The Smallest Man

by Frances Quinn

  ‘Not far,’ he said. ‘Now I must get along.’

  He clicked his tongue at the horse but she didn’t move. They’re blocking the way. I told myself they were just showing a hapless farmer who was in charge; I’d seen our soldiers behave the same way on the march south.

  ‘Where?’ asked the soldier again. ‘You don’t sound local.’

  Say Ashwell. Say Edmondthorpe. Or Pickwell, even.

  ‘Over near Bennington,’ he said.

  Henry, you bloody idiot. He must have seen the name on a signpost.

  ‘Bringing that hay back from market, are you?’ said the soldier.

  ‘That’s right.’

  Henry didn’t know why he was asking that. But I did. Bennington was miles away, over on the other side of the county. I closed my eyes and waited.

  ‘From Oakham market?’

  ‘Yes. Now, if you don’t mind—’

  ‘Special, is it, the hay in Oakham?’

  Henry didn’t answer. He was sharp enough to know we were caught, even if he didn’t know why.

  ‘Only, I’m wondering why you wouldn’t buy your hay at Grantham market,’ said the soldier. ‘Instead of coming all this way.’

  ‘Look,’ said Henry. ‘I’ve done nothing wrong and, with your permission, I’d like to get home to my wife and children.’

  ‘Well, you see, there’s another thing I’m wondering,’ said the soldier. ‘And that’s what you were so keen to hide in that hay when you saw us coming.’

  Of course. They were making sport of us all along. And now the game was up.

  You’ll die a traitor’s death.

  ‘I wasn’t hiding anything,’ said Henry. ‘I was just fixing my wheel.’

  The soldier laughed.

  ‘You’re lying. We saw you. Now do you want to tell me what’s in there or shall we look for ourselves?’

  My heart was hammering in my chest. But Henry wasn’t giving up.

  ‘All right,’ he said, with a deep sigh. ‘It’s my son. He’s a bit simple, and stunted in his growth, and he’s afraid of soldiers. I didn’t want him to see you and be frightened.’

  I held my breath. Could it work?

  ‘Perhaps you’re a father yourself, sir?’ said Henry.

  ‘I am.’

  ‘Then you’ll understand, I need to get him home to his mother. And there’ll be no end of trouble for me if he’s in a state when she sees him.’

  There was a pause.

  ‘I can’t let you go without checking. Lads, see what’s in there, but go gently.’

  My turn now. Eyes down, mouth shut. You can pass for a child, of course you can.

  ‘Yes sir,’ said another voice. A voice I recognised. It took a moment to place it, and then I knew I was done for.

  I wasn’t going to let him drag me from my hiding place like an old rag doll. I pushed my way out of the hay, and stood. He stopped, halfway down from his horse, his stupid mouth open like a fish just popped from the hook.

  ‘That’s Nat Davy,’ said Jack Edgecombe. ‘That’s the queen’s dwarf.’

  Chapter Thirty-six

  Almost seventeen years from the day when I stood at the door and heard eleven shillings chink into my father’s hand, I was back at the big house on the hill. The lawn in front was a sea of tents and inside, the marble floor was barely visible under a layer of mud and dirt, patterned with the prints of soldiers’ boots. What, I wondered, would the duke say if he saw his fine home now?

  Major Sarenbrant was sitting behind a big table. Arabella was right: he did look like a skeleton with skin. His face was long and thin, with hollow cheeks and dark shadows under his eyes, and the hands that held the documents he’d been reading were bony.

  He peered at me as though I was an insect on the ground.

  ‘The queen’s little doll-man – so you really are as small as they say. I see now why it was so easy for the girl to smuggle you in.’

  ‘Where’s the man who drove the cart?’ I said. ‘He has nothing to do with anything, he’s just a farmer. You should let him go.’

  Major Sarenbrant stretched his thin lips into a smile.

  ‘A good try. And loyalty to a friend is always to be admired. But we know who your companion is.’ He walked round to stand in front of the desk, and stared down at me. ‘I sent a message. With the girl.’

