Garland of Straw (Roundheads & Cavaliers Book 2)

by Stella Riley

  Fairfax considered it. He would have preferred to keep the Army out of civil government but that left Parliament at the mercy of mob-rule. More important still, it left the way open for Denzil Holles and the Presbyterians to make an approach to the King at the very moment he was receiving the Heads of the Proposals. And that, given His Majesty’s talent for playing both ends against the middle, could put any possibility of settlement as far away as it had ever been.

  Sir Thomas conferred with Lieutenant-General Cromwell and then, with reluctance, did what the Agitators had been demanding in solo and chorus for the last two months. He ordered the New Model to strike camp and commence a slow march on the capital.

  Colonel Brandon received the order from one of the Lieutenant-General’s staff without batting an eyelid. When the fellow had gone however, he communed silently with the ceiling for a while before murmuring softly, ‘Dear me … dear me. What is Brother Jack going to say?’

  *

  On Saturday August 7th, Bryony Morrell hung precariously from a railing outside the Fishmongers’ Hall and craned her neck for a first glimpse of the procession. It must be very near now and about to swing into view round the corner from Canning Street. Already she could hear the tuck of drum and tramp of feet over the decidedly feeble encouragement of the crowd. And soon, therefore, soon she would see Gabriel.

  A line of disapproval momentarily marked her brow. Why weren’t more people cheering? It was all very well for Uncle Jack to say that the Army had no business interfering in the City but people had been getting sick of having to protect their property from roving bands of drunken ex-soldiers – so surely someone had to restore order?

  Bryony had only a hazy grasp of politics. Not so very long ago, the world had been split into Roundheads and Cavaliers. Now it seemed to be largely made up of Presbyterians and Independents. The first, so far as she could make out, weren’t unanimous in their view of the Covenant but united to a man in wanting everything put back exactly as it had been before the war. The second wanted an end to the miseries of the Covenant and a fresh start based on a whole boiling of new ideas. The City was largely Presbyterian, the Army almost totally Independent and the Parliament [when present all in one piece] somewhere in the region of half-and-half. The result, it seemed to Bryony, was complete confusion.

  She peered up Fish Street Hill, her eagerness sharpening with every second. Thanks to Aunt Annis – who had dragged her off to visit some decrepit old relative – she’d missed yesterday’s triumphal progress to Westminster, when the MPs who’d fled had been escorted back in style by soldiers with laurel leaves in their hats. But today the bulk of the Army was marching through the City and out across the bridge towards Croydon and Bryony had made very sure she wouldn’t miss that too. She’d waited until Uncle Jack was occupied with a customer and Aunt Annis resting in her room and then, scrambling hastily into her best amber taffeta, she’d slipped out through the scullery and taken to her heels.

  The crowd eddied around her and she experienced a moment of concern for her gown … and then all was forgotten as the head of the procession finally came into sight.

  Bright silk flags heralded the first regiment of Horse and the lone, solidly-built rider at the head of it. Bryony frowned. This man was not – could not be – Sir Tom Fairfax, who everyone said was romantic-looking and always rode a white horse. No. The middle-aged fellow on the long-tailed roan must be Lieutenant-General Cromwell, about whom there was nothing remotely romantic and whose nose was every bit as big as people said.

  The crowd continued to hover between a few ragged cheers and a good deal of low-voiced muttering. Ignoring them, Bryony clung to her plinth with one hand and enthusiastically waved her scarf with the other as the first divisions of admirably disciplined troopers rode by.

  ‘Typical,’ said a voice dryly.

  Bryony swivelled her head and looked down into the vivid, mobile face of a shabby young man standing just in front of her.

  ‘I beg your pardon?’

  ‘Typical,’ he repeated obligingly. And then, in response to her blank stare, ‘It’s just like a girl to care more for the excitement of seeing a few brawny fellows in uniform than the significance of what’s actually happening here. However, I suppose there’s still time for you to grow out of it. Can you read?’

  ‘Of course I can read! Better than you, I daresay.’

  ‘Good.’ A vagrant smile lit the night-dark eyes. ‘Then have a leaflet.’

  Bryony looked down at the broadsheet he had folded tenderly into her hand. ENGLISHMEN AWAKE! ran the caption in bold, black letters. She snorted. Englishmen. Not a word, as usual, about Englishwomen.

