‘Blow upon your coals!’ Each man shifted his match into their spare right hand and blew upon it to ensure that it burned bright. ‘Cock your match!’ the sergeant brayed. In response, the men placed their respective cords between the jaws of each serpent. ‘If any man’s cord faces the wrong way I’ll have ’em flogged from here to London!’ The threat was unnecessary, for every man had fixed his match so that the glowing tip faced him. They all pulled upon their triggers, compelling the serpents to sweep in an arc so that the match touched the closed priming pan, ensuring the cord would not overreach its target.
‘Present upon your piece!’ the sergeant called. The men shifted their left foot forward and raised their weapons so that butts met with right shoulders.
‘Secure your scouring stick!’ Each man gripped the barrel of his musket with his left hand and could feel the ramrod connected to its underside. ‘It ain’t a big job, lads, but should you fire the stick accidentally you shall have the devil of a job reloadin’. And you’ll be a dead ’un in no time. Open your pan!’
With their right hand, the recruits flicked open priming pans. ‘Good! Good!’ the sergeant bellowed over the clicking of the mechanisms. He paused to draw a hurricane into his lungs. ‘Give fire!’
As if with one mind, the musketeers snatched on their triggers. Thirty serpents slashed back, sending thirty burning match cords on to thirty open pans. The charges ignited the priming powder, which, in turn, ignited the main charges that nestled deep within the barrels.
In the copse, Stryker felt pressure on his stomach, and he opened his lone eye to see Lisette kneeling above him, thighs either side of his midriff. He raised a hand to block the expected attack, but none came. Instead he felt the softness of her cheek against his calloused palm, and the light dimmed as her face lowered to his. He was vaguely aware of long tendrils of blonde hair tickling the sides of his head, and then the warmth of her lips was upon his own. Stryker tried to sit up, to take her in his arms, but she thrust her palms into his chest, forcing him back down, never taking her mouth from his. He resigned himself to her, letting his hands slide down to her backside, digging thick fingers into her rump, grinding her groin down upon his, revelling in the heat emanating through the fabric of their breeches. Mouths were still locked messily, lips and tongues writhing, continuing the duel their bodies had just fought. Teeth clinked, sweat mingled, groans echoed.
Stryker rolled her over, scrabbling to unfasten her breeches, but Lisette was just as hungry, just as ravenous, and she pushed him away, forcing him to stand so that she might tear furiously at his clothes, revealing him even before he had revealed her. When they were near naked, Lisette leapt into Stryker’s arms, hooking her hands around his neck, clamping thighs at his waist, letting him take her weight as he had done so many times before.
She wriggled her hips slightly, desperate to guide him into her, Stryker rammed her up against the nearest trunk, moist bark sliding roughly against her back, and they took each other in unrestrained, animal frenzy.
Out in the clearing, as if nature itself responded to their passion, came the thunderous sound of hell erupting.
Much later, when the musketeers had marched away and the lovers lay side by side among the leaves, Stryker felt hollow. Lisette, staring glassy eyed at the gnarled branches above, repeated her explanations over and over, telling him again how she had been sent to Spain on a mission so covert that it called for a severing of all her ties in England.
‘You still had a choice,’ Stryker said when she had finished.
‘You would have had me tell my mistress that I chose an English soldier over her?’
‘I would have had you tell your mistress you chose to shove the assignment up her arse.’
Lisette laughed daintily. ‘I believe you would. And that is exactly why I could not tell you. Do you understand me?’
‘You’re right,’ he said after a time. ‘I would not have let you go. And had you defied me, I’d have followed you to the ends of the earth.’
Lisette sat up, fastening the shirt she had been too busy to remove. ‘I did – do – love you, Stryker. In my fashion.’
He sat up too. ‘And your own fashion means you enjoy me when it serves your purpose? Cast me aside when your mistress calls? Is that the way of it?’
She did not answer as she stood, padding almost silently over soil churned dark by their frantic movement to retrieve boots and breeches that had been flung haphazardly into the scrub.
