Rebels and traitors

by Lindsey Davis

  An elderly cavalier, heavily built and extremely well dressed, was seriously wounded in the head. Kinchin had ransacked his pockets, unaware that he was still alive until he groaned while her mother was dragging off his bloodied brocade britches. Kinchin jumped back in alarm. After landing a hard kick on the man's bare legs, her mother carried away his expensive suit in triumph. Kinchin lost her nerve. She moved away but later, after the rest of her family burrowed back into the woods to inspect their pickings, she went alone and squatted close to the old man, waiting for night and the cold to finish him off. She wanted his embroidered shirt. Kinchin had always been methodical, and very patient in her scavenging.

  Stabbing him dead was beyond her. She had no knife anyway, though she wanted to do it. The Royalist was an aristocrat, like Sir Thomas Holte of Aston. Kinchin hated all his kind. So she crouched in silence, guarding her prey like a fox staring at a chicken house, until she could complete her search. She thought the man knew she was there. She thought he must know why.

  As dusk fell, a new group of horsemen approached at a canter, thwarting her. Men dismounted and, looking over their shoulders in case of attack, they began hastily inspecting the now naked bodies. Kinchin Tew clung on there, but eventually a young red-haired cavalier came to the old man. She had lost her chance.

  'Denbigh is over here — still breathing! Damme, he's been stripped; can somebody cover him? We must keep him warm. What are you up to, young savage?' Treves demanded of Kinchin sharply. His light blue eyes had summed up her filthy condition and her watchfulness. Suspicious, he dropped a heavy hand on her shoulder.

  'I saw he was alive, sir. I wanted to help him.' Flagrantly pretending innocence, Kinchin in turn assessed this young fellow, a sharp-featured carrot-top who sounded too full of confidence. He lost interest in her, and was examining the earl's bloody head wounds, wincing. She eyed Edmund's clothes, which were plainer than those her family had dragged off to the woods, but still worth selling… He had too many men with him to risk it.

  'Did you see who looted these bodies?'

  'No, sir.'

  'This is an important lord, a favourite of Prince Rupert's.' With a grunt of exertion, Treves was helping another man lift and put the badly injured earl over a horse's back. 'He needs attention urgently. Is there a surgeon in Birmingham?'

  Reluctantly Kinchin nodded. 'Come up on Faddle.' Moments later, Treves had hoisted her up behind him on his own horse, where she clung on to his wide leather belt as he sped back into town. Adapting rapidly, she soon relaxed, as if riding on horseback behind Royalist gentlemen was her natural mode of travel. Her bare feet bounced against Faddle's hot flank and she now held Edmund round the waist with one skinny bare arm, fully confident she would not fall off.

  As they rode into Birmingham, Kinchin squealed at what she saw. Cavaliers were breaking into all the houses. They were frightening the poor, threatening the rich, picking pockets and cursing, some in strange languages. Quartermasters pretended to arrange billets, an excuse for blackmail and bullying. Men were crashing about as they searched for concealed treasure or weapons — peering down wells and into pools, smashing roof tiles, running crazily through gardens. Carts and market trolleys were being piled high with stolen goods. A smell of smoke, different smoke from the normal hearth and forge fires, hung ominously in the damp April air.

  Kinchin guided Treves to the surgeon's house and was put down to knock, but a maid came out looking flustered. The girl informed them that Mr Tillam had himself been shot, very seriously in the leg and thigh, as he stood at his house door, wanting to welcome the cavaliers. He was a Royalist supporter — or had been.

  The surgeon's maid shot Kinchin a look of amazement. 'Get out of the road, Kinchin Tew, or the mad devils will shoot you too! I'm for hiding in the attic, me.'

  Kinchin felt very frightened. Darkness had fallen. There was more noise than she ever remembered in Birmingham; the strange hubbub was clearly hazardous. Evening was for scavengers, but the Tews had lost their rights in Birmingham tonight. Louder, stronger, wickeder men had taken over.

  After a brief debate with his fellow soldiers, Treves opted to carry the injured earl to the prince's headquarters; Rupert had bedded in at the Ship Inn. 'Where can I take you, mistress?' he enquired of Kinchin politely, leaning down from Faddle. The barefoot girl was still standing in the street, wondering what to do next. Having brought her as his guide, Edmund felt concerned; he knew what was likely to happen in this town tonight. But Denbigh was fading, so he was in a hurry.

