aside like the Members of Parliament, and Cromwell is setting himself up like a king, to rule over the nation in solitary power, like the worst of these Stuarts.’
‘You’re a follower of Lilburne?’ Anne asked cautiously. Richard had always been radical in his views, but she had not thought he was a Leveller.
‘Of course. We’re not all born the eldest sons of gentlemen, with a manor and a fortune awaiting us.’ His voice was bitter.
Anne flushed.
‘That’s unkind and unjust. You know that John will provide for you, and will see that you’re settled with a wife and land when you are come of age.’
Richard shrugged.
‘Perhaps. But there are thousands of others in far worse case than I. Poor men who’ll never be able to fill their bellies and cover their nakedness, nor that of their families. The Lord did not create some men to starve while others are gluttons. “When Adam delved and Eve span, who was then the gentleman?”’
‘But what has this to do with your present state?’
‘Some of us rebelled against the actions of Cromwell and his fellows, especially when we were told we must cross the sea to fight the Irish. It’s time he learned that he can’t depend on the loyalty of soldiers when he cheats them.’
‘You mutinied!’ Anne was horrified. This meant death.
‘There were plenty that thought the same, but alas, there were more who stood by that treacherous man, still hoping he’ll keep his word. Fools that they are! In Burford near Oxford there’s been a great mutiny, and many put to death for it. So, when things went against us in the north, I had to make a run for it.’
‘You said they might pursue you here?’
‘Aye, well, I was taken once, then made my escape in Stafford. They may have picked up my trail.’
As if in answer to his words, the dogs on the farm began a furious barking. Anne realised now that they had not barked earlier, when she had first heard Richard creeping about.
‘You must hide!’
‘I’d sooner fight them. Even if they aren’t after me, they’ll be after our horses. And victuals. How many men do you have?’
‘Only old men and boys. The two day labourers go home to Weeford at night, the shepherd is up on the moor. I’m going to look out of the upstairs window.’
She ran upstairs, shielding the candle with her hand, and crept into the room where Dick and Jack slept, followed by Richard. The window here overlooked the carriageway leading up from the road. And there, clearly to be seen in the moonlight, was a troop of horsemen heading for the house. They carried pitch torches held high above their heads, and in the mingled shadows cast by moonlight and torchlight, the black shapes of the riders turned them into the horsemen of the Apocalypse, or the riders of the Wild Hunt that presaged death.
‘What shall we do? Dear God, what shall we do?’ Anne cried.
Dick and Jack had woken now, and crowded sleepily beside them at the window.
‘Who are they?’ said Dick.
‘Soldiers,’ said Anne, ‘hunting for your uncle.’
‘They’re riding towards the wheat field,’ said Jack.
In a moment, it was clear what
the troopers intended. They separated, riding through the waist-high wheat, pausing to lean down and set it alight. Small patches caught fire at first, but there had been no rain for nearly a fortnight, and the wheat was dry. The fires began to spread and join up.
‘My wheat!’ Anne cried, turning to rush out of the room.
Richard seized her arm. ‘They’re trying to frighten us. What can you do? You can’t put it out.’
‘That wheat is what stands between us and starvation.’
‘The horses!’ Richard cried. ‘As soon as they’ve torched the wheat, they’ll come back for the horses. Dick, come with me. You, too, Jack. You’ve grown into a fine big boy. We have to get the horses away before they come back to the stable.’
‘Wait!’ Anne shouted, ‘let me think. Richard, you must hide, but not here. If they search the house they’ll find you. And we mustn’t risk the children. Oh, God! The wheat!’
The flames were catching hold now, the black silhouettes of the troopers moving in front of them like some macabre puppet show. No, Richard’s safety must come before the wheat.
‘You’re right,’ she said, ‘they’ll come for the horses. Go up to Packington Moor. To Agnes Lea’s cottage; it’s hidden away. They’ll never find you there. Hurry!’