  ‘No thank you,’ she said, shoving the pamphlet unceremoniously back at him. ‘I’d sooner read Gerard’s Herbal. And right now I’d like to watch the procession.’

  ‘I’m not stopping you. I just thought you might be glad of some company, that’s all. You don’t look old enough to be out on your own on a day like this.’

  ‘Now look!’ she began furiously. Then, drawing a long, steadying breath, she gave him her most withering look and said freezingly, ‘I can take care of myself and the only person annoying me is you. So go and get on with peddling your stupid bits of paper before I start screaming.’

  For a brief moment, violent brown eyes met gently satiric black ones and then the young man shrugged.

  ‘Suit yourself,’ he said. And elbowed his way off into the crowd.

  Feeling rather pleased with herself, Bryony restored her attention to the marching ranks of the New Model and the important business of searching for Gabriel’s banner. It was green. Green for good hope, he said – but she preferred to think of it as the colour of true love. Either way, its mission today was to warn her of his coming so that she might be ready with her best smile.

  For the first hour she was kept happily engrossed by sheer spectacle; the dull gleam of helmets and breastplates, orange sashes glowing against supple buff-leather, well-polished sword-hilts and pikes reflecting the light and the constant stream of fine-looking young men who marched through the City like heroes. But eventually the novelty wore off and, by the time the procession was drawing towards its close, Bryony’s only feeling was one of resentful depression.

  She had seen cavalry, infantry and dragoons, flags of every hue save one and a grand total, had she but known it, of eighteen thousand men. But there had been no Gabriel. Her feet were hot, her back ached and her head was beginning to throb. And as if things weren’t quite bad enough, the sky had turned unpleasantly overcast and was threatening an imminent downpour.

  Heaving a morose sigh, Bryony stepped down from her perch and prepared to embark on the weary walk home. The crowds were dispersing a little but, even so, she would be lucky to reach Shoreditch before the rain came. There was no doubt about it, she decided gloomily. Today had been an utter disaster.

  It was about to get worse. Barely had she set foot up Fish Street Hill when, without quite knowing how it came about, she found herself passing through a battle zone. Two rival groups of apprentices who had begun by hurling insults at each other across the road, suddenly progressed to more tangible missiles picked up from the gutters. A fish-head whistled past Bryony’s nose and some kind of rotting vegetable hit her squarely on the shoulder. Howling with fury, she swung round in the direction from which it had come and received a handful of filthy cabbage leaves full in the face.

  A voice with no hint of apology in it yelled at her to get out of the way. Spitting cabbage and experiencing a fierce impulse to kill, Bryony picked up her skirts and scampered out of range. It was just unfortunate that, at the exact moment she judged it safe to stop running, her foot slipped on a half-eaten mutton pie and she went down like a sack of meal on the cobbles.

  Winded by the fall and gasping for breath, she heaved herself painfully on to her knees and stared first at her grazed palms and then at her ruined taffeta. A great tide of misery welled up inside her and heavy spots of rain began to land on h
er head. It was too much. She burst into angry tears.

  ‘If this is what you call looking after yourself, I’d say you could definitely do with a bit more practice.’

  Bryony opened her eyes on the rather blurred vision of a pair of painstakingly cared-for but well-worn boots.

  ‘Go away!’ she wailed. ‘Just – just go away!’

  ‘And leave you sitting in the middle of the road howling? Don’t be stupid.’ The young man of the pamphlets hunted through his pockets and eventually produced a frayed but reasonably clean handkerchief. ‘Here – wipe some of that stuff off your face and get up. If you sit there much longer you’ll be soaked to the skin and even muddier than you are now.’

  ‘I’ll be soaked anyway,’ sobbed Bryony, ignoring the handkerchief and clambering to her feet. ‘I l-live in Shoreditch and I c-can’t afford a chair.’

  ‘One thing at a time,’ he said. And, grasping her wrist, towed her briskly into the shelter of a shop doorway.

  It was then that she became aware of two things. First, she noticed her rescuer’s pronounced limp; and second, that he wore a knot of bright green ribbon thrust jauntily through one of his button-holes.