  Kinchin thought Treves was jesting. He must see her grimy condition. His genuine gallantry impressed her, however. She considered him an innocent; she even thought him stupid — yet she felt touched.

  Her predicament was awkward. She could not ask to be taken back to her family, hiding up in the woods with their plunder. Instead, she assured Treves she had friends nearby. She convinced the cavalier the Swan Inn was a place of safety. So Kinchin watched her red-haired gallant move off through the chaos towards the Ship, where the prince was. She felt a sense of loss, and almost wished she had stayed with Treves, riding high on Faddle, to see out her adventure.

  As soon as she was left alone, Kinchin panicked. Gunsmoke and the stench of burned houses made the air close. Many more soldiers were noisily pouring into town; they must have come up from Henley-in-Arden during the afternoon. All around her were sounds of assault.

  Birmingham would normally be dark and still at this hour, with only a warm hum from tavern interiors; now it seemed alive with violence. Breaking window glass crashed and splintered. Men's harsh voices bellowed and swore. Women screamed. A group of prisoners were marched up to the Bull Ring, jostled and bullied by cavaliers who intended their racket to be heard and feared. Kinchin watched them searching the prisoners for money, amid threats and demands for large ransoms.

  Nervously, she crept into the Swan's small courtyard, relieved that this dim area seemed comparatively quiet. A lantern swung beside the taproom. The door stood closed against the evening chill. A streak of faint light came from the stables. It was oddly still. She missed the normal buzz from regular drinkers. Even so, nothing seemed too badly amiss in those first moments.

  Horses clattered up suddenly. As riders burst through the gateway, Kinchin froze. Alert for new customers, Thomas threw open a stable door and emerged from the warm stalls as he always did, ready to take the horses. He limped forwards obligingly, one hand outstretched to gather bridles, a smile of welcome blossoming.

  Pistols shot. The ostler fell to the cobbles. Three cavaliers trotted right over him, and dismounted. They shouldered open the taproom door and entered, calling loudly for ale. None glanced back.

  The flurry of noise over, there was silence. Kinchin stared. Thomas lay face down in the dark yard, one arm still outstretched. He must be dead. Who would do that? Why do it? He was not a threat. He was only doing his duty, coming to take their horses.

  A new Royalist rode in. In a terrible miscalculation Kinchin believed this man brought help. Hard eyes took in the dead ostler, the dark pool of blood around Thomas, and the shaking girl. He levelled a gun. She had made a mistake.

  He was covering her with the carbine. Faint light from the stable fell across him. Kinchin would never lose that image: the man ready to kill her, the huge horse, the filled moneybags tied to the saddlebow, the heavy spurred riding boots, the aimed gun in his gloved hand — and the reckless tilt to his curling brimmed black hat, with its bright turquoise band.

  He chose not to shoot. The day was ending; he wanted rest and ale.

  She felt the hot breath of his high-spirited horse as the rider pressed forwards to the taproom, then she clutched up her skirts, passed by him and ran like a rat, sliding out of the Swan gate in one long speechless streak, so secretly and swiftly the cavalier must have wondered if he ever really saw her.

  Chapter Seventeen — Birmingham: Monday and Tuesday, 3–4 April 1643

  With a thundering heart, Kinchin flung herself into a
dark doorway, hoping to escape notice from the soldiers in the High Street. Shaking and petrified, she tried to breathe. Her lungs refused to expand. Her muscles seemed unable to bear her up.

  'Where's your God Brooke now?' jeered raucous Royalists to their cowed prisoners, as they herded these beaten men into the Swan. 'Where's your Coventry now?'

  Worn out and depressed, the Birmingham men in shirts and stockinged feet were holding up their britches; their coats, their belts and their boots had been stolen. They limped inside to the courtyard. Kinchin thought she spotted the smith Lucas among the wretched crowd. A baffled cavalier demanded of one prisoner, 'How can you take up arms against your oaths of allegiance and royal supremacy?'

