Or so I think. One evening an unexpected letter arrives from Bridget. I am surprised to see her familiar hand scratched across the outside of the letter, for we have barely corresponded since our last meeting on the morning Dick and I left Whitehall. I tear it open quickly and a pamphlet falls from within the handwritten page: a single sheet of bold type. I scan it first before sinking to the floor in a pool of skirts, the paper clutched and smudging in my fist. Mary comes into my room and I hear her voice from far away asking me what has happened. I look up at her, my eyes burning with tears.
‘It is a Bill of Attainder.’
‘What’s that?’ She lowers herself onto the floor beside me.
‘It is where Parliament passes judicial sentence on an accused person as if it were a court of law.’
‘What does it say?’
‘It says that the remaining fugitive regicides – the men they are hunting down across Europe and the New World – are convicted of high treason …’
‘And?’
‘So are those regicides who are already dead: John Bradshaw, Thomas Pride, Henry Ireton … and Father.’
Mary shakes her head at me, pulling the sheet from my hand to examine it for herself. ‘But how can they judge men who are dead? What does it mean?’
I grasp around on the floor for Bridget’s letter. It is brief, written in just the clear and decisive way that my big sister speaks. I read it quickly before a sudden wave of nausea sends me to my feet, scrambling for the chamber pot. I reach it just in time and gasp, my chest heaving painfully as I stare at the sick glistening yellow in the bottom of the china bowl.
‘They are to dig up Father’s body from the Abbey, hang it on the gallows at Tyburn and then cut off his head.’ I say the words into the bowl before I am sick again.
Mary and I are on the road to London the very next day. We do not know what we will do when we get there or who we can ask to help us. But we know we cannot let this butchery happen to Father; we will throw our own bodies across his to stop it.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
When we arrive at last at Thomas’s London townhouse late at night, he is sitting up in the library reading. Mary flings herself straight into his arms before he can remove his glasses, succumbing to a wave of tears. I watch with hopeless longing, clutching Robert’s miniature in my pocket so hard I fear it will break.
Thomas looks over Mary’s shoulder to me and I snarl at him in return.
‘You said the king would be forgiving, that there would be no lust for blood!’
‘I know.’
‘You said there would be no vengeance against my family.’
‘I know. It is horrible, a disgrace. I am disgusted, as are a good many others.’
‘We must do something!’
‘Here, sit,’ he says, trying to soothe me as if I am a yapping dog.
‘I need pen and paper,’ I say, moving past him to the writing desk without even removing my travelling cloak. ‘I must tell Bridget we have come.’
We are at supper the following evening when Bridget is shown in and my eyes widen to see the tall military figure of her husband Charles behind her. Thomas rises from his chair and goes over to them, his gentle breeding and diplomatic nature taking over. He kisses Bridget on the cheek and shows her to the table before returning to Charles. I watch in silence as my brothers-in-law lock eyes before shaking hands slowly, with no great enthusiasm visible on either side. My memory flicks back to the disastrous dinner at Whitehall almost two years ago when Charles had blocked Thomas’s election to Richard’s Council of State and baited Thomas so far he walked out of the room. Would things have turned out differently with Thomas and Lord Broghill on the Council as Dick had wished?
Mary and I stay seated and, though I have a sudden yearning to embrace my older sister, neither of us makes a move to greet her. Instead I nod an acknowledgement and Mary signals to a servant to fill their cups. As the servants circle, I watch Bridget and Charles. If I had expected them to look shamefaced, I should have known better: it has never been in their natures. But still, I fancy I see some depletion in their great stores of confidence and conviction, for all that they hold their heads up high, and Charles looks like he has aged ten years, his blond hair now ash grey. When the guests have drinks, Thomas motions for the servants to leave us: what we have to discuss cannot be overheard by anyone.
‘You look well, girls.’ It is Bridget who begins with unexpected softness. ‘I have missed you both.’
I contemplate an answer but have no idea how I can begin to tell them both of the great anger I feel towards them, of the blame for all our misfortune that I lay at their feet. Perhaps they will tell me that I am unfair – that there were many other actors in this tragedy – but how can I think of others when I am blinded by the betrayal within my own family?
‘We have come to London in answer to your letter, Biddy,’ Mary says at length. ‘We have come to see what can be done about Father.’
‘It is a disgrace,’ Charles says, his eyes glaring at Thomas in challenge even as he speaks sadly. ‘To perform such an act on a corpse – on your father’s body.’
‘And on Henry’s,’ Bridget adds quietly and my heart stirs a little at the reminder that it is her first husband – her great love Henry – who is to be strung up beside our father.
Charles glances sideways at his wife and reaches for her hand. I am touched by his care for her, particularly when it is his predecessor in her affections who prompts her sorrow.
‘And if they disinter them from the Abbey,’ Bridget continues, looking now at Charles with wide eyes, ‘will they dig up our baby Anne and Betty and Grandmother too?’ Tears are forming in Bridget’s eyes; a sight so rare that I stare at her, quite at a loss.
