The Jacobite's Wife

by Morag Edwards

  I ran to Grace’s room and burst in without knocking. She jumped from the bed, her hand over her mouth.

  ‘Quickly, Grace. We have to leave. There’s a gang of men in the street who look as if they’re going to attack the house. We’ll have to show everyone our secret way out through the garden. We’re the only ones who can do it. Hurry, go to Mary in the hall.’

  I ran to my room and pushed my nightshirt and Mother’s old, torn petticoat into the embroidered purse that Anne had given me for Christmas. Instead of joining the others as I should have done, I ran towards Mother’s room at the front of the house. I had to see the men again. Keeping my head away from the window, in case my shadow attracted attention, I now counted about fifty. Some carried torches, others sticks or swords. A group at the front had their heads bent together in low talk and the rest were waiting. Last time they had shouted. This silence felt worse.

  Down in the hall my brother-in-law took charge by counting heads but Grace beckoned from the front that the group should follow her down the servants’ stairs and along the narrow corridor that led to the kitchen. I kept to the rear of a ragged line of servants; those who were orphaned children or not quick-witted enough to create a fictitious family. As the line paused at the exit to the garden, I stole into Mother’s stillroom to slip a bottle of rosewater into my purse.

  Grace called over the line of waiting heads that we must walk through the garden in absolute silence and carry no lamps. While they shuffled behind her in single file, I remained for a few seconds at the outside door until I was sure that no one was left behind. We crept through the stable yard, fearful that the horses might whinny in fear or pleasure and give us away. There was no moon and with each step through the formal garden, I expected the dark shapes of the statues to jump out and grab me by the neck. I imagined a sword through my heart, or worse, to be stolen from the end of the line by a group of men. The paths narrowed and I feared that the women’s petticoats made too much noise against the foliage. Someone stumbled and called out and we stood still, our breath frosting in the darkness, hearts bumping in our chests, waiting to hear the mob bray with delight that we’d revealed ourselves.

  I followed the group into the kitchen garden, past the rows of turned earth ready for planting in the spring. We squeezed through a gap between the glasshouses and staggered over the stinking heap of rotten vegetables and fallen apples that the gardeners thought useful. At last, my family and our servants gathered, silent and expectant, waiting at the solid garden gate. A sound of glass breaking carried across the garden from the house.

  Although I knew where the key was kept, our urgent need to escape seemed less important than hiding from my older sisters that I had used this gate before.

  ‘Come on, girl!’ Viscount Carrington growled at me through clenched teeth. ‘I thought you knew of a way out.’

  While Grace fumbled with the heavy key, Carrington spoke over our heads too loudly, as if addressing troops. ‘Once we’re on the street, we head for my residence.’ I glanced over my shoulder, terrified we’d been heard. ‘Keep together and don’t attract attention to yourselves,’ he intoned. ‘If any servants have family nearby, make your way there. It’s best if we’re not too big a group.’

  I allowed my brother-in-law the dignity of being the leader. I bowed my head to him, the senior man in the family, a role that ought to belong to William, who swayed between two gardener’s boys. I watched my family push ahead of the servants to be first through and waited with Grace to lock the gate. The refugees shuffled ahead of us down the narrow gardener’s passage, their small bundles held close. Grace and I pulled our capes over our heads, our faces hidden. She looked up at me from under her hood and I took her hand. ‘Don’t go home to your mother. Stay with me, please,’ I whispered.

  I was used to the smell of fire from fireplaces and garden bonfires but this odour was so different from the smell of ash or charcoal. It was damp and sour and grew stronger as we pushed deeper into the ruins of our home. I searched the broken rooms with my sisters, picking our way amongst the shattered glass and sodden rugs. A mouldering, acrid, rotten stench caught in the back of my throat and I covered my face with my cloak. Anne, Mary and I entered each room, the skeleton chairs, broken glass and twisted metal a choking reminder of the power of fire. Inexplicably, recognisable objects remained exactly where they had been dropped and isolated corners of rooms remained untouched, framed by blackened walls. Doors had been left ajar for us by the servants who had been first to check on the house but the door to Father’s study had been left shut. Anne pushed through the door, only to close it sharply behind her and bar my way from entering.

