Red Hugh

by Lisson, Deborah;

  Five

  LIKE A WOUNDED albatross, driven before the wind, the Trinidad Valencera battled her way round the northern coastline of Tír Chonaill. Apart from the sheer bulk of her, there was little left to show that she had once been the pride of the Levantine Squadron in the greatest Armada that Spain or any other country in the world had ever assembled. That glorious dream was over – shattered in one battle off the coast of France – and the southerly winds which had saved the Trinidad Valencera from the Dunkirk shoals had not, in the end, proved kind to her. Driven northward and unable to regain the channel passage, she had been forced to set a course around the top of Scotland. Now the autumn gales of the North Atlantic were completing the work begun by English cannons. Her sails were shredded, her rigging damaged. And she had lost her heaviest anchors – cut them and run on that terrible night off Calais when Drake’s fireships had come sailing out of the darkness on the flood tide, spitting flames like a pride of vengeful dragons.

  Below decks, she was a floating pesthouse. There was no food. What little water remained lay in green and putrid pools in the bottoms of barrels. Her crew was dying. More than five hundred men – her own and those rescued from the sinking Barco de Amburgo – lay crammed together in a space designed for less than a quarter of that number. They were starving, half-crazed with thirst and suffering from wounds, scurvy and dysentery. Soon they would all be too weak to man the pumps or take their turn at the steerage.

  ‘Take great heed lest you fall upon the Island of Ireland,’ their commander, the Duke of Medina Sidonia, had warned his captains, ‘for fear of the harm that may happen unto you upon that coast.’

  But the Trinidad Valencera had no choice. With her canvas torn and spars shattered, she could do nothing but run before the sou’westerlies. Besides, if she did not find food and clean water her crew would be dead long before she reached the coast of Spain. Wallowing in the Atlantic swell and listing more dangerously with every hour that passed, she ploughed through Inishtrahull Sound and eastward along the coast of Inishowen until, finally, she dropped her remaining anchors in Glenagivney Bay.

  ‘Your position is hopeless,’ declared Henry Hovenden. ‘Your ship is wrecked. Your men are dying. You have nowhere to go. Surrender to me and I will conduct you safely to Dublin and see that you are sent to London to plead your case.’

  Colonel Alonzo de Luzon swayed on his feet and considered the offer. What the Englishman said was true. The Trinidad Valencera had finally broken up in Glenagivney Bay and he and his wretched band of survivors had been on the road for twelve days since, looking for food and shelter. They would be no match for Hovenden’s private army. But … surrender? He was an officer in the army of his most Catholic Majesty, King Philip of Spain – and these starving men were his responsibility. He had heard stories of how the English treated their prisoners.

  ‘Your soldiers are hungry,’ pressed the Englishman, as if reading his mind, ‘and exhausted. You have come far on little food. They are brave men – do not force them into further suffering. Surrender now, and I will see they are fed and rested before we march for Dublin.’

  He is lying, said one part of de Luzon’s mind. He is a perfidious Englishman and you cannot trust him. But the other part – the part that craved sleep and food as a drunkard craves his wine, knew he could do little else. ‘And our money and chattels?’ he quibbled, hearing his own voice from a distance and amazed at his obstinacy. ‘The goods we salvaged from our ship?’

  ‘Your possessions are forfeit to the crown as spoils of war. I cannot deprive Her Majesty of what is legally hers. However, I will permit each private soldier to keep his best suit of clothes and each gentleman to retain two. That is my final offer.’

  De Luzon knew he should refuse, but he felt his exhaustion pressing down like an anvil on his shoulders. He looked at his emaciated army, then bowed his head. ‘Very well,’ he conceded. ‘I yield to your terms and trust in your honour to observe them.’

  Like sleepwalkers, the starving company shuffled forward to lay down their arms. Swords, muskets and pikes were stacked in a heap before the gloating eyes of Henry Hovenden and his brother. De Luzon watched wretchedly. See their greed, accused his mind. See how they count the weapons, how they calculate the reward they will get when they present them to their queen. You have sold your freedom to men who have no honour. They will not keep their promises. His heart heard the words and knew them to be true, but he lacked the energy to worry. He swayed on his feet and imagined himself lying down and never having to rise again.