  The Birmingham man retorted, 'I never did and never would take any such oaths!'

  A furious blow with a musket butt sent him flying — though he was not killed, because the Royalists were still hoping to make money from their captives. Kinchin heard grumbling that Prince Rupert would be annoyed that the ransoms from their impoverished opponents were only tuppence, eight pence, a shilling, and occasionally twenty shillings. More than one of the prisoners made indignant protests, claiming to be no soldier and no rebel but a faithful supporter of the King… a plea which earned only laughter. The soldiers declared that any forced ransom would be received as well by His Majesty as if it were a voluntary gift.

  While Kinchin crouched in shadow, a familiar sight transfixed her: down the dark street, head in the air and eyes vague, sauntered Mr Whitehall. The crazy parson picked his way among the debris as if puzzled how so much clutter came to be littering the town. He sniffed the air, troubled by the smoke. He was walking about openly, either unafraid of the Royalists or unaware of danger. Kinchin now hardly knew which way to turn to avoid a mauling, yet Whitehall had not seen her so she clung to her dark space, still in shock after the brutal killing of Thomas.

  Lit by flickers of candlelight through windows where the shutters had been flung open, the lunatic's long dark coat and white neckbands marked him out as clergy. Cavaliers quickly spotted him — and saw sport. They supposed he was Minister Roberts, whom they loathed. Despite all Mr Whitehall's past assaults, Kinchin almost shouted a warning. She dared not. Boisterous men surrounded him, shoving him to and fro, laughing at him, demanding whether he wanted quarter. Too crazy for caution, Mr Whitehall cried: 'I will have no quarter! I scorn quarter from popish armies! Your King is a perjured and papistical King! I would rather die than live under such a King! I would gladly fight against him — '

  A poleaxe blow ended his rant. Cheering Royalists moved in and hacked him to death. They disembowelled him by twisting swords in his guts; then they quartered the body as if this were a formal execution. Searching his pockets, they found hand-written papers. Sordid stories of his attempts on local women were read out aloud gleefully, then came ribald promises to publish them to a wider audience. 'A comfortable kiss from one woman, a cinnamon kiss from another — and another from one of just fourteen — ' Kinchin trembled, terrified she would be identified.

  The cavaliers went up and down the town, exulting that they had killed Minister Roberts.

  Only feet away from parts of the blood-soaked corpse, the distressed young girl still cowered. She felt no joy that Mr Whitehall's death had freed her. Worse dangers walked abroad; she felt as vulnerable tonight as she had ever been.

  Once the killers moved off, the High Street emptied temporarily. Kinchin made a quick bolt for the only place that might offer her refuge. Shuddering and stumbling, she fled through the Corn Cheaping and around the houses by the church. Everywhere, doors stood wide open. From within the small houses came strangers' swearing and carousing. Little Park Street seemed darker and quieter, though a group of horses and carts should have told her that Royalists were close. Sure of kindness awaiting, she rushed in through the half-open door to the Lucases' kitchen, then realised her error.

  A fug of tobacco smoke met her. Big men with loud voices had taken control of the smith's home. They were ransacking domestic cupboards, upsetting utensils, devouring food and drink, terrorising the family. As Kinchin ran in, two moustached cavaliers in open jerkins with their great boots astride the kitchen bench, raised overflowing tankards in a toast to Prince Rupert's dog: 'Here's a gallant health to Boy!' Another, with forward teeth and a wide mouth, was rocking the baby's cradle with the point of his sword. Across the room, Kinchin saw the terrified Mistress Lucas, gripped by a soldier who had his pistol at her breast. He kicked open a door that led to stairs up into the bedroom.

  'Damme! A girl — ' Kinchin's arrival caused brief delight — then disgust when they saw her condition. The men turned up their noses, just as she was repulsed by them; they reeked of horseflesh, stale ale and sour shirts. Their clothes and long hair were pickled in old smoke and sweat. A filthy monster — ' The man's slurred accent was thick.

  'What are you?' Her shocked whisper came out automatically.

  'We are Frenchmen!' He was so drunk he could not boast and control a tankard simultaneously, but spilled ale over one flowing shirtsleeve. 'We have volunteered to save your miserable kingdom — we French, some Germans, Irish, Dutch, and Swedes.'