  ‘There’s no need to see what’s in there. There’s things written on the walls … vile words … I don’t want you to read them.’

  ‘What is it?’ Mary joined us from the drawing room.

  ‘There’s words on the walls … written in excrement, I think, describing what they want do to the women. I don’t think Winifred should see it.’

  ‘Quite right, Anne, and I don’t think I want to either. How much worse this might have been – at least no lives were lost. I’m glad we decided to let the servants have the evening at home. It was better for us to escape rather than try to fight back.’

  I didn’t agree. Had our able men been with us like last time, they might have helped to defend the house. If the mob had met some resistance, perhaps there would have been less damage and I wouldn’t have been left without a home.

  ‘Perhaps they knew that we were practically alone. That’s why they chose Christmas Day,’ I murmured.

  Mary turned to me. ‘Winifred, you can’t mean that one of our household betrayed us?’

  ‘That’s exactly what I mean. I’m glad no-one was hurt but perhaps we wouldn’t have been attacked at all if they’d thought we were defended. It wasn’t a good decision. We’ve lost our home and all the servants have lost their positions.’

  Anne’s face reddened and I was afraid I’d said too much but it was Mary who spoke, her calm words more terrifying than any anger. ‘I don’t recall that you expressed a view at the time, Winifred, although the decision about the servants was known to you, as it was to everyone else. The only people who are worthy of blame are the men who were hell bent on destruction. You are lucky to have a home with Anne and not be sent to Frances in Edinburgh.’

  ‘I’m sorry, Mary,’ I felt my skin flush and lowered my gaze.

  ‘Remember Father’s words,’ Mary continued. ‘We must stick together and think of others, not just ourselves. Now wait here and reflect on what I’ve said while Anne and I make a quick inventory of any furniture that can be salvaged. Don’t use the staircase, it might not be safe.’

  Of course, I disobeyed her. The upstairs rooms were strangely unaffected, although everything was covered in a fine, greasy layer of soot. From my room I took my hairbrush and comb, from Mother’s a perfume bottle and from Lucy’s her old doll, left behind in her rush to France. I tucked these treasures under my cloak and by the time my sisters returned I stood exactly where I had been left.

  Chapter Three

  My sister’s carriage dropped us at the Middle Tower. It was a warm day but Grace and I pulled the hoods of our cloaks over our faces to walk up Water Lane. The path was uneven and the walls high, one side in full sun the other in deep shade. We kept close to the dark wall and turned left through an archway, past the Bloody Tower on our right-hand side and climbed the steep incline to Tower Green. I heard footsteps and the high voices of women and children, but kept my eyes down. They might, like us, be prison visitors and therefore deserving of a warm smile but, more likely, they were the wives and children of the wardens, disparaging of treasonable families like ours.

  I stopped at the royal chapel on the green and pulled back my hood. The stone shimmered like rich butter toffee. I looked down at the small crosses that marked the executions of Anne Boleyn, Catherine Howard and Lady Jane Grey and frowned. A soft wind lifted strands of my
hair, which drifted across my cheeks like cobwebs. It was too peaceful here for violent death.

  ‘Grace, my mother might have been executed right here. Yet I had to pass this place every time I came to see her. I’d been told the stories of the executions and at night I used to imagine my mother’s head rolling on the ground.’

  Grace pulled me away. ‘Don’t think about it, Winifred, you’ll start your nightmares again. I’ve never understood why the Countess was accused of treason. I was only a scullery maid at the time and not allowed to ask questions.’

  We joined arms and walked slowly down to the Lieutenants’ Lodging, where my brother William was imprisoned along with other male prisoners of rank. The sun shone in my face and I threw back my head to feel its warmth in my hair.

  Grace sat on a mounting block with her back to the wall. ‘I’ll wait here for you. It’s so dark inside that place.’