  When the last weapon had been surrendered, the company moved off, bound, so the Hovendens told them, for Castle Berte – the stronghold of one, Sean O’Docherty, Lord of Inishowen. It was an agonisingly slow progress, for many of the Spaniards were too weak to walk and their companions in little state to assist them.

  They had just skirted a large bog which lay between them and the castle when a commotion broke out towards the back of the column. De Luzon turned to see what was happening. An English soldier, under the guise of assisting a fallen prisoner, had pulled off the man’s cloak and was searching the hems for hidden coins. The Spaniard was too weak to protest, but some of his companions had gone to his aid. As de Luzon approached, one of them shoved the soldier away.

  The trooper’s hand flew to his hip, a dagger flashed and one of the Spaniards staggered backwards, clutching at his chest. At once pandemonium erupted. Like wolves set loose, the troopers fell on the rest of the prisoners and began to strip them of everything they owned, tearing, ripping, dragging off boots and clothing and killing anyone who resisted.

  The suddenness of the attack was as frightening as its brutality. De Luzon was bewildered. He tried feebly to push his way through the scrum. Hands seized him and threw him to the ground. They beat him, tore at him, turned and twisted him and stripped him of everything he wore. Voices screeched at each other, fighting over his possessions. He struggled helplessly. Someone grabbed him by the hair.

  Then something – a fist? a musket? a knife hilt? – struck him across the side of the head and he passed out.

  He came round to a sick and eerie calm: a silence, broken only by the sobs of men driven beyond endurance and the crying of the injured and the dying. The frenzy had spent itself. De Luzon shut his eyes. He never wanted to open them again. He was naked but that didn’t matter; nothing mattered. All he wanted was to lie still, undisturbed, and wait for death. He felt himself sliding back into unconsciousness.

  Then, not far away, a man shrieked – a wild, gibbering sound that rose to a crescendo and ended, too suddenly, in a choking gurgle. De Luzon remembered his duty, remembered that he was a colonel in the Spanish army and that these men were in his care. He dragged himself to his feet and looked around.

  The scene was like a painting of hell. Scarecrow figures staggered across a nightmare landscape, or sprawled naked on the earth, too weak or stunned to move. Some were bleeding, some were probably dead; one or two, driven over the edge into madness, crawled around on all fours, mewling like lost kittens. Around them, blood-smeared and sweating, clutching their spoils and grinning like demons out of the inferno, stood the Hovendens’ troopers.

  De Luzon staggered across to where Henry Hovenden stood with his brother, Richard. ‘Is this how you keep your word?’ he gasped. ‘Is this your concept of honour? You are no better than animals. I was a fool to trust the word of an Englishman.’

  Henry Hovenden’s heavy features flushed with anger. His brother took a step forward. ‘Have a care, what you say, Spaniard. I could have my men fillet you where you stand.’

  De Luzon almost laughed. His detached mind was whispering to him with brittle clarity. ‘And lose the ransom I will bring you?’ he jeered. ‘Your queen, who is an aging slut, with no more honour than you – who rewards you for your treachery – would not thank you for that.’

  Richard Hovenden swore, and made as though to draw his sword, but his brother laid a hand on his arm. ‘I regret what has ha
ppened,’ he said to de Luzon. ‘It was not of my doing or by my orders. I cannot restore your belongings –my men have claimed them as trophies of war and to despoil them would be difficult and dangerous. However, the castle is only two miles distant and I promise you, you shall have clothing found for you when we reach it.’

  De Luzon looked into his face and knew that he was lying. ‘We cannot walk another two miles,’ he said. ‘Without food and rest we cannot walk another hundred yards. We are dying – all of us.’

  Hovenden frowned. ‘Then we shall make camp here for the night.’

  ‘And in the morning we shall be weaker than we are today.’

  ‘I will send to the castle,’ promised Henry Hovenden, ‘and see you are all fed before we move out.’

  The day passed – and another night of starvation. The night was beyond imagining. Naked and defenceless, separated from his men and penned in a square formed by armed troopers, de Luzon huddled with his fellow officers through the hours of darkness, impotent against the cold and damp of the September night. None of them slept – for they knew that those who did would surely not wake again.