‘Why are you here now, Lisette?’ Stryker said, as he watched Lisette dress. She did not answer, but began kicking at a pile of fallen leaves and twigs until a solid thump sounded against her boot. She stooped to retrieve the package. The swathes of linen had come away, revealing the wood.
‘What’s in that box?’ Stryker asked.
She smiled enigmatically. ‘You might think about donning your britches, sir, before asking further questions. The day is cold.’ She reached out, drawing soft fingertips along his forehead and down the left side of his face, tracing the swirls and undulations of the scar she had once tended with poultices.
When she turned to walk away, plunging into the trees, Stryker scrambled to his feet, hurriedly dressing. ‘Wait!’ he called after her, hopping awkwardly in the wake of her rapidly disappearing form as he struggled to cram on his left boot. ‘Wait, Lisette!’
By the time he had scrambled into the clearing, she was gone.
CHAPTER 11
‘What do you want?’
The woman was old, wizened. She peered through the small hole in the door, presenting a sharp nose and suspicious eyes to the newcomers.
‘Want?’ Captain Eli Makepeace asked. ‘We must see your master urgently, madam. It is a matter of life and death.’
The woman sniffed. ‘They all say that. Wait there.’ She slid the shutter closed.
Makepeace stepped back from the threshold and craned his neck to look up at Langrish House. It was an imposing, three-storied structure of beige stone and huge rectangular windows. In the gathering dusk it cast sinister shadows, long and jagged.
‘Sh-shall I knock down the door, sir?’ said Bain, standing a pace or two behind the captain.
Makepeace turned, looking up at him. ‘Have patience, Sergeant. Old Moxcroft will open up once he hears our tale. No need to ply your skills yet.’
‘And what tale’s that, cully?’ The speaker was a very short, wide, snout-nosed man in his middle forties, wielding an ancient-looking fowling piece. He and his half-dozen mates had appeared from the side of the house, all bearing muskets, poised and ready.
Makepeace glanced from one hostile face to the next. ‘Easy now, gentlemen. Let’s not be too hasty on those triggers.’
‘Soldiers ain’t welcome ’ere,’ the barrel-bodied leader said. ‘Cavalier, most like, by the sound o’ that slick tongue.’
‘Foppish arse’ole,’ a young man, wet-lipped and jaggedtoothed, put in.
‘You are for Parliament?’ Makepeace said.
‘Not neither,’ the leader replied. ‘We’re for our kin only.’
Makepeace thought back to the clubmen they had enraged further north. ‘A fair stance, friend, and no mistake. I am no Cavalier, and I mean you and your village no harm. I carry a message for Sir Randolph. I must speak with him.’
‘Shoot ’im, Marrow!’ another of the men growled. ‘Don’t matter if he’s Cavalier or a piss-lickin’ Puritan. He’s a soldier and there’ll be more on their way. Always are. They’ll want feedin’ and clothin’ and Christ knows what else.’
The short man, Marrow, stepped forward with clear intent.
‘Hold, Jem!’ a new voice suddenly echoed from somewhere behind the group. ‘We said hold, you stubborn toad!’
‘You must forgive Mister Marrow, Captain.’
They were in a small room at the rear of Langrish House. The walls were crammed full of scrolls, shelf upon shelf of them, vellum splashing the chamber in creams and ochres. The owner of the house was seated before a wid
e-topped desk, strewn chaotically with papers and open tomes. He leant back in his chair, making a steeple of long, bony fingers at his chin.
Makepeace was seated opposite. ‘No harm done, Sir Randolph.’
Moxcroft dipped his head in what might have been apology. ‘He and his sons are useful to us. We feed them a morsel or two, they keep an eye on our estate.’
‘Fuckin’ clubmen again,’ a voice murmured from the doorway.
Makepeace twisted round to look at Bain. ‘Hold your bloody tongue, Sergeant.’
‘It is fine, Captain, really,’ Moxcroft said smoothly. ‘We admire a man unafraid to speak his mind.’
Makepeace wrinkled his nose. Bain stood a little straighter.
‘And we’re glad of his presence,’ Moxcroft continued.
‘We?’ Makepeace asked.