  I sat down next to her, delaying my visit to my brother’s unwelcoming rooms. ‘Do you remember a woman called Elizabeth Cellier? She often visited my mother at our Lincoln’s Inn house.’

  Grace shaded her eyes and frowned. ‘I didn’t like her. She always made Cook annoyed because she used the kitchen to boil herbs.’

  ‘I didn’t like her either. She and Mother were always out, trying to heal the sick. Anyway, they started visiting Catholic prisoners and met a man called Thomas Dangerfield, who accused them of plotting to kill the king.’

  ‘That’s ridiculous,’ Grace interrupted.

  ‘It is ridiculous,’ I continued, thinking of my elegant mother and the hatchet-faced Mrs Cellier conspiring to commit murder. ‘But he had planted some evidence which was taken seriously and they were both arrested. I wasn’t told much about the trial but I remember my father saying that Mrs Cellier was very convincing in court.’

  ‘I remember her arguments with Cook. She usually won and that didn’t happen often.’

  ‘Mother didn’t see much of her once they were both released. I don’t think my father wanted it. Mother never spoke of the matter again. I’ve often thought about how things would have turned out if she’d been found guilty. I was only eight and my father was in the Tower too.’

  Grace frowned and rested her hand on my arm. ‘It would have been awful for a little girl to lose her mother like that but it didn’t happen. You had her with you until you were sixteen. It’s best not to dwell on what might have been.’

  ‘I also wonder how things would be right now if Mother had never met Mrs Cellier. My mother’s chance friendship with this woman has brought so much harm. If the baby had died, the people might have been happy to keep James as king and we wouldn’t be having all these terrible battles. It frightens me that so much can depend upon such a small thing. Maybe it would have been better for everyone if my mother had been executed.’

  ‘Winifred, please, I don’t like to hear you speak about the Countess like that.’ Grace looked around her. ‘I can understand why you must hate this place but what has Mrs Cellier got to do with your mother saving the baby prince?’

  ‘She taught my mother everything. She was a midwife. She knew about babies.’ I felt sullen and angry with Grace for taking my mother’s side. I heard myself speak to her as if she were stupid. ‘Don’t you see? This is all Mrs Cellier’s fault,’ I sulked, ‘every bit as much as my mother’s.’

  Grace leaned forward and her shadow shielded my eyes from a sun dropping low in the sky. ‘We can’t predict the future, Win. When we learn something, we can’t be sure how we’ll use it. We’ll be with your mother soon enough and you’ll have the chance to ask her about these matters and try to understand what happened. Hurry or you’ll be late for William and this food is spoiling.’

  She handed me the basket from my sister’s kitchen and I walked on to the Lieutenant’s Lodging. I wanted a row but it wasn’t going to be with Grace. I followed the guard upstairs and waited while he searched through the keys on a heavy ring, worn on a belt around his waist. I had been visiting William for months, always on the same day of the week and always at this time, but every week the guard studied each key as if it was fresh from the blacksmith until I slipped him a coin of enough weight to allow him to find the correct one. I knew I should give him the bribe immediately but I felt we would both miss the pretence.

  The guard bowed low as he held open William’s door, announcing ‘Lady Herbert’ as if William might have had a steady stream of visitors through the day. William looked up from his book in surprise. I knew he would have heard the guard’s measured tread and heavy breath as he climbed the stairs and listened to the rattle of the key but this was our ritual; William would act as if he wasn’t expecting me and I would pretend I was pleased to see him. I pulled my cloak from my shoulders and handed over the basket of simple food and ale from Anne’s kitchen. It was a meagre offering and William didn’t bother to look inside. Since we had lost Powis Castle and all our houses and estates there was no money. William often complained that his rooms received no natural light apart from early in the morning and had asked to be moved but we couldn’t pay what was asked. This room was furnished with a few pieces from the Lincoln’s Inn house that hadn’t been destroyed the night it was ransacked and retained a slight smell of soot, alongside damp and mice.

  My brother’s cheekbones stood out, chiselled from his face, the last of the light catching their sharp angles in deep shadows. He hadn’t shaved, nor was he wearing a wig. He gestured that I sit down on the other side of the empty grate.