Dick and Jack tumbled out of the door after him, and they were gone.
She hesitated no longer, but ran to wake Patience and the women servants, then rushed downstairs to the kitchen and shook Peter and Josiah awake. Isaac was nowhere to be seen, though his truckle bed was tumbled. He must have gone with Richard.
Anne shot the bolts on the kitchen door.
‘Quick! Into the hall. Fetch the muskets and their gear and take them upstairs. Josiah at the front of the house, in the boys’ room, Peter at the rear, in mine. Margit, you load for Josiah, Bess for Peter. Biddy, look to Master and Mistress Swynfen, that they don’t take fright.’
She was scrambling upstairs now, hardly noticing when she stubbed her toes painfully on a step. Blurred with sleep and stumbling, they followed her.
‘Hester, take all the younger children upstairs into the garret, but be ready to bring them down quickly if the troopers fire the house. Leave the baby in my chamber, I’ll fetch her if needs must.’
‘Bows,’ said Bridget, limping up the stairs behind Anne. ‘There are bows and quivers in the kist on the landing. I’m a fair shot. Patience?’
‘I can shoot,’ said Patience, breathless, her hair a wild roseate halo about her head, ‘though I’ve no great talent for it.’
‘In this darkness, all we can do is aim at shadows,’ said Anne. ‘No one is to shoot unless they shoot first. Do you hear? No one. We mustn’t provoke them.’
They nodded their understanding, the men and maids peeling away along the corridor to their posts, while Bridget opened the kist and handed out the bows which were for sporting use rather than defence. Anne took a bow and a supply of arrows, but when she reached the boys’ room she laid them aside and seized one of the muskets.
Josiah, waiting quietly by the open casement with his primed musket resting on the sill, glanced round at her.
‘Can you fire a musket, mistress?’
‘Aye,’ said Anne grimly. ‘I can fire a musket.’
She finished ramming the ball home and lit the slow match, then opened the other casement as quietly as she could. Margit was loading the two remaining muskets. She was pale with fright, but she had laid out balls, powder flasks and rags neatly on Dick’s bed.
Anne leaned out of the window. From here she could not see whether Richard and the younger boys had managed to lead the horses out of the stable, but there was no sign of the troopers riding off in pursuit. It seemed as though she had been gone from here for a long time while she roused the household, but the soldiers were still at their work in the wheat field. She ground her teeth together in fury and frustration.
‘They’m coming back,’ Josiah murmured.
The torches had clustered together again and were moving towards the house. Anne wiped her sweaty palms on her robe and tried to hold the heavy musket steady, resting on the sill. Suddenly they were at the front door, with a heavy log pulled from the woodstack. Three or four of the men dismounted. It was difficult to see how many in the flame-lit darkness, as their shadows leapt and danced below the window. The moon which had shone earlier over the lake had been lost behind heavy clouds. There was no light of moon or stars.
With a great crash, the men swung their makeshift battering ram against the door.
‘Not yet,’ Anne whispered to Josiah.
‘’Tis a hard angle for shooting,’ he said. ‘Too close under us.’
‘If they try to shoot at us, they’ll have to step back. Then we’ll have a clearer line of fire.’
The heavy oak door of Swinfen Hall had kept out intruders for several centuries. It was not going to yield easily. And the men seemed in a hurry. There was the sudden crash and tinkle of breaking glass. Josiah’s face, pale in the wash of the torches below, turned towards Anne.
‘They’ll be inside in a minute.’
Anne bit her lip.
‘All right. We’ll have to open fire.’
It was her decision. She would take the responsibility. She set the slow match to the charge and aimed at the dark mass of men below.