Moxcroft rolled his eyes witheringly. ‘We are Sir Randolph Moxcroft.’ He ignored Makepeace’s bafflement. ‘Jem and his lads don’t . . . appreciate . . . our situation, naturally, so it is wise to guard the door. We maintain the pretence of a peace-loving merchant, and they consider us worth protecting. We would not like them overhearing us now.’
‘Well, I apologize for Sergeant Bain all the same,’ Makepeace replied. ‘We had a small altercation with some clubmen a few days back, and it has left him irritable. He’s no gentleman when he’s irritable.’
Makepeace found Sir Randolph Moxcroft disconcerting. He had expected a frightened rabbit, but Sir Randolph Moxcroft was entirely at odds with this preconception. An easy, flowing confidence marked every languid movement of his long arms, while his eyes, small and translucent, roamed with the lazy alertness of a reptile. The spy was indeed crippled, as Makepeace had been informed, but the limitations of his immobile legs were counterbalanced by a wicker chair, ingeniously adjusted to include axle and wheels.
‘Sir Randolph, I must urge you to treat what I have to say with the utmost urgency,’ Makepeace said. ‘A godless villain named Stryker comes for you even now. You must leave at the earliest opportunity, with us as your protectors. Your new Parliamentarian masters are waiting in London to give you safe harbour.’
‘Indeed,’ said Moxcroft impassively. ‘This is grave news.’
‘I was half expecting Stryker to have reached you by now, such was our unfortunate delay in reaching your house. But it seems luck is still with us. Let us not try it longer.’
Moxcroft’s eyes, the palest blue Makepeace had ever seen, settled on a point somewhere over his shoulder. ‘How were we discovered?’
‘Papers – written in Blake’s hand – taken at Kineton Fight. They allude to the agreement he brokered with you.’
The long fingers rubbed at Moxcroft’s pointed chin. ‘And our good friend Blake?’
‘Dead. Or soon will be. Forde was shot before we left Banbury. Our shared master is not inclined to lose your knowledge as well.’
Moxcroft nodded. ‘Then we must leave without delay.’ He glanced around the room. ‘Allow us a short while to gather our things.’
‘Take as little as possible, sir,’ Makepeace urged. ‘We must leave with all haste.’
A sudden rap at the door made both men look up. Bain spun round, alert and ready for a fight, but, as he inched the door open, dirk at the ready, only the drooped face of Ruth, the maid-of-all-work, peered through from the corridor beyond.
Moxcroft leaned to one side so that he could see past the captain. ‘What is it?’
She bowed, casting eyes at the floorboards. ‘Beggin’ your pardon, Sir Randolph, but Jem Marrow’s spotted more men. They’re riding down the track from Bordean.’
‘How many?’ Eli Makepeace snapped, his heart suddenly racing. ‘How many?’
‘Seven. He reckons they look like soldiers, Jem does.’
‘Why here?’ Father Benjamin asked Lisette as she joined him on the high ramparts.
‘So that we are not overheard, of course. Walls have ears, Father, except perhaps ones that touch the clouds.’
The pair had reprised their parts of Benedict and Ethelbert to gain access to the walls, the pious guards eager for them to pray blessings upon Basing House and its defenders.
‘You succeeded then?’ Benjamin said earnestly, hope sharpening his tone.
‘What makes you think so?’
He spread his palms. ‘If you had not, you would be dead.’
The priest studied the elfin face, partially concealed within the cowl of her long, dark cloak, and he saw her azure eyes brighten in triumph.
‘Bless you, Lisette.’ He paused. ‘Well? What is it like?’
‘I have not seen it. The box is locked.’
‘Of course, of course. I was simply curious. Where is it now?’
Lisette rapped her knuckles against her right thigh. The sound was like the knock on a wooden door.
Benjamin seemed surprised. ‘You can walk with this weighty object at your leg?’
She nodded. ‘Yes, it is not heavy. I have it fastened with twine. Besides, I was carrying it in my arms, concealed in cloth, and a thieving bastard thought he could take it off me, just because I was a foreigner and anything I had should be his. I am not taking the risk again.’