‘We had more respect for the dead than they do,’ Charles says bitterly and I recollect how he doted on the baby he had buried in the abbey above all his others. ‘The king was given a respectful burial in the chapel at Windsor Castle after his execution,’ he goes on, ‘for all that he was a tyrant and a traitor.’
I expect Thomas to blanch at these words but instead he nods. ‘I agree,’ he says calmly. ‘You will not find me defending such barbarity.’
Charles’s head snaps back towards him, his grey curls shaking. ‘Then we can speak freely about it before you? We can trust you for all your love of the pretended king?’
Thomas regards him coolly. ‘I can promise you one thing, Fleetwood, that I will never betray my wife and her family for any cause.’
How odd it is to hear those words from him: the last addition to our family, the unknown royalist whom we all, Charles chief among us, suspected for so long. And yet it was Charles – whom Father loved above almost any other – who brought us down. I expect Charles to bridle at the barb but the fight has gone out of him as quickly as it came. He turns to look at Mary and then at me; a lifetime of pain and sadness in his eyes.
‘Enough of the past,’ I blurt out, surprising myself with my outburst. ‘What of Father’s desecration? Do we know when it will be? Can we stop it?’
‘I believe it is planned to take place on the anniversary of the old king’s execution – on 30 January,’ Thomas says.
‘How symbolic,’ Mary says bitterly.
‘That is still a few months away,’ I say, looking around the familiar faces. ‘We will have time to think of something, won’t we?’
We sit in silence for a few moments before Charles gives a little cough.
‘I have the beginnings of a plan,’ he says quietly. ‘It is dangerous and will in all likelihood fail, but we may have a chance of pulling it off if I can grease the right palms and call on some old loyalties. I can do it alone – I have nothing now to lose and I owe it to your father.’
‘No, Charles, we will help,’ I say quickly, looking to Mary, who looks in turn to Thomas.
All heads around the table are turned to the viscount. He rises to his feet, walks around his chair once with his chin dropped on his chest, then sit
s back down and reaches for Mary’s hand.
‘And so will I,’ he says.
It is nine o’clock in the evening when I slip out of the house by the back door. I pull my plain hood tightly around me against the cold rain that pitters and patters on this bleak January night. We have had several months to plan this evening and everything has gone smoothly so far: Thomas, Mary and I dined together at seven before I made my excuses and retired early to bed. Mary had laid out the stolen servant’s clothes ready for me and, hidden in these, I creep from the Fauconbergs’ fine townhouse unnoticed. Rounding the corner of the building I see Charles standing in the shadows of the high buildings opposite, watching for me under a broad hat. When he sees me he pulls his shabby scarf and cloak tightly around his face and climbs the stairs up to the house. I can just hear his muffled words in reply to the steward who opens the door; hear him say he has an urgent letter from Yorkshire to deliver to Viscount Fauconberg.
I carry on walking, bending my head low until I am around another corner, out of sight of the house. I wait for a minute for Charles to join me and without a word he takes my arm and leads me along the street and down an alleyway to a small courtyard behind the row of fine houses. There is a cart there, the rounded ends of some barrels just visible beneath a tarpaulin. A rough-looking man is waiting beside it, chewing his fingernails.
‘Don’t ask who he is,’ Charles whispers before helping me up onto the driver’s seat and climbing up beside me. I crane around and see the scruffy man lift the tarpaulin and clamber into the back of the cart just before Charles taps the horse and it lurches forward.
We drive through the back streets of London, the rain flicking into our faces.
‘It’s good,’ Charles comments as I wipe my face with my glove. ‘Means there are fewer people on the streets. As long as we can keep the sacks dry.’
We journey a long way: several miles across London. We pass so close to Whitehall that I can almost smell my old home, but Charles keeps us to the side streets so that I only glimpse the palace between buildings and down passages. At last we emerge into a field and he pulls into a brewer’s yard behind an inn close to where we used to live in Drury Lane. There are other carts in the yard and some horses tethered in the stable but no sign of life in the buildings around; the only sound a creaking from the inn’s sign painted with a rampant red lion – like Father’s emblem – which swings lightly in the rain.
Charles waits a few minutes before slipping lightly down from the cart. ‘Shhh.’ He looks back up at me. ‘You must stay here and keep watch.’
I nod and watch as Charles moves off to the back door of the inn, the man who rode with us slipping into step behind him. He taps lightly and a candle appears at the window before the door is opened quietly from within. The men go in and I pull my hood more tightly around my face. They are gone only a few minutes before the door opens again and Charles and his accomplice appear, struggling to carry a heavily shrouded object between them. Despite the weight they hurry quickly round to the back of the cart and I feel it creaking behind me as they heave the object inside. There is a shuffling noise before I see them again, hurrying back into the inn with what appears to be a large sack of flour hoisted between them.
All is silent once more and I think we are almost safe when I hear footsteps. Two men appear around the edge of the yard and walk unsteadily towards me. They pass under the lantern hanging over the entrance and I see that they are soldiers. My heart stops beating. I watch their approach, trying to think quickly. One of them stumbles and leans on the other for support. They are drunk, I think – thank God. Perhaps they will not notice anything amiss.