  Morning came. There was still no sign of food, but de Luzon had not expected any. It had become obvious to him that their large number was an inconvenience to their captors – that the fewer prisoners who actually reached the castle, the better pleased the Englishmen would be. He wondered if he would make it himself. Though he had dragged his body into a sitting position he had not yet attempted to stand again and was not sure he was capable of doing so.

  He looked across at the English camp. The Hovenden brothers had spent the night in comfort in their own tent. They were standing before it now, talking to a man and woman in Irish dress who had ridden over from the castle. The newcomers made an odd couple. The man was stooped and frail-looking. The woman had a hardness about her that was almost masculine. Her dark hair shone like burnished copper in the morning sun and it was she who appeared to be doing all the talking.

  De Luzon wondered who they were. He sensed a new threat – though he could not imagine what it might be. He saw one of the Hovendens shake hands with the old man. Watching, de Luzon wrapped his arms around his aching chest and shivered.

  The camp began to break up. The horsemen saddled up and moved out. The foot soldiers began to rouse the prisoners, prodding them to their feet and urging them to walk. As they stumbled away, de Luzon tried to count those left behind – the still forms that would never rise again. He staggered to his feet and awaited his own orders, but none came. The guards surrounding him and his fellow officers held firm and when he tried to move forward one of them shoved him back, sending him sprawling to the ground.

  He lay on his back in the dirt. His all-seeing mind, hovering somewhere above him, looked down on him pitilessly. You, know, don’t you, it said with icy logic. You know what is going to happen now.

  ‘No!’ De Luzon heaved himself up again. He saw his soldiers, grouped like a regiment of scarecrows on a piece of open ground, a bare two hundred yards from the camp. He saw the line of foot soldiers bearing down on them with primed muskets. He saw the cavalry on the far side of the field. ‘No!’ he screamed again. ‘Madre de Dios, no!’ He lurched forward, but the guards seized him and held him back. And then the trumpet sounded.

  Six

  LITTLE BY LITTLE, grim stories of the Armada’s fate filtered back to Dublin. Donal’s prediction had been all too accurate. On Clare Island, stronghold of the notorious Gráinne O’Malley, a hundred survivors from the Gran Grin had been butchered by the people of her kinsman, Dubhdarach Roe. In Galway, Tadhg na Buile O’Flaherty had made false signals to entice the Conception to her doom, while, on a beach near Killala, Melaghlen McCabb had waded knee-deep into the surf with his battle-axe to hack down eighty castaways from another wreck. The few survivors of these murderous onslaughts had been speedily rounded up by English troopers and executed.

  The news struck bitterly at Hugh and his friends. Eoghan took it hardest – he had been so certain of a Spanish victory. He paced the floor like a caged bear, wild with rage and frustration. ‘Damn them all,’ he spluttered. ‘The O’Malleys, the O’Flahertys, the whole misbegotten pack of them. Is it a liking they have for slavery? An army they could have had – a whole damned army – and they after hacking it to pieces on the beaches.’ He whirled round on his companions. ‘Have they no shame? Would The O’Donnell treat fellow Catholics so? Or my father, or yours, Donal? Would any of those men be dead and their ships after landing in the north?’

  Donal shook his head. ‘It’s not that simple, Eoghan. Sure everyone knows the O’Malleys and the O’Flahertys are little better than pirates. But with a monster like Richard Bingham as Governor in Connaught and the whole province broken and starving – faith, what choice have they?’

  ‘And Bingham after putting the fear of God into the local chieftains,’ added Hugh. ‘Threatening them with torture and death and they harbouring any castaways.’

  ‘Ah, the butcher!’ Eoghan spat on the floor. ‘And who is after putting the fear of God into Bingham, eh? Well, I’ll tell you for nothing, it was Fitzwilliam. The truth of it is all round the stableyards. The old queen is demanding vengeance, and himself fearing for his own neck and he leaving a single Spaniard alive on Irish soil.’

  ‘Ducks eat frogs,’ muttered Donal grimly.