  He cleared his throat before speaking, as if his voice had not been used that day.

  ‘Any money from our esteemed parents?’

  ‘They send what they can. Mother says life is very frugal at St Germain. The French king has been generous to fund so many émigrés but she says that more arrive every day. But she’s well and Lucy too, although she’s worried about Lucy’s decision to enter a convent, as you might expect …’

  ‘I’m sure it’s a hard life at the court of Louis XIV.’ William interrupted me, trying out a Welsh accent which only made him sound bitter rather than funny. I stood at the window and looked out at the chapel, still glowing with late autumn sunshine, then turned back into the pall of the room.

  ‘They’re not part of the French court. It’s the English court in France. There are many mouths to feed and everyone has lost their estates, just like us.’

  He snorted and folded his arms across his chest but he didn’t argue. I was glad because I needed to tell him something difficult.

  ‘I want to be in France with our mother and Lucy. I’ve asked her to send for me.’

  ‘So my little sister will abandon the family as well? I thought you hated her.’

  I felt my chest tighten. ‘So what if I do? Why shouldn’t I go to France?’ I grasped the back of his chair. ‘You’ll be out of here soon. Everyone’s being released. Then you’ll be free to live again. You’re still young, you can find a wife, a position. But look at me. I’m seventeen and I never meet anyone my own age. Our sister’s house is filled with boring old Jacobites and I’m not welcome at court. I have no dowry. I’m as much a prisoner as you. I’m so dowdy. Look at this gown.’ I held up its pitiful folds then let them drop, as if my fingers were soiled.

  ‘Have you considered living with Frances in Scotland? I’ve heard the young Scots lords are a wild and handsome bunch.’

  ‘The Scots are savages, everyone knows that! Anyway, there’s no future for anyone of the Catholic faith in Scotland. The clans have retreated and Presbyterianism is the established church. Not even the Episcopalians are safe.’

  ‘So my little sister is a Jacobite after all. You’ve been taught well by Anne.’

  I sat down in the empty chair and rested my hands in my lap, trying to ignore his taunts. ‘Lucy’s letters show her devotion to our faith and her vocation is clear. She’s determined to join a convent, so Mother will need my help with the prince. When it comes, I want to take my chance.’

  ‘With the hope of balls and
parties and young men to dance with?’ William’s tone was conciliatory.

  I smiled at him, putting my anger aside. ‘You’ve no idea what life is like with the esteemed Viscount and Lady Carrington. He chews his food like this.’ I roll ed my eyes and ground my jaw. William gave a yelp of laughter.

  ‘I’ve been made to study French and Latin and needlework and dancing, but for what? At St Germain, I can use my learning. I have to get away from here … and you will likely be freed before I go.’

  William’s expression closed, ‘Neither Anne nor Mary has been to visit me. Only you come, every week.’

  ‘They’re so busy,’ I lied. ‘I’m sure they’ll visit soon. You know that we can’t afford the price of your bail,’ I said, rehear sing familiar arguments, but I had little confidence that either of my brothers-in-law had tried particularly hard to have him released. William must know that our sisters believed he had let us down on that dreadful night we’d escaped from the mob. We’d never spoken of it but I had overheard from their whispered conversations that they thought he was a drunk. My own role on that night had been forgotten and I’d had to sit through many accounts, each more vivid than the last, of Carrington’s quick-witted bravery in leading the household to safety through the garden.

  ‘And your young maid, Grace,’ William broke into my thoughts. ‘Will she accompany you?’

  ‘She’s not my maid, she’s my companion. I have no other. It was Anne’s decision and it has made me very happy. I would have gone mad without her.’

  William stood to light his lamps and I watched his careful use of the ends of candles that Anne’s servants would have thrown away. I thought I saw loneliness in his sloping shoulders and rounded back and resolved to try to be more kind and to bring whatever the kitchens could spare, until I was called to France. I said farewell and as he pressed my head into his chest, I smelt mildew from his clothes.