‘Evening, mistress,’ the stumbler says, grinning up at me from beneath his hat. ‘You’re a pretty girl; what are you doing out here all alone?’
‘I am waiting for my master, sir,’ I reply, doing my best to mimic the soft burr of a country servant.
‘What’s in the cart?’ The other man peers at the tarpaulin behind me.
I think quickly. ‘Some flour, sir, and barrels of ale. We were meant to deliver them earlier today but we lost our way.’
‘Ale?’ His companion grins.
‘Yes, sir, though I can’t let you have any; not without the landlord’s say-so.’ I force myself to smile even as I try to think what I should do if the men inspect the cart.
The man who is more alert cocks his head to one side and examines me closely. After a few moments, he moves around the cart to the back. I have just closed my eyes in despair when I hear a retching sound.
‘Eugh! God’s teeth, man, you’ve covered my boots. Oh no! Again? Come here, quickly,’ and with that the man hurries his drunk companion to the other side of the yard, where they disappear up a staircase.
A moment later, Charles and his helper slip quietly out of the back door. ‘All right?’ he asks me.
I nod, still shaking.
‘Right.’ Charles tips his hat to the other man, who hurries away, disappearing into the street. With a last check of the cart and tightening of the tarpaulin, Charles leaps onto the cart and we are away.
He drives more quickly now, glancing from left to right as we speed across the field and through the streets, heading north through the City. It is not until we have been gone for some minutes that I think it is safe to speak: ‘Father?’
‘Yes, he’s in the back.’
I catch my breath, thrilled at the idea even as it repulses me. ‘Is he … all right?’
‘He’s wrapped up well in many layers of sacking. He’s all right.’
Tears well in my eyes; I do not know what I feel.
‘And Henry? I thought we would bring both of them.’
Charles shifts against me on the seat. ‘It was no good. I paid handsomely but, though the student physician could find a body to match your father’s from among the criminals he dissects, he couldn’t find one to match Henry Ireton. Henry died too long ago; the physicians don’t handle corpses that old. Your father only died a couple of years ago and he was embalmed so a newer body of the right build, knocked about enough, could pass for his at a pinch.’
I swallow to rid my mouth of the taste of sick. ‘Did you tell Biddy?’ I ask when I can speak again.
‘I had to. Poor darling, she cried horribly. But she understands, says it is probably safer this way anyway; the swapping of one body is less likely to be detected than two.’
‘That is just like Biddy,’ I say, admiring her generosity. ‘She never puts herself first.’
‘She wanted to come instead of you tonight,’ Charles goes on, ‘but I persuaded her to stay at home; she will need to be my alibi if it comes to it.’
‘You were right. And Mary will do the same for me. But how did you make sure the bodies lay above ground tonight? They are not to be executed for another day.’
‘Our brother-in-law Viscount Fauconberg has great influence at court. He planted the idea in a few minds that they disinter the bodies early so they could charge people sixpence to see Old Noll’s coffin one last time.’ Charles smiles grimly in the moonlight.
I shudder at the indignity of it. ‘And the soldier guarding the bodies at the Red Lion? How did you buy him off?’
Charles smiles properly then; the first time I have seen his full smile for longer than I can remember. ‘I didn’t have to. He’s a veteran of our army; served under Oliver in one of his old regiments of Ironsides. The old fellow told me he would do anything for the great Cromwell who he had loved so dearly; told me he would have followed your father to the very gates of hell.’
A few minutes more brings us to Clerkenwell Green at the north edge of the City. Charles pulls the cart down a narrow lane in the shadow of an old priory from where I can see the flickering lanterns of the Fauconberg carriage waiting just ahead of us. Charles looks around hastily; it is a secluded spot, not overlooked by any windows, and the streets are empty. He takes the lantern and holds it above his head. The lantern on the carriage ahead moves in answer.
&
nbsp; Charles leaps down from the cart and then helps me to climb down after him. We stand there in silence until two figures appear out of the gloom: Thomas and his manservant. They hurry over to us and Charles clasps Thomas by the shoulder.
‘Good man!’ he says with a soldier’s rough warmth.
Thomas manages a nervous smile in return. ‘All well?’
‘So far. Come, quickly.’
I watch, rooted to the spot as the three men move to huddle around the back of the cart. They bend and heave and then shuffle over to the carriage, carrying my father between them. They are just wedging him into the space under the carriage seat when I regain my senses.
‘Wait!’ I run over to them. ‘I must say goodbye.’
‘Quickly, Frances,’ Thomas urges. ‘I must get him out of London and on the road north as soon as possible. The servants think I left for Newburgh hours ago in answer to the letter Charles brought; I must make up the time.’
‘A moment only.’ They stand aside and I place my hand on the sack-covered bulk of my father’s body. He is wrapped in so many layers I do not know what part of him I touch but I lift my fingers to my lips, kiss them and replace them on him, pressing into his soft form so that he can feel my touch. ‘Goodbye, Father. God speed.’
I stand back and Thomas climbs in, arranging himself on the seat above Father. His servant places a large blanket over his lap and closes the door before climbing up on the driver’s seat. He flicks his whip and with a last smile from Thomas they are gone.
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