The priest’s jaw dropped. ‘You fought him off?’
‘Aye. Barely.’ But Lisette had not fought him off. She thought of the man with one eye and a lethal broadsword, and of how his very appearance had scattered the crowd like sparrows before a hawk. The man who would never know how close she had come to abandoning her queen and her God, simply to be with him. She forced her mind back to the priest. ‘What have you discovered?’
While Lisette had been scaling the high rampart of Old Winchester Hill, Father Benjamin had ridden north to meet a Royalist agent in a chapel near the Thames, a man who would have word of England’s shipping lanes. They had agreed to meet at Basing to exchange their news. ‘There is a ship bound for the Netherlands in a week’s time.’
‘From where?’
Benjamin winced. ‘London.’
The Frenchwoman looked as though she might attack. ‘London? Tell me you jest, Father!’
He shook his head, placing a calming hand on her elbow. ‘It is the only such ship making the journey. The ports are in turmoil, and the weather does not help matters. I cannot guarantee when the next crossing might be. London is your only route out of England. At least this side of Advent.’
Lisette ground her teeth together. ‘It is the heart of the rebellion. The whoreson Puritans will have sentries on every street corner.’
Benjamin’s expression was serious. ‘Aye. And that is why you cannot enter the capital by land. I have arranged for a barge to take you to the coast. You will make rendezvous at Richmond. They are less likely to accost you if you travel by river.’
‘I suppose.’
‘The captain of the barge is called Horace Crumb. He conveys wool to the Port of London. If you can be concealed within that consignment, you will be put on the ship without hindrance.’
Lisette blew out her cheeks. ‘Merde.’
The priest remained silent. He knew enough French to agree with her.
The track was steep and the horses nervous, gingerly picking their way through the slick and sticky mud.
‘Fuck it!’ Skellen rasped, fighting to regain control of his mount as its hooves slipped.
‘Steady, Will,’ Captain Stryker, out in front, called back to his sergeant.
The seven men had galloped across the sapping terrain like a small herd of deer, weaving in and out of trees, over fallen branches, across man-made ditches and water-worn furrows.
They had reached the hamlet perched high on Bordean Hill and funnelled on to the track that would take them down to a place called Langrish.
‘The final act, eh lads?’ Captain Forrester shouted.
It had nearly meant their deaths more than once, but Stryker had successfully brought them to this place, so far from home, and now they would complete their mission.
The men were all inf
antry by trade, but today, having replenished and improved their uniforms at Paulet’s cavernous stores, they looked more like a group of light cavalry. Buff-coated torsos were crossed by two belts, from which hung a sword on one side and a carbine on the other. High bucket-top boots poked through stirrups, while saddlebags slapped the animals’ flanks, heavy with spare clothing, gun oil, dry match, food, water, knives, spoons, sewing kit and tinderbox. They had also relieved Basing of ammunition, wadding and prickers. In short, they bristled.
‘How much further?’ panted the portly man, mounted to Stryker’s left.
‘Struggling, Forry?’ Stryker said, noting his fellow officer’s crimson cheeks and dripping brow. ‘But your horse is doing all the work!’
‘We’, Captain Lancelot Forrester replied, patting his bouncing stomach, ‘have seen better days.’
‘Julius Caesar, sir?’ Ensign Burton chirped in from somewhere to the rear.
‘Give me strength!’ Forrester barked, casting his eyes heavenward. ‘Timon of Athens, you ill-educated youth. Act four, scene two, as any fool knows. What are they teaching children these days?’
The group reached the foot of the hill, emerging from the random tangles of the trees, and passed the first of the village’s buildings, the church of St John. Stryker slowed his mount, scanning the surrounding hamlet quickly, dragging a faint image of the place from distant memory.
He pointed south. ‘That way.’
‘Can’t see much, sir,’ Sergeant William Skellen said flatly.
‘Where the road bends.’ Stryker said. ‘The house is just beyond those trees.’
He kicked his horse into a gallop, the beast responding enthusiastically now that they were on flat ground, and the others followed. As they rounded the road’s curve, a building gradually began to resolve from the high canopy of leaves.
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