  ‘Now,’ he said, once more proffering the handkerchief. ‘Stop crying and do what you can to clean yourself up. Then we’ll see about getting you home. And don’t tell me to go to the devil again. I may not be a gentleman – but, fortunately for you, I’m no Pharisee either.’

  Bryon wiped her face and hands and then set about scrubbing ineffectively at the hopelessly stained taffeta.

  ‘Oh God!’ she groaned. ‘Look at it. It’s my only silk dress and Uncle Jack will probably say that it was all my own fault and refuse to let me have another one for years.’

  The young man refrained from observing that her uncle probably had a point – or even that there were worse things to do without. He didn’t want to start the girl crying again. And so, not realising his mistake, he said cheerfully, ‘Oh well … look on the bright side. At least none of this happened before the Army marched by – so your soldier-boy saw you looking pretty.’

  ‘He didn’t. He wasn’t even there,’ came the lachrymose reply. ‘It’s all been for nothing.’

  Her reluctant hero cast his eyes heavenwards and muttered something under his breath. Then, with careful patience, he said, ‘Perhaps we’d better see about getting you home. You say you’ve no money and sadly, neither have I. But perhaps you could take a chair and have your uncle pay for it?’

  She thought about it and came to the muddled conclusion that things were quite bad enough already without her adding to them. Peering uncertainly up at the sky, she said, ‘I think, on the whole, it will be better if I just walk. And the rain’s easing off a bit, isn’t it?’

  It was – but any fool could see that it wouldn’t last. Sighing, the young man said so.

  ‘Well, if I don’t mind, I don’t see why you should!’ snapped Bryony. ‘I’m perfectly capable of going on my own, after all.’

  ‘I’ve heard that one before,’ he retorted. ‘Come on. Let’s go before it starts throwing it down again.’

  She scurried after him, determined and faintly conscience-stricken.

  ‘I can manage, I tell you. And, unless you’re going that way yourself, you can’t possibly walk all the way to Shoreditch just to escort me.’

  ‘Can’t I?’ His tone was silky-smooth and he did not stop to face her. ‘Why not?’

  ‘Because … because you’ve hurt your foot, haven’t you?’

  ‘Not recently. And it’s not likely to get any better. But if you’d rather not be seen with a cripple, you only have to say.’

  Not unnaturally, it took Bryony some time to recover from this attack. But finally, as they were crossing Gracious Street, she said cautiously, ‘Why do you wear that ribbon? Is it for some feast-day?’

  He shot her a surprised glance.

  ‘Hardly. It’s a political token.’

  ‘Oh.’ Her heart sank and she realised that, after the leaflets, she ought to have expected it.

  Laughter warmed the intelligent face.

  ‘Don’t worry. I’m not about to deliver a lecture. If you want to hear me speak, you’ll have to come to the Whalebone one evening. And I can’t even offer you a pamphlet.’ He paused and then added casually, ‘You had a point there, by the way. It’s time we stopped dividing the nation. And, despite what we’re taught, I’ve a suspicion that women are equal to men in God’s sight – if nowhere else.’

  It was social blasphemy and Bryony’s jaw dropped. She said weakly, ‘My goodness! If that’s what all you green-ribbon people think, I’m not surprised your ideas haven’t caught on.’

  ‘What makes you suppose they haven’t?’ he grinned. ‘As it happens, we’re collecting quite a following – both in the Army and outside it. All we lack, you might say, is a name.’ The grin widened and he lifted one brow. ‘Then again, since we’re led by Free-born John, perhaps we don’t need one.’

  Bryony stopped dead. She knew everything about John Lilburne except what he actually stood for. Uncle Jack mumbled quite a lot about outlandish notions to do with tithes, the excise, freedom of speech and the like but she usually did her best not to listen. Frowning a little, she said, ‘I don’t see how Mr Lilburne can lead anything when he’s nearly always in prison.’

  ‘Don’t exaggerate. He’s only been there twice.’

  ‘But he’s there now, isn’t he?’

  ‘Sadly, yes. Sent to the Tower by the House of Lords for sticking his fingers in his ears and denying their jurisdiction. But it’ll take more than that to silence Free-born John. He’s still able to continue with his writings, you see – and there are plenty of people like myself to get them printed and circulated.’