  A traitor’s death. A part of me wanted to plead for my life, to say whatever I could to save myself, but there was nothing to say that would make any difference, and the better part of me was glad of that. If I was going to die, at least I’d try to do it bravely.

  ‘You know, I suppose, what happens to traitors?’ he said.

  I took a breath to steady my voice.

  ‘I know you kill innocent women. Lady Denham had done nothing.’

  ‘She harboured a spy. She asked for what she got.’ He leaned against the desk, his bony arms folded. ‘But if you think that’s what you’ve got coming – a nice clean shot to the head – I’m afraid you can think again. I promised you a traitor’s death, and a traitor’s death is what you deserve.’

  I already knew what he meant, and he knew I knew. But he was going to spell it out anyway.

  ‘Hanging is never a nice death,’ he said. ‘Too many variables. Miscalculate the drop, or tie the noose badly, and they dangle like puppets, slowly suffocating.’

  He waggled his long, skinny fingers, to demonstrate the movement, but there was no need. As you know, I’d seen plenty of hangings. When they went wrong, the way he’d said, the only hope was to have friends in the crowd who’d pull on your legs to break your neck and put an end to the agony. There’d be nobody there to do that for me.

  He put his head on one side, as though a thought had just occurred to him.

  ‘And of course, with you being so very small, and light, that makes the calculations very difficult indeed.’ He shrugged. ‘Even a professional hangman might struggle to get it right. And we don’t have a professional hangman here. But I’m sure my men will do their best to make sure it doesn’t go on too long.’

  I once saw a man who took forty-five minutes to die, his fingers clawing at the rope, his eyes bulging and his face turning blue. How long would it take for my scant weight to pull the rope tight around my neck?

  ‘I promised you a traitor’s death, and I’m a man who likes to keep his promises,’ Major Sarenbrant said. ‘But in your case, there are other considerations.’

  Hope flickered. Don’t show it. He was playing with me and I wasn’t going to give him the satisfaction of seeing it work.

  ‘You are, I understand, very precious to the queen,’ he said. ‘So I’m going to make her an offer. We’ll release you, and Mr Jermyn, if she agrees to come before Parliament and listen to our proposals for peace.’

  ‘Agree to be your prisoner, you mean. I heard you, remember? You want to capture her so you can make the king surrender.’

  ‘And thanks to you, we have another chance.’

  ‘She won’t agree,’ I said. ‘She’s not stupid.’

  ‘We’ll see. But at the very least she’ll be distracted. And if that gives her less opportunity to encourage the king in his obstinance, it can only further the cause of peace. And who knows, perhaps you’ll be saved from the noose.’

  ‘I don’t want to buy my freedom that way. If you’re going to kill me, then kill me.’

  ‘You mistake my meaning, I’m afraid. I wasn’t offering you the choice. The choice will be hers.’ He waved a hand at the soldiers standing behind me. ‘Take him away – and watch him. He’s craftier than he looks.’

  As we reached the door, he spoke again.

  ‘What were you doing here, in Rutland?’

  ‘I wanted to see my father, but I couldn’t find out where he’s living now.’

  ‘Ah,’ he said. ‘Just your father?’

  ‘My mother died some years ago.’

  ‘And what about your brother?’

  I didn’t answer.

  ‘Samuel, isn�
��t it? You thought I didn’t know. And I wouldn’t have – we’re a large company here, I don’t make the acquaintance of every pikeman.’ His lips stretched into that thin smile again. ‘But your brother came to see me, as soon as he heard you’d been taken. To plead for you.’

  Sam must have had to pluck up all his courage to face a man like Major Sarenbrant, and not only admit to being my brother, but ask for mercy for me, the enemy. I pictured him, a grown-up version of the boy I remembered, beetroot-red, stumbling over his words, but determined to say what he’d come to say. The good, loyal brother, who I’d forgotten about when my life took me somewhere more exciting.

  ‘Don’t take it out on him,’ I said. ‘Please. If he’s on your side, he’s loyal, I can promise you that. Nothing I’ve done has anything to do with him.’