  The baby was screaming. Now almost a year old, he was big enough to struggle upright in the cradle. Kinchin had never taken to this child; the chubby fellow in his knitted cap and embroidered bib was too clean, possessed too many home-made toys and was far too happy. He was always being given attention — kissed on the head as his mother passed his warm cradle, dandled by neighbours, fed little titbits, taken down to the forge to see his father…

  The nearest soldier pricked at the child's jacket. His sword point caught in the wool; he planned to lift the little boy and drop him into the fire — but the sharp blade cut itself free and the red-faced infant sat back suddenly, with a renewed cry.

  'Robert!' protested the mother faintly. The cavalier who held her gave her a vicious cuff across the face. She struggled wildly as he pulled at her waistcoat buttons. No stranger to beatings herself, Kinchin saw that such violence was completely new to the housewife, but Mistress Lucas only bit her lip, enduring whatever was done to her, out of terror for her child.

  Kinchin tried to distract the men. 'The baby cries. Let me walk him.' She spoke with fake confidence, but scavenging had taught her how. She went quickly and picked up Robert, bringing his blanket with him to hide him in it. He clutched her, hampering her movements, and was heavy in her arms. Her eyes tried to reassure his mother. She never knew whether Mistress Lucas understood because the young terrified housewife was being dragged backwards out of the room.

  Kinchin promenaded with Robert on her shoulder. Hushing him gave her some comfort. The soldiers now ignored them. One was rattling up the fire with a poker, then examining the poker to see if he would bother to steal it. From beyond the inner door came a loud thump, at which the man by the fire made an obscene gesture. Another signalled for Kinchin to pour him ale. She managed to do so one-handed, while Robert grabbed onto her. Nervously, she manoeuvred to keep all the men in view, in case they tried to jump her.

  Mistress Lucas was being ravished. Kinchin heard it. She understood what this experience would mean to a chaste woman. It could be her turn next.

  The Frenchman stomped back into the room, fastening the buttons of his britches. Without a word, another man stood up and pushed past his colleague, one hand at his belt. They were matter-of-fact. None discussed what they were doing. This was their routine. Enemies were killed; their houses stripped; their horses stolen; their women violated. The more blood shed and the more fear caused, the greater was the victory.

  The nearest man had his back to her, shovelling firedogs and pots into a sack. Kinchin sneaked up her courage. Still carrying the Lucas infant, she slipped out of doors.

  She crept away down the garden path, desperately trying to keep her steps quiet. Its cinders were painful under her cold, bare feet. She managed to drag open the forge's heavy shutter just enough to squeeze through
with Robert. She had never been inside before, and was surprised that the high workplace seemed bigger than the house. It was dark, but dimly lit by the fire.

  Warmth came from the hearth, even though Lucas could not have used it for two days; he would not have worked today because of the fighting and yesterday was Sunday. The cavaliers must have burst in here earlier. They had flung fuel on the hearth and blown up flames with the bellows while they turned everything upside down in their search for valuables. Kinchin squeezed through the strange scattered tools, knocking painfully into large items of equipment and gasping as her bare soles were gouged by pieces of metal on the floor. She crouched with the baby in her arms beside the brick hearth.

  'Be safe, Robert — make no sound.' Away from the tumult and comforted by her steady voice, the child soon settled and slept.

  For Kinchin there was no relaxation that long night. Hours stretched away. Holding Robert, with her cheek against his soft warm head, she stole to the doorway from time to time. It was no use. Throughout the town, cavaliers sat up drinking, blaspheming, tyrannising their prisoners, terrifying women, insolently boasting. With the outside air cold on her face, the miserable young girl wiped her nose on her sleeve, listening to the uproar. All night there was no let-up. Over and over again she slunk back miserably into the forge. She longed to help Mistress Lucas, but could not. If the cavaliers laid hands on her too, neither her youth nor her squalor would save her.

  Dawn brought a temporary diminution in the terror. The character of the tumult changed. Carts and horses began clattering northwards in businesslike convoys. The sounds of organised companies of soldiers on the move under orders took over from rampage and riot. For Kinchin Tew some relief finally came.