  Bryony started to walk on slowly. There was no doubt that, although the day had been catastrophic in most respects, it had not been without adventure. And despite his limp and his shabby clothes, her companion was somehow profoundly likable. On a sudden impulse, she held out her hand and said, ‘I’m Bryony Morrell. And you?’

  ‘Samuel Radford,’ he replied, making a brief but polite bow over her fingers. ‘Once of Banbury but, for the last year or so, of Cooper’s Lane in Blackfriars. Delighted to make your acquaintance.’

  Bryony dimpled and then withdrew her hand to pick up her skirts as they crossed Cornhill. Not that there was much point in it. The taffeta was smothered in a variety of unpleasant stains and damp from the incessant drizzle. And with her hair beginning to snake its way wetly down her back, it wasn’t surprising that people were staring at her.

  Two thoughts became one and she said diffidently, ‘I’m sorry I was so rude before and I’m truly grateful to you for coming with me. But I think it might be better if you didn’t come quite all the way to my door.’

  Mr Radford homed effortlessly in on the core of the matter.

  ‘Uncle a Presbyterian, is he? Well, don’t worry. He won’t offend me – nor I him, hopefully. Unless he’s some kind of petty tyrant?’

  ‘Oh no – not at all. It’s just that I went out without telling anybody. And now, coming home in such a mess and with you having views Uncle Jack doesn’t approve of …’

  ‘An explosion is likely?’

  She nodded. ‘He always thinks he knows best. Come to think of it, when you’re sixteen everyone thinks they know best.’

  ‘The sad truth being that they generally do,’ he responded dryly. ‘But not always. Sometimes people jump to the wrong conclusions. So just accept I’ll be helping you explain your appearance and save your breath for walking. Here comes the rain again.’

  *

  Twenty minutes later and thoroughly drenched, they walked into the Morrells’ simple but cosy parlour to be confronted not just by Jack and Annis but by the very last person Bryony had expected to see.

  ‘My God!’ said Gabriel, on a faint but unmistakable quiver of laughter. ‘I thought you’d given up making mud pies.’

  A tide of colour staine
d the girl’s skin but, before she could speak, Annis Morrell said anxiously, ‘Where on earth have you been? We’ve been worried sick.’

  ‘It’s obvious where she’s been,’ cut in Jack. ‘Though I don’t see how watching the march-out has resulted in her coming home in this condition.’ He paused, surveying his niece. ‘Well?’

  Bryony pushed her hair back with both hands and continued to stare at Gabriel while, all around her, drips started to form puddles on the stone floor.

  ‘What are you doing here?’ she demanded unsteadily. ‘You were supposed to be marching to Croydon with the Army.’

  Sam’s brows registered surprise but he had the sense to keep his mouth shut. It was no business of his if Mistress Bryony was hankering after a fellow old enough to be her father.

  ‘Not me, I’m afraid,’ responded Gabriel negligently. ‘My regiment is one of four left to protect the Parliament and the Tower from any further unpleasantness.’ He stopped and then, regarding her with mild foreboding, said, ‘Ah. Never say you only went to watch the march-past in the hope of seeing me there?’

  Bryony’s flush deepened but Jack spared her the need to reply by saying, ‘Never mind all this. I’m still waiting for an explanation – and an introduction.’

  ‘All right. All right!’ Bryony drew a long, bitter breath. ‘I got in the way of an apprentice fight and slipped over. And this is Mr Radford. I never met him before today but he walked home with me so I’d be safe. And now – if you’re satisfied – I’m going to get out of these clothes.’ And she flounced soggily from the room, leaving a trail of footprints behind her.

  Jack gazed silently at the ceiling and then looked across at Samuel.

  ‘If she didn’t thank you, allow me to do it for her. You’ve been more than good – particularly in view of the weather.’

  Sam shrugged. ‘I won’t melt. And anyone would have done as much.’

  ‘I doubt that,’ said Annis. ‘And since you’ve had a soaking for your pains, you must let us find you some other clothes and stay to supper while we dry your own.’

  He started to protest and then was stopped by an unexpected discovery. Neat as wax in her blue gown and with her soft, brown hair covered by a demure cap, Annis Morrell was a small, no more than ordinarily attractive woman in her mid-twenties. But she had a smile that completely transformed her face and, for a fleeting instant, she reminded him of his favourite sister.