  ‘Oh, I realise that. Your brother didn’t exactly strike me as a master spy.’

  He smirked, and I wanted to punch him in the eye so badly that my fists clenched of their own accord.

  ‘No, I won’t be punishing him,’ he said. ‘In fact, I have him in mind for a special mission. Who better to take my message to the queen? If he wants to plead for your life, he can plead to her.’

  There was nothing to lose now.

  ‘Can I see him?’ I asked. ‘Before he goes?’

  He thought for a moment, then shrugged.

  ‘Why not? I’m sure a reunion will strengthen his resolve to persuade the queen – and your life is in her hands now.’

  * * *

  They locked me in a room upstairs. It was almost empty of furniture, just one chair standing by the window, but there was something familiar about it. After a while I realised: it was the room where the seamstresses used to work. Where they’d put me in the blue clothes with the gold lace, and I’d looked at my reflection in the window and seen the boy I was to become.

  I sat on the floor. The wooden panelling on the wall pressed against my back and the floor was cold beneath me, yet I struggled to grasp the fact that it was all real. That very soon, I would be dead. I feared the agonising death ahead of me, and I mourned the loss of the future I hoped for, when the war was over and we could all live at court again. But worse, much worse than that, was the moment when I realised I had already seen Arabella for the last time. Never again would I hear her voice, snappy with irritation, or bubbling with laughter; never watch triumph sparkle in her eyes when she beat me or Henry in one of her endless quizzes.

  How would she feel when she heard I was dead? Though she could never love me as a man, I believed she was fond of me, as she might be of a brother. I hoped that if I took a long time to die, if my eyes bulged and my face turned blue, she wouldn’t hear about it. I didn’t want her to think of me like that. But perhaps she wouldn’t think of me at all; if they killed Henry too, the loss of me would be nothing to her, and if they let him go, the joy of that would be what filled her head, not thoughts of me.

  Either way, I hoped she’d get to know that I didn’t betray the queen. When Major Sarenbrant explained his proposal, I’d been certain she wouldn’t think of doing what he asked. But then I remembered Bridlington. With cannonballs screaming through the sky, she’d risked her life to save her dog. Faced with my brother, begging her to save my life, could I be sure she’d say no? That she wouldn’t convince herself she could talk them round, tell herself they wouldn’t dare harm her?

  I didn’t want to die. But I couldn’t let her risk her life for me. She had children, she had a husband who loved her. I had lived for twenty-seven years, and there was no one whose heart would be broken if I didn’t live another one. So what choice was there? I had to convince Sam she mustn’t be allowed to give herself up, and I’d have to rely on him to convince her.

  Chapter Thirty-seven

  My brother looked just as I’d pictured him: same curly hair, same face, with its slightly puzzled expression, but tall now, and broad, like our father used to be. His feet, in their soldier’s boots, were enormous.

  ‘Nat,’ he said, his face breaking into the slow smile I remembered so well. His thick leather tunic creaked as he knelt down and hugged me so hard I was afraid he might crack my ribs.

  ‘It’s good to see you,’ he said, when he finally released me and we sat down on the floor. He must have been thinking about what was going to happen to me, and so was I, but suddenly I wanted to put off the moment when one of us had to say it.

  ‘I should have come before,’ I said, as though we’d just bumped into each other in the street. ‘I always meant to.’

  ‘I used to think you’d come back,’ he said. ‘For good, I mean. I thought, Nat won’t like it there, he’ll miss Oakham. I used to go and stand on the Stamford road sometimes, and see if I could see you coming.’

  All through those first months at Whitehall, when I’d pined for home, I’d never thought about how lonely he’d be without me.

  ‘But Mother said I wasn’t to think that way,’ he said. ‘She said it was a big chance for you, and I should be pleased you’d taken it. And then when we heard they were writing poems about you and all that, well, we were so proud, I can’t tell you.’ He laughed. ‘And you won’t believe this, Nat – Jack Edgecombe started going around saying he was a friend of yours. Till I punched him on the nose.’

  That I’d have liked to see.

  ‘You know it was Jack that brought me in?’ I said.