The crack of the first shot startled her almost as much as the soldiers. The musket crashed back into her shoulder and she staggered, try to stay on her feet. Smoke and the stench of gunpowder choked her. There was an angry yell from below. She could not have hit anyone, but the troopers were taken by surprise. The defenceless house presented a different prospect now. Josiah fired immediately after Anne, and from the window of Nan’s room next door she heard the swish of an arrow. The girls could reload more quickly with arrows, but here was Margit, passing her another loaded musket. Bracing her feet firmly, Anne took aim and fired again. This time there was a cry of pain, followed at once by the crack of a shot hitting the stonework by her head. She ducked back.
‘When you’ve loaded that musket, Margit, go and tell Peter and Bess to move to the small front room in the east wing. The men are all on this side of the house, and from the wing they’ll have a clearer shot at them.’
The girl fled, her bare feet slapping on the boards. Another shot from below hit the window, sending a spray of glass shards into the room, but Anne heard the impact of her own next shot in flesh, and a scream of pain. A wild anger flooded her as she grabbed the last of the loaded muskets and fired again. Immediately afterwards she saw a flash from a window in the east wing, followed by a terrified squeal from one of the troopers’ horses.
Margit was back, her hands shaking as she poured the powder into one of the muskets, spilling it amongst the broken glass.
‘I’m sorry, mistress! I’m sorry!’
‘Don’t worry. You’re doing well. Don’t hurry too much.’
Anne turned to Josiah.
‘You and Margit take two of the muskets to the west wing and start firing from there. I’ll stay here. I can load for myself.’
She risked a look out of the window. The troopers had dropped their torches the better to load and shoot, and they burned in two heaps on either side of the door. Angry voices were arguing below, and there was a swish and then a yell of pain as an arrow found its mark. She loaded, took careful aim, and fired into the centre of the clustered dark shapes below. The musket was burning hot, and she had singed a lock of her hair on the slow match.
Then Josiah opened fire from the west wing as Peter fired again from the east. Neither ball seemed to find its mark, but the troopers, now fired on from three sides where they had hoped to surprise a house full of helpless sleepers, had had enough. Anne leaned forward and watched those on foot remounting. As the horses wheeled to head away down the drive, one rider twisted in the saddle and fired a final shot. Pain exploded in Anne’s left shoulder and she fell backwards, striking her head on the corner of the bed. The dim light of the candle dipped a
nd swayed as she clawed herself to her knees, then dragged herself upright by the post of the bed.
She ran from the room, calling the others to the kitchen, where she heaved back the bolts from the door. They came running, gentlewomen and servants alike, following her with buckets, out of the yard and down to the lake.
‘We must throw water from the lake onto the fires,’ Anne gasped, trying to organise them into a line, passing buckets from hand to hand, as she had seen people do when houses caught fire in London. But it was beyond hope. Their pitiful buckets were like spitting on a bonfire.
‘The storm’s a-coming at last, mistress,’ said Josiah. ‘God willing, ’twill come in time to save some of the crop.’
The thunderstorm. Of course, all day it had been threatening. Anne threw down her bucket and raised her arms to the heavens, where black clouds blotted out every trace of moon and stars. Her blood-soaked sleeve fell back as she prayed with her whole body, arguing, promising God anything, making bargains. If only he would save the wheat. The others ceased their helpless attempts and turned to stare at her. Had she cried aloud? She did not know, nor did she care. More of the fires joined together, leaping from furrow to furrow, and then, like the voice of God himself, thunder cracked once over the woods, and lightning thrust down to earth like God’s finger pointing. Over the crackle of the fires there sounded a sudden rush of wind, and then a few drops of rain spattered her up-turned face.
The thunder crashed again, this time directly overhead, and the clouds opened like a heavenly flood, falling like a benison on the burning field.
It was dawn before the fire was finally extinguished. Although the storm put out most of the flames, there were pockets of embers which had to be dowsed with buckets of water from the lake. Part of the wheat was saved, but a third at least was lost to the fire and to the great gashes where the troopers had ridden through it, trampling it under foot. Anne sank down amongst the charred remains of that green and hopeful forest of blades she had nurtured with such love. She covered her face with her hands and could not hold back the great cry that rose in her.