  ‘Poor sods,’ said Hugh, not sure whether he meant the dead Spaniards, himself and his fellow hostages, or the western chieftains threatened and hounded into murder. It was the devil’s own dilemma they were caught on, but to buy your life with the blood of a stranger and he after placing himself under your protection – dear God, what a weight that would be on a man’s soul.

  ‘You have a visitor, Master O’Donnell,’ announced the Constable. ‘Your father is come to Dublin and wishes to see you.’

  ‘My father?’ The news was so unexpected, Hugh felt a stab of fear. Had his mother been arrested?

  ‘Is the Lady O’Donnell come with him?’ he asked cautiously?’

  ‘No,’ said Seagar. ‘He is here alone, on an errand to the Lord Deputy. He awaits you in the Lord Deputy’s apartments.’

  Relieved, but still mystified, Hugh followed his jailer across the courtyard to Sir William Fitzwilliam’s private quarters.

  He was shocked when he saw his father. In the short time since their last meeting, The O’Donnell had deteriorated even more. His iron-grey hair had grown wispy and almost white. His frame was stooped. His eyes faded and full of uncertainty. His voice, when he greeted Hugh, was almost unintelligible, and the boy realised that whatever had brought him to Dublin it was not a business that gave him any pleasure.

  He felt suddenly old himself – as if he were now the adult and his father a frightened child who must be protected and comforted. He longed to fling his arms round the old man – to hold him and reassure him – but he was painfully conscious of Fitzwilliam’s watching eyes. Instead he took The O’Donnell’s hands and gave him a filial kiss.

  ‘It’s glad I am to see you, Father, and you coming all this way to visit me.’

  The O’Donnell smiled feebly. An aide translated Hugh’s words into English. Fitzwilliam smirked condescendingly at both of them. ‘Your father is not here solely on your account, Master O’Donnell,’ he said in Latin. ‘He is come to render a service to the crown.’

  ‘What service?’ Hugh was immediately suspicious. It could not be anything good that the Englishman should be smiling so.

  ‘He has brought me prisoners. He has delivered into my hands thirty high-ranking officers off the Spanish ship Trinidad Valencera, recently cast away on the shore of Inishowen.’

  God Almighty! Hugh’s belly lurched horribly. For a moment he actually thought he was going to vomit. He stared at his father. He tried to speak but his tongue would not form the words.

  His father saw his distress. He clutched at Hugh’s arm. ‘For you.’ He quavered, ‘I did it for you, Hugh Roe. Did we not promise you – your mothe
r and I. No stone unturned … whatever it might take …’ His voice trailed off and he stared at his son with watery blue eyes. ‘They promised me,’ he finished lamely. ‘They gave me their word of honour.’

  Hugh wanted to weep. This poor old man, so confused, so trusting, so utterly unfit for this cruel game. ‘They are lying to you, Father,’ he said gently. ‘They have no honour and no intention of keeping their word. They will hold me and they will hold your Spaniards – and laugh at you for believing otherwise.’

  ‘That is enough,’ broke in Fitzwilliam, who had been listening to the exchange with growing indignation. ‘Your father did no more than his duty in bringing these men to me. There are heavy penalties for those who harbour the queen’s enemies. As to your release – it is not within my own power to grant that, but I have promised to lay the matter before Her Majesty.’

  ‘And you think she will agree to this … this … blood-bargain?’

  ‘She may. Naturally, I cannot swear to it. No man can presume to know the queen’s mind.’

  ‘And there you have the truth of it, for doesn’t it change with every passing breeze? I was after forgetting – remind me again of her fickleness.’

  He spat the words in Irish and flung a mocking glance at Fitzwilliam’s aide, daring him to translate them into English. When the man hesitated, he repeated them himself in Latin.

  The Lord Deputy turned a delicate shade of purple. ‘How dare you!’ he spluttered. ‘You do your cause no service by this impertinence. If you cannot keep a civil tongue in your head, I shall have you removed and given a sound whipping.’

  ‘You would not dare.’

  ‘You think not? You are a prisoner here, Master O’Donnell, not some honoured guest. You would do well to remember that. And as for these castaways – these Spanish dogs for whom you show such a touching concern …’ His eyes narrowed, as if, in his rage, he were seeking some new injury to inflict. ‘Be grateful they, at least, still have their lives. Ask your father what happened to their companions.’