  He nodded.

  ‘Full of it, he was. That’s how I found out. I couldn’t believe it when I heard you were here.’

  ‘We went to your house and—’

  ‘You met Sarah then? And my little Lucy?’

  I nodded.

  ‘She looks so much like Mother,’ I said.

  ‘I know, you should see her when she’s cross. She’s the spit of Mother then. Scares me sometimes.’ He smiled, and nudged me in the ribs. ‘Bet you never thought I’d marry as fine a woman as Sarah.’ Luckily he didn’t wait for an answer. ‘And she’s not just pretty – clever as a cat, Sarah is. Lucy’s got her brains too. She can do little sums on her fingers already – remember how long it took me to learn adding up?’

  ‘Except when it came to getting your fair share of the dumplings. You always counted them well enough.’

  ‘Ah, well, in that she is like me. Loves her food, does Lucy.’

  I started telling him about the food at Whitehall, me babbling on about fricassees and cutlets and syllabubs, and him shaking his head in disbelief, and now and then saying, ‘What did that taste like?’ But all the while I was talking, I was thinking, this will be the last time I see him. And then he asked me something about the kitchens at Whitehall, and I started to answer, but I couldn’t carry on, and the words just came out.

  ‘They’re going to hang me, Sam.’

  He flinched, and shook his head.

  ‘No. I won’t let it happen, Nat, I promise. You’ve got to tell me what to say, what will make the queen agree to come.’

  ‘She can’t. If she lets them take her, they’ll charge her with treason and they’ll kill her.’

  ‘No, that’s not what Major Sarenbrant said. They just want to make her understand it’s not right for the king not to listen. And I’ve got to make her see she’s got to say yes so they’ll let you go.’

  ‘No. I don’t want you to persuade her. I don’t even want you to try.’

  ‘But—’

  ‘I want you to tell her I’m already dead. It’s the only way.’

  * * *

  It took me a long time to convince Sam, but I always could talk him round in the end. We said our goodbyes, as best we could, and I made him promise to send Major Sarenbrant a message saying the queen refused to meet them, rather than bringing the news himself. That way, I hoped, the deed might be done before he got back. I didn’t want him there to see it.

  I spent the next four days in that same little room. During daylight hours, I kept myself calm by thinking over my memories. What a strange and unexpected life I’d had: from our little house in
Oakham and the tiny world I knew there, to the splendour of the court and the adventures of the past few months. But most of all I thought about Arabella. For the first time, I let myself wallow in loving her, and think about how it would be if she loved me back. There was no harm in it now, was there? I imagined the life we could have together when the war was over; I even pictured us old and grey, sitting in front of our own fire somewhere, and watching our grandchildren play.

  But as the shadows lengthened towards evening, my thoughts weren’t strong enough to keep the fear away. All the hangings I’d ever seen played themselves out in my mind, though I couldn’t tell if they were really memory, or terrified imagination. Men pissed themselves with fear as they were led to the gallows, and screamed for someone to pull on their legs and end their agony. Eyes bulged from livid red faces, and necks cracked; the lucky ones.

  When at last I slept, in my dreams the rope was stiff around my neck. I stood on the cart beneath the gallows, as a crowd of leather-tunicked soldiers laughed and mocked me; in one dream someone called out, ‘Who’ll be the smallest man in England now?’ The cart moved beneath my feet as the horses fidgeted at the noise, and I struggled to keep my footing, to give myself a few more seconds of life. And then, as Major Sarenbrant gave the order to pull the cart away, I would wake up, soused with sweat, and panting with fear. For a second, relief flooded through me as I realised it was just a dream, before I remembered the truth, and dread filled my body and made my bones feel light as air.

  Chapter Thirty-eight

  The message came on the evening of the fourth day. I was at the window as the lad slipped down from his horse, and patted his satchel to check it was still there.

  * * *

  ‘So you were right,’ Major Sarenbrant said. ‘A pity. We could have brought this war to an end, and begun to get the country back to peace again. But the queen doesn’t want peace. She wants power.’

  And your side don’t?